Floating in the void of a new universe, silver wings unfurled, and handsome face twisted by arrogance, was Damon, God of Evil. In this universe there was nothing but him. No suns, no moons, no planets, plants or other people. For the universe he stood in was not Earth’s. Nor was it Excelsior’s. He stood in a new universe of his own creation, a blank slate of a world to be moulded by his will.

Or perhaps it was merely a new plane of existence within Excelsior’s universe. The boundaries between universes were hard to ascertain. This was, in truth, half the reason Damon created this new existence. It was time to test the limits of his divinity.

One fact he knew is that he was not truly omnipotent. He could not travel between Excelsior and Earth, a limitation presumably placed by the being calling itself “God” who brought them here. Or, were all forms of travel between worlds merely beyond their power?

He’d tried to travel to a universe separate from Earth or Exclesior and nothing had happened. However, given the fact he didn’t know if there were other universes beyond the ones he’d visited, that told him little. And so, mimicking God, he made a new universe and travelled to that.

And thus, this new void was born, with Damon floating within it. He surveyed his domain of nothingness and concluded that he most likely had the power to travel between worlds, with travel to Earth limited by an even higher power. Now it was time to find out if he was truly omnipotent beyond his God imposed limitations, or if his divinity only awarded him power beyond what mortals could ever imagine.

He closed his eyes and began to draw all the power he could possibly draw from within himself. He shaped it, moulded it and then released it. A huge pulse of brick red fire burst from him in all directions, occasionally settling in place and burning as if it was atop a fuel source.

The self-appointed leader of the gods opened his eyes to witness dark flame stretching endlessly as far as the eye can see. If he was truly all powerful, his fire would stretch into infinity, as if he had truly infinite power, then his reach should be limitless.

He smiled. Imagine that. Achieving what mankind had always dreamed of and leaving your mark on existence in a way that is truly infinite and everlasting. He began to laugh, and upon noting how normal it sounded he strained to add a bit of villainous mania into it. He shut his eyes once more and reached out with his godly senses to find-

Oh. There reached a point where the fire ran out and no longer burnt. He was encased within a sphere of flame, admittedly hundreds of thousands of millions of miles long, but not all existence within this universe was on fire. The powers of The Seven are limited. Abruptly, his laughter ceased.

Concerned, he decided it was time to once more repeat the experiment, now with yellow flame. He drew power from within and again unleashed it upon his universe of fire. It spread out across this new world like before and now he found that it stopped well before his red flame did.

He frowned. Evidently his powers recharged, and quite quickly too, but they were capped at a certain point and didn’t recharge immediately. Normally, when making a world like The Seven were, you would be unlikely to ever reach this limit. But it was a limit.

Now, Damon began to think. It could be assumed his fellow gods were also limited as he was, but were their strengths equal? In a world of gods with finite strength, would it be possible to exert ones will over another?

This needed more experimentation. He could ask… no. But maybe… Rich? He’d like the big explosions of multi-coloured fire and Damon had briefly brought up the possibility of The Seven not being truly all-powerful to Rich last meeting.

Utilising his divine power, he detached his senses from his physical body and sent them to Rich’s location. They left his own personal universe and began to float through Excelsior to the mountain home of Loma. And once there…

Well. Damon found he really didn’t want to enter. Despite the lack of a body, the position of his senses made him feel like he was really there. And because of said senses, he was fully subjected to the sensory overload of the sights and sounds emanating out the cave mouth. He wasn’t even fully inside! Just what the hell was going on in there?!

Cautiously he sent his senses further and further in, dimming his sight and weakening his hearing until at the heart of the cave he found his fellow gods, all clearly in as much pain as he had been. Controllers in hand they were all clearly playing something, although whatever it was seemed impossible to discern as the television screen in front of them at the first glance seemed to exclusively display bright flashes of blinding multicoloured lights, explosions of colour and blared nothing but the first twenty seconds of some upbeat anime OP before switching to another equally ear-piercing track.

Rizzleritchensteineonizziism was of course the exception to the gods pain, the only one whose face was not scrunched up and squinting at the screen. He pressed buttons much faster than the others and if you took note of the TV, it would briefly display his precise inputs and then the word “Combo!” followed by a series of digits. The screen would then flash, display an explosion, or change tracks.

If you then completely put away all rationale and common sense and truly scrutinized the screen, looked between the lights and ignored the sounds, you would be able to see just an entirely normal game show set up, all contestants not yet having answered the question, presumably because they hadn’t been able to read it yet, amidst all the chaos.

Above the game show were the scores of all five of the contestants, most extremely low, other than Rizzleritchensteineonizziism’s, which slowly increased every second a player didn’t answer, then increased further when it was revealed a player answered wrong.

Damon would have rolled his eyes if his sight was connected to his body. Evidently his fellows had decided to play Scientia in a trivia game, but to try and nerf him and entertain Rich, they’d given the magic god the task of distracting the other players via the flashy effects he so loved. It was clear they’d underestimated his limits somewhat.

Damon’s mind began to waver as he stared at the screen, its brightness drawing him in, and just for a moment he became vaguely invested in the gods valiant attempt to defeat Rich’s godlike talent for explosions, mayhem and twitchy button inputs.

‘NO!’ Damon cried internally, as he dragged his sight away from the game. He had to focus. Or leave. Did he even need Rich? An entire universe only he knew existed could be used as a great trump card in his schemes. But what could he do as an alternative? Of course! He could just his use divine powers to know whether each god was stronger, weaker or equal in strength to him, considering they still presumably made him close to omniscient. Satisfied, he prepared to move his senses back to his skin. Then Rich’s head snapped round to stare right at him.

Damon jerked his senses back to his body and found it to be already screaming.

‘WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT!?’ his inner voice screamed. It wasn’t a nice snap, it was a full, horror movie 180-degree twist. How did he know where he’d been? Why did he do that? ‘See, this is why I don’t work with him’ Damon thought. ‘He’s terrifying!’

But at least he was gone Damon reassured himself.

A huge boom echoed behind him with an all-consuming yell of “HEY!” If Damon was ever aware of someone telling their friends, family, or an audience of readers of this moment, he would have stressed they say he did not scream. He merely yelped. Rizzle, however, took one look at the fire all around him and shamelessly screamed his lungs out.

Vanishing in an equally loud bang, Damon was left watching the spot Rizzleritchensteineonizziism had appeared in with mounting dread until a thunderous crash echoed just out of sight to his left. No hypothetical storyteller could ever be convinced not to call the screech that leapt out Damon’s mouth anything but a scream. The god of evil whipped around to face his tormentor.

And then found he was dressed head to toe in authentic firefighter garb, shivering with pure terror.

“You tried to kill me!” Rich yelled, finger pointed accusingly at Damon. “You tried to burn me alive! Trick the contracts with indirect murder! VILLAIN! I’LL NEVER DIE!!!”

Damon stared incredulously back, shock swiftly dissolving. ‘This is ridiculous.’ He thought. ‘His bodies made of energy! His arms made of fire for god’s sake!’

He coughed into his silver hand and drew himself back up into his usual regal stance.

“You must be mistaken” he snarled. “I didn’t even remotely try to summon you here.”

Rich grinned, albeit quite shakily. “No need. I think Loma didn’t like contacting me the first time cos I accidentally yelled into his head a little. So, I meddled with my brain, so it alerts me when someone needs me. Cool right?!”

“You’re insane” Damon replied, sneering. “Turn that off immediately, l never want to accidentally summon you again.”

“Nope!” came Rizzlerichensteineonizziism’s joyous reply, fear slowly being forgotten. “So, what is this place if not my death trap?” His eyes started to gleam as he took in the area around him.

“If you must know it’s a new universe I made to test my powers. It was not open to the public” If looks could kill, Damon’s glare could quite appropriately kill a deity. Rizzleritchensteineonizziism would have been safe however because he wasn’t paying enough attention to see it.

“I wasn’t asking you.” The magic god cocked his head to one side curiously. “And you’re wrong. It’s just another plane in the Excelsior universe.”

“How could you possibly know that?” Damon spluttered.

Rizzlerich grinned “I don’t. But from what I know about your new plane I don’t think its separate enough to be its own universe.”

“And how do you know anything about the universe I just created” the evil god snarled.

Now Rizzlerich met his stare, and his deadpan expression perfectly countered Damon’s god slaying leer. “I’m omniscient. Duh.”

Damon paused for a moment. But he was not one to lose face easily and retorted “Actually, we’re not. We have no knowledge of Earth after our summoning, proving we are not, in fact, all knowing”

Rich shrugged. “Mm. Maybe. So, why’d you summon me here?”

Damon’s glare intensified, a truly magnificent feat given its already masterful display of murderous intent. “I. Didn’t.”

Rich ignored him as his eyes glazed over. “Ooohhhh, cool! Expel all your energy as a huge explosion of coloured magical flame which will stick in place regardless of the need for fuel or surface! Dunno why you needed me for that cos your mind seems unreadable, but I’m happy to test my powers if it means a biiiiiiiiiig boom!”

‘That bastard tried to do WHAT?’ Damon thought as he became very glad he’d protected his thoughts from intruders as an early precaution in his schemes. Out loud he replied “Well, I considered asking you to repeat the test in a new colour to determine whether one god contained more power than the other. However, without your help I realised that that was unnecessary-“

“Shhh Shh Shh” Rizzleritchensteineonizziism reached across and planted a heavily gloved finger on Damon’s face. “Repeat the test, test the limits of gods, blah blah blah, got it. You may want to stand back or flee this universe entirely!”

Damon’s face paled and he swiftly teleported his physical form to his castle in Excelsior while keeping his senses glued firmly on the antics of Rizzleritchensteineonizziism. The god with the long name began gathering power, noticeable thanks to the completely unnecessary chanting and hand waving before expelling it all in a burst of bright purple flame.

Damon sent his senses racing alongside the explosion, watching as the purple spread beyond the limits of his yellow flame, then further still just barely crossing the border between his dark red fire and complete nothingness.

Panic began to consume him as the implications of this quickly became apparent. Rich was stronger than him! He tried to reassure himself that the difference in strength was minor and Rich’s fire just barely eclipsed his own but the more he thought the more he realised the difference was only minor on the incredible cosmic scale of their powers and in reality, you could fit a planet the size of Earth anywhere there was only purple fire. Rich was a whole Earth stronger than him!

Damon reappeared before Rizzleritchensteineonizziism, face somehow paler than when he’d first teleported away. The magic god looked up at him, eyes literally sparkling.

“Did I do good? What do we test next?!” he excitedly cried.

“Nothing!” Damon cried back. “I never needed you here! Please, like you said, I can just use my limited omniscience to know things!” He stared in exasperation at Rizzlerich’s puppy dog eyes and almost comical pout. “I mean it. Go away!”

“Fiiiiiine. But let it be known you’re a terrible friend!” Damon let out a huge sigh of relief as Rizzleritchensteineonizziism teleported away. But his moment of reprieve was short lived as he once more begun to mull over the day’s revelations.

Truth be told, they worried him. Why was Rich stronger than him? He searched for those answers in whatever part of his mind was somewhat all-knowing and found that he was stronger because he had more direct worshippers.

Worshippers? Since when had that been a factor in a god’s strength? Had someone willed this to be so, or had someone simply believed this was how gods should work and subconsciously altered the rules of Excelsior accordingly? Just how much had Excelsior been influenced by unconscious biases? He put what he considered to be unimportant questions out of his mind as he focused on the one big question. How could he use this information to his advantage?

Because, if he could gain power from worshippers… and if he could transfer his power to others… Oh yes. He rubbed his hands together eagerly. A plan was forming in his mind, a little rough around the edges perhaps, but it was forming nicely.

When Rizzleritchensteineonizziism returned to Loma’s living room he was somewhat disappointed to find his fellow gods too focused on their game to be shocked by, or even really notice his trademark explosive entrance.

He was not surprised to see they’d stopped playing “Despair-inducing Do You Want to Be a Billionaire tm” as he’d left by letting them know it was now impossible for them to catch up to his score and he was now going to find out why Damon wanted him 5 minutes ago. Now it seemed they were playing some modified version of Antonio Car. He smiled as he settled in and began to watch the nail-biting race of the gods.

Aomy playing as Princess Poppy was holding the lead, perfectly hugging the corners, and mastering the drifting mechanic but as a trivia question about some historical event she’d never heard of popped up at the top of the screen, her lead became less assured.

Scientia spoke the answer in his mind, an improvement over button inputs attainable only to those able to psychically communicate to their game system. As he did, Metal Antonio sped ahead of Poppy with a great burst of speed and immediately crashed into a wall.

This was the balancing the gods had decided on to keep this game fair. Nerfing the least trivia adept god while she played her game of choice with a system that punished those not good at trivia while rewarding the god with by far the worst reflexes with speed boosts and power ups as he displayed his mastery over obsessively collected knowledge.

Loma’s face scrunched up with intense focus as Wantonio utilised his lesser speed boost from answering correctly second to drift neck and neck next to Poppy in the outside lane. The two characters continued to dance, one gaining the upper hand and losing it just as quickly as Loma’s jack of all trades okayness at both Antonio Car and matters of intelligence kept him perfectly at pace with Aomy’s more focused Car racing skill.

Before Rizzleritchensteineonizziism could blink the two were zooming toward the finish line, still so evenly matched. There were no more questions. No more corners. Neither had items left. The sound of the room reached a crescendo, Aomy and Loma taunting each other with excited, yelled insults, Scientia groaning as he struggled to manoeuvre himself off a different wall and Rizzleritchensteineonizziism cheering wildly for no one in particular just because he liked making noise.

Then, all sound was drowned out by a triumphant “WOO!” All aforementioned participants turned with dread toward its source to find Naturum grinning as she put her controller down. “Just got a Torpedo Ted” she happily explained.

They all turned back, dread mounting, and saw Yoshee transform into the infamous missile as it barrelled down the track, past the warring Wantonio and Poppy and across the finish line. The room erupted into a chorus of noise, Aomy and Loma yelling in mock anger as the nature goddess got up from her seat and began a triumphant little dance.

Eventually, the miniature celebration began to die down, and Naturum finally noticed Rizzlerich amongst the other gods.

She blinked. “Hey, when did you get back?”

“You didn’t notice?! I literally explode when I teleport! I’M THE LOUDEST ONE HERE!!!”

Aomy laughed softly. “Sorry, we er. Must have been really focused I guess.”

Rich folded his arms huffily which had the amusing effect of releasing a load of steam. “I see I have no good friends amongst the gods. I’m going to go party with the mortals now. Goodbye forever.”

Naturum smiled warmly at him. “Oh, come on, don’t be like that. Especially not when we turned items to frantic just for you.”

At this the magic god perked up. “Turn the items to bombs only for one round and I’ll call it even!”

“Deal!” replied Naturum as she handed him a controller.

And so, within their world of frozen time, the gods not still scheming resumed their activities. A truth all of them knew to various extents was being a god was difficult. Often stressful. Full of responsibility. It made this moment so much more glorious for all of them. At last, the gods got some much-needed rest.