Reborn: Rise of the Greatest Summoner

'Don't do it!' Ghost screamed in his head.

'Don't do it!' He badly wanted to scream this out.

'Don't do it!' He really wanted to.

'Don't be a martyr!' The Espionage Priest of the Beast Coalition wanted to yell this at the Beast King but he could not bring himself to do it.

At this moment, Legolas already unmuted the galactic communication device. If he wanted to yell, he could but at this moment, he couldn't.

Through the connection, Ghost just looked at the feared Demonic Lion.

He looked at the notorious leader of the Beast Coalition.

He looked at the imposing figure of the Beast King.

'Don't do it!' It reverberated in his mind but he said something else.

"You've grown". The words came out of his mouth without him thinking about it as for the first time in minutes, Gaufrid looked at him again.

Looking at the galactic access phone, Gaufrid saw tears flowing.

Ghost was caught with tears; this was a first to Gaufrid!

He was shocked, but this sight only made Gaufrid smile.

Seeing his smile, Ghost bit his lips as he stared at him. 

His lips quivered; his emotions were unstable.

As he stared at him, Gaufrid seemed to become smaller before him as time seemed to rewind right there before him to 250 years ago when the Beast Coalition was still in its inception stage.

When the young, hot-blooded Gaufrid was still running amok.

When he still had the identity of the Nak mercenary.

He still remembered it vividly like it was yesterday. He could still feel himself going through the emotional battle of his mind on seeing the 2 young beasts heroically fighting against the Nak poachers.

His decision to rescue Gaufrid and Saurtem that day was not made on a whim.

He already lived for so long as a beast and grew to understand the world he lived in that he grew used to the cruelty against beasts, he learned to turn a blind eye to it.

At that moment in time, he already completely embraced his 2nd identity.

He already watched dozens of beasts poached and sold, even killed by his poacher group but he never intervened to help these beasts.

He intervened that one time because the 2 beasts were different.

"Monsters!" Guafrid yelled aggressively at the poachers even as Saurtem was already captured and he was slowly being cornered.

"I hate you all, cowards!" He spat hatefully.

"You call yourself the sentient races but that's just hypocrisy!"

"We're beasts but we're not monsters!"

"You…, you are the true MONSTERS!" He roared.

"One day, I shall become the symbol that will end the reign of brutality against beasts, I will pull you monsters down from your pedestals!"

"Even if I die today, my spirit will live on!" 

"My ghost will haunt you!"

"Till beasts gain freedom, you all shall gain no freedom!"

Ghost had seen other beasts yell even more ridiculous words of bravado when faced with the prospect of death and captivity, but Gaufrid was different.

His choice of words was different.

The anger in his voice and zeal of his spirit resonated with him.

This was why he saved Gaufrid and Saurtem.

At this moment, Ghost went down the memory lane as he remembered that moment of taking them to his home.

He didn't want to become the good Samaritan though, he wanted to put Gaufrid to the test and see if he would die and fade to history just like the others.

"You can only stay at my house for 2 days, any more than that is already risky for me".

"I won't jeopardize my identity just to pamper the 2 of you".

Gaufrid reacted like he didn't hear as he looked at this beast with bright shining eyes. "You're powerful, join us!"

"Huh?" Ghost looked at them, confused.

Gaufrid did not hold back, he told him everything.

"My life goal is to end all the beast suffering".

"My goal is to liberate every beast in suffering".

"I want to build a Beast Empire".

"I want to create a beast organization to oppose the sentient races".

"…" For almost a minute, Ghost did not reply.

Hearing those words being said so zealously felt like a stray bullet was just shot through his heart, it made him relive his childhood in an instant. 

Ghost's childhood was even more traumatizing than Gaufrid's and Saurtem's.

In most planets of the Minerva Star System, most Naks and Ackermanns mostly eat animals that were yet to take any mana into them but in some planets, Naks and Ackermanns eat beasts for their higher nutrient quality.

Most of these people don't give a damn that their food had sentience.

This was worse than eating companions like dogs and cats.

This was like humans literally eating other humans.

This was how bad the stigma of beast suffering was.

Ghost grew up in a beast slaughterhouse.

When he was just 6 months old, he saw his father, the biggest of the Reptiles killed and made into a popular Nak stew by his Nak captors. 

When he was 8 months old, he saw his mom killed for food.

A day after his mom was killed, food was served to them like usual.

That day, Ghost could not eat.

The monsters served his mom to him to eat.

He could hear their voices due to his keen senses outside their cage. "Hehehe…, will he eat it?"

"He has no idea".

"They're so foolish, I wonder how it feels to eat your own mom".

Hearing those words, Ghost shook in bottled rage and frustration.

That day, he cried tears of rage and humiliation.

Before he was 2, he saw his whole family slaughtered one after the other for nothing but food. Imagine that as a sentient being, let's say a human.

Imagine the trauma, the cruel living it was.

At the ripe age of 5, Ghost was finally taken alongside the others to be slaughtered but it was that day that he awakened his shapeshifting bloodline.

He escaped that day, running far away from the slaughterhouse.

Decades later, as a Grade D Shapeshifting Reptile, he came back as a Nak citizen casually patronizing the quality meat there and he massacred every single Nak citizen working in the slaughterhouse for revenge.

Remembering all these, the tears rolling down his eyes flowed faster.

Looking at Gaufrid through the galactic access phone, Ghost ground his teeth. "It is your destiny".

"Do what you need to do but…," He paused as he inclined his head to look at the human. "Make sure to use a soul contract".

Gaufrid nodded as tears also flowed down his eyes at this moment.

"Thank you…," he paused for a few seconds. "Teacher".