"Alex, can you hear me? Wake up."
Alex could hear a vague voice but couldn't recognize it.
"What is going on? Am I alive, or is the Judge of Hell calling me to be judged for my sins?"
Alex was in a semi-conscious state. He wanted to wake up, but something was keeping him in this condition.
Then someone poured a glass of water on his face.
Alex instantly woke up.
"Am I really alive? Have the doctors successfully removed my cancer cells?"
His consciousness was coming back slowly.
"Hey, Alex, are you alright?"
He heard that unfamiliar voice again. A young man was waving his hand in front of his eyes.
"Who are you? Where are the doctors?" Alex asked the man.
The man stopped his hand and looked worriedly at the woman beside him.
"Those bastards went too far this time. Alex didn't even do anything. They just beat him up like beasts. Poor Alex," the woman said angrily.
"I think he has lost his memory or is still in shock. Let's give him some time. He has gone through a hard time after all," the young man said.
"Alex, call us if you need anything. We'll stay nearby."
Saying this, they left a phone near him and left the room.
"Who were these people? I seem to be in a hospital, but it looks more advanced than the one I remember. Is this a secretly modified advanced room learned from alien technology?
If that's the case, I'm sure they only use these advanced rooms for critical operations like mine.But why would they use such a hightech room to treat a poor guy like me who doesn't even have legs."
But then his eyes landed on his legs, which were covered with a blanket.
Alex's eyes widened and became like footballs when he saw them.
"How can this be possible? Maybe they're not legs."
Alex immediately tried to move those legs, and to his surprise, he could move them easily.
"Have they given me robotic legs or something?"
He removed the blanket, and two normal legs were there. They didn't look robotic at all.
"Nothing makes sense anymore. When did Earth become so advanced that they're implanting natural legs and treating stage-four cancer? Something is wrong, very, very wrong."
Then his eyes landed on the blue cat beside him. The cat was very small and vulnerable. It looked like it was going to die at any moment.
Suddenly, a tremendous amount of information started flooding into his brain.
"Ahh!"
He couldn't help but let out a roar before losing consciousness again.
He didn't know how much time had passed, but something was licking his face.
He woke up again.
"Blue," the name came out of his mouth instinctively.
The cat's ears perked up and looked at him. When it saw that Alex was awake, it became extremely happy.
Now Alex understood what was going on.
This was not earth. He had transmigrated into a world where Dragons and Demons were the two major races living alongside humans.
Humans were naturally weaker than Demons and Dragons, which was why they relied on summoning beasts from the Nine Astral Realms. The Astral Realm was mysterious, divided into nine layers, each more dangerous than the last.
At fifteen, people became adults in this world, gaining the chance to contact the Astral Realm and summon a beast from one of its layers. The first layer held the weakest beasts, while the ninth contained the strongest.
Beasts were ranked by strength: Common, Uncommon, Rare, Ultra Rare, Legendary, Epic, Mythical, Supreme, and Divine.
Alex had just turned fifteen yesterday. He was excited to summon his first partner from the Astral Realm.
A person's ability to summon a beast depended on their soul power. The stronger the soul, the higher the layer they could reach. Everyone was born with a certain amount of soul power. It could grow later through cultivation, but the first summon revealed whether someone was a genius or just ordinary.
In this world, cultivators advanced through realms: Master, Grandmaster, Lord, King, Emperor, Saint, and Demigod. The Demigods were the strongest beings, capable of destroying even a galaxy with a single touch.
Normally, people summoned their first beast from the first layer, the common beasts, but some people could reach the second layer by doing intense training from childhood.
Because the rank of the summoned beast decided the fate of its summoner. Everyone got one chance at each major breakthrough. But if the summoned beast was just a common-ranked beast, then it would never be able to break through from the Master realm to the Grandmaster realm.
It would be stuck at that level, and since the master's cultivation depended on the summoned beast, they would also be stopped at the Master level.
Reaching the second layer was generally possible for those who dedicated their lives to training from their childhood. But to reach the third layer, one had to be a genius. There was no training that could bridge that gap.
As for the fourth layer, only children of those Demigods might achieve it.
Even at the higher levels of cultivation, they could barely reach the seventh layer, even those Demigods.
The highest record in the world was a Mythical beast from the seventh layer. It was the strongest in the history of the world — a nine-headed Hydra and it was summoned by the strongest Demigod of humanity, Sir Alexander Isac.
He had summoned it when he broke through to the Demigod realm 2000 years ago. No one had summoned a Mythical beast since then.
The blue cat was the beast the previous Alex had summoned from the first layer.
Though it wasn't a powerful one, Alex was still excited to get his first summoned beast.
But then some of his classmates, who had successfully summoned beasts from the second layer, started mocking him.
Alex couldn't take it and cursed them. They beat him so badly that the previous owner of the body died and he had descended into this body.
"Guess I also died in the operation theatre," Alex sighed.
Then he looked at the weak cat, which was on the verge of death but still licking him happily.
Any summoned beast, if not contracted with its summoner within 24 hours after summoning, would die. It couldn't survive alone in the main world.
But Mythical beasts and above could survive even without a contract, as Sir Alexander had been unconscious for 10 days after summoning the Mythical beast because all his soul energy had been consumed at that time.
For those 10 days, the Hydra protected its summoner. Not even a Demigod dared to approach it.
He knew all this because in their academy, there was an entire book on Sir Alexander Isac and that was a compulsory one.
"I'm sorry, Blue, for making you wait. I'll contract with you right away."
Alex cut his finger with a sharp knife and placed it on Blue's forehead.
Instantly, their souls connected. Alex could feel Blue's emotions, his happiness, his excitement, and also how weak he was right now.
Just as he thought his life as a mediocre summoner was a out to begin, he heard a sound.
[Master has contracted his first beast. The Beast Evolution System is activated.]