Martial World Sharang.
Two weeks after Serenity Peak had been turned into a Devil’s Den.
The tree devils and the demon tree constituted the new reality for all the surviving citizens of the city.
No external help was going to come from outside the city; each citizen needed to take responsibility for their own survival.
During this time, Aksai had completed his experiments on the tree devils and obtained all the information he needed about them.
He shared some of the natural weaknesses of the tree devils that he had learned from his experiments with his subordinates to raise their chances of survival in the danger zones.
For example, tree devils didn’t fare well when subjected to fire-based attacks and traps.
Plus, the metal-like vines around their torsos and limbs could be targeted to affect their movements.
One needed to target the metal rods lodged in their limbs and destroy them if they wanted to incapacitate the tree devils with minimal effort and time.
Similarly, the tree devils could be attacked with acid-like liquids and solutions to prevent them from rapidly recovering from wounds. Weapons could be coated in highly potent acidic solutions to counter the tree devils’ insane recovery speed.
Aksai also shared some direct tactics and trap-based attacks with his subordinates based on the results he had obtained from his experiments. He wanted to ensure that his number of palace guards didn’t dwindle too fast during the coming months.
The martial arts schools, which had also begun sending their own parties into the danger zones, closely observed Aksai’s subordinates.
They soon learned what Aksai had discovered and started implementing these tactics to deal with the tree devils they faced during their expeditions into the danger zones as well.
Aksai paid no mind to the fact that martial arts schools and other organizations had begun to mimic his tactics for dealing with the tree devils.
In fact, he felt that it was better for him in the end if all the surviving citizens in Serenity Peak worked together to constantly dwindle the tree devils’ population. The smaller the number of tree devils at the time of the judgment day, the more his chances of slaying the corrupted druid would be.
Plus, could he really monopolize the tricks he had discovered?
Aksai was well aware of the resilience and adaptability of the human species. Humans’ survival instincts were top-notch. Given enough time, they would be able to adapt to some of the harshest climates and toughest situations.
Aksai was confident that the people still living within the Devil’s Den would have adapted to their new reality and developed their own methods for dealing with the tree devils anyway without his intervention. Aksai had simply hastened the process by showing them what they needed to do through the actions of his palace guards.
***
Aksai’s private chamber.
Aksai was seen meditating inside a compound Array Formation, constructed of Stellar Greenwood Tantra and an essence-gathering formation.
As he regulated his breaths with his eyes closed, his daily Spirit cultivation reached a melting point.
Soon, Aksai began making various hand signs through the partially automated cultivation process managed by the neural link fabric. These hand signs were executed so rapidly that it was challenging for any regular person to follow them.
All of a sudden, Aksai’s hands abruptly stopped moving, and he opened his eyes. A spectral message awaited him as soon as he adjusted his vision.
[ The daily cultivation practice ended automatically due to diminishing effects. ]
“These woodland zombies are truly intriguing,” Aksai murmured to himself as he swiped the spectral notification away with his hands.
While meditating, Aksai used a part of his consciousness to analyze the experiment results gained from various rounds of experiments over the last two weeks.
He had discovered that there were various layers to the reanimation, a common concept used in most puppet techniques.
Through his research on the tree devils, he found a method to keep one’s puppets partially alive. In this state, a puppet’s heart continued beating even though the soul had already departed the body.
This state, which Aksai defined as Undeath, could allow the tree devils to survive on their own even without having the Spirit stones embedded in them. They would be able to use ambient Spirit essence to survive as well as to power their Spirit spells.
The corrupted druid, with his tree devils, had a solid advantage over Aksai and his Scarecrow puppets. The difference lay in the number of puppets the two could deploy at any time.
Aksai could handle at most about 30 puppets using his current skills. This number was already exaggerated compared to what the Spirit cultivators of his generation were capable of.
However, the corrupted druid could control hundreds of tree devils with his puppet technique. This was made possible because he used the demon tree to control the puppets’ actions.
The demon tree controlled the actions of the puppets, and the corrupted druid controlled the demon tree in return, enabling him to control a massive number of puppets without facing any drawback or metal fatigue.
This layer of control made Aksai remember the concept of network topology from his previous world.
If one were to assume the tree devils as nodes and the demon tree as the ever-expanding network, then the corrupted druid ruled over the nodes by acting as the server.
The so-called network that was the demon tree had its own logic. It was akin to an artificial intelligence specifically made for controlling the puppets. It didn’t put an additional burden on the server while it maintained consistent contact with the nodes.
Aksai, on the other hand, used his neural link fabric as a conduit between him and the puppets. It was his version of the network topology that enabled him to control so many nodes.
However, the Spirit farmer simply couldn’t use this advantage against the corrupted druid because the latter had something way better, at least when it came to controlling many puppets. Aksai’s puppet art was like an infant when it stood against the puppet art used by the corrupted druid.
This was why he needed to plan ten steps ahead.
The reason he had spent so much time in experiments and preparation was to find a way to neutralize the corrupted druid’s trump card. At least for enough time for Aksai to take action against him.
“I should never try to outcompete my opponent in the field he is already good at. Rather, I need to force him to come to my level and fight me. And I think I found just the right way to do that,” Aksai smiled to himself wickedly as he thought of a way.