"Can I bear to kill it?" Inala muttered as he sprinted through the channel, cursing in response immediately after, "Fuck no! Whether or not it's my child, I cannot kill a baby!"
The Boar King had a vengeance to fulfil against the Empyrean Tusks. In Sumatra Chronicles, it annihilated Resha's Mammoth Clan and killed all Empyrean Tusks.
The Boar King had a Nature of devouring and assimilating the natures of all his prey. As he had consumed enough Empyrean Tusks, he had their nature too. Meaning, the moment the newborn—Empyrean Tusk baby—lets out even the faintest of cries, the Boar King would sense her location.
And he will come here immediately. The hive-mind nature of an Empyrean Tusk allows it to pick up a newborn Empyrean Tusk's cries from far away.
The Boar King typically roamed in the Dieng Canyon's vicinity, gorging on its traffic. Towards the end of Sumatra Chronicles, after the herd crossed the Dieng Canyon once again, the Boar King attacked them.
Therefore, as he prowled around the region, he was well within the range to pick up the baby's cries. That meant doom for the herd. 'Even with endgame Resha, the herd wasn't equipped to deal with him.'
'What happened that night?' He thought in worry, 'Did Oyo somehow derive the method to birth baby Empyrean Tusks through the information she interrogated out of me? My hip bones were in the worst shape when I woke up the next day. Does that mean she slept with me to make the baby?'
He had a lot of questions but no answers. But whether or not he had the answer, Inala knew he couldn't bring himself to kill the baby. That would traumatise him for life. He didn't have a destructive tendency like Blola or Virala.
As long as the result wasn't too gory, he could kill Pranic Beasts. But that was it. He hadn't killed any humans. He was averse to the notion. The only way he could kill someone and not be traumatised was when they were scum and made him angry enough to warrant death.
But a baby was innocent, the purest of living beings. All mammals instinctively cared for and protected the young of their race, whether it be their offspring or not.
On Earth, one of his friends married and had a baby. He of course visited them to offer his congratulations. It was a formal visit. He wasn't even that close with that guy. But despite that, when he stared at his friend's son, he was overcome by a protective instinct.
That was genetically coded in everyone. And Inala didn't have the means to overcome that. 'Then, there's only one option.'
By the time he reached the end of the path, Inala firmed his mind, patting his Storage Lantern, 'I have enough Empyrean Tusk's tusk bone powder to build my body. I can survive away from the Settlement for a short duration.'
He planned to flee with the baby and live in a human kingdom for a few years, until the baby grew up enough for her cries to not broadcast her location to every single Empyrean Tusk in the region.
Since he knew the herd's travel route by heart, Inala could camp at a farther location and wait for the herd to pass through, returning to the Clan alongside the mature Empyrean Tusk.
But this was a last resort. As long as the baby doesn't cry, he wouldn't have to risk his life. 'Dammit, this isn't fair!'
Inala reached the end of the channel and he leaped out, using the Zinger King's corpse as a cover; he made a beeline towards Granny Oyo's house and kicked the door down, "Oyo!"
There was no sign of life in the house. He expanded his senses and tried to detect any other traces of Prana, failing to find any. 'If she's not here…'
He hurriedly recalled the information in Sumatra Chronicles, 'Right, she had an underground refinery.'
There was a channel entrance within the house itself; Inala rushed through it and arrived at a node, noticing multiple paths trailing from it. "Right, the one on the right extreme."
He quickly reached the end of the channel and banged on the door. It seemed sealed from the inside. Inala took a couple of steps back as his Prana Hand slammed forth, raising its weight to the limit, and bombarded the door.
It took him almost a minute to break through, entering the barren room inside to see a frail woman sprawled on the floor. She was weak, like a brittle tree branch. Blood covered the floor, having coagulated after extended exposure to air.
All the vials on the shelves were strewn haphazardly, their contents consumed in a hurry. The room was filled with a dense, bloody stench. Inala controlled his shock and noticed the twig-like woman on the floor.
"You…you're here." The woman was of course Granny Oyo. But unlike her overbearing powerful self from before, she barely had any strength in her. A glance at her and Inala knew that she was no longer a cultivator.
Held in her hands was a baby that seemed to have been birthed mere minutes before. Granny Oyo only had enough strength to cut the umbilical cord. She couldn't even clean up the blood covering the crying baby. Yes, crying.
At the baby's cries, Granny Oyo said in pride, "Never in my life did I think I would get the honour to birth an Empyrean Tusk. My hollow life finally feels fulfilled."
She stared at Inala weakly, her eyes tearing up, "I almost failed to deliver. Thankfully, I had enough cultivation to combust for the final nurturing of the baby. Hear her strong cries. She's born with a healthy body."
"How…long has she been crying for?" Inala asked, resigning himself to fate. He knew he was late. Despair set in him as he realised the Boar King would have heard her cries already.
"For a minute or two?" Granny Oyo said weakly as her eyes drooped. It seemed giving birth to an Empyrean Tusk took everything out of her. She was on the verge of death. After glancing at the baby, she motioned for Inala to pick her up, "I leave her in your care."
"Who…is the father…" Inala turned silent as he picked up the crying baby, his emotions a mixture of fury and sadness, 'I guess it doesn't matter.'
"I'm sorry for forcing myself on you," Granny Oyo said. Even though she seemed to be apologising, there was no hint of remorse in her eyes, "When I interrogated you that day, I despaired upon knowing my Deity's life was reaching its end. But I soon understood my purpose. It was to continue our Deity's existence and birth an Empyrean Tusk. My Mystic Bone Art reached its final level and allowed me to unearth information from my bloodline. I found out that we were compatible and our union would produce an Empyrean Tusk. So, I did it."
"You know what that means, right?" Inala stared at her coldly. "Despite facing death everywhere around us as Mammoth Clansmen, even we uphold some morals. But you…"
"A dead lady doesn't have to care about that. Whether you're angry or not is irrelevant. Punish my corpse all you want." Granny Oyo's face revealed a hollow smile as the light in her eyes died out, "I have a solid grasp of your character. No matter the process, since she's your daughter, I'm sure you'll give your everything to protect and nurture her. And as she grows up, she'll become the Clan's Deity."