After he was done fully absorbing the most Aether he could for the day, Ning decided to check out how much he had grown. He took a bowl outside and closed his eyes to focus on creating more water.
Soon, water droplets formed in the air and started dropping down into the bowl. One after another, they dropped into the bowl without any restraint. By the time he was nearly out of Aether, he had managed to collect an entire bowl of water.
'Holy Sh*t! My Aether amount nearly tripled. This absorption method is not that bad,' he thought. 'If not for the fact that my automatic one works all the time, I would definitely be getting this.'
He threw away the water and put the bowl back inside the house. Then, he checked up on the brother and sister, who were concentrating on the book in front of them.
'Well, I guess I can leave them for a bit,' he thought.
"Famir," he called.
"Yes, senior?" he looked up.
"Once you are done reading it and have completely learned it, hide it somewhere where no one can find it. Or better yet, destroy it. Do what you think is best, I will go away for a bit," Ning said and left.
Famir went back to reading the book.
Alex walked outside and teleported to the mountain's base. He walked up to the barrier and flicked it as fast as he could.
"Ow!" he screamed out loud and looked at his finger that was very swollen.
"Damn, how strong is this seal?" he wondered once again. His energy had been filled, but unfortunately, he mostly got heat energy from this.
He decided not to waste any more energy and didn't buy anything to heal his finger. It would heal on its own in due time.
Seeing that it didn't even take him a single minute to gather his energy for the day, he couldn't help but laugh. He teleported back outside of Famir's house and decided to go around the village once more.
He needed to pass the time for a bit. He walked around the village again, however, this time he couldn't see anyone there.
"Weird? It's finally daybreak. They should be here," Ning thought. He walked a bit further and saw a group of people gathered somewhere.
"Hm… isn't that the old man's house?" Ning thought and walked closer. As he got nearer, he could hear the old man shouting.
"… to do this. We have to. Those criminals dare think they can waltz up to us and demand that we pay them just because they say so? No. They cut my son's hand today. Tomorrow if we don't have the money, they will cut off your hands. Can you stand that?" the old man's enthusiastic voice spoke out loud. However, there was also a hint of sadness in that voice.
"WE CAN'T!" the entire crowd shouted.
Ning felt a little chill go down his spine when he heard a little whimper come from the crowd. He walked up and shoved aside the crowd to get to the front.
When he saw what was ahead, he was horrified. In the middle of the crowd was the Old Grand Uncle filled with tears, an old woman by his side sobbing quietly, and Jangar whimpering as he clutched his left arm which was cut at clean at the elbow.
He had a cloth wrapped around the cut, but blood was still pooling below him and he was starting to look pale.
"Step aside," Ning shouted and immediately walked to the center of the crowd.
"Get away from my son," the old man tried to stop Ning, but for some reason, he couldn't move at all. It was as if an invisible force was keeping him at bay.
"Show me," he said to Jangar who willingly showed his cut. Ning saw it and immediately pulled out a few ingredients from nowhere, shocking the entire crowd of villagers.
Ning then quickly made a paste out of them and fed it to Jangar. Before soon, he started to be immune to pain and was no longer bleeding from the cut.
Ning then picked up the arm from the ground and picked up Jangar easily and walked into the house. As soon he reached inside, he placed the cut-off hand at the place it was cut and then asked the system to heal it back.
The system asked for nothing and healed his arm after taking the required amount of energy.
"Phew! Thank god I was out here. If they had let you lose any more blood, you would've likely died," Ning said. Jangar was in disbelief at what he was seeing and couldn't think of anything to say.
"You bastard! What are you do—" the old man walked in expecting Ning to be onto some trouble, only to find his son's arm fixed.
"Wha-What?!" the man exclaimed. "How is this possible? What did you do?" the old man demanded. The woman was right behind the old man and was equally in disbelief.
When she heard her husband speak those words, she immediately hit him on the back of the head and started scolding him. "This young man just helped our son and all you can do is question him?" she scolded.
She then walked up to Ning and took his hand as she bowed and started thanking him. The old man came to his senses as well and started thanking Ning.
Ning told them they didn't have to, and it took him 5 minutes to convince them to stop thanking him. He then sent those two away to talk to Jangar alone.
"What happened? Who did this?" Ning asked.
Jangar was back to his senses now and started talking. "They were Khrom's men, they came asking for protection money from the villagers," Jangar said.
Ning was a little surprised.
"However," Jangar added, "I think they came for you. The protection money was all just a ruse to find you. When they noticed me and realized I was the one with you, they decided to make an example out of me"
"But really all they were doing was punishing me for what happened in the clothing store."