Chapter five * two roads*
The war ended.
But humanity's power system split in two.
One road carved into the spirit. One road carved into the soul.
The Golden Pillar. First miracle. First cruelty.
When extinction fell from the sky with teeth and fire, the Pillar of Light slammed into the earth. The ground split. Golden radiance bled across continents like sunrise turned into a blade.
Every warrior who bled that day felt it.
Something unlocked inside their spirit.
Will turned to iron. Breath heated to fire. Presence stopped fearing death.
That was the Spiritual Trait.
Power you couldn't see. Power you could feel.
Power that made the air grow heavy the moment you stepped into a room.
But the war was over now. As if both the humanity leaders and the exotic beasts leaders have called for truce.
The sky didn't scream anymore.
Extinction wasn't clawing at the walls.
So the Pillar slept. Buried under dust and prayers no one dared say out loud.
At fifteen, the Awakening came.
Cold stone courtyards. Silent children. Breath held until lungs burned.
The upper echelon dragged out the golden rocks the Pillar left behind. Gigantic. Ancient. They stood like the ribs of a dead god.
They hummed.
Low. Deep. Enough to rattle the teeth in your skull.
They smelled like ozone. Like burnt sunlight.
A palm pressed to stone.
The world either answered…
Or it abandoned you.
If you were talented, the rock glows.
Thunder rolled through bone.
Fire raced through your spirit until your chest felt too tight to breathe. Ice crawled through your breath. Lightning snapped behind your eyes until the air tasted like copper and storms.
Minor element. Major element. Unique element.
The laws of the world chose you. Branded your spirit with either of the three types elements.
After the war. It wasn't only the Natural elements
Humans awaken as spiritual trait they began Awakening special abilities of its own uniqueness.
Then spiritual trait was being categorized by the uniqueness it carries and how much power it could manifest.
If you weren't talented?
The stone stayed dead. Cold.
You pulled your hand back.
And walked away.
Still human. Still fragile. Still mundane.
Powerless in an age that buried the weak without even carving their name.
Then Maslow Griffin broke the rules.
He didn't just kill beasts.
He shattered them. Bound them. Made them kneel.
He founded Beast Taming. Carved a second road for a species running out of roads.
A Soul Trait couldn't be trained. Couldn't be bought. Couldn't be begged for.
You were born with it.
Or the grave was your only inheritance.
Humanity's wise men carved white stones to find them. Smooth as bone. Cold enough to steal heat from your palm the second you touched them.
On Awakening Day, every child touched two things.
The golden rock for Spiritual.
The white stone for Soul.
And the air went still.
Like the world itself was holding its breath.
Most only got one. Spirit or soul. Spiritual or beast.
But the rare ones… the ones born with both burning under their skin…
The world called them _Super Talented_.
When they survived and grew teeth, the world called them _Experts_.
Governments dragged them into sealed halls. Blood. Sweat. Old medicine.
Beast meat forced down their throats until they gagged. Cultivation that broke bones like glass.
Forged like weapons.
Because the legend rank warriors who watched Maslow Griffin stand alone against the humanoid horror knew the truth.
The beasts didn't come to talk.
They came to erase. They came with a motive. A mysterious intention that no one could fathom
Humans and demonic beasts couldn't share the same sky.
War was only sleeping.
And the upper echelon was buying time with other people's children.
If you had a Soul Trait, you could become a Beast Tamer.
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Soul Trait rank mirrored Spiritual Trait rank. Same ladder. Same climb. Same corpses on every step.
The blessing hit the moment your Soul Trait awakened.
Qi flooded your meridians. Ice water first. Then molten metal under your skin.
You could cultivate. Break past human limits.
Every breath made your lungs stronger.
The curse?
No elements. No laws of the world.
Your hands stayed empty. No fire. No wind. No lightning.
Not until you contracted your first beast.
Rich families dragged beasts from black markets that reeked of fear.
Poor kids bled in forests, gambling their life for one chance.
If luck abandoned you, you stayed weak. Forever.
The ritual was savage.
Blood spilled. Ancient rune drawn. With the same blood of the exotic beast to be contracted. Lines glowing red like they remembered every kill.
Dead beast laid in the circle. Soul Trait activated.
The rune light up.
Fire without heat devoured flesh. Bone ground to dust.
The beast's soul was ripped out, still screaming. Refined. Braided with the essence of its body.
A spear of light shot into your forehead.
Slammed into the beast space inside your mind.
Pain like a red-hot nail through your skull.
Vision became white. Teeth aching.
Then silence.
One beast. One space taken. One chain forged around your soul. Connecting you with the beast soul.
Like Spiritual Traits, Soul split into three.
Normal Soul Trait: 1 beast space. One partner. One chance to live.
Medium Soul Trait: 2 beast spaces. Twice the power, one plus one stops becoming two.
Special Soul Trait: 3 beast spaces. Only for monsters. Only for exotics. Talent that made kings lose sleep.
Contraction had levels too.
Normal Contraction. Leash thin as spider silk with the beast.
Borrow the beast's claws. Its eyes. Its murderous instinct.
Summon it to fight.
But the bond was fragile.
The beast could snap it. Sink fangs into the throat of the hand that fed it.
Medium Contraction. Leash became iron chain.
The beast obeyed. Its essence bled into your body, drop by drop.
Spirit hardened. Bones thickened. Reflexes sharpened until you moved before thought.
Human fragility patched over with beast durability.
You stopped breaking so easy. You stopped dying so fast.
Special Contraction. The final sin.
Human and beast fused. Spirit warped. Bones cracked and re-knit with sounds like wet wood splitting.
You became a humanoid beast. Claws where fingers were. Fangs where words were.
1 + 1 stopped being 2.
It became annihilation.
This was why cities still lit lamps for Soul users.
Why parents fell to their knees when a child's palm cause the white stone to glow.
Because only this could slaughter demonic beasts with ease and Climb the ladder of power to the top.
And those who wielded both Spiritual AND Soul Trait?
They weren't soldiers.
They were natural disasters wearing human skin.
When war sirens screamed again, they stood at the very front.
One hand wreathed in element. One mind holding a beast that dreamed of blood.
Spiritual gave them the laws of the world.
Soul gave them the savagery of monsters.
Together, they became something the demonic horde never calculated.
Immense. Terrifying.
Humanity's last, screaming blade against the dark.
After everything settled, 140 years passed.
Silence didn't last.
Beasts began using aberrations for small skirmishes against humans. Hit and run. Test the walls. Sometimes, exotic beasts were spotted in the White Continent. Shadows moving where no shadow should be.
The skirmishes dragged on.
50 years of back and forth. Claws vs steel. Fang vs qi. No full war. No critical issue. Just blood spilled in small amounts, year after year.
Then Maslow Griffin mysteriously vanished.
At first, it was a whisper. A rumor among a few old men. "The Calamity is gone."
But years passed. The whisper became a shout. Every human continent spoke the same words. Panic came first. Cold sweat. Sleepless nights. Who would stand if the beasts came again?
Years passed.
Only face-offs. Only deaths at the border. Nothing that threatened peace. Nothing that shook the walls.
Another 50 years.
Maslow's disappearance was forgotten. His name faded to ink in history books. Some said old age took him. Some said he walked into No Man's Land to conquer it. The words sounded unbelievable even to those who spoke them. But no one had facts. No one had proof.
Until the governments confirmed it.
Maslow Griffin died of old age.
240 years.
That was how long the war that almost erased humanity had been dead. Now it was homework for new generations. A chapter to read in the annals of history books.
Another 200 years passed.
Still no war. Still skirmishes. But the aberrations and beasts grew bolder. They pressed closer. Tested more.
Yet it did nothing to dull the new generations.
If anything, it sharpened them.
Beasts were hunted in mass now. Dragged back in chains. Used for beast taming ceremonies. Sold to those with coin. Their beast cores hummed in palms being used to— replenish qi, push past bottlenecks, break through to the next realm.Their meat was a delicacy. High-level exotic beast meat made a cultivator's physique denser, stronger, after each bite.
In the eyes of mankind, exotic beasts became gold.
Hot commodities. Cultivators looked at them with greed. Eyes sharp as knives.
Aberrations were different.
No cores. No value. Only thick meat. Disgusting to look at. Worse to smell. It gave nothing and took everything. Kill one and you still had to watch for corrosive pus. Watch for the mist that clung to the air and ate skin.
To a cultivator, aberrations were vassals. Trash soldiers for exotic beasts.
Unless… unless one gained intelligence. Enlightenment from mutation energy in No Man's Land. Those were rare. Those were terrifying. And they stayed deep in No Man's Land, where no sane man went.
Cultivators still preferred exotic beasts.
Even though same-level exotic beasts were stronger than humans. Stronger than aberrations. Stronger than most without godly talent.
Humans grouped up anyway. Surrounded them. Brought them down. Because after the kill, they gained everything. Meat. Core. Bones.
Even bones were used by artisans. Forged into weapons.
Aberrations?
Corrosive. Useless. After the kill, you burned the corpse. Or dumped it in some random corner and walked away fast.
Another 60 years passed.
The countries in the continents changed form. Kings and queens rose. Emperors rose higher.
Countries broke down. Villages. Cities. Kingdoms. Empires. Holy Lands.
They sprang up. They vied for supremacy. Diplomatic knives instead of blades. A chain of order formed.
Chief of the village.
Governor of the city.
King of the kingdom.
Emperor of the empire.
Lord of the Holy Land.
Only the few peak powerhouses were allowed to establish a Holy Land.
Another 30 years crawled by, slow as stone grinding on stone.
The countries in the continents shifted. The old maps bled ink and became something new.
Kings rose. Crowns heavy with rust and blood. Queens rose, voices sharp as winter air. Emperors rose higher still, their shadows stretching across entire provinces.
The land itself broke apart and rebuilt.
Villages first. Mud walls. Smoke curling from thatched roofs. The smell of dust and woodsmoke in the morning air.
Then cities. Stone underfoot, cold enough to steal heat from the soles. Voices echoing down narrow streets.
Kingdoms after. Banners snapping in the wind, colors faded but proud.
Empires next. Roads of packed earth and metal, stretching beyond the horizon, carrying trade and war.
And at the peak — Holy Lands. Places the air tasted different. Ozone and burnt sunlight, like the old Pillar stones. Few dared speak their names.
They sprang up overnight. One year a village, the next a fortress.
They vied for supremacy. Not with claws first, but with words. Diplomatic knives hidden in silk sleeves. Treaties signed with hands that still smelled of blood from the last skirmish.
A chain of order formed. Cold. Rigid. Unbreakable.
Chief of the village — standing barefoot on packed earth, staff in hand.
Governor of the city — seated behind desks of bone and wood, ledgers stacked high.
King of the kingdom — throne of dark stone, gaze heavy as chains.
Emperor of the empire — aura pressing down like a mountain, voice echoing off walls.
Lord of the Holy Land — only whispers now. Names that made the air go still.
Only the few peak powerhouses were allowed to establish a Holy Land.
Their qi alone could carve territory from the wild. Their presence kept beasts and aberrations at bay for a hundred miles. One step wrong, and the land would remember.
And a new power system was forged in that time.
Not like the past.
The old system was desperation. Scribbled in blood while extinction breathed down every neck. Haphazard. Rushed. Built under the immense pressure of a world ending. No time for knowledge. No time for theory. Just survive. Just kill. Just don't die today.
This new system was different.
Clean lines. Clear ranks. Words that meant something. It was put together piece by piece, so humans could finally understand.
*Core Split*
There are 2 roads to power in the modern age:
1. *Spiritual Path* = Laws + Elements
Power comes from resonating with world laws. You get Minor, Major, or Unique element at Awakening. No beasts.
2. *Soul Path* = Beasts + Bonds
Power comes from contracting demonic beasts. You get 1/2/3 beast slots based on trait grade: Normal/Medium/Special. No elements until you contract. Strength = bond level + beast quality.
*The 9-Rank Ladder*
Every rank has 3 tiers: Early / Mid / Peak. Tiers = small growth. Rank jumps = massive power spike.
*Ranks 1-3: Foundation*
*Awakened*: Unlock Qi. Sense your trait. Weakest rank, but you can cultivate now.
*Ascender*: Qi armor forms. Body stops being fragile. You outrun cars, break concrete.
*Golden*: Golden Qi appears. Aura pressure crushes weaker cultivators. Short flight + steel-melting attacks. Named after the Golden Pillar.
*Ranks 4-6: Domain Stage*
*Lord*: Domain seed forms - 5m zone where your laws are stronger than normal laws. Split-mountain damage.
*King*: Domain expands to 50m. You can rewrite minor laws inside it. City district level destruction.
*Emperor*: Domain 500m. Beast + user can fuse attacks. National-level threat.
*Ranks 7-9: Law Stage*
*Saint*: Domain 5km. Heaven/earth Qi bends to you. Law avatars + full humanoid beast fusion appear here.
*Legend*: Domain 50km. Speak and laws obey. Split-continent level. Peak of human power.
*Myth*: Touch the source of laws. Pillar-level power. Reality warps around you. Peak of the modern age.
*Bond Levels - Soul Path Only*
1. *Leash*: Thin connection. Borrow claws/eyes. Beast can betray you.
2. *Iron Chain*: Beast obeys. Its durability bleeds into your body. You stop breaking easy.
3. *Fusion*: Human + beast merge. Claws, fangs, warped bones. 1+1 = annihilation.
*Super Talented*
Born with both Spiritual + Soul. One hand uses laws, one hand controls beasts. Hits the power ceiling of both paths. Governments call them "natural disasters".
Clean ladder, clear stakes per rank. Each rank jump is a story arc. Each tier is a mini-arc.
Where they stood on the ladder.
How far the next rung was.
What they should aim for when they closed their eyes at night and felt qi move under their skin.
From Awakened I to Myth. From village chief to Lord of the Holy Land. Every step had a name now. Every step had weight.