Chapter 1654 A Pair of Dog Eyes
After years of fierce fighting, he finally got his wish.
Sun Hao's headless neck stretched forward as his body surged ahead, attaching itself to a massive, pillar-like blue horn. He swung his hammer and square shield incessantly, filled with excitement.
The enormous horn condensed countless years' worth of the great monster's essence and seemed to represent a particularly unique stream of aura within the Ten Thousand Extinctions Ancient Graveyard.
Sun Hao greedily absorbed the flow of aura within the horn and various energies beneficial to his body.
Unconsciously, the horn grew smaller and smaller. Without Sun Hao restraining it at all, the beneficial energy within the horn was partitioned among the several foreign objects within his body and the Sumero-Void Condensing Pagoda.
Only an extremely intense fighting spirit, a potent ferocious might, accompanied by a mysterious, elusive aura, remained within Sun Hao's physical form, merging into his Wilderness Body Immortal Technique where it continuously circulated.
By the time the horn was fully digested, who knows how many years had passed.
And the changes Sun Hao gained were immense indeed, worthy of the effort spent so long struggling to seize the horn.
The first change that appeared left Sun Hao, who relied purely on instinct, both strange and deeply puzzled. This time, that odd treasure pagoda inside him—his own, which knew only to take in things but never to release anything—finally acted somewhat generously, spitting something out.
Stranger still, Sun Hao, who had never had any perception of the outside world and never known he needed to communicate with anything, seemed able to hear, or his body seemed able to sense, something outside "barking" wildly. It seemed to be saying: "Out! Out! I, the Divine Dog Border Collie, am finally out! Yay! Who are you? Could you be Sun Hao (Sun Chenxiang)? Dammit, no way, you've lost your head?!..."
Sun Hao felt it was strange—he seemed able to hear something making noise, though what it was saying registered only as a vague, indistinct murmur.
His simple mind couldn't grasp it.
But instinctively, Sun Hao knew this thing had come from inside his body, that it was beneficial to him and could be trusted.
After a long while, Sun Hao slowly lowered himself, nudging the strange thing beside him with his severed neck. He heard the strange thing outside yelp loudly: "Shit! It really is Sun Hao (Sun Chenxiang)! The treasure pagoda is inside you?! Damn! I knew it couldn't be good news when the old guy kicked me out! Boss Sun! How’d you end up so tragic? Lost your head?! Ahh... poor unlucky Border Collie, what's to be done now? Grandma's, what sort of place is this? Smells awful! Going to vex this Divine Dog to death..."
Sun Hao heard these words in his mind. Instinctively, he knew this thing called "Border Collie" was referring to him when it said "Sun Hao (Sun Chenxiang)". It seemed, in the depths of his being, he too gained a faint, indistinct trace of memory, though if he tried to recall it specifically, nothing came.
Holding a hammer in one hand and a shield in the other, Sun Hao rose stiffly to his full height, ramrod straight. He beat his shield against his chest, and his stomach began noisily gurgling and rumbling, louder and louder.
Meanwhile, the mysterious aura circulating within his Wilderness Body Immortal Technique gradually coalesced in his abdominal region into a swirling mass of energy. As he continued to pound his shield and vigorously bulge his stomach, this mass of energy underwent a peculiar transformation.
With a thunderous rumble, the mantra of the Wilderness Body Immortal Technique seemed to swirl ceaselessly in Sun Hao's heart: "Xingtian never a thousand years, Xingtian dancing with shield and axe; Xingtian never a thousand years, Xingtian dancing with shield and axe..."
Intense, blinding red light also erupted from the surface of the Xingtian Axe-Shield, shining onto Sun Hao’s body.
Border Collie, who had just emerged, stared dumbfounded at the transformation occurring within Sun Hao.
Suddenly, KABOOM! Sun Hao's exposed belly button, on his bare upper body, burst violently open. A sky-rending roar erupted, shaking Border Collie's ears: "AAAAHHH... ohhh!!!"
Border Collie stared, stunned for a long moment. Standing on Sun Hao's shoulder, it barked frantically: "Damn! You've got to be kidding! Your belly button turned into a bloody maw?! Chenxiang! What in the world are you cultivating?!"
Sun Hao heard Border Collie's words. But his current, barely cognizant sliver of consciousness was like a confused infant, utterly incapable of understanding their meaning.
The newly mutated belly-button mouth conjured by the Wilderness Body Immortal Technique couldn’t form words properly yet. It could barely manage two simple syllables—"Ahh..." and "Ohh..."—let alone say anything more complex.
After testing for a long while, Border Collie finally fully understood Sun Hao's condition.
His head was gone, whereabouts unknown, and likely never coming back.
Yet the formidable Sun Hao persisted, stubbornly alive despite it.
Because he lacked a head, he naturally operated purely on instinct now. Still, the strange emergence of the belly-button mouth also revealed to Border Collie that Sun Hao was now very different, albeit subtly, from ordinary mindlessly driven beasts.
Jumping from Sun Hao's left shoulder to his right was easy and delightful travel—wide shoulders with nothing blocking the way.
After forming his belly-button mouth, Sun Hao continuously made excited "Ahh..." and "Ohh..." noises. Unwaveringly, he marched forward again, guided by the sensations emanating from the foreign objects within him.
Border Collie became a resident upon Sun Hao's shoulders, looking around in every direction, left and right, brimming with curiosity.
The Sumero-Void Condensing Pagoda remained sealed. Especially without Sun Hao's head or Divine Sense, opening it was basically impossible.
However, as Sun Hao invested more and more resources, weakening its sealing state, Elder Qing forced out the Pagoda's most unique occupant—Border Collie.
As Elder Qing had suspected, upon arriving in the Lower Void, Border Collie adapted swiftly. Even in the notoriously perilous Ten Thousand Extinctions Ancient Graveyard of the Lower Void, it remained lively and energetic.
It was remarkable for a mere Mutt to be quite so miraculous.
Leaping back and forth on Sun Hao's shoulders, a smug secret darkness warmed Border Collie's heart: "Gahaha! Gahaha! Look at me now—flying around Sun Hao's head! Gahaha! Could anything feel more amazing!?"
It hopped about for a while, its eyes darting left and right. Quietly, it raised its hind leg, peering around again. A thought blossomed: "Gahaha! If I did my business right on Sun Hao's head right now... probably wouldn't be an issue... Gahaha... should I go ahead? It’d feel amazing... this is the supremely famous Sun Hao (Sun Chenxiang)...!"
However, moments later, Border Collie lowered its leg dejectedly and muttered to itself: "Boss Sun treats Border Collie better than words can tell. It might feel amazing, but it really wouldn't be right. Forget it, forget it... you get a pass this time, Boss Sun..."
Sun Hao's headless body, carrying Border Collie, strode forward with long, swift steps.
After walking for a while, Border Collie spotted a critical problem ahead and began barking frantically: "Idiot! There's a mountain ahead..."
Before it could finish, Sun Hao’s massive iron hammer swung down with a whooshing wind. WHAM! It struck the small hill dead-on.
Border Collie's jaw dropped in astonishment.
The hammer swung again. BAM! BAM! BAM! Sun Hao plowed straight into the heart of the hill, forcing his way forward by brute power. Halfway through, he thrust his severed neck forward.
Border Collie scrambled to dig in its claws to hold onto the shoulder. Focusing its gaze, it saw the jagged stump being jammed into a pool of strange, clear spring water. Glug glug glug… Sun Hao began guzzling the spring water.
Not one to be outdone, Border Collie stuck its own head in to start drinking. It sensed the water was pure; it held a miraculous, invigorating benefit. Its eyes lit up instantly. Though Boss Sun currently appeared to be in miserable shape, his abilities were top-notch. Sticking with Boss Sun might just mean feasting on delicacies and living well.
Moreover, Border Collie discovered something that thrilled it: the usually cunning-as-a-fox Sun Hao (Sun Chenxiang) was currently in a pitiable state—his intellect was compromised! Border Collie itself was now the real mastermind! Gahaha! It couldn't get any better than this! It could be calling the shots now! Standing firmly on Sun Hao's shoulder, Border Collie's eyes blazed with ecstatic light. It howled at the sky: "Upper Realm! Border Collie has arrived! Woofwoof! Woofwoof! Here to conquer the four corners with this dimwit Sun Hao!"
It hadn't howled more than a few times when it suddenly yelped in panicked chaos: "Boss! Don't go there! It's a cliff! Can't go! It's a cliff!... AHHH SHIZAAAT!... CRASH!... Damn! This dog's dead!!"
Long, long afterward, from the bottom of the cliff came indignant canine barks: "Border Collie... got... UP! Dammit! Boss! That way! Don't go! Don't! It’s a deep pool! Damn!..."
Long, long afterward, more frantic barking rang out: "Drowning this dog! Drowning this dog! Boss! You beat me! Blades can't pierce you! Water and fire don't touch you! Through the tempests and infernos you stride! Whatever's in your path, you tread right over! Fine! Border Collie admits full and utter defeat!... Damn near blinded this dog's pair of eyes..."