The moment the Poison Demon Cult poured from the Divine Convenience Store's doors, the nature of the battle down the Blazing Ridge shifted.
It transformed from a desperate retreat or a four-way standoff to a quick subjugation.
The Ironbone Clan Warlord, who had been pressing his advantage against Akasha, hurriedly retreated. His wyvern shrieked as it recoiled from the overwhelming wave of malicious intent washing over the battlefield.
"Poison... Demon... Cult?" He roared with a voice filled with disbelief and dawning horror. "What is a damned cult from the Inner Abyssal Circle doing here in our lands?! This is the Southern Wilderness!"
His question was answered not with words, but with a plague of toxins and curses heading their way.
The cult's priests, spilling out of the mystical establishment atop the ridge, started emitting a green spiritual energy as they began a guttural chant.
The air immediately grew thick and corrosive as the spiritual energy wrapped around them.
The Ironbone warriors' lightning-charred bone armor, designed to withstand physical blows, began to fizzle and corrode as cracks ran across the material like a disease. Their wyverns choked, flapping frantically as their lungs burned from the inside out.
From the east, the ethereal spirit-masters of the Spirit Haze Sect, who had been preparing to pick off the stragglers, immediately faltered.
"Retreat! Retreat now!" Their leader commanded, his ghostly form flickering with panic. "That is not a foe we can bind! Their poison corrupts even the soul! And there's a peak Nascent Soul Stage expert among them!"
The Spirit Haze Sect tried melting back into the shadows from whence they came, their opportunistic ambitions instantly extinguished by the arrival of a far more terrifying predator. They were merchants of secrets, not frontline soldiers, and they knew an unwinnable battle when they saw one.
However, a sudden wave of unknown energy manifested, halting their techniques to turn incorporeal. From the direction of the Poison Demon Cult, Venom Master Huangfeng held a store-bought talisman called [Soul Anchor Talisman]. A high earth-grade artifact that was specifically designed to prevent spirits and souls from escaping a designated area.
"Leaving so soon, sneaky ghosts?" Venom Master Huangfeng buzzed as his Wasp Branch priests and acolytes swarmed forward along with their Hunting Wasps, their stingers dripping with a paralytic neurotoxin, stabbed the Spirit Haze cultivators' necks, preventing them from running away.
"That's right. The Shopkeeper's grand opening party has only just begun. It would be inconvenient for you to miss the main course." With the threat thwarted, Venom Master Xun dusted her robes and regained her grace. She jumped and floated down in front of Venom Master Huangfeng, with the latter bowing slightly towards her.
"This…" The leader of the spirit-masters stared in horror, his body seizing up from the potent venom. He could only watch as his elite spirit-masters were systematically incapacitated, their bound souls and ghostly summons dissipating like smoke in the wind. "W-we were wrong. Let us go just this once and we will swear an oath to never cross the Divine Convenience Store."
"An oath?" Venom Master Xun's lips curved up as she looked down at the old master. "That's a good start. But convenience, you gnarly ghosts, doesn't need that. What it needs are patrons loyal to its creed."
She gestured vaguely towards the raging battle. "We'll discuss the terms of your... continued existence... later. For now, enjoy the show."
With the two factions that dipped their toes in this chase neutralized, the full, terrifying might of the Poison Demon Cult was unleashed upon the original target.
The High Priest stood at the forefront like a decrepit god of plague.
He pointed his skull staff towards the Crystalweb Tyrant.
"That overgrown pest has disrupted the Shopkeeper's grand design! It is the ultimate inconvenience! Children of Poison, your Great Poison Demon watches! Purge this filth!"
The cult's forces split into two disciplined wings. The Wasp, Serpent, and Toad branches, led by their Venom Masters, formed the vanguard, charging directly at the Crystalweb Tyrant and its elite broodlings.
The remaining branches, including Xun's own Arachnid Branch, moved to encircle the battlefield, cutting off any escape routes for the swarming lesser spiders.
The likes of Luhan and other Acolytes fought against the broodlings with increasing confidence. Their bodies not only glowed with the green aura of their scripture but also the buffs provided by the store-bought talismans.
With this, it became a perfectly executed pincer movement, a display of tactical coordination that the Ironbone Clan, for all their brute strength, could only watch with slack-jawed horror. Like the Spirit Haze Sect, they eventually surrendered to the Blazing Maw Tribe and the Poison Demon Cult forces that surrounded them.
"You are an impressive specimen," The High Priest said, "A creature of a foreign realm, intelligent, powerful... a worthy offering. The Great Poison Demon will be pleased."
The Tyrant, with all of its instinct and intelligence, couldn't help but shrink back. But as if it's still clinging to the hope of getting away, it let out another psychic shriek, a wave of pure terror meant to shatter the minds of lesser beings.
Unfortunately for it, the High Priest didn't even blink. The green gem on his skull staff glowed, absorbing the psychic attack as if it were a gentle breeze.
"Insolent creature," He scowled. "You know nothing of true terror. Allow me to provide a… convenient demonstration."
He raised his staff. The ground around the Tyrant began to bubble and blacken. From the corrupted earth, thousands upon thousands of venomous snakes, centipedes, and scorpions erupted. A terrifying carpet of death swarmed up the Tyrant's crystalline legs.
Before it could even emit any form of resistance, it soon found itself bound by a writhing mass of venomous flesh. The smaller creatures began to burrow into the joints of its crystalline armor, injecting their potent toxins directly into its body.
The Crystalweb Tyrant roared, a sound of agony and fury, as it thrashed wildly, crushing hundreds of the venomous creatures with each movement. But for every hundred it crushed, a thousand more took their place.
The other Venom Masters joined the assault. The Serpent Branch unleashed colossal, poison-scaled pythons that coiled around the Tyrant's legs, constricting with the force to shatter mountains. The Toad Branch summoned hulking, wart-covered behemoths that spat globes of corrosive acid, melting through the Tyrant's crystalline carapace.
It was a systematic, horrific dismantling. After their failed rebellion, Gao, Kang and the other Venom Masters had their eyes opened on the path of convenience. Even the wounds they acquired as an example set by the High Priest had long been cured by the store's incredible healing salves.
Although their branches were still weaker than the Wasp and Arachnid Branches which didn't suffer any losses from the rebellion for standing at the High Priests' side, they regained their strength. Also, they began spreading convenience within the Inner Abyssal Circle.
Eventually, the Outer Realm behemoth, a creature that had terrorized a region for months, was quickly brought down by the might of convenience.
Venom Master Xun watched the spectacle with a satisfied yet almost bored expression. She floated gracefully towards the immobilized Ironbone Clan and the paralyzed Spirit Haze Sect, Marrow Weaver at her side.
"You see," She said, her voice sounding like a melodious lecture to the captive audience. "This is the difference between a simple beast and a loyal patron. The Tyrant fights with instinct. We fight with strategy, coordination, and an endless supply of high-quality consumables."
She gestured towards the new store on the ridge, its lights a beacon of serene order amidst the chaos. "The Shopkeeper does not demand your subservience. He offers an opportunity. A chance to be a part of something greater, more efficient. More… convenient. You can either be a customer, a partner... or an obstacle. And obstacles, as you can see, tend to get removed."
The Ironbone Warlord gritted his teeth, his face a mask of humiliation. The Spirit Haze leader could only tremble, the paralytic poison preventing him from even speaking.
On the ridge, Chi Yang watched the entire scene unfold from the safety of the store's entrance. The terror she had felt earlier was slowly being replaced by a profound, earth-shattering awe.
The Poison Demon Cult was a force of terrifying evil, there was no doubt. But today, that evil was wielded like a divine instrument, purging a greater threat with efficiency. This was the world the Shopkeeper operated in. And she was now its newest manager.
"This… What should I do now?" Chi Yang whispered to herself as she slowly turned around, once again taking in the interior of her new place of work. The Southern Wilderness Branch of the Divine Convenience Store.