"System," Elian murmured, his heart in his throat as he watched the ten dull core fragments resting on his blanket. "Initiate fusion. Combine [Ember] with [Ember]."
[Command Acknowledged. Consuming Catalyst...]
The ten shattered pieces of Fire Slime cores began to vibrate. A faint, reddish-orange light leaked from their jagged cracks. Suddenly, they dissolved into fine, glowing ash that floated upward, swirling into a miniature vortex before darting straight into Ignis's forehead.
The Ash Fox yelped, jolting awake. Its dull gray fur stood on end, and the temperature in the cramped dorm room spiked by several degrees. Ignis squeezed its eyes shut, letting out a low, distressed whine as a wave of heat pulsed from its small body.
Elian reached out, his hand hovering hesitantly. "Easy, Ignis. Easy, buddy. I'm right here."
The process lasted less than a minute, but to Elian, it felt like an hour. Finally, the heat dissipated, and Ignis collapsed onto the rug, chest heaving, but looking otherwise unharmed. In fact, the patch of fur around its scruff looked marginally glossier.
[Fusion Complete!]
[Skill Mutated/Upgraded: Ember (Common) -> Fireball (Uncommon)]
[Host Note: The beast's internal mana pathways have been forcibly widened to accommodate the new skill. Lethargy is a normal side effect.]
Elian let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. He fell back onto his thin mattress, staring at the cracked ceiling plaster. He had actually done it.
As Ignis slept off the fatigue of the forced evolution, Elian couldn't help but reflect on the sheer impossibility of what had just occurred. In the world of Aethelgard, the laws governing Magic Beasts were absolute, dictated by a concept known to scholars as the "Bloodline Shackles."
Every beast was born with a predetermined ceiling. A creature like a majestic Silver-Winged Griffon was born at Bronze-Rank but possessed the Bloodline Shackles of a Diamond-Rank beast, meaning it would naturally grow and evolve until it reached the Diamond tier.
An Ash Fox, however, was an evolutionary dead end. They were scavengers, born at the bottom of the Iron-Rank, and their Bloodline Shackles were locked firmly at the top of the Iron-Rank. No amount of training, premium food, or standard combat could make an Ash Fox break through to Bronze. They simply lacked the genetic blueprint for it. Their skills were fixed: [Scratch] and [Ember]. Period.
To give a Common beast an Uncommon skill without a natural evolution was considered academically impossible. It defied the laws of mana. If the Beastmaster Guild knew that a penniless student had rewritten a beast's genetic skills using trash-tier core fragments, Elian would be dissected in a laboratory by dawn.
"We have to be careful," Elian whispered to the sleeping fox. "If we show too much too fast, we're dead."
Two hours later, the midnight bell tolled across the academy campus. Elian gently nudged Ignis awake. The fox blinked, looking unusually alert, a tiny wisp of smoke curling from its nostrils.
"Come on," Elian said, stuffing his cloak into his bag. "We can't test this in the dorm. If you burn the building down, they'll bill me for it, and I'm already in debt."
They slipped out the dormitory window, sticking to the shadows of the academy walls. Elian led Ignis through the silent, cobblestone streets of Oakhaven, heading toward the industrial outskirts. About a mile past the city limits lay an abandoned brick kiln. It was surrounded by a quarry of scorched earth and discarded clay—the perfect place for reckless fire magic.
The night air was crisp and biting. Elian stood at the bottom of the quarry, facing a stack of rotting, discarded timber about twenty paces away.
"Alright, Ignis," Elian said, feeling a knot of nervous excitement in his stomach. "Show me what you've got. Aim for the wood. Use [Fireball]."
Ignis trotted forward. The fox planted its paws into the dirt. Unlike the previous attempts where it would just open its mouth and cough out a pathetic spark, this time was different.
Ignis took a deep breath. The ambient mana in the air seemed to rush toward the fox's open jaws. A bright, condensed sphere of swirling, orange-red flame materialized, illuminating the dark quarry walls. The heat radiating from it was intense, completely banishing the midnight chill.
With a sharp bark, Ignis launched the sphere.
The fireball streaked across the twenty-pace distance in a blink. It slammed into the rotting timber with a concussive THOOM. Splinters of burning wood exploded outward, and the entire stack was instantly engulfed in roaring, ravenous flames.
Elian shielded his eyes from the blast, his jaw dropping.
"Holy..."
It wasn't just a bigger ember. It was a dense, highly volatile projectile. An authentic, Uncommon-rank offensive skill.
However, before Elian could celebrate, Ignis let out a weak whimper and collapsed sideways into the dirt, its tongue lolling out.
Panic spiked in Elian's chest. He rushed over and scooped the fox up. Ignis was breathing, but its body felt incredibly heavy, and its eyes were half-closed.
Elian checked the system.
[Warning: Beast Mana Depleted. Physical Stamina at 5%.]
[Analysis: While the skill is Uncommon, the beast's core stats remain at Iron-Rank (Low). Firing one [Fireball] consumes 95% of the beast's total mana reserves.]
Elian let out a shaky sigh of relief, cradling the exhausted fox in his arms. It made perfect sense. He had given a heavy cannon to a foot soldier. The system allowed him to bypass the rules of nature, but it didn't magically grant Ignis infinite stamina. If they wanted to use [Fireball] more than once a day, Elian was going to have to find a way to upgrade the fox's base stats—which likely meant fusing passive skills or finding a way to trigger a full-body evolution.
And that meant he needed more cores. A lot more.
"You did amazing, buddy," Elian whispered, looking at the burning timber lighting up the night. "One shot is all we need for tomorrow."
He turned back toward the city, carrying his sleeping fox. Tomorrow was the Mid-Year Assessment. For the first time since enrolling in the academy, Elian wasn't dreading it. He was ready.