Nearly six months later, in a forest near a rather remote village, a 14-year-old boy stood in front of a tree with his eyes closed and an extremely serious expression.

The boy looked like a statue, and one could easily mistake him for one if not for his occasional breaths that caused his chest to move. After staying in this static position for a few more seconds, he opened his eyes and, in the next instant, took a step forward.

"Strike!"

A loud sound echoed around the boy as he punched the tree in front of him. The tree swayed for a few seconds from the impact of his blow before returning to normal.

"Not bad," the boy muttered, quite pleased, as he observed the mark on the trunk, right where he had struck with his fist. It was a subtle mark, but it showed the impact of his blow by being able to affect a wooden trunk.

This young man was Long Ming, who had recently started training after completing his manual. Creating that manual had not been an easy task, and many times Long Ming had thought of giving up. Fortunately, after four attempts, he finally managed to complete it and began training since then.

The manual he had invented was called "Manual of Resonance with Heaven and Earth," and it consisted of a 'mantra' that allowed the user to enter a state of 'resonance' with nature, allowing them to feel and guide the energy of nature, although in a very limited way, being almost exclusively for exercising the body.

Unfortunately, this manual was incomplete and had several problems and flaws in its 'structure,' so to resolve them it would be necessary to rewrite the entire manual, which was not feasible (nor possible) at the moment.

But that didn't discourage Long Ming. After all, creating a manual almost entirely from scratch, and functional at that, was not an easy task — some would even say it's impossible!

Nevertheless, Long Ming showed impressive progress for the short time he had been training. And he couldn't be happier than he already was.

Despite training effectively for about two months, he already had a very muscular and defined body. Moreover, he was probably the strongest person in his village. And that wasn't an easy task, considering his village relied mainly on hunting and woodworking (two occupations that required considerable strength).

"Have I already reached the first realm?" Since he only had the information from that book, which was quite shallow and vague, Long Ming couldn't compare his progress nor know how 'far' he had gone.

He had even fantasized that he had become one of those referred immortals and that if he went to any big city, he could beat entire clans and marry several jade beauties. But obviously, whenever these thoughts arose, he would slap his cheeks twice to regain his reason and regain some of his humility.

"Tsk, regain consciousness, Long Ming! Don't be arrogant; the world is enormous. If I managed to reach this level so quickly, surely there are people who have trained for much longer and are several times stronger than you," Long Ming reproached himself for fantasizing about his own strength and walked towards another tree.

Next to the trunk of this tree was a basket with the body of a boar and some small animals like rabbits and squirrels. Since he started training, Long Ming decided to start working as a hunter, both as a form of training and to earn more money.

There was a high demand for bones, skins, and even some organs of wild animals, so this trade ended up being reasonably profitable.

"It's time to go back." After putting the boar's body basket on his back, with some difficulty due to the size of the basket and the weight of his catches, he picked up his spear that was right next to it and returned to the village.

It was a peaceful walk until he reached the outskirts of the village, and soon he could see the wooden walls built to protect the village from the monsters of that forest. Long Ming walked towards the village gate, which was guarded by two young men, and after greeting them, he entered without much difficulty.

"Oh! Big brother finally arrived!" Just after entering the village, a familiar voice sounded in the distance, near one of the houses. Looking to that place, Long Ming noticed several children playing and talking, and among these children was his younger sister who, upon noticing him arriving, ran towards him with open arms.

"How was your day, brother? Did you bring a big boar this time?" she asked teasingly while hugging him. Shortly after, she looked at the basket Long Ming was carrying, which was almost the size of her brother and carried inside a boar that must have been 1.5 meters long and 90 cm tall.

"Of course, I got one your size," he replied as he walked towards his house.

"Can I borrow your spear?" a few seconds later, his sister asked timidly, as if afraid of being rejected.

"Sure, just don't go poking anyone," Long Ming saw no reason to reject, so he gave her the spear and continued walking towards his house.

When he was already close to home, he looked back to see that his sister was in front of that same group of children, spinning her spear from side to side while her spectators laughed and cheered in admiration.

Seeing this scene, Long Ming couldn't help but laugh, as he found it quite funny how she tried to handle a spear that was almost twice her size and still quite heavy for her age.

After watching her for a few more seconds, he entered his house and prepared to dismantle the boars and small animals he had caught. As a mere novice in the hunting business, Long Ming was still quite inexperienced in this task, but after a few hours, he finally properly cut each of the animals. Then he packed the pieces of meat from the boar and small animals, either to donate to other families or to save to eat with his own family, and cleaned up all the mess he had made.

When everything was ready, he took some boar bones and took them to a neighbor who had asked for them earlier. As he returned home after that, he noticed his sister returning home with a depressed and downtrodden smile.

Then he looked to the side and noticed a man walking towards him with a serious and angry expression, as if he were capable of killing someone at any moment.

"Damn," Long Ming felt a bad omen when he saw that man walking apparently irritated towards him.

"Hi, fa—"

"Why did you give your sister a weapon?" Long Ming's father didn't even give Long Ming time to greet him before reprimanding him in numerous ways.

Long Ming listened to the sermon quietly for several minutes, occasionally getting tired of standing for so long, before his father finally calmed down and punished him, forbidding him from going to the city that month.

After this unpleasant encounter, he handed the bones to his neighbor and returned home to train with the spear.

The next day, before the sun illuminated the world, Long Ming abruptly woke up with a sweaty body and heavy breathing.

He looked to the side in fear, but after seeing that his sister was there, sleeping peacefully, he relaxed and got out of bed. He mechanically picked up his spear, which was beside his bed, and walked towards his parents' room.

Upon looking inside the room, and noticing that his parents were also fine, he left the house and began walking towards the village gate.

"You woke up early again, Long

Ming," immersed in his own thoughts, Long Ming gave a small startle as he suddenly noticed a voice calling him.

When he turned around, he noticed an elderly man sitting on a chair and looking at him curiously.

"What are you doing up at this hour, old man? It's not even day yet," Long Ming asked curiously, his eyes still dull and with an expression of fear.

"Taking advantage of the seconds I'm alive. And you, boy? A hunter like you should sleep well, otherwise it may affect you when hunting," the elderly man replied.

"... nothing much, just wanted to take a little stroll around the village. Since everyone should be asleep," he thought for a while before trying to come up with some excuse.

In reality, Long Ming had had a vivid dream that, although he didn't remember the details, had filled him with fear and despair. And that feeling of constant danger was even more intense that day.

Long Ming felt that a great adversity was waiting for him, and that scared him because he couldn't know to what extent that would be correct, nor even what 'adversity' it would be.

"A stroll? Oh, boy. So young and already worrying about us. At your age, you shouldn't worry about such things... it's the duty of us adults to worry about the safety of our people, not children who are still crawling like you," the old man remarked.

"I know, sir—" when Long Ming was about to reply, his senses picked up sounds of extremely heavy footsteps approaching from afar.

Instantly, he ran towards the wooden wall and used his spear to leap over it. With ease, he climbed to a height of almost four meters and, as he looked into the distance, he noticed a huge boar running towards the village.

"A monster?!" he exclaimed in surprise.

The boar seemed to be almost two meters tall and who knows how many meters long, this size was not that of a common boar.

Therefore, it could only be a monster!

Monsters were completely different from common animals, as they were usually enormous and possessed an utterly astonishing strength. They were creatures that many considered great calamities and capable of destroying entire villages with ease.

"A Monster!" he shouted as loudly as he could, to alert all the other hunters in the village, and without thinking about his own safety or his chance of victory, Long Ming ran towards the giant boar.

The boar seemed to understand Long Ming's intentions and also ran towards him, aiming its giant tusks at his throat. Long Ming was not intimidated by this and, using his little hunting experience, also continued running towards it.

When the boar came into range of his spear, he crouched slightly to avoid being stabbed by the tusks and pierced a specific point in its chest. It was where its heart should be!

Long Ming felt as if he were trying to pierce a piece of iron, but taking advantage of the momentum of the boar's charge and his own run, he managed to pierce its skin and felt the tip of the spear penetrating a thick layer of flesh.

The boar screamed in pain, then raised its front paws and stomped on the ground, making a loud noise and forcing Long Ming to step back.

The monster turned towards Long Ming and ran towards him again.

"Tsk, looks like I didn't manage to pierce its heart," Long Ming grumbled internally as he dodged to the side, avoiding the boar.

The creature couldn't stop its momentum and ended up colliding with a tree. Without much effort, the tree split in half, slightly disorienting the creature and allowing it to stop running.

"Strong", Long Ming was surprised, and a little scared, when he realized that the boar had knocked down that tree without much effort.

"If it hit me head-on, I could even die", a chill ran down his spine at the possibility of dying. However, this only served to strengthen his determination to kill this creature.

After all, if this monster could kill him so easily, who was the self-proclaimed strongest hunter in the village, what couldn't it do to the other villagers? Long Ming refused to think about this possibility, as he was convinced he would prevent it from happening.