Chapter 21

"Thanks for everything," Aiden said after taking the spear.

"It's not a big deal," Galey answered with a warm smile. "Normally this ceremony is from father to son, but since your father isn't here right now, someone should take responsibility."

At that moment, Aiden realized that his father had never told him about this ceremony, which made him a bit sad. Galey noticed this and tried to comfort him.

"Well, before beginning our expedition, your father entrusted me with something for you so you could take it with you if this situation occurred," Galey said while putting his hand in a bag he wore on his waist.

Soon after, he took a little wooden box that he gave to Aiden. Carefully, he opened the box and found what looked like a necklace with some kind of fang.

"As far as I know, this is one of the fangs of the mutated fox that killed Uno in the legend. Your father wanted to give it to you when you became the next leader of the village, but he predicted that maybe you would need it on this journey. You can see it as some kind of lucky charm." Galey said with a smile while trying to comfort him.

"Thank you, I appreciate it." Aiden replied.

And like that, after receiving the necklace, the ceremony was over.

After that, the three villages met in front of the entrance that was nearer to the new area. The three chosen were each surrounded by people from their village who were wishing them luck and saying goodbye to them.

When the farewell was over, the three chosen began to walk towards their destination.

"Maybe we should officially introduce ourselves now that we are a team." Aiden suggested.

"I like the idea. If we are going to work together, we should know each other, so I will start," Blunt said while laughing. "I'm Blunt. I lived more or less 75 seasons. My adulthood day happened 23 seasons ago, and my trial was to kill with my bare hands a red steam gorilla that had its lair in a mountain near our village. I love meat, fighting, and my best qualities are my strength and resilience.

"Well, I guess that's fine," Aiden said while scratching his neck as he didn't know how to react to Blunt's presentation. "I'm Aiden, and I'm 17 years old. I'm the son of the leader of my village, and I've been training my combat and hunting skills since I was little, but I don't have a lot of experience in real combat as I have never gone alone hunting before. I only killed a few common animals while being monitored by my father or some other hunter. "

When Aiden stopped talking, both he and Blunt looked at their companion, waiting for her to introduce herself, to which she replied with a snort before finally starting to talk.

"I'm Brigitte. I'm 20 years old, so I guess I'm the older one here. I graduated from the Lumite School at the age of 12, becoming the youngest student ever capable of mastering all the teachings of our school. Since then, I have spent my time perfecting and upgrading those teachings, as well as discovering a few new fields of investigation previously unknown. As for the abilities and skills that I can use in a field mission, my specialties are tracking and long-distance communication, but don't think that I lack combat skills, as I can perform pretty well with long-range attacks. I recently reached the third level in my cultivation journey, so I'm one of the most capable cultivators in my village. " Brigitte explained, while she kept a proud smile.

After she finished her speech, both Aiden and Blunt kept quiet for a few seconds, trying to understand everything that she said.

"I haven't understood most of the things you said, mainly yours." Blunt finally said, while bursting into laughter and pointing with his finger at Brigitte. "But what I did understand was that you are pretty strong. I have also reached the third level in my cultivation, so I want to see how strong you are. "

At that moment, Blunt stopped walking right in front of Brigitte.

"Come on, punch me with all of your strength. I want to see what that small body can do with that level of cultivation." He said this while sticking out his chest to make it easier for her to punch him.

"Why the hell am I supposed to punch you? And why the hell would that help you test my cultivation?" Brigitte said, embarrassed while covering her face with her hands.

"You know, to test your body refinement," Blunt said, quite convinced.

"Body refinement?" Both Aiden and Brigitte asked while looking confused.

"You guys don't know about body refinement? How the hell do you guys cultivate them? Body refinement is the core of the cultivation journey." Blunt exclaimed while arching an eyebrow.

"I don't know what you are talking about, but what I'm sure of is that the core of the cultivation journey is the expansion of the dantian." Aiden replied.

After saying that, they instantly looked at Brigitte, trying to find someone that supported their words. But what they found instead was a surprised look on her face. Then, with a trembling hand, she pointed at Blunt.

"You say that you use "body refinement" to cultivate, while Aiden said he uses the "expansion of the dantian" to cultivate." She said, before pointing at herself. "But in my village, we don't do anything that sounds like that. We cultivate by stimulating and strengthening our minds."

At that moment, silence returned. No one dared to say anything, as they were trying to understand exactly what was happening. After a few minutes, Brigitte finally began to talk again.

"I have a theory. Maybe, just maybe, each of our villages developed its own methods of cultivation, each one different from the rest, and each one with its advantages. Maybe if we work together, we may be able to fuse them to create a new training method that overcomes all of them, or at least that lets us get stronger in new ways." She said.

"What are you suggesting? Do we just tell you our secret training methods so you can try them? " Blunt said, while on his face appeared a grimace of disgust.

"That's right, I can't simply teach you my family techniques just like that." Aiden said, supporting Blunt's words.

"I'm not saying that you should just teach me all of your techniques. Of course, you would be secretive with that kind of information, I would keep them hidden too, but how about the basics? We can teach each other the most basic training methods that we know, so the others can develop them in their ways, not just copy the others. "

"If it is just that, I can teach you some of the techniques that the commoners use in our village," Blunt said, convinced.

"Me too. There is some knowledge that is known by everyone in my village, so there should not be any problem sharing it with you." Aiden said after hearing them.

After that, the three took a break from their travels to find a secure location where they could share information on their cultivation methods.