21 Towards the capital(1)

Ever since he returned, a week had passed with Kai helping his parents. Helping Tarika in the morning and hunting with Bolt the rest of the day.

Since his breakthrough, he tried to achieve the state of nothingness. Though he still hadn't reached there, he felt he wasn't far from it.

It was tragic that with so much magic power at his disposal, he couldn't practice attribute magic. He begged Daoma countless times but he still hadn't agreed to allow him to learn attribute magic.

During this time, Alfred had come and told Kai that they would be leaving soon.

Kai did not have a lot of stuff to pack, but Tarika insisted on helping him. Kai was carrying a backpack with two sets of clothes and a bottle of water. With his parents' insistence, he took a few copper coins for rent and food. They forced him to take it because they were afraid if he showed the spirit stones then he might get robbed.

He wanted to tell them that he could hide them in his space ring, and even if someone realized he had them,  he would beat them with his Grandmaster level power, but seeing Tarika's worried face, he relented.

On the day of departure, Kai and his parents headed towards the town gate. There they saw Alfred with the elders.

Seeing Kai arriving, Alfred asked him, "Do you know how to ride a horse?"

"No, but don't worry. I'll be going on foot," Kai replied while grinning.

"If we go on foot, we will reach the capital with our grandchildren in our hands."

"Relax," saying that Kai strengthened his legs with magic and speed up.

Kai's parents, the elders and Alfred looked at the trail of dust astonished. 

Kai peeked behind to see where Alfred was, but to his surprise, he saw that Alfred was still at the town gate with his mouth agape, so he stopped and headed back.

"Town lord, you were saying something?" Kai cheekily said.

Alfred looked at Kai in surprise because he felt an aura of a Grandmaster from Kai. It had just been a few days since they last met but in those few days, Kai went from peak Master stage to peak Grandmaster stage. Just how fast does this guy progress? 

The gap between Master and Grandmaster took years to overcome but here was Kai overcoming it in days.

Seeing everyone's reaction, Kai started laughing.

"Looks like this will be done fast," Alfred said. "Our first stop is going to be Filon, from there we will proceed to Anon."

The size of the Buraford Kingdom was not very large. 

It was located in the eastern part of the continent, sharing its southern border with the Romand Kingdom and the Alfrine Kingdom, and the Great Oman Empire at the West. The three kingdoms also shared their borders with the dark forest.

They constantly had to defend against the attacks of the magical beasts, although the Burford had it easier since it suffered fewer attacks compared to the other two.

"Kai, stop. Let's rest for a bit," Alfred said. Though they weren't tired, the horse needed some time to recover. Kai sat under a tree and started to recover his magic power.

Alfred got down from his horse and pulled out a bottle of water from a small pouch, offering it to Kai.

Looking at Alfred's proud expression, he wanted to see what would happen if he told him that he possessed a one of a kind treasure that could not be found anywhere else in the realm.

They sat under the tree and started eating a small lunch that Tarika had packed for them.

"You could have set up the village anywhere, but why so close to the Forbidden Forest?" Kai asked Alfred.

Listening to Kai, Alfred said with a helpless smile, "Over here because we do not have to pay any tax to the kingdom which makes everyone's life easier."

Kai asked again, "Isn't it better to have protection than not?"

Looking at Kai's confused look, he continued, "There is another reason for living here. Here we can do what we want, but in the cities, we have to pay high taxes to both the kingdom and to the nobles and even the crime rate is very high in the cities. Here we are at least safe, while in the cities, we would be living troublesome lives every single day."

Kai nodded as he understood the full implications of living in the city.

After some rest, Alfred and Kai continued their journey towards the Filon.