7

After killing Justin, Ray took his mana seed and started heading for the elevator to the surface. He was much more confident than before since he was aware of the power situation above him.

He shouldn't be in any trouble in the outside world unless he deliberately goes to someone strong like a city lord, or if he gets overwhelmed by the vast number of humans in the empire.

His main worry wasn't any specific person, but his environment in general. Right now he was somewhere in the middle of the Theoking empire, which was not good at all since it didn't take a genius to realize that Ray, the 10 ft tall creature with black scales and sharp features, was not a human. He was akin to a cat swimming in an ocean of sharks— he had to leave as soon as he could.

Before he decided anything too dramatic, he followed the map to the elevator and safely made his way to the surface. There was nobody there to stop him on his way up, but once he reached the surface, he had to kill a few late stage 1 practitioners who were guarding the entrance. He figured the humans didn't expect an anomaly like him to appear in the middle of their empire, so they didn't bother putting so much protection around every mine.

He made sure to not let any human survive since if any of them escaped and reported to a higher-up about his existence, he had no confidence in dealing with a legitimately powerful cultivator. He had never seen one with his own two eyes, but the memories from the fighting technique gave him a careful and risk-free attitude.

He wordlessly killed all the human's guarding the mine, then turned to stare at the bright ball of fire in the sky, a wondrous looking appearing on his face. It was his first time outside of the mines, so he was a little dazed as he looked at the bright colors and trees around him. He secretly felt a bit of relief after being cooped up in the musty mine, even though it was only for a couple of days.

After soaking in his new environment for a couple of minutes, his expression turned to boredom once again; the beauty of nature no longer interested him.

There was only silence in the empty mine surrounded by a thick forest.

"Where am I?" He whispered to himself.

Wherever he looked, he only saw trees, then even more trees. He quickly abandoned the use of his visual perception and released his ki aura, which gave him much more information.

He could sense every little bug crawling through the dirt, and occasionally a few animals. He was on high alert for a moment after sensing an animal, but he quickly figured out its non-threatening potential.

After soaking in the information for a few seconds, his eyes snapped to the left since his aura picked up signs of human remains.

There were footsteps imprinted into the ground— fresh footsteps at that.

Even small things like the footsteps a mile away from him couldn't escape his vast ki perception, although his soul was still weak, so it took him a moment to realize it.

He quickly started making his way toward the footsteps while maintaining a low-key profile. The human mentioned powerful beasts that attacked anyone they came across, so he didn't want to attract too much attention to himself.

After jogging for a minute, he reached the footsteps he sensed and followed along its path. Multiple other footsteps also joined the original trail, which was a clear sign of human settlement or civilization.

After following the trail for an hour, he sensed a creature with high ki density traveling towards him. It wasn't a human, so Ray figured it was one of those beasts Justin was talking about.

After confirming it was still in the first stage, a curious expression rose on his face. He never saw any beasts before, so his curiosity peaked after sensing the strange creature.

He ran toward the beast and arrived next to it a minute later.

The beast looked similar to a red fox, except for its massive size, which made it easily as big as a hippo.

It quickly noticed Ray and let out a low growl. Ray's interest was pushed further after realizing the beast could sense his aura, which the humans couldn't do at all.

Ray took a step toward the fox in a non-threatening manner.

The fox took a step back in return and looked like it wanted to flee.

It snarled at Ray one last time before running in the opposite direction of him.

'Smart little fox,' Ray thought to himself after seeing the fox flee. Of course, he wasn't going to let it off so easily just because it knew it could understand their strength difference, so he caught up to the fox and yanked its tail.

The fox let out a high-pitched yelp and started clawing Ray in desperation.

Ray gave it a sharp slap on its face, which only made it even more frantic.

A frowning expression appeared on Ray's face since he didn't know how to make the fox stay still.

After thinking for a couple of seconds, he got annoyed and simply ripped the fox's head off, giving it a painful but quick death.

Ray looked at the fox's corpse with a slight sense of regret. He made a mental reminder to not act so quickly on emotions, since he originally wanted to keep the fox alive.

What attracted him to the fox in the first place was the strange clump of ki energy that he found in the fox. At first, he mistook it for a ki crystal, but once he inspected the fox up close, he realized it was like a battery that powered the fox.

Humans stored their ki energy throughout their entire body, equally distributing the energy everywhere. The fox, on the other hand, seemed to have a core to store its energy, with fewer but much thicker ki veins originating from the core.

He tore the core from the beast's body and tried absorbing its ki like a ki crystal.

It wasn't much, but Ray still used the energy diligently and started his progress toward refining all of his skin. It was going to take some time to reach that level, so he might as well start training as soon as he could.

He was up on his feet only a few seconds later, since the energy had already run out in that short time. It would have been a decent resource if he was still a stage 1 practitioner, but he was already past that, so it was all but useless for him.

He suddenly realized the gathering of humans he was looking for was already within his perception, albeit at the very edge of it.

A hungry look appeared on his face at the thought of all the humans sitting in one spot, ready to be farmed. His priority was still constructing his magic core, so he still had to slaughter quite a few humans, then kill a legitimate mage.

The second part would be harder, but the first part could be completed whenever he wanted to. He was no longer clueless about the world around him; he understood that he was close to the peak of the world's power.

As long as he didn't cross the steps of anyone like a city lord; there was nobody in the world that could stop him from doing what he wanted.