Boring. That was the best word Alistair had to describe the mission. At least, so far. He was sure that things would get more interesting once he got to the village and started asking around.

But until then, he had to deal with things like walking along a dusty dirt path with the hot sun beating down on him. Well, at least he had all his things stored in his ring. Alistair couldn't imagine how the peasants dealt with carrying things around everywhere in this blistering heat and thick humidity.

If only, if only he'd gotten some quality of life artifacts. Like a temperature ring. They stabilized the temperature on your body and clothes to whatever you desired. Or those boots he'd been thinking of before, the ones that would make him move faster. But alas, he hadn't given comfort much thought, having underestimated just how unpleasant the journey would be.

He definitely wouldn't make that mistake again.

It took Alistair a few days to reach the village. Lost Moss, named after a local nursery rhyme, was a small village of around 400 people. Give or take. Alistair had no interest in actually counting them, so the number was really just a guess.

Following the main road through the village led him directly to the Chieftain's Cottage. The chief being the person who was basically in charge. At least, to the point that he was allowed to speak for the village and make important decisions. The rank could be stripped in a single session of the Elder's Council, so it wasn't always a stable position to hold.

But that wasn't Alistair's problem, so he didn't care.

He knocked on the door, taking care not to hit too hard. It looked sturdy enough, but he didn't trust some peasant's hut to stay form under his casual strength. Body Refinement normally only took a person to the peak of what was naturally possible, but he also had all his meridians partially open. He was a lot stronger than a normal human and had to keep it in mind.

"Coming, I'm coming," came the voice of an old man. "Just give me a moment to…" the voice trailed off, leaving Alistair to stew and consider how badly he needed a proper bath. He'd washed in streams, but that was hardly a replacement for clean water and soap. He felt grimy. He hated feeling grimy.

"So, what's-" the wrinkled face of the old man froze, his hand trembling as it rubbed at his wispy beard. "C-cultivator?" He breathed. Alistair nodded, and his eyes widened in joy.

"Excellent!" The old chief excitedly pulled Alistair inside, setting up a chair at the only table and moving towards the little kitchen area. "I assume you're here to kill the monster?"

"Yes, I am," Alistair confirmed. "Is everything the same as in the report, or has something new happened?"

"No, no," the chief said, suddenly morose. "All more of the same. Ten chickens and a pig have been taken since we sent it, but it's behaved the same way. Always attacking at night, sneaking past whatever guards we set up."

Alistair nodded. "Has anybody caught a glimpse of it?" He asked. "Or outright seen it?"

Regrettably, the chief shook his head with a sigh. "No, no. Jasp claims he saw it. Says it looks like a wolf. But before that, he said it looked like a fox. And before that, a cat. So I doubt he actually saw it at all. He's most likely just making up stories to get attention. He does that sometimes. Erm- anything you'd like to eat or drink?"

Alistair smiled gently and shook his head. "No, thank you. I have everything I need in my storage ring."

"Right, right," the chief said, sitting down across from Alistair. He wrung his hands nervously as the silence stretched on between them. His gaze slowly sank to the table as Alistair's gaze bore into him.

"So," Alistair finally said, making the chief look up gratefully. You'd never have thought the chief was the elder of the pair, but facing somebody who could so easily kill you had a way of making a person timid. "Where's this Jasp person?"

The chief's eyes widened. "Are- are you sure?" He stammered. "My lord, I-"

"Don't call me 'lord'," Alistair interrupted coolly. "I'm not a lord of anything and thus the title makes me uncomfortable."

"Right, right, my apologies," the chief murmured. His gaze had sunk to the table again, making Alistair let out a small sigh of exasperation.

"I want to speak with Jasp," he repeated. "Even if it's all nonsense, it might not be. I want to have an idea of what I'll be facing. That way, I'll be better prepared."

"Of course, of course," the chief said, sounding like he was going to collapse.

Alistair considered the chief for a moment, then internally shrugged. Maybe the chief had a bad experience with cultivators before? It happened. When a person could do whatever they wanted, their true nature tended to show itself. Alistair was a pretty reasonable person, preferring peace to violence of any sort. But for another person, they might kill, rape, and plunder wherever they went. The chief might have run into one of those types.

The chief slowly got up, the scraping of the chair on the wooden floor jerking Alistair out of his thoughts. The old man led Alistair out of the house, leaning on his walking stick every time he put weight on his right leg. They passed a series of wooden houses of various sizes before arriving at an especially small one.

"No one wants to live with Jasp," was the only reply Alistair got from the chief after an inquisitive glance.

The chief rapped sharply on the door with his cane. "Jasp!" He shouted, his voice cracking slightly from the effort. "I know you're in there, you lazy layabout! Get out here! A cultivator is here to kill the monster, and he wants to talk to you!"

The chief shot Alistair an apologetic look. "I'm sorry about this," he said. Alistair frowned slightly.

"Sorry about what?" He asked. But before the chief could answer, the door was thrown open.

"Hello, he-llo!" The newcomer sang out in a theatrical tone. He had dirty blonde hair, mud brown eyes, tan skin, and a sneaky twinkle to his eyes that made Alistair immediately understand what nobody believed his story about the monster.

"You're Jasp," He said quickly, wanting to cut the man off before he could build up a head of steam. Jasp was obviously the sort of person who loved talking and playing the fool. Alistair would be here all day, playing audience to Jasp's acts, if Jasp had his way.

"Yes, yes I am!" Jasp cried out, spinning away with shocking nimbleness. The chief moved with equally surprising speed, hobbling forward with his cane raised before walking Jasp with it several times.

"Enough-" smack "of-" smack "your-" smack "foolishness!" The chief shouted. Jasp yelped with each blow until they stopped coming, at which point he whimpered and scooted away, looking decidedly less enthusiastic.

"Alright, you wrinkly old coot," He growled, rubbing his arms and legs where the blows had landed. "Keep your whiskers on- or what's left of them anyways." Jasp smirked as the chief flinched, his hand darting up to his thin beard. Then Jasp jumped away with a yelp as the chief swiped at him with his walking stick again.

Alistair cleared his throat, drawing their attention. He'd been watching with detached amusement, but the show had gotten old and he wanted to move on to the reason he was here.

"Jasp," he stated, making the young man's gaze sharpen. "What did you see of the monster?"

The playfulness on Jasp's face fell away as he shrugged. "Not a whole lot, really. It was running away with one of Old Marn's chickens when I saw it. At first, I thought it was some sort of huge cat. It slinked around like one, in any case. But it didn't really look like a cat. More like a wolf, really. So I figured it was probably a fox, since foxes look like tiny wolves, but move more like cats. But then I remembered that there aren't any foxes around, not in this season. So I figured it had to just be some weird sort of wolf."

Alistair blinked. The chief was far less reserved.

"Jasp!" He shouted, fury and indignation turning his face a splotchy red, "You mean to tell me that you could have described the whole thing that clearly this entire time!?!?"

"Umm," Jaso trailed off as he met the chief's enraged eyes. "Yes?"

The chief let out a strangled cry of rage before swinging his stick wildly at the evidently infuriating young man. Alistair chose to let himself out and head back to the Chieftain's Cottage to wait.

His plan was simple. He'd wait for the monster to attack, then use his tracking talisman to, well, track it. Then he'd kill it and head back to the sect with the body after getting his mission slip signed. He'd rest for a day or two, then take another mission. Rinse and repeat.

He just needed to tell the chief where he'd be sleeping and to send somebody to come get him as soon as the monster attacked.

-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-

Alistair lay awake on his bedroll, looking up at the stars as he thought about the somewhat amusing conversation he’d had with the village chief.

“Oh, good,” the chief had said, breathing a sigh of relief. “I didn’t know where you’d gone and I- well, I’m glad you’re here.”

Alistair raised an eyebrow at the man, but didn’t comment on whatever the man had been going to say. Instead, he moved on to the reason he was here. “The monster attacks every night, correct?” He asked for the sake of clarification.

The chief nodded. “Yes, every night.” He paused, then continued when Alistair just kept staring. “We don’t know how it manages it. No matter how many guards we set or how many fences we built, it just slips past all of them and takes what it wants.”

That was less than ideal. It meant either the monster was intelligent enough to outwit them, or it had some sort of innate ability that let it slip by them unnoticed. Simple camouflage would be the best case scenario. But it could also be invisibility, illusions, impermeability, or even outright teleportation. Alistair, unfortunately, suspected it was illusions. Ever since he’d heard that the creature looked like a fox, it had been the one thought he couldn’t get out of his mind.

It would make sense. All fox species had innate powers of illusion and enthrallment, no matter what other abilities they had. A demonic fox even more so than a normal fox spirit. It would be difficult for a Meridian Opening fox to fully mask itself, but not impossible. Especially when it was dealing with ordinary peasants.

Alistair shook his head with a sigh, then looked the chief in the eye. “I want all your people out watching tonight. Men, women, even children. As soon as something is taken, they come straight to me. I’ll be waiting at the center of the village, just by the well. I’ll chase down the monster alone.”

The chief nodded hesitantly, a vaguely rebellious look in his eye. Alistair crooked an eyebrow at him, and the chief voiced his thoughts unsteadily. “Even the children?” He asked.

Alistair shrugged. “Sure. Or not. What’s important is that you discover the attack within half an hour. I have a tracking talisman that will lead me to the monster, but it won’t work well after more than half an hour.” That wasn’t strictly true. The time limit was a full hour. But Alistair didn’t want them being lazy about it. Giving them only half an hour would keep them on their toes.

The chief nodded again. An image of a bobblehead version of the chief popped into Alistair’s head, almost making him grin in a rather undignified manner.

“In that case, then, I’d like to leave the children out of it,” the chief said. Alistair spread his palms in an uncaring gesture.

“Whatever you like,” he said.

That had been three days ago. Since then, the monster had snuck past the village three nights in a row, with the village only discovering the theft after it was too late. Tensions were running high, as the villagers had expected a quick solution to their problems after the arrival of a cultivator. Comments like “useless” and “what are we even paying, housing, and feeding the upstart brat for” kept getting thrown around.

The villagers had seemingly forgotten that he hadn’t been paid, had been eating his own food, drinking his own water, and sleeping on his own bed outside any of the houses. They hadn’t given him a damn thing. Although admittedly, they had been getting a lot of sleepless nights thanks to his orders. But that was the one thing they didn’t resent him for. And it was the only thing he’d actually done!

Alistair sighed, internally bemoaning the stupidity of humanity. Then he noticed the person running towards him.

“An attack!” The person, a young girl, shouted. She reached him as he jumped to his feet, doubling over and panting. Alistair waited for her to catch her breath before asking the one question he had.

“Where?” He asked in a strict, no-nonsense voice.

The girl, who hadn’t quite gotten her breath back, pointed in the direction she’d come from. Obviously. What he meant was-

“Which pen?” Alistair clarified.

“Pig pen,” She gasped out. Alistair nodded sharply and took off.

His feet left deep furrows in the earth as he ran, outstripping anything an ordinary mortal could achieve. A smirk crossed his lips for the briefest of moments before his face returned to its usual mask. He truly, truly loved being a cultivator. Dying horribly had been the best decision of his previous life!

Sure, it had a lot of boring moments. Sitting around chanting a sutra while guiding qi through your body was hardly exhilarating. At least, once the initial rush of controlling a magical energy wore off. Alistair wasn't certain he'd ever lose that hint of wonder he felt whenever he manipulated qi. Still, it got pretty mundane and boring despite being incredible in it's own way. But this? The pay-off? It was what made it all worth it.

"There!" A man shouted pointing at Alistair. A number of people ran over to the cultivator as he altered his course to meet them.

"I was told there was an attack," he said, sliding to a graceful stop. "Where was it?"

"Here, here," a woman said, guiding him by the arm to a specific pen. A bit of fresh blood splashed on the ground made it clear that the theft had been recent.

Alistair immediately summoned his tracking talisman from his storage ring and pushed his qi into it. As a Body Refinement cultivator, it took him several seconds just to gather enough qi to activate the talisman. He had to carefully pull the qi out of his flesh, gather it in his palm, then move it to the activation key on the talisman. A tricky and somewhat dangerous move.

It was easy to damage the body by moving qi through anything other than your meridians. It was why cultivation was said to only truly start after all a person's meridians had been opened. At that point, it was possible to rapidly and easily move qi through your body as needed, thus allowing for magical abilities to be used far more easily than when your meridians remained closed.

But this was good enough for now.

A feral grin played on Alistair's youthful face as the talisman rose into the air, forming a ball of light around itself. It made the villagers flinch to see. Suddenly, they all became keenly aware that they'd been harboring somebody who was both strong enough and skilled enough to slaughter every single one of them. The face of one of the older men, who'd been one of the people rabble-rousing the day before, completely drained of blood.

Alistair didn't so much as notice their reactions. His focus was entirely on the ball of light.

"You all," he said, focusing his attention on the villagers. He was momentarily distracted by one man's appearance. It looked like he was about to faint. "Are- are you alright?" He asked.

The man stammered for a moment, then fell over. Alistair pursed his lips, then decided he didn't have time to deal with the idiocy of peasants. He refocused on the crowd, making them flinch from the force of his gaze.

"I want you to gather a hunting party and follow me," he said. "It's possible this thing is stronger than we thought. If it's too much for me, I'll need support. If it manages to kill me, you'll want to attack it while it's tired and weakened. Meaning right after our fight. Understood?"

They nodded and ran off. All in different directions. Alistair indulged in a moment of despair. These villagers were idiots! He sighed, shaking his head. Then he turned his attention back to the talisman.

"Alright," he breathed. "Showtime." He moved towards the ball of light. As soon as he drew near enough, it moved towards the forest.

Alistair's wolfish grin returned. Perfect.

He took off, following the light as it led him deeper and deeper into the forest. The forest was hardly thick. The trees were at least a dozen feet apart from each other at all times, and there was little to no undergrowth. The moon and stars peeked could almost always be seen thanks to the near-total lack of clouds. Combined with the soft white light of the tracking talisman, Alistair had more than enough light to see by.

He slid to a halt as a low snarl reached his ears, the soft padding of paws on earth making itself known over the pounding of blood in his ears. An enormous fox, larger than most wolves, slid out from behind a tree, moving with eerie grace.

As Alistair had thought, the monster that had been stealing livestock was a fox demon. Ah, the sweet feeling of vindication. The simple satisfaction of being right.

Alistair pulled his spear from his storage ring, along with the Holy Wall talisman. His armor was already equipped. After all, armor couldn't just be summoned on and off his body. He'd had to take his time getting each piece on just right, then made himself comfortable sleeping in it.

He blinked the errant thoughts out of his mind, focusing on the impending battle. The fox was circling, darting from tree to tree. He gripped his spear with both hands. Normally, he'd say it was a poor idea to use a spear in a forest. But this forest was thin enough that it wasn't a problem.

The fox let out a low, warning growl. Probably the fox equivalent of "turn your stupid ass around before it rip you apart". Alistair wasn't sure. Nor did he really care. If it was just the one fox, he wasn't actually all that worried. Foxes weren't especially good at straight fights. Not unless they were one of the higher class foxes, with some sort of bloodline ability to help them. But that almost certainly wasn't the case here.

Normally, a fox demon would rely on enchanting the opponent. Whether this meant illusion or enthrallment depended on a few factors. Enthrallment, for example, only became a factor after they'd formed their Golden Core and shattered their Mortal Shackles. At that point they'd gain a human form, like all spirit beasts, with human wisdom to match. At that point, nearly all fox spirits became devastatingly beautiful. It made it easy for them to enthrall most cultivators of the opposite gender.

But for a fox of this level, the only real option was illusions. And the fox would have already spent most of its energy to trick the villagers. After all, that was the main reason Alistair had gotten so many villagers keeping watch. The more people it had to trick, the more tired the fox would become. As long as it hadn't entered the Qi Condensing Realm, it would have to be nearly out of qi.

So, full of confidence, Alistair cautiously advanced. What? Just because he was confident didn't mean he was stupid. Even if it was an opponent he was almost certain to defeat, it could still injure him badly if he was careless. And he needed to keep his senses sharp in case of there being one or more foxes.

Actually, maybe his Eye of Insight would tell him in the description?

DEMONIC FOX Age: 8 Sex: Female Race: Fox Spirit (Demon) Spiritual Root: 51% Water Root 49% Fire Root Meridians: Ordinary Mortal Physique: Ordinary Mortal Bloodline: None Cultivation Level: Meridian Opening - Stage 5 Overall Talent: 12 Occupation: Monstrous Fox Description: A demonic fox that has been terrorising a farming village. It has a single living kit that it will protect with its life.

Well. That was spectacularly useless. Alistair was sure he could get useful information if he played around with the Eye of Insight for a minute, but he didn't have the concentration to spare. Or the time. The fox was growling louder and louder, moving more sharply and fiercely as it circled him. It was going to attack soon.

Alistair made a sharp jab with his spear. The fox leapt back, despite the spearhead never getting anywhere near it. It made to lunge at Alistair, but he swiped his spear at it. The shape blade made a whistling sound as it cut through the air, making the fox retreat further.

The fox snarled, then breathed out- mist? Alistair snarled and lunged, spear arcing towards the fox's chest. It was an easier target than the head and would do a fine job of disrupting whatever illusion this was. The fox jumped back, the mist fading slightly from the distraction. But then it went back to spewing misting and the technique stabilized.

Alistair pressed forward, planning to attack until it stopped trying to cast the technique. It wasn't his preferred style of combat. He liked to fight defensively, letting his opponent exhaust themselves on his defenses before swooping in for the kill. But that wasn't an option right now.

The mist was already high enough to completely cover the fox and becoming denser by the second. If the fox created enough of it, Alistair wouldn't be able to see through the mist, allowing it to attack with near impunity. Alistair thought he was good enough to win the fight regardless, but it would be stupid to take the chance.

Alistair paused in his attacks for a moment, switching his spear for his sword. He held the sword, Archon's Grace, in his dominant hand, his right, while pulling the Spear of Judgement talisman into his left. He then continued his attacks with the sword while slowly gathering qi in his left palm.

It was difficult. Pulling qi from his body without damaging it was a lot harder when he was actively moving around. Trying to do it while also focusing on attacking the fox made it so it took nearly half a minute to gather the qi he needed. But then he had the qi and was activating the talisman.

The fox let out a hissing noise as the spear, formed of holy light, formed off to the side of Alistair's left shoulder. He let it sit there for a moment as he lunged at the fox. Predictably, it jumped away. Like it had every other time. With a thought, he sent the spear rocketing towards the spot where the fox would land.

It didn't have time to dodge. The spear slammed into it, knocking it off balance as it hit next to the shoulder. Alistair's muscles screamed in protest as he lunged, moving and swinging his sword with all the speed and force his Body Refinement cultivation could offer.

His sword slammed into the fox's neck, completely severing it. The head hit the ground with a tiny, hollow thud as the body collapsed to the ground. Alistair breathed heavily, wiping the sweat off his face as he looked at the body. Slowly, a delighted grin spread across his face.

He'd done it! He'd killed his first demon! Sure, it hadn't been especially strong. But still! His first demon!

He quickly stashed the head and body into his storage ring. Spatial storage rings, at least of this level, couldn't store living beings. But they could store dead flesh without any issues. It was an easy proof of completion.

Alistair glanced toward the ball of light generated by the tracking talisman. He moved towards it, pushing it towards where he'd seen the mother fox demon come from. The description had mentioned a kit. If it was a demon, he'd need to kill it. Otherwise it would grow up to become a new monster fox.

He only had to walk for a few minutes to find the den. A large tree had fallen over, and the fox demon had created a nest in the branches. As the light soared over the branches, Alistair could hear a fox squeaking in protest.

He poked his head into the den and scanned the fluffy red fox kit.

FOX SPIRIT Age: 1 Sex: Female Race: Fox Spirit Spiritual Root: Firesong Spiritual Root Meridians: Ordinary Mortal Physique: Ordinary Mortal Bloodline: None Cultivation Level: None Overall Talent: 24 Occupation: Fox Kit Description: The offspring of a monstrous demon fox that terrorized a local village.

Alistair swallowed hard as he got a good look at the kit. No longer needing to worry about whether or not the kit was a demon in disguise, he was able to fully appreciate just how adorable the little bundle of fluff was.

"It's official," he murmured to it. "I'm keeping you."

-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-

The walk back to the village was slow. Mainly because Alistair had no reason to move quickly. He'd just killed the only monster in the forest capable or willing to attack him. Then he'd taken its offspring as his pet. Funny how the world worked sometimes.

Alistair rubbed the little fox's head, making her squeak in pleasure. He'd need to think of a good name. Luna? Ciara? Nimue? Or maybe something more common.

He shrugged the thoughts aside and reflected on his fight with the fox demon. From the view of hindsight, Alistair could safely say that he probably should have used his Spear of Judgement talisman earlier. By the time he'd gotten enough qi to it, the most had been thick enough that he could barely see the fox. The only reason he'd actually been able to hit the fox was that he'd made it retreat enough times that he could guess where it would jump to.

If he'd missed, he would have been forced to rely on activating the enchantments on his weapons. Which wouldn't have been the end of the world, but using an artifact was a lot harder than using a talisman. Talismans charged themselves using ambient qi. All the person using them had to do was gather enough qi to trigger the activation sequence. But with artifacts, you fueled the entire thing.

Alistair figured he'd only have one attack in him, using either spear or sword, before he was totally drained of qi. And that was disregarding how long it would take to gather the qi needed.

Of course, if worst came to worst, he could have used his Holy Wall talisman. But that would mean he couldn't use it later if he got hurt. He didn't have any proper healing items- which was now on his list of Things To Buy, just above enchanted walking boots and just below a temperature control ring. Or maybe he should get temperature controlling robes? Or a sash? Sashes seemed to be all the rage these days. Everybody, even the elders, had fancy sashes showing how cool and elegant they were.

Alistair had a plain black sash with gold trimming. Which was basically neutral, as far as sashes went. It was hardly unfashionable, but it wasn't fashionable either. But Alistair liked it. He liked his black robes with their white edges and gold trimming too. Honestly, he just liked black, white, and gold. It was hard to go wrong with that particular color combination.

He walked like that for a while, petting his new fox and thinking about totally ordinary stuff. Occasionally he'd stop to enjoy the scenery of the dew covered forest as the little specks and drops of water sparkled in the moonlight. Other times, he'd look up at the moon and stars. The night sky was so clear. So beautiful. There was no pollution, either light or gas, to fog up the sky. It was all crystal clear, especially to his Body Refinement eyes.

He enjoyed a light breeze. Both the feel of it on his face and the sound of it rustling the trees.

Yes, Alistair thought. Truly, dying in his old life and being reborn in this one had been the best thing that had ever happened to him.