Hu Yumei had lived two lives before her death. The first, as a soldier. The second, as a veterinarian.
She was an orphan raised by the state, growing up in military barracks, cradled by the sound of gunfire and the cold clarity of commands.
Discipline shaped her. Combat hardened her. By sixteen, she was already deployed. By twenty, she had survived two wars.
She fought in deserts, jungles, and cities choked by dust and flame. She buried comrades whose names she still whispered in dreams. When her final tour ended, she didn't return with medals. She returned with silence.
So she left the uniform behind and chose a different path—one not paved in orders and blood. She went back to school, studied late into the nights, and became a veterinarian.
It surprised people, but not those who knew her heart. She had always been good with the wounded—whether human or beast.
Her new life became one of gentle paws, wet noses, and long days tending to the broken and wild. Rescue missions, shelter work, forest patrols—she traded rifles for syringes, boots for rubber gloves. The world finally softened around her.
Until the day it all went wrong.
The mission was simple: rescue and relocate an endangered snow panther from a remote archipelago. But no one accounted for pirates.
The ambush was sudden. Explosions rocked their research vessel. Men with guns boarded, taking hostages. Hu Yumei, calm under fire, fought tooth and nail—she was no stranger to death. But this time, she wasn't wearing armor. Just a blood-stained lab coat.
Still, she saved the young biologist, shielded the ship's cook, and bought time for others to escape into the jungle. Then she was shot. Even so, she swam. Bleeding, gasping, crawling toward shore. Toward safety. Toward nothing.
Even as she collapsed beneath a bush, she tended to the wounded, shoving aside her pain. Her last thoughts were not of regret, but of the lives she was leaving behind.
Her six loyal dogs. Her three aloof cats. Her five golden fish—all waiting, unknowing. Alone.
And Maximus, her golden eagle. Her soulmate. Hatched from a cracked egg in her hands. Who would feed him now? Her best friend was scared of butterflies. Her husband—no, ex-husband—didn't even like birds.
"Oh dear," she murmured with a fading breath. "Maximus…"
———-
She felt it first: weight. As if her body had been swapped for stone. The air was thick. Sounds came near and far, as if underwater.
Rushed voices. Terrified.
She wanted to move. Couldn't.
Then—shaking.
A woman's hands, rough and trembling, yanked her upright.
"Wake up, little darling! We have to leave now!"
Hu Yumei gasped, coughing, lungs filling with air that wasn't hers. Groggy. Disoriented. She blinked, then squinted up into a tear-streaked face full of fear.
Who…?
Reality began to spin.
This wasn't the jungle. Not the mission. Not even Earth. The air pulsed with something older, stranger.
Her limbs were tiny. Her arms—soft and pudgy. Her chest? Flat.
A child's body.
The woman clutched her protectively, grabbing a worn bag and bolting for the door.
As Hu Yumei bounced against her shoulder, memories of another life crashed into her like pressure. Memories that weren't hers.
A girl named Fan Yumei. Age seven. Kind, curious. Died just last night from a fever after a dangerous attempt to awaken her core—a process needed to activate one's body for cultivating a profession.
In this world, both humans and beasts were ranked by star-level (1–7) and class, from F (lowest) to SS (highest), depending on profession.
The poor girl had traveled two villages away, desperate to heighten her potential.
She'd been inspired by a wealthy classmate who bragged that his brother had found rare 3-star spiritual core plants at the edge of the Dew Springs Mountains' safe zone.
Proudly, he would say his brother secured many resources for him to awaken with higher core purity.
Thanks to that support, he could aim for a better class, profession, and star rating. He would definitely become a Soul Function Awakened.
Fan Yumei had wandered the safe zone's edge, hoping for her own miracle.
Her family didn't have much. Neither parent held high-level profession awakenings, nor did they possess enough Federation coins to afford cultivation resources.
Growing up in the countryside safe zones meant scraping by. They owned only one outdated shared phone—and even that came with a steep monthly service fee of 500 Federation coins. No internet. Her mother used it sparingly.
Her mother, Ka Sanni, was a 2-star E-Class spiritual core holder—a low-level Herbalist still at the Apprentice stage, Base Low level.
Her father, Fan Yangwei, had a 4-star D-Class dual-core awakening in Hunter and Elemental Caller. His sub-profession, Rune Master, was at Apprentice stage, Major Mid level. But with limited resources, he'd only managed to learn a few basic runes to make life a little easier.
They'd poured everything they had into her schooling at the city academy, hoping she'd be the one to turn things around.
Instead, before she could enjoy the fruits of her hard work, she died of a fever caught in the wilds of Dew Springs Mountain safe zone.
Now… Hu Yumei was in her body.
They shared a name: Yumei. But this world was a backward, evolved version of Earth—one filled with magical beasts, raids, mages, and core-bound fates.
And right now, one of those beast raids had reached their doorstep.