Beast-Tamer: Limitless Evolution

Introspection

"Hm." Osho pinched his cheeks and turned his head as he looked at himself in the mirror.

Compared to a few days ago, he looked much better.

His skin was no longer sunken in, and it now had that same, healthy dark glow from before.

In fact, it seemed even better than before.

'Interesting.' Osho thought as he inspected himself.

'It seems like whatever my ability did that drained me so much wasn't all bad.' He mused.

He was RIGHT there.

On the cusp of it.

Right next to the Adept rank.

In fact, he was sure that if his ability to rank up wasn't tied to Gale. He would have already done so.

He sighed and pulled back a bit.

He'd spent the rest of the week recovering. Surprisingly, he'd recovered quite quickly. It typically took a few weeks to more than a month to recover from total energy exhaustion, with that time increasing the stronger one became, at least without the aid of external items.

So his recovering so quickly was nothing short of a miracle.

That said, he still needed to explain to his lecturers why he didn't attend any of his classes. Thankfully, Veronica and Mateo handled it, but not after giving him an earful about how this would be the last time they would help him like this. Which was fair.

'Tomorrow is when we will go and hunt some beasts.' Osho thought. That's when the weekend would begin, so I need to prepare my mind.' He hummed and stretched a little.

It had only been a few days, but with the constant emotional support from Ellie, Osho finally realized something that had been bugging him.

Even in his volatile state, he could recognize that the way he broke down was... off.

It went without saying, but Osho has gone through a LOT throughout both his lives.

Especially in his past life where he wasn't as... mellow, as he is now.

So under normal circumstances, with everything he'd been through, his mindset should be one that was solid and difficult to shake. And yet, one event caused him to almost completely shut down.

He'd at first tried to convince himself that his importance was so much that the consequences of his death would simply be too catastrophic to think about, and all that weighed on him was guilt.

However, the number of people in the world who knew about his ability to evolve beasts could be counted on 15 fingers, and while his status as someone with Legendary Rank Potential was a bit more well-known, his death wouldn't exactly do much besides leave the status quo as it was.

He wasn't trying to discount how devastating certain people would feel if he died, especially if his death was due to a dumb mistake entirely on his part, but still.

It was only after Ellie had stayed with him for the following days that he realized the problem.

He was burnt out. Severely.

Not in the mental way. He liked his rest when he could help it, but more emotionally.

Ever since he transmigrated, he'd unintentionally placed a responsibility on himself.

While Osho wasn't the most selfish person, the way he had so eagerly taken up the mantle to figure out a way to uplift humanity as a whole with his ability was a bit strange. Then again, that can be attributed to him trying to change from his far more selfish nature before he died.

Anyway, due to this, as well as the myriad of other things that came his way, his accident had more or less been the tipping point, and all that built-up strain that he hadn't been aware of before finally snapped, and everything came crashing down all at once.

In the end, he was exhausted, and he didn't even know it.

It was only after Ellie's efforts, along with the efforts of the others, that he managed to recover in that department, and Osho had to do some introspection during the entire ordeal.

In the end, he made a decision.

'No more shouldering unnecessary burdens, and confide in others when things get too much.' He said to himself with determination. Knowing how he tended to keep his feelings to himself, either due to not wanting to burden others. Or simply... forgetting.

He sighed and took a few breaths to regulate his emotions. One thing at a time.

When he decided that he was reasonably calm, he turned to address something that had been chilling in his room these past few days.

The red egg

The surface looked like it was flowing with the viscous red liquid. But upon closer inspection, it was simply a trick of the light combined with the way the eggshell was shaped.

That didn't stop the feeling one got from touching it from being eerie, though.

Osho tilted his head and went over before picking it up.

As soon as he did, he felt a tingle run down his spine as a wave of unease started to wash over him, making him frown.

He hadn't noticed it there when he was performing his experiments on the egg. Or perhaps it had only formed after he lost consciousness.

Regardless, one thing was certain.

The egg had an aura.

This might not sound too strange. After all, from the way the beasts reacted to the eggs with fractured ribbons, it was clear that eggs had some sort of unique presence, even if humans couldn't sense it.

However, this was different.

It was still an egg, no creature had hatched from it, and it was no longer sentient.

Despite this, though, if one could look closely, they would be able to see two things.

A faint, almost invisible red aura that stuck to the surface of the egg like a second membrane, and an even fainter white undertone, signifying its novice rank.

For all intents and purposes, that should be impossible.

Osho thought long and hard about what he could have possibly done to cause this phenomenon, but he had no concrete answers.

His current theory was that due to his constant tampering with the conduits on the ribbons, he had inadvertently caused some sort of mutation, as his actions also made the conduits a lot more complicated than they had initially been. But he had no way to confirm this.

With that said, there was another issue.

What did he do with the egg?

The most obvious answer would be to hatch it when he breaks through to the next rank. The problem with that, though, is that similar to how he couldn't tame another beast until he reached the next rank, he couldn't check his compatibility with another beast until he did the same thing.

Which left the question, if Osho broke through and he wasn't compatible, what would he do with the egg?

Give it to one of his friends when they broke through? It was certainly an option. Granted. Kurt wouldn't be part of the people who could get it as he had made it VERY clear that he wanted nothing to do with it.

Either way, that was an option.

He could also give it out anonymously, but he wasn't exactly sure about the repercussions of such a thing. Moreover, he had a feeling that doing so would come back to bite him in the future. Indirectly or not.

Then there was the third option.

Just... leave it.

Unless someone tried to hatch it or its original parent did so, the egg would remain the same way until it was destroyed.

However, this only applied to 'normal' eggs. It was apparent that Osho had done... something to the egg. So he honestly wouldn't be surprised if it somehow managed to hatch with no outside assistance.

'One thing is for sure, though. Whatever is inside is dangerous.' He noted.

When he had shown the egg to Gale and Bedrock, their reactions were... a bit exaggerated, to say the least.

Bedrock summoned his armor without hesitation, and Gale's domain pulsed as he seemed almost ready to destroy the thing right there and then.

It was only after Osho calmed the two beasts that they eased up slightly, but no matter what he said or did, they wouldn't drop their vigilance around the thing, and he honestly couldn't blame them.

Holding this thing made him feel like it was suddenly going to open up and eat him. Despite this, though, he didn't drop it or anything.

He made it this way, and he wasn't so lame to be wary of something he created.

... Also, if it were somehow aware of what was happening outside, he counted it would be very happy to know its creator was wary of it.

Better safe than sorry.

"Well. If it does turn out that I can hatch you, you're gonna be my next beasts and I don't care what anyone else says." He drummed his fingers on its surface for a few seconds before dropping in back in its spot.

'I do wonder if I can manipulate the conduits of Gale and Bedrock like I did. If so then I have a LOT of ideas.' Osho smiled, seeming to have already gotten over the trauma of what happened as he got ready for classes.

What he didn't notice was the faint pulse that escaped the egg after he dropped it.

Almost like a heartbeat.