The Dawn of the New World

"Bring back his...corpse?" Kuo stood in place, shocked by the lack of empathy in General Li's words. But what could he do? He was just a lieutenant in his army. He had no place to speak in such matters. So he waited...

***

The granny and the princess got everything ready by the end of the next day. Hao Xuan's body was still in the coffin but the white liquid had been exchanged with a light green one. It had a medicinal scent and just taking in a deep breath would increase blood circulation and give a refreshing feeling.

There were many ingredients placed beside the coffin in an orderly fashion. Some were old roots, some were still writhing insects, there were even a few different body parts that looked that they were from an ancient era.

There was also a long dried up beast tongue, some horns, a few eyeballs, and lastly the glass bottle with the Werebeasts venom.

The princess had cleaned herself up and change into a ceremonial robe. She finally looked the part of an actual princess. Her long hair were tied up in a bun. She was still wearing the glasses which along with the robe, gave her a very scholastic vibe.

The recipe that they were going to use was not for an actual pill. Rather it treated the patient as the pill. Meaning Hao Xuan would be the center of the entire recipe.

This recipe was a long-forgotten secret of the spider clan. An ancestor of the clan had accidentally found it in one of his expeditions. There was not much with the recipe. It only said to use as a last resort. There was no name for it and nothing else to describe any of its effects, but later on, the clan had used the recipe once on a prince of the clan when he almost lost his life in the forest above.

After the treatment, the prince awakened a special constitution and went on to become quite strong. Unfortunately, he vanished sometime later and no one knew if he was even alive or dead, after all, it had been more than 700 years since anyone had heard from him.

The chances of survival were actually not that high and it greatly depended on the patient's condition.

In reality, this 'recipe' was part of an ancient book that was written by one of the earliest races that had visited the Beast World. Unfortunately, everyone from that race perished and no one alive knew the actual use of this medicinal recipe.

Although many people had made conjectures, none of them were 100% true. This recipe was used as a last resort on people that were on their death bed. Its main goal was to awaken the hidden potential of the body by pushing it to the limit. The willpower of the recipient greatly affected the process as it was extremely painful and many would rather choose death than go through it.

The granny meditated while the princess also cleared her mind. After about 40 minutes she suddenly opened her eyes and stood up. She tapped the cane on to the ground and markings on the stone under the coffin lit up one by one.

They slowly formed a complete circle with Hao Xuan in the middle. The liquid in the coffin started to heat up and after a few mins, it started bubbling.

"Begin!" the granny said sombrely and the coffin floated up in the air while a white flame appeared under it. The princess started putting in the ingredients one by one in a specific order while chanting some old scriptures.

****

"Huuk" Hao Xuan felt a sudden pain in his chest. Meng who was talking to him when he suddenly stopped and looked up at him with a knowing smile on his face.

"Looks like someone really wants you back kid. But I don't think you'll be able to handle this process," he said looking into Hao Xuan's eyes.

"The process? What do you mean?" he asked through his teeth. The pain was getting worse by the second. When Meng saw that, he moved forward and tapped the middle of his brow with his index finger and the pain vanished instantly.

"Eh..? What happened? what was that?"

"Our time comes to an end kid," he said while getting up.

"I've told you quite a few things and you listened quietly, I appreciate that. It has been ages since I had the chance to talk to someone new. You have my thanks. Now choose. Do you want to live or pass on to the next life? You won't feel any pain whatsoever and I can get you into the kingdom of heaven itself if you choose the second option."

"Heaven? Am I finally dying?" Hao Xuan asked with a perplexed expression.

"Yes, but, this isn't fair. Your memory is still fucked up huh? Alright, I'll let you see everything so you can make an informed decision," Meng put his hand over Hao Xuan's head and closed his eyes. His palm lit up and something inside Hao Xuan's head cracked, like a broken dam that was holding back a raging river, all his memories came flooding back.

He saw his old life back on earth, if you could even call it that. He remembered the moment it all changed and then he remembered meeting Maaz, his mother and father, and the four younger siblings.

"Emi would still love big brother no matter what," he saw the doll-like face of Emi standing at the edge of his bed hugging her little teddy bear as if she was right in front of him.

He remembered leaving the house and going to the camp, and then he remembered waking up in the royal palace.

"AHHH" his head felt like it was splitting in two.

"You remember everything now?" Meng asked while standing next to him.

"Yeah....I...remember it all," he replied with a hateful look in his eyes. "How dare he! How fucking dare he take them away from me?!? My motherfucking memories!" he shouted in anger.

"Calm down, we don't have much time," Meng tapped his forehead again and all his emotions disappeared.

"Choose, live or die? If you chose to return back to the land of the living, I can even help you out a little bit in exchange for one favor.. This favor can be cashed in at any time and you have to honor it," Meng looked at him in the eyes.