Wang Ba did not rush to the Spirit Water Courtyard.

The eggs laid by Alpha-Seven had begun to hatch. He needed to verify immediately if any of the new chicks were “Phantom Chickens.”

“Phantom Chicken” was the classification he gave to mutants like Alpha-Seven—birds that possessed blinding speed and lethal beak-and-claw strength.

Initially, he believed Alpha-Seven was a genetic fluke, a biological singularity that couldn’t be replicated. But then Alpha-Nine—another mutant—hatched a male chick that inherited her “Peerless Beauty” trait.

That changed everything. It proved mutation traits were heritable.

The probability, however, was abysmal.

Despite Alpha-Nine’s relentless mating schedule—and the assistance of surrogate hens to maximize incubation—she had only produced one mutant son.

Wang Ba named him Alpha-Ten.

As a male, Alpha-Ten’s beauty eclipsed even his mother’s. Wang Ba classified this new aesthetic variant as the “Phoenix Feather Chicken.”

Unlike his mother, however, Alpha-Ten was insufferably arrogant. He treated every other bird in the coop with disdain, strutting around like a king in a pigsty.

In this regard, he was the spitting image of his grandfather, Alpha-Five. Both were showy narcissists who preferred admiring their own reflections in the water trough to acknowledging the existence of hens.

But Alpha-Ten was worse. At least Alpha-Five eventually lowered himself to breed.

Alpha-Ten spent his first six months doing nothing but eating and preening. He was useless. Enraged, Wang Ba finally released the violent Alpha-Seven to beat some discipline into him.

The result was unexpected.

The beating opened a new world for Alpha-Ten.

The more Alpha-Seven pecked him, the happier he seemed. The harder she hit, the more excited he became.

From that day on, he became Alpha-Seven’s shadow. He followed her everywhere, practically begging for abuse. When Wang Ba took Alpha-Seven to the Wood Tower Dwelling for cultivation, Alpha-Ten would stand at the gate of the coop, staring blankly at the horizon like a lovestruck statue.

Eventually, even the stoic Alpha-Seven couldn’t resist the overwhelming aesthetic power of a Phoenix Feather Chicken. She succumbed.

The birth of Alpha-Eleven was inevitable.

Born as a High Grade Spirit Poultry, Alpha-Eleven’s combat power far surpassed his mother’s. Unfortunately, even after a massive infusion of Lifespan, he remained stuck at High Grade. It seemed that leaping across grade boundaries became exponentially harder the further one progressed.

What left Wang Ba truly speechless, however, was the family drama.

Six months later, a fully grown Alpha-Eleven used his superior strength to beat up his father, Alpha-Ten—revealing the pretty boy to be nothing but a paper tiger. Then, asserting dominance, Alpha-Eleven forcibly mated with his own mother, Alpha-Seven, multiple times.

Wang Ba couldn’t bear to watch. It was a moral catastrophe.

However, the incestuous chaos yielded results. Perhaps because both parents carried the Phantom gene, the mutation rate increased.

In the following six months, Alpha-Seven produced two more Phantom Chickens.

One was Alpha-Twelve, the antisocial guard rooster Wang Ba had stationed at the gate.

The other…

Wang Ba glanced at his Storage Bag. Inside, a bird with a heavy iron collar around its neck paced restlessly.

Alpha-Thirteen.

This one wasn’t just antisocial; it was a psychopath.

Minutes after hatching, it pecked its own sibling to death. Wang Ba had to isolate it immediately. Even after receiving a Lifespan deposit—which usually bought loyalty—it remained aggressive, treating Wang Ba with barely tolerated indifference.

Wang Ba had been forced to buy a “Spirit Beast Collar” from the market just to ensure it wouldn’t try to murder him in his sleep.

“Is the bloodline too pure? Is inbreeding causing these personality disorders?”

Both new Phantom Chickens exhibited extreme aggression or social defects. Wang Ba suspected genetic degradation. Backcrossing offspring with parents was standard animal husbandry, but Phantom Chickens were mutants. Conventional rules might not apply.

There was another reason for his suspicion.

Alpha-Thirteen’s growth was terrifying.

Its size and spiritual fluctuations dwarfed every other creature on the farm, including the giant turtle. Even the surly Alpha-Twelve instinctively cowered in its presence.

There was only one explanation.

Wang Ba tested it with a Spirit Light Talisman. The blinding blue light confirmed his theory.

“Alpha-Thirteen is a Top Grade Phantom Chicken. Comparable to Qi Refining Level 10!”

This bird was his trump card. With Alpha-Thirteen, he could hold his own against anyone below Foundation Establishment.

Of course, the Phantom Chicken was a glass cannon. It had blinding speed and lethal attack power, but its defense was paper-thin. It was an assassin, not a tank.

It lacked the versatility of Rice Bucket, the High Grade mutant turtle.

Rice Bucket possessed innate water manipulation abilities. It could condense water into ice arrows and control the flow of the pond. As a cultivator specializing in water arts, Wang Ba was genuinely envious of his own turtle.

Rice Bucket was another accident.

Two years ago, after the Jade Fire Spirit Berries solved the food crisis, Wang Ba accelerated the turtles’ breeding cycle. He even installed a temperature-control Formation around the pond to create an eternal spring for mating.

The population exploded from two hundred to nearly a thousand.

But inbreeding took its toll here, too. Defects appeared: missing eyes, albinism, two-headed hatchlings.

When Wang Ba first dug Rice Bucket out of the sand, he thought it was just an albino runt. Then the baby turtle spat a water arrow at his face.

It was weak, but it was magic.

Wang Ba raised it with obsessive care. Born as a Middle Grade, a lifespan infusion pushed it to High Grade, unlocking its full potential.

Now, his arsenal included three combat-ready High Grade beasts—Alpha-Eleven, Alpha-Twelve, and Rice Bucket—and the nuclear option, the Top Grade Alpha-Thirteen.

He wasn’t the strongest cultivator in the sect, but he finally had teeth.

Wang Ba walked out from behind the coop, a sigh escaping his lips.

None of Alpha-Seven’s new eggs were mutants.

“Just normal chicks,” he told Bu Chan.

He left the farm and headed toward the Wood Tower Dwelling.

“Yo! Fellow Daoist Wang! Going to the Wood Tower for some ‘fun’ again?”

“Haha. Just cultivating. Nothing exciting.”

Walking through the market, Wang Ba exchanged pleasantries with familiar faces. The cultivators winked and nudged each other, their smiles ambiguous and lewd.

The Wood Tower Dwelling had changed.

With the influx of “Free Missions,” Left-Path Cultivators had more income, but the disparity was growing. Desperate female cultivators had turned the Wood Tower into a red-light district, renting rooms to “entertain” male cultivators in exchange for resources.

Furthermore, a Foundation Establishment elder from the Heavenly Gate Sect had recently opened a new luxury district on the site of the old West Garden Market, diverting a Second-Grade Spirit Vein to power it.

The Spirit Water Courtyard, once the pinnacle of luxury, was now considered second-rate.

The entire area had become… complicated. The Wood Tower was a mess of lust and commerce. Serious cultivators had moved away.

Wang Ba, who visited daily, was seen as a bit of a degenerate regular.

Since his reputation as a “Chicken Master” had spread, people felt comfortable teasing him. Wang Ba didn’t mind. He leaned into the persona.

A man with vices—greed, lust, gluttony—was a safe man. No one feared a degenerate.

“By the way, Fellow Daoist Wang…”

The cultivator who had just been joking lowered his voice, scanning the crowd for Heavenly Gate disciples. “Can you spare some more Spirit Poultry?”

Wang Ba’s expression didn’t change. “How many does Fellow Daoist Yan need?”

“Fifty. Do you have them? If not, thirty is fine.”

Yan’s voice carried a trace of desperation.

“Fifty?” Wang Ba frowned slightly.

For him, fifty was nothing. But for a Qi Refining Level 6 cultivator, that was a massive investment.

Currently, a Low Grade rooster sold for 5 Spirit Stones. The price had skyrocketed compared to the old days.

The Heavenly Gate Sect didn’t farm chickens because the efficiency was too low for their demonic techniques. They preferred pills and blood. Only eccentrics like Yu Changchun used chickens to supplement their Blood Bone Path cultivation.

This created a supply vacuum. The only sources were imports from the Nine Spirits Sect or rogue cultivators.

The primary buyers were the Left-Path Cultivators—the remnants of the Eastern Sage Sect. They still practiced orthodox, steady-paced cultivation. For them, Spirit Poultry was the safest, most stable way to build a foundation.

But as more Left-Path cultivators switched to demonic techniques for quick power, Wang Ba’s customer base was shrinking.

A fifty-bird order was rare. He wouldn’t turn it down.

“I have them,” Wang Ba said slowly. “But are you paying in Spirit Stones, or…?”

“I don’t have that much cash,” Yan admitted, looking pained. “Half in stones. Half in High Grade Talismans I refined myself.”

“Deal,” Wang Ba said instantly. “Fellow Daoist Yan’s talismans are excellent. You are practically a Top Grade Talisman Master. With skills like that, the Sect will surely gain favor on you eventually.”

It wasn’t flattery. Yan was genuinely talented.

Yan shook his head, a bitter smile on his face.

“Top Grade Master? Heh. I just hope I survive the coming storm.”

Wang Ba laughed lightly. “What storm? Why so pessimistic?”

Yan stared at him, eyes wide with disbelief.

“Fellow Daoist, you must be joking. I’ve asked around at the other stations. Once the Sect Conscription begins, for us Left-Path fodder, it won’t just be ‘nine deaths and one life.’ It will be a slaughter. How can I be at ease?”

Wang Ba’s smile vanished.

“Fellow Daoist Yan,” he said, his voice dropping to a whisper. “What did you say? Sect Conscription?”