Bab 13: I'm going home...to the place that I...sorta belong?

Zhen Liu grabbed Fergus' severed head and was just about to shove it into the bag when all of a sudden, the ring on his left hand started glowing.

"What the hell?"

And then zap him, causing him to let go of the bag.

"Gah! The hell man?!"

"Did your ring just talk?," Alicia asked.

"Did my ring just talk?," Zhen Liu echoed.

Moments later, a beam of aether light shot out of the ring and hit Fergus' severed head square on the forehead. Zhen Liu didn't understand what was going on exactly, but he could sense that his ring was extracting...something.

This weird light show kept going for a few minutes until the aether beam abruptly shut off.

Both Zhen Liu and Alicia stared at the ring on his hand as the glow it had emitted began to dial back until it was normal bronze ring again.

"..."

"You didn't see anything?," Zhen Liu asked as he picked the bag back up.

"I didn't see anything," Alicia agreed with a nod.

"Right on," Zhen Liu said as he tossed the head into the bag, "Now let's go. I think I know an aether herb that can help with your poison problem, and I'm pretty sure we can get back to Stone Claw in time for my funeral if I ask my Hippo friends."

"Hippo friends?"

_________________________________________________

Stone Claw City.

Located at the periphery of the Wasting Sands, in the frontier region of the IronHeart Kingdom, Stone Claw City was surprisingly prosperous. This prosperity came from two main sources: adventurers and mining.

The Wasting Sands was a massive desert, full of dangerous locales that were positively crawling with aether beasts and teeming with aether herbs. Many nobles, mercenaries and apothecaries would regularly come to the city for last minute supplies for their expeditions or to unload whatever goodies they managed to get while exploring. This of course lead to many merchants and entertainers coming and going in order to facilitate the needs of these adventurers.

Additionally, Stone Claw City happened to be sitting upon several large deposits of precious metals, minerals and more importantly, crystallized aether.

Aether crystals were not only an easy way for cultivators to fuel their development via absorbing the aether locked within them, but also served as important material/fuel for the creation of aether treasures and elixirs.

Unfortunately, all this wealth floating around and the lack of law enforcement led to a lot of bandit groups sorta milling about the general area of Stone Claw City in hopes of getting rich via unlucky travellers. However, none of these bandit groups dared to make a move onto the city itself because of the four powerhouse factions that ran the place, each ran by an Aether Grandmaster.

The first faction was the Wolfe Family, led by their patriarch,Jacob Wolfe. The Wolfe Family had been around since the founding of Stone Claw City and had established dominion over many of the smelting and blacksmithing businesses in Stone Claw City. As a result, the Wolfe Family specialized in weapon-based arts and formulas.

The second faction was the Corrada Family. Led by their matriarch, Madame Telana Corrada, the Corrada Family owned a majority share of the pharmaceutical and herbalist businesses. The fact that they happened to specialize in poison based formulas was completely incidental. Anyone who asked otherwise quickly disappeared under mysterious circumstances.

The Diggers Union made up the third faction in Stone Claw City and they were a bit weird. Not exactly a family or clan like the other three factions, the Diggers Union was a massive workers unions composed of all the miners in Stone Claw city. Led by "Grand Miner" Orgo, the Diggers Union represented the backbone of Stone Claw City. The fact that a majority of their formulas and arts revolved around brute force, digging and Earth elements, explained why they were very good at their job.

The last, and certainly not least, was the Zhen Clan. While technically a recent arrival, having arrived in the last four decades or so, the Zhen Clan had established themselves as one of the powerhouse factions due to their unusual speciality: aether beasts. From grooming, to training, to processing, the Zhen Clan knows the ins and outs of aether beasts better than most professionals. Under Patriarch Zhen Shi, the Zhen Clan had made themselves indispensable to the hunters and nobles that come and go from the city.

Which is why when the Zhen Clan held a funeral for one of their young masters, people heard about it.

"Have you heard? One of the Zhen Clan young masters died?"

"Which one? The First? The Second?"

"I think it was the...Fourth one? Zhen Liu?"

"The kid with no cultivation? Why host a funeral for him?"

"Maybe to save face? If you believe the rumors, that guy was the equivalent of a golden sword. Uselessly pretty."

"Maybe another faction tried to take him out to demoralize the clan."

"I don't know, maybe he faked it so he could run away with a prostitute!"

"Hah!"

"Seriously? I've been dead for a month and that's what people assume?," Zhen Liu complained as he and Alicia walked through Stone Claw City's merchant district.

"Oh, it's not that bad," Alicia consoled him, "The rumors could be much more devious."

"Yeah, I don't know. I'm leaning towards the idea of him getting caught in bed with the fiancee with one of the other young masters," a weedy looking guy said while drinking a mug of ale.

"Or maybe the fiancee of one of the young mistresses!," his companion, a burly woman added.

"Perhaps both!"

"Hah!"

"You were saying?," Zhen Liu asked with a pointed glare.

"Point taken...," Alicia conceded, "Hey, are Tiny and Mini gonna be okay? We are pretty far from their home."

As a means to get to Stone Claw City in time to attend his own funeral, Zhen Liu had petition the help of Tiny and Mini to act as their ride. It took a bit of convincing and bribery with the idea of luxury aether beast treatment, but Tiny eventually relented and helped them cross the desert. Zhen Liu learned that Raijin Hippos were incredibly fast that day.

"They'll be fine. Zhen Clan's stables are the best in the region," Zhen Liu assured her, "granted it sucks that they didn't recognize my freaking face. Three gold is just highway robbery."

As far as Zhen Liu understood, Valresta's currency was based on a gold, silver, copper coinage, with the conversion rate being ten copper to the silver and ten silver to the gold. While each country had their own names for the three main coin types, it was just universally agreed to just refer to their respective materials.

Zhen Liu and Alicia eventually made their way to the Zhen Clan estate and were greeted by the sight of funeral decorations and a whole bunch of people in black mourning outfits.

"Wow...I almost feel bad for crashing my own funeral."

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