Good Mafu

Wei Sha's eyes connected with the Darken Mafu's.

'Shit!' He shot his sights away from the creature.

From what he remembered, Darken Mafus didn't fancy being stared at because they too recognised their outwards appearance of a repulsive and malformed fiend.

Eyes just off the Darken Mafu's body, he sighed in relief as from the corner of his eyes he saw the Darken Mafu nudge forwards.

'Yes!' he rejoiced when a rough tongue ran over the slit on his wrist. The Daren Mafu had accepted his blood offering. 'I am favoured,' he thought to himself.

[Stop] All of a sudden, as the Darken Mafu became engrossed in licking the blood flowing out of Wei Sha, Lin Siniang intervened.

The Darken Mafu's tongue, still seeking to lick the wound, was moved away by Lin Siniang's pull.

As a reply, the Darken Mafu let out a roar and resisted Lin Siniang dragging it away from Wei Sha.

'What?' Wei Sha became confused for a second before his mind tried to recall the ancient texts. Maybe he had missed something?

'No, the Darken Mafu shouldn't act like this.' There was no answer, at least in his memories.

[Maf!] Lin Siniang — for the first time Wei Sha had heard — raised her volume.

With no pre-given answer at hand, Wei Sha sought to understand the scene in front of him. In that scene, the beast she called "Maf" jumped at him multiple times, but never got far as the collar halted its efforts.

Wei Sha, not knowing what action to take, did nothing.

Anyway, it seemed to him that Maf eased its craving for blood rather fast for a predator. Or the collar choking its throat discouraged it enough to give up and act nice again.

A minute later, when the Darken Mafu laid on the black floor, letting out dissatisfied groans, Lin Siniang turned to him.

In her sign form, she spoke [Sit]

Wei Sha backpedalled to the chair as she continued [Th- t-sts wil- con-in-e]

Lin Sinian pulled Maf's collar a bit and hovered towards him.

'She will put me back in straps?' Wei Sha imagined what would happen next, and so complied before she had told anything.

[N-] However, Lin Siniang, seeing him strap himself voluntarily, forbid him.

"Okay?" He didn't know why she changed her mind on the matter; nevertheless, he untied the straps he had managed to work on so far.

[Yo- ar- w-lc---e]

Wei Sha didn't catch the meaning of her words. 'She's trustful of me?' 'Did that interaction with the Darken Mafu do something?' So, he decided to think of a motive for her actions which seemed to have him in, favour?

[Maf!]

"What?!" Wei Sha came back to reality with a jolt. However, the first thing he saw was Maf, trying to slither its tongue towards his wound, beginning to seal itself.

Nothing serious.

"Whose a greedy boy?" Wei Sha nudged his back forwards. "Yes, you are." He scratched the Darken Mafu by its human ear.

In turn for his pats, Maf let out satisfied growls while still attempting to lick his blood, though Wei Sha didn't let the latter happen due to his fear of things escalating once more.

[Th-t'- en-ug-] Indeed, Lin Siniang did not allow this interaction to last long.

Wei Sha shot his back straight, and in his mind expected Maf to appear disappointed or resentful even.

However, Maf as if understanding her words didn't at least show a negative facial expression.

[Maf, check the aspirant's aptitudes]

Maf listened, and so took two steps towards Wei Sha — the Darken Mafu now stood between Wei Sha's legs. Then it raised its paw against Wei Sha's dantian.

As Maf did so, Wei Sha stared at the long black hairs on its back.

Eyes glued, he saw how the hairs began to turn blue.

Wei Sha's forehead wrinkled.

Of course, his confusion had no change to the fact that every single hair on Maf's back turned blue, nor how they waved elegantly along its body.

'Blue? I shouldn't be blue. . .' On the matter of the wave motion, he possessed no clue to its meaning. What he knew, however, was that the purity of the colour wasn't common but a one in a ten thousand, if not rarer.

Soon more wrinkles rose on his forehead. 'The colour, it's changing?'

Likewise, the wave motion ceased with the turning of colour.

As the hairs on Maf's back took a green hue to them, they floated upwards like seaweed.

Lost all understanding on the situation at hand, Wei Sha looked through the hairs at Lin Sininang. "What's going on?" he asked, eyes squinting.

No answer.

Once again, Lin Siniang hid information from him.

Yet as he already looked at Maf's hair, he could see another transition process come about.

'Red. Flowing like wildfire.'

"Rawr!" Maf let out a grand roar.

'Is it trying to say something?' Wei Sha glanced at the Darken Mafu, who indeed showed a motion. Maf's tongue glided over its teeth row, picking any blood stuck between its razor-sharp teeth.

'Meh,' Wei Sha rejected such an idea. 'It just wants more of my blood.'

As he thought so, he saw how Maf got onto his hind legs.

Also, the second frontal paw came atop the other — the one already placed above Wei Sha's dantian.

"rawr."

'Maf roared?' It sure tried to roar, Wei Sha had no doubts concerning this, but the volume of it was so. . . pitiful. More so than a roar, it was a miserable wail.

Aside from the interpretation of a roar, Wei Sha felt Maf's paws push against his dantian.

[Hmm] A hum coming from Lin Siniang could be heard as Maf did so.

Next, Wei Sha, looking down at Maf's paws, noticed threads — no longer than a toothpick — of every colour imaginable rush out of his dantian.

From there, each thread flew and penetrated a strand of hair on Maf's back. That strand then took the colour of the thread which had entered.

A spectacle began.

The strands of hair, already occupied, came under assault from the ones still launching off from Wei Sha's dantian.

A blue thread would attack a red strand of hair. Their collision began a mini-war concerning which colour and effect took place. As an added fact, the outcomes of those battles added in new colours as some colours, instead of fighting, mixed into their respective secondary colours.

Wei Sha rolled his eyes and shook his shoulders. 'I might as well look at the walls here!' He held no interested in watching colours do whatever this was supposed to be. What he wanted was the results, his aptitudes!

[Hmm. Hmm] Lin Siniang hummed as she started to hover around Maf.

"Lin Siniang." Wei Sha tried to gain her attention when she was between him and Maf. "Is this good or bad?" Sure, he had asked her once already and given no answer. Still, going against his idea of not pushing her, he did so since he couldn't keep himself silent anymore.

[B-d] she responded.

Her words shock Wei Sha to the core. 'What if I don't pass the test?' A chill ran through him.

[G--d] she gave another response a moment later.

Wei Sha felt as if a weight had fallen off his shoulders.

[Ter-ibe] she contradicted herself once again.

'Choose your mind already!' he thought as two new, heavier weights took place on his shoulders.

This went on for a good while.

'Okay. I can't let Lin Siniang decide my fate.' Sick of this emotional abuse, Wei Sha decided that he would intervene in this somehow.

Despite his wants and wishes, what could he do?

Wei Sha, looking around him and trying to invent one, had nothing he could use until.

'Maf!' he found a piece he could work with.

And.

His hands were still free.

With these two pieces in his control, he didn't waste a second to use them to better his standings in this fate deciding moment.

*Slit*

Wei Sha used his fingernail to open his other wrist.

The fresh blood oozing out of the wound attracted Maf's attention in no time.

"Here you go, boy," he whispered, hoping Lin Siniang wouldn't notice his actions.

The bubble appeared to be engrossed in the strands of hair on Maf's back. His ploy had begun just fine.

Maf, though continuing with the testing, licked the stretched out hand with no squabbles.

[Ast-und-ng]

Wei Sha snickered. His plan worked!

[Ext-a-rdin-ary]

The more blood Wei Sha fed, the more positives he heard from Lin Siniang.

Of course, Wei Sha's ploy had the negative of him losing blood at an extreme pace, but that was set aside since failing the test would mean death!

The positives far outstripped the negatives.

The positives weight so much, that when Wei Sha realised blood in the hand being fed to Maf be almost all spent, he slit open the old wound almost sealed shut.

Maf, who too had noted the lack of blood, changed to Wei Sha's other arm gushing out that sweet nectar.

[Unse-n]

Sometimes, taking a glance at her, Wei Sha deemed that Lin Sininang had her mind rammed with other matters right now. And so, he without a second thought or preparing a contingency plan continued.

Like he could have made a contingency plan anyway, for the lack of blood was so great, his mind became hazy.

The picture his mind received wasn't much to look at while the feelings he received were mushed into a blank sensation which informed him of nothing. To add more misery, he hadn't felt anything from his legs for some time already.

All he knew was to hold his hand up so Maf could have one or two licks more.