At last, the creature crashed to earth like a crumbling hill, the impact rippling through the clearing and making the ground shudder. Jared sank to one knee, bracing on the blade, lungs heaving while cold sweat slicked his brow. That single strike had drained the scrap of energy he had just regained and torn open half-healed wounds.
Ignoring his own bleeding silence, he hurried to the small Fire Unicorn, scooping the trembling cub into his arms and flooding it with a thread of pristine celestial essence.
The blessed beast’s vitality proved stubborn. Under that nurturing flow, the burns on its scales dulled, and it nuzzled Jared’s palm with shy gratitude, though its bright eyes still drooped with fatigue.
Jared’s gaze fell to the ape’s fallen bulk, and a spark of calculation flared behind his exhaustion. New to this land, wounded, and on foot, he needed both a guide and a mount. The ape’s strength, and its familiarity with these woods, promised both.
He closed his eyes and sent a mental command through his spiritual sense, offering the beast a chance at servitude instead of death. Yet even choking on its own blood, the ape’s eyes still burned with wild defiance.
A guttural warning rumbled in its torn throat; it would rather die than bow.
Jared’s brow tightened.
Enough mercy…
Golden light flickered in his pupils as he stopped masking the royal Draconian blood coursing through his veins.
An ancient, sovereign dragon’s power awakened and billowed from him like a sleeping emperor rising. The pressure bypassed flesh, spearing straight into soul and bloodline, terror incarnate to any beast.
The once-defiant ape began to quake uncontrollably, every massive muscle shivering beneath its black fur.
A pressure rolled off Jared like a tidal wave of ancient bloodline, a draconic supremacy etched into the fabric of life itself.
The forest hushed. Every beastly instinct inside the black-furred giant ape screamed that it now stood before royalty.
The murderous gleam in its eyes vanished.
Trembling, it tried to bow that mountainous head, a muffled whimper rising from its throat—half apology, half plea for mercy.
Jared dismissed the dragon’s power, stepped to the creature’s brow, and pressed his palm against its coarse hide. “Submit to me, guide us out of this forest, and you will live.”
All hint of defiance died. The ape lowered its skull until its tusks raked the earth, surrender woven into every sinew.
Jared exhaled in relief, sealed the torn flesh at its throat with a thread of healing aura, and let the wound knit closed, life preserved. He vaulted onto the creature’s back, a living platform broad as a courtyard, then nestled the small Fire Unicorn before him. “Go!”
The ape loosed a guttural roar, rose, and began a thunderous trek through the primeval green.
From that swaying perch, Jared finally surveyed the unknown world spread beneath the canopy, each step revealing vistas no map had ever named.
Trees older than dynasties soared skyward. Some trunks would have required thirty arms to encircle, and their crowns blotted out the sun, turning noon into dusk.
Moist shadows clung to the air—rot, moss, and dense wood-spirit energy, along with subtle currents of danger that slithered between roots like unseen serpents.
It came sooner than expected.
A poison-scaled alligator burst from a swamp, slime and armor flashing, jaws wide for the ape’s foreleg. The beast ranked no higher than Heavenly Immortal Realm Level One, but its venom could melt bone.
The giant ape answered without a command. It roared, lifted its free foot, and hammered the ground.
Boom!
Earth jumped. The reptile flattened into pulp, life snuffed in a single, mountainous stomp.
With a flick of his wrist, Jared drew out the creature’s purified blood, vital essence, and a jade-green inner core laced with poison and water aura, then offered them to the little unicorn.
The small Fire Unicorn chirped with delight. It swallowed the gifts in one gulp, the energy spiraling through its tiny frame like sunrise heat.
A faint sheen returned to its dulled scales, and its eyes regained a spirited spark. Yet that was only the prologue. Ahead sprawled a beast forest so vast and lethal that every step promised fresh blood and fresh opportunity.
Packs of razor-toothed blood wolves lunged from the underbrush. Jared answered with a sweeping rain of swords. When silence fell, the alpha wolf’s core and blood essence nourished the unicorn once more.
