A Review

Ahsch was rather thankful that nothing else of note happened in the remaining couple of hours of the evening. Close to midnight, he had the sentries start to make rounds, informing everyone that the festivities were ending and that they should begin making their way back to their homes. A good number had already left earlier in the night, but there were still hundreds of people to clear out. Given the size of the crowd, the hrafthi wasn't too worried about highwaymen or the like accosting anyone as they returned to the Capital, not to mention that magic had provided Euphoria a means of illuminating the night at a much lower technology level than Earth, meaning that the streets were well-lit and the city watch could patrol even at night. Crime was still present, but not nearly as prevalent as one might think of in a fantasy world.

By the time the majority of the crowd was gone, there were still a few dozen individuals - most of them obviously poor - who had stayed behind as long as they could. Ahsch invited them to stay the night using the benches and break their fast in the morning with the servants and sentries, but that he unfortunately couldn't extend the Temple's hospitality further. All were quite grateful, and the Dominant Mage wondered if they had expected to be thrown out forcefully.

In truth, for this many individuals, he could probably afford to house and feed them indefinitely; the problem was that the Capital had a much larger destitute population than was present at the Temple, and he couldn't take care of all of them. He wasn't sure what the other religious orders would have done in this situation, but he couldn't stomach the idea of tossing them out into the night when he had a safe place for them to sleep and enough food to share with them in the morning. But he couldn't solve the problem of the unemployed (or underpaid) and homeless just by doing that, and he didn't want to invite trouble by allowing them to stay permanently.

Maybe A'ura has some ideas, he wondered after passing word to the sentries and making his way back to his room. The Temple servants were bustling around, cleaning up the, blessedly, little mess left over from the festivities, and putting away the tables and food. He detoured to tell the head cook to portion out the leftovers that would last more than a few days for their overnight guests, for them to take with them the following day. The startlingly tall, muscular dog-girl, whose name was Annae, gave him a small smile at the instructions, then nodded and reassured him that it would be done.

Ahsch then joined Ariin and Mahat in bed, but was asleep moments after his head hit the pillow. It had been a long, eventful evening.

The following day, Ahsch joined everyone for breakfast, then saw their guests to the gate, wishing them well as they left. Then he had the sentries close up the Temple and joined Ariin and Mahat in the modest, under-filled library of the Temple. They were still in the process of purchasing books to fill it, but it was the best place to study, with multiple long tables, perfect for laying out a few books about the other religions to reference as the trio started to work on what, exactly, Enochiel's Priesthood would look like.

He'd already settled on having three proper 'ranks' among the priesthood, that being regular priests, high priests, and archpriests. What he wasn't sure about was the exact makeup of the different ranks, or how one would go about attaining them. "Probably without any hard limits," he mused to his girls, "and I don't want to say that only certain roles could be certain ranks. Priests would probably ascend the ranks by merit, with the accumulation of knowledge and responsibility being the deciding factor. I don't want to end up with a bunch of archpriests who got there because of nepotism or solely by charisma, I want them to actually know what we're working towards and support it."

"Just remember that no matter what you decide on for your preisthood, your religion may as well be a dictatorship," Mahat gently reminded him. "You are Enochiel, the god these priests will worship. Your word is law within your religion, and unless you decide to forcefully convert people, that means that anyone within your religion is choosing to join of their free will. If they don't like it, they can leave."

Ahsch made to protest, but hesitated. As a rule, dicatorship - or any form of sole rulership of a group meant to last longer than a lifetime, really - was a bad idea. Sure, the founder could be a great person who truly worked for the betterment of the group - and people in general - but the next guy might be awful. But Ahsch was (going to be) a god - he would be around to lead Enochiel's religion indefinitely. He wasn't sure about how the other gods ran their religions - if they even did - but as far as he could tell, he could hand down his rules and directives directly, and be present to make sure they were obeyed to his satisfaction. And there was no risk of a bad actor coming in and taking control, thereby turning all his hard work into something evil.

"Hmm," he hummed, thinking. "I'm sure things will have to change in the future, as we grow and expand, but for now... for now, we'll set these general guidelines for promotion: prospective priests will be acolytes, and hold basically no authority, either within the Order or of the Order to our followers. After a year, they will be allowed to test their knowledge of Enochiel's general teachings, and will have to prove to at least a high priest that they will be a benefit to the Order by gaining the recommendation of four members of the Order - no more, no less, regardless of who it is. Priests can become high priests in a similar way, but their test will focus more on the meaning of Enochiel's teachings, the goals and reasons for it. They must also prove that they can think critically by presenting an argument either for the inclusion of new rules or teachings, or against existing rules and teachings to a panel of four archpriests."

"That's brilliant," Ariin exclaimed. "That way, the Order doesn't stagnate, holding on to useless teachings, nor ignoring new ideas!"

"Exactly," Ahsch nodded. "And as long as the argument is well-reasoned and seems to fit within the ideals of the Order, they should be allowed to become high priests, regardless of if the change it adopted or not. Then, to become an archpriest, a high priest must demonstrate knowledge from all of Enochiel's teachings - they won't need to recite the whole of whatever book is written, but any random passage can be used, and they have to get it all correct. From there, they'll have to prove their intentions by presenting a project of some kind - either something they can perform themselves, or with a group of lower-ranked priests - and at least start work on it. With as small a group as we're starting with, I'll then decide if someone can become an archpriest or not."

"Okay, that's all well and good," Mahat said, "but what about all those rules, huh? All the religions have things their clergy have to follow, or rituals they have to perform regularly. What do Enochiel's priests have to do? What are their rules?" She laughed. "You don't even have rules for your worshipers in general!"

"I don't... I'm not..." he was conflicted. As long as he - or rather, Enochiel - was receiving worship, what right did he have to impose further rules on people? At least, beyond the basics? "I guess, 'take care of your body...'" he started.

"How? When? Where?"

Ahsch sighed. "You really want me to spell out every bit of it?"

Ariin raised an eyebrow. "You'll have to eventually," she pointed out. "Remember, we might know about that nifty high-tech stuff you have from Earth, but the people of Euphoria - your worshipers and priests - don't. You say 'take care of your bodies,' and while the two of us might know you mean to bathe regularly and clean your teeth every day, not everyone else will. So yes, spell out every damn thing, and be ready to provide the tools people need. From your perspective, this world is amazing for having magic, but to us, it's far more impressive that a magicless world has people with intact teeth after their sixties, medicine that cures illnesses we don't even know exist, and that your average person doesn't stink of sweat and grime every day."

Ahsch let out another sigh. "Okay, we can refine the wording later, but I guess here's the start of your damn specifics: bathe at least once every other day, preferably daily; clean your teeth at least once, preferably twice a day, morning and night... since basically everyone can learn magic, let's make it a rule that priests need to have a few spells in their repertoire, including some kind of disease-sensing spell, so they should cast that on themselves at least once a month - hell, I should figure out that spell, now that I think of it... then I guess..."

The three worked on fleshing out the various aspects of Enochiel's priesthood until lunch, which they took at the Temple. By then, Ahsch's duties as a Lord Odestag required his attention, and they made the journey back to R'sath, where he caught up on his paperwork, his royal lessons, and resumed his regular activities. He also took the time to carefully examine all of his Boons; the recent experience with a 'weird feeling' from Object of Worship meaning that Ariin got a new Boon made him curious if anything else was slipping under his radar, not to mention he knew he wasn't making full use of his other abilities. So he went through and considered each and every one for at least a few minutes, measuring if he was making use of them, how well he was doing it, and what he improve.Ritual Amp was tricky, mainly because he didn't do a lot of magic regularly, and nothing that would really need the extra oomph that the Boon would provide. Though it did occur to him that he could get some pretty incredible results from otherwise simple spells if he did use ritual casting.

He essentially skipped over Secondary Generation Method and Pierce, as they were both extremely passive, the first only providing him access to Ecstatic Generation, and the latter allowing him to penetrate magical defenses. The former was technically used (and the resulting Mana wasted) on a daily basis, while the latter had rarely come up in the first place, though the one occasion it really would have - his 'fight' with Phashim - he hadn't made much use of an almost 20% defense penetration rate. Fire off enough Heart Pierces and even his ridiculously outclassed stats would at least do a little bit against the Mystical Calamity. And it probably would feel better than just running away the whole time.

Object of Worship got a thorough review, as he didn't want another 'Divine Vassal' situation, though the main thing he noticed was the stream of power coming from it - the extra power he gained from worship. From that as well, he could detect with his bond-sense, that his domains were more firmly his, though they were far from providing much in the way of practical use to him. He did make a note that his words would increase in authority as he gained more worshipers. That could certainly come in handy.

For Cleansing Light, he wasn't much interested in making more angels - three was plenty, and he felt like he barely made use of even those three, or at least not effective use. That was more a consequence of their simple, computer-like thinking, requiring him - or, he supposed, Ariin, now that she had Divine Vassal - to baby-sit them through anything particularly complicated. Though being Magnitude 16 and 14, they probably would be fairly effective in combat. But what caught at his mind was the name, which didn't really mesh with 'make angels, pass on spells to worshipers.' Then he remembered, Office Lady had mentioned something about healing and banishment magic when she had explained the Boon in greater detail. On reflection, he realized that Accelerated Stitch had actually been pretty effective when he'd made use of it - sure, it wasn't a cure-all, and didn't necessarily fix things properly, but being able to overcome debilitating injuries, then undo the healing if it hadn't gone right, was pretty powerful. He made a note to look further into healing and banishment magic, and see what all was available - his earlier thought about a 'detect disease' spell probably fell under healing magic, so that was at least one firm idea about where to take it.

He was hesitant to play around with Transformative Trinket, mainly because it would reduce his magical 'stats,' and he'd have to somehow make it up later - 'time and rest' wasn't very clear, though he assumed it would come back passively, and at a faster rate than normal until it caught up with where it should be from his continued natural growth. Still, a wild idea to simply make a very weak artifact, then pass it around to multiple people, learning dozens of new Innate Magics, was tempting. That idea quickly died when he re-read the part about the artifact bonding to the wielder, and therefore, the only way to pass it on would be with the wielder's ****. But the part about the wielder being able to grow as though the part of his power that he sacrificed into the artifact was innate to them... could that mean they'd inherit his insane growth potential? Regardless, anything useful for such an artifact would severely weaken him, and so he'd have to wait to make use of it safely.

While he'd activated Mystic Fluids on Ariin, he'd yet to make proper use of the Boon - he spent most of his time capped on Mana, and with so much income that, in recent memory, the only time he'd have been able to make use of it was when he was making Aena, Nyrin, and Sifthi. Potentially creating dozens of angels a day could be neat, but past that, there wasn't much he was planning to do at this point that would require such an influx of Mana. Though a possible thought of looking into alchemy to see if he could preserve the fluids for long-term storage came to mind. That and making a group of, essentially, magic milk cows of some women with high Mana Throughput and starting an all-natural Mana potion business...

Shaking away the fantasy, he thought about Sexual Learning. He knew himself, and that he was a romantic - anyone he fucked he'd catch feelings for, so casual flings to learn tons of spells wasn't of much interest to him, due to the emotional fallout he'd experience. That, and Innate Magic was tricky to work with at times, and he already had enough to work on as it was. Which left, for the moment, Avery as the only realistic, untapped source for the Boon. They'd already discussed that, so he just made sure he wasn't missing anything and moved on.

Rereading Familiar of Flesh, he had a flash of shock: Mahat could serve as the origin of his spells! He felt dumb for never making use of that, though once again, even as a guide in the Woods, he hadn't done tons of magic, as a lot of that job relied more on knowledge and stealth than magic. But it was another key feature he'd been neglecting, and could be critical later on.

Parental Mastery and Innately Mystical were also Boons he mostly passed over, as he had no children to have 'Mastery' over as of yet, and Innately Mystical was another entirely-passive Boon that he'd already made full use of, and this time all the way back at whatever the 'reincarnation office' was. Still, he made a note that he could give his children abilities from hrafthi, greater spined foxes, and angels, as Mahat technically counted as those mystical foxes for the purposes of the Boon, and he'd fucked the angels all of a handful of times (and they counted as a unique race), though they didn't generate any power for him that way, and fucking something with as much personality and initiative as a blow-up-doll was a fetish that he had to be in a specific mood for, one he hadn't felt for quite some time. Though now that he thought of it...

Shaking off the fantasy that threatened to distract him, he frowned in thought for a moment, then asked Ariin to send him the System Descriptions for her Boons that he had gained from Sexual Learning. While they may not be truly innate to him, and the passive effects would have to be activated like a spell, they were still available, and he knew he hadn't done much to experiment with them, outside of his in-progress attempts at combining Edge of Glory and Arsenal of Ecstasy to cast on Ariin. His sister obliged, and he reviewed the descriptions and cast the spells as they came in, examining them in the same way that he'd done for his own.

Protected Power was the inverse of Pierce, and he made a note to not start having it up constantly as he cast the Boon-made-spell - the load on his Mana Pool was easily absorbed, given all the secondary, extradimensional pools he had access to, and he was willing to bet that if he ended up in any sort of anti-magic zone, he wouldn't be able to cast the spell in the first place to gain the effects, and given he was not only a royal, but also the Prophet of a controversial religion, the risk of being targeted were ever-increasing.

Sexual Amplification, while nice, clashed with Ecstatic Generation, which... No, hang on, Ahsch stopped himself. _I was just thinking about how I was wasting so much Mana Generation because I'm constantly topped-off. Why not make use of Sexual Amplification when I'm not actively trying to generate Mana? The reserved Mana is easily covered with my Pools, and while I don't do a tone of magic, having a bit extra kick - especially if I am ambushed, re: Protected Power thoughts - could literally save my life. Well, this life. He cast the spell-Boon, and re-reviewed the Description. I should be getting at least a 170% boost every time I use this, _he thought. Over 200% if Ariin is involved. It was a pity it only lasted for as much time as the sex did, but still, it could be useful. Especially if he had long morning sessions, or planned to fuck for a bit before going into potentially dangerous situations.

Mystic Domain was one he had to think about for a long moment. He recalled Office Lady disparaging it somewhat, saying something about it not really helping on a world with magic. But then he considered the effects of the 'aura of civilization' found on Euphoria. The Mana of the world in civilized places was much less dense than beyond civilization. This was especially true in a place like the Capital, which was insanely 'civilized,' making the ambient Mana fairly thin. He knew that spells and enchantments that relied on ambient Mana to sustain themselves were difficult to form and maintain in the Capital due to this, but what really struck him was that he could actually make use of the Boon if the effects were powerful enough - and with something like 18,000 Mana to dump into it, there was a high chance that it would be at least respectable. Maybe I should see about using this at the Temple, he thought. Making it as Mana-rich as unclaimed wilds would make it a great boon for the Order. Though it would draw a lot of attention.

Ariin's Edge of Glory was another passive one that he realized he probably should just have on all the time. Sure, he wasn't walking around on the verge of cumming 24/7, but even passing arousal would bump his passive Mana Generation from Dominant's Tithe at least a little bit, and when he was making use of Ecstatic Generation, it would pay dividends.

At the thought of his second Mana Generation Method, the hrafthi decided to check both of the description for those as well. Nothing had changed for either, but after a bit of thought, he realized that he could technically have more Thralls than his Mana Throughput, he just couldn't draw Mana from them. Given his inherent hesitance to make Thralls at all, he doubted he'd make use of that feature, but it was worth remembering if he ever did end up with many Thralls.

As for Ecstatic Generation, he thought about how the angels could generate Mana for him by some weird interaction of Cleansing Light and that method. Potentially very useful if he needed to do magic but they were able to be fucking for Mana. And it might even stack with Edge of Glory, though somehow being busy _and _aroused sounded like an awkward combination.

Reviewing his conclusions, Ahsch sighed. More magic to look into, more things to remember in general, more spells to develop... on top of everything else, the ever-growing pile seemed impossible to shrink. Mahat giggled into his mind. I suppose it's a good thing you're aiming to live forever, Master. Or at the very least, if you end up reincarnating, you'll have a head start. You should have asked for eidetic memory!