Ichikishimahime hid in the cave and refused to come out, so a giant Gunbai suddenly appeared in Ryou's hand.
Holding the Gunbai with both hands, he gave it a violent swing. A powerful hurricane instantly blasted Ichikishimahime's stone door open.
Ichikishimahime was also hit by this gale, creating a slight sound as she collided with the cave wall.
It turned out Ichikishimahime wasn't playing mysterious or hiding in another dimension; she was using Senjutsu to remain invisible above Ryou and Candy's heads.
Candy caught this slight movement and activated White Zetsu's perception to lock onto Ichikishimahime. Once locked, its claw pointed to a spot and it called out to Ryou.
"Ryou, over there!"
Ryou swung his Gunbai toward the direction Candy's claw was pointing, prepared to tear Ichikishimahime into pieces with a single fan stroke.
"Eight-stage—"
"Spare my life, sir!"
Ichikishimahime suddenly appeared and knelt down, prostrating herself on the ground to beg for mercy.
It wasn't that Ichikishimahime was a coward, but she had previously used Senjutsu to perceive the battle between Ryou and Tagorihime.
These Snake Sages could crush average Shinobi, but they couldn't handle top-tier Shinobi; they could only outlive them.
For instance, the successive reincarnations of Indra and Asura were far more powerful than the Snake Sages, yet they didn't live as long as them.
This was a kind of victory, a type of win—they were absolutely winning at life!
On the other hand, because they possessed Senjutsu which allowed for longevity, they were particularly timid.
Tagorihime had suppressed this instinctive cowardice because of her greed to devour Ryou and obtain power greater than the White Snake Sage.
Ichikishimahime, however, had no way to suppress it.
She was the youngest of the three Great Snake Sages, and her combat power couldn't compare to Tagorihime and Tagitsuhime.
The Senjutsu Tagorihime used was broken by a single swing of Ryou's fan; even with the home-field advantage of Ryūchi Cave and the bonus of natural energy, she couldn't defeat him.
If she went outside, she would be even less of a match for him.
So as soon as she saw Ryou lose his temper, Ichikishimahime knelt.
Ichikishimahime knelt quickly, and Ryou retracted his Gunbai just as fast.
He really didn't want to let it go to waste!
Ichikishimahime wasn't as mature as Tagorihime and Tagitsuhime; her human form was quite cute.
She had deep grayish-black hair tied into symmetrical double buns, adorned with a golden crown featuring crescent moon decorations.
Her eyes were deep blue and elongated, outlined with reddish-brown eyeshadow, and she wore light blue teardrop-shaped pendant earrings.
She wore priestess-style clothing primarily in white, with white ribbons flowing behind her, giving off the ethereal air of a Sage.
The two buns on her head were very traditional in style; it would be a waste to just kill her like this, he had to 'handle' her.
Ryou walked up to Ichikishimahime, grabbed her hair, and shouted, "Are you still going to test me? Are you still going to test me?"
Ichikishimahime's voice was soft and trembling, looking both terrified and pitiful: "My Lord, I won't test you anymore. I am not qualified to test you!"
Seeing her looking so pitiable, Ryou hurried to 'care' for her; a spore appeared in his hand, and he pinched Ichikishimahime's mouth open to shove it down her throat.
Ichikishimahime swallowed with difficulty, her face looking miserable: "My Lord... what, what did you give me to eat?"
Ryou patted her head: "Good stuff!"
Ryou then formed a hand seal, and Ichikishimahime was instantly placed under hard control.
"My Lord, don't, please don't—"
Ryou laughed loudly, then stopped the hand seal and looked at the collapsed Ichikishimahime with his hands on his hips. "Now you know how powerful I am, right?"
Ichikishimahime was giving off obvious steam.
She glanced at Ryou, feeling as though she were looking at a demon.
How could someone be this perverted?
Ryou then formed a seal to threaten Ichikishimahime: "Conjure that test paper again. I don't believe you can solve those difficult problems!"
Under Ryou's command, Ichikishimahime used Senjutsu to conjure the previous test paper.
She took out a pen and paper and began calculating for Ryou: "My Lord, when the Sage power is in a steady state, f(x) tends toward a constant value, which means f'(x)=0."
"Combining the rule for differentiating integrals with variable limits, we transform the integral expression into a solvable relational expression, thereby finding the steady-state value..."
Candy leaned in, perched on Ryou's shoulder, watching Ichikishimahime solve the riddle it had given Ryou.
Looking at it this way, the expressions of both the human and the cat went completely blank.
But with so many professional terms, Ichikishimahime couldn't have made them up on the spot; she really knew advanced mathematics!
Could you really reject a cute little Snake Sage who knew math?
After Ichikishimahime finished explaining the first problem to Ryou and Candy, she prepared to solve the second one.
Ryou, breaking out in a cold sweat, quickly yelled for Ichikishimahime to stop: "Sage Master, stop reciting, Sage Master! This stuff is too profound. I still prefer more abstract knowledge."
How abstract? For example, researching black holes.
Stephen Hawking once said: Even if only one finger can move, it cannot stop my exploration of black holes.
Or for example, learning a foreign language, where A is a sound, B is a location, and C is an action.
You don't want 'a', you don't want to go to 'b', you're unwilling to 'c', and you won't eat 'd'.
Foreign languages are good; one must learn foreign languages.
Mathematics was too torturous. Just when he was getting ready for business, the other party suddenly pulled out a set of advanced math problems; no matter how impatient a person was, they'd have a bucket of cold water poured over them.
Once stopped by Ryou, Ichikishimahime went silent, looking at him somewhat timidly.
She was afraid Ryou would go crazy again.
Ryou was curious about how Ichikishimahime knew these knowledge systems from the secular world.
It was like a ghost story—a female demon from the deep mountains and old forests doesn't ponder how to seduce scholars, but instead researches physics!
The styles didn't match at all, okay?
Moreover, advanced math wasn't something you could just learn by having a high IQ; if you gave it to the Sage of Six Paths, he would also look bewildered.
Mathematics is a system; you must systematically master the framework and foundations before you can solve high-level problems.
A vocational school student entering a math competition and reaching the world's forefront is truly winning at life.
Ryou pinched Ichikishimahime's face and asked, "How do you know this knowledge?"
Ichikishimahime replied, "My Lord, what I love most is eating wise men and devouring their wisdom."
"I have devoured much wisdom. In ancient times, people called me the Wise Serpent, meaning the Snake Sage who represents wisdom."
"I once thought my wisdom would be unprecedented and unsurpassed, so I looked down on human stupidity."
"Until 50 years ago, when the Warring States Period ended and the era of the Five Great Nations began. Various human theories emerged in succession, and theoretical iterations advanced by leaps and bounds."
"I left the mountains wanting to challenge all the wise men in the human world."
"We would set riddles for each other. As long as they could answer my riddle, I would give them a reward. If they couldn't, I would eat their brains and devour their wisdom."
"If they could set a problem I couldn't solve, I would return to Ryūchi Cave."
"But just after coming out of the cave, a middle school teacher put a math problem in front of me, and I lost. I lost miserably."
"The development of human academic fields in modern times exceeded my imagination, so I began to use any means necessary to learn human knowledge."
"By stealing, by robbing, and by devouring human brains, I must become the most intelligent life form in this world."