The birdman was confused, and a little scared. Didn’t Tao Ba say that if they guessed wrong it would consume him?

“Don’t worry, I’m confident. I just checked if it was an Artifact, it was not.”

“Even if I believe you, how can I do anything with the egg?”

Tao Ba didn’t join the conversation, he just sat back down and pointed at his teacup. Sage walked over and poured tea for him while he spoke to King.

“I have a technique that allows me to interbreed two very different species. I will be taking some of your essence and infusing it into the egg.”

“What!? How do you know that’s going to work? What’s even in there?”

“I don’t. We also don’t know how much essence its going to take, or whether its going to work. That’s also the reason I never tried it before in the past. I’ve never had a Demonic Beast as powerful as you. If anything can help this little dragon to hatch it has to be the magnificent King of the Sky.”

King frowned, then he looked over at Tao Ba. He’d sensed the energy of a beast from this kid earlier, couldn’t he have done it all this time? He looked at Sage. Before he could ask, Sage interrupted.

“Tao Ba is far too powerful and special to risk. I’m also not his master.”

It was already too late. He’d agreed to work with this human and only a few months later he was being made into a sacrificial lamb.

“Don’t worry. I’m fairly confident this will work, and when it does you’ll be very well rewarded. Just consider this your last test. Once we get through this you’ll be free to return to the outside world as you wish. You’ll have my complete trust.”

They’d already made a deal, but Sage had so far prevented him from leaving the Universe Ring wanting to build trust between the two before he’d risk him breaking their contract and flying off. It would cause great damage, but there was no telling if the Hawk might just suffer the penalties in order to escape.

“Cursed humans. I’ve already been a prisoner for three months, let’s just get this over with.”

Sage had King stand near the egg and he placed his hand upon the birdman’s head. Very slowly and carefully, he poured his energy into the Breach Hawk and saturated his body. He had to match his own Qi as closely as possible to Kings. Normally, this process was much simplified by linking to the insect that the technique was going to be used on. The array on the ground underneath them came to life. It was created to help harmonize their energy and make it easier to match up their Qi. It took nearly a quarter hour for the energy to fully saturate and sync up with King’s. At that time, Sage reached out his other hand and placed it upon the egg. He slowly performed the same process, adding his energy to the egg and attempting to match its Qi.

It took even longer than with King, but thankfully when he poured in what seemed like a sea of energy it finally gave a response. He could feel a Qi signature. He immediately started to match it. The energy on the one hand now completely different from the one on the other. After a few minutes he finally got it as close as he possibly could and started the transfer. The ‘Mutate’ technique from the Insect Immortal Index. Combining two creatures that would have no way to do so in the wild. Very powerful Demonic Beasts could shapeshift, and using that power they could interbreed. Dragons were notorious for it. The ‘Mutate’ technique let him do the same thing with even the weakest Spirit Insects, which he used to build an army of bugs.

The essence with King’s signature transferred through Sage’s body, getting changed to match up with the signature of the egg’s essence before flowing into the egg. Sage was the converter that linked the two and forced them to intermingle. Normally, this was performed on eggs at their earlier moments, overwriting their current ‘programming’. Sage would call it DNA, but he didn’t know if such a thing existed in this world. Just like electricity and gunpowder, there was no telling what other laws and properties of the universe were different here.

More and more essence energy flowed out of King and into the egg. It wasn’t just taking his Qi, it was sapping the energy that supported that Qi. King was a Demonic Beast and didn’t know how to cultivate. Instead there was a beast core within his body that performed all the functions of a Dantian. The egg was sapping King’s cultivation. The beast core was getting smaller and smaller by the second, feeding the egg. King had dropped down to level 51 and was about to regress to a lower rank. Sage could only apologize later, feeling the massive flux of power that came when the Breach Hawk’s core cracked. Huge flakes of it fell off and dissolved. Human cultivators would form their core upon reaching the fifth rank, Demonic Beasts would have their beast cores transformed. A rough and malformed stone at the earliest ranks it would gradually grow rounded, clearer, and more perfectly shaped. An ugly lump would become an asymmetrical crystal and later on a shining pearl.

The Breach Hawk continued to drop lower until it sunk below Sage’s cultivation at level 47. Lower and lower until it was about to fall another rank. Finally the flow of power stopped and Sage released King, letting him rest from his sacrifice. The egg was no longer invisible to their senses. At the instant that the essence drain stopped it seemed to come to life and a powerful lifeforce washed over the three of them. Tao Ba took another sip of his tea and watched closely.

“We did it!”

The egg didn’t hatch.

At least not immediately. The egg hadn’t hatched, but it now had a very powerful life force and it was only a matter of time before it did. King had held up his end of the bargain and Sage released him from the Universe Ring. Having fallen from the peak of the fifth rank down to the beginning of the fourth rank was quite a hit, and King was no longer the most powerful beast in the area. On the other hand, he was still the strongest one on the mountain so he was in little danger in the immediate area. With the matter of the egg on hold, Sage had to honor his bargain with King.

Sage taught the Breach Hawk the technique to control his own Human Seal and the two of them set out from the mountain. King was smaller than he used to be, instead of being able to carry a bus on his back, now he could only fit a pickup truck. They covered ground at such astounding speed, the Breach Hawk truly lived up to its reputation. Sage set up an array and then the Breach Hawk led beasts into it. With the combined force of Sage, King, and a small army of insects, they killed hundreds of beasts over the course of a few weeks.

This rampant slaughter was not without cause. Firstly, they were collecting a large amount of food and resources to fund their future operations. Inside the Universe Ring, Sage could put whole areas into stasis and the meat could be kept from going bad without limit. Second, Sage wanted to restore the Breach Hawk’s strength as quickly as possible so they harvested many Beast Cores from the Demonic Beasts for King to consume. Lastly, there was the matter of fulfilling the contract he’d formed with King.

A Breach Hawk was a very rare and powerful beast. The more innately powerful a Demonic Beast was the more difficult it was for them to assume a human form. Sage had forced a Human Seal onto King as a method to control him, but in actuality he had given the Breach Hawk what it always wanted. The birdman turned out to be a womanizer. Breach Hawk’s are descendants of the Void Wyrm, one of the many types of dragons. The problem was that the Breach Hawk’s bloodline was just too powerful for any of the birds in the area. It had traveled for quite a few years trying to find a suitable mate with no success. Even then he might only find a single suitable female, and what if they didn’t get along? So, King put all his hopes on taking a human form. He’d been struggling for decades to raise his power. Then, out of nowhere, Sage appear.

The Human Seal could solve his problem. King made a deal with Sage. They formed a Master and Servant contract after Sage made an oath. King wanted women. Lots and lots of women. The bird didn’t want to settle down, he wanted to breed. He would only bow his head and take Sage as his master in return for getting his own harem.

To Sage it was a somewhat silly demand, but it seemed to be all that King cared about. Creating hundreds of children that would spread through the world. Showing off their strength, and therefore showing how powerful their progenitor was. He wanted to show off by having lots of famous and powerful children.

More human than I gave him credit for.