Chapter 78: Taming

"Sigh, didn't an entire Hare fill up your stomach? Is that what that information meant when it said you were gluttonous creatures. Let's see what you guys like. Hmm… it does say you guys are carnivorous birds but not what you like to eat. Does any meat work?" he asked. 

The bird couldn't comprehend such a line of thought and didn't speak. 'System, what food do they like exactly?" he asked. For a few thousand energy he got an answer. 

Snakeskins. 

"Holy… that's some taste in food you guys have," he said while feeling disgusted. "Damn, where am I supposed to find snake skins now? Do I waste the final bit of energy I have?" he wondered. 

"Whatever, system. Make a kilogram worth of snake skins," he ordered. Thankfully, that didn't cost a lot. If the snakeskin had energy in it, it might have cost a lot more, but only snake skins itself, it cost him about 2 million energy.

A long strip of snakeskin dropped in front of him that made him feel disgusted, but the bird's eyes seemed to light up when it saw that. 

"I hope it doesn't leave," Ning said as he slowly let go of the Telekinesis. He needed to focus all of his attention on making the Ascending Mist Brand. 

While the bird was eating the snakeskin, he diverted his focus into making the brand. Mists started spilling out of his hands as they gathered in front of him and made a brand. 

It took him about 9 minutes to make the brand this time. He was a minute faster than before and fortunately, the bird was enjoying the snakeskin very much. 

Ning couldn't help but pet the eagle and slowly dropped the brand on it, hoping it would accept it. The brand changed colors from blue to bright orange as it fell onto the body of the bird.

A sizzling sound escaped from where the band hit the bird. "Burn. Pain. Hurt," the bird started speaking. Ning got a little worried it would escape now. 

He immediately started caressing the bird as he said, "It's okay. It's okay. I'm here. Just bear with it and I will give you more snake skins to eat. You will get more food," he said. 

"More food?" The bird stopped struggling and let the brand do its work. Soon, Ning felt a connection being established between himself and the bird. 

"So… the bird is tamed and controlled by my body and not me?" he was surprised to learn that. However, it did make sense since the Qi was his body's and thus the brand would belong to it as well. 

"That's a shame. So, if I ever change bodies, then I wouldn't be able to use the bird huh?" he thought.

"Food?" the bird asked. 

"Haha, yeah, yeah," Ning said as he made the system made a kilogram of snakeskin once more. "Come on, jump on my shoulders, I will feed you," Ning said.

However, the bird didn't move. "Here, come," Ning said as he patted his own shoulder. The bird flew up and landed on the shoulder on one leg and slowly lowered the other one. 

"Huh? What's wrong? Is your leg hurt?" Ning asked. 

"Leg. Hurt." The bird said. Ning picked him up and started checking the talons. The bird was very submissive after being tamed, so he had no worries. Still, he gave it a snakeskin to chew on while he checked. 

He checked the talons and found nothing wrong. He moved a little up and check the featherless part of the leg, there was nothing wrong either. 

He then moved a little up and found some crusted blood on the feathers there. He slowly parts the feathers and found that the bird was still hurt. 

"Was it me?" he thought at first. He wondered if a sudden telekinesis stop had done this. But seeing how old the blood looked, that would've been impossible. 

"The blood has fully clotted, so it should be at least a few days old. What happened?" he asked. 

"Human. Harm."

"Ah," Ning realized. "Someone found you and tried to tame you didn't they?" Ning asked. "Sigh, they must've gotten your legs when they tried to take you down before branding you."

"You shouldn't be out during the day then. Your kids are supposed to hunt at night, what were you doing hunting during the day?" Ning asked. 

"Hungry. Injured. Didn't eat." 

Ning made sense of the jumbled-up words and felt bad about asking the question in the first place. "I see. So you couldn't hunt while you were hurt and came out anyway today because you were very hungry, huh. I should have realized that."

"System, can you heal uh… what should I call you?" Ning thought and couldn't come up with a name. "Let's just call you Night for now. That should work. System, heal Night's legs," he said. 

<It will cost 4,600,000 Energy, are you sure?>

"Yeah, do it."

White light shined from the bird's leg and in less than a second, it was healed. No longer feeling any pain from its legs, Night started to twist and turn its head in confusion and happiness. 

It didn't understand what had just happened, but it didn't care as it was healed and was happy now.

"Congratulations! Here, have some food," he said as he gave Night another snakeskin. Night ate that piece of meat with great joy. Ning smiled a little as he saw the happiness in Night's face and said," Don't worry. You will get loads of these from now on." 

Night understood that and cried out in joy. Ning just shook his head and looked to the sky. There were a lot of trees in the forest, but even then they couldn't block the sky and where the sun was.

There wasn't much longer before the sun reached the zenith. Although it didn't feel like it, he had been here for more than an hour. So, he turned back around and went back to the Mist Origin Sect.