"Haru! Amazing, did you really manage to reach Qi Condensation?" Jou asked the girl once she completed her attempts to cultivate.

Seeing Haru nod happily all of them congratulated her.

"Great, go eat a bit Haru, then we can move on." Yui told her, happy that her attempt to help actually worked out fine.

It did not take long for the group to move on and continue their search for a beast.

"I found one. It seems to be a bear, rather big, probably close to spirit tier." Nariko announced shortly after. It probably lives in some cave in the little copse of trees on the hill or something.

Most of the scouting work was done by her, as the other three were not good at tracking anything at all and no one asked Yui to help. Not that she would have any idea how to track something really.

"Get ready, Nariko will try to hit it from a safe distance to weaken it and we can then try to lure it into a trap. If that won't work Tashiro and myself will block it. Haru, it's great that you can cultivate now, but you should get used to your new strength first, so better hang back this time."

Under Jou's directions the group quickly dug a pitfall trap before covering it up with twigs and grass that would break as soon as something as heavy as a bear stepped onto it.

As none of their group was even close to Mid Qi Stage, they did not want to risk any serious injuries by engaging with the bear directly. Tora made it clear that Yui would just be watching and not interfere and they had to rely on their own skills.

When Nariko shot an arrow at the bear, missing its head, but still managing to hit its back, the beast was roaring in pain and anger.

It was a world where the strong would hunt the weak and the smart would use their advantage against anyone with less skills.

Unlike normal animals, spirit animals were far harder to tame and raise, not to mention that the unexplored lands were still hiding endless amounts of spirit beasts.

Beast waves would threaten and destroy smaller settlements from time to time and it was a constant struggle for humans to acquire resources, not just against other nations, but against the threat from beasts as well.

A second arrow made its way towards the bear, but being prepared this time, the bear managed to evade the projectile with a quick jump, letting it whizz past its body.

Nariko did not have time for a third arrow before she had to retreat. The bear was simply way too fast, and she had underestimated its speed, thinking it would take a lot longer to cover the distance between them.

The girl hopped over the trap, taking up a position behind the two young men who were blocking the path for the bear as soon as she was beyond their line of defense.

A third arrow found its way over the heads of Jou and Tashiro, this time hitting one of the bears paws.

Before the bear even managed to close in on them, the trap finally showed its usefulness.

The floor that was just a thin cover fell apart and the bear ended up in the pitfall trap.

Unable to get out quickly, it was just a matter of seconds before the barrage of arrows and throwing weapons from above ended its life.

"We did it!" "Yay that pelt is going to be worth a great deal, this trip was a great success."

"The claws and fangs can be sold for some money as well!"

Haru quickly made an estimate of the price they would get for the bear's parts.

"All in all, this bear should be worth about 10 spirit stones. That’s 1000 shards. Even if we save up 400 shards for coming here again, we still made 600 shards profit."

The remaining part of the day was spent with dismantling the bear and distributing the parts to everyone's backpacks.

"Ready to return to the pavilion?" Yui asked the group and soon they all found themselves back in the shop.

-

When Yui was back in the shop room, she took a quick look around. The shop was pretty empty, except for Ryoma who was standing behind the counter with a new robe in the colors of the Earthly Treasures Pavilion.

Obviously, Tora asked him to take over acting as a temporary shopkeeper, not that Yui was surprised. Tora on the other hand was in the forge with Miyuki.

"She's making wooden toys for Miyuki." Ryoma told Yui when he saw her curious look.

Meanwhile the group of kids who had been hunting with Yui, made sure they were ready to leave and wished Yui goodbye.

"Come back when you want to go hunting again. Have a good day!"

It did just take a moment for her voice to attract attention. The three kids were barely outside the shop, when another even younger voice could be heard in the shop.

"Mommy is back!"

Forgotten were the wooden toys as Miyuki bolted out of the forge room and into Yui's arms.

"Ahh, did you miss me little one?" Yui asked her with a smile and picked her up. "Mhm, I missed you. Aunty Tora made me a pony and a tiger."

"Oh, a pony and a tiger? That's an interesting combination. Won't the tiger eat the pony?"

"No, it can't eat the pony! It's made of wood!"

"I see, well that’s good. You have to make sure to show them to me later." Yui gave Miyuki a quick kiss on the head before putting her down on the floor again. Obviously really happy watching Tora make more toys, it did not take long for the little girl to have left the shop room.

"Yui, … there is some elder who wanted to meet you and has been waiting in the shop for a while." Ryoma whispered to her.

'This would explain why there is suddenly a little table next to the benches with a cup of tea.' Yui thought to herself.

On the bench was an older man in a daoist robe. He looked like your harmless grandfather type, but by now it was easy for Yui to feel his powers underneath his grandfatherly looks.

This was definitely no ordinary old man.

Walking over to him with a wary attitude Yui once again tried her best to keep Tora's training in mind. 'Steady power flow, steady.'

Yui did not want anyone to notice her ineptitude with her own spiritual power. That would be like throwing some bloody meat into the ocean water while swimming next to it. Inviting all kinds of nasty people who would behave like sharks if they noticed some kind of weakness.

Not that she really had any idea what her power imbalance looked like to others in the first place.

No one but Tora had any idea of how strong she really was, but Yui just expected everyone somewhat powerful to see that she was a beginner.

"You have been looking for me senior?" she asked the man, who stood up to greet her with a smile.

"Indeed, you must be the owner of this shop, Lady Tai?"

Yui just nodded in reply to his question. He seemed friendly enough after all and she could not feel any danger, more as if she was watched curiously.

"Wonderful. I'm here on behalf of King Yura to make your acquaintance and talk about some topics that would be important for the co-existence of our kingdoms. You can call me Elder Moriai if you like."

"King Yura? I see, he already sent someone. Well, we might as well find a nice quiet place to talk."

"As you wish your Majesty." Once again, Elder Moriai seemed to have a strange friendly look, making it hard for Yui to dislike or be wary around him.

Yui had already given up on rejecting the title, at least when she had to deal with things in an official way. She wouldn't let anyone else during regular business use that form of address.

Not thinking much about it, she evoked the Earthly Treasures Pavilion's powers and transported both of them to a nice quiet spot next to a lake at a corner of the Old Vine Forest.

It was one of Yui's favorite spots, a scenic location where she would often go to relax after her training with Tora, with several large stones one could sit one and watch out towards the lake, enjoying the view.

"What a nice place! It's not surprising that you pick this location rather than sitting in a boring throne room."

"We might not have a lot of snacks or good tea, but the view is much better." Yui said, giving the lake another look, before sitting down on one of the stones and turning her attention to the man.

"You said you wanted to talk about some things concerning our countries?"

Elder Moriai cleared his throat and sat down on a stone as well.

"Yes, first of all, there is the problem of Sume being built in your territory."

Before he could go on Yui sighed and interrupted him.

"I don't mind, as long as Yura is no longer sending fools, who think they own our land and threaten me with closing my shop. Keep things as they were before, I have neither a need to tax the people on our lands, nor would I benefit from having you remove common people's houses and livelihood."

"I could have you pay a sum to compensate me, but that would just weaken Yura to the point where I have to deal with other countries trying to invade and even more troublesome people coming to our doorstep and causing trouble for our customers."

Elder Moriai did not really expect their discussion to go this way. He never would have thought that instead of pressuring the Yura Kingdom for benefits, she only wanted to be … left alone you could call it?

'Are they weaker than we expected them to be?' he thought to himself, wondering what the reason for her strange answer was.

"I see, what exactly is it that you want to achieve then? Making more profit seems like it would not be too hard, because of your rather interesting offers. You will likely expand quickly. But what of your position as a nation within the Islands?"

Yura Kingdom was just one of many on an island group in this world. Without easy access to instant communication and fast transport methods, the world was still largely unexplored.

All that was known to the people in the surrounding kingdoms was that most of the landmass was in the form of large islands, therefore the world got the name of Islands of Eternity, dating back to the mythical founding story of a powerful immortal cultivator, giving up his immortality to bring these islands into existence.

"As you are in the middle of our Yura Kingdom, for the time being, other countries won't interfere, but at some point, they might see you as a profitable target. How will we respond to such threats?"

Moriai wondered what the girl would do to face such a threat. It was an interesting question and he wanted to see a bit more of how she would react. He just had to paint a nice picture for her. As long as he was not the target it should be fine right?

"We cannot hold back all cultivators at our borders after all. If they are strong enough, they will be sure to find their way to the capital and this place. Many people might suffer because of it." Elder Moriai began to explain.

Yui's thoughtful look turned into a frown. She didn't like the idea of the population suffering just because they were in the way.

"They might go after your customers to ruin your business. The people who earn something from your regions mostly don't have very high level of cultivation, like the group that you came back with."

Yui's frown turned into anger. Her spiritual power acted on her emotional state and began to tremble slightly.

'Calm down, it's just words, I won't let anything happen to them. Keep the power steady, like Tora said.'

"That should not be …" Yui just wanted to switch to another topic, but obviously Elder Moriai noticed her unstable emotional state. He always had a way to read people's expressions and gestures to find the right words.

In a way one could say he was toying with people's feelings, trying to achieve some sort of response that he wanted in his conversations. It was all too easy to impress common people, but even more useful to him was to use such words on the powerful.

'She will have no choice but to work together with us, thinking that it is the only way to protect the people around her.'

"How will you defend all those people without an army of your own, or without enough people to support your goals?" he continued his questioning.

"I will make sure they don't dare to." Yui responded, now even her body trembled visibly in anger.

"How do you want to achieve that though? You can't just destroy another country by yourself right. Imagine they would kill your loved ones like that little girl you …"

He did not get to finish his words as the last thread of willpower holding together Yui's grasp over the Earthly Treasure Pavilion's power finally snapped.

Spiritual power literally exploded out of her body, flooding the nearby area. The sky turned dark, the whole area as far as the eye could see turned dark, only brightened slightly by the lightning bolts crashing down on the place, each ripping craters of dozens of meters into the earth. The trees started to burn and turned to ashes within moments.

Without warning, in just a short moment the nice scenery of the lake and forest had turned into a nightmare of apocalyptic proportions. If someone had told Elder Moriai at this moment, that the world was going to end, he would have believed it.

Power was radiating from Yui's body, pushing him back against the stone with such power, that even with all his cultivation, he was still smashed against it to the point that he could hear some of his bones breaking.

He could hardly concentrate on anything other than resisting the immense force, but he still realized that the girl in front of him was no longer standing on the ground. She was now hovering above it, with eyes as dark as the darkest clouds.

Elder Moriai watched with horror as the earth itself split apart under her feet, ripping the land asunder and creating a ravine that quickly expanded all the way to the lake. What was once a nice lake, turned into a dark bottomless hole, nothing more than a crater.

He did not even dare to look at the girl anymore, but he could still hear her voice, a voice that was now trembling with power and killing intent.

"I will never let anyone harm my people. If they want to go to war with my Empire, I will end their rulers before it even started."

Then as if someone just woke him up from a nightmare, the clouds disappeared, and the girl returned to her normal shy appearance. No he corrected himself quickly from even thinking of her as just a girl, the Sovereign of the Earthly Treasures Pavilion, he would never think of her as a girl ever again.

If the spot where she was now standing and the several kilometers long ravine extending from it were not still there, as well as the crater that was once a lake and all the ash filled space that was once a forest, he would have believed all of this to be just a dream.

"Let's return." Yui quietly said, giving her favorite scenic spot that had just turned into a crater a pitiful look. "I'm no longer in the mood for any further discussions."

Getting up was a lot more painful than he had expected, but as none of his injuries were life threatening, he did not dare to even comment on it.

Yui just transported them back and headed downstairs to her room, not even giving Elder Moriai another look.

Poking her head out of the forge, before taking a few steps into the shop room with a mischievous smile, Tora rolled her eyes at the old man.

"Did you have fun playing with our little empress' reverse scale?" she asked with a curious look, as if she was really interested in some information.

"You know. I would have never guessed that anyone could manage to piss her off so much that she'd turn from a little wallflower into a natural disaster ready to crush anything that threatens her family."

Elder Moriai had no real answer to Tora's words. Usually he might have said something, but this twin's looks reminded him too much of what had just happened.

"Maybe invite her into the palace next time for the chat, if you plan on checking out her bottom line. That way we could share the cleanup efforts after you are done. I'd rather not have to renovate our forest every time."

Whistling a happy tune, Tora returned to the forge and like Yui, she did not really bother about sending Elder Moriai off.