—------ Congressman Armstrong —------

  ‘What an incredible waste of time.’ I clicked my tongue in annoyance, crossing my arms and tapping my fingers.

  It has only been a few days since humanity’s first great threat showed up, then that was followed up by the appearance of something strange but suspiciously helpful to our species.

  ‘The Dark Lord Azurath, and The System… Both just show up unannounced and flip the world on its end. Two sides of the same coin.’ I rubbed the bridge of my nose in thought.

  ‘One claims to be evil, but has only done mass murder as a sort of global vigilante action against evil.’ I sneered in disgust as I remembered that monster in human skin, Congressman Leotold.

  Leotold seemed so normal, yet he was done in just like so many others like his ilk.

  Turned into glitter.

  ‘The System claims to be some kind of force of good, designed to combat The Dark Lord, yet it also gave unknown powers to literally anyone that asked.’ I exhaled through my nose, my thoughts troubled by the strange times we live in.

  “Though… I did accept its offer myself.” I muttered under my breath while everyone shuffled into the conference room.

  It was impossible to say no to it. To receive power with literally no cost.

  My curiosity won over my caution at that time, and so I got something specially suited to me.

  ‘The ability to loosely measure someone’s morality and whether or not they are lying… Perfect for politics.’ I resisted the urge to smirk, thinking about my very useful ‘Skill’ as The System calls it.

  Skills related to seeing through lies are quite popular, as most people report receiving something like it alongside something more unique to them.

  Using the Skill is extremely simple, merely looking at someone with the intent on measuring them is enough.

  ‘Grey, grey, dark grey, grey, light grey…’ I briefly scanned the room, confirming for what must have been the 5th time that nearly all of these politicians had superficial morals.

  Some had nearly white auras about them, but they were the smallest minority. The other, slightly bigger minority was…

  ‘Black as tar, oily, slimy, disgusting vermin.’ I kept my gaze neutral as my eyes wandered over the small group of regular looking Congressmen and Congresswomen.

  But my eyes told me of the darkness hidden within them.

  Calling them vermin might be a bit much, since I haven’t seen them do anything illegal or terrible myself, but my ability works on photos and videos of people as well.

  Having personally looked through the evidence and the victims of The Dark Lord Azurath, every single photo and video displayed the same oily black tar like aura surrounding the Glitterified.

  So I had reason to believe they were… less than kind.

  “Sir, the meeting is starting soon.” My secretary brought me out of my thoughts, and I focused on the main speaker.

  An old frail man, like most of us in Congress, stumbled up to the center podium and coughed into his hand.

  …

  The meeting was, as I previously thought, a complete waste of time.

  These foolish old men and women were ignoring the main issues at hand, and were focused on introducing another bill that increases our salary.

  I enjoy money, and I am by no means a saint, but there has to be a limit somewhere.

  Before I could make my own displeasure known, a voice beat me to it.

  “Why are we debating over this non-important issue, when we have literal aliens at our doorstep?!” Congresswoman Elaina, a short stout old African American woman who fit into the small ‘good’ aligned group.

  “We’ll cover that after this current issue. This was scheduled before they showed up. We have a due process.” The speaker replied, clearly annoyed with being interrupted.

  “We need to cover it now. The alien technology known as The System has already infested our military and our people. We cannot just blindly trust it.” Congressman Miller, a fat tall man with a shiny bald head disagreed. He was with the majority, with a grey morality.

  “I say we can trust it! Ever since The System showed up, do you know what the murder rate has been? ZERO! That is unthinkable!” Congressman Strider, a younger man of 67 stated. He was a lighter grey.

  “Just because there is no death does not mean there is no causality. Injuries caused by indiscriminate Skill usage continues to rise each day.” Congresswoman Julia, an old woman with a ring on each finger and covered in expensive jewelry, shook her head with a jingle. She had a dark grey aura.

  From there, everyone began to yell over one another. They were all fighting over whether or not they could trust The System, but no one brought up the most pressing issue.

  “Why doesn’t anyone acknowledge… him?” My secretary, a young woman with a thick pair of glasses named Barbara whispered to me.

  “I do not know. It baffles me as well.” I whispered back, though it was probably unnecessary due to the volume of the yelling.

  She would not dare to speak his name, as a rumor online started spreading that if you say his name out loud too many times, ‘The Dark Lord would grace you with his presence’.

  A silly ‘copypasta’ as my grandchildren explained to me, though some people preferred to be more cautious than likely needed.

  There’s even been a trope online lately of people trying to summon him on purpose at 3am, but it’s all fake of course.

  While I was an old man myself, I hated dealing with fellow older people. The joke that ‘Congress is an elderly home’ really hits the nail on the head when something like this happens.

  People trying to use their age as superiority, mishearing what someone said completely, and don’t even get me started on the ‘pill alert’.

  As if summoned by me thinking about it, everyone's phones went off at nearly the same time.

  Everyone quickly shut them off, sat down, and took their afternoon pills.

  “What a joke.” I grumbled around a sip of water, taking my own prescription medication.

  With the blessed moment of silence, my mind wandered to The Dark Lord Azurath.

  It was too tempting to use my ability on him, so I did almost right after I got the hang of it.

  I used a recording from one of his appearances on TV, and to my surprise he had a mostly grey aura. Not something you would see for an 'evil' being.

  That only made me more curious about him, but I can only get so much from some recordings that lasted only a few seconds.

  The room was quiet, the old fools taking their break to breathe.

  Of course, it was only a matter of time before it all started up again.

  …

  —------ Some Clickbaity Content Creator —------

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  ‘What am I doing with my life?’ I sighed as I got all my gear setup in my basement.

  A green screen, a few cameras and tripods, some cheap studio lights, candles, a prop leather book, and a very cheap Halloween astronaut costume I got online.

  “‘You can make good money online!’ they said. ‘It’s so easy!’ they said.” I grumble, reminiscing about how my friends convinced me into starting this damn channel.

  “This is so lame…” I sigh again, setting down a light and grabbing the cheap costume to make the proper customizations.

  I started this gig because I needed the money while in college, and it happened to work well with my major in video graphics.

  It went well, for a while. Almost like a dream come true actually.

  But then I graduated and suddenly everyone knows how to make videos and a degree is completely worthless.

  So now the job market for graphic design is over saturated with talent, and I have a loan to pay off.

  “And to top it all off, my parents don’t respect my career choice.” I huff, but calm myself down since it’s not all that bad.

  I got a moderately sized channel going, enough to earn just enough to be considered minimum wage, but it’s certainly better than working at a fast food place for the rest of my life.

  A trend that was still fresh, was trying to summon The Dark Lord Azurath.

  Well the actual trend of trying to summon some kind of ‘spirit’ is super old and over done to shit, but this specific variant is new.

  It sort of brought it back, though I’m guessing not for very long.

  “I gotta get on this train before it's gone. Rent isn’t cheap.” I muttered to myself, a habit I picked up from talking to a camera all day.

  I hummed a tune while I got to painting the costume.

  …

  —------ Greg Hudson, The Dark Lord Azurath —------

  I was on a self imposed break, chilling at my moms house, but there wasn’t really a whole lot to do.

  So I was scrolling through videos on the living room TV, until I came across something interesting.

  A really shitty trend where people try to summon me.

  “What the hell? That’s hilarious.” I smiled, and opened the first one I saw.

  It was just some teenager with her phone, standing in front of a mirror and chanting my name.

  Then someone, probably her brother or friend, burst through a door wearing an incredibly terrible costume and scaring the shit out of her.

  The other videos were pretty much the same with varying levels of effort.

  Some tried it at night, some didn’t even bother with a costume and only wore a helmet that vaguely resembled mine, but there were a few that had some real effort put into it.

  One guy had stilts to match my height, and there was a behind the scenes video for that one.

  ‘Maybe I should fuck with one of these guys…’ My smile took on a more devious visage as a most evil plan began brewing in my mind.

  …

  —------ That Same Click Baiter —------

  Hours passed, but I finally had a somewhat passable costume.

  I used the recordings of his TV hijackings, but it really was terrible.

  “Who dresses like this?” I frowned at the downright childish design.

  It practically oozed deviant art OC angst.

  I was alone, so I’d be the one wearing it. Which made me cringe at the thought.

  Recording this video is going to be a pain, especially because I was alone. I had a plan though.

  I would record the whole video first, where I “summon” The Dark Lord Azurath, react to nothing there and pretend I’m being chased or interacting with him.

  The script was pretty simple, and once I completed that I would record myself in costume in front of a green screen and then edit that footage into the full video.

  It would be janky as hell, but I was hoping the shaky camera movement typical with these found footage types would hide any noticeable effects.

  “It’s almost time.” I looked at my phone for the time, and did my final checks.

  Lighting was good, massive magic circle drawn the ground I copied from Google, candles in place and ready to be lit, everything was all set.

  Now I just needed to start recording.

  “Here’s hoping this dumb Skill works.” I mumble, praying to any deity out there that it will work.

  The Skill I got isn’t impressive. The only thing it does is supposedly make me more charismatic and popular.

  “Hello Everybody! It’s me, CraigsPost and tonight we will be summoning… The Dark Lord Azurath~!” I did the intro Flawlessly, a good start to the video.

  “It is currently… 2:53 AM, as you can see, and this is our circle!” I showed off a clock on the wall, and then the circle on the ground with the candles at each star point.

  “That’s right~. We’ll be using a real magic circle. This won’t be like those other videos. This one is real!” I walk around the circle, showing it off in better detail.

  “Now let’s waste no more time, and light this candle! Or, well… candles.” I awkwardly joke for comedic effect, and pull out a lighter from my pocket.

  I light each candle and record the process in a sort of first person view, holding the camera up at eye level the whole time.

  “Alright, now that they are lit, we can use my secret weapon~.” I make my way to a table and pick up the ‘magic tome’.

  “I can’t use this and the camera at the same time, so wait here guys.” I say and put the camera down on the tripod I setup, facing the circle and myself.

  With me on the other end of the circle than the camera, it gives a nice shot to have something appear behind me. All according to the script.

  “Okay guys, here we go. ‘Oh Dark Lord, head my call.” I begin the made up chanting, holding the blank leather book up in front of me.

  While chanting, I waved my hands around for effect.

  In the script, once I finish chanting right at 3 AM, I’ll slam the book closed and it’ll seem like nothing happened.

  That is for a few seconds, before the candles go out seemingly “by themselves”.

  “-I summon thee! Show yourself to ME~!” I finish the chant, and slam the book closed.

  Utterly still silence.

  Just as planned.

  ‘Alright, now to just blow out the candles and-’ I freeze as every candle begins to flutter, then go out one by one.

  Only a second later, and I’m in complete darkness.

  “Wha-” I whisper, then scream as my arm brushes against something.

  I throw myself away from the feeling, rolling into the middle of the circle and crawling away as I try to make out the shape in the dark.

  I knock into the tripod, and the camera falls over.

  My hands shoot across the floor, looking for it. Once I find it, I rapidly turn on the flashlight attached to it.

  The basement is illuminated with a harsh white LED light, and it reveals…

  “The costume…?” I mutter, my hands shaking as the shitty halloween costume stands limp where I once stood.

  It’s clearly empty, the costume folding in on itself in places and the helmet leaning as if on a rack.

  I squint at the darkness around the costume and I see something like… fingers, holding onto the helmet.

  My heart races as a figure begins to rise from behind the costume, and it soon towers over the circle.

  “Th-T-The Dark Lord A-Azurath?” I stutter out, paling at the sight of the true visage of horror.

  I laughed at the costume earlier, but now…

  Now I trembled before the so called ‘OC’.

  “You rang?” A calm voice replied, and the Dark Lord began to move.

  “What is this anyway? Some kind of replica?” He asked, and I could tell that he was smiling as he held the costume up and examined it.

  I was not smiling.

  ‘What the fuck. What the fuck. What the fuck.’ My mind continued on repeat, completely collapsing into a cycle.

  But my body chose to respond instinctually.

  “Do you want to play a game?” I asked, and then scrunched up my face in terror.

  ‘WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU ASK HIM THAT YOU FUCKING MORON?!’ I screamed internally, and I knew what the culprit was.

  My Skill, the one that makes me more ‘charismatic’ and ‘popular’, just made me talk unprompted.

  “A game? Hmmm.” The Dark Lord Azurath hummed as his fingers tapped against the cheap plastic helmet.

  This was it. I was going to die.

  What a shit life it was.

  “Sure. That sounds fun~.” He chuckled darkly, waving his hand in a slow manner.

  The cheap costume floated away from him and settled into a chair against a far wall.

  ‘A life line! Now I just need to-’

  “What do I win if I beat you?” My Skill moved my lips before I could even finish thinking.

  Fuck.

  “Hmm, I suppose I will grant you one wish if it is in my means.” The Dark Lord responded, he sounded almost amused.

  The Dark Lord Azurath laid on his side comfortably in mid air, resting his head on a propped up hand that leaned against nothing.

  He was just leisurely floating 2 feet off the ground.

  ‘A wish? I wish to live, so that works for me, but what if I lose-’

  “Deal.” My fuckass Skill once again spoke for me.

  ‘Why couldn’t I get fireballs or something? Why?’

  “Excellent~! What are we playing?” The Dark Lord Azurath shifted, and he was now sitting crosslegged in the air and resting his elbows on his knees.

  ‘Dude, I don’t know what games an alien would like. What are we just going to play poker or-’

  “...Super Duper Kart Masterz.” My Skill provided a family racing game.

  ‘...Why God? What did I do in a past life to deserve this?’ I lamented internally.

  Sure, I was good at the game since I liked to play it in my free time, but there was no way that an alien would be okay with-

  “Then we shall play this ‘Super Duper Kart Masterz’ you speak of.” The Dark Lord Azurath replied simply.

  …I give up.