After returning to the village the two made their way to to where the village's largest merchant lived. Outside his home about eight cultivators could be seen loading and unloading goods, half of them loading new goods onto the cart and the other half bringing away the goods they'd just unloaded to somewhere else on the premises. As the two approached the group several people noticed them, their dirty appearance and bandages drawing quite a few worried glances. Yan Da, the group's leader and the only Meridian Opening cultivator among them, approached the two upon seeing the sorry state they were in and asked what happened.

Liu Zhu was still a bit out of it, so his companion explained the situation. Yan Da just nodded and listened, and after the man was done speaking he did his best to deal with the situation. "Xie Hua, Zuo Shi, good job not dying. I'll talk to the merchant and then head out to finish it off, keep doing what you're doing- er, the not dying thing, not the bleeding thing. Stop doing that." Yan Da immediately requested that the merchant call for a doctor, and the merchant sent one of his employees out to do so. After dealing with that Yan Da hurried to the woods with Feng Jun and another Late Blood and Viscera Tempering cultivator to finish off the panther.

After the village's doctor arrived he took a look at Liu Zhu's wound first. Xie Hua had expected him to need stitches when he bandaged his wound, but when the doctor took a closer look at the wound he decided against it. The panther hadn't punctured anything important and the bleeding had already slowed down so there was a good chance the wound would heal naturally given two or three weeks. The only advice given was to apply bandages, keep the wound clean, and to apply pressure if it bled too much. Xie Hua was confused since he could've sworn the wound looked a bit worse when he bandaged it, but just shrugged it off as a side effect of him panicking. After all, that was a far more reasonable explanation than the teenager sitting next to him having the ability to recover from wounds at an ungodly speed.

Xie Hua, on the other hand, did have to get a couple of stitches. He grit his teeth and sat through the procedure without any complaints, and by the time the doctor was done Yan Da and the others had returned, the panther slung over their shoulder. Its windpipe was crushed completely, so it appeared that they'd finished the job by targeting the wound Liu Zhu had left behind. As the three approached the group Yan Da nodded at Liu Zhu and Xie Hua. "Good job, this thing was half-unconscious when I found it. Could've recovered but it would've taken a long time. You fucked it up good." After saying this Yan Da had everyone return to dealing with the merchant while he left the group, muttering something about 'visiting the village chief real quick'.

After Liu Zhu spent half an hour slowly moving crates while making sure he didn't exasperate his wound further, Yan Da returned to the group with a grin on his face. Everyone threw a glance at him, confused, and paused their work for a moment. "Get everybody together, I just got some good work. Long story short there are more of those panthers nearby and if we kill them we get paid. Get this done with, get everybody together, and then I'll go over it in more detail."

With everyone put to work and motivated by the promise of a job that paid well the old cargo was moved to a storehouse and the new cargo shoved onto the cart in record time. Once they were done Yan Da took the group inside and gave them the rundown on the situation. "Xie Hua and Zuo Shi almost got murdered by a Reed Panther earlier today. Fortunately they managed to get it worse than it got them and we went and finished it off. That would be the end of things, but when I took the body to the village's chief to get some payment for it, he informed me that it was pregnant. He also informed that based on a few marks on it, it had probably been pregnant before. That means there's a few more lurking around the area, and while most of them are probably only as strong as an Early or Middle Blood and Viscera Tempering cultivator, the adult male might be almost as strong as me. And that means we have some work to do! Go out, kill the cats, and we all get paid! Long as we stay in a group we should all stay safe and make some cash. Alright?"

Everyone seemed more than eager to take the job, as with a group of over a dozen cultivators it was unlikely that anyone would get killed as long as they stayed on guard. Liu Zhu was still a bit shaken and couldn't use his full strength without risking tearing open his wound again, but went along with the plan. He wouldn't gain much from sitting here in the village, and with a small horde of cultivators around him is was doubtful anything would happen.

As everyone came to a consensus Yan Da made a point of giving Xie Hua and Liu Zhu the payment for killing the first Reed Panther in front of everyone else, as they "did most of the work and took on most of the risk". The payment was a little less than 20 gold coins each. Liu Zhu thanked Yan Da for taking care of the aftermath for him and took the money, putting it into a deflated coinpurse he kept on his belt. Most of his funds were in his backpack to avoid standing out from the rest of the group, so this influx of money caused the previously sad-looking coinpurse to more than double in size.

Most of the cultivators were told to do whatever they wished for the next few hours as long as they could be easily found later. After saying this Yan Da called Xie Hua, Fang Jun, and Liu Zhu over. "I'm heading over to speak with a hunter the village chief mentioned and you're coming with me. Xie Hua, Zuo Shi, the two of you saw the Reed Panther so think about if there are any important details about it you need to mention. Feng Jun, you're good at talking, I'll leave him to you if I mess up. The village chief said he was hard to predict but would probably help us, so I'm hopeful." The group of four left the rest of the cultivators, retrieved the Reed Panther's corpse from the village chief so that the hunter could examine it if need be, and then began their trip to where the hunter lived. Apparently he didn't like interacting with others much and had made his home by a lake several hours away from the village. Fortunately everyone was a cultivator so the trip was under an hour, but the trip was still a pain and left Liu Zhu wondering why he would want to live this far away from civilization.

As the four neared the lake, they saw a small wisp of smoke rising up into the air. They changed direction slightly to approach it and found an old man sitting by a fire. A scraggly, unkempt beard dominated his face, and his body was obscured by a crudely-sewn fur cloak several sizes too big for him. As the four neared they saw that he was staring in their direction. "Heard ya comin' from a mile away. Whatcha want." The man coughed several times before saying anything, and spoke in a rough, slow fashion, as if he if wasn't used to talking. His speech or appearance weren't the most surprising things about him though- the truly shocking part about him was his cultivation. Yan Da mentioned that he was at Bone and Marrow Tempering, but that was clearly false- he'd reached Meridian Opening already.

Yan Da took the lead in speaking with him. "Some Reed Panthers showed up in the forest next to Thornbrush Village. We wanted your help tracking them down." The hunter paused for a moment before gesturing to a log next to his fire. Getting the hint, everyone took a seat. "How's Kang doing?" Everyone sat there for a moment, perplexed by the question, before Yan Da seemed to realize something. "The village chief? He seemed lively when I saw him." The hunter just nodded, going silent for a moment before prodding at the fire and putting more firewood onto it. "Good to hear that old buzzkill is doing fine. Haven't seen him in a couple decades. I guess he mentioned me?" Yan Da just nodded, and the hunter eventually wheezed out a response. "Of course. Well, he sent you to the right man. You aren't willing to let me take care of everything, are you? I find them, kill them, take the corpse, you get paid whatever's left without the body?"

Yan Da didn't even think about it before declining. "No, this is our work and the body is what most of the payment is for. That won't do." The hunter sighed. "Of course it isn't. Well, was worth asking. The thrill's in the hunt for me, so if I could get rid of you guys I would. Course I could just turn you down, wait for you to get tired of looking and then see if I can find it later, but since it's my friend's village it's that's going a little too far. I'm in as long as you can spare me a few parts- as you can see, I could use a new cloak." Yan Da thought about it for a moment before agreeing. "That's fine. We can work out the exact split later. I'm Yan Da, and it's a pleasure to be working with you. Your name is...?" The hunter laughed as he stood up and shook Yan Da's outstretched hand. "I don't need a name. I'm the hunter who lives by the lake, and that's all I need to be."