I Can Devour Monsters' SSS Talents

The true form of that thing, that Calamity, was beyond anything he could imagine, more precisely, the human mind was simply not capable of imagining something like this.

The space around the Ruined Heart had turned into an ocean of darkness, but an ocean without a surface, without an up or down.

Inside it, mouths opened that were not connected to any head or body, some were small and some were so large that even the Ruined Heart looked tiny compared to them.

Eyes opened and closed at impossible distances.

Some beside each other.

Some inside each other.

Some in places where Lian’s mind could not understand exactly where they were and something that looked like wings was spread through the darkness.

But anything that looked like a feather was actually a crack leading to another darkness.

Horns came out of it, but not in directions that should have been possible in normal space.

Every time Lian tried to understand its complete shape, the image changed, not because the creature was moving, but because his mind was unable to understand all of it at once.

And at the center of that shapeless monster was his human body.

Small and limited, a shell of flesh and bones that something of such great size had compressed itself inside.

He finally understood why the shadow that had appeared behind his body changed its shape every moment.

Those outside were only seeing random parts of the Calamity’s true form.

A mouth.

A wing.

A horn.

An eye.

But none of them were really that, they were only the mind’s attempt to give meaning to something it should not be seeing.

Lian turned his attention back to the Ruined Heart, masses of darkness had come toward it many times.

Every time they got close to the boundary, the space between them collapsed, as if the path itself was being destroyed, part of the darkness moved toward the heart and suddenly there was no longer a ”way” to reach it.

A few moments later, the space around it formed again, Black Silence tried again, it failed again but apparently it did not even realize that something was there.

That was the strangest part.

The Ruined Heart had not only protected Lian, it had hidden him.

He looked at the broken heart for some time.

”What exactly are you?” he asked in his mind, even though he did not expect any answer.

There was no answer, of course and only the weak light inside the cracks of the heart pulsed once.

His gaze fell on the five indentations, exactly as if something was supposed to be placed there to fill them.

But what?....Calamities?

In any case, after being saved, it did not take long for Lian to be able to see the outside.

The first clear image was Seris, when they were still beside the Forgotten Tree and the Calamity had just come out of the cocoon.

She was lying injured on the ground, then One, who was crawling toward her body.

Then Black Silence raised his hand and he understood what he wanted to do.

A strike.

And that was the first time Lian had resisted, he had pushed everything that remained of himself against the boundary of the Ruined Heart.

Not to take his body back, that was impossible at that time, only to disrupt the command that was being sent from Black Silence to his muscles.

He had succeeded for a fraction of a second, the hand had stopped, the purple light in his eyes had shaken and then Black Silence had taken control again and slammed One into the tree.

Lian understood at that moment that he could still change something, very little but he could.

Then Seris attacked, the fight that he saw from inside his own body felt strange, but it was a short fight anyway, in fact it was not even a fight.

And when Black Silence wanted to finish Seris, Lian had interfered for the second time, this time more and for a little longer, enough for the body’s movement to stop.

Enough for Black Silence to notice something.

Not to understand that Lian was still alive, but it had felt the presence of some unknown resistance, at that moment the Young Vorhelm had pulled back.

Completely.

”If I do that one more time, it will understand that I’m still alive.” he thought calmly in the darkness.

From that moment on, he had remained silent, just like a short time ago when the battle had started, he had seen and heard everything and when One had tried to reach him through their link again, he remained silent.

When Seris had said his name, he remained silent again.

When her voice had risen among the attacks and she had asked why Black Silence had chosen Lian’s body, he remained silent again.

Even when Seris had screamed—

”Help me, damn it!”

Lian had heard it, word by word, for a moment something inside him wanted to hit the wall of the heart again.

Just to show that he was there.

Just one pause, one finger movement, anything, but he had not done it, not because he could not, because he should not do it, everything would be ruined, his plan would fall apart.

Black Silence was not thinking about him right now, from the Calamity’s point of view, he was finished, he had been eaten, the body was empty and this was the greatest advantage Lian had.

And he was not willing to lose it just so Seris could feel better for a few seconds.

No matter how painful that scream was to hear, no matter how One had called him through their link, he had remained silent.

During all that time, he had not only watched but had also learned, not the exact thoughts of Black Silence, that creature did not have a mind that worked like a human mind.

But because it was using Lian’s body, some things passed through.

Hunger.

Purpose.

When the first chain broke and the Calamity became more complete and the pressure of that dark ocean became stronger and that was when he reached his conclusion.

Black Silence was incomplete, part of it was inside his body and part of it remained inside the Titan and as long as the two were separated, anything Lian did would remain incomplete.

Even if he somehow took his body back, he would only have part of the Calamity inside himself.

The other part could remain inside the Titan, be transferred again, find another host and return again.

If he was going to devour this creature, limit it or do anything else to it, all of it had to be in one place.

So Lian had done something that looked crazy from the outside.

He had simply done nothing....

He had allowed the first chain to break.

The second.

The third.

Even when he realized that the Titan was getting close to full awakening, he remained silent, because for once Black Silence’s goal was the same as his.

Completion.

Now there was no large part left inside the Titan.

Cindar was dead, the last anchor had been cut, the seals were broken and all of Black Silence was inside Lian’s body, in one place.

Exactly what he wanted and now the only thing left was to find a way to devour it.

Of course, one problem still remained, he had no certain way to devour it, devouring a skill and talent was one thing, devouring a complete creature, especially a Calamity that had infected a world for centuries was something else.

His Glutton ability had never been made to eat the creatures themselves and Lian knew this.

So his plan could not simply be to ”eat” Black Silence.

But something else was also bothering him.

The system had said from the beginning to devour the Calamity itself, so if such a Quest existed, there had to be a way.

But Lian did not know any way right now and this was the annoying part.

His entire plan was based on a theory that he had no way to test beforehand.

But he knew one thing, he had no way to directly eat the Calamity itself, but perhaps he did not need to eat the Calamity in the same way it was.

In fact, maybe he could take a shortcut and not need to devour it directly himself, like using the Devourer Egg for help.

Maybe then a way would open.

Maybe.

The word ”maybe” appeared too many times in this plan.

If Lian had a body, he would probably frown.

”Sounds very reliable.” he said sarcastically in his mind.

There was no one to answer him, but even if that plan failed, he had another option.

The Ruined Heart.

This thing had been able to keep his identity out of the Calamity’s reach, so perhaps it could work the other way too.

If Lian took control of the body back for long enough, perhaps he could pull part of Black Silence into this closed space.

Or all of it.

He did not know how long he could hold it, one hour? One day? One month?

Maybe only a few minutes.

But even a few minutes were better than having a creature free that wanted to go to the earth and then eat other worlds.

”Worst case, I’ll make a prison for it.” he thought with cold calmness.

”I’ll figure out how to devour it later.”

The real problem was something else, how to take his body back.

When Black Silence had just come out of the cocoon, its connection to the body was still incomplete, that was when Lian had been able to interfere twice.

Now? The situation was completely different, the Calamity had become complete and all its parts had returned.

Its existence was wrapped around Lian’s body like countless roots..

And if he tried to forcefully take control right now, Black Silence would probably notice him before he could even move a finger.

And this time it would not settle for just a short search.

The Ruined Heart might hide his identity, but Lian was not willing to test whether it could resist the full attack of a complete Calamity or not.

He needed to create a moment when Black Silence’s control over the body would break.

Even for a fraction of a second.

What could do that? Lian had thought about the answer for a long time and in the end he had found only one option.

Death.

The body had to die.

The thought was simple, it was stupid too but it was simple, Black Silence was no longer a guest inside his body, it had merged with it and it had even proudly said a few minutes ago

”This body is mine.”

Well, having a physical body was not only an advantage, it also had many disadvantages...