Dragon's Breath

(Mommy!)

(Mommy look at me!)

Sophie could not hear the bat's thoughts as the blood bond had not matured enough to establish a mental link.

She did however have a vague sense of the emotions that her new pet was feeling so the excited little bat was enough to make her smile.

"Okay let's see if you are a boy or a girl?" Sophie curiously flipped the bat over to find out.

She had already figured out a few potential names for her first combat beast pet, but they were all gender specific.

Baby frostwing bats were covered in soft fur but that did not prevent Sophie from seeing the business downstairs.

Yep… that's a male.

"Your new name will be…" Sophie paused for a moment and carefully went through all the names in her mind before a certain one just stood out to her.

"Moon. I will call you Moon."

The frostwing bat now called Moon responded with a loud,

"Squeak! Squeak!"

Moon was thrilled that his mommy had returned so his frozen domain ability slowly deactivated and the room returned to its normal temperature.

Sophie remembered that Frostwing bats required regular feeding, so she sent one of her maids downstairs to get some warm milk from the kitchen.

Petra soon returned with a feeder bottle and offered to help out but the frostwing bat did not allow anyone except Sophie to come near.

He was very territorial!

Rokan had heard the news from Sophie and also stopped by to check up on his daughter's combat pet.

Sophie excitedly told him about her bat's ability to use frozen domain and the duke planned to ask a couple of his friends in the beast pet field if they knew about this phenomenon.

Moon was not too happy that his mommy seemed distracted and started to wail loudly.

The duke shot the crying bat a casual look filled with a threatening aura that made Moon stop instantly.

His beast instincts warned him not to mess with the older man in front of him who smelled similar to mommy.

Moon became very obedient after this incident and Sophie could not figure out what had happened.

(Next Day)

"Well isn't he just adorable," Katarina cooed softly as she lightly tickled the frostwing bat's ears.

Sophie's training had not stopped since she returned home but now there was an additional companion by her side.

Moon would cry loudly whenever Sophie left his sight even for a moment and his frozen domain ability would activate instantly.

The duke was not too pleased that, yet another creature was taking away his daughter's attention.

So, he made sure to let the little bat know the hierarchy of the house!

He had also reached out to some of his beast cultivator acquaintances to question the rapid growth of the frostwing bat and had received positive news.

Apparently, it was generally accepted that the younger the pet was when their ability first activated was directly linked to their potential.

Moon was perhaps one of the more impressive frostwing bats in terms of raw talent.

Sophie was also not comfortable with leaving her little baby by himself, so she got an empty box and filled it with soft bedding to carry Moon around.

She walked to her different training sessions with the happy frostwing bat in her arms.

Today would be a day long solo session with Katarina as she would be teaching Sophie some poison techniques.

Sophie had followed her immunisation schedule rigorously and Katarina was now confident enough to teach her some skills.

"Alright, I will now teach you a poison technique called 'Dragon's breath'," Katarina stopped playing with the bat and stood up.

"Watch carefully as I demonstrate."

Katarina reached into her pocket and took out a vial of purplish black liquid that shifted around the tube with an eerie light.

Sophie figured the attack had something to do with spreading the poison, but she was still shocked when Katarina leaned back and casually poured the contents of the vial straight into her mouth!

The poison infiltrated Katarina's meridians and directly flowed through all corners of her body before entering her dantian.

"The essence of this technique is to nourish the poison with the qi inside of your body to enhance its corrosive qualities," Katarina explained as she saw her now dumbfounded student still in a daze.

"This allows even a weak poison to become something much more dangerous."

One rotation…

Two rotations…

Three rotations…

Katarina turned to face the opposite direction and gently took a deep breath before exhaling slowly.

A purplish black mist was expelled from her mouth and spread rapidly until the entire area of the training room in front of Katarina was covered by the dark fog.

Hiss!

Sophie could see the walls of the training room begin to melt as the metallic outer shell was unable to withstand the powerful corrosive effect.

"Amazing!" Sophie clapped loudly in awe as Katarina just smirked proudly.

Moon did not know what was going on, but his mommy seemed happy, so he also started to cheerfully make cooing noises.

"Are you ready to give it a try?" Katarina held out a smaller vial filled with a reddish-brown liquid and placed it in Sophie's hands.

"You will start off with a weak poison so don't worry if something goes wrong."

Katarina had carefully selected the poison from a common grassland snake whose effect amounted to nothing more than a mild irritant.

Even enhancing the poison using this technique would not significantly increase its lethality.

Sophie had absolute trust in her teacher, so she unscrewed the vial's stopper and followed Katarina by pouring the liquid into her mouth.

Cough! Cough!

Sophie choked hard as the burning liquid slid down her throat, but the pain was not enough to disrupt her concentration.

She could feel the poison entering her body and wrapped the liquid up in her qi to control its path.

The poison passed through her meridians and entered her dantian without much trouble as Katarina helped greatly by placing a hand on her back to guide her qi.

One rotation…

Two rotations…

Three rotations…

When Sophie felt that the poison had been sufficiently nourished, she guided the toxic liquid back into her meridians and they flowed straight towards her mouth.

"Okay now take one deep breath and slowly exhale to release the poison," Katarina patiently instructed.

She was quietly shocked at how fast Sophie had learnt this technique as most would be unable to withstand rotating the poison more than two times when first training this skill.

Sophie could feel the poison welling up in her throat, so she took a deep breath and brought it into her mouth.

This was it! She had finally found out her impressive talent!

She excitedly opened her mouth and exhaled softly in a forward direction.

And….

Nothing happened.

Wait…. what??

Where did the poison go?!