Roy became aware of the existence of Chaos with the help of his system. The notifications it issued to him when he killed the Red Mist Walkers also helped him conclude that it has corrupted the spirit of the Dragon's Pond.
But, of course, he couldn't outright tell them that.
The existence of the system was a secret. A secret is best kept when it is known by only one person. Roy had no intention of ever revealing it to others, at least not in this lifetime. He was quite certain about that.
"I have a skill that allows me to determine whether someone is a chaotic being or not when I killed them. It activated when I took down the two Walkers, signifying that they accepted Chaos."
Roy mixed lies with truth, giving them a valid answer before he pointed at Tevenlor and continued,
"And you… you said you and Yulran didn't see anyone but Damien taking the secret passage in the past several years. Damien isn't corrupted. That is what I am sure about, which leaves me to believe that the Elder Spirit welcomed Chaos with open arms, allowing it to descend straight into its heart. That's the only way it could have gotten corrupted in absolute secrecy, no? They then worked together to refine the Dragon's Pond and the evil spirit, creating anomalies like the Red Mist Walkers."
The anomalies were created by Chaos and the Elder Spirit Working together, and since these anomalies were aiming for their lives, it could only mean that the Elder Spirit wanted them dead for some reason other than it being just chaotic and wanting everything destroyed.
Tevenlor: 'Damn, his reasoning ability is actually quite good.'
The Formless Siren: "…" Is he a detective?! She would have thought that if she was from the modern world. The word detective wasn't in her memory.
Tevenlor felt impressed with his new master and gave him a head nod.
"Yes. We would have sensed it getting corrupted by chaos if the Elder Spirit had chosen some other way to get corrupted by it. But for one to have the ability to accept it directly, they must be in utter despair or be disastrously desperate for something. There's nothing down here to make him despair. So he is desperate for something. But what?"
"There actually is. Won't you be in despair if you know you are going to get stuck in a place for all eternity and that there is an evil god out there that might find and refine you one day?"
Roy's words shocked them.
"That… I didn't think about it."
"Father died. The last shield against Voss has disappeared. Now it has become easier for it to find the Dragon's Pond. And if it ever does, the Elder spirit is done for. It's thinking about the future. That's why it is in so much despair that it accepted Chaos."
The Female Siren received a pat on the head for being too intelligent.
Roy was about to kiss her but remembering that she had puked a minute ago, he held back his desire to taste her lips.
Suddenly, Tevenlor said to them, "If that's indeed the case, it isn't only in despair. It's also desperate about it. As without it, it can't leave this place."
"It is?" The Female Siren turned her head in confusion.
Tevenlor pointed at Roy.
"A body. My body!" Roy's lips thinned into a vicious smile. "It needs it to escape this place."
"It's like you think. The way out of the ancestral can only open when a dragonkin completes the last trial. That's why it needs your body. It probably knows we are here. So it will send more towards us."
The Female Siren were enlightened about the enemy's plan by hearing their words.
Unlike him and the other spirits, the spirit of the pond didn't have a humanoid body. It couldn't feel most of the seven emotions and six desires. It knew they existed, but for hundreds of years, it couldn't experience them. It yearned for them. It made sense that it was raring to get a body.
On top of that, it knew that remaining here would eventually lead to its downfall.
It needed to escape this place, and Roy was his only ticket out of here.
"But why make a move now?" Tevenlor muttered.
It had plenty of chances to take over a body in the past. So why was it trying to do that only now?
Roy chuckled, "Because the last sign of Yulran has disappeared from this world."
He didn't know how but the Elder Spirit had somehow sensed that the leash holding it down had disappeared.
Now, it could finally act out its evil thoughts.
"It has been bidding for its time patiently, acting like a monk, and now that the time to hunt is here, it won't let us go easily," Roy added, his eyes crackling with thunder.
With Yulran gone, nothing was holding it back. It was a spirit made out of his blood.
More specifically, it was the consciousness of a drop of his blood.
Yulran could kill him with a single thought.
That's why it hadn't made a move when he was alive.
But now that it had lost its connection with him, it realized he had died and its time had come.
It wanted to do nothing more than possess a pure-blooded body and leave this damned place.
Roy clutched his free hand into a fist. "It's going to get it from me."
The Elder Spirit wanted Roy's body as it was the only thing it lacked to get out of here.
But Roy wasn't going to give his body to it and kill it if it kept eyeing him or them.
"Doesn't that mean it isn't just Chaos's servants but also the Corrupted Spirit of the Dragon's Pond that is waiting for us up ahead? The next trial ground seems like a death trap to me." The Formless Siren said.
