Chapter 38 part 1

Cleaning the tiger house is actually a very simple matter. Take the tiger to a place where it can’t reach you, and then it only takes more than ten minutes to basically clean it up. After all, tigers love cleanliness. The only dirt left is their excrement and food residues, so it is still very quick to clean up.

After cleaning, Kong Bi played with the big cat for a while, rubbed the big cat’s cheek and left.

Tigers are very independent creatures. As long as they are sure that Kong Bi will not leave their sight, they will not be so anxious about Kong Bi leaving their sight.

Kong Bi went back to the cafeteria to eat, because she had to go back to accompany the big cat at night.

It’s not that I’m afraid that the big cat will be lonely and sleep poorly, but that the contract is not something that can be rest assured once it is concluded. Otherwise, if it’s just this once, the ancient demon kings are not short of natural materials and treasures to supplement their consumption. If it’s really that simple, how can they not rely on this method to develop confidants like an assembly line?

Therefore, there was still a lot Kong Bi needed to do, which she called prenatal education.

Firstly, she had to make the little demon tiger instinctively restrain itself from absorbing the surrounding energy upon birth, preventing the large cat from turning against it and biting it to death for its own survival. Secondly, she had to guide the little demon tiger to adapt to her different kind of demon power and refine it for its own use. Thirdly, she had to ‘seal’ the little demon tiger, ensuring that not even a trace of power could leak from its body, as a demon with power but no control would be a disaster for all surrounding living beings upon birth.

In addition to this, Kong Bi also had to stimulate it, hoping it could awaken its innate divine ability at birth. After all, such a technique was a significant drain for a demon king, and it would be a huge loss for the demon king if the other party’s aptitude was ordinary.

Therefore, Kong Bi had to stimulate it and guide it, hoping it could awaken a talent for prolonging life.

After all, a tiger’s lifespan in the wild is only a little over a decade, and the highest recorded lifespan in captivity is just over twenty years. Moreover, this era is not friendly to demons. Under the tribulation of the Dharma-ending Age, rather than awakening a combat talent with great destructive power, it would be better to awaken a talent that allows it to live longer. Perhaps it could even survive until the spiritual energy revives.

Of course, talking about this is still too far off. Kong Bi simply hopes that she won’t have to send the little demon tiger away after it’s born. Most people who raise pet cats and dogs eventually have to part with them. But if they raise pets like parrots with longer lifespans, then it’s more likely that the pets will outlive them.

Selfishly speaking, Kong Bi hopes to be the latter, not the former.

After all, a demon’s lifespan only undergoes earth-shattering changes in adulthood. Before that, unless they consume life-prolonging elixirs, their lifespan increase will be very limited.

Take Wang Tianba as an example. The lifespan of a wild owl is only three to five years, and in captivity, it can reach ten years. The lifespan of a fledgling demon doubles, but even taking the highest lifespan into account, it’s only twenty years. However, it broke through, and this leap in its life will increase its lifespan again, but the increase won’t be as significant as the first time. Gaining half of its previous lifespan would be the most ideal scenario.

Why is this the case? Because the direction of evolution is different at each stage. Demons in their fledgling stage don’t need other pursuits; they only need an increase in lifespan to enrich their knowledge through time. Just as humans become wise with age, rich experience is also a valuable asset in the demon world. The more they know, the higher their wisdom, and the greater the possibility of breaking through. Therefore, the primary growth for fledgling demons is wisdom.

When wisdom is high, various battles will break out, as well as the plunder of resources. Therefore, the changes in a young demon’s physical form are: wisdom (lifespan) → physique (strength) → supernatural abilities… Each stage of a demon’s life is survival wisdom painstakingly explored and refined, just like the various functions that every surviving creature in nature instinctively evolves to best ensure its survival.

Perhaps it was because of the big cat, but Kong Bi noticed that the frequency with which the people in the cafeteria looked at her today was somewhat high. However, Kong Bi didn’t pay it any mind. She knew that without her asking, someone unable to contain their curiosity would soon come to find her.

Sure enough, seeing Kong Bi finish eating and prepare to leave, Shi Zhuo immediately darted over, excited and expectant: “Director, can I become your apprentice and learn skills?”

“…Captain Shi, what are you talking about?” Kong Bi suspected she had misheard. “What could I possibly teach you?”

“Director, you must know martial arts, right? I saw it all!” Shi Zhuo was so excited he was almost gesticulating wildly. “Yesterday, I didn’t react in time, but when the tiger rushed over, you jumped almost as high as the tiger! And I went back to take a look this morning, that pit was made by your foot yesterday, wasn’t it? Director, please teach me! I can endure hardship!”

Kong Bi: “…………”

Kong Bi wasn’t sure if true martial arts existed in the world; she certainly had never seen any. Her Taoist grandfather had only gone up the mountain because his family was too poor to eat. When encountering unreasonable people, his best tactic was to lie down on the ground and start calculating whether he should buy a car or a house. Before the bloodline within her awakened, Kong Bi hadn’t shown any special abilities. Her strength was fairly normal. Even after becoming a demon, she didn’t know any martial arts. It was purely her demonic physique that allowed her to brute-force her way through anything, even without any knowledge of fighting techniques.

In addition, the green peacock’s most formidable attack lies in its legs, and Kong Bi is naturally the same. The strength in her legs far surpasses that of her upper body, but this isn’t due to hard training; it’s an innate talent of the green peacock.

However, explaining to Shi Zhuo that she didn’t know kung fu wouldn’t convince him. So, Kong Bi pondered for a moment and said, “This is a family tradition, and our ancestral teachings cannot be passed down to outsiders. Moreover, it’s generally better to start practicing martial arts from a young age, otherwise, unless you have exceptional talent…”

Kong Bi’s unfinished words were already very clear. Shi Zhuo immediately looked disappointed. He didn’t believe he possessed exceptional talent. He had learned this very clearly when he joined the army. Some people, even without prior exposure to high-intensity training, could always be at the top of their class during training and wouldn’t feel tired at all the next day after waking up, while others would experience a decline in their condition the next day and could only persevere through sheer willpower.

Moreover, when he enlisted in the military, he had come into contact with traditional Chinese martial arts—far from the exaggerated legends, they were nothing that miraculous. Qigong, in particular, had seemed like a joke. But now, after seeing Kong Bi, he began to wonder if those myths weren’t entirely false. It was just that such realms were likely unattainable for ordinary people in their lifetime. Some things truly belonged only to geniuses.  

Noticing that the other party didn’t press further, Kong Bi was a little surprised. After all, the fervent look on his face earlier didn’t seem like someone who would give up so easily. Still, she didn’t say anything more. While she suspected that, over time, her inherited knowledge might eventually include martial arts or similar skills, there was no point in making empty promises.  

After all, a possibility wasn’t a certainty. A monster’s inherited memories only recorded what was beneficial to itself—martial arts might not be included. At the end of the day, monsters preferred to rely on their physical bodies in battle, while humans were better at utilizing tools. Their paths of development were fundamentally different.

Perhaps everyone found the idea of Kong Bi knowing ‘martial arts’ too outlandish. Apart from Shi Zhuo and Yang He, the two involved parties, there weren’t many who even half-believed it. After all, the fact of stomping the ground and creating a pit was simply too fantastical. Instead, Quan Xiangsong and the others were more inclined to believe that Kong Bi’s family might have some kind of ancestral animal taming method. This was more palatable to them than saying Kong Bi had a special constitution that naturally made animals like her.

Otherwise, if it were the latter – if she naturally emitted a pheromone that made animals in their world feel close to her – then for them, as people who specialized in studying animals, it would be enough to turn them into sour lemon spirits (extremely jealous).

…

After a few days of adaptation, the big cat’s mood became much more stable.

As a wild tiger, it was more casual than Kong Bi expected, and did not feel uncomfortable because the tiger house was different from the reinforced concrete outside.

Perhaps it was because it felt that this was just an unfamiliar wild environment, but the meat was enough to soothe its heart, and it did not stay for a long time, so it did not feel anxious about the unchanging environment around it.

Generally speaking, tigers are actually more home-based. After they are full of prey, they are usually too lazy to leave their territory. Only when they are hungry next time, they will go out to hunt and choose a new residence.

The food in one area is limited, which is why tigers have such a large range. They usually hunt in one place a few times before moving on to stay and hunt in a new location, and then move again, in a cycle. This is the method their survival wisdom tells them: to sustainably ‘drain the pond to catch all the fish’ – they will only return to feast after the prey in one area has fattened up.

Now that food is plentiful, the big cat’s desire to move around is very low, especially since it feels its labor is just a few days away, so it’s even less likely to wander off.

To keep the big cat from getting bored, Kong Bi brought in a few tree trunks to serve as scratching posts and even hired a craftsman to weld a hollow iron ball for it to play with.  

Other types of balls were essentially disposable for the big cat—a single swipe of its paw could flatten them. In comparison, the iron ball had a much longer lifespan, and since it was hollow inside, it wasn’t too heavy, eliminating the risk of accidentally injuring the cat.  

However, aside from briefly playing with them when they were first introduced, the big cat soon lost interest. It wasn’t out of boredom, but rather due to the effects of pregnancy.  

As a first-time tiger mother, her heart was filled with trepidation about the unknown. This restless anxiety made it impossible for her to relax and enjoy herself as carefreely as before.