In order to take over the world, you need a degree in World Domination.

Scratch that. In order to take over the world, it is highly recommended that you have a degree in World Domination. Six of the seven past Soteriai (excluding the short reign of Virgil Soter the Mad) had degrees in World Domination, and a degree lends credibility that you know what you're doing once you're in charge. Thus, if you want to take over the world, and stay there for over a month, it's highly recommended that you get your degree first.

Which is why, at the age of twenty-seven, I'm standing outside the Gates of Hell at midnight as children a decade younger than me stream in, dragging suitcases up the marble staircase through the cast bronze archway, the Thinker gazing down as they pass on through. My eyes flit over the doorway, pausing on the life-sized bronze figures on either side before resting on the Three Shades at the head of the frame, the three pointing to the university crest, an emblazoned U and motto, not present in Rodin's original, but restoring the words from Dante's Inferno to their rightful place.

Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate. Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.

I smile and step on through.

The courtyard beyond the wall is lit brightly with bonfires, smoke curling upward through the branches of the trees and into the cloudless night, an attendant tending to each. More attendants were guiding the crowd, holding signs and guiding them towards the various dormitories. I scan the signs and don't see my residence, so I approach one of the attendants to ask.

"Argead House? Please, follow me." The attendant bows slighty, hands his sign off to one of the others, and pulls a torch out of the fire. He sets off, and I follow behind, away from the hordes of children.

"Your first time on campus?" he asks, as the bonfire lighting gives way to streetlamps and the sounds of the crowd begin to fade.

"Yeah. Much more ominous than I was expecting, but at the same time it feels just right."

The attendent chuckles. "Yeah. Personally, I think it's a bit much, especially the whole midnight move-in. But hey, we're the only institute of higher learning for Powers on this side of the Atlantic. They've got to embrace the villany."

I smile at the thought. If my father could see me now.

We arrive at the house, and the attendant gives me one last bow as I climb the steps up to the house. It has the appearance of an old Victorian mansion, complete with ivy climbing up the side wall, but I know better; the entire University was barely thirty years old, constructed during the reign of of Aetos Soter the Wise, who adbicated to establish guidance for the next generation of powers. Or indoctrination. Two sides of the same coin.

The door opens up onto a lounge, lit by a dusty stained-glass chandelier in the ceiling directly over an old pool table, a game in progress by three young men. An older man and a young woman sit by the fireplace at the end of the room. A pair stand chatting by the wall, drinking out of stemmed glasses, and a two individuals are seated alone by the windows, books in hand. All of them, formally dressed, and all of them look up as I walk in.

One of the pool players approach. "Welcome to World Domination." He shifts the pool cue from one hand to the other. "State your name and power."

I pause. I have names; multiple, in fact. But they don't want my real name, and I'm no longer a hero. I'm--

"Antumbra. Unpowered."

There's a pause; barely noticeable, a half-second. The young man looks surprised for a second, but catches himself quickly. "Impressive. The name's Ember. Pyrokinesis." He snaps his fingers, and a flame appears at the tip of his thumb, and with another gesture, it goes out. "You must have impressed the University some way to be invited to join us. Let me get you a drink. In the mean time, make yourself at home. You can leave your luggage over there."

He points to a corner with his cue stick, where another abandoned suitcase lay, then hands it to me and walks out of the lounge into the kitchen, where I hear the tinkle of glases. Everyone turns back to what they were doing, and resumes its muted tones of conversation.

"Don't mind him." Another one of the players says, as he lines up his shot. "He's just a show off. He can cool down drinks, too. Fun at parties." He takes the shot, pockets the 9-ball, and turns back to me. "The name's Fork. Nice to meet you."

I shake his extended hand. "So, what's your power?"

"I can multitask. Pattern-matching, mostly, but also some degree of processing, which makes me the smartest person in the room. Factually." He pockets another ball, without looking.

"Looks like he's not the only show off."

"Aww, crap." He looks down and scratches his hair sheepishly. "Yeah, he rubs off a bit. Been roommates with him for the past two years; we're both in Third. Anyways, let me introduce you around. This is Flicker," gesturing to the third player with the cue, who waves back "Second year. Can make objects phase in and out of reality. Don't ever go into his room."

"For your own safety." Flicker laughs. "I don't even know what I have in there."

"The two by the fireplace are the rest of the Thirds, Martin Estver and Eos."

"Estver?" I interrupt. "Of Estver Coporation?"

"The same. Apparently he thought being the head of a multinational corporation wasn't enough for him, or he would have turned down the invitation. And yes, he's capable of mind control, but he doesn't use it on us. Well, he tried one, but we noticed, and he hasn't done it since."

"That we know of." Flicker adds.

"Good point."

Ember returns, and hands me a glass of red wine. "Making new friends I hope?"

Fork takes his shot. "Just talking about the time Marty took you out for a spin."

"Hey! That's personal. If the story get's told, only I get to tell it."

"The only reason we figured out was because Ember was being less of a jerk than usual."

"What about Eos?" I ask, trying to steer the conversation. "What's her power?"

Ember shrugs. "Who knows? Something to do with light manipulation. She changes her hair colour like twice a week. I like it when it's dark green. Pity she doesn't wear it much anymore."

"Only after you told her." Flicker smiles.

"I said, a pity."

Flicker lines up his shot. "The guy by the window is Veritas. My year. Not the most social. Senses motives or something. Not to any degree of detail, but enough that he doesn't talk much with anyone."

"Not fun at parties." Fork adds.

"She's also in my year. Assembler." Flicker gestures to the girl reading a book by herself. "One of those tinker techs; she can make functional prototypes of anything. Of course, they might require the energy output of a small star, but they work first time, which is better than most. Invented anti-gravity, but they're still trying to make it viable."

"As a joke I asked her for a laser that could destroy the moon." says Ember, "She got me the plans the next day."

"It would have worked, too." Fork smiles. "I checked it over. Required an unimaginable amount of energy and a couple unknown elements to stabilise the flux, but the physics worked out. Could have shot once or twice before burning out."

"Yeah, most of her designs end up staying on paper." Flicker smiles sadly. "She has boxes full of blueprints. Even with the University's help, most of the designs are out of our tech level."

"Doesn't sound very useful." I reply.

"Unfortunately not. Amazing at discovering new scientific theory, though. Reverse engineering her designs usually results in rewriting a few physical laws."

Ember looks over my shoulder and I turn to follow his gaze. Another student had just walked in, and as he closed the door, the room fell silent again. He looks young, barely past twenty, and despite being tall and lanky appears well-toned, at odds with his bad posture. Ember steps forward.

"Welcome to World Domination. State your name and power."

The student's eyes dart around the room, and finally he shakes Ember's offered hand. "Case. Umm...acid spitter?"

"You spit acid? That's amazing!" Ember grabs his luggage and tosses it over to the corner, then claps Case on the shoulder and brings him to the pool table.

"Er...well...that's not all I can do, but everything else takes a long time. I can basically control how my body grows."

"And how does that let you spit acid?"

"Repurposing the saliva glands to secrete stomach acid." Case mumbles, "and even more mucous, to make my mouth acid-resistant."

"Best superpower in your year, I bet. Antumbra over here," Ember gestures, I wave, "doesn't have a power. Tetra over there," he waves in the direction of the pair with the drinks, "is some sort of botanist. The tech kind, not the kinesis kind. Although she's working on trees that grow lungs, so that's kind of cool. I'm Ember, firestarter. Let me get you a drink."

Ember disappears. "Yes, he's always like that. I'm Fork, and this is Flicker. Why don't you two go join Tetra and Sengo? You first years should talk with each other."

We walk over and introduce ourselves. Sengo shakes both our hands and excuses himself, walking over to the fireplace and taking a seat. Ember returns with the drink and hands it to Case before returning to the pool table.

"Did you know that there are barely any mad botanists? Techies are a dime a dozen, with their freeze rays and teleporters. And all the other biologists are more interested in their frankensteins and chimeras. Is there any other field more underrepresented than botany?"

"Botany has a few." Case replies, "You've got Wynd and his triffids"

"More animal than plant, really. Mitochondria, nerves, the whole works. Plants aren't designed to move; once you take that out of the picture, almost everyone loses interest. Sure, you've got your few plant-based poisons, but it's always cheaper to hire a mad chemist."

"How about your lung-trees?" I ask. "Surely that's more animal than plant."

Tetra smiles. "It's in collaboration with the other biologists here. For organ transplants and experiments, although we're hoping to push it all the way to growing cadavers; it's cheaper and more sustainable than cloning. And less stress on your people. No more fears of being suddenly kidnapped and used for experiments. Or as a host. Or parts. You didn't have to deal with any of that, did you? Where are you from, anyways?"

"The North. No fancy techlords or experimenters there, just your basic brutes and mage-kings. Just keep your head low and do what your ruler tells you and you'll be all right. At least that's what I did."

"Then how'd you get an invitation? Surely you did something to impress the committee."

"Well, I got fed up and staged a takeover. Unpowered rulers are fairy rare, aren't they?"

"Wait, you gave up a rulership to come here?"

"I gave it to a friend, my people are safe." I lie. "Not really my thing; I prefer the bigger picture. Which is why I'm here. I see you're a world-class botanist; How about you, Case? What did you do to get your invitation?"

"Me? I don't know...um, I've read that the committee selects people based off a combination of power and past actions, with a further selection based off personality. So I guess my power impressed them? Somehow?"

Tetra scoffs, "Unlikely. Acid spitting is not something that gets you World Domination."

"Now hold up." I say, "What else can you do, Case? What exactly is your superpower?"

"I can...um...selectively change my appearance...but that takes months...um...bone plating but that hurts...basically..." He mumbles the last bit.

"Say again?"

"I can selectively modulate gene expression in my cells." he mumbles.

"Wow." Tetra looks him up and down. "That's actually fairly impressive. And you waste it on spitting acid?"

"Simplest non-disruptive demonstration of my abilities. Also have denser bone structure, increased musculature, conscious control over fight or flight response, appetite, radiation re—"

"Yeah, yeah, I get it. Do you know what you need? A neuroscientist. Controlling the neurotransmitter levels in your brain? You could do anything!"

"Noted."

"Really. Damn, your power's really great. All I have is a generic techie knowledge of growing new plants."

"Well, you can still do a lot with your powers." I say, "That's the point, isn't it? Pushing at the limits of what your powers can do?"

"I guess. At least I have powers to exploit; you don't have any."

I shrug. "I guess I have some ca—"

The door slams open, and everyone turns to the new arrival.

He drags in two luggage bags, and goes out again to bring in a large wooden crate, barely fitting through the door. Ember puts down his cue and approaches him.

"Need any help?"

"Hands off. Just point me to my room."

Ember's smile falters. "Er. Second floor, first door to the right."

The newcomer walks towards the stairs, his luggage bags following behind. Swearing is heard from the hallway, followed by the regular thumps as he drags his stuff up the stairs.

Ember calls after him. "What's your name, friend?"

"Fuck off!"

He chuckles. "Well, you heard him."

Fork elbows him in the ribs. "Looks like we finally have someone more of a jerk than you."

"Well, now that everyone's here," Ember glances up the stairs, "well, most of us." He claps his hands. "Welcome first years to World Domination. This will be your home for the next three years, so make sure to treat it well. We know all your names, and I trust that all of us will be warm and welcoming. Except maybe to Fuckoff, fuck him." He gets a few chuckles out of that. "Don't be afraid of asking about anything. Now, it's—" he checks his watch. "—four in the morning, and although you might not have anything until the speech tomorrow night, it's best to get some sleep. Once again, welcome to World Domination. I hope you have a wonderful time."

One by one the other students get up to leave; we grab our bags and Ember shows us to our rooms on the second floor. Tetra and I share a room; she calls the top bunk and immediately jumps into the bed. I start to unpack.

"Hey, Antumbra, you doing anything tomorrow? I'm heading into the lab, I can show you what I'm working on, if you'd like."

"Can't." I reply, folding my clothes and putting them in the bottom drawer. "I've got some bureaucracy to take care of. Some other time?"

"Sure." Tetra yawns. "Mind hitting the lights?"

Soon she is asleep, and all that's left are me, my clothes, and the darkness. I lie back on my bed, staring up at the mattress, listening to the noises of the house.

Everybody was lying tonight.

Okay, maybe everyone except Case. Case and Fuckoff. We really need him to give us a real name.

I didn't expect World Domination to be so...inviting. The University is literally throwing the people who will be eventually murdering each other for the position of Soter into the same cramped rooms, for three years. Telepaths, telekinetics, mad geniuses and body horrors. The initial question threw me off guard; I had expected months of prying, with intense secrecy over our powers to keep the others from knowing. So I replied with my cover story.

Yes, I am powered. I haven't used it since I was nine. The story would have worked better in secrecy; everyone would be pretending to have no powers. But claiming to be the only unpowered only makes me come across as suspicious. They might start digging. I gave too much away about my past; unpowered rulers are rare enough, and if they draw a connection between the actions that got me the invitation they might link me to my previous identity. I've scrubbed all records of my power from my region, but the alias is a clue in and of itself.

But an environment of open information was useful enough, granting an open analysis of everyone's powers. I knew everyone's powers, except for Fuckoff and Sengo, but the latter would be easy to obtain. And, given that everyone here had received an invitation to World Domination, I could estimate the extent of their powers as well.

Ember. Claims to have pyrokinesis, but obviously has some finer control over temperature in general, if Fork's comment on cold drinks could be trusted. Probably has the ability to transfer kinetic energy from one area to another, but the range and limits of his powers must be spectacular to be included here. Almost any Power has the ability to generate infinite energy (we are used as a renewable energy source), but only those with uncommonly high wattage could stand to achieve any sort of standing. A common power, with uncommon limits.

Fork has a mental power, more difficult to analyse, given that their power is more limited by the person's creativity in application rather than the power itself. Increased multitasking, pattern recognition, and processing. Any of those could be a potential power by itself, but a combination of those would make him, as he said, the smartest person in the room. Faster information acquisition and processing would make him a genius at anything he cares to learn, and multitasking would make him invaluable in dealing with crises. Useful when he has access to information, but cut him off and he's dead in the water.

Flicker. Object phasing. Not enough information to evaluate dangers of his power, but if he can phase himself like most other phasers, no physical barrier can stop him. The rest of his ability is dependent on his reaction time. Combine phasing with instantaneous reaction time, and you have a nearly invulnerable power.

Martin Estver. Mind control. Obviously has a good control of his powers already, given that he's used it to build his multinational corporation from the ground up in barely a decade. But not good enough to mimic the actions of others, unless Estver wasn't trying to mimic Ember's actions. He probably has the most experience using his ability to gain power over others, so it'd no surprise if he's playing the long game as well.

Eos. Goddess of the dawn. Light manipulation. Not much to go on. A chameleon? Unlikely to be useful for governance. Illusionist? More likely, and easy enough to hide. Enigmatic. One to keep an eye on.

Veritas. Telepath. Senses motives. Especially useful when dealing with treacherous allies. Depending on the amount of detail he can get out of the reading, he could get anywhere from a vague sense of unease to full details on your plans and intent. The latter would make it him the most dangerous person to be around. Tread with caution. Keep my distance.

Assembler. A prototyping tech. Not the most dangerous, but could be a useful tool, or powerful if she obtains the resources. Unlimited energy and exotic materials aren't hard to come by if you have access to the right Powers, but that requires the resources to employ them. Probably has the easiest ability to create doomsday machines. Keep in contact.

Case. Control over the gene expression in his own cells. Not sure what that means, but Tetra seemed impressed, so I should be concerned. Doesn't seem to have the best grip on playing the power game, but his power might make up for it. Control over his own body systems, along with limited impersonation skills. If he ever learns to think like a Soter, he may be a useful tool.

Tetra, mad botanist. Like other mad biologists, unchecked release of experiments could easily destabilise the entire biosphere. In fact, most of the biosphere is already engineered to watch for such threats, but any exceptionally skilled biologist could easily evade these monitors. Although if it's any consolation, plants aren't as mobile as animals nor as rapidly reproducing as bacteria.

No information on Sengo or Fuckoff, although Sengo seems friendly enough as it is. Fuckoff might be more difficult to get information on, but his abrasiveness with the rest of the program will make information from them more forthcoming.