"I have a proposition for you," said Tianlan."I"ll hear it," replied Shiva.
"I can take you and your brother out of here."
Shiva frowned and cautiously retreated a step.
"Why would you do that? What"s in it for you? And why should I trust you?"
"Honestly, I want you to help protect my family. If you can"t trust me, then trust your sense of smell. Our Shao Clan isn"t hostile towards spirit beasts. There"s even one we call sister-in-law, fiancee and daughter-in-law."
"You want us to be guard dogs?"
"Kind of, but I wouldn"t put it that way. I"m inviting you to join our family. I a.s.sume you would sacrifice your life for your elder brother"s sake because he"s your family. Am I correct?"
"Yes. I would."
"Then, all we ask of you is to treat us like family, and we will do the same for you."
Shiva shook her head.
"It sounds unbelievable."
"But it"s worth a shot, isn"t it?"
"…"
***
"Why am I still stuck at this bottleneck?"
Rhava laid on the scalding hot surface of the volcanic region and ruminated over his plight. After discovering the secret of the paralysing section of the volcanic environment, he and his sister had made rapid improvements to their cultivation. She had gone up to the equivalent of the seventh layer of the transcendent realm, whereas he had shot up all the way to the peak at the ninth layer. Only a sliver away from the minute realm.
But that"s where his troubles began. What had previously been a smooth and easy journey had come to an abrupt stop. Both he and his sister had been stuck at their respective cultivation levels for months now.
"Is this the limit of our bloodline?"
For spirit beasts, cultivation was easy. All they had to do was to eat and sleep and their bodies would naturally mature. But all of this relied on the heights that their progenitors had reached. The further down the tree one went, the lower the effects a spectacular ancestor would have on their descendants.
At some point, all of the advantages would be removed and it would be up to the individual to push themselves higher. But that was easier said than done. For spirit beasts, who mostly relied on their bloodlines, trying to reach higher limits was a mammoth undertaking. It would be the equivalent of a human trying to break through to a new realm without even knowing its name. They would essentially have to discover it by themselves, which was magnitudes harder than following an established path.
Rhava and his sister had lost their parents before they could learn of their lineage, so they were unsure where their bloodline would take them, but it seemed they had both reached their respective limits.
"But I"m so close. I can feel it."
Even though his cultivation progress was halted, Rhava could feel the thrum of the energy he had acc.u.mulated over time. It was rushing through his body like a raging tide, it"s pressure almost unbearable, but Rhava thought it was a sign of nearing a breakthrough. He was going for the minute realm, after all. Once he broke through, he would be able to soar through the skies. That surely came with much difficulty, not to mention overcoming a life-threatening lightning tribulation.
"But what about Shiva?"
There was doubt in the back of his mind. His sister Shiva had also experienced the swelling energy, but that didn"t match his experience when he was in the seventh layer. It had been smooth sailing for him.
In the end, he a.s.sumed that she had inherited weaker bloodline traits than he had, decreasing her overall potential, causing her to come to her limit sooner.
He dismissed the possibility of the two of them lacking the talent to go further and came to the conclusion that the swelling energy was a sign of overcoming one"s limits. Once the energy grew to its peak, they would finally break the shackles of their bloodlines and would venture out onto their own paths.
Fortunately for him, his next meal was already dished up. When the next environment shift came and he found himself in the familiar snowy environment, he immediately shot up to his feet, opened wide his gaping maw, and went after the human"s neck.
"!"
That was when he caught a particular scent in the air. Upon realising what it was, he snapped his mouth shut and jumped back, lying on the ground submissively.
"Forgive me, Your Grace! This one was foolish not to recognise someone of such dignity!"
The human retreated and looked around cautiously. He had no idea why the wolf had just retreated and lowered itself, but he didn"t really want to find out. For all he knew, it was thanking the heavens for its meal.
Not far away, he saw another wolf and a fellow human. What was strange was that the human seemed to be petting the wolf, and the wolf seemed to have no problem with it. But when it noticed the new arrivals and turned its gaze to him, he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand at attention.
Arms flailing, he fled for his life.
Behind him, he could hear the howls of a wolf.
"If I could just have a moment, Your Grace! I"m willing to swear loyalty to you!"
The boy checked his rear after hearing the howls and breathed a sigh of relief after seeing that the wolf was moving slowly. He had no idea what it was saying, but to him, it was the equivalent of, "I love it when they run. It"s just not worth it without the chase."
Needless to say, he used everything he had to make his escape.
***
"Your Grace…"
Rhava watched helplessly as the n.o.ble canine tribesman made a fool of himself. If he had managed to get on his good side, maybe he and his sister would be able to escape the control of the Shimmering Sword Sect.
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"… Rhava. Over here."
Rhava heard a voice he shouldn"t have.
"Shiva? What are you doing here?"
When he turned to the source of the voice, he saw his sister and a human.
Sharpening his eyes, he bared his fangs at the human, but then he noticed that the scent of that n.o.ble beast was still there. He had been mistaken earlier.
He lowered his head towards the blue-eyed tribesman.
"Your Grace."
"Rhava, he"s human."
"But…"
Rhava looked back in the direction the other one had run off in. If one of the two was the esteemed n.o.ble, he would rather it not be the strange one.
"What you"re sensing is apparently his sister-in-law. Here, let me explain."
***
"This doesn"t sound right."
"But think about it, Rhava. He doesn"t need to trick us like this. If he wanted to harm us, wouldn"t he have already done it? Besides, there"s his sister-in-law"s scent. You can tell that she wasn"t on guard against him, can"t you?"
"There are all sorts of tricks that these humans use, Shiva. They could have used deceit to get the n.o.ble lady to lower her guard around them before taking her fur to use to fool other canine tribesmen."
"But what would be the point? And how would someone of such a strong bloodline not have protection against things like that? There"s no way she would have fallen into human hands."
"I don"t know, Shiva. I don"t know. But what I do know is that our parents were killed by their kind. We can"t trust them. Not one."
"You can"t judge a whole group based on a few individuals, Rhava."
"Those are the same words Rimja said. Frayza too. Not to mention Shinja, Monja and Genja. And look what happened to them. They didn"t fall at the hands of our kind, Shiva. They were killed by humans. Every one of them."
"It"s not the same."
"It is the same."
"You"re being paranoid, Rhava. This is our opportunity to change things for ourselves. If we don"t take it, who knows when we"ll get another chance?"
"Stop these foolish thoughts, Shiva. You know better. Beast and Man calling each other family? Ha. That"s a fantasy. The ravings of a lunatic."
"But-"
"Enough, Shiva! That"s enough. Now, let"s go."
Shiva gave Tianlan a remorseful look then followed after her brother.
"Shiva. I"m just trying to-"
"I know. I just thought there was a chance for us."
"We"ll find another way. One that doesn"t involve humans."
"Mm."
"Hey, after I make a breakthrough, I"ll go talk to Vajra. Together, we might be able to make our way out."
"Vajra? You know I don"t like that guy. Something"s off about him. Plus, he"s a cat. You can"t trust a feline tribesman."
"Now who"s the one judging groups?"
"…"
"Look. I don"t like him either, but at the end of the day, he"s the strongest of our kind here. If we want to find a way out, we"re going to need his help."
"I guess so."
"Don"t worry. I"m close. I can feel it. Just a little more and I"ll be able to break through to the next level."
"That"s where you"re mistaken," said Tianlan.
Rhava and Shiva hadn"t moved quickly and hadn"t attempted to hide their conversation, so Tianlan overheard what they were saying.
Rhava stopped and turned his head to look at Tianlan.
"What do you mean?"
"If you keep doing what you"re doing, both of you are going to seriously injure yourselves. Death isn"t out of the question either."
"What are you talking about?"
"You"re clearly showing the signs of what we call qi deviation. I can see that you"ve been acc.u.mulating energy for a while now, probably hoping for a cultivation breakthrough, but it"s more than you"re capable of dealing with. As it continues to rampage through your body, it"s causing fractures to your circulation paths. If you keep adding more, you"ll cause your circulation paths to rupture. In the best case, you would only be crippled."
"You have no idea what you"re talking about. We"re not as weak as you humans. We must be broken down before we can rebuild ourselves. That is the way we surpa.s.s our limits."
"Then let me ask you. Have you encountered a sudden bottleneck after smooth and continuous progress?"
"What of it?"
"You"ve been using this little link to the volcanic region to hunt very successfully. But have you ever considered why there"s only this small patch of this mountain that connects to the volcanic region?"
Rhava frowned and Tianlan continued.
"It"s because it"s unintentional. Ordinarily, if you were to stay on the mountain, you would be transported to the tundra region, then to the glacial region, then back here. Note that these are all frigid regions filled with yin energy. It was likely designed that way to keep yin affinity beasts in suitable environments. But through using this small malfunctioning section of the mountain, you were able to quickly access the volcanic region. A yang region."
"!" Rhava"s eyes widened, and Shiva seemed to be on the same page.
"A region full of yang energy, and one packed to the brim with fire element qi on top of that, is the worst possible environment for you. When you combine that with the fact that you were paralysed and had limited control of your qi, you have all the necessary ingredients for-"
"A corrupted core! Of course. How did I not think of that?"
"Mm. The reason for your a bottleneck is that your cores aren"t fully functional any more. They"ve been poisoned with fire qi. You"ll have to neutralise that before you can make any progress."
"Heavens. If we had continued the way we were..." Rhava didn"t want to finish the thought.
"Rhava," said Shiva. "He didn"t have to tell us that. Why don"t we at least think about-"
Rhava shook his head.
"They have their ways, and we have ours. The two shouldn"t mix. I"ll get you out of here, I promise."
He lowered his head to Tianlan.
"You have our thanks, human. I hope you can understand my unwillingness."
Tianlan waved his hand.
"Don"t mind. We all have our own paths to walk. Anyway, the offer is open-ended. I"ll be in the sect for a while, so if the day comes when you"re willing to call me brother, just call out to me."
After saying that, Tianlan went on his way.
As he walked through the thick snow, he pulled out a book and flipped to a certain page.
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