Naath woke up to Brutus nudging him with his paws. He turned over and groggily sat up, “good morning Brutus.” Brutus growled to show displeasure, Naath grew confused as Brutus looked over at the bag Naath used to store food. Naath understood saying “ah don't worry I’ll go grab us some food from the nearby shops, wait here Brutus I’ll be right back.” With that Naath grabbed the bag and headed for the door however, Brutus refused to stay put, this time going with him. Naath let out a breath and said “alright, but you can't take any food unless I give it to you myself, understood?”

Brutus perked up slightly and barked, lightly while wagging his tail in approval. Naath shook his head and they left headed towards the doors of the inn. As Naath walked by the innkeeper asked “ah young man, you only have half a month left in your room. Would you like to renew your payment or are you leaving after that time?” Naath jumped and asked “how long is it until the sect entrance exams are held?” The innkeeper said “15 days give or take, the same amount of time your payment has as a matter of fact.”

Naath thought ‘that breakthrough must have taken more out of me than I thought, I actually slept for half a month?!’ Naath let out a breath saying “I plan to enter the sect so I won’t be needing to renew the payment for my room. Thank you though.” After saying that the innkeeper’s expression changed and he asked, “young man, er it wouldn't have been you that broke through about half a month ago would it?” Naath nodded his head asking “Ah, I'm sorry if I happened to disturb the other residences in the other rooms.” The innkeeper chuckled and said “young man you disturbed 90% of the city with that incredible level of sound from that breakthrough.”

Naath chuckled awkwardly as he left the inn. After that he turned and started towards the direction of the markets and walked towards them. After walking for about five minutes he had arrived at a location with rows of stalls all selling various foods. Naath grabbed a bunch of salted meats, that would last for a long period of time without going bad, and tossed them into his bag. Of course half of them all went to Brutus in the end anyway. After Naath was done with his shopping he headed out of the city and towards the raging river sect nearby. It took Naath about 20 minutes of walking from the city gate before seeing the outline of the walls surrounding the sect.

When Naath saw it he stopped for a moment and his jaw dropped slightly as he thought to himself. ‘If this is a 12th grade sect then how impressive would a 1st grade sect be?!’ In front of Naath was a large set of walls no lesser than the ones from the city he had just left. In fact the raging river sect was like a small city itself, at the four cardinal directions of the sect there was one gate each. At the gates there were lines of people stretching out for hundreds of feet.

At the front people were registering at a desk to apply for the entrance tests. Some people left dejectedly and others were handed a small stone badge and beaming with large smiles. Naath got into the back of one of the lines with Brutus right next to him, the line moved slowly every few minutes when someone had finished a test. After several hours Naath had finally arrived at the front of the line. The man behind the desk asked “name, where are you from, how old are you, what is your cultivation and what level of noise did you produce on your latest breakthrough?”

Naath said “my name is Naath, I'm from the riverside village, I’m almost nine years of age now. And what measures of noise are there to use?” The man behind the desk said “the levels of noise are, mute meaning cant be heard by anyone but you. Popping which is heard from a foot to a few feet away. Cracking which is heard up to several tens of feet away. Snapping which is heard up to several hundreds of feet away, and finally there is breaking. This is heard a mile away or more, if it is at the breaking level please state how far the noise traveled.”

Naath nodded and said “ah in that case mine was breaking level, I don't know how far it went per se but I know the entire city heard it apparently.” The man behind the desk’s gaze changed and he said “listen brat I dont have time for stupid jokes, what level of noise did you really achieve? Don't lie, we have a special stone here that will register and test your bone age, cultivation, and noise level here.” Naath said “senior I truly did make a noise loud enough that it spread at least through the entire city.” The man behind the desk shook his head.

“Sigh I guess we will have to do this the hard way, young man place your hand on this stone tablet.” With that the man behind the desk waved his hand and a stone tablet appeared on top of the desk instantly. Naath jumped and looked bewildered by this event. The man behind the desk said “it was just taking an item out of a spatial ring, at the very least it seems you truly are from some remote village.” Understanding dawned on Naath, spatial rings were items used to store various things inside of a separate space making them entirely weightless. Of course all spatial rings had a limit on the amount of space in them. The cheaper ones had 10 square meters of space. The expensive ones had enough space to store entire towns and villages.

Naath put his hand forward and laid it on top of the stone tablet, after that information appeared in his mind. Naath assumed the same information was also appearing in the man behind the desk’s mind as well. The information said “bone age, 8 years 11 months. Cultivation initial stage second level bone hardening. Noise level, breaking, 30 miles!” Once the information on the noise level appeared, the man behind the desk actually fell out of his chair and his gaze changed completely.

He stuttered “y-y-yo-you, what the hell?! What’s with that noise level?! Pass! You pass! , take this badge, it has your information on it and will let you take the sect entrance exams.” Naath smiled at the man's reaction and asked “when is the entrance exam going to be held exactly?” The man behind the desk said still with clear signs of shock on his face “it will be held in 10 days time at dawn.” Naath nodded, took his stone badge and walked out of the line back towards the city.

Later that night in a bar inside of the city. the four examiners from the four gates of the sect had gathered. They were discussing the examinees they had seen earlier today as they had the past few days. They started talking about the worse ones, or the ones who tried to register despite being older than 20. They all started laughing and moving on slowly talking about the ones that had made deep impressions on the four of them. One of them spoke and she said “ah right I met a rather outstanding young man today.

He was already at peak level one bone hardening! The noise level he produced was at the cracking level, haha sorry boys I think I got the best talent at my gate today. After that she and two of the other examiners started arguing over the talents they had seen as well. After arguing for a few minutes they all collectively realized the examiner who had seen Naath remained silent the entire time when the best talent came up. One of them asked “what did you not have any good talents come through today? It’s alright we can't expect to see talents every day.”

The examiner shook his head and downed the rest of the alcohol in his cup wiping his mouth. He said “it’s not that I didn't get any talents today, simply if I spoke of the most talented young man today not a single of the three of you would believe me. Even I still don't believe it myself, the kid was a monster level genius. As he spoke he slowly swirled the drink in his hand and downed the contents of the glass. The other three looked at each other and started to laugh saying “don't go making up bullshit stories to try to dissuade us because you didn't get one today. Who was this “monstrous level genius? Why is he such a monster?” The examiner who had Naath shook his head and said “alright but don’t piss yourselves from fright when you hear what I say.

The kid’s name was odd so it stood out to me, he was named Naath, he was initial stage second level bone hardening and his noise level…” He stopped and drained another glass of alcohol before continuing. “His noise level was at the breaking stage at a distance of 30 miles!” The other three examiners started laughing hysterically and mocking him, one of them asking “what and how old was this imaginary monster of yours?” The examiner shook his head saying “he was 8 years and 11 months old.” The examiner who had Naath said it in a shaky voice with a dead serious expression.

When they heard the shaking in his voice and the seriousness on his face the other three stopped laughing and one of them said “holy shit, you serious?! That-that-that can’t even be called a monster level talent it's simply beastly!” The other two who were mocking nodded their heads in agreement to this statement and asked them about everything related to Naath. The examiner told them everything “he was a young man with average height, jet black hair and green eyes that held a depth not normal for someone his age. He came together with… with… Holy shit! That kid had a… a... how did I just realize now?!

Wait how did he have one if he was from some small remote village!?” The other three wore scowl asking “with what, what did he come with?” The examiner who had Naath took a few deep breaths to calm himself and said “he had a silver moon wolf by his side!” The other three were stunned on the spot, that was a magical beast that even some noble children couldn’t get a hold of because it was so rare and sought after! The rest of that night was spent by them drinking and asking questions about Naath.

Naath who was in his room at the inn working on compressions had no idea about any of this and silently cultivated preparing to his utmost limit until the day of the sect entrance exams.