The days following the Vanguard’s breach of the Rotting Marrow Swamp bled into a blood-soaked routine for the demonic cultivators.
Sunny remained sequestered in his warded pavilion, utilizing the brutal lull in the actual fighting to delve deeper into the sect’s forbidden archives. He had explicitly ’borrowed’ a massive stack of bone-scrolls from the command tent, intending to study them whenever his fabricated ’trances’ allowed.
He was currently deciphering a particularly gruesome text detailing the elemental philosophy of the Demonic Path. The author, a notoriously mad Grand Elder named Gu, posited that the ancient five-element cycle was absolute: Wood feeds Fire, Fire creates Earth, Earth bears Metal, Metal collects Water, Water nourishes Wood.
Sunny explicitly found the reading somewhat relaxing, as it reminded him of old fantasy novels from his previous life. However, he also recognized fatal flaws in the ancient demonic logic. The Supreme Merge System had explicitly proven to him that high-tier demonic mutations routinely shattered these foundational laws. For instance, the horrific Sludge-Horror he had witnessed in the execution pits was technically a Water/Shadow attribute fiend, yet it possessed an absolute immunity to physical Metal-attribute strikes, defying the ancient cycle entirely. The Demonic Path was not a predictable science; it was an escalating sequence of chaotic mutations.
"Supreme One."
A deep, trembling voice interrupted Sunny’s internal critique.
Sunny slowly lowered the bone-scroll, allowing his crimson eyes to drift toward the entrance of the pavilion. Quartermaster Jin had just entered, flanked by two imposing, unfamiliar cultivators. Jin’s face was slick with terrified sweat, and he kept his back deeply bowed, explicitly terrified of interrupting the Young Master’s ’contemplation.’
"I beg your dark mercy for this intrusion," Jin stammered, his eyes darting nervously toward the silent, towering Iron-Forged Ghoul Ape standing in the corner. "Commander Vile of the Flaying Pavilion requested an audience. He brings a tribute."
Sunny felt a sharp spike of stress, but he maintained his freezing, statuesque posture. "Approach."
Commander Vile stepped forward. He was a massive, scarred warlord, his armor radiating the sickening stench of dried marrow. Beside him stood a pale, aristocratic woman who possessed a terrifyingly cold aura.
However, Sunny explicitly focused his gaze not on the warlords, but on the grotesque, undulating mass floating silently behind the woman. It was a massive, semi-transparent entity that resembled a floating lung, comprised entirely of dark, pulsing veins. It drifted through the stale air of the pavilion as if swimming through an abyssal ocean.
Sunny was internally fascinated and horrified. A levitating organ? This world is profoundly disgusting.
Commander Vile bowed his scarred head. "Young Master, we witnessed your absolute mastery during the Vanguard deployment. I bring my prized fiend, an Elite-grade Bone-Scythe Mantis. I humbly offer the required tribute for you to ascend it to the Commander tier."
Vile gestured to a heavily chained, violently thrashing insectoid beast held by two terrified thralls near the pavilion entrance.
Sunny explicitly noticed that Vile said ’Elite-grade’.
He casually activated the System’s diagnostic overlay and fixed his gaze upon the chained fiend.
[Target Identified: Bone-Scythe Mantis]
[Monster Level]: Tier 3 (Peak)
[Monster Grade]: Normal
[Condition]: Frenzied (Combat Stimulant Overdose)
Sunny’s crimson eyes narrowed almost imperceptibly. A Normal grade?
He explicitly knew that ascending a Normal-grade fiend to the Commander tier required a vastly different, far more volatile combination of dark resources than ascending an Elite-grade fiend. If he attempted the Elite-tier fusion protocol on this beast, the unstable core would instantaneously detonate, likely obliterating the entire pavilion and everyone inside it.
"..." Sunny explicitly chose not to speak immediately. He stared at the thrashing Mantis, letting the heavy, suffocating silence stretch. He knew that directly accusing a Vanguard Commander of possessing a trash-tier beast would be viewed as a lethal insult.
"The tribute required for this specific entity is eighty high-grade Corrupted Spirit Stones," Sunny finally rasped, his voice dripping with freezing apathy.
Commander Vile flinched visibly. Quartermaster Jin gasped, falling to his knees in sheer panic.
"Supreme One!" Jin practically screamed, his face hitting the obsidian floor. "The standard tribute for an Elite-grade ascension is forty stones! Have I offended you? Please, do not exact your vengeance upon the Commander’s fiend! Flay me instead!"
Jin explicitly believed that Sunny was arbitrarily doubling the price to punish Jin for his previous, disastrous attempt at political manipulation. He was entirely convinced that Sunny was going to purposefully sabotage the Commander’s beast out of spite.
Sunny did not even glance at the groveling Quartermaster. He kept his glowing red eyes fixed entirely on Commander Vile. "I do not negotiate the cost of absolute power. Pay the tribute, or remove the trash from my sight."
The pale woman standing next to Vile narrowed her eyes, observing Sunny intensely. She then shifted her gaze to the thrashing Mantis. A slow, cruel smile curved her lips.
"Pay the Supreme One, Vile," she whispered, her voice like cracking ice. "His judgment is absolute."
Commander Vile ground his teeth, but he produced a heavy velvet sack and tossed it onto the obsidian altar. "As you command, Young Master."
Sunny explicitly loved doing business with people who were too terrified to argue. He mentally commanded the Phantom Ash Scorpion to drag the heavy sack of spirit stones into the corner.
"Wait outside," Sunny commanded. "The refinement requires absolute darkness."
The moment the heavy pavilion doors ground shut, sealing Sunny inside with the chained Mantis and his own fiends, he immediately collapsed against the altar, letting out a long, shuddering breath. The sheer stress of extorting a warlord was agonizing.
Outside the pavilion, Commander Vile immediately activated his communication jade slip. His scarred face was twisted in absolute fury.
"Warden," Vile hissed into the jade. "You explicitly guaranteed me that the Bone-Scythe Mantis procured from the southern breeding pits was an Elite-grade specimen."
There was a terrified silence on the other end of the connection. "Commander... it was verified by the pit-masters... Is the Young Master displeased?"
"The Young Master instantly recognized it as a flawed, Normal-grade runt! He doubled the tribute because the ascension requires twice the raw dark essence to stabilize its pathetic core!" Vile roared, pacing furiously across the ash-covered ground. "Do you think I am a fool? The surrounding pavilions are all vying for the Young Master’s favor! If I presented a flawed beast to him, he could have slaughtered it as an insult to his craft!"
"Commander, I swear upon my soul—"
"Silence! When I return to the inner sect, I will personally feed you to the feeding pits!" Vile shattered the jade slip in his armored fist, his aura flaring with violent killing intent.
Quartermaster Jin knelt trembling in the ash, explicitly confused. He had believed Sunny doubled the price out of petty revenge. He now explicitly understood that the Young Master had actually saved the Commander from a catastrophic, explosive failure, diagnosing a flawed beast with a single, terrifying glance.
Jin explicitly resolved to never, ever question the Supreme One’s absolute genius again.
Two hours later, the heavy obsidian doors of the pavilion ground open.
A massive, towering Bone-Scythe Mantis emerged, its dark-metal carapace gleaming with unstable, Commander-tier energy. It was twice the size of its previous form, radiating a suffocating pressure of pure slaughter.
Commander Vile immediately dropped to one knee, offering a deep, respectful bow to the darkened doorway. "I offer my soul’s gratitude to the Supreme Flesh-Crafter."
Sunny stood in the shadows, projecting his villainous aura. He explicitly ignored the Commander’s groveling. He pointed a pale finger at the grotesque, floating lung-entity hovering behind the pale woman.
"What is the function of that abomination?" Sunny asked coldly.
The pale woman stepped forward, bowing her head slightly. "It is an Abyssal Void-Sac, Supreme One. A scavenger breed from the deep trenches. It possesses no combat capability, merely a highly expanded, internal dimensional pocket. The Outer Sect smugglers utilize them to transport bulk contraband across the quarantine zones."
To demonstrate, the woman casually tossed a heavy, jagged broadsword directly at the floating entity. The massive blade did not pierce the fleshy membrane; it explicitly vanished the moment it made contact, swallowed entirely into an unseen void.
Sunny explicitly stared at the floating sac.
A beast that possessed an internal, dimensional storage space? If he could fuse that explicitly non-combat trait into one of his own fiends, he could carry an entire armory of cursed weapons and a literal mountain of spirit stones without anyone ever knowing.