Far from the Wildlands, at the great forest surrounding the Celestial Haven Sect, two brothers were desperately trying to survive, under the guise of a dark night.
“Get away from us!” A young boy around 14 years old held up a dagger as he faced the slow approach of three opponents, all brandishing swords.
Behind the boy stood a scared little brother who clung to his leg in fear.
“Good couple of slaves they’ll make eh.”
One of the bandits spoke up.
“Too bad one of em will lose a hand.”
The younger boy gathered his courage.
“Don’t you fear the Celestial Haven Sect? They’ll punish you.”
The three bandits looked at each other and laughed.
“That lazy bum of a cultivator, all it took were a few women from our boss and he locked himself in a room all day haha.”
The child's eyes dimmed.
“I don’t believe you!” the older boy spoke.
“Surely we’ll get justice!” he held the dagger out further.
The three bandits laughed once more.
“Justice, yeah right, he’s happy to just have fun with women, he could give a rats ass about how many of us pitiful mortals die, he’s just stationed here as a virtue signal by the sect.”
The boy's hand began to tremble and the dagger shook.
Was this truly the end for them?
“NO!” he thought about his little brother who stood behind him, he couldn’t let him become a slave.
His grip tightened.
“COME AT ME! I’LL KILL ONE OF YOU AT LEAST!” his eyes sharpened, his gaze held the resentment of a beast that was cornered.
The bandits looked at each other, trying to figure out who would swing first.
One of the bandits decided to swing, his sword headed towards the boy's wrist.
The boy used his dagger to deflect the sword and lunged at the man, biting his jugular vein and ripping into his neck, a display of utter animalistic instinct.
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He quickly let go and returned to his defensive position before his brother.
The bandit who had been bit fell to the ground screaming as a fountain of blood shot from his neck, desperately trying to use his hand to plug up the bleeding hole that had been carved into his neck.
His eyes held a deep fear as he looked at the bloody mouth of the boy.
The boy’s eyes continued to constrict, it was as if he was slowly turning into a beast, his instinct for survival was raging, consuming his rationality and fear alike.
“That’s it, looks like you’ll lose more than just a hand.”
“Stupid kid you could have chosen to be sold like a good slave.”
The two bandits stopped joking around, they both came at him together.
One of the swords was aimed at his neck and the other at his right shoulder.
He deflected one of the swords and stabbed his dagger into the bandit's arm, but the second strike lodged itself into his shoulder.
He screamed out in pain and fell to his knees, he had given it his all and it still wasn’t enough.
He shut his eyes as he awaited the final slash, but to his surprise he didn’t hear or feel anything, just a thump, as he saw the two bandits heads fall to the ground.
Before him stood a tall man with red hair and a saber, an almost otherworldly aura surrounded him, he could feel a sort of resonance with him.
“I-”
He wanted to speak but looked to his shoulder after feeling the absence of pain, the wound had been completely mended.
“No need for gratitude, I sensed a deep resolve within you, the resolve of a wounded beast.” Krimin Spoke.
He bowed his head and had his little brother do the same.
“Thank you, great immortal.”
“I am no immortal, just a cultivator, a cultivator of the demonic no, of the Beastial Path.”
He turned his gaze to look at the pair of the siblings.
“I need directions to the Celestial Haven Sect.”
“It should be 300 miles north, great immortal.” the older brother replied, shivering from fear. He had never met a great immortal before, but he had heard stories about them. He heard that there was a man who coughed in the presence of a great immortal and he lost his life.
Krimin bent down and rubbed the boy's head, noticing the fear in his heart.
“We humans are at our very core very similar to beasts, where we differ is our change. Beasts have always continued to respect their instincts, but we’ve changed, humans began to respect things like power more than their intuition. Brother killing brother, father killing son, the very idea of this feels unnatural and yet we do it anyways. We’ve become deviants. Deviants unable to contain our petty desires.”
He smiled.
“You did good, protected your family. I helped you due to the teachings of the Beastial Origin, it states your clan and family are your God, to protect the family is to worship the Beastial Origin. Since I saw you perform an act of worship, I acted.”
He threw down some pills and a manual that dictated the process of refining one's body and condensing Qi before the boy.
“Become one who serves only his family and only his clan, become one of the Beastial Origin, do that and the Beastial Origin will bless the very ground you walk on.”
The boy was overjoyed, he didn’t understand what the Beastial Origin was but he was grateful at the generosity of the great immortal.
“I will remember the teachings of the great immortal and be forever loyal to the Beastial Origin.”
“Good kid.” Krimin stood up and started flying towards the Celestial Haven Sect.
He looked to the very same ringed moon that Feng Zhiming had fallen asleep staring at.
“Father, I’ll return soon, I’ll return after honouring the Beastial Origin.” he spoke to himself as he sped up.