A humanoid magical beast

"Haochen, did you fail to contract a mount too?"

Outside Knight Sacred Mountain, Jiang Li looked at his junior fellow disciple, Long Haochen, who had likewise returned empty-handed. A bitter smile surfaced on his face.

Neither had managed to gain a magical beast's recognition or complete a contract, but his junior fellow disciple had failed because his talent was too great. Even the finest magical beasts on Knight Sacred Mountain felt unworthy of him.

His own situation was the exact opposite. Even the lowest-ranked level-one and level-two magical beasts wanted nothing to do with him.

What awaited Long Haochen next was the Nine-Headed Chimera, the God of Damnation.

As for him, with his innate Internal Spiritual Power of three points, he probably would not win a mount's recognition even through the teleportation array.

Such was fate!

Sixteen years ago, he had transmigrated to the Holy Demon Continent. His parents had both been ordinary people, and before he could grow up, they had died at the hands of the Demon Race. He had been raised by the Knight Temple.

He had thought he had been given the script of a heaven-sent genius who would save the world in its hour of peril-until he awakened his Internal Spiritual Power at nine.

His Internal Spiritual Power had been a mere three points, a single-digit number.

His talent was worse than Yu Xiaogang's on the Douluo Continent. Through normal cultivation, he had no hope of reaching the fourth tier in this lifetime.

Fortunately, the Holy Demon Continent did have ways to increase innate spiritual power. The simplest was to become someone else's Retainer Knight.

Whether to receive instruction from a good teacher or to build a relationship with the protagonist, Long Haochen, ahead of time, he had cultivated his External Spiritual Power to its limit of 200 at twelve, becoming a Quasi-Knight, and then headed to Haoyue City.

After a great deal of trouble, he had finally become Ye Hua's disciple.

Under Ye Hua's instruction and through his own research, he had become a knight at the peak of the third tier at sixteen. His Internal Spiritual Power had been stuck at 499 for a full three months.

Coming to Knight Sacred Mountain to select a magical beast this time was his way of tagging along with Long Haochen to borrow a little luck.

Failure would not matter. He had long since prepared himself for it.

Successfully contracting a magical beast mount would have been an unexpected joy.

As things stood, his luck simply was not that good.

"Senior brother, you didn't gain a magical beast's recognition either?"

Long Haochen was stunned by Jiang Li's words.

In his eyes, his senior fellow disciple was truly outstanding. Even after breaking through to the fourth tier, he was still no match for him. A senior brother like that should not have failed to contract a magical beast.

"Such is fate!"

Jiang Li gave a self-mocking smile, but there was little sorrow or joy on his face. He had long since prepared himself for a scene and outcome like this.

"Neither of you gained anything?"

Seeing Jiang Li and Long Haochen, Ye Hua hurried forward to ask. As he spoke, his heart filled with bitterness.

He had never imagined that both his disciples would follow in his footsteps-and fare even worse than he had.

"I'm sorry, Teacher. I've disappointed you."

Long Haochen lowered his head guiltily.

"How is that possible?"

"With talent as great as yours, how could you have gained nothing? Are those magical beasts all blind?"

This time, the speaker was the mountain's elderly guardian, and his words were directed at Long Haochen.

Jiang Li was ignored outright. After all, the old man could sense the fluctuations of spiritual power within him. To have only this level of cultivation at his age, his talent could not reasonably be very good.

Failure was perfectly normal.

"You needn't take it too much to heart. Warriors without powerful mounts can still become mighty figures of their generation. Though mounts are of great use to us knights, they aren't everything..."

After offering Long Haochen some comfort, the elderly guardian brought up using a teleportation array to draw in a mount and asked whether he was willing.

"Senior, I'm willing to try my luck here with you."

Long Haochen spoke with ironclad resolve.

"Senior, this disciple of mine would also like to try his luck. Sorry for the trouble."

Hearing that there was still a chance to contract a magical beast, Ye Hua hurried to secure an opportunity for his eldest disciple, Jiang Li.

After learning of his second disciple Long Haochen's talent, Ye Hua had not worried that he would have no mount. He was the Child of Light! How could his talent prevent him from contracting a magical beast mount?

Something must have happened that he, as his teacher, did not know about.

But with others present, it was inconvenient to ask.

As for his eldest disciple, Jiang Li, he was genuinely worried.

After all, his innate Internal Spiritual Power was only three points, worse than Ye Hua's had been back then. He himself had at least possessed nine points of innate spiritual power.

Their shared fate, coupled with Jiang Li working even harder than he had in his youth, naturally made Ye Hua feel an extra measure of closeness toward him.

Naturally, he would do everything he could to help this disciple secure every opportunity to improve his strength.

"Very well!"

The elderly guardian glanced at Jiang Li, then nodded gently without refusing.

"Thank you, Teacher."

Although Jiang Li did not hold much hope, how could he let his teacher's kindness go to waste?

Next came Long Haochen's turn to use the teleportation array to contract a magical beast.

The elderly guardian first teleported them into a cave.

Familiar with the storyline, Jiang Li naturally knew that the cave had been created by the Ancient Elves, and that the core of its array was the Elven Language. While Long Haochen used the teleportation array to contract a magical beast, Jiang Li swiftly committed the Elven writing inside the cave and the visible structure of the teleportation array to memory.

Having lived two lives, his mental strength far exceeded that of ordinary people. Though he lacked a photographic memory, he could memorize things quickly.

Even if he did not understand their deeper meaning or underlying principles, there was no harm in remembering them. Perhaps one day, when he grew strong, he would be able to unravel them through study.

Time passed quickly as he immersed himself wholeheartedly in the process.

"Li, it's your turn."

Only at his teacher Ye Hua's soft call did he stop what he was doing.

Returning to his senses, Jiang Li saw that a lizard-like magical beast with two heads had appeared beside Long Haochen.

He knew this was the God of Damnation, Austin Griffin.

However, that had nothing to do with him, so he paid it little attention.

Then, under the elderly guardian's guidance, Jiang Li sat cross-legged in the center of the summoning array.

The next moment, Jiang Li sank into a world between reality and nothingness. He could sense many things here, along with all manner of complex emotions.

In his perception, there seemed to be hundreds of millions of points of light gathered around him. Wherever he looked, various auras surged out of those lights for him to examine.

With his cultivation, he very likely could not last even a quarter of an hour, so he needed to find an existence among those lights that felt close to him as quickly as possible.

Rather than examining them directly, he closed his eyes and slowly felt them out.

After an unknown amount of time, a flash of inspiration came to Jiang Li. He felt a pull and instinctively extended his perception toward it.

Darkness enveloped his entire little world. Only a single point of light still shone with a gentle glow.

An inexplicable emotion immediately welled up in his heart.

Loneliness, helplessness, weakness-as though abandoned by the world.

It clearly carried an aura of light, yet held traces of a chill that made one shudder.

"Would you be willing to become my companion, to support each other, grow together, and stand by each other in life and death...?"

Though he did not know what lay behind that point of light, it was the only existence that had not resisted him, the only one that had made contact with him. With a stir of his thoughts, Jiang Li sincerely extended an invitation.

He could sense that this magical beast very likely possessed considerable intelligence.

"Companion?"

"Stand by each other in life and death!"

"Who are you?"

Soon, the point of light conveyed a thought. Just as Jiang Li had guessed, the other party possessed considerable intelligence.

"My name is Jiang Li. I come from the Holy Demon Continent..."

A measure of hope immediately rose in Jiang Li's heart. Normally speaking, a magical beast with considerable intelligence could not itself be weak.

Before he could continue communicating with the other party, a violent pain shot through his head.

Jiang Li knew his time was up.

"I agree!"

Just as Jiang Li thought he was about to miss this opportunity, a cool male voice rang out beside his ear.

Jiang Li immediately activated the equal-contract seal his teacher had prepared for him.

Light blazed, and the connection was completed in an instant.

The two parties successfully formed a contract.

The next moment, Jiang Li opened his eyes and looked ahead.

A young man dressed in fine robes, with a refined bearing, appeared before him.

"A... humanoid magical beast?"