Aaron felt her use three skills while he kept focusing on withstanding the pain. And then, the pain was gone.

His body no longer rejected Arcane Energy. His dantian welcomed it, and his spiritual channels became able to pump it to his body and soul, despite his own Arcane Energy being incapable of affecting his body — a quick of this world's energies. But more importantly, he could control the Arcane Energy in his dantian at will.

He had completed his cultivation session. He was now a One Star Arcanist. It was time to act.

The first skill Aaron used would've allowed him to escape the bird's attack from earlier. It was his simplest detection skill, yet one of the best in his arsenal.

Arcane Sensory Arts: Active Perception!

An explosion of Arcane Energy came out of his body, immediately expanding to five hundred yards around him. He had nowhere near enough energy to fill such a vast area, but he did something similar to what Alys had done to her Space Energy in the caves. He spread the energy particles to increase the area covered without changing the amount of energy used, leaving gaps in between them.

For Alys that had been enough, but he knew the shortcomings of such a technique. If the particles were spread too thin, something might enter the covered area without being touched by anything, thus remaining undetected. Therefore, he had experimented with the skill in the past until he had found a perfect balance between the maximum area covered and effectiveness. To achieve that without making the particles too close, he also used his superior energy control to kept Arcane Energy in constant, random motion, making it nigh impossible for anyone or anything to dodge all the particles while approaching.

So when Arcane Energy rushed outside of his body, he felt everything around him within a radius of five hundred yards, with no exception. Despite the vast amount of information, it overwhelmed his mind only for an instant. Not only were his willpower and reasoning attributes at level ten, but he also had a lot of experience with that skill and could filter the useless information easily enough.

And that was how he "saw" what was going on in the room before seeing it with his own eyes.

Lana was sitting in a corner of the room, and her hands were shaking. She was covered in blood and crying, staring wide-eyed at the corpse in front of her.

The corpse belonged to the Sorcerers of the Arcane Circle who had given him the letter a few hours earlier. He had a cut on his neck caused by some ability of hers, and the two puppies were licking the blood that was dripping from it. The beasts were predators, after all.

Aaron then focused on the outside. The second Two Star Sorcerer was waiting under the bedroom window, looking around anxiously.

Aaron jumped and immediately appeared outside the open window. The Sorcerer heard it and looked up. While Aaron was falling, the enemy pointed his hands at him and used a skill.

The man's Arcane Energy formed into a spell and came to Aaron, who laughed contemptuously. He didn't even need his active perception to feel the spell's flaws.

He also didn't need to take more Arcane Energy from his dantian to counterattack. With but a thought, he repurposed the particles of the active perception skill that were already between the man and himself. That was versatility at its best.

The particles took the form of two arcane drills that pierced the incoming spell's weaknesses. They all exploded like a harmless balloon.

The rebound of having the ability forcibly canceled hit the Sorcerer badly. He was thrown violently against the wall of the tavern and fell to the ground like a puppet with strings cut.

Aaron came over and lifted him by the neck.

"It amazes me that a pathetic Two Star Arcanist thought he could act against—"

In the middle of his speech, the man started moving the Arcane Energy into his dantian, probably to use another spell. Aaron countered it.

Arcane Detaining Arts: Central Suppression!

Half of Aaron's Arcane Energy was being used to maintain his active perception spell. Now, the other half penetrated the Sorcerer's body and wrapped around his dantian like an unshakable cocoon. This cocoon had internal formations to suppress and cancel any energy that touched it.

Aaron's energies were pure, and his skills were almost perfect. But the soul had natural protection against invasions that extended to the body, and the difference in power would limit who he could suppress.

Roughly speaking, because his Arcane Energy is still at the One Star level, he could suppress someone with impure energies up to the Two Star level. Even so, to suppress a Two Star cultivator, he would need to take them by surprise. They couldn't be expecting him to do that to them, nor could he give them time to resist it.

That is unless they were as weak and energetically impure as the people in that kingdom. The Sorcerer's energy was so impure that it was a miracle he had reached the Two Star level. Aaron had no problems using the central suppression against the man.

The moment his energy was suppressed, the man opened his eyes wide and became pale. Invading other people's bodies was an admirable feat in itself. To suppress the dantian of others with a raw spell, using no magical artifact, was almost impossible.

He finally understood the monster he was facing.

"Let's try it again," said Aaron. "What prompted two pathetic Two Star Arcanists to act against a Three Star Qi Manipulator, a Three Star Devout, and a Four Star Shaper?" While asking, he used another skill.

Arcane Sensory Arts: Targeted Lie Detection!

He redirected a third of the energy being used in his active perception spell to this ability. Arcane Energy enveloped the man's heart, eyes, and skin. When he answered, Aaron would know where he was looking, if his pupils were dilating, if he was sweating, and his heartbeat rate.

As the name of the skill indicated, he had created a simple lie detector. Unfortunately, One Star Arcane Energy was not enough for him to read the target's mind directly.

The man opened his mouth to speak, but Aaron's hand was grabbing his throat too tightly. He loosened only a little, and the Sorcerer spoke with difficulty.

"The cubs... Our initial objective... in Red City... was to observe them... and get... them if the barrier fell... They seem... valuable."

"Initial objective?"

"The Madam of the Arcane Circle ... She saw them first ... And told us to guard... Them... For her."

"Why did that change?"

"Abandon... Kingdom."

Aaron frowned and continued the interrogation. He soon had a clear picture of what had happened.

Madam Selna, the leader of the Arcane Circle branch in that kingdom, had come to the Red Forest for reasons unknown. She had found the puppies and ordered her men to protect the area and take the puppies to her if they could.

However, shortly thereafter, they were ordered to leave the kingdom with urgency. Every member of the Circle in the kingdom had been ordered the same.

Only those two Sorcerers had stayed behind, in the last city where Aaron had been seen. They were to wait until he arrived, no matter how long it took. Then they would give him the key to the Circle and the letter before leaving.

However, Madam Selna was a Four Star Sorceress. If she wanted something, it should be valuable. When they saw the puppies with Aaron, greed spoke louder, and they took a shot at acquiring them.

One Sorcerer knew an invisibility spell, the window was open, the Four Star Sorceress was unconscious, and they had noticed no detection spells in the room. Everything seemed to work in their favor.

This Sorcerer did not know what had happened after the other entered the room. He only knew that the wolf had squawked and a lot of noise had come from there. He didn't run because if they were forced to run after him, it would be worse to run than to stay behind and explain. That's how things usually worked in a world where the strong ruled and the weak obeyed.

To the man's surprise, it was Aaron, a mere Qi Manipulator, who came to him. The Sorcerer reckoned that maybe the powerful women wouldn't come after him for whatever reason, and tried his luck in battle. He failed.

"You didn't lie or hide anything from me," Aaron said after understanding the situation. "That's why I'll allow you to live." The man visibly relaxed. "But you tried to steal from me. You must be punished."

Arcane Offensive Arts: Arcane Blade!

The energy of the targeted lie detection spell left the man and condensed into a very thin, micrometric blade, and it swiftly cut the man's hand. He tried to scream in pain, but Aaron squeezed his throat again, choking him.

"You are right-handed, and for your sincerity, I cut your left hand. If you try to rob me again, I'll kill you."

The man couldn't even move his head to nod.

Aaron dropped him on the ground and canceled both central suppression and arcane blade spells. His sensory arts, of which he had used active perception and targeted lie detection skills, were nothing more than a way to use pure Arcane Energy to get information. The energy never really became a proper spell, and that allowed him to reuse their energy. However, the energy used in any other skill, including the central suppression one, would be changed irreversibly and thus, be permanently spent.

Fortunately, he had a hurricane of Arcane Energy in his dantian. He was already regenerating his energy at an absurdly high speed for someone at the One Star level.

Now that Aaron had released the Sorcerer's throat, the man finally screamed while holding his stump.

That was a very mild punishment, considering any half-assed healer could regrow limbs. The thing is, the Sorcerer hadn't been the one to invade the room, nor had he raised a weapon against Aaron — not before being attacked first anyway. His attack had been legit self-defense, and Aaron wasn't unreasonable enough to want people to just let him attack them and be grateful for it.

The man had been just a watchman. He had even stayed put to explain things to Lana or Alys if they appeared because they were strong, and he understood running would be worse for him.

He wasn't innocent, but Aaron had said to the Royal Guards in the summoning room that he forgave many things from people as weak as them, and this man might as well have been forgiven, considering his light punishment. In fact, part of the reason Aaron had even cut his off-hand off was to teach him how dangerous it was to do stupid stuff like that. If there had been no consequences, he might've grown cocky. Of course, the other part was that Aaron was also pissed and wanted the imbecile to pay for it.

He wasted no more time with the man. He jumped into the room, picked up the corpse of the other Arcanist — it didn't even have a spatial treasure for him to loot — and threw it out of the tavern. Let the trash take care of their own. Then he closed the window.

The pups complained when Aaron removed their food, but he ignored them. Instead, he went over to Lana and crouched down in front of her.

"Are you okay?" he asked gently.

The girl had already cleaned herself up, but she was still shaking a little. She was still sitting in the room's corner, hugging her legs, with her head down. She didn't look at him to answer.

"I never... Before... I always healed..."

"You never killed a human before?"

She nodded. Honestly, he was surprised that her mind in its current state understood the implications of that action.

"But you have killed beasts and carnifexes before, right?" he asked. He wanted to tell her it was the same, that it didn't matter. To his surprise, she shook her head. "It was your first time with the elementals?!"

She nodded, and Aaron sighed. It made sense, Lana was a Priestess and her class was about healing and protecting, not attacking. He didn't know her past, but she had certainly witnessed plenty of killing before, considering how nonchalant she was about watching him or Alys kill people.

Yet, Lana herself had never killed. She had not reacted to killing the elementals, but now the previous trauma had joined this one. Even in her mind-altered state, it had affected her.

He sat next to her and put an arm around her back in a half hug.

"I don't know what happened here, but I know it was necessary. And I know you have followed the rules of the Ironblood clan. Whoever tries to steal from us must at least be captured so I can judge them later, but the situation might call for their death instead. I say this was such a situation. You did well."

Aaron would probably have let the actual robber leave with his life too if he had survived, but he wasn't going to shed any tears for his death. When an invisible man invades your room, you don't ask questions. You act first, and only after you consider yourself safe do you worry about motives. Lana had panicked and killed the man after feeling threatened, and that was completely justified in his book. He had come to steal, but who knows what he might have done after he saw he could get away with it?

Not to mention death was one of the possible punishments for invading any area belonging to the Ironblood clan. This room had been rented by them, and so he considered it theirs until the rent was over.

Lana only cried harder after hearing his words. She pulled her and stroked her hair.

"Shhh... Everything will be fine," he whispered and said nothing more.

The wolf cub took personal offense at Lana's crying. At first, he came to Aaron and bit his bare foot, but Aaron reinforced the skin with Qi and his teeth failed to pierce. After a while, he gave up and went to Lana, trying to get on her. She took him and hugged him. He licked her hand.

The panther cub just climbed on the bed, sat on top of Alys, and fell asleep.

Aaron took the time to calm down to analyze his dantian in search of problems caused by his last cultivation session. After a moment, he concluded that everything was right.

It was a pity that his Arcane Energy was only at the One Star level, but there was nothing he could do about it. If he had waited for the end of his body's acclimatization period with Qi, he would have grown Arcane Energy straight to Two Stars. He hadn't waited though, so he had to limit Arcane Energy. Otherwise, his body would have exploded.

Thing is, he hadn't admitted it to himself before, but he had been scared. The bird's attack had left him completely defenseless, a feeling he hadn't had in a very, very long time. He had never been that close to death for so long that he had forgotten how terrifying it could be.

So, he had come straight to the inn and cultivated Arcane Energy. No waiting period, no thinking in the long term. He needed safety right then and there.

And he felt glad he had done it. It had been delightful to use energy outside his body once again. Fighting with Arcane Energy had felt right.

Unfortunately, that meant his waiting time before cultivations had doubled. He would need to wait for twenty days before he could improve one of his energies.

He would still be satisfied with his decision even if there wasn't something nice in the Sorcerer's tales. He had said that Madam Selna had ordered another location near the Red Forest to be protected. The Sorcerer hadn't known what was in there, but Aaron had a clue.

He had used the Rise to the Heavens cultivation method for the first time right on the edge of the forest, and the last time right after leaving the caves.

There might have been new sprouts in each of these locations.

He just needed to decide which way to go.