The air trembles.
Steam rises from the Moon Root Reflection Pool, now glowing with an unnatural fusion of silver and ember. Trees quake in silent awe. Beasts in the distance howl—not in fear, but reverence.
Feng Xian stands waist-deep in the water, transformed.
His body glows with threads of gold and ember Qi, and a faint shadow of a beast form—a horned feline with burning stripes—coils behind him like a guardian spirit.
His voice is deeper now, centered.
"This pool is not yours to defile, Azhur."
Azhur the Vile blood hisses, blood mist coiling around him.
"Then drown with it!"
He plunges both hands into the corrupted ground, summoning a Venom Shade Serpent Wraith—a spectral beast stitched from stolen beast cores. It lunges.
—The Battle Deepens—
His flames don't consume—they guide.
He dodges and counters with fiery arcs shaped like claw strikes and tail sweeps—echoes of the beast he saw within. Nai'Esha joins the fray, her illusions wrapping around Azhur to blind and mislead.
Yet as they fight, the pool shudders again.
Suddenly, the water begins to recede—not evaporate, but drain—revealing steps beneath it, overgrown with moss-covered beast carvings.
The jungle groans.
A hidden chamber stirs beneath the surface.
—Revelation: The Beast borne Seed core—
The battle halts briefly as even Azhur is momentarily stunned.
A pulse of ancient Qi surges from below—wild, sovereign, and ancient.
Floating above the newly revealed steps is a glowing crystal orb wrapped in root-veins and beast bone fragments:
The Seed core of the First Beast borne, long-thought myth.
It contains a pure echo of the primal bond between man and beast—not domination, but unity.
Nai'Esha whispers:
"This is why the pool called you… it recognized your Beast borne Flame."
"Only a true heir can awaken what sleeps beneath."