Chapter 117

The atmosphere at the scene became especially lively with the appearance of the Frost Night War Wolf. Researchers from various fields were discussing the new evolution theory, while the research team from Hongzhou University appeared somewhat downcast.

Professor Yuan Xin’s gaze was fixed on the presenter, Feng Le, seemingly lost in thought, while Yang Lei continued to watch Mu Huiyue, his fists unintentionally clenching.

From the moment she displayed the summoning array with five layers of Beastmaster seals, Yang Lei knew he had misjudged her.

A freshman in her first year who could reach level 5 as a Beastmaster and possess combat power of more than one monarch race at the mature stage—forget about someone like Fang Xuyang. An opponent like the Frost Night War Wolf would even be a challenge for someone like Yang Lei.

She was from the combat department, and it was certain she would make it into the school team and represent Jingzhou University in the national competition.

Originally just tagging along with the research group to gain some experience, Yang Lei now felt an unexpected sense of pressure.

Look at the new students at their school. Once they return, I’ll have to make sure to give those little brats in the combat club a proper lesson.

Not far from them, Lin Lin, representing the Original Wood Research Institute, sat alone in the audience, her eyes fixed on the podium without moving.

The last time they met in Xizhou, Mu Huiyue was only a level 4 Beastmaster, and the Cloud Pup showed no signs of evolving.

Who would have thought that just a month later, she’d already reached level 5? Was this woman’s meditation progress boosted by some immortal elixir?!

But compared to the opponent’s Beastmaster level, the content of this lecture made Lin Lin’s heart race even more.

The evolution that breaks through innate core skills meant that she might have a chance to raise a pet beast with the innate core skill Reverse Space!

This was the bottleneck that had held up the research group for nearly a year, and now, she was seeing a glimmer of hope in Mu Huiyue.

Lin Lin bit her lip and took out her phone to send a message to the mentor in another exhibition hall.

At this point, Feng Le on the podium continued explaining the composition of the Resonance Crystal and the conditions required to trigger the Ritual.

The threshold of the individual pet contract entropy and the possible forms the Ritual could take completely depend on the individual, and the evolved innate core skill will also be influenced by the type of emotional resonance.

Thus, Professor Xie Qingwei’s new evolution theory cannot be fully summarized in numerical formulas. Without exact evolution results, large-scale industrial replication is also difficult.

But the emergence of the Contract Evolution Theory will change the current Beastmaster cultivation system, prompting Beastmasters to rethink their relationships with their pets and the emotional bonds they share.

The standard for evaluating a pet’s potential, beyond fixed factors like race level and innate core skills, should also consider the pet’s own desires and willpower.

“Finally, I will present the fourth evolution case.”

Having finished the theoretical section of the lecture, Feng Le paused slightly and looked at the audience below.

Everyone’s faces lit up with anticipation. The previous cases were all experimental video recordings, and the individuals that had already completed their evolution certainly couldn’t be as convincing as seeing it live.

“Before that, I’d like to tell you all a short story.”

Feng Le smiled lightly and looked at her contracted pet, “This is my partner, Rabbit. It’s a vengeful spirit puppet.”

The worn-out rabbit puppet floated in front of the Beastmaster, bowing to the audience. Its small skirt glimmered with faint resonance crystals.

The giant projection behind the podium switched to the encyclopedia mode, displaying information about the vengeful spirit puppet.

This was a relatively ordinary, low-ranking Battle General species vengeful spirit puppet, with an innate core skill of C-rank dark-type ability Spirit Dissolution.

The vengeful spirit puppet is considered a relatively common type among dark-element extraordinary creatures, with its initial discovery lost to history, as it’s been so long since it was first found. They are typically spotted in abandoned houses.

Most vengeful spirit puppets belong to elite species, and their appearance is determined by the type of puppet that resonated emotionally during their creation.

The battle general species of vengeful spirit puppet is an individual born with a stronger resonance, but very few Beastmasters are willing to contract them as battle pets for training.

Aside from their unpredictable temperaments and terrifying appearance, vengeful spirit puppets have yet to show any controllable evolutionary forms, which is one of the primary reasons for their lack of popularity.

“Rabbit was my favorite toy when I was a child,” Feng Le said, a hint of nostalgia in his gaze. “It was a birthday gift from my grandmother when I turned six. After I got it, every day I would talk to it, play with it, and sleep with it. We were inseparable, the best of friends.”

“But my parents were very angry about it. They thought I wasn’t ‘manly’ enough, believing it was because I spent so much time with a cute little puppet. It was something only little girls would continue to play with.”

The young man on the podium was already over twenty, but his face still looked youthful. He had fair skin, large eyes, long lashes, and rosy lips—his appearance was one that instantly gave off an impression of cuteness and delicate charm.

It’s not hard to imagine that he must have been a child who was as beautiful as a doll.

However, in the eyes of some people, a man who grew up to look like this was indeed not “manly” enough.

“I grew more and more disgusted with myself for not being ‘manly’ enough amidst their insults, but I still couldn’t bear to part with Rabbit. Later, when my family moved to Jingjiang City, they left Rabbit behind in the old house and wouldn’t let me bring it with me.”

“When I got to the new school, I shaved my head, worked out, and intentionally got into fights to create some battle scars, trying hard to make myself look more like what my parents expected… but it still didn’t work.”

“These actions didn’t make them happy, but they made me miserable. When I entered middle school, I became increasingly sensitive about my appearance and struggled with relationships with my classmates, so I ended up transferring back to my hometown.”

“However, the old house had already been occupied by wild dark-type creatures. I rushed in recklessly and nearly became their meal, but it was Rabbit who saved me.”

“It was Rabbit, who had already turned into a vengeful spirit doll, helping its former friend.”

Feng Le’s gaze fell on his contracted pet, and he held a resonance crystal that emitted a faint glow in his hand.

“After that, I awakened as a beast master and contracted Rabbit. I worked hard to study and was admitted to the Attribute Research program at Jingzhou University. I wanted to further understand what dark-type extraordinary creatures were and why Rabbit became a vengeful spirit doll.”

“Now, I know.”

He turned to look at the audience, who had quieted down at some point, and smiled as he said, “It didn’t develop ‘resentment’ from my leaving. Instead, it hoped that its former friend could accept themselves with peace, not be bound by anything, and freely pursue the future they wanted.”

“Just like how it is a vengeful spirit doll that is not liked by people, it can still find a beast master with whom it grows and moves forward together.”

“To give this presentation at a conference of this scale, to become the ideal researcher in the eyes of everyone… this is my answer to all those past experiences, and it is the ‘ritual’ that Rabbit gave me.”

“In this presentation, no one will care about my appearance. The focus is only on the knowledge I possess, my research achievements, and my report. I have achieved the state I once idealized, and I no longer worry about my appearance.”

Feng Le spoke aloud, and though no one noticed, his hand still trembled slightly from nervousness. But he bravely took the first step in accepting himself and challenging himself.

Just like the boy who once returned to the old house, excitedly proposing a contract to the vengeful spirit doll, Rabbit never harbored resentment toward him, and he had never blamed his most beloved doll for his parents’ scolding.

The stitch on the old rabbit doll’s mouth was slightly crooked, as if it were smiling.

The resonance crystals shimmered, their bright light enveloping the vengeful spirit doll’s body.

At that moment, the light of evolution blossomed.

The audience below instinctively held their breath, staring in disbelief at the vengeful spirit doll bathed in the light of evolution.

A vengeful spirit doll, which had never shown any signs of controllable evolution, was about to evolve right before their eyes?!

As the radiant light dissipated, a completely new extraordinary creature appeared on the podium.

It still retained the appearance of a rabbit doll, but its tattered clothing had transformed into a lavish court dress. Semi-transparent energy lines extended from every joint of its body, converging upwards, as though manipulated by an invisible hand like a marionette.

However, that invisible hand didn’t exist. The higher up those energy lines went, the more transparent they became, eventually disappearing into the void. The controlled doll seemed to be the true form of this extraordinary creature.

The giant screen displayed the new creature’s information.

[Name]: Marionette Soul Puppet

[Attributes]: Dark, Psychic

[Race Level]: Low-tier Monarch

[Growth Tier]: Stage 1, Mature

[Core Skill]: Broken Line (Dark B-level)

[Race Introduction]: A Dark extraordinary creature discovered in the A-level secret realm “Terrifying Canyon.” It uses soul lines formed by mental energy to control sentient and intelligent beings, capable of easily destroying weak souls.

[Normal Hidden Energy Value]: 112425P

No one could have expected that the evolutionary form of the vengeful spirit doll would be the Marionette Soul Puppet.

Unlike the newly discovered and unknown evolution of the little cloud dog, Frost Night Fighting Wolf, Marionette Soul Puppet is a pet already recorded in the extraordinary creature encyclopedia. It was first discovered in the A-level Dark secret realm, “Terrifying Canyon,” in the Heila region and has always been considered a low-tier Monarch race extraordinary creature.

In the few recorded sightings, the Marionette Soul Puppet’s core skill was confirmed as the B-level psychic skill Mental Manipulation, and no individual with the Broken Line skill had ever been documented.

The B-level Dark skill Broken Line is an extremely rare defensive purification skill. When used, it can cancel the effects of any controlling skills, disrupt established domain rules, and maintain stable self-awareness within the chaotic domain.

The Marionette Soul Puppet, a pet that controls other creatures through soul lines, would normally find it difficult to learn the Broken Line skill. However, after hearing about the story between Feng Le and the vengeful spirit doll, everyone understood why this Marionette Soul Puppet’s core skill had become Broken Line.

A puppet controlled by strings wishes to sever all the strings that bind it during its growth.

This is the contract between it and its Beastmaster, the source of their soul resonance.

The audience was filled with ongoing discussions, and some researchers were even trying to take photos to document the event.

The Contract Evolution that occurred on-site was far more impactful than the subtitles on the PowerPoint or the video on the giant screen.

What’s more important is that this was yet another evolution of a Monarch race!

In this project presentation, four evolutionary forms of Monarch races had already appeared, and they were all Dark-type pets that were difficult to evolve into higher-tier races, which even gave the impression that Monarch races were surprisingly easy to evolve.

However, among the extraordinary creatures discovered so far, over 80% are from elite and warrior races. Monarch races represent high-level combat power with deterrence, and they are the rulers of B-level and below secret realms.

Having a fully evolved Monarch race contract pet means the possibility of achieving the title of a Master Beast Tamer, granting success and a relatively high social status in any field. This is the lifelong goal for many Beast Tamers.