[ STATUS ]
Species: Swamp Tortoise
Realm: Middle Spirit Beast Realm
Age: 11 Years
Body Statistics
Length: 4.2 Meters
Shell Diameter: 3.1 Meters
Weight: 2.8 Tons
Attributes
Strength: 125
Defense: 520
Agility: 62
Vitality: 1,520
Traits
Primal Repose
Skills
Black Carapace Guard — Mastery: 50%
Earth Sense Domain — Mastery: 25%
Mountain Crushing Bite — Mastery: 20%
Qi Veil Art — Perfection
Condition
Core Type: Mutated Hybrid Core
Qi Density: Extremely High
Qi Stability: Perfect
Qi Purity: Greatly Increased
Primary Beast Qi: Beast Qi
Elemental Attribute
Water Qi — Awakened
Core State
Beast Qi — Active
Pure Beast Qi — Dormant
Chaotic Qi — Dormant
Water Qi — Active
Stored Energy
Dormant Pure Beast Qi — Sealed
Dormant Chaotic Qi — Sealed
Pure Water Qi — Stored
Resistances
Pressure Resistance: Very High
Energy Corruption Resistance: High
Temperature Resistance: High
Mental Stability: Enhanced
Poison Resistance: Enhanced
The translucent screen flickered once before a familiar status window unfolded before my eyes.
I silently read through the status window, my gaze moving from one line to the next.
The first thing that caught my attention wasn't my attributes.
It was my realm.
Middle Spirit Beast Realm.
"...I actually broke through."
A quiet breath escaped me.
Surprisingly, I wasn't as shocked as I thought I'd be. After learning that only six months had passed instead of another five years, I had already guessed that Primal Repose must have continued cultivating while I was unconscious. If that was the case, breaking through wasn't difficult to understand. The same went for the changes in my body and the increase in my attributes. A breakthrough into a higher realm naturally brought changes to every part of a beast.
At least I hadn't lost another five years.
That thought alone eased the weight on my mind.
But the relief didn't last long.
The old skull's warning quietly resurfaced in my thoughts.
My breakthrough had been anything but ordinary. If the phenomenon hadn't been concealed... what happened afterward? Did powerful beasts sense it? Did they come searching? Or had everything somehow passed unnoticed?
I had no answers.
Those missing six months were still a complete blank.
With that thought lingering in my mind, my gaze continued downward, searching the status window for anything that might explain what had happened.
Water Qi — Awakened.
"...Water Qi?"
My brows slowly furrowed.
The memories ended the moment the river swept me away.
Everything after that was nothing but a blank.
Then where had this Water Qi come from?
My gaze continued downward until it reached the Core State.
Beast Qi.
Pure Beast Qi.
Chaotic Qi.
Water Qi.
I quietly read each line.
Beast Qi was nothing unusual. Every beast possessed it.
Chaotic Qi... I already knew it existed, lying dormant within my Mutated Hybrid Core.
But Water Qi...
That was different.
The old skull had once explained elemental affinities to me. Every beast I had encountered until now possessed Fire, Wind, or Earth.
Yet mine had awakened a Water affinity.
He had even called my situation an abnormality.
"...Then why now?"
The breakthrough alone couldn't explain it.
If awakening an elemental affinity after entering the Spirit Beast Realm was normal, the old skull wouldn't have reacted the way he did.
That left only one possibility.
Whatever had happened during those missing six months...
Ding.
A new notification quietly appeared beneath the status window.
[Water Qi Attribute awakened.]
[Water Qi successfully integrated into the host's cultivation.]
[Host may now refine Natural Water Qi into Beast Qi.]
[Water Qi and Beast Qi may be circulated independently or together.]
[Further applications depend on the host's comprehension.]
I quietly read through every line.
"...So the underground lake had been sitting on top of a Middle-Grade Pure Water Qi Vein."
So that was how my Water affinity had awakened... but the real question remained. Why had my body been capable of awakening an affinity now, after all this time?
My gaze returned to the status window, settling on the next line.
Refine Natural Water Qi into Beast Qi...
My eyes remained on the notification.
"...So I can cultivate with Water Qi... just like any other beast with an elemental affinity."
...
But another line caught my attention.
Pure Water Qi — Stored.
I frowned.
"...Stored?"
If my body had already awakened Water Qi...
Why was there still Pure Water Qi stored inside my core?
Ding.
[The host assimilated a quantity of Pure Water Qi far beyond the body's current capacity.]
[Only a portion has been successfully integrated into the host's cultivation.]
[The remaining Pure Water Qi has been refined and stored within the Mutated Hybrid Core.]
[Water Qi purity has increased.]
[The remaining Pure Water Qi will gradually integrate as the host's cultivation improves.]
I silently read every line before slowly nodding.
"...So my body couldn't assimilate all of it at once."
That made sense.
The Mutated Hybrid Core had simply stored what my body couldn't assimilate.
...Besides, this was only a Middle-Grade Pure Water Qi Vein. The Chaotic Qi that had filled that cave was on a completely different level.
Instead of clearing my doubts, every answer the System gave only seemed to raise another question.
My gaze drifted farther down the status window.
Pure Beast Qi — Dormant.
"...Pure Beast Qi..."
I quietly repeated the words to myself.
Beast Qi... but pure.
If the name meant what it suggested, then it wasn't an entirely different kind of energy. It was simply Beast Qi refined to a far higher level of purity than normal.
My brows gradually knitted together.
Then how had I obtained it?
Neither the System nor the old skull had ever mentioned anything like this before.
Had it always existed inside my Mutated Hybrid Core?
Or had it only appeared during those missing six months?
Ding.
[Pure Beast Qi identified.]
[Pure Beast Qi possesses significantly greater purity than ordinary Beast Qi.]
[Current host is unable to utilize Pure Beast Qi.]
[Pure Beast Qi remains sealed within the Mutated Hybrid Core.]
[Further information unavailable.]
I stared at the final line for a moment.
"...Unavailable?"
Before I could dwell on it, another notification quietly appeared.
Ding.
[Required condition fulfilled.]
[Host cultivation has reached the Middle Spirit Beast Realm.]
[Primal Repose Record Archive unlocked.]
[Events experienced during Primal Repose may now be accessed.]
[Additional Primal Repose functions remain locked.]
My gaze immediately settled on a single line.
Events experienced during Primal Repose may now be accessed.
I stared at those words for several breaths.
Primal Repose...
That was the only part of the past six months I couldn't remember.
Before I could think any further, a faint ripple suddenly surfaced within my mind.
It was as though a long-forgotten memory had begun to stir.
My heart skipped a beat.
"...Could it be..."
"...Everything that happened while I was unconscious... was recorded?"
My eyes remained fixed on the notification.
[Events experienced during Primal Repose may now be accessed...]
I frowned.
"...Accessed?"
Before I could react, a strange sensation spread through my mind. My vision blurred as the cave slowly dissolved from sight.
It wasn't like falling asleep.
Nor was it like entering another world.
Countless scenes flashed through my mind one after another so quickly that I couldn't react to any of them. The raging river, the enormous whirlpool, the violent lightning, endless System notifications, my body being battered apart and reconstructed again and again, Qi Veil Art desperately holding everything together, the underground lake, the endless sea, and that strange world where calm waters and violent currents existed side by side... everything rushed past my mind in the blink of an eye.
Before I could even process what I had seen—
It was over.
I blinked.
The underground cave slowly came back into focus.
The gentle currents drifted quietly around me as though nothing had happened.
I remained still for a long moment.
"...So..."
A quiet breath escaped me.
"...That was everything that happened after I lost consciousness."
Six months of memories...
They had all been compressed into a single instant.
I looked down at my shell.
"...No wonder everything changed this much."
Yet even after seeing everything...
One part of those memories still didn't make sense.