Two Weeks Later.

Obviously, most cultivators wanted to get their hands on as many resources as possible, but to Raymond, money had an entirely different meaning. Instead of furthering his cultivation, Raymond could use this money to enhance his talent. In the short term, it might not do that much for him, but in the long run, it would be way more beneficial. The only real problem with going into Greencrest forest was that Raymond wasn't strong enough.

With the strength he had right now, he might be able to defeat one of the weaker species of low-grade rank 1 demonic beasts, but that was about it. If he wanted to have some degree of safety, Raymond wanted to at least break through to the 4th revolution of body-refining before going into the forest. And to break through to the 4th revolution of body-refining, Raymond reckoned that he would need to spend at least 2 weeks cultivating, and that was just an estimate. He still wasn't sure how much harder it would be to cultivate in the future.

Through the books, Raymond also learned that the forest was divided into different zones. The first zone, which was basically the outer rim of the forest, was fairly harmless. In this zone, cultivators would be hard-pressed to find a single rank 2 demonic beast. In comparison, the 2nd zone was a lot more dangerous, and it was in this zone that Raymond had woken up in. In the 2nd zone, rank 2 demonic beasts were abundant in numbers, and if you were really unlucky, you might even run into a low-grade rank 3 demonic beast.

Last but not least was the 3rd and final zone, this zone was also commonly referred to as the death zone by cultivators that lived around here. Most people were not brave enough to venture into the death zone, but out of the few that did, almost 90% didn't return alive. Some people claimed to have spotted all kinds of things in the death zone; one cultivator even claimed to have seen a rank 5 demonic beast, the Frostflame Demonic Ape.

Through these texts, Raymond also learned that not counting the low, mid and high grades, there was another grade of demonic beasts. This grade was the top grade, or more commonly referred to as the paragon grade. A paragon-grade demonic beast was something that was hard to come across, and if you did, there was only one logical thing to do: run! A rank 1 paragon-grade demonic beast would be something that only the strongest of 9th revolution body-refining experts could handle.

To Raymond, all of this information was certainly useful, and it strengthened his resolve to get stronger. Just thinking about all the different types of demonic beasts out there that could easily take his life almost made him shudder. Raymond was destined to be powerful, he knew that much, but to realise this destiny, he needed to work hard. Which was exactly what he was going to do. With a determined expression on his face, Raymond quietly left the library, his goal to break through to the 4th revolution of body-refining!

...

With a loud shout, Raymond swung his sword heavily, stirring the winds in his surroundings. He was finally done with his training session, and he felt like he was beginning to get close to another breakthrough. If he made another breakthrough in his sword art, Raymond would have managed to reach the perfection realm of mastery. For only two weeks worth of practice, his achievements would baffle most. Although his sword mastery was close to perfection, his other martial arts were a little lacking in comparison. His Basic Footwork Technique had managed to reach the advanced realm just the day before, which wasn't too bad, but his Basic Fist Art was still stuck in the intermediate realm of mastery.

Although it was a little disappointing, Raymond didn't feel down because of it. These past two weeks had been hectic, and most of his time had been spent on cultivating rather than practising martial arts. After cultivating for 3 and a half hours, Raymond would practice his martial arts for an hour, before taking a break by going to the library or strolling around the city. After having some fun, Raymond would practice his martial arts for another hour, before rounding off his day with another 3 and a half hours of cultivation.

This had been his routine for the past two weeks, and it had brought him splendid results. Cultivating for 7 hours in a row would be tedious, but breaking that time in half and cultivating once in the morning, and once in the evening was way more doable. Like this, Raymond's cultivation had leapt all the way from the beginning of the 2nd revolution to the beginning of the 4th revolution. Not only that, but he had already filled his 10th energy channel with spiritual energy, which meant that he was already working on his 11th one.

The Raymond from two weeks ago would probably not be able to touch his sleeves at the moment. With satisfaction apparent on his face, Raymond left the courtyard of the inn. On his way out, he snuck a glance at a middle-aged man that was sitting on one of the benches with both of his eyes closed. Raymond still had no idea who this middle-aged man was, but he would always show up at least once a day, occasionally glancing in Raymond's direction.

Every time he did, Raymond could feel his hand holding the sword tremble, and a cold shiver would run down his spine. It was like being eyed by a prehistoric beast, a sort of feeling that was hard to describe. In the beginning, Raymond wanted to confront the man, and ask him what he wanted, but after some consideration, he realised that it was probably not the best idea. Before he grew strong enough, Raymond would make sure to stay away from trouble, especially when he could feel how scary the middle-aged man was from a single glance.

After finishing up his practice, Raymond took a shower before he left for the library. On the way there, he bought himself some snacks and something to drink, which he would enjoy whilst reading. As per usual, the library was empty when he got there, not a single soul seemed to have an interest in reading here, but to Raymond, that was almost like a blessing in disguise. Since he was all alone here, he could relax a bit without caring about his image at all.

As he read through a few books on spiritual herbs and items that were worth a considerable sum of money, Raymond pondered a little to himself. Although he had gotten way stronger in these past two weeks, he was still unsure if he should head into the Greencrest forest yet or not. On the one hand, he wanted to grow stronger as soon as possible, and to do that, he needed resources. But on the other hand, he also wanted to just train in peace until he was even stronger since that would provide him with a lot more security.