On the road into the Scorching Sun kingdom, there were many carriages and people, all waiting to get into the kingdom.
The entrance to the kingdom was simply massive, at least 100 feet tall with a massive gate ready to go down at any moment. Next to the gate was a seemingly endless wall, with it stretching past the horizon and into the distance. This wall was made of massive marble bricks, seemingly so heavy that no one could conceive how the wall was built.
As Will sat in the carriage, he noticed that instead of sitting there not moving, the carriage was moving forward at a constant pace, moving through the line of people as if they weren't in the way. He figured that this was because they were soldiers of the kingdom and had to get back inside.
It was at this time that Will finally noticed the heavy mood, and a forlorn sadness that hung over everything like a fog. He could figure what this sadness was about though. The princess of the kingdom had just been put into a coma by the person who Will had just killed earlier. This person was Quent, the archer assassin, the city master of hidden valley city, which had been wiped out by the soldiers which Will now sat with.
The princess was someone who was loved by the whole kingdom, and it brought them great sadness to know how she had been hurt.
Because of this, there was a generally bad mood among the people of the kingdom. This mood extended even outside the kingdom and made it's way into Will's senses.
Will was now much more sensitive to emotions now that he had reached the second stage of the foundational realm. His ruby heart had also gotten much stronger and was now capable of consistently cultivating using the ruby heart manual.
As the soldiers approached the gate, they were stopped by the guards. "We need to check through your carriage please," said one of the guards as he approached the carriage, which had now stopped.
At this moment, Old Man Dai opened the door and invited the guard inside. The guard was only at the fifth stage of the foundational realm, but he needed to go inside the carriage to give them clearance into the kingdom. Unless the people going into the kingdom had a certain seal of some kind declaring their status or identity, every carriage would need to be checked for intruders or illegal items.
As the guard stepped inside, he noticed that Old Man Dai was at the 8th stage of the foundational realm while the scraggly bearded man and the other person was at the 7th stage of the foundational realm, but what confused him was Will, who was only at the 2nd stage of the foundational realm, who had red hair, eyes, and even had wings.
Despite this, he was only here to check if there were any intruders here or illegal items. He had a list of thieves and illegal items that weren't allowed inside the kingdom. Because of this, he could not question who Will was unless he suspected him to be an intruder.
"You're clear to go in," said the guard as he stepped out of the carriage and led them into the kingdom.
As they went through the gate, the first thing Will saw was endless fields, with very few houses. There were just endless crops with farmers everywhere, tending the crops.
"Around the outskirts of the kingdom are just the crop fields, in the case of an enemy getting through the walls, all we lose are a few fields and no citizens," said Old Man Dai when he noticed Will's confusion. It was made this way to avoid casualties in the case of a war when people attacked the kingdom walls.
"It'll take about a month to reach the center of the kingdom where the castle is. I'm one of the king's trusted advisors so I will tell him about you when we get there," said Old Man Dai.
'Now I know what makes him seem so odd,' thought Will. He had always figured that there was something odd about Old Man Dai, because of not only his demeanor, but also his judgement and judge of character. It made sense that he would be an advisor to the king with these qualities, even though his cultivation level was fairly low. This would also explain why the king would trust him to bring down the person who had attempted to kill his daughter.
With this, they continued to sit there for a few minutes before Will finally decided to meditate on the mysteries of his heart. As he did so, a low rumbling sound started to reverberate through the area, with his heart being the source.
As this beating went on, it progressively got clearer and clearer, eventually sounding as every person there had a heart beating directly in their ears. Then, it eventually started to get quieter and quieter, leaving them wondering what caused the silence.
But in reality, this was caused by Will learning to control his heart's power better, leaving him able to control his heart so well that it would be silent. This whole process of learning took more than two weeks without sleep and without doing anything but meditate.
During these two weeks, he managed to get such good control of his heart that he could make it near silent. However, it still took much energy to control his heart, so when he wasn't using it to cultivate, he decided that it would be better to just not have it beating since it was not necessary.
Then, for the following two weeks, he decided to sleep during the day, and cultivate at night when the soldiers were sleeping.
With this schedule, he managed to reach the fifth stage of the foundational realm in the first week, and by the end of the second week, he managed to reach the sixth stage of the foundational realm.
This speed would already be considered legendary in the city where he came from, since even princess Belle, who was the most talented person in the kingdom, was only at the sixth stage of the foundational realm at two years older than him.
Luckily, nothing like the first time he broke through would happen again during the third and fourth weeks of the journey.
On the journey, Old Man Dai also told Will about the situation of the kingdom and how things worked there. It turned out that Old Man Dai was of very high authority in the kingdom and was only a couple positions below the king in authority despite being so weak. The king was at the first stage of the silver core realm, the realm above the spirit realm.
Once in the silver core realm, one would be able to use spiritual power, which was more than ten times stronger than inner breath. For this reason, the king was the undisputed leader of the kingdom and would be completely unrivaled to those under the silver core realm.
To anyone in the spirit realm, the silver core realm meant someone of significant power and equal status to a king.
When he heard about this, Will thought to himself, 'one day, I will reach the silver core realm,' not knowing how much stronger he would really get.
Now, at the end of the one month of travel with the group of soldiers, they finally reached a city.