A familiar, cold, and sterile air drifted past his sickly white skin as he shivered ever so lightly, yet he laid still in his bed, his body sunken into the mattress since it had laid there for so long; The hiss of the respirator attached to his mouth was the only sound that echoed throughout the dull room.
'This is… oh. I see.'
It was a memory, he had been seeing such dreams often in the past half a year or so, he wasn't sure why though.
His eyes opened a crack, as far as he could manage; He looked around the room hazily though he couldn't even shift his head, at this point the muscles of his neck had degenerated so far they couldn't even shift what little weight his head weighted, let alone all the equipment attached to him.
Opposite him was a window, he remembered that it was his only form of entertainment, but he couldn't remember what, all he saw was a blank white void as if the building floated in space.
'What was it I enjoyed watching? That memory… it's gone…' he closed his eyes in acceptance, every time he had one of these dreams he'd realise that he'd lost something, but since he didn't know what, he wasn't sure whether it was important.
At first, it scared him, but eventually he became numb to it, they were only small details after all…
He suddenly heard footsteps approaching, he waited until the person came in to sight, it was the nurse that regularly checked up on him… yet something was wrong, he could remember the outfit she wore, the pristine white uniform that stood out in the dark, yet her face… her skin… her hair… everything felt blurry.
'Which nurse was this? I saw too many while I was here… was it the one that wore that horrid expression? The one that I always hated to see?' He pondered as he stared at the figure that could have come from a horror game.
As he stared at the figure he couldn't help but recall the one figure that wore a similar outfit in his current life – Jing Yaling.
'She said these dreams might be my soul attempting to patch the holes in my memory, scouring my instinctive reactions to restructure them…' And just as he thought that the fog around the figure cleared and the person that stood there was now Jing Yaling wearing the nurse's outfit.
Her expression was filled with annoyance and distain as she wiped his body and replaced the IV, catheter bag and other such things, he felt a wave of insecurity, fear and pain overcome his mind as he watched her face through his dull eyes.
'… I wish that memory remained lost forever, I don't want to see her looking at me with that.' He wanted to throw up, the feeling of entrusting your life to someone that clearly distains you was sickening, he had heard her whisper multiple times that she'd wish he'd dropped dead, he feared every second that she was in the room with him.
But he couldn't even speak, he couldn't move, he couldn't tell anyone about it; He had to bear with it, all way until he passed.
She left the room after half an hour, slamming the door behind her, his mind felt like a ball of string that untangled itself as she did.
He closed his eyes and loosened his mind, it was time to let go, he didn't want to be here anymore. He felt his body being to float and drift as a white feeling washed over his senses, and then, he woke up.
…
Shu He's eyes opened gently to a wooden ceiling, it wasn't the Medical Division that he expected, as his senses awakening he found the scents around him familiar as he began to shift his muscles and feel his surroundings.
'This… I'm still at the sanctuary building?' He could smell the different scents of animals, feed and hay wafting in the air, it seems that he hadn't been moved much since he blacked out, he moved his arm slightly, expecting to feel some pain but to his surprise there wasn't any.
"What?" He exclaimed with surprise, he had definitely channelled a flood of Golden Qi through his body, he should be in a similar state to the time after his match with Jin Bao, yet as he began to move all of his muscles there wasn't a single ounce of pain, the surprise cleared his mind as he sat up gently.
'How am I okay?!' He looked around, the room he was in is a spare room, he was currently on a simple, normally unused bed that disciples that lived in would stay in, however he then realised he felt a weight on his legs as he looked down.
There was an animal there, it had pristine white feathers covering most of its body that shone in the light, but its plumage wasn't pure white, it had a pattern of bright red feathers on the underside of its wings that were current tucked in, its breast had a pattern of red feathers that resembled a candle flame and there was a single red feather sticking up from its head along with a clean, orange bill.
"… Little Xue?" Shu He said hesitantly, but the more he looked he was sure it was that little white duck that he had picked up a couple months ago, she was definitely bigger than before, but she was already a small duck, now she's just the right size for an adult duck!
Unfortunately she didn't respond, her head was tucked into her torso, bundled up like a dumpling as she slept gently. Shu He couldn't help but smile gently as he stoked her little head, at the same time he was a little confused.
'Before I fainted, wasn't she...' He remembered quite clearly; she wasn't in the form of an animal at that moment.
Suddenly the door to the room opened and Elder Bai walked in "Oh, Shu He you're awake! Good, I was thinking I'd have to go grab someone from outside to help" he walked over to the bed and placed a bowl of water and a towel on the bedside "How are you feeling? I didn't expect you to collapse like that! It almost gave me a heart attack!"
"I'm fine… surprisingly good actually, I thought I'd be feeling a lot worse" Shu He replied as he grasped and loosened his fist, still wondering why he was fine "How long as I out for by the way?".
"About a couple hours hour, so It wasn't that long".
"Is that so…" Shu He glanced at Little Xue who was sleeping soundly "Elder Bai, what happened while I was asleep?".
Before Elder Bai he smiled mischievously "Did you see it?" to which Shu He stared at him oddly "See it? See what?". Elder Bai then gestured towards the sleeping duck. Shu He sighed "So my mind wasn't playing tricks on me… but how is that possible? I thought that was the process to become an Evolved Spirit Beast".
"It is, which is why I'm excited" Elder Bai smiled "Based on her current Qi levels and Quality, she is without a doubt a Birth ranked Spirit Animal, yet she gained the form of a human! It's a new possibility, something completely unheard of!" He spoke with glee, almost dancing around the bed.
"You didn't expect this?"
"Of course not! This is a convention breaking event! If we can study this a bit more, having lower ranked Spirit Animals attain human form might be easily possible!".
"I- I don't think that would be possible" Shu He shook his head, if his Golden Qi was the cause then only he- based on his current knowledge- could cause it.
"Well, you might be right" Elder Bai calmed down immediately "But it's still worth studying".
"Right... by the way, why is she in her animal form now? Did something happen?" Shu He questioned; Elder Bai's face lit up like he had remembered something "Right! She clearly doesn't have great control over that form, yet when she saw that you weren't moving she went over and did something to you".
"Like what?" Shu He frowned as he continued to pat the little ducks head.
"I don't know, I couldn't tell, she just held on to you for the best part of an hour before she fell back into her animal form" shrugged Elder Bai.
"Held on to me…" Shu He murmured as he thought for a second "Could it be..?". He activated his <
It was even gathering the surrounding Golden Qi! Not just that, due to their connection he could feel the excess Qi flowing into him, recovering his own reserves!
'It's gotta be that she must have removed the Golden Qi from my physical body! She already had a unique constitution; did it evolve with her?' He stared intently to see if he could figure out anything more, but it was something he wasn't familiar with so he couldn't deduce much.
"Did you figure something out?" Elder Bai who had gotten oddly close to him asked as he stared at the little duck.
"I didn't tell you before, but she seems to have had a special constitution before that revolved around consuming things, would that change now that she has Ascended?" He asked, just to find out what was normal.
"She even had such a thing?! You really are lucky picking her up… yes, most constitutions remain in a dormant or weakened state while in a mortal body, now that she's Ascended it will begin to blossom" Elder Bai explained as he inched closer and closer to Little Xue.
"Would you mind not getting much closer…" Shu He actively pushed the Elder back, feeling his eyes were becoming rather dangerous.
"Ah- Sorry, it's just a spirit animal with a special constitution are rare… I wanted to find out what rank it was".
"There are ranks to those?"
"Of course! The world of cultivation likes to rank everything after all!" Elder Bai laughed "The ranks are Mortal, Earth, Heaven and Divine, these ranks are based on their growth potential".
"Is it possible to change the rank of a constitution?" Shu He asked out of curiosity.
"It's incredibly hard, a constitution originates from the Soul, so to increase the constitutions rank the soul needs to be refined, such materials barely exist in this world".
"Just how rare are they? Do you know of any in this sect?"
"Just one, you're actually familiar with this person" Said Elder Bai, surprising Shu He.
"Really? Who?" Shu He flipped through his memories, unsure as to which one would have it.
"Chao Shi".
"Him?!" Shu He's eyes shot wide open. 'THAT Chao Shi, the one who brought me here?!' his mind spun with confusion. "I didn't think he was such a big shot… he seemed fairly normal" Shu He spoke honestly.
"He does give that impression when you're familiar with him, but you shouldn't forget he's the respected Senior Brother of this Sect, some of his fans would skin you alive if they heard you badmouthing him hehehe".
"Right… You do hear people mention him a lot" Shu He nodded, even the sect master was fond of him, though he wasn't sure of the actual reason. "What constitution does he have?".
"It's called the 'Living Sword' constitution, he is basically a cultivator that was made to use the sword, his body and store and produce Sword Qi of the utmost highest quality, and his comprehension with the sword is second to none". Elder Bai looked out the window, into the distance "It's rank is Heaven, only second to Divine".
"To think he was so amazing…" Shu He shivered slightly as he realised that the person that had brought him to this sect wasn't another mere disciple.
"Well, he's still a bit of a brat" Elder Bai shrugged "He didn't want to accept that he was fated to leave everyone else behind, now look where he is…" he sighed "Ignore me, I'm rambling; He is the only one I know of, but it's possible some of the cultivation families, other sects or even rogue cultivators have one but are keeping on the low".
"Why? Wouldn't it benefit them to show it off and become famous, reaping the resources?"
"Where there is reward, there is risk" Elder Bai looked back at Shu He, warning him "Constitutions can benefit you greatly… or they can be forced to benefit someone else, especially with organisations like Hive wandering around".
Shu He felt a chill down his spine as he imagined the fate of someone with a constitution being captured, if they could produce high quality Qi then couldn't they be used as a battery for their life? Treated as a living tool, tortured but unable to die.
"Enough of that heavy stuff, look, she's waking up" Elder Bai pulled him out of his dark thoughts as he looked over to the little duck, her head shook lightly as her small bill widened in a yawn before her ruby like eyes reflected his figure.
"Quack!" [Shu He!]