"L-Lord... no response!?"
Although Olivia knew that the Spirit of Void only occasionally answered its followers, was it really going to ignore them even in such a desperate situation?
Her heart sank. "So this is... what a god is?"
At that moment, the words one of the believers had used to describe the gods suddenly surfaced in her mind: "Gods have no wants or desires, no love or hatred. They look down upon the Mortal World and care nothing for the rise and fall of ants..."
"We are all just ants. What does the life or death of ants matter to such a mighty being? Maybe... the one who answered us before was merely one of that terrifying being's personas, just a false personality, a single aspect..."
"My Lord... are you punishing me?"
Watching this scene, Lin wore a smile. "No matter what you do to me, I will still believe in you..."
Countless masses of flesh engulfed her, like an embryo nurturing new life. Veins spread rapidly across Lin's face, covering most of it like a mask. Only one eye remained exposed, and even that space was steadily shrinking...
Just then, Olivia suddenly felt it—a terrifying presence... had descended!
A tear rolled from Lin's lone eye.
"I..."
Aaron Sothoth stared at the scene, at a loss for words. "I logged off to eat a meal, and now my fanatical believer is about to die?"
He gazed at the flesh covering Lin and knew the situation had become extremely dangerous.
"Thank goodness Olivia already performed the ritual..."
Aaron swiftly connected to the ritual. His own mysterious energy surged out like a tide and flowed into Lin.
"How did Lin get so badly contaminated?"
Once the connection was established, Aaron felt a chill run through him.
The contamination and fleshly mutations covering Lin were horrifying to behold. It seemed that every inch of her flesh was filled with another powerful, frenzied will!
"Mother Tree of Flesh?"
Aaron's mysterious energy kept erasing that will. The flesh mask on Lin's face stopped spreading.
But Aaron remained extremely wary. He even felt a trace of terror!
As the contamination was cleansed, he could feel that the frenzied will was growing furious.
Outside the window, the Crimson Moon in the sky turned even redder. It seemed... to have become a frenzied, uncanny eye, hanging high above and gazing down upon the Mortal World...
"The Scarlet Moon, the Great Mother of Terror, the Mother Tree of Flesh that births countless forms!"
A string of honorific titles appeared directly in Aaron's mind.
He even saw countless cysts forming on the surface of the fleshly mass before him. There seemed to be countless embryos inside, and they were even drawing in the spirits around them...
If I crawled inside, would it give birth to me, giving me a real body in this world? No...
Aaron came to his senses, and his consciousness shuddered. "I've already been slightly affected by the contamination... Even if it gave birth to me, I'd probably be controlled by the Scarlet Moon and suffer a fate worse than death, wouldn't I?"
"Get out of here!"
He had only used one unit of mysterious energy before. Now he roared as he poured out all his reserves.
Two units of mysterious energy...
Three units of mysterious energy...
Ten units of mysterious energy!
At last, the enormous mass of flesh split open, revealing Lin within as the countless masses of flesh curled inward.
Lin seemed to see a hazy humanoid figure. A warm, large hand stroked the top of her head. "Leave!"
Pop!
A lump of flesh detached from her body. It crawled across the floor like a soft-bodied animal, eventually devouring a chair. It fused with it of its own accord and began to take shape...
Branch after branch and root after root sprouted from the chair. Like fruit appearing on a tree, they formed a crimson staff.
It was entirely crimson, as if branches and tendrils had twisted together. The top forked, with countless tiny branches forming a canopy that resembled the head of a ferocious wooden dragon.
"Don't look at the moon again."
Aaron spoke to Lin.
If ordinary evil believers were merely exposed to the source's power as they walked their path, and Lin had previously been especially susceptible to contamination by a small amount of that power, then this time was far worse. She had entered the terrifying being's direct line of sight!
The source of her path had taken notice of her! If she had belonged to a cult that worshipped the Scarlet Moon, she would have been elevated to Saintess on the spot.
But her later behavior had probably made her a textbook turncoat. If she drew the being's attention again, her fate would surely be grim.
"Thank you for saving me!"
Lin's head throbbed. Aaron had only driven the contamination from her body; he hadn't sealed away the knowledge she'd gained.
She knelt on the ground and offered her sincere thanks.
"Be careful of the dangerous knowledge in your mind!"
Aaron reminded her again.
Beings at the end of a path were the source of the mysterious, perhaps even the mysterious itself. They represented the most profound occult knowledge!
Ordinary cults pieced together only a tiny fraction of information from their mutterings.
But Lin had practically stared directly at the Scarlet Moon. She might know more high-level occult knowledge than even the High Priest!
Aaron certainly wasn't about to pass up this chance to reap some benefits.
He glanced at Olivia as well and, while he was at it, drove out a trace of hidden contamination the Scarlet Moon had left in her. Only then did he end his response to the ritual.
"Phew..."
Only then did Olivia let out a heavy breath. She glared at Lin. "What dangerous thing did you do, Lin?!"
Lin gave an embarrassed grin and took Olivia's hand. "Sister Olivia, I won't do it again."
"There won't be another time. If our Lord hadn't happened to answer our prayer, you, I, and everyone in this building would be dead!"
Olivia scolded her.
"I really won't do it again."
Lin was still shaken as she replied, understanding that her days of exploiting the situation for benefits had come to an end.
The Scarlet Moon had already remembered her. Next time, it might directly bring down divine punishment!
"Sigh... What a mess... How are you feeling?"
Olivia sighed.
"Other than a bit of pressure in my head, I'm fine..." Lin closed her eyes, and a wealth of forbidden, terrifying knowledge surfaced in her mind.
The knowledge of how to advance beyond Blood Overflowed was the least significant of it.
There was also knowledge about building blood pools and drawing in spirits through the blood of young women—enough to keep someone forever young...
And knowledge about using flesh and bone, together with rituals and sacrifices, to craft terrifying Strange Objects.
There were even... some more cruel and uncanny sacrificial rituals...
Olivia's gaze swept over the blood-red staff, and she couldn't help sighing again. "This is the first time I've ever seen a Strange Object come into being..."
Lin opened her eyes. "Sister Olivia, do you mean... it's a Strange Object?"
"Not just a Strange Object. It might even be one of the most terrifying kinds. After all... it came directly from... a true god!"
Olivia sighed. For some reason, her gaze kept being drawn to the staff. Its scarlet lines were so perfect they looked like a work of art, and the curve of its forked top was mesmerizing...
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