The Record of Unusual Creatures

At only 10 cm tall with a comical look, the Malevolence could not be taken lightly. There was a sense of crisis. Hao Ren had to deal with it seriously. He took the lunch box and immediately headed to heaven to look for Raven 12345.

By the time he arrived, it was meal time. A heavenly meat aroma wafted into his nostril when Hao Ren arrived at the entrance of the ‘temple.’ He looked up and saw fire in front of the fountain in the center of the garden. There, Raven 12345 was having a barbeque.

In a typical script, you would be struck dumb if you saw a god having a barbeque in front of his house. But after working with the neurotic goddess for some time, Hao Ren was immune. His first reaction was, “Oh, the neurotic goddess does know something else other than cooking noodles.”

Sensing that someone was visiting, Raven 12345 looked up and saw Hao Ren was there with a lunch box in his hand. The goddess was flabbergasted. “What the heck? It is as if you have not had enough last time, now you come with a lunch box?”

Hao Ren was stupefied.

“First thing first, this meat is not for you, mainly because Bahamut is poisonous and I am afraid that you will get diarrhea. But then, as a pope, don’t you feel embarrassed mooching food off of me?”

“I am not here for the food,” Hao Ren said, finally could not bear to hear her babbling and interrupted her. “This lunch box is a sealed container. Something has happened.”

“Sealed container? Why don’t you use an electric cooker?” Raven 12345 made fun of him. But when she sensed what was in the lunch box, her expression turned solemn. “So, what happened?”

“Vivian has split again, last night,” Hao Ren said. He could care less about etiquette rules in front of Raven 12345. Pulling a cushion over, Hao Ren sat with legs crossed before the goddess, and then slowly unlidded the lunch box. “This is the thing,” he said.

As soon as the lunch box was opened, a dark-red shadow lunged out. The little thing moved so fast that she did not realize what was on the outside and went straight into the fire not far away. The little creature was screaming in pain. Seeing something was not right, Raven 12345’s reaction was fast. With the snap of her fingers, the flame, burning with incredible power, was extinguished in an instant. Even the residual heat in the ashes seemed to have gone.

In reality, the Malevolence was only in the fire for less than a second, but she was already like a drowned mouse lying face down in the ash, twitching, and unable to get up.

“What is that?” Raven 12345 asked while throwing the miniature Vivian treatment magic, before picking her up with two fingers. “A Malevolence? Why is she so tiny?” the goddess asked.

“We have discussed this before.” Hao Ren told of what happened in details. “Our conclusion is, the amulet you gave Vivian has somewhat reduced the sequela of the splitting and the strength of the Malevolence. When we found her, she was hiding in a mouse hole, probably planning an offensive plan, such as launching a raid from the mouse hole to catch us off-guard, kill us all, and stuff like that.”

“It seems that she is not as clever as you think. Probably she was just made the mouse hole her home.” Raven 12345 scratched her chin, observing the Malevolence with interest. “I have studied the intellect of Malevolence before, they basically think like a beast. Though having a certain level of intellect, their animal instinct is dominant and controlling their actions. They are purely destructive machines. You can see them as a highly concentrated collection of negative emotion and power. She may be tiny but should be similar in nature.”

“Why do you think she is so tiny?”

“Well, your guess could be right; it might be a result of the amulet’s power.” Raven 12345 said while swinging the tiny thing, who was struggling and making some threatening but meaningless growl at her. “Do you know what it means?”

“What does it mean?” Hao Ren asked, eagerly wanting to find out.

“It means that Vivian’s split, hibernation, loss of memory, and the Malevolence she released—all of these unusual symptoms are rooted in her soul, and had nothing to do with external factors. The amulet I gave her was actually a soul protector, and it would only unleash its power in fighting the ‘lesion’ at the spiritual level,” Raven 12345 said, looking at Hao Ren.

“You mean there is something in Vivian’s soul?” Hao Ren was nervous.

“The possibility is extremely high, but that thing must have been symbiotic with her soul, and may even be part of her soul from the beginning. So it is undetected by conventional methods. Only when this latent factor-induced lesion in her soul, the amulet was activated, and we discovered the clues.” Raven 12345 said, nodding.

“Is this latent factor the source of corruption?” Hao Ren had quickly linked this to his recent investigations. “Just like the things lurking in the souls of the guardians in the Plane of Dreams.”

“There is this possibility,” Raven 12345 said cautiously.

Hao Ren scratched his chin. A vague thought that emerged long ago in his mind was becoming more apparent. “Is this is not like a ‘detoxification’ process?” he asked.

He paused for a moment to reorganize his thought. “The pollutant in the soul is an external ‘toxin.’ When the pollutant grows, it will threaten Vivian. When the pollutant reaches a certain level, Vivian’s soul will begin the detoxification process. But because the contaminant is too ingrained with her soul, the detox will inevitably hurt her— like the removal of the infected part of the body, it is exhaustive to her soul. This will explain everything. She hibernates because she needs to recuperate after the damage done to her soul during the detox; she loses her memory because of the damage to her soul too, and the same thing also causes her to lose her power. So the Malevolence is essentially the discharged toxin.”

“Good analytical skill. But you can continue to infer: what if the detox process fails?” Raven 12345 nodded lightly.

“If the detox fails, it will lead to total pollution.” The battle and the gigantic demon-god Vivian in the deep underground of Inferno came to mind. “Vivian had experienced a unique splitting in Inferno. There were two different splits, both were normal. The one stayed on Inferno became the goddess the natives worshipped for a long time. But when we arrived, there was only the demon-god, Vivian. If I’m not mistaken, it must be the result of pollution exceeding the critical value.”

“Vivian would be totally transformed into a demon.” Raven 12345 added.

The question was finally answered.

Why was the split body of Vivian on Inferno so different from others—from strength to appearance? The reason was that it was not the discharged toxin, but the body is entirely infected by the pollution!

“I should have thought of this earlier,” Hao Ren smacked his own head, he sounded upset. “The splitting phenomenon is so in-your-face.”

“But you didn’t even know the existence of the pollutant before. It’s not your fault.” Raven 12345 unexpectedly comforted him. “The investigation of corruption has only started recently. You have done a good job already. Is Vivian not safe and sound at last? The amulet I personally blessed is still with her. She is going to be fine.”

“I won’t be able to sleep if the problem is not resolved completely,” Hao Ren said with his brows pulled together. “The pollutant is still inside her. Is there any way to completely purify that stuff?”

Raven 12345 quietly looked at Hao Ren for a while. He looked helpless. The goddess shook her head. “Using force to remove the pollutant is very risky. What’s more, you haven’t even figured out the nature of this ‘evil force’ in the Plane of Dreams, and what the corruptive pollution is all about. If you don’t know what it is, you can’t treat it.”

After thinking for a further long while, Hao Ren could not help but agree. “So the most effective way is to find out the source of the ‘evil force’ in the Plane of Dreams as soon as possible.”