Pastor's Tantra

"...It turns out that demons can really evolve.

Ligeia, whose face was still bleeding, murmured in surprise: "I thought it was just a legend."

"It's indeed almost the same as the legend."

Yanis sighed: "I have never seen a demon complete evolution in my life, let alone you."

In theory, demons can undoubtedly evolve. After all, the power system of the Sin Brand is here, and keeping the form unchanged must not be in line with the changing nature of the transcendent path.

"Because the evolution of demons often accumulates a large amount of power, which requires devouring a large number of souls and accumulating for an extremely long time."

Aiwass heard the discussion between the two, and while healing himself, he replied: "If the time span is extended to five hundred years, then demons that have independently evolved will still exist."

After all, in this world, it is quite dangerous to harvest even the souls of mortals.

Because according to the rules of this world, after all lives with souls disappear, the souls will enter the dream world and plunge into one of the nine rivers in the dream world according to their strongest path adaptability.

After two rounds of screening by the Nine Pillars God and the Heavenly Lords, souls that are not wanted by any god will be reintegrated into the world and become the material for the souls of newborns of various races. The soul will gradually grow with the maturity of personality and the increase of intelligence. After the death of an old man, he can become nine babies. If this cycle continues, there will be more and more creatures in this world.

In other words, every soul in this world is on the account. It cannot be appropriated at will.

To create an apostle, you need to share part of your own strength, and the nine rivers need to be filled with souls, otherwise it may cause the world to tilt - if there is a path that has not returned the soul of this path to the world for a long time, then the soul of the newborn baby The proportion of roads mixed with this part will undoubtedly become smaller and smaller.

Then the influence of this path in the material world will decrease. Tiansi, who prefers other paths, will also have an opportunity.

From this perspective, the soul given to the world can also be regarded as a "tax". After paying enough taxes, the rest belongs to you, and everyone can use the taxes paid together.

——Yes, in this world even the high gods have to pay taxes. ơɱ

There have been many dream wars between Pillar Gods and Pillar Gods, between Pillar Gods and Tiansi, and between Tiansi and Tiansi. The direct cause of these wars is often problems with the distribution of souls.

Maybe Sizhu was interested in someone who wanted to be an apostle, but he was poached by Tiansi from other paths before he died; or maybe the soul that was originally going to enter the blood realm was secretly branded with a major sin and turned into a demon.

Even if a soul is directly destroyed, it means that the soul directly returns to the world, but not many gods will be dissatisfied. At most, the pillar god or Tiansi who booked that soul in advance will be angry because of it.

But if you steal a soul, especially a soul that is favored by the Pillar God or Tiansi, it is undoubtedly a very serious crime.

——It seems that he just stole a soul, but in fact he killed an apostle in advance and stole the soul that might have belonged to other paths to the transcendent path.

This is an "imbalance" move.

Therefore, only when the terms of the contract are met - that is, if the other party has determined in advance that he will "hand over his soul" and actively accepts the deal, the responsible person will be transferred to the party who signed the contract.

"It's okay to say that the phantom demons of other paths, but the demons beyond the path must have a strong desire to ascend. However, they themselves have no flesh and blood, and are just phantom demons living in the dream world. Therefore, they cannot be like creatures in the material world. Becoming stronger through the power of the path itself.

"So, demons can only obtain highly valuable souls by signing contracts. The transcendent power emitted by the host can slowly increase the power of demons; demons can also find ways to complete the contract and eat the souls directly. To gain a lot of transcendent power.”

Aiwass made a simple metaphor: "It's like eating eggs and eating the hens that lay them. Although the latter seems not cost-effective, if there are other hens who are not afraid of death who dare to take over, it is not impossible to carry them. Stab and jump ship.”

Because of this, few demons can gather enough strength to complete their evolution. You need to be active in the material world for at least four to five hundred years to have the opportunity to accumulate the power to support evolution - and you must not die completely during the entire process, otherwise you will be reborn as a phantom egg, and your power will naturally have to be calculated from scratch.

In Aiwass's impression, there weren't many demons that had clearly completed evolution.

For example, the giant prince's brother, the beholder - it gained a little power during the Ring of the Ring ceremony and evolved into the beholder lord.

This is one of the evolutionary directions, and it is also the simplest evolutionary direction.

Aiwass's Shadow Demon can also directly evolve into the Shadow Demon Lord. This only strengthens one's own template without changing the skill set and form, which is equivalent to obtaining comprehensive strengthening on the original basis. The race remains unchanged, but the elite monsters have become lord monsters. But this is still not considered a high-level phantom.

In addition, the shadow demon with the "Rage" brand has another real evolutionary direction.

That is the "Fire Demon" who became a high-level phantom.

Balrog also belongs to the system of the Brand of Fury, and is a high-level phantom, very powerful.

Balrog is also the only demon among demons that has mastered the power of the path of devotion - Balrog can create a large number of familiars by devouring souls and splitting itself infinitely. It can also be forged to create "demons" equivalent to the deep purple "holy object" level. equipment".

This is roughly equivalent to a low-end version of Fallen Heavenly Division - instead of turning people into demons, it turns people into familiars; at the same time, Balrog can also give others power... Although it is given through equipment, the equipment must also It can be considered part of the power.

——A gun doesn’t count as a combat weapon?

Not to mention having a combat power of 5 with a gun, you can't even reach a combat power of 5 without a gun!

But there is no doubt that if Aiwass's shadow demon becomes the Balrog, then Aiwass will not be able to sign a contract with her as a beast of sin. Because the Flame-Contrary Butterfly is also a fire attribute, it overlaps with the Balrog.

And there's another problem.

That means Balrog is ugly.

Some players may think it's majestic, but Aiwass just thinks it's ugly.

The form of the Balrog is that of a scorching monster made of flames, magma, and red-hot metal. It looks like a giant with a strong physique... Not to mention being unable to contact Aiwass, even just by showing up, the high temperature that can easily melt the earth will make the surrounding creatures unbearable.

And if Shadow Demon really turns into Balrog, it means that all the power she accumulated on the path of love will be nullified. She can still use some of the power of shadow, but not too much - after all, she still needs to accumulate a lot of deflections on the path of devotion before she can complete the evolution.

But Night Stalker is different.

The Night Demon is a demon with the mark of jealousy, and her counterpart is the Mirror Demon. The essence of jealousy is comparison and imitation, and imitation is the essence of ritual. Therefore, the Mirror Demon is a demon that purely transcends the path, and it is quite difficult to evolve into a Night Demon across the path.

But it happened that Shadow Demon's Rage Brand changed into a Jealousy Brand. If she evolved from Shadow Demon's jump mark to Night Demon, she would be able to retain a considerable part of Shadow Demon's power, and at the same time obtain a new template for Night Demon.

——The sixth-level high-level phantom!

In terms of strength alone, it is already as powerful as the final BOSS of the current version.

"Brother," Yulia frowned slightly, "You were too dangerous just now..."

She didn't want to blame Aiwass, nor did she want to reflect on what had been successful. But it really scared her to tears just now.

What if Aiwass does this again?

What if the demon betrays him next time?

——That’s a devil! A demon with a traitorous nature!

"Don't worry, I will only raise one demon in Vines, and there will be no others... The others will also be phantom demons from other paths, and they will not be dangerous demons."

Aiwas comforted: "I know Vignes very well, she will never betray me. And the transcendent desire that Vignes gets from me is more mellow than the soul of the vulgar. It is like the taste of an egg. Nutrition and deliciousness have surpassed hens..."

...So she won't harm me, just don't worry.

Aiwass wanted to make a joke to make Yulia relax.

But looking at her red eyes and the eyes staring silently at him, Aiwass still shrank his neck and did not dare to say these words.

——Aiwass’ intuition told him that Yulia might explode after saying these words.

So Yanis quickly changed the topic: "I remember that if a demon devours other people's souls, it may be discovered and punished by the agent of the hourglass."

"Well," Aiwass nodded and immediately answered, "Although Sand Time is a bit nosy...but he is indeed the pillar god who cares most about maintaining the balance between the two worlds.

"Restricting the Pillar God and Tiansi from coming to the material world and blocking the upper limit of the world level to protect the material world are all due to the sand timepiece; and the fragments of Tiansi fell into the material world and increased the power concentration of the corresponding path. After that, He will work hard to raise the upper limit of the corresponding world level to restore balance between the two worlds.

"Without Sand Clock, the Lord of Balance, the world would be doomed——"

This is speaking from the heart.

Think about it, the Nine Pillar Gods and the Heavenly Lords can walk around the world as they please without any restrictions, and can initiate world-scale wars at every turn... Aiwass couldn't even imagine how chaotic the scene would be.

...Of course, Sand Clock is also the most troubled Pillar God.

When the contract with the phantoms summoned from the dream world expires, He will prevent these phantoms from staying in the material world; if someone steals souls in the material world, He will also send an agent to deal with it; if the war in the material world lasts too long and the people are in dire straits, He will He will also be responsible for intervening and mediating; if there are wild high-level phantoms in the material world that are too powerful, He will also take action to send them back to the dream world...

When the Ring of Ending Ceremony begins, Sand Clock will become the busiest Pillar God.

When players challenge Tiansi, they will receive targeted blessings from Sand Clock and use this as a countermeasure - this is the normal mode.

And if the player chooses not to accept the blessing of Sand Timepiece, he can forcefully challenge Tiansi and pass the level to obtain another difficult achievement. This is considered difficult.

In terms of the settings of the game "The Linking Ring", card draw guarantees, crit probability pseudo-randomness, backpack detection, difficulty balance... these are only designs at the game level, and they also belong to the field of sand timepieces. At least that's what the officials say.

……Um?

Just when Aiwass thought of this, his expression suddenly changed and he covered his chest. Night Demon, who had transformed into a crow form, also suddenly changed back.

"……etc?"

He felt as if something was cracking in his heart.

——That was the contract signed with Shadow Demon on the night when Aiwass awakened his past life memories.