Chapter 606 - 545: Programmatic, Rigid Meticulousness

Chapter 606: Chapter 545: Programmatic, Rigid Meticulousness

The scorching sun had hung high in the sky of this realm for a full nine days.

But the pitch-black darkness lasted for only nine hours.

After nine hours, the pitch-black darkness dissipated, and the scorching sun once again hung high in the sky.

Yellow sand filled the air as heatwaves rolled across the land.

After a night, Chu Mu’s situation seemed to have remained unchanged.

The Sand-tailed Scorpion Tide was still endless, surging forward wave after wave.

He was still one man with one saber, trapped in the midst of this endless, bloody slaughter.

However, compared to his previous desperate flight, his mindset had shifted. It was as if that Pill Pattern Elixir had pulled him out of the mindless, instinct-driven slaughter.

With his composure restored, he naturally began to think more.

’This Desert Sea... it seems... shrouded in suspicion, too.’

As his Three-foot Blade swung, Chu Mu suddenly revealed an opening. In the next instant, the endless Sand-tailed Scorpion Tide, like an incredibly precise machine, immediately detected the flaw.

The Sand-tailed Scorpions within a radius of dozens of yards all broke from their relentless forward surge, instead coordinating a series of deadly strikes around the opening.

Chu Mu’s expression was calm, showing no alarm. With a swing of his Three-foot Blade before him, he forcibly covered the opening. As the blade flowed, the dozen or so Sand-tailed Scorpions that had lunged for the flaw were cut down one by one.

As the opening vanished, his bladework returned to its flawless state, and his impenetrable Defense was restored. The Sand-tailed Scorpion Tide, which had mobilized in response, visibly returned to its former state.

It was like a rigorously trained assassin who, after a failed strike, would conceal their killing intent and wait for the next opportunity.

’But perhaps... it’s even more like a machine following a fixed program. A Puppet?’

Chu Mu frowned deeply, shock and suspicion evident in his eyes.

’Something isn’t right with this realm, with this Desert Sea.’

’And this Sand-tailed Scorpion Swarm... something isn’t right about it, either.’

The failure of the Pill Pattern Elixir was one of the many mysteries of this realm.

The nine days of scorching sun and the nine hours of perpetual darkness were also due to the abnormalities of this realm.

And as for this Sand-tailed Scorpion Swarm...

He had arrived here suddenly and, while still completely bewildered, was thrown into an endless, bloody slaughter.

Coupled with his preconceived notions about them, his mind had been overwhelmed by fear of the Sand-tailed Scorpion Swarm. Killing and escaping consumed his every thought.

But now, after fighting for days, he took another look at the endless Sand-tailed Scorpions...

Admittedly, the Sand-tailed Scorpion Swarm he faced was almost identical to the Sand-tailed Scorpion Race described in ancient records.

From their Insect Race-like colony structure and their evolutionary patterns to this endless siege, it was as if the ancient catastrophes caused by the Sand-tailed Scorpions were being re-enacted with him at the center.

Seamless. Flawless.

It was utterly terrifying.

But...

Chu Mu scanned his surroundings. The sea of sand stretched endlessly, the Beast Tide surged violently, yet there wasn’t the slightest hint of chaos. A strict, almost severe order was clearly evident within the Sand-tailed Scorpion Tide.

’But this strict order... it doesn’t just seem strict. It seems more like... a mechanical rigidity?’

Chu Mu’s frown deepened, the shock and suspicion in his eyes growing more pronounced.

After a moment of contemplation, a thought struck him, and he once again deliberately revealed an opening as a test.

Just as he expected, the moment his impenetrable Defense showed a flaw, an almost programmatic reaction occurred instantly.

The hundreds of Sand-tailed Scorpions within a radius of dozens of yards all moved in concert.

And when he covered the flaw and restored his impenetrable Defense, the Scorpions immediately resumed their previous behavior, surging toward him wave after relentless wave.

’It seems like a normal phenomenon, but this, clearly, is the greatest abnormality of all.’

After all, every Sand-tailed Scorpion was supposed to be under the control of a Sand-tailed Scorpion Mother. The scorpions themselves possessed no Spiritual Wisdom; they were merely pawns and cannon fodder manipulated by their mother.

But a Sand-tailed Scorpion Mother...

As far as he knew, due to their unique method of inheritance and reproduction, every Sand-tailed Scorpion Mother was born with a Spiritual Wisdom no less than that of a human.

In other words, regardless of the Cultivation of the Sand-tailed Scorpion Mother behind this swarm, its Spiritual Wisdom should be exceptionally high.

Yet, judging by that programmatic response just now, this endless swarm of Sand-tailed Scorpions and their seemingly strict order didn’t seem to be controlled by a Spiritual Demon. It felt more like mechanical, programmed rigidity.

After all, he had used the same opening, the same trick, multiple times. If a Spiritual Demon were in control, it surely wouldn’t be fooled every single time, let alone react in almost the exact same way on each occasion.

This kind of programmatic rigidity was something he was, in fact, very familiar with.

After all, every Puppet he had ever Refined was just as programmatically rigid.

Or to put it another way, in the Cultivation Immortal Realm, all Artifact Puppets were this programmatically rigid.

’If it wasn’t programmatically rigid, it wouldn’t be an Artifact Puppet. It would have to be called... a living being!’

’In common terms... it would have gained sentience!’

Take his Spirit Plant Puppets, for example. All he had inscribed upon their cores was the body of knowledge related to tending Spiritual Plants.

When it came to tending Spiritual Plants, a Spirit Plant Puppet would meticulously follow its instructions. It would be rigid, strict, and strive for perfection, making no errors or omissions.

Any problem that arose, as long as it fell within the scope of the Spirit Plant Puppet’s core records, would inevitably be met with a programmed response.