"So, what's your decision?"

  "You said you were a copy, yeah?"

  "Yes, but I'm technically—"

  "I want the real thing!"

  I Will myself into my copy.

  "I am the real thing."

  "No you're not. You just confirmed you were a copy!"

  "I've replaced my copy. Besides that, don't treat them like crap. They're just being honest with you. Exactly as I have been all along."

  Marshall eyes me suspiciously.

  "I can't tell if you're insane."

  "You know those stories about Cthulhu?"

  "Yeah, my daughter loves thos— oh, you've gotta be fuckin' kidding me."

  I warp part of myself into my eldritch form. Which, I'm totally okay with despite being upset at being a blob monster... Earlier today? Yesterday? I'm not sure, with all the places I've been. Regardless. This thing— me?

  It's orders of magnitude more horrifying.

  I like it.

  Did I change without realizing?

  *urrrp*

  Reah, he's gonna barf.

  ...

  Hr, he didn't.

  "Oh, god! Put— put that back?! I—, um. I get it."

  I pull myself back into the proper shape of a dragon.

  "Do you have any other concerns about my strength?"

  "How could I? Besides, if you're THAT, do we have a choice? Does it matter if we say no? You don't need to kill us. I uh, we'll all... Like the books."

  "That's not it. If you commit a heinous crime, I'll prosecute you exactly as your nation's law does. That said, you really don't have a choice about submitting. Above all, I'mma dragon. Rawr. We don't give up our loot. Because I'mma dragon, rawrgardless of what I look like, I'm not going to intentionally harm anyone unless they deserve it. I'm more fair than your law."

  He looks at me weirdly. Probably the rawring.

  "How can an abomination like you claim to mete out justice of all things?"

  Roh. Rude.

  "The reason I left was that one of my subordinates was feeding me."

  He gives me a look of the purest confusion I've yet witnessed.

  "Huuuh?"

  "She murdered one of my other subordinates during an attempted escape, but to do that, she tried to break my subordination of her mind, body, and Will. This involved her, rehm, feeding one of my many tentacles. It seems she thought that would distract me. There was so much food nearby that I indeed became hungry."

  "I thought you ate black holes?"

  "I guess you could say she was feeding me portions of another dimension. As a result, I evolved."

  He throws his hands up and yells.

  "Oh, so the unassailable eldritch god has grown stronger! And its tentacles extend to at least one other dimension, too! That's some GREAT intel! Thanks!"

  The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

  I ignore his exasperated sarcasm.

  "She was partly responsible for most of those hundred and eighty-one billion deaths. She and several others stole a very powerful weapon from me, but I let her live because she stopped before unleashing said weapon alongside her compatriots. She decided she wouldn't strike the killing blow."

  He looks at me with suspicion.

  "You let her live because she didn't personally use the weapon she stole?"

  "Isn't that what your criminal system would do? Execution isn't a reasonable punishment for theft."

  He nods, slowly.

  "Okay. You executed her for committing murder?"

  "Not right away. She confessed. Therefore, I gave her a third chance to live. I'm all about freedom and free Will."

  "What? Why? Are you one of those liberals—"

  I cut him off with a swift wave of my clawed hand. Not literally.

  "Dragons don't give a damn about politics. What matters is what's right. What's right is that she gets another chance to repent so long as she earnestly wants to do better. More crimes? More restrictions, more repentance. But I can read minds. I don't need to guess and interpret intentions like your court system. I know whether they're guilty. I know whether they feel guilty. If what they did and how they feel about it don't match? They're punished more harshly. She didn't lie or take my third chance; she asked me to kill her. I did. That's my brand of justice."

  He stares at me.

  ...

  ...

  ...

  For a long time.

  ...

  ...

  ...

  Finally, he speaks.

  "I'm not sure whether you're twisting my mind like they do in my daughter's stories, but she also likes dragons. They're very prideful and abhor liars; or so she says. I guess I can accept that."

  "Then?"

  "We'll submit. America is yours, Chronovoid."

  "Wait, what about the President?"

  "She gave me sole authority to decide. She's 'The President,' so she can do that."

  He shrugs and continues.

  "Apparently."

  Hruh.

  "She's a strong person. It takes guts to recognize that she can't make a good decision due to her experiences, assess who's remained the most level-headed, and then also delegate the responsibility to that person. It takes a whole lot more guts to do the same with the entire faith and trust of a nation on your shoulders."

  "I'm not level-headed; I just don't believe in magic."

  He pauses for a moment, then corrects himself.

  "Didn't. In any case, I'll inform her of your praises, my new President."

  He gives me a standard military salute, then furrows his brow, before dropping his arm in defeat. It doesn't show in his posture, though, as he seems to retain his military pride. He continues speaking.

  "Hm, I suppose you don't need human soldiers."

  This man's pretty quick on the uptake. I hope he'll decide to become a dragon; we could always use more dragons like him. But, I strongly doubt he'd accept if I offered directly. Since I'm effectively an eldritch god. Hreh.

  "She's still 'The President' and you're still a general. Don't go restructuring on my account. Unless there's someone unethical whom you couldn't find a way to remove. To which end, I'll need the locations of where you store all your documents. Classified, secret, digitized, I don't care— all of them. The moment I execute criminals in the know? I'll find the documents anyway. That, or I'll have the source when I eat their memories."

  He looks at me with surprise and then realization.

  A woman in military uniform opens the door.

  *chrok*

  Marshall exclaims loudly.

  "You really ARE an eldritch god!"

  She hears him and hesitates for a moment. Her face twists in fear, confusion, and then resignation. She looks at me with a hint of defeat and depression. She evidently knows what Marshall means. Finally, she sturdily walks across the large room toward Marshall. She stops and salutes him when she reaches his vicinity.

  "Sir, we've got a new report."

  She holds up a red folder.

  I sprout a shiny black tentacle and wave it at her.

  Her eyes widen as Marshall takes the red folder, then she turns and flees at a fast walk.

  "It's okay, miss— I'm a kind one. A few minutes ago, my mind-slave told me I was kind, just prior to asking me to kill her. I didn't make her death painful; don't worry too much."

  She shudders, hard. Her brisk walk turns into a sprint.

  I return to looking like a normal dragon.

  Reah, seems I enjoy being venerated through fear. My personality must've changed after this last evolution, which is weird because my species is still supposed to be a dragon. Guess I'll keep an eye on it.

  She closes the door behind her.

  *chrok*

  Greh? I can see her behind the closed door?

  Guess I'll keep many, many eyes on it. My Void Will has spread across this whole area.

  I look back to Marshall, whom opened the red folder while I was busy taunting his military personnel. I point at the folder and inform him of what I did a moment ago.

  "That's probably my portals. You can use those to visit an Earth-only version of my Chronometric Temple. Technically, you can visit any world you want from there. But, be aware that not all worlds will treat you warmly. I won't allow criminal activity— but that doesn't mean I'll throw them in jail if they pelt you with rocks for invading their privacy. Dragons disdain injustice, but there must be an actual crime, not mere annoyance or justified injury. Finally, I can't say my dragons have rooted out every criminal. It's all at your own risk."

  "Speaking of dragons. And your other form, too, sadly. My daughter would probably kill me to meet you."

  I look at him concernedly.

  "Do you mean that literally?"

  "I hope not."

  "Rah. I can meet her if you'd like."

  "I would, my leader."

  He adds while reading:

  "It's like you knew already."

  "Deity. Plus, I put them there."

  "Why after we agreed to submit?"

  "For the same reason I said earlier."

  He looks up from the folder.

  "What was it again?"

  "Freedom."