Chapter 271: Subduing The 【deer Head Sword】
The Tiger Demon relied on various bird memory fragments extracted from local plant brains, cross-referenced with the terrain structures stored from the previous mountain search, and quickly confirmed the directions of two suspected boss locations.
Additionally, there were several suspicious targets, but they couldn’t match the terrain information it had recorded, so they were temporarily set aside.
With targets identified, the Tiger Demon merged into the shadows again and began rapidly advancing.
At this time, around 3:40 PM. Considering the need to return to the construction site to meet up with the senior student and head back to the city, the Tiger Demon accelerated once more, hoping to hurry and complete these last two missions.
After a 20km unobstructed shadow sprint, the Tiger Demon emerged from the shadows cast by the trees and looked up at a steep, sharp-angled strange peak.
This mountainous area was riddled with jagged rocks and protruding strange peaks, with howling winds constantly whistling from above. Due to the unique terrain structure, it had become a place in the nearby mountain forest that conformed to local feng shui theory of ‘gathering wind and qi (harboring filth and corruption)’.
Nearby polluting energy was spontaneously converging here, gradually forming a ‘pollution depression’. The Tiger Demon clearly perceived that the energy reactions in the bodies of creatures secretly spying on it nearby were higher than those of previously encountered creatures.
And atop this steep strange peak, there was a BOSS-level creature with an even stronger aura that had already detected its arrival and sent down a sword intent full of deterrent meaning from above.
“Hm? — Wild sword cultivator?”
The Tiger Demon was slightly surprised. Along its path, it had seen many mutated creatures affected by sword dao pollution, with certain organ structures in their bodies distorted, suffering the pain of flesh twisting, yet carrying a distinct sharp sword dao aura.
But this kind of pollution was a passive outbreak, only bringing pain and torment to the host creature without converting into attack power. At most, this sword dao pollution brought continuous pain torment while also reinforcing the tormented areas, providing more abundant vitality to obtain even longer-lasting pain for tempering the organs polluted by sword dao pollution.
The BOSS on the steep strange peak was different; it was also a wild sword dao polluted creature. Yet it had broken the fate of most of its kind, able to actively intervene in the uncontrollable mutated pollution and make it its own.
Though without a systematic sword cultivation technique to build a complete system, it was still a naturally nurtured wild sword immortal. It could even transmit intimidating sword intent from afar to repel intruders, rather than mindlessly launching a frenzied direct attack.
The Tiger Demon said in surprise: “The thing on this mountain unexpectedly has a brain. It even knows to use pressure to intimidate—this is not wanting an outbreak of conflict, forcing me to leave.”
Snake Snake: “Could it be like that previous dead one who planted itself into a tree, a half-mad human sword cultivator? Or a polluted creature that luckily absorbed a sword cultivator’s mantle?”
After any [Seed]-level ability user dies, the pollution crystal in their body doesn’t dissipate; instead, it can be extracted like a [supernatural characteristic].
Directly consuming it is a [great medicine] in the eyes of same-system cultivators (1); transplanting it into an ordinary person can fully inherit the potential, as well as 1-3% of the strength (2); it can also serve as a necessary condition for rebirth and resurrection + supernatural data (3).
The Tiger Demon shook its head: “The sword qi isn’t strong enough to reach [Seed] level. Its strength is far inferior to mine!”
With some curiosity, it stretched its body long again, turning into a tiger-shaped silhouette sticking to the rock wall, quickly ascending in the direction of the sword intent intimidation.
In the span of a breath, the Tiger Demon climbed the hundred-meter sword peak. In a crevice filled with black weeds, the ground was covered with white bone fragments, piled into a concave nest where it saw a massive stag in the center.
This stag had a robust build with smooth fur in auspicious white. Lying in the bone nest, it vigilantly stared at the abruptly appearing black Tiger Demon, its muscles tensed all over.
It was just lying down, yet its shoulder height still exceeded 1 meter, with a body length of about 2 meters. On its head grew a pair of sharp, branch-shaped horns, with the tips shaped like sharp sword blades.
The strangest part was that the stag had three heads in total. The largest and most normal head naturally bore the horns, a white stag head. Below its main head, at the 2/3 mark of the neck, grew two smaller deer heads with their own necks, with ordinary brown fur and yellow spots.
It didn’t feel like some three-headed monster. It was more like a kangaroo-like dad carrying two milk babies. On this stag, the strongest source of sword intent came precisely from these two small deer heads with blood-red eyes full of malice glaring at the Tiger Demon.
The white stag now stood up, its lines sleek and posture elegant, staring at the Tiger Demon with full hostility while its intense hostile sword intent locked it firmly.
In contrast, the pair of small deer heads growing from its neck bared small tusks full of sharp teeth, emitting piercing howls, frantically provoking the Tiger Demon. At the same time, they resonated with the main body’s sword intent, appearing eager to move.
It gave it a sense of deja vu from Myogi Mountain Immortal mode.
The pitch-black giant Tiger Demon stared at the stag several sizes smaller than itself, not in a hurry to act, instead speaking in human tongue: “Hey, can you understand words?”
The white stag remained unmoved upon hearing this, as if sensing a fatal threat, growing more agitated, restlessly scraping its hooves, intensifying the driving sword intent deterrence again to force the Tiger Demon to leave.
Snake Snake said regretfully: “It looks fair and clean, like an auspicious omen that has successfully cultivated. Pity it’s a fool that can’t understand human speech.”
The Tiger Demon also admired this stag’s appearance; if not for the pair of ‘evil-gazing’, brown-furred flawed deer heads growing from its neck, it really had the flavor of an ‘immortal mount’.
It suddenly thought of something: “Snake Snake, do you think this deer could be an artificially raised top-tier mount?”
The more the Tiger Demon thought, the more it felt this was the case! Apart from that pair of superfluous ‘small deer heads’, this stag was too perfect, not like a naturally bred ‘polluted mutated life’. It was more like a deliberately cultivated product.
Snake Snake: “Capture it, sell it? This ‘Misty Mountains trip’ wouldn’t be a waste then.”
Just as the tiger head and snake tail were blinded by greed, discussing in front of the main subject how to kidnap and sell it; this stag sensed the continuously rising malice and finally couldn’t hold back, striking first with a sword.
‘Yoo! Yoo!’ Two deer cries rang out as sword hums, blood light spraying and splashing.
The stag’s thick neck position, the two small deer heads convulsed uncontrollably and violently, their long mouths emitting piercing sharp cries, launching the first wave of mental shock, yet it had no effect on the Tiger Demon.
Immediately after, ‘pop pop’ sounds came from the stag’s slender neck; at the connection between the small deer heads and the body, two massive wounds were torn open.
The two brown deer heads detached from the flesh body, flying straight into the sky, while from the stag’s slender neck, two sharp vertebral flying swords were pulled out. At the same time, large chunks of shredded flesh and blood mist were brought out from the stag’s neck.
“？!”
The Tiger Demon widened its eyes, stunned by the abstract sight of this thing wordlessly pulling out a pair of ‘deer head vertebral flying swords’ from its neck. This was far more grotesque than the squad’s [Pipe Wrench Sword Immortal]!
On the other side, the white stag merely cried out to manipulate a pair of ‘small deer flying swords’ in the air with agile turns from afar, straightening the vertebrae into two fierce white bone sword lights shooting toward the Tiger Demon.
Bang! Bang!
Two muffled thuds, the two white bone flying swords intercepted mid-air by a ‘massive black demon claw’ manifested from shadows. The Tiger Demon merely slightly used shadow manipulation to condense a giant hand seal, capturing and suppressing the two small deer vertebral swords in mid-air.
This stag was well-developed, not grown crooked, and had even refined a pair of living ‘small deer flying swords’, possessing the poise of a sword immortal.
But its pollution degree was still too weak; this pair of innate flying swords (small deer) parasitic in its body were far from reaching [Seed] level. Meanwhile, the Tiger Demon’s strength had long surpassed [Gate], rapidly approaching the pre-mutation spiritual root’s peak (Nascent Soul?).
Seeing the pair of flying swords controlled by the ‘shadow hand’, the white stag anxiously called out. The two small deer heads emitted pained cries, the vertebral sword bodies erupting with even sharper sword qi again, like two fish frantically struggling to escape control, yet firmly suppressed by the Tiger Demon.
At the same time, the equally white-boned skeletal snake tail excitedly smashed headfirst into the shadows beneath the Tiger Demon, disappearing.
The next moment, a massive semi-transparent shadow snake demon 1.3 meters in diameter rose straight from the black grassy ground behind the stag, six or seven meters tall, twisting its body to look down at the panicked stag, eyes glowing with evil red light, spitting a black tongue.
Immediately, the snake demon dove in, clashing with the stag whose horns were enchanted with sword qi. The snake demon ignored the stag’s sword qi cuts throughout, impervious to blade or spear, unilaterally crushing with power, soon splitting into countless shadow tentacles to meticulously and carefully bind and package the stag, tossing it aside.
On the other side, the Tiger Demon slightly squeezed. The shadow giant hand then crushed the pair of ‘small deer heads’ to ‘moderate bone fractures + concussion’ with measured force. At the same time, massive shadow pollution turned into viscous black liquid, pouring into the small deer’s seven orifices, burrowing into the brains and adhering to the pale spines, wrapping them up.
Soon, this pair of ‘deer head swords’ stopped struggling and were suppressed and sealed.
Through perception, the Tiger Demon unexpectedly discovered that this pair of ‘small deer flying swords’ and the white stag were not one body, but three ‘independent lives’ with no blood relations: dry dad and two kids.
After controlling this ‘three-in-one’ local small boss, the Tiger Demon didn’t hurry to subdue the stag, instead sending out numerous shadow tentacles to sweep the nest, quickly digging out a long-cold ‘sword cultivator corpse’ from beneath the concave bone pile.
This skeleton’s attire was long tattered, several broken pill bottles empty, long consumed by the stag. Only a gnawed, incomplete beast skin recorded a deer head sword refining method.
The Tiger Demon glanced briefly and tossed the beast skin aside, roughly reconstructing this stag’s origins.
Likely, a sword cultivator had ventured deep into the Misty Mountains to capture a high-quality ‘polluted’ deer for refining a flying sword. The remaining beast skin content described needing to capture a doe as the sword embryo matrix, continuously feeding it various pills and spirit medicine mixed with ‘metal elements’ while pregnant with fawns…
Cultivating the deer fetus into an ‘innate sword embryo’, and continuously feeding its own blood to enhance affinity. Ultimately, based on resource quality invested and the number of deer fetuses the doe carried, there was a chance to obtain single flying swords, dual swords, three-life swords… and so on.
Because its own blood was added, it was easier to refine such [life swords + non-swords] into innate flying swords.
But during the sword sacrificing process, the sword cultivator predictably had an accident. He unexpectedly discovered this auspicious white deer and wanted to capture it to cultivate as a mount for sale. He also had the idea of sacrificing the entire white deer into a higher-quality ‘innate flying sword’.
Disregarding his weakened body, he forcibly captured the ‘stag’, starting a new task to gradually erode and temper the white stag with sword dao pollution.
Out of greed + overconfidence, he multitasked with two sword sacrificing missions; weakened body + misty environment erosion + spirit medicine aura from sword refining attracting other polluted creatures to attack… ultimately magnificently failing.
The freed ‘stag’ had already undergone basic and complete ‘sword dao pollution (flying sword transformation)’. But with the sword master dead, it couldn’t continue, though the foundation was laid, making it a half ‘wild flying sword’.
The doe on the other side was killed by attackers, its abdominal offspring miscarried and died prematurely, leaving only this pair of ‘sword embryo infants’ that absorbed the mother’s sword dao pollution, half-dead.
Ultimately dug out by the milk dad and stabbed into the neck to complete parasitism, also using ‘flying sword entry into body’ to cut and torment itself to resist its own sword dao pollution, maintaining rationality.
Over this long time, this pair of ‘deer head swords + young’ couldn’t survive independently due to innate deficiency, premature death, sword transformation, etc., so they grew inside the stag, continuously growing vertebrae (sword bodies), erupting sword qi to cut and torment the dry dad, absorbing his nutrients to survive.
Meanwhile, the stag luckily hit upon an alternative pain entry method to slowly elevate its own sword dao foundation, while tempering this pair of ‘dry son flying swords’, also ensuring rationality remained. Painfully getting stronger on one side, ensuring physical and mental double health on the other, step by step becoming the regional small BOSS.
This information partly came from the ‘beast skin’; the other part from the Tiger Demon reading memories via the brain eggplant CPU implanted on the stag’s head.
After being subdued by the Tiger Demon, powerless to struggle or resist, even having its pair of [dry sons. deer head swords] confiscated and suppressed. This stag, with rationality intact and having stumbled onto the ‘wild sword cultivator’ path, chose submission.
Before installing the external brain, the stag’s intelligence, stimulated by sword dao cultivation, wasn’t much worse than a domestic pet (Border Collie), even smarter. But it had an essential gap from humans, or even human children capable of logical thinking.
But after installing the brain eggplant CPU, it gained an auxiliary thinking ‘artificial stupidity data soul program’ out of thin air. With this, it would slowly gain wisdom for better communication.
At the same time, after this brain eggplant invaded its brain tissue, it also became a means for the Tiger Demon to control cannon fodder. It could be considered collecting a few handy ‘small demons’ before establishing a base.
Pity the stag had a brain and could be controlled. Conversely, the pair of deer head swords couldn’t be fitted with brain eggplants; they themselves were core flying swords of the sword dao system.
The stag treated them as kin (clan descendants) to raise, inserting them into itself, yet didn’t refine them as ‘innate flying swords’. Thus, the stag and fawns weren’t in a ruler relationship; it also wasn’t a complete sword cultivator, more like a half free ‘wild deer-type flying sword’ + ‘parent-child swords (child swords ×2)’ with only usage rights.
