"Why don't you just want me to give you the most powerful magic puppet? Just now you obviously wanted me to conjure up a puppet." The wish was so pure that even Rose felt a bit embarrassed.
"I can't control a powerful magic puppet... If I make one myself, it's much easier to manage." Hilia just wanted to quickly finish the summoning contract—the less the Evil God was involved in her wish, the smaller the price she'd have to pay.
Originally, she really did want to directly conjure a puppet, but when Rose didn't make one appear, she cooled down and decided to make it herself, and the Evil God could just casually offer a few pointers!
Rose sensed that Hilia was saying one thing but thinking another, but didn't comment.
"The contract is signed. Next, I'll help you make the magic puppet."
"Um... What's the price?" Hilia asked.
"You'll know once the wish is fulfilled."
Rose had already decided—he couldn't let this girl go.
He didn't know if someone else would summon him in the future, but now there's only this silly, naïve-looking girl, and he had to hold on tight.
Still, assisting Hilia in making the puppet—even the strongest puppet—that wish wasn't equal to helping her unseal him. It was basically like someone asking him to do the math for 1+1, while he was asking them to earn him a hundred million.
But that's not really a big deal. Now that he was mastering his own power as the only officially designated Evil God among the Gods, Rose had already figured out what to do. No matter what, if the girl wouldn't help him unseal himself now, she'd have to eventually.
That pitch-dark sealed place was even worse than being hung up in the sky as a satellite!
After getting familiar with all his powers there, the only thing Rose could do was cultivate and wait—waiting until he was strong enough to break the seal from the inside. He never imagined that after just a blink, a thousand years would have passed. Based on his current progress, he estimated that brute-forcing the seal would take another thousand years—only an external intervention could save him from that.
Rose couldn't wait that long.
Girl, you're the one!
"Oh, I see. So that means I still need to slowly collect materials to make it myself?" Hilia asked, delighted.
Rose said nothing, but just nodded.
"That's awesome!"
If I have to do everything on my own and the Evil God doesn't have to lift a finger, the price must be really simple!
In reality, Hilia followed Alina and the others out of the cave. She looked at the tied-up heretics, then cautiously glanced at Rose, anxious that he'd ask her to set the heretics free, but noticed his attention wasn't on the heretics at all. Instead... it was focused on those pale, skinny civilians.
Hilia quietly explained in her mind, "Those people are just regular folks who were tricked by the heretics. After being manipulated, they stopped working and lost their source of income, so... this is what happened."
"It's not that simple." Rose mused, "What are you planning to do with them?"
"Ms. Ailina said they'll send them to the church in Silver Frost Town and help them get home, and the church will support them for a while."
Why wasn't the Evil God concerned about his own believers, but instead focused on these civilians the cultists had exploited?
Hilia was a little curious.
No answer.
After that, Rose didn't speak, and Hilia nervously followed behind the group.
The group walked for a long time, finally reaching a town, and Alina at the front stopped.
"We're in Silver Frost Town. On the way out we used a Directional Teleporter, but there's none here, so we'll have to take the Shadow Patrol Vehicle back to Huijin City. Luckily, there's a patrol point here."
A young boy raised his hand and asked, "Teacher, we're escorting so many people—won't taking the patrol vehicle draw too much attention?"
"We're all trainee knights of the Holy Court—escorting heretics is part of our duty and should be witnessed by everyone. There's no need to hide or sneak around."
While Alina answered, Hilia took the initiative to explain to Rose in her mind, "The Shadow Patrol Vehicle is a high-speed armored vehicle that only runs along special routes. It isn't really for combat, but for convenient travel, though not many people use it."
According to the book, the Evil God and his followers were all ancient old gods who probably didn't get these new things. If I keep explaining, maybe he'll like me more and it'll be safer later, Hilia thought.
"So, it's like a high-speed train from another world. Got it. Finally seeing something familiar."
Rose looked at the patrol point in front of him, feeling a little sentimental. This device was similar to a high-speed train: fixed routes, fast speed, lots of passengers. But unlike trains, there were no tracks—instead, the route had Element Furnaces every few hundred meters, guiding and powering the vehicle. The patrol vehicle hovered above the ground, so you could also call it a Magic Hover Train.
"Actually, the name 'Shadow Patrol Vehicle' was coined by me."
The game "Star Fall" blended open world and simulation management: from solo Rangers to waging war on the battlefield, from small-town mayor to king of a nation, from raising a wife to collecting generals, from making matchboxes to remaking the world—anything you wanted to experience, you could. Renaming something was no big deal.
The NPCs in the game could even evolve on their own—every choice changed the ending, even killing mission NPCs.
It's like an actual alternate world, and looking at it now, it really IS a real alternate world.
"Huh? You named it?" Hilia was a bit stunned, surprised, "Did you make it too?"
"You could say I made it."
"But the history books say the Shadow Patrol Vehicle was a miracle created by the Gods. Then you brought five hundred years of disaster, causing lots of miraculous tech to be lost—the patrol vehicle was one of them. Only in the past few decades has it been put back into use. It's the third-best long-distance tool, just behind the Directional Teleporter and the Wings of the Wind God."