Mind Demon's Path of Domination

Chapter 189: Hope for the best, prepare for the worst

ROAR!

The Golden and Silver Savages around all found themselves turning their heads, feeling an ominous sensation in their gut—that nasty, disgusting sense when a demon was near—before they began running towards the sound of that violent roar.

From the sky, Mark looked down, his silver savage physique hidden amidst clouds while his wings flapped soundlessly. He could see small figures on the ground—Savages, all nervous and roaring back as they ran towards the Minotaur at the center of a clearing.

As the Minotaur's Soul Sense spread out to cover a thousand meters across this wild forest, Mark smiled. Here it begins, let's see.

His own Soul Sense exploded into the atmosphere, hidden beneath the overt Minotaur.

Oh, quite a lot of Silver Savages, and I can already see fourteen Golden Savages. No, twenty-one now.

The first to appear and surround the Minotaur was a group of Silvers but before they could get into formation and make trouble for his obedient slave, Mark's gaze focused on them. For now, he had to attract more Savages here and until then, the Minotaur would have to fight.

Flap.

Heart Input!

He whispered into their Hearts, "Shut your eyes and don't use any abilities."

As they blanked out for a second, the Minotaur moved. It was too fast for a Silver and in a mere second, all five heads floated into the air.

Mark nodded. I'll leave this place to you for a while.

He suddenly had his eyes brighten. Once they knew he was a threat, Golden Savages had never worked alone—but in this sudden chaos, he could see three Golden Savages in different areas who had been separated from their allies.

Mark blitzed through the skies towards one of them and floated above him.

Due to the Minotaur's Soul Sense, his own Soul Sense went completely unnoticed!

If I killed one Gold, the other Golds would know his death and would all grow extra alert. That is unnecessary for now even though that might make them move towards the Minotaur faster. I shouldn't kill him, but should still do it in a sense then.

Mark smirked—he had an idea.

What are his Savage Magic?

Mark scooped down on the Gold on the greyhound-like a descending eagle, his speed incredible. He smirked.

MVLeMpYr-unofficial-chapter

Eye of Heaven and Earth Meld.

A sense-type ability and a concealment type. A harmless enemy.

Yet, Mark was now using a Silver Savage as a Parasite Host and the body was just too slow compared to a Gold. The man stared up in alarm and moved just in time to detach Mark's savage head.

The decapitated body with wings stumbled two steps forward while the man stared with a frown. A Silver with wings?

The body didn't fall and Mark immediately brought out the Hamster. A demonic hand tore through the Silver corpse and touched the Gold's face.

"Goodbye."

Alchemic Shapeshifting.

"Ar—"

The man turned into a ballooning mess and Mark slammed his hand into its chest.

"I've been wondering," he said, face bloody. "You can't die entirely without your mask being destroyed, that's true for all savages. Even if you are decapitated, somebody can use Healing abilities on you and revive you. But, what if your whole body has been turned unhealable?"

He took out a beating heart from the bulging mess and touched the body again.

Alchemic Shapeshifting.

The man was transformed into… clothes. He completely became a dress. And no dress was ever alive.

Yes, he might not be dead due to his mask still being unbroken, but he was as good as dead.

Who'd ever think to heal a cloth?

Who'd think that cloth was once a man?

Can a cloth-turned-man even be healed?

Only Alchemic Shapeshifting can save you!

Mark then turned to look at the Heart in his hand, faintly golden in color. This heart contained all the Heart Blood that savage used to have, so without it, would it grow weaker?

Was it even a savage now that Mark had its Heart Blood?

So many questions.

He turned the Heart into a container-like shape and put it into his World Space. He then threw the cloth onto a tree branch without much thought.

He wasn't going to let a Savage with pieces of the Savage World's Will within him enter his World Space. Even though it was now just a cloth, who knows what would happen if a piece of the World Will entered his World Space?

For now, hanging this cloth here was fine.

With that, he caressed the hamster on top of his head and looked up into the blue sky. The clouds were thinning in this area. He flew up into the remaining clouds and headed away from there to a rather silent area of the forest.

He scooped down and landed on a tree.

With a wave of his hand, Yuri was taken out of his World Space, landing on the ground nimbly. She looked around and rubbed her nose.

"Hmm, I can smell chaos already," she said.

Mark looked down at her from the branch, at her red hair, short, slightly curled, and beautiful.

She had colored it!

She had even worn the types of ancient robes that savages usually wear, and now, she was ready. There was a small bag on her side, filled with some simple tools and small containers of Black Water just in case it was needed in this whole shebang.

Unconsciously, he found his gaze locking onto her slightly purplish eyes.

Turning, Mark looked at the violet screen that popped up beside him.

====

[The Dream Gamble—Yanchan/Mark]

[Dream: Find and meet his sister Yuuna.]

[Conditions]

Successfully complete the Dream.

[Warning]

Do not let the Puppet—Yanchan—die while the Dream Gamble is live, or the main body will also die.

[Success Reward: You can take any one thing from Yanchen as your own]

[Failure Price: Yanchan can take any one thing from you of his choice as his own.]

====

"Yuri, you'd need to change the color of your eyes to red," he said and she froze.

"How am I supposed to do that?" she asked.

He threw her a small box and she opened it. Inside, there were two small contact lenses.

"How'd you make this?"

"I prepared it using Alchemic Shapeshifting early on. So, you have to go meet my Puppet and convince him that you are Yuuna, his sister. She has red hair and red eyes, so use those contacts."

"Give me some more info about this Yuuna woman when you are giving me such an important mission…"

"She is Yanchan's sister—my Puppet's. Kidnapped in a sense by savages three years ago. She participated in an expedition into the ocean and is believed to be fighting demons somewhere."

He looked into the distance as a boom echoed into the air—the Minotaur was fighting.

Yuri sighed. "What's the name of Yanchan's father and mother?"

Mark smirked. Of course, when he had been hunting Silver Savages around the areas, he hadn't been doing nothing. He had researched.

He had gone to the villages around this area and had spoken with the villagers who knew about Yanchan's village. That village itself had been buried under a landslide but there still remained people in other villages who knew about the people from that village.

"Yanchan and Yuuna have been orphans since youth, their parents were killed by a wild beast while hunting. Yuuna is a woman who ate some weird berries that their village grew—anyone who eats it gains red hair temporarily and she ate the root of that as a kid, so her hair became red along with her eyes.

"Because of that, they were ostracized and grew up in a rather lonely place. And then, three years ago, savages took her away from him, and from then on, he had been living only to see her once more."

Yuru cringed. "Now, I have to act like this woman and convince him that I am her."

And it's a pretty sad thing, she thought. Sigh, I've grown somewhat mellow with Mark's protection over me—this is serious business Yuri, become calm.

"Fine, I'll handle it. Where is your Puppet?"

Mark broke a rather big branch from the tree and used Alchemic Shapeshifting to turn it into a Savage Mask. It would be removable, but in a sense, it looked somewhat similar to other savage masks, unless someone tried to remove it, nobody would notice it was fake.

He threw it to her too.

"Head west, you will meet the Puppet on the way—and catch this, too."

Yuri looked at a container glittering with Golden liquid.

"Don't become a Savage yourself," he said. "At least not before learning the entire truth about them. They have pieces of World Wills inside them and that makes me a bit worried, but just in case you are in a crisis against savages, use it as a bargaining chip."

"Bargaining chip?"

"I turned a Golden savage into a cloth and hanged him on a tree in the forest, I'll do the same with a bunch of other savages. If I face some true crisis, I'll agree to turn them into normal for them to let me go, you can use the same tactic by using the Heart Blood as proof that you have killed a Gold without killing them."

After all, if a Gold died, other Golds should have noticed. If they learned she had the Heart Blood without them learning about the death of another Gold, it was natural to think the Gold was still alive. It was a good bargaining chip.

In the worst-case scenario, he would use tens upon hundreds of silver savages and Golds as a bargaining chip to make them let him go. Of course, he'd rather kill enough of them here and leave but this was just a worse-case scenario preparation.

Hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.

With that, he nodded and flew away. Yuri quickly wore the contacts and wore the mask, it was a very well-crafted mask—the kind that no artisan of this world had been capable of mimicking. She looked at a puddle.

Her reflection looked like a red-haired, red-eyed Savage.

She moved through the woods, her lithe muscles burning to life!

For a while, I am not a Hunter, not a scientist, but a naive monkey from these wilderness. A savage who thinks clouds can be eaten, stupid and foolish.

Yeah, I am Yuuna, sister of Yanchan.

And I will convince that kid of that fact.

As she ran, she couldn't help but notice another thing.

And damn, I think Mark got way smarter than when I first met him. He is gained more experience. His strategies are more layered, and he is somewhat more discerning.

She couldn't help but find her heart skip a beat.