Chapter 151: Dolly

Without waiting, Night and the Nightmare Origin Tree got to work immediately.

​The crushed soul of Wispr appeared in his palm in the outside world.

​Lilith and Eve stepped out and stood guard.

​His clones were already reserved for the city conflict.

​Last time his first totem had caused a commotion, so this time they were cautious.

​Night first reviewed the technique a couple of times. Since he would be doing it himself, there was a high chance of failure.

​And failure meant he would lose the soul completely. It was risky, yes, but it was the Soul Cultivation technique he had chosen, so he had to do this at some point anyway.

​Night nodded at Lilith and Eve, then finally started.

​Nightmare Fire spread from his palm and completely covered the crushed soul.

​He started refining the ego to destroy the personality of the Devil.

​This was the first and most crucial step. Any mistakes here would mean the following processes would become exponentially harder.

​The Nightmare Origin Tree had been a huge help in this step. It had already crushed the soul and turned it into a malleable soul orb.

​But a Devil was still a Devil.

They were a race famous for their strong ego, so Night still faced some resistance. However, the resistance disappeared when he used his Domain to exert pressure on it.

​After the ego was wiped out, the soul started to melt and change shape.

​This was the second step. Now Night had to precisely guide the egoless soul to take a desired shape, as this step would determine how strong it would be.

​Night had to guide it to adapt to a form that would best describe its nature.

​Night used Nightmare Fire to nudge and awaken its instincts.

Since he already knew it had an Innate Skill, making it instinctively trigger that skill was the best way to make it change into a suitable shape.

​He used Nightmare Fire to scare it into becoming defensive, so that its survival instinct would kick in and it would become aware of its Innate Skill.

​But it proved to be more than a little tricky, since an egoless soul was no different from a dumb rabbit with zero survival instincts.

​After some struggle, he was finally able to get some reaction from it, then and as if guided by some instinct, the soul changed shape.

​It became the size of a small toy. Its form kept shifting as it started to take a shape and create a soul body.

​Night had initially expected it would look exactly like Pancy, but he was proven wrong as it started to resemble a black voodoo doll.

It had rough patches across its surface, as if it had been through a lot of abuse. The doll like like the lead villain in a horror show.

​It had two purple buttons as eyes.

Everything about it was doll like, except for its mouth, that is.

​Its mouth had teeth and it wore a creapy smile.

​As Night looked at it, he got a weird feeling that it was thinking something weird about him as it stared right back at him.

​Shaking his head, he started the third and final part, which was to engrave it onto his body and soul.

​This was the easiest part for him, since he was a Summoner and he already had a way to form bonds.

​He carefully created a line using his soul energy and connected it with the doll. It was smooth and effortless.

​If he had before failed to destroy its ego complete, he would have most likely failed at this stage.

​As soon as the connection was formed, something happened that was definitely not a part of the Soul Cultivation technique.

​Nightmare Mist rushed out of him and encased the doll in a cocoon right before it could be engraved onto his body.

​What to do? Night grew deeply nervous.

This is out of the syllabus.

​"Do not worry," [Blaze] advised. "It should be something unique to you. The process has not been interrupted, so just be patient."

​Night nodded and focused on the delicate process.

​He could not afford to be careless at the very last step.

​He didn’t want to be like one of those stupid travelers who were cautious throughout the entire journey, only to have a accident when they were close to their destination just because they got careless in the end.

​The Nightmare Mist didn’t make him wait very long.

Maybe because it was egoless, the process was over in moments, and the thick cocoon broke apart.

​The doll opened its jagged mouth, inhaled, and the shell like Nightmare Mist was entirely into its body.

​It then smacked its lips in delight.

​Night looked at it speechlessly.

So much for being egoless. It looks like a gutton.

​Night then nudged the doll using the newly formed connection to finally engrave it onto his body.

​As he did this, he also undid his thick robe on his upper body.

​The doll turned into a bright flash of purple light and disappeared into the back of his right hand.

​On the back of his right palm, a totem appeared. It looked like a purple button eye trapped inside a mouth with sharp teeth.

​Immediately afterward, he received information about its skill.

​This skill was fundamentally different from the ones from the System. This was the skill he got for properly refining the totem.

​Unlike the skill he got from Nuwa, which he couldn’t see for some reason, this one was clearly visible.

​[Puppet Master: A master puppet master is always hidden in the shadows, always manipulating the world exactly as per their desires.

​Allows user to guide, manipulate and control how things and situations unfold.

​Every successful puppeteering will enhance your soul.

​You will grow stronger as you cause others to lose their will.]

​Night muttered softly, "What a weird skill."

​It felt far more like a passive skill than an active one.

It felt quite similar to his Domain, but it didn’t have any immediate outward effects and felt more like a reward based skill.

​Like it would give him a reward by enhancing his soul if he played and manipulated others.

​He openly shared his findings with [Dream].

​As he watched, the totem flashed once, and the doll came out and started flying around him in circles.

​Night smiled happily looking at this. It felt exactly like having a fairy from a fairy tale, except it looked exactly like a cursed voodoo doll.

​"It is not too weird of a skill," [Dream] commented. "I have encountered such skills before in the past. They are exactly like a cheat code if you actually know how to fully exploit them."

​"But I do not know if this skill will be of much use to you, unless you plan to scheme against your enemies behind their backs," she added.

​"That does sound like a massive chore," Night agreed. "Why bother with complex schemes when I can simply eat them and call it a day..."

​"But it does have serious merits now that I think about it," he continued. "Maybe it does not need any grand puppeteering to work. If even small manipulations and petty schemes work, then it would be incredibly useful for my soul cultivation."

​[Dream] chuckled warmly. "You can freely test it on those invaders."

​Night looked closely at the hovering doll and thought about what exact name he should give it.

​This time he didn’t want to give it a grand edgy name. He wanted to try to name it something simple.

​"You are a doll, and you look cheerful," Night declared. "How about Dolly?"

​[Dream], "_".

​[Blaze], "_".

[Dream], decided she needs to add a naming lessons, to the list.

​At this, the doll now named Dolly, stopped and looked at him seriously. It seemed to be seriously considering it. It even folded its tiny hands as it repeatedly mouthed the name without making any sound.

​Dolly finally nodded rapidly and gave him a creepy but somehow cute smile.

​Lilith and Eve looked at Dolly in clear approval, but that approval disappeared just as quickly as it had appeared the moment Dolly sat directly on Night’s head and started playfully pulling his white hair with its small doll hands, while giggling in a completely inaudible voice.

​...

​Rango initially looked happy, but then he looked at Night with suspicion. "How did you find us here?"

​He doubted he was so handsome that Night had found him halfway across the world or something.

​"I ate one of those invaders’ corpses," Night answered. "From them, I got to fully know why you were here. And since I am currently this city’s Ruler, it was very easy to know your exact location."

​Night answered truthfully, since Rango was someone who had kind of saved him back when he had first entered their world mistakenly thinking it was just a dungeon.

​Rango’s lips twitched. "You actually ate those hairy bastards?" Then he said in mock worry, "Quickly spit them out or you will definitely get acidity."

​Night gave a fake, heavy sigh. "I cannot. They are already almost completely digested."

​Rango snorted. "With how snake like their nature is, I am sure their corpses were poisonous. If I were you, I would be desperately looking for an antidote right about now."

​Night laughed, and following his lead, Rango laughed as well.

​"Shit!" Rango’s body shook violently, causing him tremendous pain, but that didn’t stop him from laughing loudly anyway.

​Lucy and the other wolves looked at them speechlessly.

​Rani, the white wolf, ignored them and asked Lucy, "How come you grew so quickly? The last time we saw you, you were just a wee little cub. It has not even been three full months."

​She was not talking about her physical size, but their obvious emotional growth.

​Lucy sighed heavily. "A lot has happened since then." She didn’t elaborate any further, and instead she asked curiously, "How come you guys are actually here? Did you come here to invade?"

​By now, Rango and Night had finally stopped their laughing.

​"If only," Rani sneered. "My idiot of a husband went back and provoked the other tribe leaders as always."

​"This time he was especially colorful with his insults since they had lost to you, a mere human kid," she continued bitterly.

​"Rango even declared that if it were him, he would have already conquered the entire world by now."

​Another female wolf added, "But who would have actually known an Immortal was with them? And it seems they had taken his too seriously. The next thing we knew, we were dumped right here."

​At this, all the wolves looked incredibly depressed.

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