A whole day had passed since Abæus fell asleep after experiencing the flames summoned by Umber and Melvin. It was deep sleep accompanied by an endless dream. Abæus was covered in flames in this dream as he soared high amongst the sky's watching the world pass under each flap of his wings, the air would rumble from each of his breath, and the clouds would disappear from the heat of his body. He would occasionally rest on top of mountains and absorb the cascading sunlight, refining it into his energy. He continued flying for days as creatures would shiver and pressed their bodies low to the ground as he passed overhead; even other birds would shake in fear before descending from the sky.

These beasts dared not fly again until he had long passed, and the majesty of his being had faded. He continued flying for countless days until the ocean had come into his sight, and as Abæus soared over it, his reflection caught his eyes. A body filled with crimson feather lined with a gold sheen casting off seven-colored flames, his beak, talons were black as night but glistened with deep crimson like blood-red stars lighting up the sky. Abæus stared in awe, looking upon himself in the ocean reflection from his beak to seven tail his body stretched over three-hundred meters.

"…eathe…, feath…, FEEEAATHERS!!!"

A booming screech jolted Abæus awake; a sharp yellow beak was dangling above his squinting eyes. The owner of this too pointed beak was Melvin, whose hot breath washed over Abæus as he shrugged off the vestiges of the dream. The last bit of which was slowly fading away from memory. "Where am I?" he asked Melvin. Who just turned walked out of the entrance back into the blinding light of the outside world.

Abæus looked around, trying to get his body back under his control; it felt like he hadn't moved for days as he spread his wings. They smacked into the wooden wall, sending bits of hay flying about the room. It reminded him of an old chicken coop he had seen once on a field trip. However, this coop was made of dark redwood. That gave off a constant warmth like gentle rays of sunlight peeking out amongst clouds. He noticed that he had been lying on a golden straw pile that was partially charred, creating a warm hearth as a bed for himself. All this paled in comparison to the changes that Abæus had undergone. He was no longer covered in the small fluffy feather of gold, but genuine scarlet feathers that glinted with specks of gold under the light. He had grown to just over 1 foot tall with a wingspan of two feet, but what shocked him was that when he closed his eyes, he could feel an intense flame inside of his body condensed into the shape of a sphere. It pulsed along with every beat of his heart, spreading throughout his blood.

Abæus stood up and shook his whole body as he walked out into the light after Melvin. The curiosity of his experience tugged at his mind, and he needed to find answers to each of these questions. However, upon coming out of the coop, he noticed that it was one of three set aside from a much larger coop, not too far away and that Melvin was sauntering into the middle one.

"Melvin, wait up. I need to talk to you," Abæus crowed.

However, Melvin brushed him off and entered his coop before kicking the door shut tightly behind him. He stood there, stunned for a moment before sighing and heading off in search of Umber. This world was foreign and had so much for him to learn. It had been a whirlwind of dizzying experiences the last few days, but even he didn't know how many days had passed since his incident on the hilltop.

Abæus wandered around, searching for Umber till the sun had risen almost directly over his head. The warmth from the rays of sunlight intensified as they filled the sky. The heat of the sun brought an inexplicable feeling to Abæus, a calling as the rays fell upon his body. They seemed to linger, getting trapped between his feathers, causing them to sparkle like flecks of gold as he walked across the fields. He was slowly making his way towards the hill in hopes of finding Umber.

He noticed as he walked his feathers seemed to keep collecting the sun rays as the flecks of gold had built up into a sheen covering, and the temperature continued to rise. It kept building to the point where the brilliance of golden light covered Abæus' whole body. The core inside him had gone from spreading warmth to a raging fire in the pit of his stomach. Abæus began running towards the hill as he spread his wing out in an attempt to cool down with the passing wind, but this only gave more room for the sunlight to be trapped with his feathers. He found himself sprinting across the field towards the hill as his steps charred the long swaying grass beneath his talons. A small trail of embers had begun to float in the air behind him as he madly dashed up the hill, screaming for Umber.

Abæus began shrieking as he crossed over the emerald hill's crescent, startled Umber, who was in deep meditation with the sun's rays dancing wildly around his body. He turned towards scream and saw Abæus flailing his wings as flames begun to blossom across his body like swaying scarlet lotuses. This shook Umber to his core as he immediately dashed in front of Abæus.

"Sit down, focus on your core and try to make the flames follow the path of your blood!" he yelled desperately as he opened his beak wide and began sucking in the flames that were blooming across Abæus body. The flames were raging out of control as Umber breathed in as much as he could off Abæus. This gave slight relief to Abæus, who had sat down and begun focusing on the core inside of himself. He could feel it burning under the constant influx of energy from the sun that had amassed across his body. He began willing it to spin spread across following the path of his blood. The burning sensation spread inside of him under his direction as waves of pains cascaded over his consciousness.

Abæus focused on pushing the flames through his core and following the path of his burning veins. It was like a map of all his veins and blood vessels formed inside his mind as he willed the flames forward. The energy condensed from the sun began running rampant through his vessels like hot magma scorching everything. The tips of his feathers began turning into ash as the energy pathed beneath. It followed from his heart across his wings and cycled backed before heading through his thighs, legs, and back. After a few cycles of rotating the energy throughout his body, the energy had finally seemed to calm down, slowly circulate the path under his core's direction.

"You survived this time. You should be more careful in absorbing the sun's rays. They will be naturally attracted to you now that you have formed a beast core." Umber said.

Abæus continued with his cultivation as umbers voice faded into the background leaving him alone with his thoughts. The world seemed to melt away as the warm of the sun's energy snuck its way into the crevices of his body. The feathers that had been charred by the rampant energy o soon fell out as new one began to grow quickly replacing them. however, as Abæus continued meditating the world began to slip away as a familiar voice echoed in his mind. The words were unfathomable to him, but they guided the energy within his body in automatically. The energy of the sun began to heat up again as it pooled in seven locations the crown of his head, wings, legs, belly and heart. These small pools of energy formed seven ephemeral stars across the path of energy, and as the last one formed in his heart a voiced echoed out from the recess of his mind.

"Celestial Yang Beast Manual" the voiced cried out before fading away.

There seemed to be more but as Abæus tried to understand it faded away as if it was just out of reach. It seemed that he would have to continue cultivating before it would show itself again.