Seren was about to disobey what Lute had just said and leave the small hole in the hill she –regrettably- called home. When she reached the opening of the shelter within the hill, her body and mind both stopped in tandem. She was the epitome of a corpse. The reason for this, just one look outside of this small hole in a hill and you could see well over forty Vicious Beasts of all types, shapes and sizes. Every single one of them ranging from the seventh level of the Foundational Qi Realm to its peak, there wasn’t a single beast here that was below the late stage Foundational Qi Realm.

“W…What is this?!” Seren stuttered in dismay. Never once had she seen so many Vicious Beasts living in a single place, and in harmony at that. There was no bloodshed or fighting.

But that wasn’t the most shocking thing that made Seren appear to be dead. Her eyes almost shot out of their sockets when she saw Lute. He had the atmosphere of a tyrant about him. He was casually walking forward and every single beast even those above him in cultivation at the peak of the Foundational Qi Realm were giving way to Lute.

Every single one of them knew to avoid Lute, he was like a death god in the form of a human at this cultivation level. Despite being in only the very first realm of cultivation, he was commanding respect with his Slaughter Aura.

Roughly one hundred meters in front of him, there was a large dragon-like lizard. But it wasn’t a true dragon; those shouldn’t appear in the Mortal Realm that much Lute was sure of. This lizard was probably only one hundred millionth of a true dragon’s bloodline. There was absolutely no way that it would possess any more than that much on this waste of a planet, all life was of low quality here.

This lizard had two heads and was in the first level of the Nascent Qi Realm. If it were the previous Lute, he wouldn’t dare fight it. But this was the new him, whose physical body was coming ever closer to the second level of the Primordial First Physique. He was almost half a step into the peak of the Foundational Qi Realm at the tenth level. There was no way he would lose to a first level Nascent Vicious Beast anymore, even though he was handicapped and unable to use his left arm to fight.

He also could fluidly weave and change the two hundred forms he knew in any way he saw fit. Despite not knowing any techniques aside from Shifting Time Collapsing Void, Lute was confident he would win.

All at once, Lute’s Qi surged, releasing all of his pent up Qi, Lute revolved it throughout his body. With a surging intent to kill, Lute’s Slaughter Aura strengthened once more. Charging forward, Lute went for a direct head on clash with the double headed serpent.

The nascent beast was quick on the uptake, it clearly knew Lute was the master of this lake, if it killed him, it wouldn’t have to worry about anything else here.

It similarly charged forward, opting to come to a sliding stop and tail swipe Lute. Lute was ready though, changing stances ceaselessly; he maneuvered without losing momentum and sent his right fist directly into the thigh of the Vicious Beast. The sound of a shockwave resounded, under the force of Lutes strength which was very close to the second level of the Primordial First Physique, it caused the thigh to cave in and muscles tore and the bones fractured. This was also a strike enhanced by Lutes Qi, so the strength behind that strike would’ve instantly killed a human cultivator, even in the Nascent Qi Realm.

Only now did Lute realize his own strength, he’d previously thought he would struggle against a second level Nascent Qi Realm cultivator or beast. But the effects of his body breaking down and then repairing itself into a stronger adaptation was truly monstrous, combined with the fact each time he broke through a cultivation realm, the increase in strength was also larger for him compared to someone at the same level, he realized that he was underestimating his own powers.

This strike would be enough to even cause third, maybe even fourth level Nascent Qi Beasts to be severely injured if they didn’t defend properly. Without even letting the Nascent Beast a moment to recover, Lute recklessly charged in again, weaving the two hundred forms in a manner that allowed him to keep momentum and this time, Lute struck a heavy blow upon a vital point.

The bones were shattered, organs displaced, and without even a moment in time to react, the lizard, which had great pride in its bodily strength fell dead. Lute didn’t even feel any emotions despite realizing how much he didn’t understand his strength. Instead he got to work extracting the core, and then left the corpse for the other beasts in the area.

Seren was awestruck. Lute had no arts or techniques to speak of from what she witnessed. But what she did realize, he had fought that beast with one arm, as clearly she could tell his other was injured since Lute refused to use it. In a brute strength match, Lute won in two moves. One hit to the thigh, immobilizing the beast, and another at a vital point within its chest, completely caving in the body.

What kind of body would a person need to fight a Vicious Beast head on with no Arts or Techniques? All he used was some mysterious fighting style that was too profound for her to understand and his Qi. That was all, nothing else besides directly clashing with the beast.

It was actually very anticlimactic there wasn’t even a shred of Lute’s usual lust for battle because this wasn’t a worthy opponent. Although his Slaughter Aura surged, Lute didn’t show the characteristics battle maniacs had, he had withheld the sadistic smile all battle maniacs had in common when fighting.

Seren had never heard of someone being able to fight a Vicious Beast above them in cultivation, much less clash head on. That was only something that people did if they had not only talent, but extreme high quality equipment and powerful arts. Lute had no equipment, he was only in a loincloth which she disdained, and he didn’t seem to have any arts or techniques. That only left him with talent, and an extremely tough body!

This was the first time Seren was so interested in another person. She was your typical ice queen that never associated with anyone. And yet Lute piqued her interest. Although she would never admit it to Lute, he was captivating on the battlefield.

With a baleful aura, scars all over the upper half of his body, piercing sky blue eyes that showed nothing but disdain and the urge to slaughter, and being in a loincloth of Vicious Beast fur, Seren had to admit Lute looked like a savage, or perhaps he looked more like a War God that went into combat with nothing but his body.

With a talent like his, it would be a waste to live out his life here in the mountains. There was no doubt that he could easily become an Elders direct disciple in the Fallen Tide Hall with his ability.

With such thoughts roaming through her mind, Seren actually began to feel pity for Glen and even more so for the twins. They had all aggravated a monster. And if she were to bring him to the Fallen Tide Hall, problems would arise. But now that she had the thought she wasn’t going to let go. Lute was a potential sparring partner and an acquaintance that she could have for the first time. He did not look at her lewdly like all the other males in her sect, nor did he demand any favors, if anything he ignored her, but he would still talk if she pushed him to.

Perhaps she would finally be able to appear as something other than an arrogant noble to others in the sect if she was seen conversing with someone, because even though she acted the way she did in the sect, it wasn’t as if she was actively trying to be antisocial, it was just people were either jealous of her or wanted to use her, or even worse, they put on a fake personality in front of her, hiding their true nature. But Lute seemed to be the opposite, he made his personality or perhaps two personalities easily show. There was the calm, reserved and quieter version of Lute. And then there was the extremely violent version that wanted to exterminate life. If this wasn’t the definition of a split personality she didn’t know what was.

Seren however was wrong, Lute didn’t have two personalities; he just hid the violent parts deep down within until he felt the need to kill. This was the culminations of not only his desire for combat, but also Isla’s as well, she was also very violent. So when the souls mixed, the bloodshed Lute craved on the battlefield had already been portrayed to an extreme level. His calm demeanor was only a façade, while it was a part of him, and he did remain calm most of the time, the bloodshed Lute was involved with was closer to his true self. Not submitting to anyone unless he knew that they for sure would win against him.

Seren was formulating a plan in her head when Lute returned, holding a small pearl sized core in his fist. Walking over to a corner of the shelter, only then did Seren realize that there was a pile of many cores built up, the majority being Foundational Qi, a few Nascent Qi were mixed in. This would be a rather large sum of merit points for disciples in the Nascent and Foundational Qi Realms.

She almost lost her mind when she saw Lute casually throw the newest core onto the pile not caring if it broke.

“What are you doing? Do you know how fragile those are?!”

Lute, which had made a returned to his quieter less violent self after suppressing his Slaughter Aura, looked at Seren in confusion. What was the point of cores if he couldn’t use them? Right now they were like pretty rocks to him, without any use.

“Is there a problem, it’s not as if I can use them.”

Seren began to furiously tap her foot against the ground. “Yes, there is a problem”, “Those are worth a lot of currency, and you’re just throwing them in a corner?”

Lute rolled his eyes, it didn’t matter if they were valuable to others, and he didn’t need to sell them. What mattered was if he saw value in them, and right now they were useless colored rocks, with absolutely no value. He didn’t even know why he was stockpiling them.

“Well don’t touch them, rather, why don’t you just regain your strength, I am leaving to cultivate, don’t leave lest you want to die.”

With those parting words, Lute dashed out of the shelter. He knew she was too weak to leave and frankly, he was beginning to regret his decision. She was a lot more talkative than he first thought, and she was apparently easily angered. He hadn’t gotten a shred of information regarding the sect she came from or anything of the sort.

‘I should probably ask my questions soon, but talking is annoying, it is so much better to just stay secluded by myself. Having to converse with others that fly of the handle at useless things like cores is useless.’

Lute began to earnestly cultivate, after grasping a new understanding of his strength he felt as if he could finish that last half a step and formally enter the peak of the Foundational Qi Realm.

Seren on the other hand was angry that Lute just left, leaving her alone. It was annoying but he was right, if she wasn’t directly next to Lute, the moment she left the shelter the beasts would all probably attack her together which she had no chance of survival against.

Forcing herself to calm down, Seren entered a state of cultivation as well, focusing on restoring her used Qi. Unlike Lute, her and all other cultivators couldn’t autonomously restore their Qi reserves by doing nothing. They had to actually focus on absorbing it from the world. The only way to achieve similar affects as Lute would be to use taboo arts that came with a hefty price and probably only half of the results that Lute could achieve.

The day turned into night, and night into day. Finally, Lute stepped into the tenth level. Now that he understood his strength, he knew how much more of a qualitative change each level for him was compared to before. He had no doubts about jumping to fight in cultivation anymore. At least not until the middle levels of the Nascent Qi Realm.

The only thing he was lacking was techniques. He had the martial arts from the Thousand Way Scripture, but in the end that wasn’t a technique, it was simply smarter ways to move his body while fighting. Its main goal, to prevent whatever action he did from losing effectiveness and wasting as little energy as possible, the Thousand Ways Scripture cut out all unnecessary movements.

Seren had spent this entire time regaining her Qi. Despite having wounds still, her complexion was much better. Once her injuries healed, she would be back at full strength. But right now she was roughly at sixty-five percent. But even if she was at one hundred percent, she doubted that she would win against Lute, as when he came back she was able to tell he broke through in cultivation. He was very adept at suppressing his cultivation, but since he just broke through, she was able to sense it….barely.

Now that there were no interruptions, they both had the same thought. How to effectively leave the mountains, for Lute, he wanted to know about the world, and for Seren, it was how to get Lute to join her sect as he was a talent that they couldn’t let go of.