The Beast Core Cultivator

Dawn broke over the ruins of Ashwood Village, painting the smoke filled sky in hues of bruised purple and dull orange.

Damian hadn't slept. He hadn't even sat down. For the past six hours, he had been digging.

Without a shovel, he used his bare hands, tearing through the packed earth and scorched roots with terrifying ease. His fingers, which should have been bloodied and broken, were perfectly fine. The latent Qi from the beast core in his chest passively coated his skin, rendering his flesh tougher than cured leather.

He placed Elder Thorne into the final grave, covering the old man with a mound of dark soil. There were thirty two graves in total. Thirty two lives snuffed out just to provide a distraction.

Damian stood up, brushing the dirt from his hands. He felt a strange disconnect. His mind was drowning in grief, but his physical body felt impossibly alive. Every breath he took drew in the crisp morning air, but he also felt something else, a faint ambient energy in the atmosphere. He was sensing the natural Qi of the world, something only true cultivators could do.

He closed his eyes and looked inward.

Where his heart beat steadily on the left side of his chest, a second rhythm pulsed in the center. The crimson core of the Iron-Scaled River Hound sat perfectly within him, acting like a secondary organ. With every pulse, it pumped a warm, refined energy through his veins. The violent, chaotic nature of the beast had been entirely stripped away, leaving only pure, unadulterated power.

I am in the Qi Gathering Realm, Damian realized, clenching his fist. The air around his knuckles seemed to ripple faintly. But I don't have a cultivation technique. I don't know martial arts. All I have is brute force.

Brute force wouldn't be enough to storm a sect of flying immortals. He needed more power. He needed more cores.

Before leaving the village, Damian walked toward the collapsed remnants of the local forge. The blacksmith, a burly man named Kael, was among the dead. Damian sifted through the collapsed stone and still-smoldering coals until his hand closed around a hilt.

He pulled it free. It was a heavy, single-edged Dao-a sabre forged from black steel. It was unfinished, lacking a proper guard, but the blade was thick and the edge was brutal. It was too heavy for a normal mortal to swing effectively, but when Damian lifted it, it felt perfectly balanced in his enhanced grip.

He ripped a strip of cloth from a fallen banner and wrapped it tightly around the hilt.

Damian turned his back on the graves and faced the dense, sprawling expanse of the Whisperwood. Beyond this ancient forest lay the Eastern Peaks. The Whisperwood was infamous; it was a breeding ground for demonic beasts, a place where even seasoned mercenaries refused to tread lightly.

For the immortals on their flying swords, it was a minor obstacle they simply flew over. For Damian, it was a hunting ground.

He stepped into the tree line. The transition from the morning light to the thick canopy's gloom was instant. The air here was thicker, heavy with the scent of pine and decay.

He hadn't been walking for more than ten minutes when the hair on the back of his neck stood up.

Damian stopped. He didn't hear anything, but his newly awakened senses were screaming at him. The shadows between the trees seemed to stretch and distort.

Above, his instincts flared.

Damian didn't look up; he simply threw his body to the side, rolling across the damp forest floor.

A heavy thud echoed where he had just been standing, followed by a vicious hiss. Damian sprang to his feet, bringing the black sabre up in a defensive guard.

Crouching in the ferns was a pair of Phantom Lynxes. They were the size of large wolves, their fur a shifting, smoky grey that made them incredibly hard to focus on. They were lower-tier beasts, usually relying on stealth and numbers to overwhelm prey. Yesterday, a single swipe from one of them would have torn Damian's throat out.

Today, they looked... slow.

The first lynx lunged, its jaws unhinging to reveal rows of needle like teeth.

Damian didn't retreat. He stepped into the attack. The beast core in his chest flared, pumping a surge of Qi into his arms and legs. He swung the heavy black Dao.

The blade didn't just cut; it roared through the air with the force of a falling tree. It cleaved straight through the lynx's skull and out its midsection before the beast could even register the strike. Black blood sprayed across the ferns as the two halves of the creature hit the ground.

The second lynx, seeing its mate obliterated in a single strike, let out a yowl of terror and scrambled backward, trying to melt into the shadows.

"You don't get to run," Damian growled.

He kicked off the ground. The earth beneath his boots cratered. He crossed the thirty feet between them in the blink of an eye, appearing directly above the fleeing beast. He brought the sabre down in a brutal, two handed arc, pinning the lynx to the forest floor.

Silence returned to the woods, broken only by Damian's steady breathing. He felt a rush of adrenaline, but he wasn't exhausted.

He knelt beside the second lynx and drove his bare hand into its chest. He didn't know exactly what he was doing, but his body seemed to operate on an ancient instinct. He pulled out a small, murky grey orb. A beast core. It was significantly smaller and duller than the River Hound's.

Damian held it over his chest. Just like before, the core liquefied into light and sank into his skin.

He felt a tiny spark of heat add itself to the raging fire in his chest. His Qi grew just a fraction denser.

A grim, dangerous smile touched Damian's lips as he looked deeper into the dark woods. He finally understood the rules of the game.