The Azure Serpent Lake became an island of tranquility in the turbulent sea of the Green Mountain Sect. The story of the auction had settled into a tale of caution around the section, whispered by outer disciples and discussed by the inner sect.
Elder Jin, as his master had predicted, had withdrawn into a resentful seclusion. His faction's public activities were curtailed by their catastrophic financial loss and the humiliation of their prodigy. This provided Li Yu with a precious and much-needed period of peace. He was no longer a target of active aggression but a subject of intense, watchful curiosity.
He used this time to solidify his foundations, both for himself and for his small faction. The first order of business was the unadorned wooden box resting in his storage ring. He gathered his three friends in the main hall of the pagoda. The air was thick with anticipation.
"Master has given me a great opportunity and a great risk," Li Yu began, placing the box on the table. He opened it, revealing the withered black Serpent's Breath Root. Even in its dormant state the root exuded a powerful ancient aura that made the Qi in the room feel heavy.
"The Serpent's Breath Root," Brother Kai said, examining the fine treasure. "I have only read about such a treasure in ancient texts. It is said to contain a trace of a true dragon's bloodline."
"Master has said that it can help Crimson evolve," Li Yu explained. "It could awaken its dormant Flood Dragon bloodline and push it from a Rank 3 Spirit Beast into a true Rank 4 Fierce Beast."
Hu Jian's eyes lit up. "A Rank 4 beast! Junior Steward, that would make Crimson as powerful as an early-stage Qi Condensation expert!"
"But the master also said it was dangerous," Lin Tao interjected, his gaze sharp and analytical. "The draconic energy is violent. If the evolution fails…"
"Crimson could be crippled or even die," Li Yu finished, his expression serious. He looked at his three most trusted advisors. "That is the choice before me. Do we risk a loyal companion for a chance at greater power?"
The three men fell silent, the weight of the decision settling upon them.
"Crimson is your contracted beast, Junior Steward," Brother Kai said finally. "The bond is yours. The choice must be yours alone. However," he paused, choosing his words carefully, "a beast tamer's path is one of mutual growth. A beast's greatest desire is to evolve, to reach the peak of its own bloodline. To deny it that chance could be a cruelty in itself."
Li Yu nodded. He closed his eyes and extended his spiritual sense, not just to the Beast Bag at his waist, but deep into the bond he shared with his companion. He did not ask a question. He simply presented the feeling of the root, the raw, potent draconic energy and the two possible outcomes: glorious evolution or catastrophic failure.
The response from Crimson was not one of fear or hesitation. It was a wave of pure, unadulterated and ferocious desire. It was a primal instinctual scream to become stronger, to reach for the nobility that slept in its very blood.
Li Yu opened his eyes, his decision made. "Crimson has chosen."
The evolution was a carefully planned affair. Li Yu chose the most secluded part of the valley, a deep, underwater grotto accessible only through a hidden entrance in the lake. He, along with his three friends, set up a perimeter, their auras on high alert to ward off any curious beasts.
Inside the grotto, Li Yu released Crimson from the Beast Bag. The powerful Marsh-Drake looked at the withered root in Li Yu's hand. Its intelligent eyes were burning with a hungry primal light. Li Yu placed the root on the ground and Crimson devoured it in a single gulp.
For a moment, nothing happened. Then, the drake's body began to tremble. A low, pained groan rumbled in its chest. Its dark green scales began to glow with a faint, crimson light. The light grew brighter and brighter, until the entire grotto was bathed in a fiery, red glow.
Crimson threw its head back and let out a roar of pure, unadulterated agony. The draconic energy was a violent fire, burning through its veins, tearing its body apart and reforging it anew.
The process was brutal and terrifying to watch. The drake's scales began to crack and fall away, revealing raw, steaming flesh beneath. Its muscles spasmed and its bones audibly creaked and groaned. Hu Jian, Lin Tao, and Brother Kai watched with pale, tense faces, their hands clenched into fists.
Li Yu was also nervous. He sat before the writhing beast, his spiritual link a soothing steady anchor in the storm of its pain. He could feel its agony but he could also feel its unyielding will to survive, to be reborn.
He focused his will and began to channel the pure vital energy of his Koi spirit, not to interfere but to provide a gentle nourishing support. It was helping to soothe the most damaged parts of Crimson's body and guide the violent energy.
The ordeal lasted for an entire day and night. Finally, as the first rays of dawn pierced the grotto's entrance, the violent fiery light began to recede, coalescing around the drake's body. The agonized roars softened into a low powerful rumble. The cracked and broken form began to heal and reshape at a visible rate.
When the light finally faded, a new creature stood in the center of the grotto. It was still recognizable as Crimson but it was profoundly different. It was larger, its body more sleek and powerful. Its scales were no longer a simple green but a deep iridescent jade. Each one shimmering with a faint crimson light. A single small sharp horn, like a shard of black jade, now jutted from its snout and the frill around its neck was a brilliant, fiery red. Its aura was no longer just that of a powerful beast; it was the aura of a king, a true descendant of a Flood Dragon.
It had succeeded. Crimson was now a Rank 4 Fierce Beast. He was now more flood dragon than marsh drake.
It turned its head and looked at Li Yu, its eyes no longer just intelligent. It was filled with a deep ancient wisdom. It lowered its horned head in a gesture of unwavering loyalty. Li Yu smiled and reached out, not with his hand but with his spirit.
The Koi's Sanctuary opened and Crimson, feeling the irresistible pull of the nourishing, high-level space, dissolved into a stream of light and vanished. The Beast Bag at Li Yu's waist remained, a perfect decoy to hide his spirit's unique ability.The Deep-Sea Naga egg was also sitting within, allowing the potent life-giving mist to slowly incubate the dormant life within.
The news of a personal disciple successfully evolving his companion into a Rank 4 beast was soon known to many. It was a rare achievement to get a beast to not only advance in cultivation level but to evolve. It increased his reputation quite a bit, making him a more renowned beast tamer in the sect.
And with that reputation, came requests.
The first came from Su Ling. She did not send a messenger but arrived at the Azure Serpent Lake herself. Her presence was as elegant as ever.
"Junior Brother Li," she said, her tone polite but direct. "My master, the First Elder, has a problem that currently no one has been able to solve. He has asked for your assistance." Li Yu agreed, it was a good chance to learn, test his skills and make some connections with the first elder. He was starting to understand just how beneficial connections were.
She led him to the First Elder's personal menagerie, a place of profound power and quiet dignity. In a large and specially constructed ice-bound enclosure, a magnificent beast lay listlessly. It was an Ice-Crystal Kirin, a Rank 5 Tyrant Beast. Its body was like a statue carved from a glacier, its horn a single perfect shard of unbreakable ice.
"It has not moved from that spot in a month," Su Ling explained. "It refuses to eat and its aura grows weaker by the day. We have found no signs of sickness or injury."
Li Yu approached the enclosure, his spiritual sense extending. The Kirin was a creature of pure, noble ice but it had an ancient aquatic ancestry, a lineage that traced back to the primordial, frozen oceans. He could connect with it. He was met not with pain or sadness but with a feeling of overwhelming boredom. It was a king with no kingdom, a creature of immense power with nothing to do.
He stood before the enclosure for a long time, his brow furrowed in a look of deep concentration. "The issue is not with its body, Senior Sister," he said finally, his voice grave. "It is a sickness of the spirit. It is deep and complex. I cannot offer a solution immediately. I will need time to observe, to attempt to commune with its spirit. I ask for three days of undisturbed observation."
Su Ling looked surprised by the request but nodded. "I will inform my master. You will have your three days."
For the next three days, Li Yu sat in a small pavilion overlooking the Kirin's enclosure. He did not move and did not eat. He sat in a deep meditative trance with his eyes closed and his aura completely still.
To Su Ling and the other disciples who watched from a distance, it looked as if he were engaged in a profound, silent and exhausting spiritual battle. They could occasionally see a faint, crimson light flicker around his body, a sign of his spirit's exertion.
In reality, Li Yu was perfectly relaxed. He was spending the time consolidating his own cultivation. He was absorbing the pure cold energy of the enclosure. In return he was subtly feeding the Kirin small, almost imperceptible threads of his Koi's vital Yang energy to pique its interest and confirm his diagnosis.
He had learned from his activities in the city that the more effort something took to solve, the more valuable it was. He learned that he needed to take more time to solve an issue, to show that it was difficult to solve and in return a more valuable job was completed when it was done.
On the morning of the fourth day, he "awoke," his face pale and his brow beaded with sweat, a performance of a cultivator who had just completed a difficult task. He approached Su Ling who was waiting patiently.
"I believe I understand now," he said, his voice slightly hoarse. "This Kirin is not sick. It is… lonely."
Su Ling raised an eyebrow. "Lonely? We have tried introducing other ice-attribute beasts. It ignores them."
"It does not need a companion," Li Yu corrected, his voice filled with the certainty of a scholar who had just solved a great puzzle. "It needs a rival. A challenge. Something to stimulate its pride. Its spirit is that of a conqueror, a king of the frozen peaks. Here, it has no kingdom to rule, no subjects to awe, no rivals to crush. Its spirit is starving for a purpose."
He looked at the massive, empty enclosure. "The ice here is smooth, perfect. But in its natural habitat, its territory would be constantly challenged by lesser beasts. It has no one to hunt, no one to display its dominance over."
He turned to her, his hard-won solution on his lips. "I suggest you introduce a school of Rank 3 Frost-Scale Pikes into the enclosure. They are aggressive, fast and too weak to pose a real threat to the Kirin but they are annoying enough to be a sport. Give it something to hunt."
Su Ling stared at him, her mind processing the logic. It was a simple solution but it was born from an insight that had eluded all of their master beast tamers. It wasn't something that could be sensed or detected, it had to do with the nature of the beast. It was an insight that, in her eyes, had taken three days of profound spiritual communion to achieve.
Two days later a message arrived from the First Elder's peak. The Kirin was active and its aura was stronger. It was amusing itself by flash-freezing and shattering the unfortunate Frost-Scale Pikes. Li Yu had earned the gratitude of the sect's most powerful elder.
His fame grew. He was no longer just Elder Ning's new disciple that was skilled with fish; he was the sect's rising beast tamer. The boy who could speak the silent language of beasts. With that came even more requests to have beasts inspected or diagnosed.
Li Yu didn't get carried away however. He made it clear that he specialized in beasts with an aquatic bloodline. He would take a look at other beasts as well to learn and further his own knowledge. He was genuinely interested in learning more about beasts. He did make it clear that beasts without aquatic bloodlines were going to be up to fate if he was able to solve them.
Each solution he offered came only after days of quiet, intense observation, further building his reputation that his methods were as mysterious as they were effective. He solved a problem for a reclusive artifact refiner whose water-elemental forge-salamander had gone dormant. He helped a powerful core disciple whose prized school of armored battle-fish were suffering from a strange shell-rotting disease.
With each problem he solved, he asked for no spirit stones or reward. Looking instead for texts on beast care and texts about this world. That only made others have a better opinion of him and he was rewarded anyway. Things they had that they thought would be useful for him. Some gave an aquatic herb, a piece of deep-sea ore, or some texts from their personal libraries.
He was becoming a node in the sect's network of power when it came to beast care. All the while in the dead of night his true cultivation continued its silent terrifying ascent. His secrets hidden deeper than the abyss itself for his own safety.