176 Zhenlang

Lowering the potential of the grandmist energy covering her body, Elizabeth struggled as she turned her head in the direction of the footsteps. However, before she could get a proper look at what the 'friendly' looked like, she found herself thrown into the air. In the next moment, she was laying on what appeared to be a fluffy white fur rug.

"Er..." Elizabeth wanted to speak, but her mind was flooded with information coming from Belle which answered most of her questions. So for the next couple moments, she silently enjoyed the short ride as the "fur rug" walked her out of the room where she had her battle.

"Oi, stop calling it a fur rug! Zhenlang is my personal cutie~" Belle said to get Ellie's attention.

"Zhenlang? As in "True Wolf?" Did you really give this monster that nickname?"

"Duh! This big boy here hails from one of the most prestigious bloodlines among the wolf race. But on a more serious note… How'd you figure out the meaning of his name?" To Belle, it was inconceivable for Ellie to know of the ancient language used in the upper levels of Heaven.

"Huh? It's just a direct translation from Chinese. What, did you think I was one of those Americans who only learned English?" Ellie, proficient in Chinese after being exposed to dozens of languages when she was growing up in her rather extreme household, questioned. All this time she had assumed that the moniker for the white wolf came from her functions. But after hearing Belle, it seemed she had named the wolf personally. She didn't think it to be that odd for her to know additional languages when her parents usually spoke five or six different languages a day when they were raising her.

"Chinese?" Belle said, before immediately putting aside the thought for another time. She continued, "Anyways, Zhenlang was one of my two Tamed Beasts before, you know… Right now, he's preserving his strength since it looks like he's been dealt a terrible blow."

For the next couple minutes, Elizabeth quietly kept healing herself as she was transported by the white wolf, Zhenlang. Halfway through the journey to where the wolf planned to bring her, Elizabeth healed herself to the point of being able to sit herself up and when they encountered a dead-end — the end of the entire cave system, no less —Elizabeth was restored to about 85% of her perfect health.

To Elizabeth's shock, at the dead end, what she found was a carbon copy of the Zhenlang; only the white wolf at the end of the cave was lying down in apperant rest. Even more unbelievable to her was the fact that after getting the message to dismount off Zhenlang's back, the standing Zhenlang walked over to the copy that was laying down and then phased right through to fuse!

"What the fuck?" Elizabeth couldn't contain her curiosity as she knew that Belle probably knew what it was that she witnessed.

"What? You didn't know you were being carried by Zhenlang's spiritual consciousness? I told you he had been dealt a terrible blow, didn't I?" Putting up the act of ignorance, Belle made it seem like Ellie was the idiot for even asking.

"The fuck? Wh-How… Hmph!" Feeling slighted, Elizabeth stopped bothering with Belle as she looked at Zhenlang again. Mesmerized by the beast, she was stunned out of her staring stupor when she heard an assertive male voice say, "Ellie, was it? Whoever you may be, thank you for protecting my master and letting her survive."

"It speaks?!" Elizabeth's hair rose as she took a startled step back. She hadn't expected the beast to talk to her when it had been silent throughout the time it had transported her.

"Obviously it speaks! You little sparrow speaks and you expect a friggin God Beast to lack voice?" In Elizabeth's Soul Land, Belle could be seen shaking her head in disappointment as if mocking Ellie for her naivety.

"I was just busy talking things through with my master on the walk here… You know, catching up with everything that has happened to her thus far? Well, we've already discussed her story so let's talk about mine..." With a disheartened look, Zhenlang lied down while gesturing for Elizabeth to take a seat herself as it began to narrate.

"Going back to the 9th Layer of Heaven, after master was exiled, the sovereigns who called for her banishment didn't exactly care about me, her Tamed Beast. They may not have bothered to kill me outright, but it didn't stop master's jealous competition from feeling the need to end everything related to her..."

"As a True God level God Beast, I would have had countless places in the Ninth Layer of Heaven if not the lower Layers where I could have thrived. But I, along with Jasmine, were hunted down by master's peers. We had no choice to descend to the lower planes where those snobby Godkings wouldn't deign stepping foot, but unfortunately, before I managed to make it to this lower dimension, my divinity took a direct hit..."

"Jasmine should be in the Sevenfold Archaic World where we both originally would have stayed at, but with my failing divinity I can't guarantee survival so I took the deeper descent in this Lowlight Plane."

Elizabeth found a gap in the wolf's words to ask, "True God? Jasmine? Sevenfold Archaic World? There are just so many things I have no idea what you are talking about that I don't even know where to begin."

With a most somber tone, Zhenlang sighed, saying, "Surely master will be able to fill you in on the details later, as unfortunately, my time has come… I've just barely been prolonging the decay of my divinity for as long as possible and every moment wasted is one I can't afford for master's sake."

"I've already said everything master needs to know and will hope she can get revenge for me when she returns to her previous peak." With his body flaring in a white glow, Zhenlang's existence began disintegrating as the pieces of his leftover divinity began floating into Elizabeth's body, leaving the lass speechless.

"NO!!! Switch with me, now!" With a forceful tone utterly opposite to the normal cheerful, albeit over-the-top, tone she usually carried herself with, Belle demanded Ellie let her use her body. She got her wish as Ellie was too stunned to even fight back as Belle took over the body's motor functions; not that she would have gotten in her way had she been in the headspace to fight back in the first place.

Now, as Belle took over the body, something odd happened. A subtle change had transformed Elizabeth, but it was so minor no one noticed. At the tips of her hair and the center of irises where there was only white and red respectively, a tinge of cyan shone through. Immediately, bringing Elizabeth's cultivation base and strength to a level unidentifiable, a phantom Dantian carrying a sliver of Elizabeth true cultivation from before she was crippled superimposed itself atop Elizabeth's current Dantian. This incarnation of Elizabeth's past glory came stacked with esoteric and unbelievable skills Ellie couldn't comprehend and one such skill was being used right before her eyes.

Bending reality to her whims, Zhenlang's dissipating form immediately ceased. The pieces of his divinity that were on the path to combining with Elizabeth's cultivation base diverted their route to her Soul Land. With the exertion of a soul pressure that would frighten Kurt had he been there to witness it, another Embryonic Vessel of Seraph manifested instantaneously. Promptly, all traces of Zhenlang were collected in the new Embryonic Vessel and before Belle collapsed from abusing her powers with Elizabeth's weak body, she casted a Divine Time Art and returned control of the body to Ellie.

Thereafter, it didn't matter how many times Ellie tried to contact Belle, she never answered; not that she could. It was to be expected, as but a fragment of her complete soul, she not only used reality-bending time and soul abilities, she did so with Elizabeth's less-than Spirit Tier body. Now all the mysteries Ellie had would go unanswered for even longer as even with her current understanding of the soul, she had not a clue of when Belle would recover from such an extravagant showing…

[Side Quest 6: Spelunking The Mysterious Cave

Degree of Completion: Mythical

Spirit Grade Difficulty: F

Objective) Fully explore the hidden cave system by the creek with the Forest of Beginnings. (✔)

Optional Objective 1) Strip away all the goodies hidden away within the cave system. (✘)

Optional Objective 2) Clear the quest before encountering people from the Societies of the Shadow Realm. (✔)

Description: It was kind of a big ask, telling you to take ALL the treasures in this cave system, but all you had to do was get the ones visible and you didn't even manage that! Che! For killing a Spirit Beast you get your mythical ranking, but it's a shame… You could have done better.

Reward: 1 Spirit Grade Reforging Crystal

Bonus: Seal of Yin and Yang (Situational Augmentation)

Side Quest 7: An Inkling Remnant Of The Past (Complete)

Degree of Completion: TRANSCENDENTAL

Difficulty: Incomprehensible to the user

Objective) Make contact with that ghostly figure of your past. (✔)

Optional Objective) Figure out why it appeared in the first place. (✔)

Description: Congrats, you now have more questions and no one to answer them for you~ On the flipside, at least Belle managed to make the most of this situation for you.

Reward: Complete Primordial Ghost God Bloodline (Sealed)

Bonus: Static Embryonic Vessel of Seraph (Contain's Zhenlang's soul)

Innate Skills

Name: Infantile Wolf God Form

Description: Characteristics to all those with the Primordial Ghost God bloodline or its derivatives, assuming a demihuman state is now possible. But more importantly, it is required to perform Ghost God bloodline skills.

Effect: At 0.01% Bloodline Capacity, when assuming this form, all of the user's senses double. Additionally, Wind, Yin, and Chaos Affinities develop faster at a rate proportional to how complete your bloodline is.

Name: Bloodline Skill: Ghastly Strike

Grade: SSS+

Description: Innate to all Ghost Gods, the ability to stack corporeal and incorporeal attacks now becomes intuitive while in the Infantile Wolf God Form and can be learned outside of the form with enough practice.

Effect: Layering basic soul attacks with physical attacks becomes second nature while assuming the Infantile Wolf God Form.]