“OUCH!”

Bao Gang pulled the 10 cm long lizard off his hand. The lizard brought a tiny chunk of flesh with it. Feeling cold sweat bead on his forehead he inwardly thanked Wei Yun for not allowing this lizard to grow earlier, otherwise it would be huge after a trillion years, and probably would have bitten off his entire hand. This was a truly demonic beast! By comparison, the larger ones which patiently waited for him to cultivate, scared of the consequences of charging in trying to steal the treasure for themself, were much more docile. They predicted the consequences and acted accordingly. This lizard did the exact opposite! Talk about biting the hand which feeds you!

Obviously not having a good impression of the lizard, he tossed it away from him. The lizard looked at him arrogantly, then almost as if a switch had been flipped, began to have watery eyes, but something about its mouth, still chewing a piece of Bao Gang’s flesh which made him look proud of his action instead of repentant.

However, the innocent Bao Gang fell for the lizard’s trick, believing it to be truly sorry for its actions. The lizard turned around and crawled towards the demonic beasts which were surrounding them as if a lone samurai, fighting alone, knowing that their fight would end in their death, and killing themself before their enemy could just to rob their satisfaction. In short, the little red lizard almost looked heroic.

Almost.

Suddenly, the lizard shot forward in a burst of speed, traveling half a mile in just a few seconds, gliding in the air on a pair of stubbly wings which Bao Gang had not noticed before, as they were red, the same color as the rest of its body. With its skinny, red body, it blended in with the surroundings. A red lizard in a forest full of flaming plants is not very obvious, especially a small one moving at high speeds. Before the demonic beasts even knew what had hit them, the lizard had already bored through the eyes of a demonic beast and out other, holding a red, marble sized crystal in between its claws.

As if to taunt the others, it stopped midair to let them know it had killed one of their kin under their watch. With their low intelligence, the beasts reflexively pounced at the lizard, 10 flaming wolves jumping at the lizard, with tens of beasts heading towards the scene to see what the commotion was.

That was the last thing they ever did.

FOooomph*

Golden flame shot out from the mouth of the lizard, engulfing the 10 flaming wolves and some other demonic beasts behind them. A frenzy broke out, the fire attribute beasts(they live on a flaming world, which is a result of a high concentration of flame laws, which results in flame attributed beasts), which would normally have a resistance to flame based attacks, burst into golden torches, rolling around on the ground, or even other beasts in the hopes of putting out the fire.

It didn’t. They only spread it.

Not even the trees and grass were spared, the beasts within a hundred meters were quickly caught on fire. A single demonic beast would be able to run at 10 times the speed of a normal human, and the tens of beasts which were originally caught on fire rushed out in a wave of golden flames, setting everything nearby ablaze.

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While easy to spread, the flame did not just burn the beasts quickly, it did so slowly, allowing them to spread the fire for even up to a minute. Soon, hundreds of beasts had been caught on fire, and the number was only rising.

The red lizard rushed back to Bao Gang, while holding the crystal, then the crystal visibly grew clearer until it looked like glass. The lizard also visibly grew larger by a few millimeters. The crystal, a demonic beast core, held the essence energy which the beast had absorbed throughout its life, but is usually unusable to cultivators. The beast core holds energy refined through a beast cultivation method, which is unsuitable for use by a human cultivator. When it turned clear, this indicates that the beast qi had been absorbed by the lizard, turning the crystal into energy usable by anyone.

The lizard placed the crystal on the hole in Bao Gang’s hand, where it melted into juice and soaked into his hand. A new portion of flesh quickly grew, and within 30 seconds, no one who did not witness the lizard biting off a chunk of Bao Gang’s hand would be able to tell what had happened.

The lizard looked at Bao Gang arrogantly as if to say,

“That’s right, you need me, I’m the master around here.”

For this, Bao Gang named the lizard Xiao Gou Shi(“little shit” in chinese).

“Xiao Gou Shi! Why do you have wings, I thought you were a lizard!”

As an answer, the lizard shot out a pillar of fire, to show another way in which it was not a lizard.

“Well, that’s not important right now, we should run away while the demonic beasts are in chaos.”

The area which Xiao Gou Shi had just flown to and set on fire had now been charred to cinders, with no vestiges of living creatures at all. Even Bao Gang was slightly afraid of Xiao Gou Shi’s fire and didn’t want to get unnecessarily close to it if he could help it, which is why he waited until the fire burned itself out to escape the encirclement.

Bao Gang started sprinting in that direction, the direction of freedom and safety, but as he had almost reached the half mile mark, a tiger jumped out of the bushes. 7 feet long and a few hundred pounds, the tiger completely dwarved Bao Gang. Having gained momentum and unable to stop in time, he crashed into the tiger, with the tiger biting his right arm, mauling Bao Gang’s stomach with its claws. Bao Gang, Punched the tiger in the throat repeatedly. Once, twice, three times, losing himself in bloodlust for 30 seconds, the tiger did not let up. But suddenly, the tiger released its grip on his arm. Bao Gang picked himself up, and looked at the unmoving tiger, fearful it was just playing dead, when he noticed a hole where its eye used to be.

The other eye popped out of its socket, and Xiao Gou Shi flew out of it’s head, carrying a gray demonic beast core.

“You saved me Xiao Gou Shi. Thank you.”

His lack of fighting skills would have gotten him killed had he not had Xiao Gou Shi to protect him. The punches to the tiger's neck could not compare in damage to the tiger's claws which had mauled his entire upper body. Now knowing that his peerless talent would not be enough to bring him to the peak of this realm, he would improve himself in all ways. In cultivation, not slacking off because it would make him too weak to survive. In fighting skills, because that would be what allows him to effectively use his cultivation for self-defense. And also in companions, which was the difference between life and death for him on this day.

And Wei Yun? She didn't appear, and having no way to communicate with her, Bao Gang had no way to be certain she will actually protect him in the case of danger. She might be sleeping, or just not paying attention to him, but this moment of inattentiveness might get him killed in an ambush. From this moment on, Bao Gang vowed to get stronger.