PROLOGUE

I wrestled fervently with my limbs as the violent energy from the elixir surges through my veins.

And then, there was a red blackness around me and it hauled me down against the broken part of the barrier.

It had been countless times the energy raging inside every part of my body had toss me several times wherever it wanted since the contents of the elixir accidentally entered into my system.

Sideways up in mid-air, downwards, straight down to the earth and then, back again.

The interior part of my limbs seemed to have gotten worn out because of the endless torture and the unending anguish that kept leaving my flesh in torments.

But shocking as it may sound, I didn't feel any pain but instead an entire new form of deformity that was making my heart beat racing rapidly as though it would burst out from my chests

Amidst the agonizing transformation, something struck my mind.

It was the last memory I recalled which reminded me of the ill fate that befell the other apprentices who failed to arrive at the mountain safely before I did after being sent by the seven Grandmasters of the four sects to hunt me down.

Miyuki, the only lady cultivator from Skylark sect had been the exact cause of my distress.

I could vividly recall how she struggled to defeat the two-headed half troll and half Cyclops that appeared out of the mist hovering around the forbidden forest before she got lost in one of the shadow portals created by the monster, when she failed to stop me from breaking the barrier as a result of the same monster with the power to make creatures come alive in the form of shadows, and to make shadow portals to another dimension.

Markusa and Maxwell, were the first to have been eaten by the hybrid monster from the bounty cultivators when the creature first appeared while Renji barely escaped being eaten along with them after putting a good but foolhardy fight with the creatures.

Before I could ruminate further on how the bounty hunters scurried for their lives in the dark forest on the mountains because of the appearance of these two creatures, I felt a ghastly violent heartbeat in my chest which triggered, in a split second, more of the red energy from the elixir into my veins which had gotten swollen as well as the muscles covering my entire body.

It was clear that Mandellon was fusing himself with my body and I believed he would turn me into a vessel.

"What will happen now after drinking the elixir by accident?"

I asked myself screaming for pain which wasn't forthcoming. Numerous questions and fearful thoughts of my humanity escaping me every second keep popping into my head as my body kept mutating nonstop into what I had dreaded at first glance.

"Will Hazel be angry once he finds out I failed to deliver the elixir as promised?",

"I should have been more careful keeping the elixir safe in my pouch"

"In a blink of an eye, everything I had worked so hard for had turn to nothing"

"There's nothing left for me to offer to Hazel in return for saving Annabel and my mother from dying from the poison"

I clasped my stomach when I thought the pain was all over and stood up at once when I had finished shape-shifting into the immortal like form of Mandellon. Then a voice that sounded like a tempestuous roar of the ocean waves colliding with another in a fierce tempestuous storm, spoke to me from innermost part of my soul. I knew at once he has awakened and we had completely fused together with him overtaking my whole human appearance with his huge deformity of a beast with two horns.

"Puny Mortal. How dare you steal what belongs to me?"

The voice questioned from within my mind. His voice sounded like the harsh tidal waves splashing against the rocks at bay. I couldn't answer his question and felt even more of afraid of Mandellon. I had no choice but to draw strength from the tree beside me. I refused to listen to

"Answer Me! Puny Mortal!"

He shrieked and spun me around. I landed on the grass with a loud thud and before I realize, the barrier shielding the evil creatures from leaving the forbidden mountain, sliced off my right hand but it grew back in an instant the moment I withdrew away from it.

In a flash, He took my senses into his domain and I lost consciousness in the real world. He knew I was stubborn and wanted to leave the forest before the hunters find me but he had other plans for me which was why he brought my entire soul to his domain that had sealed completely inside my body after we had fused together.

In the illusion, I was trapped in a red mist and appeared to be wearing the same robe I had worn as a disciple of Master Renzin at Eagle-Flag Mountain. After taking look around, I found myself standing on a colossal platform in between a dark chasm inside an enormous hall which lay in ruins with red aura hovering around the desolation. There was no sign of Mandellon nor could I sense his presence. I was pretty much alone wondering where I was at that moment. From what I had seen around me, I suspect that this might be one of his shapeless labyrinths just like what Reznor had told me two days before I came to forest, about Mandellon's countless domes he forged for himself.

But I wasn't ready to fix my attention on the enormous columns that held the gigantic structures that was formed together with several larger statues. I tried using the fourth level of my cultivation to see if I could break from his domain but nothing happen. I could barely reach out to my powers let alone do something to bring my inner soul back to the present. Then it occurred to me that I was trapped in his labyrinth but without any chain. There was nothing but an empty silence that hovered in the apparition and I wondered if the entire journey to forbidden forest had been a dream all along or was Master Renzin playing his usual pranks on me like he always does whenever he wants to test the level of my cultivation.

Believing he would show himself anytime soon, I took two steps forward towards the colossal steps heading to where I thought a light was shining on the pedestal of a huge throne that was seventy five tall. Over half of the throne had been split in half while the left corner of its base was shattered to stone fragments.

I brought my two fingers close reaching for my powers and used my breathing technique of total concentration to conjure forth the cultivated art of griffin wings. The two wings appeared behind my back in fiery form of fire and I took to flight heading to broken throne, surfing past two of the gigantic stairs which now, was far below my feet.

No sooner had I flew past the last stairs, my powers began to flicker and the wings disappeared even before I could strength my powers

"No!"

I screamed as I was falling from the height I had flown to and tried evoking another wing but the speed at which I was falling down was too quick for me to move my fingers. At that moment, Mandellon, in his true colossal form of a winged creature with two horns and five eyes, appeared out of the dark chasm and caught me in mid-air before I could even reach the ground.

"Weak and powerless sorcerer"

He said as he brought me down to the platform where I had once stood. He left me there standing in bewilderment and stood on the throne above me but he didn't sit on it. His hefty body size was proportionately fit enough for him to sit on the throne.

"You cultivators of the mortal realm are nothing compared to my supremeness as a god yet….."

He glared at me and continued.

"You dare make a mockery of me by stealing and drinking my elixir"

I flinched nervously the moment he pointed his huge fingers at me. I thought he would descend on me when I saw tiny sparkling particles of blue light and red aura surrounding him almost unexpectedly before I could even defend my actions. Instead of pouring his wrath upon me like I had thought he would, he shrunk himself to the size of a human and not only did his size changed but his appearance was shockingly different particularly the bright linen he wore to shroud his body. His horrid face had transfigured to that of a fine young man with long white hair as that of a pretty lady but his two horns remain shrunk and fitted on his head below a golden crown intertwined with four jasper crystals.

He disappeared into thin air before I could read his looks further and appeared behind me. I turned but he disappeared again. He kept disappearing and reappearing all around me as I kept turning around in circles trying to block his attack but he decisively struck me with a ghastly blow on my left jaw and with a frightening speed, he grasped my throat. I wanted to retaliate but it was far too late. He pinned me against the wall of the colossal throne before I could block his next attack.

His fiery eyes peered into mine and I was aghast only to find out that he had pinned me at a height way higher above the ground.

"I hate what you have done"

"It wasn't…my fault"

"Of course it is. Who knew you had planned to steal the elixir from the beginning? The sorcerers or your master Renzin?"

"How did you—"

"We have been merged remember. I can see your repugnant memories which I strongly loathe with my all being. A god like me having to succumb to the guileful schemes of a mortal. You really have made me a laughing stock with your schemes"

"I know not what you….are talking about"

"Are you playing dumb or have you forgotten?"

He asked and I drifted into memory lane. In fact, He was right about the schemes I had planned to steal his elixir under the guise of becoming a sorcerer for the delivering elixirs to the gods just like Miyuki was and the rest of the bounty hunters who were after my life.