After the earth-shaking battle between the two ancient ferocious beasts, the entire outskirts of the island seemed to have fallen into silence. Many of the surviving beasts silently licked their wounds in the shadows.
Even the countless beast and ferocious beast corpses were left strewn across the devastated forest. This benefited Bai He and Xiao Chen; for the past few days, they had not needed to search for food. Simply picking up a few corpses was enough to leave them both dripping with grease.
Among those corpses were no shortage of powerful Primordial Mythical Beasts they had seen before, such as winged Golden Divine Leopards, enormous two-headed white jade elephants, terrifying horned giant pythons...
Though they lay dead on the ground, some even torn into pieces, their corpses still emitted faint, resplendent colored light. It was clear how terrifyingly powerful they had been in life—enough to be called Beast Kings!
Yet compared to the dragons of Dragon Island, even these powerful Beast Kings seemed pathetically weak. They could not even withstand the aftershocks of a battle between the two dragon overlords.
After all, this island was called Dragon Island!
Night had fallen. Moonlight flowed like water, and stars dotted the sky.
Within the sapphire-like Small Lake, beneath the hazy, brilliant moonlight, a flash of shining silver drifted up and down through the clear water one moment, then swam like a streak of light or lightning the next, like a silver swordfish.
After swimming swiftly for a long while, the silver light finally showed signs of fatigue. It eventually stopped and slowly approached the shore.
Under the moonlight, a humanoid creature covered in silver scales and sharp bone spikes slowly crawled ashore.
With each step it took, the silver scales across its body receded like a tide, while the bone spikes withdrew one by one into its body. At last, its true appearance was revealed—it was Bai He!
Pure moonlight poured down over Bai He's long silver hair. Droplets of water on his body refracted misty seven-colored radiance beneath the moon, making his face, smooth as polished jade, seem almost divine. His silver eyes added an unusual beauty and eerie charm to the young man before them.
"Whew..."
Bai He slowly let out a breath, rolled his neck, stretched his limbs, and then glanced at the bamboo hut not far away.
Ever since Xiao Chen had accidentally seen Zhao Lin'er's white gauze garment by the lake a few days ago, he had begun secluding himself to heal his injuries. Since then, he had spent almost all of every day inside the bamboo hut.
Under the moonlight, endless Heaven and Earth Essence gathered toward the bamboo hut. Vast amounts of Heaven and Earth Essence transformed into a hazy glow that enveloped Xiao Chen, wrapping him within like a silver cocoon of light. With Xiao Chen's breathing, the cocoon expanded and contracted.
Seeing that Xiao Chen showed no signs of movement inside, Bai He shook his head. He then sat beside the lake, gazed at the rising mist on its surface, and slowly closed his eyes.
A transparent golden panel instantly appeared in his mind.
Host: Bai He Bloodline: Human╱Dragon Accompanying Spirit: Eight-Armed Evil Dragon Realm: First Order╱Transcendence (Pseudo) Divine Ability: Dragonification Cultivation Method: Heavenly Tablet Mystic Skill (Incomplete)
After devouring the dragon egg, the system-generated status panel had refreshed again. It now contained the Accompanying Spirit, representing the Companion Dragon Soul, and the divine ability Dragonification. His realm had changed from Zero Order (Unranked) to First Order╱Transcendence (Pseudo). More importantly, his bloodline had changed from Human to Human╱Dragon.
According to Bai He's deductions, the immense life essence within the dragon egg should have brought his muscles, bones, flesh, blood, and five viscera to perfection. Yet for some reason, he had never been able to produce true qi.
After pondering for a while, Bai He finally thought of the God Pillar on Dragon Island. With insufficient evidence, this was all he could speculate.
Like the God Pillar in the Yellow River, the God Pillar on Dragon Island also served a suppressive purpose.
Legend had it that the Yellow River Heavenly Tablet suppressed floods and ensured they would not recur, but that was not entirely true.
Although the Yellow River Heavenly Tablet did have such an effect, its true purpose was to suppress the First Ancestral Dragon sealed within the Yellow River.
The God Pillar on Dragon Island was the same. Its purpose was to suppress all dragons on the island, restraining their divine side and causing their beastly side to emerge more strongly.
That was why the Eight-Armed Evil Dragon they had seen resembled a mindless ferocious beast more than a divine dragon.
After Bai He devoured the dragon egg, especially after the system transformed the Eight-Armed Evil Dragon's dragon soul into Bai He's Companion Dragon Soul, Bai He's bloodline had also been partially transformed into that of a dragon. Thus, the God Pillar on Dragon Island that suppressed dragons also affected Bai He.
However, Bai He was still more human than dragon, so the God Pillar that suppressed dragons had only a limited effect on him. It could not suppress his reason and turn him into one of the savage dragons on Dragon Island that had revealed their beastly nature.
Yet, by sheer coincidence, although the God Pillar could not suppress his rational side, it still had some effect. It restrained the generation of true qi within Bai He's body, leaving his realm forever stuck at Transcendence (Pseudo).
Transcendence was the first stage of cultivation for many practitioners in the Realm of Longevity. Though Bai He possessed strength comparable to the Transcendence Realm with the help of the dragon egg, the God Pillar on Dragon Island prevented his body from producing special energies like true qi. As a result, he could not use many special techniques, such as lightening his body or drying his clothes, which left Bai He rather frustrated.
"Tap, tap, tap..."
Just as Bai He was worrying about how to break through the God Pillar's blockade and truly advance to Transcendence, a series of sounds suddenly reached his ears. Something was approaching through the dense forest.
Turning his head, he saw a handsome little white horse, seemingly flying as it leaped from treetop to treetop, treading across the branches.
The little horse was very young, only a little over a meter tall, but it seemed extraordinarily mystical. Its snowy-white coat shone with a faint crystalline luster beneath the moonlight, while the tiny jade horn atop its head looked as though it had been carved from the finest white mutton-fat jade, translucent and flawless.
This was the young Unicorn Sacred Beast from the original story!
Looking at the timid-looking Little Pegasus before him, Bai He thought to himself.
The mystical Little Pegasus stood atop the crown of a towering ancient tree, curiously watching Xiao Chen, who was wrapped inside the silver cocoon of light formed from Heaven and Earth Essence within the bamboo hut.
Bai He stood up, intending to go inside and fetch some fruit to build rapport with the Little Pegasus. But the moment he rose, it seemed to be startled and fled with a whoosh.
Over the following days, the Little Pegasus came almost every day to the bamboo hut where Xiao Chen stayed, sharing the Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy Xiao Chen had drawn in.
After learning that neither of them would harm it, it grew bolder and bolder, beginning to approach Xiao Chen's bamboo hut more closely.
Xiao Chen noticed as well, but who could possibly bring themselves to reject such an adorable Little Spirit?
Over those days, Bai He also grew familiar with the Little Pegasus. Now, whenever he fed it fruit or similar things, it happily accepted them.
Time flew by, and Xiao Chen's injuries soon fully healed. The two had already lived on this Wild Island for nearly ten days.
Yet even after making a complete recovery, Xiao Chen still gathered Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy at the same time every day, drawing the Little Pegasus over.
Whenever Bai He watched the adorable Little Pegasus cheer and leap about within the dense Heaven and Earth Spiritual Energy gathered by Xiao Chen, his heart ached in secret. Why could he not cultivate true qi? He wanted to "feed" the Little Pegasus too!
Time slowly passed like this, but Bai He never fully lowered his guard.
He remembered that not long after the Little Pegasus appeared, a large number of disciples from the sects of the Realm of Longevity would cross the seas to Dragon Island in pursuit of the Accompanying Dragon King.
Another day arrived. The sky was clear and the air crisp. It was early morning, and on the golden beach, the tide rose and fell as waves crashed one after another.
Bai He was gathering seafood along the shore. Though ferocious beast meat was rich in essence, after eating it for so many days in a row, he had grown sick of it.
Just as Bai He bent down to pick up some shellfish, earth-shaking roars suddenly rang out from the Forbidden Sea in the distance.
They were the roars of the Eight-Armed Evil Dragon!
Looking up, he saw a massive silver tail dozens of meters tall, like a God Pillar piercing the heavens, suddenly rise from the sea before crashing down violently. Giant Ships immediately shattered into pieces.
Towering waves swept up fragments of Giant Ships as figure after figure fell into the water.
In the end, however, one Giant Ship still survived.
Seeing the Giant Ship sailing toward the island, Bai He immediately threw aside all the seafood he had collected from the shore, turned around, and plunged into the dense forest.
But as if it had spotted Bai He, the Giant Ship that had survived the Eight-Armed Evil Dragon's rampage actually began turning around and slowly sailed toward the beach where Bai He stood.
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