An even larger number of beasts watched Aaron's training on the third morning.

Some had come for the second time, and when he finished, they didn't run like the first-timers. Instead, most of those gave way for him to return to the Fire Wolves' camp, lay in a circle around the place he had trained, and closed their eyes. A few ignored him to feast on the carcasses of the unlucky ones who had been hit by astray lightning.

Alys, who for once hadn't entered an enlightened state, dried Aaron's clothes and woke up the rest of the unit. Tia saw the beasts nearby and panicked.

"By the gods, what is this?!" she shouted.

She focused on her spatial ring and her bronze and gold bow materialized directly on her hand, and her quiver on her waist. Aaron found it idiotic to keep her weapon in a ring she wanted to hide, but she had already demonstrated she wasn't the sharpest pencil in the case.

Tia nocked an arrow and was about to shoot when Aaron nodded to Alys.

Space Energy came out of the Sorceress and built an impregnable barrier between the arrow and the beasts. Unlike the barriers she had created earlier, this one was visible. It looked like opaque black glass and also blocked the view.

"Don't attack!" exclaimed Alys urgently.

Logan already had his helmet on and was drawing his sword, but stopped mid-motion; Lana, who had moved behind Logan and was prepared to heal the unit, also let the energy in her staff dissipate; and Tia released the tension on the bowstring. All three of them looked at Alys in confusion.

"Did you use a spell to make the beasts sleep? Are they under your control?" She had some panic in her voice still.

Alys shook her head negatively. "When I woke up, they were already like that," she lied.

"Why did you stop me then?" insisted Tia, pulling the arrow again.

The Sorceress made her spatial shield transparent. "Look at them. There are over twenty beasts there, and three of them are on the Three Star level! I may be a Four Star Sorceress, but I've only recently leveled up and haven't had the time or opportunity to study proper Fourth Grade Spells. My Third Grade ones got a little stronger, that's all. If your attack provokes the Three Star beasts into striking back..."

Tia's eyes widened, but she didn't stop pulling her arrow. "Mount, now," she ordered. "I don't know what's going on here, but that is a Blood Monkey, a Three Star carnifex! They're known for dismembering their victims alive and forcing them..." She paled and didn't finish the sentence. "Go, quickly! Before it wakes up!"

Aaron looked at the monkey and noticed that Tia was wrong.

Anyone who killed enough sentient beings — humans, beasts, animals — developed a kind of secondary aura called death aura, also known as bloodlust or killing intent. The more one killed and the more violent the killings, the stronger the aura became, but the monkey's death aura wasn't any stronger than that of any beast.

It might be hiding its death aura, something that was simple enough for a cultivator to do, but unlikely in the monkey's case.

To become a carnifex, a beast had to develop at least some measure of sapience. Only then could they ignore the Truths of the Jungle — popularly called the laws of the jungle — and start torturing prey for their pleasure.

The monkey was merely a Three Star Beast and wouldn't have a sufficiently developed mind to create such a technique. A predator who specialized in stealth might instinctively create a technique to hide their death aura even at such a low level, but the monkey wasn't a predator.

The banana that the monkey was holding, on the other hand...

'Check Level,' Aaron thought.

A dark rectangle appeared over the banana, containing four transparent silver stars. Aaron didn't need to be a genius to conclude that the transparency of the stars meant the banana was using a skill to hide its level. Yet, he could see through it thanks to his heightened energy sensitivity.

The banana was also trying — focus on trying — to hide its death aura, but its technique was awful and Aaron could practically feel the terror its victims had been through.

As if sensing Aaron's gaze, a brown tentacle with a small blue eye in its center came out of the banana and stared at the former immortal.

"Aaron! Quick!" shouted Tia desperately.

Aaron sighed, picked up his sleeping bag, saddled his liguru, and mounted. He could kill the banana and prevent it from making more victims in the future, but that would be detrimental to the evolution of power in the region.

The easiest way for living beings to develop was through conflict. The seed that fights against the weight of the earth to grow into a plant, the herbivore that fights to survive against the predators and find food, the predator that fights against other predators to protect its territory and its resources, the human being that overcomes obstacles on their journey to reach maturity; strife was necessary for their growth.

Aaron himself had agreed to join the Fire Wolves instead of secretly increasing his power in some corner of the world in part because it would bring him challenges which, once overcome, could be beneficial to him.

That carnifex might still kill many, but if someone of lesser skill killed it, that someone would also grow a lot. Even someone who merely survived the banana carnifex would grow smarter about the dangers that may lie in front of them, but were invisible because of preconceived misconceptions, such as "a banana cannot be a danger."

Furthermore, it wasn't because a human being was cruel that they would remain that way forever, and carnifexes were similar. It was unlikely that the banana carnifex would rethink its lifestyle and stop killing for pleasure; its Four Star Qi was already hardening its convictions considerably, just like happened to any cultivator. But it was still possible.

Ultimately, the carnifex was not an immediate danger to Aaron or people he cared about, not even if that care was only at the most basic moral level of "being a human being like him." The carnifex was in the Red Forest, not invading a city, and anyone who entered it was aware of the dangers within. It was up to the person's luck whether or not they were attacked by the banana.

Soon after everyone left, Tia carefully followed and only then allowed herself to breathe in relief.

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The carnifex thanked the heavens that he had not chosen to attack. He, the human, was only at the Two Star level, but the carnifex felt an absolute dread just by being stared at by him.

The monkey wanted to stay there longer, but the carnifex had powerful impressions of his eyes. Its instincts screamed that it was time to say goodbye to the monkey for good and hunt elsewhere.

The banana withered and became a yellow liquid that spilled on the ground and was absorbed by the soil. Shortly thereafter, a yellow mole emerged from a distant hole and, while running, became a yellow bird that flew away.

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Tia made a deadly mistake that day.

It was the middle of the afternoon when Logan identified a mark that the Markswoman had left on a tree and ordered the group to turn right.

Aaron refused. "This is a terrible idea."

The liguru he was riding shook with dread when Aaron merely tried to turn right. He could also feel the high energy concentration in that direction, as well as the remnants of death aura all over the place. Together with the deep claw marks on the trees, those things made it clear that whatever lived there was not weak and it liked to kill. That was the territory of another carnifex.

Logan turned to Aaron, ready to give a moral lesson on obedience to the unit's leadership, but as soon as he opened his mouth, the ground started shaking. Short and intermittent tremors that were getting faster and stronger.

Something very heavy was hitting the ground repeatedly and approaching them.

Aaron looked in the direction they were supposed to go and saw Tia galloping her liguru full speed towards them.

"Run!" she shouted.

She was being chased. The trees behind her tumbled sideways as if something too big was passing between them. Shortly after, they saw the pursuer, a bluish tiger with four wings, ten meters tall even on all fours.

"Four-Wings Blue Tiger!" exclaimed Logan, identifying the beast. "Run!" he echoed Tia's words.

Everyone turned to run in the opposite direction the tiger was coming from, but Aaron raised a hand.

"Don't!" he shouted. "There are even stronger beasts the other way!"

The tiger was a Five Star Carnifex, which was bad enough for the Fire Wolves, but on the opposite side, things were even worse. Aaron kept using his vision-enhancing techniques as he walked, which had allowed him to see two beasts moving around in that area.

They were giant snakes, each at the Four Star level. Though weaker than the tiger, they were just cubs judging by their purposeless over-excitement, like repeatedly climbing and descending trees. If the cubs were Four Stars, what would their parents' power be?

Even if only one parent was alive and it was "only" at the Five Star level like the tiger, with the support of the two Four Star cubs, the battle would be much harder than against a single tiger.

"Run!" repeated Tia, who didn't seem to have any intention of stopping.

"If you want to die, don't drag us with you," Logan said to Aaron and prepared to enter the snakes' territory.

Aaron sighed. He owed Tia for the blackmail earlier, and this was a good opportunity to pay off his debt.

He jumped from the liguru and ran towards the carnifex.

The tiger exuded a relatively powerful death aura, and that was probably one of the things that were making Tia too terrified to realize the stupidity of running aimlessly in a dangerous forest. Or maybe she was just even dumber than he thought.

As he ran, Aaron felt a bubble-shaped spatial shield form around him, the result of Alys' magic. Unfortunately, the shield was imperfect and not aerodynamic at all, increasing the air resistance for him.

"Drop the spell!" he shouted without looking back. Her intention was good, but that bubble would hinder him more than it would help.

Alys removed the bubble and Aaron checked his opponent.

The tiger was a Five Star Qi Manipulator, but the way it used its Qi, while superior to all the humans Aaron had seen, was far inferior to his own perfect control. Furthermore, Aaron had only two levels in speed, but he also had powerful and adaptable techniques. He had no doubt that he could survive for a few seconds in a direct battle against the tiger, and that was all he needed.

As he ran, Tia shouted, "Aaron! No!" She pulled the reins of the liguru to make the animal stop, but it was also affected by the tiger's death aura and kept running.

As if in slow motion, her eyes widened while Aaron passed her. He looked at her and winked. Then he disappeared.

At the Inept level, his elusive steps technique had made even Alys, a Three Star Shaper, unable to see his movements. Now, using perfect-quality Two Star Qi...

Myriad Absolute Arts — Martial Arts — Two Star Qi — Elusive Steps!

He disappeared, and Tia only saw him again when he reappeared crouched relatively close to the tiger as if he were preparing to jump. This lasted a mere instant, then he disappeared again.

Myriad Absolute Arts — Martial Arts — Two Star Qi — Personal Launch!

The ground sunk with Aaron's footprints and broke with spiderweb cracks, as if something immensely heavy had hit the ground. The air displacement it caused created a shockwave that rocked all the plants around.

He launched himself at the tiger at incredible speed.

Unfortunately, he couldn't win this fight; it was a beast three levels stronger than him. So, he thought about what he should aim for.

He couldn't just distract the tiger while the Fire Wolves escaped. Tia was so agitated she would undoubtedly make a poor decision while running. Therefore, he had to guide their escape.

The conclusion was obvious: he had to force the tiger into a retreat. Such a show of power would also establish his dominance over the group, which would make them think twice before ignoring his warnings. More importantly, it would allow him to take at least temporary leadership and guide them to safety.

Unfortunately, the tiger was not willing to help.

While Aaron was midair, the tiger struck with its paw right at his face.