Chu Yun held the blood from the tip of his tongue in his mouth, but didn't rush to spit it out.
Unhurriedly, he took out the bottle of Pearl Tears from his robes. Pearl Tears were even harder to obtain than Snow Sand, and far more precious and expensive. They could greatly enhance the effects of the blood offering, allowing a Demon Beast to form an exceptionally close bond with its Spirit Beast Master the moment it hatched.
Putting the bottle to his lips, Chu Yun tipped his wrist and poured all the Pearl Tears into his mouth.
The cool Pearl Tears mixed with the blood from his tongue, immediately giving off a rich fragrance. Its scent refreshed the mind and brightened the heart.
Chu Yun was experienced. He let the mixture brew for a moment, then suddenly spat it out, accurately spraying the Pearl Tears and blood onto the Demon Beast egg.
A strange thing happened. The Demon Beast egg seemed like a sponge, absorbing every drop of Chu Yun's blood essence.
In an instant, the fragrance grew even stronger. The Heavenly Fox Egg also began to glow faintly with pure red light.
Chu Yun was satisfied. With the memories of his previous life, he knew every detail of how to hatch a Demon Beast egg. He knew that the purer the red glow, the better the quality of the blood essence.
At this point, a solemn expression suddenly appeared in his eyes. He knew what came next: the most crucial step.
Step six—Calling to the spirit.
Everything in this world, whether stones and trees or birds, beasts, insects, and fish, had three things.
The body, the soul, and the spiritual light.
The body governed strength, as in putting one's body into action. The soul governed the mind; those with powerful souls had vigorous spirits and keen instincts. The spiritual light governed wisdom and understanding.
When ordinary people suddenly grasped an idea, they called it "a flash of inspiration." When they praised someone for being perceptive and exceptionally creative, they said that person had great "spirituality."
The more abundant one's spiritual light, the greater one's understanding and the more readily wisdom sprang forth.
Those with powerful souls could also be fools or mentally ill. Such people might be full of energy all day long, but their spiritual light was sparse, their wisdom limited, and their understanding lacking. They spoke incoherently and couldn't even grasp the routines of daily life.
The soul produced spirit, and the body stored it. That was how the body, soul, and spiritual light were related.
This sixth step was to use the Spirit Beast Master's spiritual light to awaken the spiritual light inside the Demon Beast egg. It was crucial; if it failed, the entire hatching process would fail.
Chu Yun was somewhat nervous. He didn't know whether his spiritual light could successfully awaken the light within the Heavenly Fox Egg.
In his previous life, he had succeeded because Lady Shu had schemed against him, leaving cracks all over the Demon Beast egg until it was on the verge of breaking. A Demon Beast egg was like a body, storing spiritual light within it. When the body was damaged, the spiritual light began to leak away.
In this life, however, Chu Yun's Heavenly Fox Egg was intact. Its spiritual light was plentiful, and he worried whether his own could awaken the Heavenly Fox's. If he couldn't, he would fail. If the spiritual light lashed back at him, it would be even worse.
One must never underestimate hatching an egg; it was fraught with danger. Without thorough preparation, even success could greatly diminish a Demon Beast's potential and leave it innately weak. This might not be apparent in the short term, but the Spirit Beast Master would be the one to suffer the bitter consequences later.
He gently closed his eyes and began to summon the spiritual light within him.
He had experience from his previous life and handled it with ease. His spiritual light was like a white orb, casting a halo that flickered like a candle flame. He quickly set it in motion, sending out waves of spiritual energy toward the Demon Beast egg.
It went far more smoothly than Chu Yun had expected. The very first wave of spiritual energy received a response. Snow Sand deserved some of the credit, but Pearl Tears even more so.
Boom!
Chu Yun fell into a dream.
It was as if he had entered another world. Darkness surrounded him on all sides, and he became the flickering spiritual light within him, shining brightly in the dark.
Besides that, there seemed to be another, extremely faint light source flickering ahead, barely visible.
He wasn't surprised. Calmly guiding his own spiritual light, he probed toward the light ahead. It grew larger and larger, first a mere point, then slowly expanding into a mass of spiritual light many times smaller than his own.
By comparison, Chu Yun's spiritual light was like a clenched fist. This one, however, was only the size of a finger.
Even so, Chu Yun's heart sank. The Heavenly Fox's spiritual light was astonishingly abundant, far beyond his expectations. Ordinary Demon Beasts didn't have even a tenth of it. Even in his previous life, it had only been a fifth as much.
No wonder they say that among Demon Beasts, the fox and monkey clans have the greatest spirituality. He was both worried and delighted.
He was delighted that the Heavenly Fox's spirituality exceeded all expectations and its aptitude was peerless. He was worried that his own spirituality might not be enough to awaken the Heavenly Fox's.
Calling to the spiritual light and establishing a connection was exceedingly difficult. Generally speaking, the greater the difference between two lights, the easier it was to make contact. The Heavenly Fox's aptitude was simply too good, while Chu Yun was only a thirteen-year-old boy. The gap between their spiritual lights wasn't great.
Chu Yun struggled to draw close to the Heavenly Fox's innate spiritual light and called out to it.
At first, there was no response. The Heavenly Fox lay sleeping inside the egg. His call was like a stone ox sinking into the sea, leaving him in despair.
Chu Yun didn't give up. He kept at it. His own aptitude was quite good; compared with ordinary people like Shu Da and Shu Er, the spiritual light within him was twice as large. But the Heavenly Fox was said to be peerless, its aptitude simply too exceptional!
After half a day, the Heavenly Fox's spiritual light suddenly surged, like a lamp flaring to life. Its usual stillness broke, and it slowly began to stir, growing more active.
Chu Yun was both anxious and delighted. He had finally awakened the Heavenly Fox's spirituality, but he was also nearing his own limit.
I'll risk it! Gritting his teeth, he kept going, sending out waves of spiritual energy to call to it.
Thanks to his thorough preparations and extensive experience, the Heavenly Fox responded eagerly after its spiritual light had been awakened. It even began answering Chu Yun's call on its own.
Their connection grew tighter and stronger until it finally reached its limit.
Chu Yun seemed to hear a boom!
In this dreamlike world, darkness surrounded him. His spiritual light had drawn close to the Heavenly Fox's and now enveloped it within itself.
An indescribable sense of closeness rose in his heart. The call to its spirit had succeeded, hard-won!
Break out of your shell. I'm waiting for you. Leaving behind that message, Chu Yun drew back his spiritual light and exited the vision.
Back in the real world, he felt as if his body had been hollowed out. Sweat drenched him, and exhaustion swept over him like a tide.
His eyes narrowed to slits. He wanted nothing more than to collapse and sleep deeply.
He flicked his tongue, and pain from the wound jolted him awake. He absolutely couldn't fall asleep now, or all his efforts would come to nothing!
He had already overcome the greatest obstacle. Now, he couldn't let his guard down and allow success, almost within his grasp, to slip through his fingers.
He waited for the Heavenly Fox to emerge from the Demon Beast egg.
This was the seventh step—breaking out of the shell and establishing a foundation.
Soon, the Heavenly Fox Egg began to stir. The egg, about the size of a large bowl, had been lying still in its nest of dark Baleful Earth Stone and pure white Snow Sand. Now it began to tremble slightly.
In the next moment, the trembling grew stronger, turning into a shudder.
Crack, crack...
At the crisp sound, spiderweb-like cracks appeared across the Heavenly Fox Egg's white shell, streaked with red.
Chu Yun held back his excitement and held his breath.
The Demon Beast egg continued to tremble. One could imagine the newborn Heavenly Fox struggling and straining inside, fighting its way out with great difficulty. But Chu Yun absolutely couldn't help it.
Helping it peel away the shell would deprive it of an opportunity to grow and temper itself. That would be terrible for the Heavenly Fox's future.
At this stage, it had to develop firm conviction and a tenacious fighting spirit, drawing out the fighting instincts in its bones.
The higher the grade of the Demon Beast egg, the harder it was to break through the shell. The Heavenly Fox was a peerless Demon Beast; breaking out would be more than ten times harder for it than for the likes of Sea Burst Crocodiles and Green Fang Snakes.
The Demon Beast egg's trembling gradually weakened, and Chu Yun's expression faltered. In his previous life, cracks had covered the Heavenly Fox Egg, greatly reducing the difficulty of hatching. But this time was different. The Heavenly Fox had to manage entirely on its own.
Could it fail? The unexpected turn of events made Chu Yun instinctively clench his fists, his palms slick with sweat. His concern clouded his judgment, and he wavered: should he intervene and help the Heavenly Fox inside, peeling open the shell himself?
After a fierce internal struggle, he finally let out a long breath and unclenched his fists. He decided to trust the Heavenly Fox, his battle companion who had been by his side for most of his life! It was tough, clever, and full of fighting spirit, never yielding. So often, it had made him, its master, feel ashamed of himself.
The Heavenly Fox did it!
Sure enough, it didn't let him down. The earlier lull had been because it was gathering strength for one decisive strike. It broke through the shell in one go, revealing a little head with half-lidded eyes.
The Heavenly Fox's head was long and pointed, soaked in thick, sticky birth fluid. Its eyes were half-closed as it stared blankly for a moment, seemingly unaccustomed to the bright light.
But in the next instant, it adjusted. Guided by a powerful sense of belonging and closeness in its heart, it found Chu Yun. It let out a joyful cry and began wriggling about, making an even greater commotion.
At last, it broke through the shell and crawled all the way out. Its body was snow-white, and its tail was nearly as long as the rest of it. Birth fluid clung to its body, leaving it in a sorry state. But its eyes were now fully open, jet-black and shining like two enormous black gemstones, impossible to miss.
It cried out happily, clearly fond of Chu Yun. It looked ready to rush over and snuggle with him.
Chu Yun quickly stopped it. Through the call between their spiritual lights, he sent it a warm affection and told it to obey and quickly begin absorbing essence energy.
The newborn Heavenly Fox was very well-behaved. It immediately stopped, planted all four paws on the ground, and began consciously absorbing the essence energy around it.
Concern showed in Chu Yun's eyes. The first energy absorption a newborn Demon Beast performed after hatching could make its cultivation soar. The greater the increase, the better its aptitude.
Generally speaking, with an abundant supply of essence energy, a high-grade Demon Beast could gain six or seven years of cultivation. Those with even better aptitude could reach eight years.
In Chu Yun's previous life, the Heavenly Fox's cultivation had immediately risen to seven years after birth. Now, the Heavenly Fox Egg was intact, and it had hatched after Chu Yun's perfect preparations. What level could it reach during its first absorption of essence energy?