Future Talents

As the villagers surrounded Luckas and his group, Jeffrey, Cyl, and Philips were talking while they rode on Mountain Goats. Philips could tear the space to travel great distances, but, ordinary people couldn't take the bombardment of energy in the void so he decided to travel with them.

Philips actually enjoyed traveling like this, he remembered his younger days and was a big fan of landscapes too.

They were listening to the villagers and especially to Byrth and his group, they felt surprised that Luckas played such a big role in the escape, the shock was even greater to Cyl who was present most of the time.

His valuation of Luckas was low, he was one of the few villagers who fainted in the room, but now he began to reconsider it, especially when one of the villagers talked about how he thought that Luckas was going to run away after the first attack towards him.

This made Cyl feel shame, in his eyes the young man was just a coward, but to the villagers, he was even a bigger hero than the novice cultivator. The escort party walked all day and camped next to a river when night came.

Inside a big tent, Philips was listening to Cyl tell him what happened, he had a frown on his face, Jefffrey was sitting by the side with his eyes closed. After Cyl finished his story Philips and Jeffrey sent out one soldier Luckas and Byrth to the tent.

-" I want to reward the villagers, especially those two." Jeffrey felt that they deserved some rewards, most of the villagers lost everything, and Jeffrey thought that was the right thing.

Philips looked at his nephew, the helping hand that he wanted to give sure would be generous, while the Strafhampton family still had the prideful nature of nobles, they treated commoners way better than other nobles, especially Jeffrey whose mother was a commoner.

-" I thought about that too, I have some plan in mind, but you can take the lead in granting the rewards." Philips was deep in thought as he spoke. "About the novice cultivator, before rewarding him, we need to know if he is part of the Eternal Sun Sect."

Philips's words made the other two frown, the primal flame was still in their minds, they knew that Byrth cultivated the Eternal Sun Energy, they were almost sure that he caused the phenomenon so losing someone from their territory with such talent left them with a bitter taste in their mouths.

Not long after Luckas and Byrth entered the tent, they were visibly nervous as they looked around the room, Philips was smiling at them but it didn't mitigate the impact of the meeting for them.

Seeing how tense they were Jeffrey coughed. and said; -" First of all, I would like to extend my gratitude for your roles in the battle against the Dark Palace schemes. Could you two too please tell us what you experienced there?"

Philips was grinning inside, he could feel that Jeffrey was nervous too, he was too formal as he spoke with two young men, which would make them even more nervous. As Jeffrey finished speaking he made a gesture for them to sit.

Luckas and Byrth felt out of place, the people in front of them were way too important, Byrth was giving Luckas a side glance, as if telling him to take the lead, after all, Luckas gulped and prepared himself to tell the history.

-" Excuse me, but, where should I begin?" Luckas didn't really know what they wanted to hear.

-" You can skip the part of the attack on the village, just what happened inside the cave." This time who took the lead was Philips, he wanted to make them feel at ease so he spoke in a friendly tone.

-" We were in the last village to be attacked by the bandits, actually the army came just hours after our arrest." Luckas was scrambling trying to find some useful information. " Before the attack, one man from the Dark Palace came to the cave."

He stopped for a moment and looked at the faces of the trio in front of him, seeing that they were interested in it he tried his best to recollect all of what happened.

-" I think the man was of a higher rank than the other two cultivators in the bandit group, he ordered them to dispose of us if the army ever came close to them." As Luckas continued telling them about the meeting between the Heigong cultivators Philips's gaze grew even more pensive. -" He said that they couldn't attract too much attention now, and they should wait for the kingdom to be more chaotic to show themselves,

Philips thought for a moment and waved his hand. He looked at Jeffrey and sighed. -" Looks like this wasn't something that the upper echelons of the Dark Palace planned, maybe it's the doing of some outer sect elder."

-" If the Dark Palace truly moved I don't think we could stop them with the forces present at the time." Jeffrey too was deep in thought. " What truly puzzles me is why there wasn't any kind of backup forces. Only two cultivators are too low of a number even if it's just the plan of an Outer Elder."

-" Maybe they cant put any forces aside? The Dark Palacehave too many enemies, internal conflicts must be quite common there too." Cyl also felt suspicious of the low cultivator's numbers there.

Philips nodded and looked at Byrth. His gaze was curious as he analyzed the young man. Byrth tried to keep his composure, he wanted to push everything to Luckas as he wasn't good at social interactions.

-" If I'm not wrong you are cultivating the Eternal Sun Body?" As Byrth thought the next question was about him. he nodded nervously as the man asked.

Philips eyes sunk, Cyl and Jeffrey were shocked as Byrththe Eternal Sun Body wasn't just some low-level technique, it was the main technique from the Eternal Sun Sect. It was rare for even disciples of the sect to cultivate this technique.

-" Are you perhaps a disciple of the Eternal Sun Sect?" Philips was instantly more respectful to Byrth. In the region of the Iqecia Kingdom, the Eternal Sun Sect was one of the strongest sects, even the king would need to show them face.

Everyone was curious about Byrth background, even Luckas, he always thought that he was just a wandering cultivator but now it looked like he was connected with a powerful Sect. This made Jeffrey, Cyl, and Philips feel like a stone dropped in their stomach.

Byrth gaze was complicated but he shook his head.

-" I'm not part of the sect, I saved a group of unconscious people a year ago, and when they woke up I learned they were cultivators, sometime after that an Elder paid me a visit and said this was a reward for the help I gave them." Byrth explained how he got the technique, Cyl and Jeffrey's eyes brightened as they heard that but Philips was even deep in thought.

It didn't make sense that the Elder would give away such a technique for some random person after saving some disciples. What made him even curious about the situation was that he could help the cultivators, normal medicine wouldn't be useful for Foundation Establishment cultivators and it was too rare for Qi gathering disciples to leave the sect.

Philips was deep in thought when Jeffrey spoke suddenly.

-" Could you explain how did you help them?" After Jeffrey asked he was afraid of sounding rude and weird so he added. " It isn't that I suspect that you are lying, the truth is that your technique is just too precious to be just given away like that."

This time the one surprised was Byrth, he always thought that the technique he was given was just a low grade one. Byrth instantly was in deep thought. After thinking for some time he nodded.

-" A year ago when I was going to the White Ashe River to fish, I generally dive with a spear to get fish, after diving in my usual spots and finding them empty I decided to go deeper in the river." As Byrth told his story everyone perked their ears. "After descending the river for some time I dived in a region next to the mountains, while I was diving I found a cavern deep in the water, after exploring the cave I found a group of people lying there unconscious, the tide was rising and I was afraid of them drowning so I took them to the shore." As Byrth told his story everyone fell into deep thought.

-" Do you know what cultivation level the group was? And how many people were there?" This time the one who asked was Cyl.

Byrth thought a little and shook his head.-" There were 3 people in the group, as for their cultivation I didn't ask them."

Cyl nodded and didn't speak again. Philips was still thinking when he sighed. He felt a lot better now that he knew that the young man wasn't part of the Eternal Sun Sect. While he was curious about the situation, he could try to fill the gap himself, Philip now was focused on another piece of information.

-" This cave that you found the group, do you remember the location? The people that Byrth saved must be important in the sect that why he was rewarded with such great technique, for people with such importance to go explore the place, it must have some incredible things there.

-" The place is near my village, While I don't know the exact location I can tell where the area is."

Philips was happy about the meeting, besides confirming that the young man wasn't part of the Eternal Sun Sect he even got an important piece of information.