The Rat Cultivator

Deep beneath the earth, the tunnels of Little Green Mountain twisted like the roots of an ancient tree. Wu Yuan scrambled through the darkness, putting as much stone between himself and the surface as possible.

In his grip, the ball of Emperor’s Flow Essence pulsed like a miniature golden sun. It had shrunk to the size of a fist, yet the energy rolling off it remained terrifyingly potent. He channeled the Nine Spirit Essence Capture, frantically absorbing what he could, but his attention was split.

Wu Yuan snapped his head up, staring at the earthen ceiling of the tunnel. To the naked eye, there was only rock and darkness. But to his spiritual senses, the sky had fallen.

“The Great Demon is here.”

Even buried deep within the mountain, the pressure was suffocating. It felt like a sharp awl pressed against his spine, a primal warning screaming at him to freeze, to hide, to die. The wind howled through the ventilation shafts, carrying the stench of ancient, predatory demon power.

“I can’t finish absorbing this. What a waste!”

Regret gnawed at him. The Emperor’s Flow Essence was a once-in-a-lifetime treasure, and his body was saturated. He couldn’t digest another drop.

Desperate times called for desperate measures. Wu Yuan turned to the weasel shivering beside him. “Open up!”

He shoved the golden orb toward Little Yellow. In his panic, he misjudged his own strength—and the size of the weasel’s mouth. He didn’t just feed the essence to him; he jammed his entire claw down Little Yellow’s throat.

“Wu… wu!”

Little Yellow’s eyes bulged. He flailed wildly, slapping at Wu Yuan’s arm, his gaze screaming, Boss! Mercy! I’m choking!

Wu Yuan realized his mistake and yanked his claw back. Little Yellow collapsed, eyes rolling back into his head, white foam forming at his lips.

“Hey! Don’t die on me!” Wu Yuan slapped the weasel’s cheeks, frantic. “The big bird didn’t catch you, so don’t let me be the one who kills you!”

A moment later, Wu Yuan’s expression shifted from panic to confusion. He set the limp weasel on the ground.

Little Yellow was still unconscious, his eyes rolled back, but his aura wasn’t fading. It was exploding.

“Overstimulation? He’s starting to Awaken?”

Sensing that the weasel’s life force was stable—and actually growing—Wu Yuan let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

“Still not safe here. We need to go deeper.”

He grabbed the comatose weasel by the scruff of his neck and scurried further into the abyss of Little Green Mountain.

Time lost its meaning in the dark. Wu Yuan ran until his lungs burned and his legs felt like lead. Only when the terrifying pressure of the Great Demon faded from his senses, and the howling wind in the tunnels died down, did he dare to stop.

He had reached a cavern he didn’t recognize, buried in the mountain’s unknown depths.

“This will have to do,” he thought, collapsing panting. “If that monster can find me here, I’ll accept my fate.”

He placed Little Yellow gently on a flat rock and curled up nearby. It was time to process his own harvest.

During the escape, he hadn’t dared to inspect his internal state. Now, turning his vision inward, he examined the changes wrought by the Emperor’s Flow Essence.

The first thing he noticed was his bloodline. The Spirit Gathering Rat lineage, originally thin and diluted, had thickened considerably. The essence was purifying him, pushing him toward evolution.

But then, Wu Yuan’s eyes snapped open. “Damn it. A bottleneck.”

The Spirit Gathering Rat was not a noble lineage. It was a random mutation within the common rat population. There was no ancient ancestor to revert to, no higher tier of “Spirit Gathering King” to evolve into. He had hit the genetic ceiling.

Unless he could revert his bloodline to its pre-mutation state and evolve down a different path, he was stuck. But the Emperor’s Flow Essence, while potent, wasn’t enough to rewrite his fundamental biology to that extent.

The evolution stalled. The bloodline concentration increased, but the grade refused to budge.

“I’m wasting it,” Wu Yuan thought, anxiety clawing at his chest. “If I miss this chance, I might never rise above the bottom of the food chain.”

He needed a way to break the limit. His gaze drifted to the side, where Little Yellow was twitching and making soft, high-pitched whining sounds.

The weasel’s fur was shimmering. The awakening was complete. Even without checking the specifics, Wu Yuan could feel the sheer potential radiating off him.

“Lucky bastard,” Wu Yuan muttered, though there was no malice in it. “Gets force-fed a treasure and wakes up with everything handed to him.”

Sudden inspiration struck Wu Yuan like a bolt of lightning.

Treat the dead horse as a live one.

“I have nothing to lose.”

Wu Yuan closed his eyes. He began to circulate three techniques simultaneously: the Nine Spirit Essence Capture, the Enlightenment Technique, and the Spirit Gathering Technique.

It was insanity for a normal cultivator, but Wu Yuan possessed a freakish talent for spell multitasking.

The Spirit Gathering Technique pulled in the ambient Qi of the earth. The Nine Spirit Essence Capture wrestled the chaotic power of the Emperor’s Flow Essence into submission. The Enlightenment Technique drew upon the lingering Lunar Essence in his marrow.

Under the catalyst of the Emperor’s Flow, the three energies collided.

Gold and silver light erupted from his pores. Inside his body, the stalemate broke. The Spirit Gathering Rat bloodline didn’t revert, nor did it stagnate. Guided by the conflicting energies, it began to twist, mutate, and march toward a completely unknown direction.

For the first time that night, the pain vanished. A warmth, soothing as a hot spring, enveloped him. Wu Yuan’s consciousness drifted away, and he fell into a deep, restorative sleep.

Above ground, hell had descended upon Little Green Mountain.

“Huff… huff…”

Big Black, a massive bear spirit, tore through the underbrush, his eyes wide with terror. He glanced back at the sky, where a colossal silhouette blotted out the stars.

The Green Giant Bird hovered like a god of judgment. It merely flapped its wings, and a hurricane shredded the forest.

Trees snapped like twigs. Boulders were hurled into the clouds. Countless lesser spirits, unable to resist the suction, were dragged screaming into the sky.

Big Black watched in horror as a deer spirit, a friend he’d grazed near for years, was snatched up. The giant bird’s talon flicked effortlessly, slicing the deer’s chest open. With a gruesome squelch, the bird swallowed the deer’s heart whole, discarding the carcass to fall like a broken doll.

The weaker spirits didn’t even make it to the beak. The wind alone was sharp enough to strip flesh from bone. A red mist sprayed across the sky as bodies disintegrated, the bloody vapor inhaled greedily by the Great Demon.

Only the stronger beasts were spared immediate death—stuffed into a glowing Beast Taming Bag at the bird’s waist.

Big Black dove into a crevice just as the wind shear ripped the fur and skin off his back. He huddled in the dark, blood oozing from wounds that refused to heal, shivering as the mountain groaned under the assault.

High in the air, the Green Giant Bird looked down at the devastation with cold indifference.

“I’ve eaten my fill, and the bag is nearly full,” it croaked, its voice like grinding stones. “Creatures soaked in Emperor’s Flow Essence… truly a delicacy.”

It looked at the bulging sack with greed, then frowned.

“The quantity of Essence is lower than it should be. There really was a little mouse stealing from under my nose.”

Its golden eyes narrowed, scanning the ruins of the forest. Wu Yuan’s precautions had worked—the bird couldn’t pinpoint him, but it knew a thief was hiding.

“Perhaps I should just flip this entire mountain over.”

Demon power surged. The sky turned ink-black, and the wind intensified, threatening to scour Little Green Mountain down to bedrock.

But then, the bird’s gaze landed on the peak. There, the Great Azure Boulder glowed with a faint, defiant green light.

The bird hesitated. The killing intent in its eyes dimmed, replaced by wary calculation.

“Tch. I’ll give those foxes face today.”

The wind died down.

“But I’m taking one last snack for the road.”

The bird opened its beak and inhaled. A massive vacuum force swept the mountain. Dozens of survivors who thought they had escaped were ripped from their hiding spots and swallowed in a single gulp.

With a final, thunderous flap of its wings, the Green Giant Bird shot toward the horizon, leaving behind a scarred, silent mountain.

Hours passed. Or perhaps days.

Wu Yuan woke to a persistent tickle on his face.

He cracked one eye open. A large, furry yellow face was inches from his own, staring intently.

“Gah!”

Reflexively, Wu Yuan lashed out, his paw smacking the face away.

Little Yellow sat back, rubbing his nose and sniffing theatrically, looking like a wronged wife.

Wu Yuan blinked, shaking off the sleep. He looked at his companion and paused.

“Little Yellow? You… you changed.”

The weasel was no longer a dusty brown. His fur had turned a brilliant, lustrous gold. He looked majestic, almost regal.

“That golden coat looks incredible,” Wu Yuan said, trying to smooth over the accidental slap.

Little Yellow gave him a side-eye that clearly said, Your flattery is clumsy, Boss.

Wu Yuan put his hands on his hips. “Oh? Getting an attitude now?”

Immediately, Little Yellow’s facade crumbled. He grinned, tail wagging, and rubbed his head affectionately against Wu Yuan’s shoulder.

“You’ve gotten smarter, too.” Wu Yuan chuckled, scratching the weasel behind the ears.

The levity faded as Wu Yuan remembered his own situation.

“Right. My turn.”

He closed his eyes, turning his senses inward to check the results of his gamble.

His expression froze.