The moonlight cast fragments of light on the surface of the pond where the goldfish were swimming, like fish scales.

The silhouettes of two people are reflected on the shimmering water. They sit close together reading a book. The slight night breeze scatters their whispered conversation. In the silence, only the sound of flowing springs and birds can be heard.

"Why is this book torn?"

"It was torn into pieces by a kid from an orphanage I worked at before and thrown into a pond, but I really liked the book, so I picked it up and glued it back together."

"Why did he tear up your book?"

"I don't know. Maybe he doesn't like me or my books. After all, no one likes an immortal monster."

Shetta said this in a calm and natural voice, as if he didn't think it was a big deal.

Bai Liu paused for a moment: "How did you get here?"

Shetta lowered her eyelashes. "The kid who tore up my book chopped me up and pushed me into the water. I drifted along the current for a long, long time, and then slowly reassembled myself. When I regained consciousness, I was already in this shrine."

"Have you ever thought about..." Bai Liu turned his head and looked at Xie Ta's profile, "leaving here?"

Xie Ta turned around and looked Bai Liu in the eye: "I can't leave."

He opened his arms slightly, and with the reflection of the moonlight, Bai Liu saw in an instant the thousands of glittering silver threads wrapped around Xie Ta's body. These threads came through the air from all directions of the shrine and were tied around Xie Ta's wrists, ankles, limbs and torso, tightly strangling him.

"This is the puppet string God has tied to me," Sheta said calmly, "Because I have not met God's expectations of me, I am here to be tempered until I can become a qualified evil god."

Bai Liu stared at Xie Ta: "A qualified evil god?"

Shetta turned his head and looked at the goldfish swimming in the pond with a calm gaze: "It can become a container for everyone's desires, can become stronger because of the pain from people's sacrifices, and can turn the world upside down into an evil game."

"I couldn't do it, so I was banished."

Bai Liu's eyes darkened: "Where were you exiled from?"

Sheta was silent for a moment: "I don't remember."

"I just remember that I was covered with a white cloth and couldn't move. Then someone would come to see me every day and ask me if I was willing to be an evil god."

"Every time I answered no, he would use tools to sculpt my face and body through a white cloth, then leave and come back to ask me the next day. Until one day he sighed and said to me, 'You will never have a soul in my hands. You need to go through training.' So I was exiled."

Bai Liu asked: "Why don't you want to be an evil god?"

Shetta paused and said, "Because I can't understand it."

"Everyone who comes to see me at this shrine and opens my eyes from my slumber has a desire that is extremely painful."

"They walked up to me, pushed aside the shrine where I was sleeping, looked up at me with dark eyes, knelt in front of me and begged me with tears, or cursed and pushed me, forcing me to fulfill their desires."

"But I don't have the ability to fulfill people's wishes. Only true evil gods have that ability."

"If the suffering of these sacrifices is of high quality and meets God's requirements, God will be satisfied to fulfill the wishes of these suffering sacrifices and transfer their suffering, desires and memories to me, allowing me to personally experience the suffering these sacrifices have experienced."

"God always tells me that pain makes the soul more valuable. I need the carving of pain."

Shetta looked down at the goldfish swimming carefree in the pond. He stretched out his fingertips and lightly touched the water surface. Ripples spread out and the goldfish swam away. He continued:

"But no matter how much pain and desire I absorb from others, I am like a low-quality leak. I can never contain or use these things to become an evil god."

"I cannot understand human desires or pain. The person who sculpted me said that I have the most evil and powerful body in the world, but it is just a failed container that cannot contain any evil."

"He said it was because I had no soul, and that pain was worthless to a soulless monster."

"I don't understand why people have desires and feel pain, and I don't understand why they continue to pray to the evil gods who torture them to fulfill their desires even though they are in such pain."

"It would be better if I just gave up."

Xie Ta turned around and gently placed his hand on the back of Bai Liu's hand. He looked at him seriously and asked in a low voice: "Bai Liu came to me and woke me up. Can you tell me what you want to achieve no matter how painful it is?"

"Can you tell me why you won't give up this desire?"

Bai Liu slightly avoided Xie Ta's gaze. He lowered his eyelids and withdrew his hand, curled up his fingers, and hummed softly.

Xie Ta leaned forward and looked at Bai Liu intently with pure curiosity in his eyes: "Why won't Bai Liu give up this desire no matter how much pain she is in?"

Bai Liu paused and said in a light tone: "Maybe it's because the pain of giving up this person is more intense than the pain of giving up getting this person."

Shetha was silent.

He sat up straight slowly, then withdrew his hand from the back of Bai Liu's hand, distanced himself from Bai Liu, frowned and looked at the reflection of his own swaying bare feet in the pool. The chains on his feet rang as he shook them.

Xie Ta asked softly, "Bai Liu's desire is for a person?"

"It's rare that just one person can cause me so much pain that I can wake up."

Xie Ta lowered his eyes and said, "Can you describe to me the pain you feel because of this person? What kind of pain is it that makes you pray to the evil god?"

Bai Liu also lowered his head. He looked at Xie Ta's swaying reflection on the water, slightly turned his head, and said calmly: "It's probably enough pain to become an evil god."

Xie Ta's eyes widened slightly, and he turned his head abruptly to see Bai Liu's appearance, only to find that Bai Liu stood up on his knees, said lightly, "It's getting light, I'm leaving," and turned to leave.

"Please wait a moment!" Xie Ta stretched out his hand and tried to grab Bai Liu who was turning away.

But the moment Xie Ta stretched out his hand, countless silk threads surged, intertwined and tightened around his wrist, and stopped the moment Xie Ta's fingertips touched Bai Liu's fluttering clothes.

Xie Ta's fingertips turned white from being pulled, but he still gently and firmly grasped the hem of Bai Liu's clothes and tugged at them. He looked up at Bai Liu and said softly, "Will you come tomorrow?"

Bai Liu stopped walking away without looking back: "Do you want me to come?"

Xie Ta's long eyelashes trembled slightly: "Yeah."

Bai Liu said calmly: "Then I will come tomorrow night."

When Bai Liu pushed open the door of the shrine and disappeared from Xie Ta's sight, Xie Ta, who was held by the puppet strings, felt a strong sense of sleepiness. He slowly fell on the wooden corridor, and the books were scattered on the ground. Xie Ta tried hard to open his eyes and look at Bai Liu's back a few more times, but he was controlled by the puppet strings and had to fall asleep.

This was the first time he had seen a sacrifice that could wake him up just by walking into a shrine.

The sacrifice named Bai Liu looked at him, staring into his eyes. Clearly, he had so many desires and pains, but he did not go crazy because of these things. He was always so calm and unperturbed when he looked at this terrifying evil god.

——That look was filled with emotions he didn’t understand.

He really wanted to see her again.

Xie Ta leaned against the old wooden board, looked in the direction where Bai Liu left, and slowly closed his eyes.

Bai Liu went down the mountain with the night light in his hand, returned to the shrine to put away the key, and then returned to the attic where he lived. As soon as he opened the door, he saw Sota, who jumped up in fright. When he saw that it was Bai Liu, his eyes lit up, and he patted his chest and breathed a sigh of relief, saying, "You're finally back! It's almost dawn!"

Then, Sota worriedly told Bai Liu what Xiao Kui had said to him, and Bai Liu nodded - this was almost what he expected.

"Won't we be tortured like this during the day too?" When Cang Tai thought of the various scenes Xiao Kui described, he became so anxious that he began to feel a headache.

"You are a servant, don't worry too much." Bai Liu said as he unbuttoned his coat and piled it next to his pillow, closing his eyes and preparing to sleep. "They should mainly torture the sacrifice."

Cang Tai helplessly looked at Bai Liu who was falling asleep quickly. He had a lot to say, but in the end he didn't say a word and just sighed quietly.

Even though he was about to be severely tortured by those perverted people from the Kitahara family, he was able to fall asleep so naturally and quickly.

As a servant, he didn't sleep last night.

As a sacrifice, Lord Bai Liu has a really good attitude...

"By the way, I'm going to break into the shrine again tomorrow night to steal the key." Bai Liu closed his eyes and suddenly spoke, "The black dog ghost at the shrine has come to claim its master. I need something that smells like Xiaokui. Did you steal Xiaokui's clothes and bring them back?"

Sota slapped his forehead and said suddenly, "I almost forgot, I brought it back!"

Then when Sota finally reacted, he was horrified: "What! You're going to steal the key and go to the shrine in the back mountain tomorrow night!"

"Yeah." Bai Liu yawned lazily and turned over to sleep. "He's trapped inside and can't leave. This is the only way for now."

Bai Liu fell asleep quickly, leaving behind a terrified Cang Tai, who was standing beside him, nervous and crazy, biting his hand and fantasizing.

Second night.

Sota was tying a bandage around Bai Liu's shoulders. Blood oozed from the bandage. Seeing this, Sota was worried and scared. His voice was filled with tears. "The Kitahara family is really going too far! How could they punish you like this right away?"

Bai Liu looked calm. After tying his belt and putting on his coat, he stood up and said, "I'm leaving."

Although he could cut Liu Jiayi's face to heal the wound, in the current situation, it was not a good thing for a sacrifice to heal the wound easily.

Cang Tai knelt at Bai Liu's feet with a worried look on his face: "Master Bai Liu, you only slept for a short while after you came back last night, and you were attacked by the Beiyuan family during the day... Are you still going tonight?"

"Go." Bai Liu said concisely.

An hour later.

Xiao Kui was lying on the window side, bored and without any clothes on. Her back, like Bai Liu's, was covered with many knife cuts, which were still very fresh, but she casually exposed them to the air without any treatment.

She was staring out the window in a daze with her chin supported by one hand, when the corner of her eye suddenly caught sight of something. Xiaokui's eyes suddenly focused, and she saw a dim light light up again on the road leading to the mountaintop shrine.

"Again?!" Xiao Kui was shocked and frowned, "Is this guy really desperate? He was tortured during the day and he went there again at night?!"

Bai Liu pushed open the door of the shrine, followed the path he took yesterday and went inside floor by floor, then pushed open the door of the shrine.

The moonlight was pure and clean. Xie Ta was still sitting in the same place, looking back at him. Bai Liu stepped onto the old wooden boards on the corridor and felt dizzy.

Bai Liu was a little dizzy due to excessive blood loss from the wound, the chase with the black dog ghost, and the hasty run to the shrine. He leaned against the pillar at the entrance to steady his slightly shaky body.

Xie Ta immediately noticed that something was wrong with Bai Liu. He frowned and walked forward, just about to reach out and hold up Bai Liu who was leaning forward.

A small dress with exquisite design and cherry blossoms embroidered on the chest slowly floated out from Bai Liu's sleeves and fell to the ground in a spin.

Xie Ta and Bai Liu shifted their gazes over at the same time.

——These were Xiaokui's clothes that Cang Tai stole from Xiaokui's attic in a hurry. Bai Liu used them to fool the black dog ghost.

This is a female lining.

Xie Ta paused as he was about to support Bai Liu. He slowly withdrew his hand and put it in his sleeve. He lowered his eyes and looked at the clothes. His tone was unclear: "...Is this the clothes that Bai Liu, who can't control his desires, wears?"

"You carry it with you?"

Bai Liu: “…”