Joe pushed aside some stones to reveal an entrance which seems to be going underground. This place was very well hidden from view. Everyone quickly went inside while Joe closed the entrance again from inside with another stones.
It became dark but by keeping one hand on the wall beside them, they could walk ahead. This was some underground passage of about some 10 meters long and 2 meter diameter.
After crossing the distance, Alex was very surprised at the wonder of nature. A very big space came in front that was shaped like a dome at the top. It was not dark like before as there were some luminance due to sunrays drilling through the crack above us.
Everyone put the materials they had on them to one side and started to check their injuries.
In group of seven only three people remained uninjured they were Alex, Julie and Meg. Whereas everyone else had varying degree of injuries on their bodies. Jack had a claw mark on his chest that was bleeding, as he was wearing beast skin of another Grade 5 demon beast it had helped him to lessen the damage caused by the wolf. Donald just had some scratches and bruises whereas Theo and Joe also had claw marks on their shoulders and legs.
Aunt Meg took out a bag from a corner which was already there. She picked some things from it which looked like some plants leaves. She gave it to the four of them who immediately started chewing on it and then applying on their wounds.
"Alex, your archery is very good. It would be somewhat hard to kill that wolf at that distance if you had aimed at his skull which is normally hard. But you successfully aimed at his soft spot that was his ear hole which easily made the arrow to tear a hole from one side to the other." Jack said.
"Yeah and not just once he also killed the second wolf putting an arrow right through its eyeball" Theo said while appreciating the youth in front of him.
"Most of the first timers do not notice these details as they just shoot with their strength at any part of the body. What you did will only come from experience. I remember that the first time I was hacking mindlessly at the beast tough hide causing me to be almost killed by it if not for them helping in time." This time it was Joe who said while recalling his noobie like action he did in his early days.
Donald then said "Alex, you are natural and it seems you had already entered the initial stage in Archery. Very good indeed"
Not shying from the praises everyone was giving Alex smiled and asked a question about what this place was.
"This is our hideout we had found some months ago. Before we would have hidden our loot on some braches or dug a hole in the ground and take it after with us when returning back. This is much better place, not to mention we can rest and recover Qi here for some time." Aunt Meg explained.
"It's a good place, but what now. Its past noon do we have to hunt more beast." Alex said while walking towards the materials gathered from the wolves.
"We will go back now as we had started a little late today while seeing if we come across some demon Beast or any herbs on the way back." Julie said while arranging and calculating their gain from this hunt.
"We can get around 6 to 7 gold coins from this. Sigh; if only we had better martial art techniques and cultivation techniques then we would have easily killed that grade 5 grey wolf without damaging its skin." Julie lamented at wastage of money caused due to their normal strength.
Alex laughed at how she made her face when talking about money.
"Hump, don't laugh. You might not know but if the cultivators from the noble family were hunting then they could have easily killed demon beast below their level without damaging most of the skin. If this grade 5 grey wolf had its pelt left intact then we would have gotten 9 to 10 gold coins only for this. Not to mention 2 more gold coins for the others making our gain double. Only the grade 2 wolves are in good condition which will get us their whole value." Meg said from behind while giving a tap from her knuckles lightly on his head.
"HAHA…don't mind their words. We should be feeling good that we are not injured badly. Or else these gold coins would have immediately halved to treat out wounds." Jack laughed listening his wife grumbling.
"If we go like this then we can definitely have enough money to pay the tax." Jack said while smilling. Theo and Joe also smiled hearing that.
They all started to converse within themselves. But Alex had his focus on something else that Aunt Julie had taken from the inside of the wolves. They were 3 small orbs the size of pearls.
Alex took them in his hand after she had placed it aside and started to examine it.
"Aunt Julie can I take these." Alex asked while showing those orbs in his hand.
"Um, you can take them but they are useless. They would just sell for some copper coins nothing more."
"Thank you I just wanted to see them" Alex got up and sat beside a wall while playing with the orbs.
Alex knew why they were useless as these orbs were incomplete demon beast core that would be formed prematurely after demon beast had entered grade 4. When the demon beast advances to grade 7 only then would they form a complete core and would be of any use to warriors, Alchemist and blacksmiths.
Another reason for the uselessness of premature demon cores was that the Qi in it would dissipate easily and also that there were many impurities that would only poison the cultivators if they try to absorb the Qi in it.
The demon core of grade 7 and above can actually be used as an alternative Spirit stone with same amount of Qi in it but it will take some time to purify demon Qi in it which made it less valuable then Low grade spirit stones.
Others would definitely find it useless but for
Alex it was very valuable now. After seeing that everyone else were sitting and started recuperate their Qi, he closed his own eyes as he tried to enter his consciousness.
After some minutes, Alex was again standing in front of the Book. He hurriedly touched the book to make that panel appear again.
o Wisdom
o Treasures
o Exchange
o Function
After it had appeared he quickly touched the Function option on the panel. In function only two options can be touched but everything else was Grey, not even the names were shown.
The two options were Inventory and Random roll.
The Inventory was an exclusive space dimension given to the user by the Book of Myriad Changes for use. It can store any nonliving thing that can be covered with the Qi of the user like space rings. Alex didn't use it till now because he didn't know how he would explain it to others if they saw him taking things out of thin air.
But this was not the main focus; Alex clicked the other option which was Random Roll.
Another panel opened that which had five tabs below a blank space.
They were Fate, Currency, Merit, Reset and Start.
Random Roll is a function of the book which randomly gives rewards to the user in exchange of these three options Fate, Currency and Merit.
Fate is some kind of energy that can be accumulated by any sentient being from another sentient beings. For example, a King absorbs fate energy from his subjects if they have some kind of good feelings towards him in any form like worship, love, loyalty, any feelings that can be mentioned as good. Not only king but even common man can absorb it if one or many people have good feelings for him.
A sentient being generates this energy subconsciously and give it to the other sentient being unknowingly. This Fate energy is useless to ordinary people because they cannot use it nor do they know about it. Only some higher Divine beings have the strength and knowledge for its uses.
In short, every one have Fate energy accumulated in them over the course of their life.
Alex also had it and the fate energy in his body was even converted into points.
Currency was nothing but Sprit Stone or something equivalent like Spirit Herbs.
Merit was something like Karma. Everyone can gain merit in their life if they do goods things whether they are known to others or not. For example, doings good deeds like helping others, saving lives, exterminating evil from the world, etc. Alex also had it but he didn't know if it was only from this life or not and his merit was also converted into points.
o Fate: 1216
o Currency: 0.8
o Merit: 2501
'If I use everything I have now then I will only get things that a categorized as low grade in the book.' thought Alex. The rewards are given in terms of how much Fate, Currency and merit are inputted in the panel.
The incomplete demon core in his hands could not be even counted as 1. But he still used everything he had for a better reward.
'Please God give this pious believer of yours a Heaven Grade techniques or I can even be satisfied with earth grade' as he prayed to the God Alex hit the Start logo.
Just as he had to done that suddenly a bright light exploded in front of his eyes. It was like someone had dropped a flash bang to make him blind.
Alex regained his vision gradually and cursed loudly "Fuckshit, what the hell was that for"
But he soon regained his bearings as he saw the words written on the panel.
His heart couldn't help feeling a gush of joy.