After speaking to his granddaughter over the phone, Qin Zhengyang frowned in deep thoughts.
"Little Wu!" he suddenly called out.
A middle-aged man came in.
He was Qin Zhengyang's butler.
"Yes, sir?" Butler Wu came in, bowed at Qin Zhengyang, and asked.
Qin Zhengyang went quiet for a while, but finally said, "Little Fei is pretty worried about Yang Tian. Sigh... Could you please make a trip and bring Yang Tian back? Bring Dovey!"
Butler Wu raised his head and asked worriedly, "Sir, if I take Dovey, what about your safety?"
Qin Zhengyang smiled and said, "Don't you understand by now? The level of a Warrior is sometimes merely a façade. Even if Dovey is not around, I can still defeat the Du Brothers."
"Understood!" Butler Wu nodded and left.
A moment later, Butler Wu stood in the courtyard and took a few blows on a whistle, making a cooing sound.
It did not take long before a gigantic Red Eagle descended from the sky and landed in the courtyard.
The wingspan of the Red Eagle was more than ten meters long. When it kept its wings, it looked larger than a cow. Its strong claws were covered with red-colored scales, but the tip of its claws was golden in color and were incredibly sharp.
Perhaps it just ate another Monster because there were traces of blood around its beak and its claws.
The gigantic Red Eagle was Qin Zhengyang's pet Monster. It had an electric ring on one of its feet. With the electric ring, it would not be attacked by the air defense weapons when it flew into the city.
The Red Eagle stared at Butler Wu and the bone whistle held in his hand.
"Dovey, the Old Master wanted us to take a trip to bring someone back." Butler Wu smiled when he saw the way the eagle looked at him.
However, it did not acknowledge Butler Wu and instead, turned its head to preen its feathers.
"Dovey, you haven't been back for half a month. Have you been out looking for a fight?" Right at that moment, Qin Zhengyang walked out of the mansion and said with a smile.
Seeing Qin Zhengyang, the eagle's eyesight softened. It only took a few steps to reach him and crouched down. Qin Zhengyang caressed its feather for a few moments and said, "Be good, go for a trip. You'll be back soon."
Only then, the eagle turned around and crouched in front of Butler Wu.
Butler Wu smiled. He picked up his backpack and hopped on to its back. The eagle opened up its wing and bounced itself to the air, carrying Butler Wu and circling around the mansion before it flew toward Yang Tian's coordinates at full speed.
To reach the forest where Yang Tian was, it would take at least 20 days on the ground, whereas flying there did not take more than half an hour.
…
In the meantime, Yang Tian was resting on a tree, holding the light blue Grade Five Beast Core.
After his fight with Feng Da, he felt that he had reached a new height, and it was the right time to take the Grade Five Beast Core.
"Squeak squeak squeak…"
When Drago saw Yang Tian holding up the Beast Core, he knew what he was thinking. He shook his claws and said many things to Yang Tian.
After he digested what the little dragon was saying, he rolled his eyes.
"H-How is that possible?" Yang Tian did not quite believe what Drago told him.
Still, he jumped off the tree, put the Grade Five Beast Core into his mouth, and swallowed it.
In a few moments, Yang Tian closed his eyes.
The energy of the Grade Five Beast Core was absorbed by Yang Tian's digestive system and slowly flowed to his entire body. Just like his previous experience, Yang Tian was controlling that energy, focusing it on the Dragon Pearl in his chest.
Time flew by.
One hour… two hours… three hours…
The process of absorbing energy was very long.
Exactly 36 hours had passed.
All the energy from the Grade Five Beast Core was kept inside the Dragon Pearl.
Through his inner vision, Yang Tian was surprised to find out that with the huge amounts of energy filling in, the Dragon Pearl had transformed from light green color to yellow.
At that moment, Yang Tian opened his eyes, and followed Drago's instructions to control the massive energy in the Dragon Pearl using his will; to let it cycle through his body once, and bring them to both his hands.
The wounds all over his body were miraculously cured through the nurturing of this energy!
More and more energy was gathering on both his hands. Yang Tian discovered that they had become red and swollen as if they were briefly fried in the oil.
At the same time, they felt incredibly numb and itchy.
"Squeak squeak squeak…"
Drago squeaked with joy and reminded Yang Tian.
Yang Tian nodded and distributed the energy to all of his fingers and the skin on his arms.
The more precise control over the Dragon Pearl energy was a first for Yang Tian. When he activated the energy before, he merely directed them to his hands or legs, or to the parts that were damaged. Moreover, there was less energy to be utilized in the Dragon Pearl.
Very soon, changes started to happen on Yang Tian's hands.
The skin on his hands and arms began to turn hard, green, and wrinkly dry.
The tips of his fingers were growing so fast that one could notice even with their bare eyes. They turned thick, then they turned flat…
Roughly after ten minutes, the skin on Yang Tian's arms and hands had peeled off.
When he looked at his hands, he was stunned.
Only because his hands had turned into dragon claws!
There was no mistake! They were dragon claws! They were identical to Drago's claws!
'I… I'm turning into a freak!'
Yang Tian looked at his claws and laughed.
He was not worried because Drago did mention that his claws could transform back into human hands.
In fact, in Yang Tian's mind, he did not care if it stayed as dragon claws. He merely did not wish to show it to Qin Fei and his parents.
'Let's test the power!'
Yang Tian stood up, went over to a tree as thick as a bowl rim's diameter, and threw a punch.
BOOM!
The punch that carried a massive amount of power hit the tree trunk and let out a huge rumble.
Crrraaaack!
The tree broke and toppled over.
Yang Tian looked at his own hands, stunned.
If it was before, punching with this level of might would not break a tree of that size; it would have merely made his hands swollen.
However, after the transformation, he almost felt nothing after breaking the big tree with his dragon claws as if he was wearing a pair of iron gloves.
Yang Tian expanded his claws, and his nails that had turned into the shape of hooks opened wide. Once again, he went over to a tree as thick as a human's waist, raised his claws, and scratched the tree nonstop by imitating Drago with all his might.
At the moment, the big tree felt like it was as soft as plastic bubbles in his mind. After less than a minute of sawdust flying everywhere, Yang Tian broke a big tree using merely his scratches.
He did not use too much might throughout the process. Ever since his hands had turned into dragon claws, his arms had become a lot more powerful than before as well.
This was not only because he ate the Grade Five Beast Core, but it was also because his arms were filled with Dragon Pearl energy.
The pair of dragon claws were probably more powerful than regular weapons.
Weapons were, after all, external possessions, but the dragon claws were his own hands. During a battle, they would be more agile and fast!
Owooo!
Right then, a Monster not too far away howled.
It was an occurrence that could happen anytime in the forest—Monsters would also hunt and eat each other. When he was moving through the woods before, he would often see high-graded Monsters fighting against each other.
Monsters needed to ingest Beast Cores to evolve themselves too. The more Beast Cores they ate, the faster they would upgrade.
The source of the howl was no more than one kilometer ahead of Yang Tian. He swiftly moved through the forest and arrived within ten minutes.
Drago hopped on to his shoulder and looked over to the source of the noise with his eyes opened wide.
As Yang Tian arrived, a Black Bear and a Silver Boar were seen fighting.
The Silver Boar was Grade One, while the Black Bear was not even graded.