Lord Valerius's sneering laughter, carried by the afternoon breeze, faded into the distance, leaving behind an echoing silence in the dusty, forgotten corner of the Spiritbeast Pens. Kenji, his knuckles white against the rough stone wall, didn't even register the residual sting of the insults. His entire focus was consumed by the System notification, the bright blue text burning against the dimness: Anomaly Detected: Hidden Compartment. Investigate? (Y/N)
He willed the 'Y' to activate. The screen rippled, and the prompt vanished. Kenji's breath hitched. He carefully ran his fingers along the almost invisible seam he had found, feeling the slight give of the stone. It wasn't just a loose rock; it was a clever mechanism, designed to blend perfectly with the ancient, uneven masonry of the pen. Years of neglect had only cemented its disguise.
He pressed again, harder this time, pushing his shoulder into the cold stone. A low groan of grinding rock echoed softly in the confined space. With a final heave, the section of the wall, perhaps a meter square, slowly pivoted inward, revealing a small, dark recess. A plume of ancient dust, thick and choking, billowed out, carrying the faint, musty scent of stagnant air and forgotten time. Kenji coughed, waving a hand through the motes dancing in the faint light.
He peered into the darkness. It was a shallow cavity, barely a foot deep, but something lay nestled within. His heart pounded with a mixture of excitement and trepidation. Was it treasure? A forgotten artifact? Or just some ancient, useless trinket? With trembling fingers, he reached inside, brushing aside a thick curtain of cobwebs that felt like velvet ribbons. His hand closed around something surprisingly soft, yet firm, like aged leather.
He pulled it out. It was an old, tightly rolled scroll, bound with a thin, frayed leather cord. Its paper, a dull, brittle yellow, seemed impossibly ancient, its edges frayed and crumbling. It smelled faintly of dried herbs and the distant memory of parchment, a scent utterly alien to anything he knew from Earth. He carefully undid the cord, unfurling the scroll with meticulous care, fearing it would disintegrate in his hands.
As the scroll slowly unrolled, its contents were revealed: faded diagrams of strange creatures, intricate symbols, and a dense, incomprehensible script. It was clearly a manual of some kind. Immediately, the System screen flickered, a burst of bright green light identifying his discovery.
Item: Fragmented Beast Whisperer's Compendium (Ancient)Description: A rare, incomplete scroll detailing the lost art of Beast Whispering, allowing a practitioner to connect with and influence spiritual beasts through subtle Qi manipulation and understanding their unique spiritual frequencies. Requires a deep connection to nature and a patient heart.
Mission: Decode Fragmented Scroll.Reward: Beast Whispering Skill (Low-Grade) + 5 System Points.
Kenji's eyes widened. "Beast Whispering!" He almost shouted the words, but clamped a hand over his mouth. This was incredible! A skill to interact with spiritbeasts, to understand them. Not a combat skill, but something far more intriguing, more subtle. And it directly linked to his new surroundings in the Spiritbeast Pens. The thought of earning 5 System Points also thrilled him. He badly needed more points to progress.
He quickly scanned the scroll's content. The language, though comprehensible through the System's universal translation, was dense and riddled with missing sections, fragmented sentences, and obscure cultural references he couldn't grasp. It was like trying to read a textbook with half the pages ripped out. He tried to piece together the first diagram, a meditation posture for sensing a beast's spiritual frequency, but the instructions were incomplete, contradictory. He frowned, frustration bubbling up. His engineering mind, accustomed to logical, complete schematics, rebelled at the ambiguity.
He spent the next hour hunched over the scroll, his brow furrowed in concentration. He tried different approaches, meditating, focusing his Qi Sensing, even attempting to mimic some of the incomplete hand gestures depicted. Nothing. The words remained a jumbled mess, the diagrams baffling. His understanding of Qi was too rudimentary, too passive, to make sense of this advanced, broken text. The subtle spiritual energies of the Luminawolves in the nearby pens, which he could perceive with his Qi Sensing, remained distant, incomprehensible hums. He couldn't connect.
His shoulders slumped. He felt a familiar wave of hopelessness, the same feeling he'd experienced after his disastrous spiritual resonance test. He possessed Qi Sensing, yes, but it was just observation. He couldn't do anything with it. And now this. Another inaccessible treasure, locked behind his own ignorance.
As his frustration peaked, the System screen, ever watchful, shimmered with a new notification.
Notification: Host struggling with Fragmented Scroll Decoding.Recommendation: Activate Auto-Decode (Fragmented).Cost: 3 System Points.
Kenji stared at the prompt. Auto-Decode? A glimmer of hope. He immediately checked his System Points. He had diligently accrued points from weeks of cleaning and foraging missions, each 0.1 SP slowly adding up. His current total stood at 5.4 System Points. Enough. Just enough. He didn't hesitate. This was the exact utility of the System – to bypass obstacles his own weakness could not overcome.
He willed the 'Y' to activate. The screen rippled, and the System Points swiftly decreased: Current SP: 2.4.
Immediately, the scroll in his hands began to glow faintly, an ethereal blue light emanating from its ancient paper. The diagrams on the screen seemed to spin, then rapidly reassemble. The fragmented sentences on the actual scroll began to mend themselves, lines of text weaving together as if by an invisible hand. Complex symbols rearranged themselves, cohering into logical patterns. Kenji watched, mesmerized, as the missing pieces were filled in, the obscure references clarified, the contradictory instructions resolved. It was as if a cosmic librarian was rapidly translating and restoring the ancient text, fixing centuries of decay and damage in mere seconds.
His mind processed the influx of information with dizzying speed. Concepts that had been baffling moments ago now clicked into place with perfect clarity. He understood how a cultivator could send out specific Qi frequencies to resonate with a beast's unique spiritual signature. He understood the subtleties of their emotions, their instincts, their innate connection to the ambient Qi. It was less about brute force and more about empathy, about listening and responding. A profound, almost instinctive understanding blossomed within him.
The glowing light faded from the scroll. The System screen confirmed:
Fragmented Scroll Decoded. Beast Whispering Skill (Low-Grade) Acquired.Current SP: 2.4
Kenji felt a strange, subtle shift within his spiritual perception. It was as if a new sensory organ had activated, allowing him to perceive the emotional landscape of the spiritual beasts around him. He could feel the contented rumbling of a resting Luminawolf, the playful curiosity of a nearby pup, the distant grumbling of a larger beast in an adjacent pen. It was faint, indistinct, but it was there. This was the "Low-Grade" part, he realized. But it was enough.
He slowly rose, his gaze drawn towards Pen Six, which housed a few Luminawolf Pups. These were young, playful, but still wild and capable of a sharp bite if startled. One pup, smaller than the others, sat hunched in a corner, whimpering softly, its fur duller than its siblings. It looked forlorn.
Kenji cautiously approached the gate of Pen Six. The System didn't give him a specific mission to tame the pup, but his new skill, his newfound understanding, urged him forward. This was his chance to truly test the Beast Whispering skill.
He slowly extended a hand, focusing his Qi Sensing. He could feel the pup's subtle aura of sadness and loneliness. He remembered the scroll's instructions: send a resonant frequency of calm and acceptance. He concentrated, guiding a minuscule amount of the ambient Qi he sensed, molding it into a soothing wave, and subtly projecting it towards the pup.
The pup, startled, immediately tensed, its dull fur bristling. It let out a low, wary growl, its glowing eyes fixing on Kenji. Any normal human would have retreated, but Kenji, now perceiving the faint wave of fear and suspicion emanating from the pup, knew it was not aggression, but apprehension.
He stopped, maintaining the soothing Qi projection, and slowly lowered himself to a kneeling position, adopting a posture of non-threat, as described in the ancient compendium. He murmured soft, comforting words, not caring that the pup wouldn't understand the language, focusing instead on the tone, the calm resonance of his voice.
The pup's growl faltered. Its bristling fur slowly smoothed. Its large, luminous eyes, still wary, fixed on Kenji. He kept projecting the soothing Qi, maintaining the gentle vocalizations. Slowly, tentatively, the pup began to shift. It took a hesitant step forward, then another. It sniffed the air, its tiny nose twitching.
Other disciples, passing by the Spiritbeast Pens for their morning chores or heading to the cultivation fields, paused, glancing in. They saw Kenji, the "trash root" helper, kneeling by the Luminawolf pup. A few snickered, anticipating a bite, or perhaps just another display of his utter cluelessness. They didn't see the shimmering Qi, the subtle resonance. They just saw a strange commoner.
But then, the unbelievable happened. The pup, after another long moment of hesitation, slowly, cautiously, walked towards Kenji. It sniffed his outstretched hand, its cold nose brushing his skin. Then, with a soft whimper that sounded more like a sigh of contentment, it gently nudged its head into his palm, allowing Kenji to stroke its dull fur.
A profound sense of wonder filled Kenji. He felt a connection, a palpable link to the small creature's spirit. It was a beautiful, inexplicable sensation. He was doing it. He was actually doing it.
Just then, a deep, resonant voice cut through the quiet hum of the pens. "Boy, what is it you are doing?"
Kenji froze. His hand was still resting on the pup's head. He looked up, his heart leaping into his throat. Standing just outside the fence of Pen Six, his imposing figure casting a long shadow in the early afternoon light, was Master Thorne. His eyes, sharp and discerning, were narrowed, fixed directly on Kenji and the now-purring Luminawolf pup. He radiated an aura of immense power, and his gaze was one of profound, searching scrutiny.