Bai Xueli woke to a piercing pain that seemed to sear itself into her very soul. Her blood boiled and her bones screamed. The very core of her being cried out and struggled in a futile attempt to escape the invader. It felt like an conquering foreign entity was dominating her soul and suppressing any of her attempts to reassert control.
After fighting a brief, losing battle, it crushed and pressured her to the point of contemplating surrender. There was very little she could do to fight against it due to her injuries and weak condition. It wrested away any any control she had over her own life or death.
[Surrender or die,] an alien thought was roughly thrust into her mind, making Xueli want to curl up with both terror and pain at the power and strength of the booming mind voice.
Xueli had no idea what was going on. Hadn't she been unconscious and slowly dying from her wounds just now? Hadn't the huge beast that had caught her been planning to eat her?
[You will die from your wounds if you do not surrender and allow the contract to take place,] the rough voice echoed in Xueli's head, making her cringe in pain. There was no where to hide from the voice.
The thoughts carried connotations and hints of a language Xueli had never heard of before. The words that the thoughts carried were completely unfamiliar. There was also a smidgeon of hesitation and rustiness, as if the powerful voice had not spoken to anyone for a long time and was not used to communicating with words. The emotions behind the words were filled with an arrogant pride, dominance and possessiveness.
Wait, possessiveness? She was being treated as a possession?
[I was lonely and prayed to the Creator for the perfect pet as a companion and you came. You fell out of the sky into my paws as an answer to my prayer, so now, you are mine. My contract pet. I refuse to allow you to die. You must accept the contract to live.]
What?
Xueli heard the thoughts and emotions but didn't fully comprehend them.
Pet?
She was about to become someone's pet?
Contract? What contract? What did it mean?
There was an impatient huff in her mind at her confusion. The powerful voice directly squeezed her to complete surrender and then Xueli cried out once more. It was like the very core of her being was being branded and chained to... to...
The huge creature that had caught her. An animal? A mythical beast? The beast was making her its pet?
The brand with which she was being marked with took the shape of an antlered deer with tiger markings and tiger paws with an opposable thumb instead of hooves. It only had the short bob tail of a deer. Xueli felt confused. What kind of an animal was this?
Much as Xueli resisted the thought, she didn't have the strength to resist. Through the internal chain leash that bound her to to the beast, Xueli realised that it was truly her master and she had become its slave. The type of slave without any rights.
The pain of being branded and bounded faded into a sensitive rawness, like how a new wound would feel. A channel of power via the chain that had leashed her to her new master glowed with a golden warmth. Golden power soothed the wound in her soul and then rushed into her body, putting everything right and back in place. Misplaced organs were returned to their original positions, broken bones were realigned. Deep lacerations knit themselves back together while dark contusions slowly faded.
Xueli's entire body itched and twitched at the odd sensation of being healed so quickly. The power then filled what felt like the blood vessels of her body - but not. The power didn't seem to exactly run through her blood vessels but in or alongside them. Xueli wondered what these new vessels were and why she didn't know humans had such invisible veins.
[Meridians,] her new owner told her. [Elemental or spiritual veins. Yours are very dry and narrow from disuse. Wherever you came from must have not had any spiritual energy like this place. Your people must have been very poor and weak.]
There was the sensation of pressure building up, followed by a popping sensation that seemed to echo through her entire body and mind, releasing a strange sense of euphoric giddiness.
The huge tide of power was then quickly pulled back and reduced to a trickle. Xueli felt how the strange golden power in her body was slowly being interchanged by the big dam of power flowing from her beast master. It was a rather curious experience.
[Rising levels too quickly is bad for you,] her owner said. [We will improve you a bit at a time. Rest now. You will be almost completely healed when you wake up again. Even with the contract and my power, you will still need a few days to recover.]
Levels? Like in a computer game?
Xueli felt like her mind was still spinning with the newness of everything and slight confusion as to what was going on. She was still trying to come to terms with all that had happened since she had escaped her exploding laboratory. Things had happened too quickly for her to grasp and comprehend. It was rather overwhelming.
The battle for her soul, her loss of control and now this sudden healing made her feel somewhat reluctant and rebellious. She had been ready to die. Prepared to die. And now she couldn't die even if she wanted to. Her life and death was tied to her owner. An owner - master - who was a literal beast. Not human. She wanted to fight and rail against the unfairness of the world at her loss of freedom after escaping captivity only to re-enter a deeper and even more inescapable type of captivity after a very brief period of freedom.
Xueli's thrashed and flailed with frustration.
[Sleep,] her owner squashed her line of thought and impressed sleep upon her, plunging her into the dark.