2 II: Mountain Path

After sending all the village children away, Aedan walked back to the cottage and started cleaning the mess.

He headed south where there was a lake and returned with a bucket of water he used to extinguish the flames, and removed the burnt pieces of wood one by one when he heard fast steps coming from the direction of the village.

"Aedan!" He heard a mature voice before a woman dressed in fur armor took a leap over the woods and fell before him. His face showed a bit of emotion seeing the gentle gaze of the woman before him.

The instant his eyes fell on her he was pleasantly surprised, but then his face darken. "Aunt Kayla, you shouldn't be here."

Not giving him ears, Kayla slapped his shoulder with a rare smile on her face. "How can I not see my favorite nephew. I saw what the village children did, let me deal with it."

Seeing her unwavering stare, Aedan could only nod as a complex feeling surfaced in his heart.

This woman used to be the second greatest expert of his father's generation and the one who treated him with the greatest. Since he was a kid he knew of her affection she held towards Olberick, his father but the latter was too single-minded and never reciprocated her feelings.

As the only one of her generation with the capability of reaching the body refinement stage, she had to take all the responsibilities belonging to her father when he suddenly left the village and Aedan, as his son, felt guilty.

With a glance, he saw her Life core was on the Ninth layer.

The process of forming the core was very hard and it required to follow a Lifeforce Condensing Manual for it to have higher chances of success.

As for those in the village, the strongest in his own generation were only in the fifth layer, much slower than him.

Aedan kept taking out the broken wooden planks, but he couldn't stay silent under Kayla's worrying gaze. "Don't worry, I'm fine"

His shoulders lowered as he whispered. "It's my fault that things ended this way."

Looking at this lonely figure, Kayla saw a mature air that wasn't present in this youth before he left five years ago.

'He must have experienced a lot out there.' Sighing to herself, she left Aedan by himself but not before telling him to call her if he needed anything.

It couldn't be said she wasn't interested in the world outside the forest to know just what changed that gentle boy so much that made him return as a cripple. Even so, the thought of leaving never entered her head.

Once he cleaned all the burned wood, Aedan picked up his Axe and walked up the mountain path.

Suddenly, his ears caught something swiftly approaching his location.

Slash!

Swinging his axe, a large black wolf received a fatal blow on its neck and fell lifeless on the ground.

"I may have been a common man now, but I can still kill a wild beast." Giving a snort at the wolf's body, Aedan continued to climb the mountain.

"This Tree is good." Finding a golden-leafed tree, Aedan was satisfied and started cutting it down.

After he took down four whole golden-leafed trees, he cut off it's branches and put them on the side.

Searching for something on his clothes, he took out a small pouch and waved in the air. All the tree trunks and branches were minimized then sucked into the pouch.

'Good, I should have finished repairing the cottage before morning.'

[Help!!!]

When he was about to return, a childish voice screamed for help inside his mind.

'Who?!' He swiftly turned around but couldn't see the source of the voice. Just which child would walking in this mountain this late at night?

Aedan focused his senses and headed towards the source of the voice while prepared just in case.

This made him follow the mountain path all the way to the top but instead of the small lake and trees that were supposed to be here was a huge hole leading deep into earth.

"Wait I came here just last night to pick herbs, there wasn't any hole here." He felt a strange sensation and couldn't distinguish it as danger or something else.

Walking to the border of the hole, he saw how deep it goes. "Its not possible something like this appeared overnight, is it?"

After searching for ten thousand ticks, he grew tired and took the path down the mountain. Meanwhile, at bottom of the pit, was a huge chamber and an even bigger stone wall filled with numerous inscriptions.