Depthless Hunger

For Kai, the fight must have been savagery, bloodshed, and hunger. Omilaena watched from the outside, coolly examining their latest experiment.

Now that he was fully prepared, Kai flickered around the clearing, evading the manticore's bursts of quills. When they had been spent, he went on the offensive and the manticore reeled onto its back legs to fight him. Even though the manticore was many times his size, the two of them clashed like equals and spun through the center. Massive claws only battered at Kai's armored skin, while his claw skill tore great wounds in the beast's side.

As they fought, his body transformed subtly but steadily. The most obvious was the dark skin, like plates of armor growing over his body. His hands had transformed into claws from the first strike, but they were actually still growing. He was half a head taller than he had been at the beginning, and much heavier thanks to all the monstrous tissue.

Would all of this produce a Physique breakthrough? Kai had been stuck at D-9 for a long time, past Omilaena's ability to boost him further. Truthfully, high level Physique was still an unknown to her, and her experiences in the Coiled Empire hadn't particularly impressed. There was something missing on a fundamental level, she just had no idea what.

Zae Zin Nim would be the test case. She had a unique body that was heavily entangled with her cultivation, not to mention her culture and her own thoughts. That was going to be a nightmare to figure out, but hopefully also bring them to solutions that could work for all three. She had been collecting Physique manuals from every sect she encountered, so hopefully they would add up to some real insight.

Omilaena realized that her mind was wandering while she watched her lover fight a vicious beast. But as the fight proceeded, Kai stopped flinching at the claw swipes, and his own claws dug deeper every time. He wasn't even really fighting the manticore, he was fighting himself.

Despite her thoughts, she was keeping an eye on his soul, waiting for the slightest flicker of a deeper transformation. But Kai showed no signs of losing control or falling into any technique, Savage Heart or monstrous. He had absolute mastery of himself... there was just something darker beyond if he gave up that mastery.

It would have to be a mystery for another day, because just as the manticore raised its tail for another burst, Kai leapt at its neck. His unnatural maw bit deep into its flesh, and though the manticore struck at him with both paws and tried to smash him into the ground, it was rapidly losing blood. Eventually it collapsed, twitched one final time, and then lay still.

As Kai stood atop the corpse, not roaring but practically radiating victorious energy, Omilaena examined his soul one more time.

Total Power: 749

Monstrous Hunger - XIII (nu)

Cultivation: Nascent Foundation 3% (251)

Savage Heart: 16 (162)

Manticore Tattoo (null)

Physique Level: D-9 (245)

Beggar King's Robes: +2 (10)

Soul Level: 9 (81)

>

Not a single trace of his temporary transformation, but given his recent advancement, he had a total of 749 power. His monstrous side had grown even more during his battle with the manticore, so she estimated his effective total as almost 1500, which explained his absolute dominance. His maximum... well, that had changed, hadn't it?

That depended entirely on how much his Savage Form transformation had added to his strength. Presuming her mid-battle observation was accurate, which was a major assumption, and presuming that was only the human side, it was an additional 100 Power. Given that he lost control, that might actually be a liability at their level of combat.

She'd noticed that repeatedly with Kai's monstrous abilities: they had insane potential growth, but only on the other side of terrible pitfalls. If he actually developed a controllable form, it was very likely to keep growing in power, which would make his hypothetical maximum even more incredible. The problem was getting there with everyone alive.

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Just as Omilaena prepared one of her monstrous essence injections, she realized that Kai was already bending down and taking a bite. It felt like he absorbed the essence, too: whatever else he had been through, his ability to consume was growing.

"I tried to leave the quills intact for you." Kai wiped off his mouth as he kicked the tail. "I waited until it had regrown them and killed it before it could launch any."

"Thanks." Omilaena played it off casually and went to go pull them out, but she was actually more pleased than she wanted to admit. His hesitation had been because he'd remembered her offhand comment and made sure to do things properly for her. She'd have to thank him for that later and she had a few ideas.

"Do you think we should get back to the Manticore tribe?" he asked. "I hope they haven't gotten themselves killed somehow."

"If they can't survive for a few weeks, they're hopeless as a tribe. A sect can get pretty far just on the rumors of a patriarch still being active, so hopefully they should last." Omilaena removed the quills carefully and began storing them in dark cloth that would seal in the poison. "But yeah, we should get back. I can probably get the weapons ready for them before we return."

"The other big thing we have is a symbol of victory." Kai severed the manticore's neck and hefted the massive skull, frowning at it. "The stereotypical option would be to make the hide into a cape, with the head as a helmet. But it's so big, that would just look stupid."

"Especially on anyone shorter than you. But I like the idea of some sort of symbol, so we should put something together with the mane, spine, and fur. I might as well make one for myself too, while we're at it."

"Seems like a good plan. Give me some time to work on this essence." Kai sat down beside the corpse and focused internally.

While he worked, Omilaena tried to ignore it and focused on her weapons. One of the most efficient uses would be to break off the unnecessary parts of the quill and use the venomous section as a blowdart or other projectile, but cultivators didn't use weapons like that. She didn't have any need for quill-based weapons herself, now that she had enough poison, so she needed to make something they would appreciate.

Before she could come up with a solution, she found herself turning back to Kai. "Hey. What are you doing?"

"Just digesting the manticore's essence." Kai looked over at her as if slightly puzzled.

"I know that, I just want to hear what you're thinking." Omilaena walked over to where he sat and crouched in front of him. "We talk about our advancement so much, but when it comes to the monstrous side of things, you almost always decide on your own."

"I guess... I could never tell anyone about it before." Her words seemed to surprise him, but after a while he nodded. "What I've figured out is that I need to concentrate the power into a specific form, at least to get the most benefit from it. For example, I could focus on the manticore's physical strength, since it had a fair amount, but I think that would be a waste. Lots of monsters are strong and I already have strength-based essence."

"But you can feed them to one another, right?"

"Yes, but it seems less efficient. Besides, since we went to all this trouble, I want to get something unique out of it."

"Could you take the tail or the quills? That seems like its most powerful characteristic... but would you grow a tail?"

"Probably wouldn't grow a tail," Kai said with a smile. "I actually ate something called a Lizarkyl, all the way back in Krysal. It had a tail technique that used my energy to project a tail-like strike, but I never really found a use for it."

"Wait, really? How does that work?" Omilaena stared at him until he cooperated.

After rooting around in his soul for a while, Kai stood up and walked to one of the nearest trees that hadn't been overturned by the battle. He focused and power seemed to flow out behind him, as if he'd formed chakra into a thick, powerful length. Then he sort of... threw his hips to the side, and the power whipped into the tree, cracking it in half.

Omilaena burst out laughing, so hard she had to hold her stomach before she was done.

"You see?" Kai rolled his eyes as if irritated, but he couldn't quite hide his smile. "It looks too stupid to use, and it's just inconvenient. So I don't think I'll be getting a tail."

"No, no, you need to use it," Omilaena insisted. "Tell Zin Nim you have a new technique, then show her. She won't be able to stop staring, believe me."

"Alright, alright. You've had your fun."

"But really, wouldn't a manticore tail be more useful? It could curl up behind you, and having an extra limb in a melee can be incredibly useful."

"Probably, but is there any point doing poison? Because of, you know..." Kai gestured in her general direction. "If we need someone poisoned, you're the woman for the job. Seems redundant to waste the essence on that."

"That wasn't what I was thinking at all." Omilaena pulled out one of the quills to demonstrate. "The poison was dangerous, yes, but what made it a threat was that the manticores had such effective projectiles. That's something you don't really have."

"Tyrant's Claw and Baleful Breath can already strike at range."

"Which is fine when you want to destroy, oh, everything in the area. But we won't always be in fights where you can cause such indiscriminate destruction, especially if we get involved in more complex conflicts. You need more options for a precision strike."

Kai listened thoughtfully, then slowly nodded. "You have a good point. I'll have to think about how to make that work, but it's better than anything I was thinking of."

"Great." Omilaena shot upright and returned to the corpse. "Now, let's get everything we need and go confirm the Manticore tribe isn't as dead as their namesake."

"I'm surprised you're so eager to get back."

"Not at all. Once we've checked on them, we have something far more important to do."