Taming the Beast World with a Frying Pan-Chapter 88: Three Stages

The kitchen was quiet, save for the crackling of the fire and the rhythmic scrape-scrape-scrape of Kael’s finger against the bottom of his clay bowl. He had finished the soup minutes ago, but he was currently trying to get the glaze off the pottery to get the last molecule of flavor.

Ren stood next to Syris, watching the tiger.

"Feral Madness," Ren prompted again, nudging Syris with her elbow.

Syris sighed, looking down at his empty bowl with a mournful expression. He looked like a man who had just finished a fine meal and was now being asked to do his taxes.

"It is... unpleasant," Syris began, his voice low. "It is a mystery to our kind. No one knows why it happens. Some say it is a curse from the Moon Goddess. Others say it is just bad luck."

He glanced at Kael, his amethyst eyes narrowing.

"But many believe it is caused by the heart," Syris continued. "Overflowing rage. Grief. Or emotions too strong for the spirit to contain. When the heart breaks, the Beast takes the wheel."

Ren frowned. "So, emotional trauma causes a psychotic break?"

"I do not know what ’psychotic’ means," Syris said, waving a hand. "But there are three stages. We are taught this as snakelets."

He held up a pale, slender finger.

"Stage One," Syris listed. "Symptoms appear. Random aggression. Insatiable hunger—the kind that food cannot fill. And the memories start to fade. They forget their friends. They forget their manners. They become... rude."

Ren nodded. "Okay. The ’Hangry’ stage."

Syris held up a second finger.

"Stage Two," he said gravely. "The red eyes. Uncontrollable shifting into the beast form. The animal is no longer just inside; it is clawing at the skin. They attack blindly. They recognize nothing."

He pointed at Kael, who had given up on the bowl and was now staring at a beetle crawling on the floor with intense, murderous concentration.

"He was showing signs of Stage Two," Syris admitted, stroking his chin. "The shifting. The eyes. But..."

Syris frowned, looking at Kael’s current state. The tiger was sitting on the floor in his beastman form—two arms, two legs, very muscular, very naked (save for the struggling loincloth).

"But he is in his beastman form now," Syris murmured, sounding confused. "Usually, a male in Stage Two cannot hold this form. He would be stuck as a tiger. Perhaps your gumbo... pushed him back."

"So he’s not Stage Two?" Ren asked, hope blooming in her chest.

"He is teetering," Syris decided. "Hovering at the precipice. The end of Stage One, perhaps. But dangling one toe into the madness."

Ren felt a chill run down her spine. "And Stage Three?"

Syris hesitated. He held up a third finger, but his hand dropped slowly.

"Stage Three," he whispered. "The Consumption. The beastman mind is extinguished completely. The body mutates. The fur turns black as void. They become a Shadow Beast."

"Shadow Beast," Ren repeated, the name sounding like a high-level boss in a video game.

"A monster," Syris clarified. "Mindless. Violent. They kill until they are killed. There is no coming back from Stage Three. Usually, when a male feels the symptoms of Stage One, they leave their tribe. They travel far away, into the wastelands, to die alone so they do not hurt their kin."

Ren looked at Kael.

He wasn’t a monster. He was just... lost. He was a big, confused cat.

"Is there a cure?" Ren asked, though she already dreaded the answer.

Syris shook his head. "No. It is a death sentence. Once the eyes turn red permanently, we usually put them down. It is a mercy."

Ren turned away, her mind racing.

She tapped her chin, thinking back to when she first arrived in this world.

She remembered the forest. She remembered Kael pinning her down. He had been aggressive then, too. His eyes had flashed red. He had been hungry—starving, actually. But she had cured him with bacon. Back then, it hadn’t been this hard.

’He must have been early Stage One back then,’ Ren analyzed. ’Now... he’s much worse.’

’System,’ Ren thought. ’Check status.’

[Subject: Kael] [Health: 22% (Declining)]

It had dropped another percent.

Ren’s heart hammered against her ribs.

’The Health Bar isn’t his life,’ she realized with terrifying clarity. ’It’s a countdown. When it hits 0%, he doesn’t die. He becomes a Shadow Beast.’

She looked at Kael. He looked calm right now, the soup having sedated the beast for a moment. But it was temporary. The numbers were ticking down. The soup was a band-aid on a bullet wound.

"Syris," Ren said, her voice trembling slightly. "This... Shadow Beast thing. I can’t let that happen. The gumbo helped, but it’s not a cure. I need to know how to reverse it."

Syris shrugged helplessly. "I told you. There is no cure. Even I, the magnificent Snake King, do not know how to fix a broken soul."

Ren gritted her teeth. She refused to accept that. There had to be a way. Even in this primitive world, there was always a solution if you looked hard enough. A hidden herb, a forgotten ritual, or an expert.

"You said ’Not much is known’," Ren pressed, turning to face him fully. "That means someone knows something. Is there anyone—anyone at all—who knows more about Feral Madness than the average beastman?"

Syris froze. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

The relaxed, soup-drunk expression vanished from his face instantly.

His lips curled into a deep, ugly frown. His amethyst eyes darkened, shifting from a soft violet to the color of a bruised plum. A palpable aura of irritation and anger radiated off him, making the air in the kitchen feel suddenly cold.

He looked like he had just bitten into a lemon.

"There is," Syris spat, the words tasting like mud in his mouth. "There is only one beastman who studies such dangerous, useless things."

"Who?" Ren asked, desperate.

Syris looked at her, his expression twisting with supreme annoyance.

"The Fox," he growled.