Aaron woke up at sunrise, and like every time he woke up, he did a series of tasks.

The first was to send a Qi pulse into his mind.

Though he rarely felt sleepy after waking up, he had been sleeping and was a bit lethargic. The transition from a relaxed mind into full attention was like receiving an electric discharge. His senses instantly sharpened, and he entered his usual alert state. He was now ready for whatever the world might throw his way.

The second task was to assess whether his triple condensed perception — aka TCP — was working as it should.

One should never assume their skills worked a hundred percent of the time. Someone might have tempered with his TCP despite the lack of obvious signs. If he found anything at all, he would know someone very powerful or very skilled had come for him in the night, which would put him in full panic mode. He would even have to consider if he weren't dead already, and his mind was trapped in some illusion.

Fortunately, everything was as it should. However, one shouldn't assume their tempering-detecting capabilities were perfect either.

Thus, the third task was to reuse the Arcane Energy from his TCP to cast his active perception skill and check the surrounding five hundred yards for anything suspicious.

That was a much broader inspection that looked for anything wrong at all. From the ambient energy levels, to comparing objects and people around to his memories from the previous night, to the hues of the colors he felt, to the feel of people's skin on his skill, Aaron scrutinized it all. Any inconsistencies were considered in depth before being discarded or investigated even more carefully. He found nothing wrong.

The fourth task was to double-check his arcane perception by comparing what he felt to his physical senses. He opened his eyes and looked around the room, felt the texture of his bedsheets, and took in the city smells from the ajar windows — the panther had opened it at night. Everything checked out.

He could still be under some kind of illusion, but if his enemy were that good, he could do nothing at all, so he might as well not worry about it. If he ever found any evidence of anything wrong, then he would think about it.

Those first four tasks assured him there was no immediate danger lurking about. Therefore, he could move to the last task, making sure his clan was okay.

He had already done a cursory check on them while looking for threats, but now he filled Lana, Alys, and even the beasts with Arcane Energy to find out how they were. Alys showed signs of improving, while Lana's mind had stabilized. She was still exhausted though; the wolf had pissed on her, but she was still asleep.

Aaron had felt the panther leave at night and return with a filled belly. The wolf was crying with hunger. It was a low cry that made Lana frown but still didn't wake her up.

However, as soon as Aaron stood up, she awakened and opened her eyes. The bed wasn't too noisy, but she had been on the verge of awakeness already, and a small squeak was the last straw that broke the camel's back.

And the coincidence of what happened next was outstanding.

The vines had both loosened and dried a little throughout the previous day's walk. That and the strain caused by his jump out and into the window the night before, had been just enough for them to break apart and fall to the ground at the same pace he stood up.

Lana didn't even pretend not to look. She smiled, said in a drunk voice, "Well, hello there to you too, good sir!" and laughed lightly.

"Good morning," Aaron said while shaking his head. She had unintentionally raised a good point. His clothes were in his spatial ring, and it was past time to check how safe it was to use it.

Arcane Sensory Arts: Keen Sensitivity!

Though his active perception was good enough for most purposes, it kept Arcane Energy spread too far apart for a thorough analysis of anything. His keen sensitivity skill, on the other hand, covered the ring with energy, giving him detailed information about its every micrometer.

At least that was the plan. The skill hit an invisible barrier as soon as it got close to the ring. Most formation masters were jealous of their creations and went to great lengths to ensure their secrecy. A barrier like that was just par for the course.

Aaron probed it and found out that if he breached the barrier, it would trigger a secondary function that would destroy the ring. Surprisingly, the barrier was well made enough that he couldn't bypass it, not with One Star Arcane Energy. He could only destroy the barrier, then race against time to render its formation useless before it could scrap the ring.

That would be a feat of speed, analysis, and control. There were at least two formations hidden in the ring, the one responsible for the barrier and the one that made the spatial ring a storage artifact. Aaron had no way of detecting them while the barrier was in place though, so after breaching the barrier, he had to locate the formations — the easy part — determine which was the barrier formation, then damage it enough for it to stop functioning. Not only did he have to do that quickly, but he also had to use just enough power to scratch the ring metal without affecting the spatial formation.

Naturally, he would have no trouble with that. If a paltry Lesser Mystic artifact, no matter how well made, could stop him, he would be a waste of cosmic space. After all, he had spent hundreds of millions of years perfecting his skills on artificing and formation mastery

Qi Enhancement: Minute Mind!

He wouldn't take any chances though. His Three Star Qi pushed his mind to its utmost limit. Everything started moving in slow motion for him. He couldn't sustain that for long without causing permanent damage, but a few seconds would be more than enough.

His Arcane Energy slammed against the barrier's weak spots, easily destroying it, then penetrated the ring. The object was hollow, and he quickly located the internal formations inscribed there. They had been drawn in an overly complex manner to make them harder to understand, but Aaron had seen much worse. He identified the one he had to destroy and used a microscopic blade of Arcane Energy to scrap the ring's metal in five points, rendering it useless.

Success.

He canceled his minute mind skill and focused on checking the storage formation for damage. Like most formations of its kind, the formation was extremely complex despite its low level.

Storage artifacts created a spatial fold and linked it to the ring's owner. The fold was made outside the very wall between spacetime and void, like a heat bubble on the painting on the walls of reality. The fold technically existed outside spacetime, so it wasn't bound by the boundaries of space. Thus, when the formation linked it to someone, it was done in a way that the bubble would also exist within the owner's soul.

Most artificers and formation masters who crafted such artifacts had little understanding of the metaphysics involved. They just copied blueprints and formations created by their betters and understood the bare minimum of it to make it work.

As with most formations, destroying the spatial formation would destroy the spatial fold too. The resulting explosion would be limited to the ring's physical surroundings and wouldn't damage the owner's soul, thanks to the same dense metaphysics. However, the items inside the fold would cease to exist altogether.

They wouldn't get destroyed; they would be outright erased from reality. The destruction of the formation meant the destruction of the bubble. Once it was gone, the items would be officially outside spacetime. Physical objects were things that required spacetime to exist, they were defined by it. Once spacetime was nowhere to be found, they would simply cease existing.

They would be gone for good, consumed by the void beyond.

There were workarounds for that, like creating a spatial fold closer to spacetime than the void. However, that required knowledge, power, and energy consumption only achievable by cultivators at least at the Immortal level.

Yet, the weaker cultivators had learned how to use it to their advantage. They made the fold's membrane as frail as possible, so it would burst at the smallest push. That way, any external attempt to tamper with it — which usually translated as theft attempts — would destroy everything inside.

Most people would rather have their items destroyed than at the hands of an enemy. Personal possessions could be scrutinized for blackmail, while cultivation resources might strengthen the thief. No, it was better to discourage thieving altogether by being a sore loser.

Some abused that frailty to destroy their opponents' items mid-battle. It was a colossal waste in most cases, and it wasn't easy to achieve either. The fold was protected by the owner's soul, while the ring was protected by the cultivator techniques. Still, albeit rare, it was doable.

Common sense dictated that cultivators should only keep things they could afford to lose in their rings. In practice, they kept most of their possessions with them. While that might sound stupid, it worked to make even fewer people destroy the rings. Greed prevented them from trashing the opponent's riches, as they were just one kill away from becoming theirs.

Either way, it was impossible to steal from a spatial fold at the outer part of spacetime. Instead, it was much easier to mind-control the owner, or just kill them and take the ring from their corpse. Once the owner died, most artifacts could be bound by a new owner.

Mass-produced spatial rings were like that. Locking it to a bloodline was possible, but too expensive, and easy to circumvent with the right techniques. The same held true to all locking techniques. Only setting a ring to self-destruct couldn't be countered, but the spiritual links created by the rings weren't perfect either. It was far too common for rings to self-detonate when they lost connection to the owner for an instant.

Aaron used his ample knowledge of such artifacts to feel every detail of the spatial formation, every symbol, every rune, looking for imperfections that could show a problem caused by the ring having melted slightly.

Unfortunately, he found many. Using that ring would mangle his hand. He needed a new one.

Fortunately, the formation was still functional enough for the fold to still exist — which he already knew, because he could feel it in his soul. Using the formation to access the fold would have been easier, which was the reason he had analyzed it first, but a little silver and mercury would let him temporarily fix the formation and use it. It wasn't risk free, but it was his only option.

Before that though... He was still naked. He folded and tied the bedsheet, turning it into a garment. Lana was no longer looking at him but playing with the puppy instead.

"Do you have money?" he asked.

"Yup," she replied without paying attention.

"How much?"

"A lot." She placed her index finger over her lips and looked at him. "Don't tell anyone, but my family is richer than Tia's. Much, much richer. Like, a loooot richer. But we don't let others know. I only know it because my father is the clan's treasurer." Her eyes widened. "Oh! You shouldn't know that either! Shhhhhhhh!"

Aaron was glad to confirm she had recovered from the shock of the killings and was back to being an airhead, but he wasn't interested in that answer.

"I meant money on you, now."

"Oooohhhhh!" Lana shook her head. "No, nothing."

He needed to retrieve the goods in the ring before leaving the city, or at least buy new weapons. For that, he needed money. He had three good options to make a quick buck.

First, the Temple of Light would probably lend him some money, considering how its followers kept bowing to him on the streets.

Second, if the key the Sorcerers had given him were of any use, it would open a local installation of the Arcane Circle that he could sell, rent, or pawn.

Third, he could pawn the Sky Splitting Sword at a local Imperial Mercenary Guild and take it back after he recovered his items and money. Unfortunately, he could only complete the commission for the sword in the guild's branch where the Fire Wolves had started it, back in the capital.

"Does this city have a Temple of Light?" he asked, and Lana shook her head. "A local branch of the Arcane Circle?" She shook her head exaggeratedly. "Mercenary Guild?" she said no.

Aaron sighed. The suboptimal options were slowly accumulating money, stealing, getting donations using his Herald of Light title, or getting loans from the Baron using his Arcane Circle's substitute position.

He discarded the slow option as soon as he considered it. He had time to spare, but it would be bad for his public image to work on something trivial for too long to get small funds. Now that he was a political entity, he had to worry about these petty things or the prestige of his political positions would lower, and with it, the power they provided him with.

Even when Aaron had been a mere Immortal — two levels lower than his peak — he already ignored most of mortals' opinions. They just didn't matter, for they could do nothing to him. No immortal had a PR department; they spoke with the power of their fists.

The path to immortality was brutal most of the time. Resources and opportunities to increase their power further became scarcer the higher one reached, and the temptation of growing stronger was too great. That was especially true for Immortals, who had tasted the sweet nectar of eternity. They wanted to guarantee they would keep living forever, and only power could give them such certainty. Even if many eventually decided to just give up on eternal life, they wanted to do it on their own terms, not because they lost a fight somewhere.

Aaron was the opposite. As long as he was killed in a fight against a worthy opponent, he would face death with a smile. He would steal to save his life, but he wouldn't touch another's cultivation resources. He would duel for resources instead, but he would force no one to accept the duel — at most he would entice them with exceptional counter-wages.

That meant he valued each thing he had more than normal. Political power was such a case. It was his, so he would use it, and it would be too much of a waste to lower its reach just to make pocket change.

For that same reason, he refused to get a loan from the Baron. Political power had a lot to do with others' perception of it, and the Arcane Circle's substitute loaning money as his first action after taking office was subpar at best. He couldn't beg for donations from the faithful for that same reason. No matter his identity as a religious figure, his identity as the local "Arcane Man" would suffer for it.

That left him with stealing, which he was against on principle. However, stealing expandable, potentially unique resources from a cultivator wasn't the same as temporarily borrowing mortal money from an unsuspecting investor. As long as his theft didn't hurt anyone and he had a good reason for it, he was comfortable with it. He would then return it with interest as soon as possible.

And if he died while robbing some poor peasant's home, it would be only fair. He wouldn't die with a smile on his face, but he would accept it. If you're willing to rob someone, you better be prepared to be caught in the act and pay dearly for it.

His active perception helped him locate the money easily. "Wait for me here," Aaron ordered Lana, then jumped out the window.

It would be like stealing candy from a child.

"The normal price is twenty silver, but for a little shit like you, it's fifty," said the seller.

The Thenor Empire traded using coins of precious metals, but they were mixed with other metals to mint them. Although Aaron could melt lots of silver coins to get the silver he needed for his project, it was easier to buy it. Especially because he also had to buy the mercury anyway.

He was in the only alchemy shop in Red City, the only place where he could buy the two metals he wanted. Coincidentally, the shop clerk was a Devout of Darkness.

"And I'm only negotiating with you because it's that or getting butchered in cold blood like the Guardian Sword clan," the salesman spoke and spat to the side. "Damn hypocrites of the Light. Love and peace, you say. Love and peace my ass."

Aaron, who was wearing rich merchant's clothes he had also loaned from an unsuspecting investor, frowned. "What did you say?"

The salesman, a tall and thin thirty-year-old with black hair and black eyes, dressed in a beautiful black robe, raised his hands in mock fear. The fear in his eyes was real though. So was the defiance. "Uuuhhh, he's going to order me killed, is he? I said..." He raised his voice. "You. Are. Damn. Hypocrites. Don't waste my time with threats, just bring in the pitchfork and fire already. I'd rather die than live in fear of the likes of you."

Something was wrong there. Very wrong.

"Let me try again," Aaron said, then took a gold coin from a leather pouch on his waist and placed it on the countertop. "What exactly happened to the Guardian Sword clan?"