Hunt and Clan Meeting

Max walked into the forest. He felt the vitality in the forest which was much higher than the clan residence. An ordinary person can have a guaranteed life expectancy of at least eighty if lived in this place. Of course that is, if he managed to live for eighty years without becoming a prey for wild animals or Star Beasts in the forest.

'The forest is too green without any dried or fallen trees, may be that is why this forest was named Ever Green. It looks just like those Amazon Forests back on Earth.'

The forest is divided into outer circle, inner circle and the core where Rank 6 star beasts live.

Max decided to live on the outer circle for an year before entering the inner circle.

It was already night time when Max has prepared a hammock between two trees.

He selected this area because there were no star beasts near the radius.

On the way to the outer circle he hunted some rabbits.

He lit up a bonfire. He was not worried about attracting star beasts because the outer circle did not have any star beasts above Rank 2. With his cultivation and the advantage of the Nine-fold Dark Shadow Art at night, he can easily escape from them even if could not defeat the star beasts.

He sat down on a log and started skinning the rabbits and roasting them on the iron rod he bought in the town. The sweet aroma spread to the surroundings as he sprinkled the condiments on the food.

Max then took a bite of rabbit while admiring the moon light. He felt that this was the happiest moment ever since he traveled to this world. Even though he was never the sentimental type of guy, he always missed those days he spent with his mentor in the wilderness.

Just when he was reminiscing the past, he suddenly felt something staring at him. He acted like he did not realize anything so as not to startle the snake. He finished eating and spat out the bones. He started climbing the hammock and acted like he was asleep. Yes, he was planning to use himself as a defenseless bait to attract the visitor when he sensed its cultivation. It was a Peak stage Rank 1 Star beast.

Well, he succeeded. In the dark two dark pupils were staring it him. It was a Sabertoothed Shadow Leopard. In fact, the place where Max is sleeping now is its territory, which is why there were no other star beasts nearby. When it arrived to the territory, it saw a human cub. So it decided to wait for a chance to kill the prey in one swoop.

So, when it saw Max who fell 'asleep' the Sabertoothed Shadow Leopard pounced towards Max who was 20 meters away. Max who was lying on the hammock with his back facing the beast had a small grin on his face.

Just when the Leopard was two meters away from him he turned his face and threw two needles aimed at the two eyes of the Leopard. One of the needles missed the target and hit the Leopard's thick skin and deflected while the other was inserted into its left eye.

The leopard fell down to the ground before its paws could land on Max. The Leopard wailed in pain as his eyes were full of madness. The needles were the ones he built back at the town. Those needles were called Soul-Stirring needles because once the needle hits a person's body he would feel pain so enormous, that he would feel like thousands of needles pricking at his soul.

The Leopard rushed towards Max with madness. Max immediately rolled down the hammock and summoned his Dual Moon Blades and applied them with dark attribute star power and attacked the Leopard who was struck on the hammock.

The blade caused a huge wound on the Leopard's stomach as blood was gushing out. Max was surprised to found out that the Leopard could still stand on its feet after being affected by the wound.

He leaped into the air as threw the moon blade on his left hand imbued with star power towards the Leopard with all his might. As the Leopard was focused on parrying the moon blade, Max rushed toward the Leopard and slid down and the ground with the another moon blade and attacked it on the stomach at the same place where it was wounded previously.

The Sabertoothed Shadow Leopard collapsed on the ground and let out a roar of unwillingness before it closed its eyes. On the other hand Max was perfectly fine because he did not use any str skills, only a little bit of his star power was used up. He walked towards the corpse to extract valuable materials from it.

Back at the Thunder Lion Mansion.

In a huge hall, there was a large rectangular table with seats on both sides with a big chair on the third side.

Leonhardt sat on the chair listening to the elders sitting on both sides.

"Everyone! The Emperor is asking us for a marriage. He wants to marry his elder daughter to Levon. What do you say?"

He interrupted the discussion.

"Sovereign! This is the conspiracy of the royal family. They want to tie us to their side to face against the Storm Wind empire. It is absolutely impossible."

The man who sat two seats on the left next to Leonhardt spoke. He wore long blue overcoat with lion imprinted on it, same as every other in the room. He looked at bid old around sixty-seventy years. Almost all of his hair turned white along with his beard.

He was the second elder of the clan. The clan had nine elders all of whom were Rank 7 Star Knights, except the first elder who is an Peak stage Rank 8 Star Knight. He was the elder brother of the previous patriarch, the current supreme elder.

He is almost ninety ears old. He has a eight star bloodline. With the cultivation resources of the clan and his talent he has reached the peak of Rank 8 Star Knight. He is not a genius so, peak stage Rank 8 Star Knight is already his limit. A Rank 8 Star Knight has a life span of one hundred years. He is almost reaching the end of life span.

All the elders of the clan except eighth and ninth elders are of the same generation as the previous patriarch i.e. Leonhardt's father. The eight and ninth elders were the elder and younger brothers of the Leonhardt respectively. Both of them who were not as talented as Leonhardt.

The eight elder is named Erwin Miller. He is an intermediate stage Rank 7 Star Knight while the ninth elder is Otto Miller, father of Levyn Miller. He has a cultivation level of initial stage Rank 7 Star Knight.

"No, it may be due to Levon's talent, after all we are not the strongest clan in the empire." the fifth elder denied the second elder.

"Yes, what the fifth said is true. They took a fancy to Levon's talent. They want to bind a future Rank 9 Star Knight to their side. After all they only have one Rank 9 Star Knight which is a bit weak compared to the Storm Wind Empire."

"We can only wait for Levon to come home from the Red Lotus Royal Academy. Let's put the matter on hold." First elder suggested.