An hour before the First Major Disaster began, a string of expletives exploded in Yennda’s residence.
“You…you fucking bastard! You cheated me!” Yuza screeched in rage as she was tied to a cot, unable to move. Her stomach was bulging; she was pregnant, about to give birth. “I’ll kill you! Bastard! BASTARD!”
Standing before her and calmly receiving her curses was Yennda. He double-checked to ensure Yuza couldn’t struggle to break free, “Please don’t try to move. Your bones would shatter from the exertion. I have injected you a lot of Mud Viper Tonic, but that doesn’t mean your Fragment Disease is cured. The baby in you shouldn’t be harmed.”
“Is…that all you care about?” Yuza spoke in disbelief, “What about everything you told me until now? About us Death Row students having a future?”
“I didn’t lie.” Yennda said, “But when I talked about our future, I was only implying my own.”
“You…” He stared at her stomach, “Your only goal is to birth the Empyrean Tusk.”
Yennda was a coward, unwilling to take risks. Unlike the other reincarnates, he didn’t have a strong base of schemes to enact or a plan to gather all the treasures and important plot points.
No, on day one, when the First Minor Crisis began, he observed the reincarnates. Everyone shone through the crisis, performing with their respective talents. Everyone but him.
Yennda ran to a corner and remained there, relying upon the shield formed by the students before him. They separated him from the Mud Vipers. And thankfully, by the time the Mud Vipers managed to reach him, the First Minor Crisis had ended.
He barely survived. That was a reality check, ‘Neither on Earth, nor here. I’m no one special. In a story, I won’t even become a side character.’
He was aware of his limits. On Earth, he was an office employee in the IT sector. Day in, and day out, he clocked in his cubicle. And when night arrived, he returned home and watched TV. His life was monotonous.
In terms of character, he was a dull individual. Merely four months after his marriage, his wife divorced him, taking his house with her in the process.
Reality was shit. And hence, he escaped to fantasy. Reading Sumatra Chronicles was his solace. He always dreamed of entering such a world where his blood would become fired up, a sharp contrast to his mundane, monotonous office life.
But that fantasy shattered when it became reality. When he arrived in Sumatra, he realised this place was no different from Earth. Rather, it was a multitude worse. He had the Fragment Disease, unable to even cultivate properly.
If he failed to contribute anything to the Clan, he would be chucked into a Pranic Beast’s mouth. Yennda was terrified of that all along, experiencing nightmares almost daily.
During the journey to the Mammoth Fair, he almost lost his life to Resha, allowing him to gauge the sheer difference between himself and the others. He hoped to turn it around with the Roto Spear, his Spirit weapon invention.
But, things didn’t proceed as he wished. The Clan pressured him daily, asking him to produce more than he could handle, threatening him with his death sentence. On earth, his superiors hounded him and here, it was no different.
Towards that, Yennda only had one thought: Fuck them!
He intended to dispose of his status as a Mammoth Clansman—where Clan’s contribution took priority—and flee to a human empire. He was an engineer on Earth, having ample knowledge of gears, engines, circuits, etc.
He could rely on it and set up a shop in a human empire and comfortably make a living. No pressure from superiors, no need to risk his life fighting Pranic Beasts, and no need to worry about his future.
He planned to settle in a massive human empire that had stably survived for more than a millennium. Such empires possessed considerable strength and resources to handle any Pranic Beast invasion.
But as long as he had the identity of a Mammoth Clansman, he wouldn’t be able to live beyond the settlement. After all, a Mammoth Clansman could only cultivate with the resources produced by an Empyrean Tusk.
Therefore, he intended to shed his identity. The only way to do that was to eradicate the imprint in his body. Of course, he didn’t wish to become a regular human either, for that was a death sentence.
The strength of every human was dependent on their cultivation technique. There didn’t exist a technique better than the Mystic Bone Art. If he cultivated a regular cultivation technique, he wouldn’t even be able to enter the Body Stage.
Hence, Yennda wished to shed his Mammoth Clansman status without letting go of the Mystic Bone Art. And the key to it was an Empyrean Tusk. 𝓞𝑽𝑙xt.𝒸𝑜𝕞
Yennda managed to piece together one piece of information from Sumatra Chronicles: When a couple with the Fragment Disease copulate, the result is the birth of an Empyrean Tusk.
While in the womb, it resembled a human. Yennda had already confirmed that. Only after a significant time after birth would the baby become an Empyrean Tusk. Meaning, even though it was a Pranic Beast, it remained a human for some time.
That meant, as long as he fused with it while it was still in the womb, Yennda would become a human with the power of an Empyrean Tusk. He was assured of the fact that he would be able to cultivate like a human from the surface after that.
Yennda stared at Yuza’s thinning body, “You don’t have enough power to successfully give birth. So, it’s perfect for my goal.”
“Bas…tard!” Yuza intended to curse, but she no longer had the strength to do so. Her everything was being sucked into the forming baby.
Upon seeing that it was time, Yennda fused his 100 Spirit Containers into a unified whole, excitedly grinning as he placed a hand on her stomach, beginning to seep his Prana inside, “Thank you for your sacrifice, Yuza.”
“Is that your plan, Yennda?” Suddenly, the door to his room burst open as Grehha sauntered in, calm. “That’s somewhat disappointing.”
“Why are you here, Grehha?” Yennda was stunned as he hurried his action, intending to finish the fusion process, suddenly screaming in pain as his body began to turn into a sculpture of bone, “Wha…what is this? WHAT IS THIS? GREHHA!”
“You needn’t know.” Grehha snorted as a thought from him and Yennda’s body—that partially became a sculpture of bone—flew away and slammed into the nearby wall. His limbs turned into bone and melted, fusing into the wall, preventing him from breaking free.
“Gre-Grehha, w-what are you doing? Grehha!” Yennda trembled in nervousness, shouting, “Please don’t sabotage my plans. We come from the same place. Please be a good brother and allow me to complete…”
“You don’t have Internal Inertial Gravity, right?” Grehha calmly muttered as he crouched before Yuza.
“Wh-what are you implying?” Yennda shrieked.
“That means you aren’t sensing his approach.” Grehha said as he pointed at his trembling hands, “This level of fear is overwhelming me. So, please don’t hold it against me, Yennda.”
“I’m only doing this for our survival.”