Beastmaster of the Ages

One shriek after another rang out. The beasts might have been primordial forces of creation and destruction in their past lives, but currently they were weak and puny beings. Even Sixth was the same; it hadn’t been hatched for that long and was still young and childish at heart.

As they continued screaming in terror, a horrific aura emanated from the rectangular object.

”What in the world is that?! A coffin?!” Lan Huang’s eyes brightened before it attempted to run toward it.

”Don’t go!” the other beasts yelled.

”You’re all... useless trash,” Yin Chen said, glaring at them with a few hundred thousand bodies before swarming toward the object. Before the insects managed to reach it, however, the insects were melted by a wave of gray smog. Surely, Yin Chen had learned its lesson to keep its mouth shut the next time something like this happened.

”Eighth really turned into a coffin....” The scared and curious beasts stretched their necks out to look, only to see the rectangular gray object continue spewing mist into the lifebound space.

Its surface was rough and uneven from the many engravings all over it, depicting humans, souls, wispy flames, the yellow springs, the Bridge of Oblivion, dark soldier-like beings, death, baleful souls, and reincarnation. The gigantic coffin’s carvings made it look like a world in its own right, boundless and filled with mysteries and countless souls of the dead.

Right before Lan Huang took a step toward it, the cover of the coffin suddenly shook, revealing a slight opening. Within the opening, a gray eye suddenly opened!

”Fuck fuck fuck!” Lan Huang backed off in fear and shook the other beasts off of its body.

”Dammit!” Ying Huo and the rest scrambled to return to the kui seas on Lan Huang’s body, diving as deep as they could.

”I saw an eye! Did it already hatch?!”

Everyone was puzzled. Lan Huang continued approaching it and noticed that the eye was round, dark, seemingly blank, and opened wide. Deep down, it saw a gray vortex. It looked just like the eye of a dead fish!

”Eighth turned into a coffin and even grew eyes.... Has it hatched already?” Ying Huo asked.

”Not yet.” Tianming’s voice came ringing from up above. ”But I think it’s getting ready. Unlike Sixth, Eighth probably needs a large amount of energy that it’s attuned to so it can immediately reach our cultivation level after hatching!”

”So we do have to find something first, right?” Ying Huo breathed a sigh of relief. There was nothing scary about an egg. ”What do you think it’ll become?”

”Do you remember the voice from just now?” Tianming asked.

”The one that said the fourth world of the departed?”

”That’s right! The fourth world. The three that we’re aware of right now are the Origin World, Ancestral World, and the Xenoworld.” Tianming’s voice was rather deep; he was also shocked by the situation. Before, he had theorized that Perpetia was another similar ’world.’

”Are you saying that Eighth is a world in itself? The hell from legend? The realm of the afterlife? Does it really exist?” Ying Huo asked.

”I don’t know!”

”It sounds too ridiculous. Why am I not nearly that impressive?” Lan Huang said.

”How do I even begin to answer that? I don’t even know!” Tianming felt a headache brewing. All he hoped was that he wouldn’t get another feisty beast like Sixth.

”Forget it! No matter how powerful it is, it’ll always be the youngest sibling! It’ll follow us elders around like a good boy for sure!” Ying Huo said.

”You stray chicken,” Sixth defiantly retorted.

”Since when was I a stray? I’m a house chicken!”

”You look like you don’t dare to stay in the lifebound space anymore. You’re going to leave the house, so you’ll become a stray chicken!”

”Oh? So does that mean you dare to keep staying here?”

”I don’t!” Sixth proudly declared.

”Then you’re a stray string of snot! The kind that gets blown out of the nose!”

Sixth couldn’t argue its way out of that and felt rather frustrated. Still, they no longer dared to stay inside for that long and quickly left the lifebound space.

”Wait, the other two little ones are still here,” Ying Huo said, recalling the other two eggs. Right as it turned back, it saw something that made it completely speechless. The coffin slightly opened up once more and sucked in the two remaining eggs before closing itself up!

”What the hell?!” Tianming was stupefied.

”Holy shit!” The other lifebound beasts blankly stared at the coffin.

”Nooo! Did it eat the two remaining eggs?!” Xian Xian began tearing up.

”It’s fine! It’s fine! They’re still there! I don’t think they’re so weak they’ll be digested so easily!” Tianming said after sensing the presence of the three eggs.

If Eighth was already so weird before it hatched, what would the two final eggs have in store for him? Ying Huo had been the kind of beast that would consume stars like candy, which Tianming had once thought to be the ultimate expression of power. However, it appeared to be the most normal of the lot—especially considering that it hatched the earliest. The ’weakest’ were easier to hatch, after all! By this point, Tianming’s mental fortitude had been greatly honed, thanks to the surprising nature of the beasts he had hatched.

”Even though the eggs are still here, Eighth’s actions must have something to do with its past life. Maybe it’ll bring some changes to the nature of the other two eggs, but we can’t say for sure if it’s a blessing or a curse. Eighth’s power is related to the world of the dead, so it seems like we have to keep an eye out for a kind of death energy in the Upper Star Ruin to hatch it!” It wasn’t a bad thing for Eighth to make preparations to hatch. At least it seemed willing to.

Tianming took a deep breath, then exhaled. All of his beasts aside from a few Yin Chens had left the lifebound space. Meow Meow decided to hide within Tianming’s left arm and fuse with his astrons before falling asleep again. ”What? You don’t want to stay inside anymore?”

”No!” They wildly shook their heads.

”Your head might stink, but it isn’t so bad....” Even Sixth was despairing. The lifebound space was filled with an aura of death, while Tianming’s brain stank of evil impulses. Both were impure places for its pure soul!

”Fine! Suit yourselves.” They all seemed like hopeless orphans. Fortunately, Sixth was almost unkillable, like Yin Chen.

Tianming headed toward Moran once everything had been taken care of. When she heard that he had dealt with Sixth, she felt some degree of relief and began collecting the divine wonders of the two dead wonderians. She’d been absorbing them while Tianming was cultivating, and had managed to succeed so far. Within the dark cave, her entire body glowed with bright astrons, as if they had been forged by precious gems. Her aura seemed many times more elegant than it usually was.