Silas saw the True Creator on that illusory sea.
Ma'am M issued him a warning, dispersing the gray-white mist that surrounded the waters, allowing him to see the other side of the sea, where a towering giant hung upside down.
"How is this possible..."
Silas murmured in disbelief.
The trembling, terrifying truth filled him with horror.
This illusory sea that had helped him resist countless dangers, that served as his trump card, his golden finger, had at its far end, on the other side, that powerful evil god?
I'm standing on the same sea as the True Creator?!
His thoughts fell into chaos. He couldn't believe what he was seeing.
"..."
On that distant side of the sea, so far as to be nearly unreachable, the inverted giant seemed to sense Silas's gaze and suddenly opened his eyes.
In those eyes, Silas saw only pure madness.
A flash of red light, and his body instantly swelled and exploded.
"Bang!"
Before Silas could cry out in pain, his form dissipated over the ocean.
"Ah!"
He jolted awake from his bedroom bed, clutching his head and crying out.
Blood poured from his nose, eyes, and ears. Intense pain stimulated his nerves, torturing him for a long time before finally receding.
"Huff, huff..."
Silas gasped violently, sweat streaming down his forehead. His eyes flickered with terror and confusion.
Though the physical pain had left his body, his heart remained anything but calm.
What's going on?
What the hell is going on!
That sea was clearly my golden finger. Why, why is the True Creator standing on the other side?!
Turbulent thoughts kept surging, filling his mind.
"Haha!"
He heard his own voice speaking, its tone provocative and flippant. "Just killed the kid, now the old man shows up!"
"That's the True Creator! He'll kill me, that's my destiny!"
He heard his own voice crying out again.
"The filthy evil god has his eyes on you. Leave here immediately. Don't worry about others. Use them as sacrifices..."
He also heard his own voice, cruel and merciless.
"Shut up... shut up!"
Silas's head felt like it was being driven mad by these voices.
He gritted his teeth, pulled the ritual dagger from his coat, and aimed it at his boiling head.
"Pfft!"
"Ugh!"
"Ah!"
"Ah!"
One stab, and pain so extreme it instantly flooded his mind. All the voices screamed out in unison at the same moment, no longer offering Silas their opinions.
"Disappear. All of you, disappear."
Warm blood trickled down his cheek to his jaw as Silas spoke coldly and madly.
Whether frightened by his ferocity or shocked by the injury's stimulus, those clamoring voices truly began to fade. Silas's ears returned to silence.
"Tch."
He pulled out the dagger, gently wiped the dulled blade, and the wound healed. Even the blood flowed back along his face into the wound.
"Calm down. The more situations like this arise, the more I need to stay calm..." Silas said to himself in a low voice.
"Think carefully. What exactly is going on here?"
After his ears quieted, he gradually regained his rationality and could analyze the problem correctly.
He listed several important questions in his mind and began thinking through them one by one.
First, did Silas really see the True Creator?
Since he'd seen it during his mad hallucinations, it was possible that due to their sequence connection, his brain had fabricated a nonexistent scene.
Or perhaps, due to the lingering influence of the evil god's offspring, he'd seen a projection of the True Creator...
"No."
Silas shook his head softly. "That was real. And it was really on that sea."
The mental anguish from directly viewing the evil god still lingered in his body.
That absolutely had the power only the real thing possessed. Not only that, the feeling that sea gave him was also genuine.
Though he'd only seen it twice, his spiritual intuition reminded him that it truly was the source of the sea in his mind.
So that brought him to the second question: why would the True Creator be there?
One possibility was that He had invaded Silas's consciousness and occupied what should have been his golden finger.
Perhaps through Ma'am M's hands, perhaps using the potion, or the divine offspring.
"Doesn't feel right."
Silas refuted himself again in a low voice.
Judging by the True Creator's state, His fusion with that sea had already gone very deep.
Not only was there no rejection between them, they seemed quite harmonious.
Besides, if the other party was truly an invader, why not take advantage of his current weak and confused state to expand aggressively and completely seize control of the illusory sea?
Silas slowly recalled the scene from earlier.
The dark, chaotic sea surface, the water vapor permeating the far end...
When he'd first arrived, water vapor had covered the sea surface, blocking his view of the distance.
So was it possible that the True Creator had already been there at that time?
Suddenly, Silas was startled by his own thought.
Could it be that I've been sharing that sea with the True Creator from the very beginning? And the True Creator has existed for who knows how long, while I've only been transmigrated for a few years.
I'm the intruder! After transmigrating, I've been competing with Him for control of this sea...
Shocking thoughts surged through his mind one after another. He didn't dare fully believe them, yet instinctively felt this was a reasonable explanation.
But that brought him to the third question:
What is this sea?
With the mysticism knowledge Silas possessed and the internal materials from the Nighthawks, there was no description of a similar existence.
Perhaps because it involved a true god and was too secretive, it wasn't convenient to reveal to ordinary Beyonders.
I never imagined my golden finger would be this kind of situation...
Silas thought to himself. An item possessed by a true god naturally had an extremely high status.
No wonder the mere sound of the sea could block the evil god's mental erosion.
However, the illusory sea also blocked the mental erosion from its owner, the True Creator.
If one followed the theory from just now, it seemed to make sense. Silas himself also possessed partial sovereignty over that illusory sea.
When he made himself the primary subject, he could break free from the True Creator's influence.
Of course, all of this was still just Silas's personal speculation. It wasn't necessarily correct and could only serve as a reference.
"This is really... I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad thing..."
Silas smiled bitterly, muttering to himself in a low voice.
His connection to the evil god was closer than he'd imagined.
The final question: what should he do next?
Silas pondered in silence.
First, he didn't plan to give up this sea. And even if he wanted to give it up, there was no way to do so.
This thing was deeply connected to his transmigration and seemed to have already bonded with his soul.
But the problem was that an evil god stood on the other side of the sea.
He probably wasn't so generous as to be willing to selflessly hand over that sea to Silas.
"Then I'll maintain the status quo for now, prioritize ensuring usage rights, then try to investigate the inside story of that sea.
If there are changes, or if I figure out the truth, I'll make specific plans then."
In the end, he made this decision.