Chapter 48: All evil shall ultimately be brought to justice by Chief Black Cat!

Clearing out the corpses and ghouls outside the gate, Yuan Zhu rushed into the Vajra Temple in a single breath. The Yellow Springs Buddhist resonance (polluting aura) exclusive to this place surged tenfold, and the shadow rifts that were previously clearly visible in his eyes now became blurred and drifted further away, making them difficult to grasp...

"Huh? So I can't exploit the bug this time."

Entering the Vajra Temple was like stepping into another away-court domain, suppressed invisibly everywhere. To effortlessly throw ghouls into the shadow world to trap and kill them like he did outside was now beyond his capabilities.

"Boss, be careful! This place is even weirder than the sacrificial altar from before. Once you cross the temple gate, it's like entering another independent space. Fortunately, it's not completely closed on a physical level; if you throw a stone over the wall, it can still fly out. If we can't win, let's run away to our heart's content! Don't worry, they can't stop us!"

The sprite turned timid with absolute confidence, calculating defeat before victory. When it came to running away, she was no less capable than her master!

The Tiger Demon nodded and looked at the ghouls who had noticed the intrusion and were swarming in to surround them. He muttered, "If you put it that way, then I certainly have a way!"

The Buddhist corpses and ghouls had led the elite forces of the temple to besiege Fujia, but a large number of ghoul monks still remained within the Vajra Temple to guard their lair, and among them were quite a few elite variants.

For instance, the Snail Chan Master who had run outside earlier to gaze at the stars possessed the ability to pierce illusions and even harbored other trump cards, but unfortunately, before he could make a move, he was tossed directly into the shadow dimension.

Right now, the Four-Armed Arhat guarding the stone bridge and the other two-headed monk on the opposite side of the pond were elite monsters in the eyes of the [Xian Scripture].

The pollution index within their bodies was more than a dozen times that of other ordinary ghouls, enough to threaten him in his Tiger Demon form.

However, these ghouls were already thoroughly dead, their brains rotted. Even though they had successfully rebooted under the pollution of the [Yellow Springs], they possessed little intelligence and lacked tactical maneuvers, making them not too difficult to deal with.

At this moment, the Tiger Demon lunged forward, whipping up a fierce gust of gloomy wind that swept across the field, repelling and blowing away the Yellow Springs corpse qi clinging to them.

Simultaneously, with a single claw thrust forward, a blast of shadow energy resembling black fog erupted and converged between the tiger's claws, shaping itself into a gigantic shadow claw that flew several meters away and grabbed a ghoul.

Then, exerting all his strength, the Tiger Demon swung his arm in a flipping motion, using the pitch-black shadow claw to hurl the ghoul over the courtyard wall just like a baseball.

Caught completely off guard, the ghoul was indeed thrown out. With a loud 'bang', it crashed heavily onto the ground outside the courtyard wall.

"Haha, it worked!"

Yuan Zhu was overjoyed. Thanks to the sprite's cowardice in planning an escape route so early on, he had managed to seize this flaw in the Vajra Temple.

Awoo! Roar! Wah wah wah!

Multi-armed ghouls waved their ritual palms, unleashing attacks imbued with death qi that forced the Tiger Demon to dodge and maneuver repeatedly. At the same time, his sharp claws lashed out, hurling blades of wind and shadow in retaliation.

A four-armed ghoul sprang forward with agile swiftness right up to him. A pair of thick, large ritual palms formed mudras, gathering intense death qi into ritual seals that struck continuously, one faster than the next, slamming relentlessly against the Tiger Demon's pitch-black, coarse fur.

Viewed from afar, the Tiger Demon's fur looked smooth, sleek, and flowing, but viewed up close, every single hair was coarse and tough, intertwining to form a dense, bristly mat that effectively distributed and absorbed the impact of force. When the attack penetrated to the thick tiger hide, it met yet another layer of resilient defense.

The four-armed ghoul's continuous Buddhist seal palm strikes landed solidly, causing Yuan Zhu intense pain, but as the momentary pain faded, he was surprised to find that it actually hurt only just a tiny bit.

The Yellow Springs pollution contained within those attacks hadn't even breached the Tiger Demon's most basic defense, let alone the 'soul firewall' acting as inner armor.

"Roar!"

Letting out an angry roar, he lashed out with a backhand paw, striking the four-armed ghoul standing right before him. The opponent hurriedly swung its ritual palms around to parry at its chest, but was still sent flying by the Tiger Demon's single slap, crashing like a cannonball into a rockery nearby.

Such formidable power?!

Yuan Zhu looked down and turned his tiger paws over. This strength was simply heaven-defying!

"Roar, roar, roar!"

Wild kitty claws dancing!

Amidst his angry roar, he slashed his paws repeatedly against the ground, tearing and cutting through the thick flagstone pavement, sending chunks of debris flying. Accelerated by [Wind Calling], the fragments transformed into a barrage of flying cannonballs that knocked approaching ghouls flying backward.

Is this the joy of sharpening claws?

Not only did his nails not hurt, but there was also an enigmatic sense of exhilaration. Thus, the Tiger Demon engaged in an even more mesmerizing kitty scratching frenzy, moving so fast he left afterimages behind, tearing apart countless heavy flagstone blocks and leaving deep, carved traces.

With a single sweep of his claw, a mix of gloomy wind and shadows coalesced into energy tiger paws that shot out once more to deliver the finishing blow, slicing one ghoul after another into fragments scattered across the ground.

Swish, swish, swish! Swish, swish, swish!

The sound of rising and falling tides echoed. Not far away, on the opposite side of the small pond, that two-headed monk pressed his palms together in front of his chest, planted his feet wide apart into a horse stance, and then leaned his upper body to the left, lifting his right leg high and stamping down fiercely on the ground.

After repeating this movement multiple times, the calm little pond grew increasingly turbulent under his instigation, ultimately whipping up turbid Yellow Springs water waves up to two meters high. The surging water leaped high out of the pond, crashed onto the ground, and splashed over the remains of the ghouls.

The shattered chunks of flesh rapidly absorbed the turbid Yellow Springs water, pulling toward each other to reassemble into complete ghouls once more, radiating an even stronger aura of defilement.

They too pressed their palms together in front of their chests, raised their extra third ritual palms high, drew another wisps of turbid water from the pond to wrap around themselves, and charged toward the intruder once more.

"Big Boss, quickly try out your close-combat talent! Engaging in direct hand-to-hand combat is not cost-effective; you're at a huge disadvantage!"

The sprite reminded him anxiously. Even though you are a big tiger, all your bloodline divine abilities have been polluted and twisted into spell-based ones. Going toe-to-toe isn't wise. Stop scratching like a cat; how much force can that have? Hurry up and try your offensive divine abilities!

Reminded by the sprite, Yuan Zhu noticed [??Claw??], which was filled entirely with question marks. At a glance, this divine ability was fraught with unknown flaws and loopholes. If possible, he really didn't plan to use it directly without testing it in a safe zone first.

[Claw]!

However, as the sprite said, this seemingly was the [Tiger Demon]'s sole close-quarters combat divine ability, which suited the current situation perfectly.

Thus, he tried channeling a bit of power into it, and immediately, shadow energy within his body poured rapidly into his forelimbs. A cooling sensation flowed through the bones of his five fingers, and then his sharp tiger claws began to grow in length at an explosive rate, much like Wolverine ejecting metal blades, with five dagger-sharp bone blades springing from his fingertips.

Not only did the claws increase in length and become razor-sharp, but a large quantity of white jade skeletons of the exact same texture as the snake tail began to grow upward against the grain of the tiger claws, forming a set of menacing exoskeleton armbraces styled in unison with the skeletal tail, firmly protecting his claws, forearms, and forelimbs.

A massive influx of information flooded Yuan Zhu's mind: as long as he continued to channel magic power, his hind limbs, his entire body, and even his head would sprout this kind of sharp, fierce exoskeleton armor covered in menacing bone blades and barbs, evolving him into a [Bone Garurumon - Kitty Version]!

"Damn, that's kind of handsome!"

A Yellow Springs ghoul launched a sneak attack from close range, and the Tiger Demon raised his paws to parry. Without exerting much force, he simply let the bone-barb-covered armbraces collide with the ghoul's ritual palms, easily piercing through the creature's flesh and blood arms, while the exoskeleton armor left a pool of Yellow Springs water on contact, emitting a sizzling corrosive sound.

Smack!

Exerting slight force in his arm, he used his sharp bone claws to easily tear the ghoul into upper and lower halves, which were then blasted to pieces in mid-air by a whip of his snake tail. Yuan Zhu looked at his rapidly self-repairing bone armbraces and the turbid Yellow Springs water that stubbornly continued to corrode and dissolve the jade-like bone structure.

Two completely different polluting energies collided, eroded, and neutralized each other, emitting a sizzling corrosive sound. It was plainly evident that his [Shadow Energy] fell short of the [Yellow Springs Buddhist resonance] by more than just a little margin.

Part of this was because "shadow pollution < Yellow Springs pollution," and part of it was because he lacked a complete transcendent system, making the Tiger Demon template less holistic than the Buddhist cultivation system, compounded by fighting in an away-field environment suppressed by the greater surroundings.

Fortunately, he was not short of polluted spiritual qi. Multiple bloodline talents overlapped, bridging the gap, and he possessed overwhelming intelligence.

With a sudden twist of his tiger torso, the skeletal snake tail behind him abruptly lengthened and whipped out, vanishing into the ground's shadow. It re-emerged as a bucket-thick half-section of a shadow serpent demon, which lunged right out of the temple gate, plunged into a crack in the ground, and connected with the external shadow dimension.

At this moment, he was like a Unit 01 with a power cord plugged into its rear end. No longer worried about spiritual qi (energy), he could unleash attacks to his heart's content.

[Claw] Max!

The skeletal armor on both arms swelled and thickened, turning into heavy armor that looked even more ferocious. Simultaneously, it rapidly covered his shoulder guards, intersecting at the spine. His hind limbs also sprouted the same skeletal shell, which then covered his entire body and head, while two long sabertooth fangs grew on either side of his tiger jaws.

True Bone Tiger Demon!

His entire body was encased in exoskeleton armor, brimming with a sense of security, a million times better than the uniform of the [Fluffy King]!

Turning his head to look at the pitch-black giant snake that had vanished into the shadow and reappeared in the distance, Yuan Zhu found a string of small question marks popping up in his mind.

Why was the combat mode of the skeletal snake tail ([Shadow Manipulation]) a pitch-black shadow giant snake wrapped in translucent shadow flesh, yet when the shadow Tiger Demon drove [Claw] to its full potential, it turned into the skeletal form of a snake tail?

Did this black-and-white interchange and intertwined form imply that I have the potential to comprehend the 'Great Dao of Tai Chi'?

Click, click, click... The four-armed ghoul led its minions to attack once more.

Waves of Buddhist seal palm strikes hammered continuously against the exoskeleton armor. Outside of his already hard-to-penetrate skin and hide defense now lay an extra layer of prickly skeletal armor, making him even harder to pierce.

The Tiger Demon endured the sizzling, corrosive pollution as he swung his paws frantically, manipulating gloomy wind and shadows to materialize into giant hands that dragged one ghoul after another right up to him. Then, bursting with monstrous strength, he swatted them one by one out over the wall.

Outside, the snake demon, with most of its body burrowed into the shadows, lunged and bit down again and again, snapping up a falling ghoul, tossing its head to fling it into the shadow world, then catching another dropped prey mid-air to toss it right back into the shadow world.

Relying on his suite of bloodline divine abilities, the Tiger Demon wreaked havoc within the Vajra Temple, roaming and weaving through the area, commanding gloomy wind and black fog, and marshaling countless disposable silhouette minions. He looked like a descending demon, stirring up a bloody slaughter in the Buddhist holy land.

He was upholding justice on behalf of heaven, purging and sweeping these anti-Buddhist ghouls who had usurped the Buddhist temple straight into the trash bin!

All evil shall eventually be brought to justice by the Black Cat Detective!

Before long, the small fry had been completely cleared out. Even the most tricky two-headed old monk and four-armed ghoul were swallowed whole by the swaggering shadow snake demon, which then bolted out of the temple gates at light speed, vomited with a 'blech', spat out 'Ptui! Ptui! Ptui!', and trotted back.

"That was amazing, Big Boss! Did you see that? I violently slaughtered two small bosses! It was me who swept clean the Vajra Temple!"

The giant snake demon stood upright and wriggled excitedly, looking exactly like the mesmerizingly twisting inflatable greeter doll at a shopping mall entrance.

While she celebrated blindly for a long time, she noticed the Tiger Demon showed no reaction and froze in confusion. The giant shadow snake tail lowered its head, gazed down at the tiny-looking (4-meter fierce tiger) yet adorable armored big cat, tilted its head in puzzlement, and asked, "Boss? Why aren't you cheering for me?"

Yuan Zhu: "I'm pondering a question. Although this [Claw] is quite powerful in use, vastly increasing defensive power and cutting damage while looking mighty and domineering, I always feel like something is missing? It's just a bit lacking."

[Minions] lacked soul data, pollution traits, and a connection to death in the netherworld, though a portion of this had now been filled in using 'Yellow Springs death qi', leaving him just needing to refine his first sacrifice before he could try herding them.

[Wind Calling] lacked a unique 'wind' of its own, but the subsequent completion route was clear and straightforward, and "wind follows the tiger," which fit the [Tiger Demon] style quite well.

Yet only this [??Claw?] felt completely out of sync with the Tiger Demon's bloodline talents, feeling far too 'snakelike' instead, making him feel it wasn't a very good match.

"Uh..." The sprite shrank a little bit, withdrawing her skeletal body from the shadows to revert back to her original menacing snakebone specimen appearance, choosing her words carefully, "Could this perhaps be my fault?"

"What do you mean? Spell it out clearly."

Incable of lying, the sprite confessed honestly, "Boss, do you remember the original bloodline talent replaced by [Shadow Manipulation]?"

"[Yogic Qi Control]?"

"Right!"

The sprite stuffed some of the original Tiger Demon data into his head.

The original 'Tiger Demon Spiritual Root' recorded a complete set of bloodline inheritances: [Yogic Qi Control, Minions, Nether Ghost Claw, Wind Calling, Mountain Lord Ghost Domain], with every single link interlocking.

Tigers were the kings of beasts, naturally possessing peerless physiques and strength, with almost no rivals except for the flood dragons in rivers, lakes, and seas. Therefore, when a fierce tiger cultivated into a demon, leaving behind its raw and bloody primitive life, it would retain its formidable physique and combat prowess.

Consequently, the [Tiger Demon] possessed an extremely formidable body, boundless strength, thick skin with high durability, sinewy steel bones, and explosive physical stamina—all of which Yuan Zhu had inherited.

[Yogic Qi Control], the Tiger Demon's primary talent, could further amplify physical advantages by injecting yogic qi into flesh and blood for omnidirectional enhancement and slaughtering the field, comparable to Toguro's muscle release or the Hulk's transformation.

[Minions] had nothing to do with physical combat; alongside physical slaughter, it opened up a completely secondary track for underworld cannon fodder, mastering nether power.

[Ghost Claw] was the re-fusion of [Yogic Qi Control] and [Minions], unifying both talents for his own use. Building upon the Tiger Demon's body being doubly amplified by yogic qi, it imbued the tiger claws with minions, condensing nether power to simultaneously attack physical flesh and tear apart souls for a third layer of reinforcement and amplification!

Therefore, Yuan Zhu was unsatisfied with the current [Bone Claw], feeling that it was missing something. Because he had only inherited the [Tiger Demon] body, but lacked the secondary amplification of yogic qi, the tertiary minion enchantment, and the unique counter-clashing burst of the [Ghost Claw].

It had transformed from an invincible dual-attribute "soul + physical" clash-kill into a defense-oriented exoskeleton attack, drastically reducing its lethality.

As for [Wind Calling] further down, the nether Ghost Tiger naturally summoned nine-nether gloomy winds, continuing to pile up underworld talents to sweep away the prey's three souls and seven魄 on a wide, crowd-control scale, capturing and refining new minions.

Ultimately, the [Mountain Lord Ghost Domain] successfully connected the yin and yang realms, and the domain's robust host-field power could in turn feed back and bless the three major talents: [Minions, Ghost Claw, Wind Calling].

Although [Ghost Claw] appeared early, it remained the Tiger Demon's ultimate single-target killing method, never obsolete and usable all the way to the end. In an ideal state, [Ghost Claw] could simultaneously stack four layers of blessings: 'yogic qi, minions, gloomy wind, ghost domain.'

As for now... what did a demonic bloodline from the immortal cultivation universe have to do with the planet Duling? To integrate locally, it had to accept pollution transformation and whitewash the [Boss Template].

Thus, the nether-styled Nether Ghost Tiger turned into the Shadow Tiger Demon, and the physical divine ability [Yogic Qi Control] morphed into the spell-based talent [Shadow Manipulation].

"Wait a minute, where did this [Belly Universe] pop up? My snake tail has nothing to do with the Nether Ghost Tiger."

Yuan Zhu used dual vision, controlling the tiger head and snake tail to stare at each other, a massive question mark popping up in his head. What was going on with this tail? The more he looked at it, the more abrupt it seemed, like a promotional freebie bundled with a phone recharge.

The sprite: "Great question! I can only say, Boss, you truly are uniquely gifted! Your [Aberrant Spiritual Root] doesn't just contain complete Tiger Demon bloodline information, it's a 1.5x luxury plebeian upgrade kit! It inherits the ultimate divine abilities of two demonic bloodlines, smashed apart and reassembled into a hybrid with even greater potential, though it requires an initial period of grinding and adaptation."

"[Belly Universe] is this tail, the snake demon's innate divine ability, and I inherited it too? Am I a chimeric fusion? Aren't I basically like a Xuanwu?"

A turtle body with a snake tail versus a tiger head with a snake tail—how bizarre! No wonder he always had the illusion of mild schizophrenia. So it was a 1.5x luxury plebeian upgrade kit, more quantity without extra charge.

Simultaneously wielding the bloodline divine abilities of two species, they originally didn't match, but after a round of whitewashing by [Shadow Pollution], they had been forcibly fused together.

The skeletal snake tail began to merge with [Shadow Manipulation]; [Claw] also inherited snakebone armor reinforcements; and [Belly Universe], belonging to the snake lineage, even gained the functions of swallowing prey and refining minions, leaning closer toward the [Tiger Demon].

The two lineage talents began grinding and adapting to each other.

"That's right, Boss, don't be disappointed. [Claw] may seem to have lost the potential of [Ghost Claw], but it is deeply bound to [Belly Universe]. [Belly Universe] is an ultimate innate divine ability on par with the [Yin Mountain Ghost Domain], capable of infinitely devouring prey and growing. Right now, the strength of [Bone Claw] depends on the strength of [Belly Universe]. When you make it big in the future, a single swipe of this claw will carry the attack intensity of an entire 'space'!"

The sprite continued to hype up a bright future: if [Belly Universe] were fed to a size of one hundred cubic meters, then a single claw swipe would apply the mass of a spatial volume onto the bone claw. With a single smash of this palm, any prey would be torn to smithereens.

If [Belly Universe] became a true universe, then a single swipe would pack the power of an entire realm.

"Furthermore, as long as we grind well, the two bloodline paths will fuse tighter and tighter, ultimately evolving into a brand new bloodline divine ability and giving birth to a new species with a tiger head and a snake tail! By then, the [Bone Claw] will still be able to stack [Shadows, Minions, Wind Calling, Universe, Ghost Domain], and you, Big Boss, will be even more awesome!" (voice cracking)

Under the sprite's continuous flattery, Yuan Zhu, who had been somewhat gloomy, cheered up once again, full of expectations for the future!

Now that I look at it, this [Bone Claw] is also quite charming, looking more impressive the more I see it! The style of the mere [Ghost Claw] was far too underworld-like anyway, completely unworthy of his mighty and domineering self!

Thus, he casually offered a small compliment: "Well said, such a sweet mouth!"

The sprite: "I am your most loyal rainbow energy nutritionist! Say goodbye to anxiety and internal friction, and stay confident and high-spirited every day! Big Boss is mighty, Big Boss is New! Bee!" (voice-cracking shout)

In high spirits, Yuan Zhu maintained his 'Bone Tiger Demon' posture, cautiously and carefully eyeing the Vajra Temple. After his previous bout of wild slaughter, he had tossed all the limited ghouls outside the temple and detained them within the shadow world.

At this moment, the vast Vajra Temple was empty, still lingering with a rich Yellow Springs Buddhist resonance, but dead silent. Without ghouls operating it, the threat index had plummeted.

"Let's go, let's take a good tour. You search every inch of land carefully and see if there are any valuable treasures. Make sure not to miss a thing."

The sprite: "That small pond, that small pond! Hurry over there, such dense Yellow Springs death qi—that must be the spring eye! Go check if there are any heavenly treasures inside!"

"Heavenly treasures? Would such a filthy world even have those?"

"Aren't those just the immortal cultivation common sense inside your brain?"

"That's in novels, not common sense! Stop blindly applying them; this is clearly not a normal world." To think you're an AI, how are you getting more and more mentally handicapped?

As Yuan Zhu's understanding of Duling continued to grow, he found the sprite becoming increasingly foolish. Failing to distinguish between truth and falsehood in his memories, she naively treated mythological novels as real reference material to apply everywhere.

However, her talent for providing emotional value was quite useful to him. Keep stepping up the intensity of the mental massage! This king can handle it.