Night had fallen deep.
The originally ubiquitous blood-red twilight had vanished, replaced by a dark and gloomy night sky.
Atop the cliff, Shiayar had stripped himself naked, wringing out his drenched clothes one by one.
"The renown of the Grant Sea is indeed well-deserved."
"Playing the hero, saving the beauty, really is a technical job. If I hadn’t prepared a life jacket in advance, I might have ended up like Jack Dawson in ’Titanic’."
"Ah, if only I had a water-type Pet Beast that knew Surf, that would be great."
Seemingly detecting its Beastmaster’s gaze upon it, the little snub-nosed monkey, Shiny, let out a dissatisfied SQUEAK.
It was you who first had me evolve along the space-time path, so why are you having second thoughts now? Is the grass always greener on the other side? It seems all Beastmasters are heartbreakers! If you had used water-attribute evolutionary materials for me from the beginning, I could have learned Surf too! I just don’t know what the evolved species name of a water-attribute Sealed Stone Monkey would be... A Water Monkey? I have the feeling there’s something slightly off about that.
Silver’s call interrupted Shiayar and Shiny’s interaction.
"I knew it; that old crone Norton definitely didn’t have good intentions."
Sensing the information Silver transmitted through the Soul Pact, Shiayar also frowned slightly and turned his body.
Not far from him, a girl named Silvia lay with her eyes gently closed, peacefully asleep.
The girl’s chestnut-colored long hair, wet by the sea, draped damply on one side of her cheek, yet it failed to detract from her beauty in the slightest.
By any discerning standard, this was a beautiful girl who would inspire affectionate feelings at a mere glance.
one were to ignore the sinister shadow behind her, wafting an indescribable stench of corruption.
The pitch-black shadow had no form, yet it was slowly eroding everything around it.
Even at a distance of several meters, just the sight of the intangible shadow weighed heavily on Shiayar’s heart, making his breathing difficult.
What was even more horrifying were the whispers that sounded without warning in Shiayar’s mind.
Madness, despair, corruption, rage, and many other negative emotions flooded into Shiayar’s mind in an instant, along with the whispers.
If one were to simply summarize the content of those chaotic whispers, it would be something like, "A madman sharpens his knife in the dead of night while the imperial star wobbles high above," and "Heaven nurtures all things for humanity, yet not a single virtue is offered in return to Heaven"...
Even with Shiayar’s already formidable spiritual power as a 2-Ring Beastmaster, it took considerable effort to suppress these surging negative emotions.
"The half-body of the Twilight Evil God," Shiayar’s expression grew more somber.
Although Norton’s hints were cryptic, Shiayar, after all, came from five hundred years in the future.
He was a player with foresight, directly aware of the outcome for the Azure Garden Dukedom.
Therefore, after spending some time gathering information from the capital of the Azure Garden Dukedom to verify his suspicions, Shiayar had already largely grasped the situation.
Sixteen years ago, a great calamity involving an Evil God’s descent had erupted in the Azure Garden Dukedom.
The descending Evil God was named "Twilight," and the disaster brought by its Godly Descent nearly turned half of the Azure Garden Dukedom into a wasteland.
Although eventually, at a tremendous cost, the Duke of Azure Garden, in alliance with several powerful experts from neighboring countries who came to their aid, managed to suppress the descended Evil God’s incarnation.
However, even just an incarnation from a Godly Descent was not something that several Titled Rank and Legendary Beastmasters could easily kill.
Despite paying a great price, they were only able to barely seal that Godly Descent incarnation.
Most of the Twilight Incarnation’s power was likely sealed beneath the grand formation within the Duke of Azure Garden’s family estate.
However, a small part, for some reason, seemed to have lingered on the Duke of Azure Garden’s newborn and only daughter—Silvia.
And for the vast majority of the populace, who were unaware of the truth, this—coupled with the occasional incidents of Silvia losing control over the Evil God’s power within her—led to a dire situation.
Under the guidance of those with ulterior motives, Silvia, who was clearly a sacrificial victim, came to be viewed by the populace as the incarnation of that Twilight Evil God, a symbol of disaster.
All hatred, resentment, and indeed all other negative emotions were attributed to Silvia.
This was the root cause of the dire circumstances Silvia faced, being rejected and spurned.
It could be said that from birth, this duke’s daughter was handed the script of a nine-tailed jinchūriki.
Only—the Seventh Hokage ultimately proved their innocence through their own efforts and won the recognition of the entire village. But, according to what Shiayar knew of the Azure Garden Dukedom’s fate, this future "Gray-Silver Witch," the founder of the White Chalk Tower, didn’t seem to have that chance to prove herself to the world...
Such thoughts merely flashed through Shiayar’s mind.
He quickly adjusted his mood and refocused his attention on Silvia, who was sleeping soundly before him.
In a sense, the challenge before him was actually the hardest part of Shiayar’s 3rd Order beginner’s task.
The power that resided in Silvia, filled with madness and corruption, was merely a fragment split from that half-body of the Evil God that had descended.
And this part had also been layered with multiple seals by the Duke of Azure Garden on Silvia.
A seal placed with the full dedication of a Titled Rank Beastmaster would naturally not be so easily broken.
The previous instances where Silvia lost control were, in fact, merely cases where a slight aura of the Evil God exploited moments of instability in her own consciousness to seep through the seals and influence the outside world.
Compared to the complete Twilight Evil God, this power seeping through the seals was minuscule, like a single drop in the ocean.
However, even so, considering the Rank of these auras from the Evil God, it was no difficult feat to level half a street block or transform a dozen Humans into twisted masses of flesh who only knew how to praise Twilight daily.
Of course, since he had gathered intelligence in advance, Shiayar, with his personality, would naturally not be unprepared for a predictable development like Silvia losing control of the Twilight Evil God’s power within her.
As the saying goes, "for every creature, there is a counter." Even though it was only the Rank of a false god, it was, after all, just an unrooted, uncontrolled overflow of aura, so it certainly wasn’t beyond suppression.
In Shiayar’s palm, a small potion suddenly appeared.
He removed the cap and downed it in one gulp.
[You have consumed a temporary Mental Strengthening Potion (Product of Alchemical City)]
[For 30 seconds, your spiritual power will be enhanced, and your Pet Beast’s mental-type skills will also have their effects increased]
[After 30 seconds, you will enter the "mental listlessness" state for half an hour]
The system panel’s prompts flashed by one after the other, but Shiayar ignored them.
So, to control a Tailed Beast—indeed, using an Illusion Technique for a targeted attack seems to be the most convenient.
In the pupils of Shiayar and Silver,
a silver moon silently emerged, slowly rotating and expanding.
Then, that silver moon gradually imprinted itself onto reality.