Chapter 3 Part 2

It was an extremely unequal contract.

Even suggesting it felt humiliating to Mu Cheng.

But Lian Yunzhi shook his head.

“No,” Lian Yunzhi said. “I want you to sign a Beast Taming Contract with me.”

Mu Cheng raised his head, looking at Lian Yunzhi in utter disbelief. “A Beast Taming Contract? I’m not a demon beast—I’m human!”

Lian Yunzhi felt inexplicably guilty but steeled himself at the thought of his Immortal Pill. “Without my Immortal Pill, you’d be dead. I saved your life! Letting you be my demon beast is already generous—I haven’t even made you my human cauldron yet!”

Human cauldron was a new term Lian Yunzhi had learned. He had found an ancient book in the Xiao Yun Mountain Secret Realm. It contained little else, just some dubious short stories.

One story told of a handsome youth captured by evil path cultivators to serve as a human cauldron. Knowing escape was impossible, the youth let out a miserable laugh and pierced his own heart with a sword.

The book was incomplete, the story unfinished. Lian Yunzhi had read it through twice without understanding the exact method of using a human cauldron, but he vaguely knew it involved refining a person into a vessel that absorbed spiritual energy through some vile method, then transferring that power to the cauldron’s master in an agonizing way.

Utterly inhumane, in any case.

As expected, Mu Cheng paled at the word, his expression turning strange. He pressed his lips tight and said no more.

Lian Yunzhi pressed on. He tossed down a dagger and said coldly, “Either sign the Beast Taming Contract with me, or cut open your own belly and return my Immortal Pill.”

The Immortal Pill had long since dissolved into his body—impossible to retrieve.

In the end, Mu Cheng humiliatingly chose to sign the Beast Taming Contract.

The Beast Taming Contract was an extremely domineering subservient contract. Once signed, the master could issue direct mental commands to the beast and even force compliance.

Lian Yunzhi remembered a story from the Immortal Assembly Banquet when he was eight. The Little Immortal Lord, who had left Xiaoze State and never returned, told them about demon beasts. He said a cultivator in the Upper Immortal Realm had obtained a rare high-tier demon beast and signed a contract with it, then used the contract to force the beast into heat and mate with others… only to be bitten to death by his own beast.

Of course, after killing its master, the high-tier demon beast exploded and died instantly.

But that illustrated just how tyrannical the Beast Taming Contract was—even capable of forcing one’s own demon beast into heat!

In truth, had Lian Yunzhi and Mu Cheng grown up on other cultivation continents, like the Middle Immortal Realm or Upper Immortal Realm, they would never have chosen or agreed to such a contract.

From the moment they first learned of the Beast Taming Contract, their elders or masters would have warned them: it was a soul contract, not to be used lightly, and never on humans, lest it bring unbearable consequences.

Unfortunately, Lian Yunzhi and Mu Cheng grew up in knowledge-poor Xiaoze State. They had never systematically studied cultivation. With no sects or masters to guide them, all their knowledge came from a Qi Refining Stage cultivator’s tales and ancient texts scavenged from secret realms. They held no reverence for the cultivation world’s soul contracts.

Thus, they now began signing the Beast Taming Contract.

Lian Yunzhi severed the Silver Silk Vine binding Mu Cheng. Mu Cheng rose from the ground. He towered over Lian Yunzhi, who frowned at the height difference and ordered him to kneel.

Mu Cheng paused, then dropped to one knee. His expression was calm, showing no reluctance.

Lian Yunzhi felt a slight satisfaction.

Next, following the steps from the ancient text, he forced out a drop of his heart blood from his fingertip. Mu Cheng cooperatively picked up the nearby dagger and carved open the skin over his heart.

Lian Yunzhi gave him an approving glance, stepped forward, and thrust the heart blood mixed with a strand of pure spiritual power into Mu Cheng’s heart!

Mu Cheng’s body trembled violently. His face turned deathly pale, veins bulging on his forehead. His distinct-knuckled fingers clawed at the ground, as if enduring unbearable agony.

Lian Yunzhi pinched his chin, forcing his head up, and stared into his eyes. Recalling words from an ancient text about a Nascent Soul Ancestor taming a 9th Tier Demon Fox, he repeated word for word: “You must accept my heart blood, just as you must accept that I will be your master from now on.”

Mu Cheng’s shuddering body stilled abruptly, then he closed his eyes in pain.

Lian Yunzhi suddenly felt a profound, mysterious connection form between him and Mu Cheng. In that instant, he sensed emotions not his own: humiliation, anger, unwillingness, suppression, pain, hatred, anticipation, peace, longing…

Were these Mu Cheng’s current emotions? How strange.

How could such conflicting feelings coexist in one person?

But he had no time to dwell.

He clearly saw the knife wound on Mu Cheng’s chest healing rapidly. At the same time, a vast, intricate ink-green pattern flickered on Mu Cheng’s skin, growing clearer yet shrinking, until it condensed into a seal-sized mark firmly affixed to his chest.

—The Beast Taming Contract was complete.

Lian Yunzhi instantly felt relieved. He wondered with interest what command to give his first beast: make it bark like a dog? Or flip somersaults for him…

Pa!

The flames burning on the giant vines along the cave walls extinguished without warning.

Lian Yunzhi, who had been smirking a second ago, fainted unexpectedly.

He did not hit the ground but was caught securely by a pair of steady arms.

Mu Cheng was not fully conscious either. He shook his head but could not resist closing his eyes. Before passing out, he instinctively held his new master tightly and rested his cheek in the crook of the master’s neck.

If anyone had been awake then, they would have thought they were dreaming.

For all the winds in Xiaoze State had stopped blowing, all the fish ceased swimming, all the birds hung motionless in the air. Only the stars in the sky slowly shifted, like the eyelid of a giant eye lifting to gaze toward Spirit Mountain.

More precisely, toward the Cave Mansion on Spirit Mountain, toward Lian Yunzhi, asleep in Mu Cheng’s arms—countless stardust gathered around him, scrutinizing him with cold light.

But no one noticed.

For everyone in Xiaoze State had fallen into slumber at that moment.