Borrowed power inevitably had a time limit.
Against things that possessed a certain concept of time, the Time Reset Talisman was practically a divine artifact.
This had been the first time the Time Reset Talisman had taken effect, and it had also allowed Him to gain a better understanding of its functions. The next time He used it, He would definitely be able to bring out even greater effects.
As the Vessel of the Stars stood upon the sea, He gazed at the dark-red waters stained by black slime and blood. His gaze swept past the blood-red tentacles before Him and landed on the distant island.
Since the Mother Goddess of Depravity had already unleashed Her might, now was the perfect time to head to that island. Moreover, Primordial Hunger was still rampaging around up there.
Smack! Smack!
The surrounding blood-red tentacles had already made the Vessel of the Stars their highest-priority target, while the black tentacles in the sky also came crashing down.
In response, the Vessel of the Stars casually opened a doorway, avoiding all the attacks and arriving on the island.
Without needing to worry about the Hope, the Vessel of the Stars now wielded six different Beyonder pathways, possessing both offensive and defensive capabilities. These tentacles, which possessed little intelligence, simply couldn't stop Him.
As soon as He arrived on the island, He saw Primordial Hunger reach out, grab a black tentacle, and pull it over to swallow it. Halfway through eating it, He began spitting repeatedly, vomiting out everything He had eaten as if complaining that it smelled far too foul.
Upon seeing the Vessel of the Stars arrive, Primordial Hunger turned around and carefully examined Him twice. "Are you a believer of the Stars, or an incarnation of the Stars?"
Without waiting for an answer, He chuckled. "Judging by how furious the Mother Goddess of Depravity was just now, you should be an incarnation of the Stars."
"You're too slow."
"..." Primordial Hunger awkwardly turned away. When the Mother Goddess of Depravity had unleashed Her might earlier, He had indeed stayed where He was and deliberately slacked off.
He hadn't expected to be caught red-handed by the Stars. How embarrassing.
Perhaps dissatisfied with the taste of the black tentacle earlier, Primordial Hunger hefted His massive bone club and began smashing His way forward!
Starting from the entrance of the mausoleum, He forcibly demolished everything in His path, smashing apart anything that blocked the way.
The Vessel of the Stars slowly followed behind Him, occasionally raising His head to look at the dark, lightless sky.
The opening that had been pierced through earlier had once again been eroded by darkness. It had already become a paradise for the black tentacles, while the sea had turned into an ocean of red tentacles.
Perhaps sensing that the Vessel of the Stars had landed on the island, black tentacles came crashing down like mountain ranges, but Primordial Hunger shattered every one of them with a single swing of His club.
He seemed to possess pure power capable of easily destroying everything before Him.
Was this His authority? Or was He deliberately displaying this aspect of Himself to mislead others' observations of Him?
After all, once one's abilities were completely understood, it became very easy to be specifically targeted and killed.
They demolished their way from the mausoleum entrance into the depths of the Black Emperor's mausoleum.
The interior was completely empty. Aside from the pitch-black walls and the elevated platform at the very center, there was nothing else.
Atop the platform stood an enormous throne that looked as though it had been prepared for a giant. Its entire body seemed to be made of iron, its surface engraved with complex, twisted, and intricate strange patterns, while the top of its backrest extended upward into the shape of a crown.
At this moment, there was no figure seated upon the chair. It simply sat silently facing the darkness, empty as it awaited the return of its rightful master, the Black Emperor.
"Is this chair prepared for me?" Primordial Hunger looked up at it. "But it doesn't look very tasty."
He tried walking toward the elevated platform, only to feel a binding and restrictive force. It was like invisible shackles wrapping around His hands, feet, and every part of His body, making it difficult for Him to move.
"The Black Emperor's order?" Primordial Hunger grinned foolishly. His entire body suddenly exerted tremendous force, contending against the Black Emperor's order that remained here. Then came the distinct sound of shackles breaking, and Primordial Hunger regained His freedom.
"I can swallow even the rules and order of that bastard the Son of Chaos in a single bite, let alone those of a mere Black Emperor."
As Primordial Hunger spoke, He opened His enormous mouth and inhaled deeply. The invisible, shattered shackles of order were sucked into His mouth. After several sounds of chewing, He swallowed them into His stomach.
When He tried to continue forward, distorted vortices appeared around Him, while the sound of metal striking metal came from inside His stomach.
"I forgot. This is only an avatar."
Primordial Hunger muttered somewhat sheepishly before focusing all His strength on digesting the restless shackles of Black Emperor order within His body.
Compared to Primordial Hunger, who was restricted at every turn, the Vessel of the Stars wasn't affected by the residual order of the Black Emperor here.
In terms of rules and order, the Hall of Stars completely surpassed the Black Emperor. Even the Son of Chaos was suppressed by it, despite this not being the Hall of Stars' most important authority.
Thinking about it carefully, this was only natural. The Hall of Stars invited Great Old Ones to attend meetings. If it wanted these existences to obediently follow the will of the Hall of Stars, then it naturally had to possess rules and order that were nearly impossible to defy.
The Son of Chaos had suffered precisely because, after being pulled into the Hall of Stars, He had acknowledged its rules and order and consciously abided by them.
Compliance itself was an important prerequisite for rules and order to take effect.
Despite being unrestricted, the Vessel of the Stars didn't act recklessly. Instead, He waited for Primordial Hunger to clear the way.
Who knew whether the Mother Goddess of Depravity had laid more traps ahead? Moreover, within a dark corner of this Black Emperor mausoleum, there was still a hidden figure.
He was observing the Vessel of the Stars and Primordial Hunger from the shadows, but due to an instinctive wariness, He chose not to approach.
That should be the corrupted Roselle.
He should originally have been sleeping on that Black Emperor throne, constantly resisting the Mother Goddess of Depravity's corruption while in slumber.
When the mausoleum entrance was destroyed and the Mother Goddess of Depravity's power grew stronger and exerted greater influence, He awakened from His slumber upon the throne on the elevated platform.
Bang!
Primordial Hunger slapped His exposed belly, producing a crisp sound. The invisible yet omnipresent Black Emperor order around Him was completely destroyed.
As for the so-called distorted vortices, in Primordial Hunger's eyes, a single sweep of His club was enough to smash them into a mass of pitch-black mush.
Then He pulled back His white bone club, leaned His mouth over, and gave it a long lick. After tasting it for a moment, He said, "The taste isn't bad. It just has the Mother Goddess of Depravity's stink mixed in."
After licking it clean, Primordial Hunger strode forward with His burly figure, carrying the white bone club over His shoulder as He continued toward the elevated platform, His gaze gradually becoming sharp.
When He reached the platform and was about to smash the throne apart with His club, the corrupted black figure hidden in the shadows suddenly darted out, accompanied by distortion and chaos.
"A little rat hiding in the shadows."
Primordial Hunger swept His club horizontally, only for the space before Him to suddenly distort and shift. The figure that should have been standing before Him had already appeared behind Him, stretching out hands covered in black slime in an attempt to grab His neck.
Viscous black liquid dripped onto the back of His neck, producing wisps of smoke as it burned and corroded Him.
"What a nuisance."
Primordial Hunger didn't turn around. Instead, another enormous mouth grew from the back of His head. It bit down on the black figure's hands, tore them off, and swallowed the two severed arms.
"Ptooey, ptooey, ptooey! It stinks!"
After chewing twice, Primordial Hunger spat the food back out of His mouth.
The remains of the severed arms transformed into viscous black liquid and flowed back onto the black figure's damaged arms, restoring the severed limbs.
After His attack failed, the black figure realized that the prey before Him was difficult to deal with and began instinctively using the authorities belonging to the Black Emperor.
Chaos and distortion instantly filled the entire Black Emperor mausoleum. Rules and order that had lain sealed away for an unknown number of years came alive once again, forming black chains.
Hundreds of black chains moved simultaneously, tightly wrapping around Primordial Hunger. Although they couldn't harm His powerful body, they bound Him tightly enough that He couldn't move.
After temporarily restraining Primordial Hunger, the black figure turned His gaze toward the Vessel of the Stars standing not far behind Primordial Hunger. Then, like a phantom, He appeared behind the Vessel of the Stars while simultaneously distorting the world around Him, twisting even His senses and vision.
The Vessel of the Stars merely stood motionless as a sacred radiance suddenly erupted from His entire body, bright enough to illuminate the entire Black Emperor mausoleum.
When facing powers related to the Mother Goddess of Depravity, the Beyonder abilities of the Sun pathway were extremely useful and convenient.
The black figure, who had slept for countless years and had always existed within a world of darkness, had never bathed in or directly faced light of this intensity.
The black slime flowing across His body hissed as it evaporated, while He Himself let out a shrill scream. With a whoosh, He fled the area around the Vessel of the Stars and appeared atop the elevated platform, using the backrest of the Black Emperor's throne to shield Himself from the light.
At that moment, the Vessel of the Stars finally saw the black figure's true appearance clearly.
He sat upon the high-backed chair. Two cracks had split open across His face, resembling two asymmetrical eyes. There were no pupils within them, only a field of blood-red.
Before the purifying sunlight, more cracks split open across the black figure's body. They extended downward from His head, blooming into blood-red flowers across various parts of His body.
Flowers of flesh formed from piles of blood and meat.
Through those open cracks, one could see something within the black figure's body that radiated a blood-red glow.
It greatly resembled the crimson moon hanging in the sky, except that this crimson moon had yet to reach perfection. Many of its parts had not yet completely converged.
Roselle, or now the black shadow, tried to conceal the radiance of that crimson moon and prevent it from shining through. However, more and more cracks appeared across His body, and the light belonging to the crimson moon grew increasingly intense.
Rays of crimson moonlight were passing through Roselle's body, shining from the cosmos into the real world.
Roselle, who had once single-handedly founded the Republic of Intis and led the tide of an era, was now merely a vessel in the hands of the Mother Goddess of Depravity, one capable of influencing the real world.
He danced according to the Mother Goddess of Depravity's will, having lost His consciousness while still retaining a trace of His original self.
That throne, filled with aloofness and majesty, was already His final shred of dignity.