Chapter 26 - Bandits

Aster said goodbye to Aria and waited for her to disappear into the hall before closing the door, he immediately threw himslef at the bed ans fell asleep while thinking.

"Tomorrow I will sell the materials of the purple scale snake and then I will return home... if I'm late mother would not let me go out again".

The night went on without any problems, the only thing Aster regretted was that he couldn't hug Lilia to sleep as he always did, nor he felt his sister clinging to him.

Aster's biological clock made him wake up early, he went to wash his face, left the room and when he came down, he did not see the owner of the inn at the reception.

"Hmm well maybe I will find her later", he thought before having breakfast at the restaurant and heading to the Ghale family store to sell thematerials of the purple scale snake.

When he entered the store, he saw the same young woman who had received him the previous time, approaching him with a smile on her face.

"Good morning, dear customer, do you want to sell materials again? or maybe you need to buy something from us this time?", she said.

Aster returned the greet.

"Good morning, I have new materials to sell, can I speak with the same senior who attended me last time?".

The girl nodded.

"Of course, follow me please".

Aster followed her to the same counter where the old man attended him last time, but now, he had to wait a bit because the old man was attending someone before him.

After a couple of minutes, the man who was talking to the old man left, but Aster noticed that he glanced at him before leaving the store, however he did not care.

Aster approached the counter and the old man greeted him.

"Good morning young man, what do you have this time for me?".

"Good morning senior, I was lucky to find a mortally wounded beast in the forest and got these materials", Aster took out the fangs, the poison sack and the snake bones from his backpack.

The old man was surprised to see the materials.

"A purple scale snake? young man you are quite lucky to have found it injured if it had been healthy, you would have faced a spiritual beast in the earthly origin realm".

Aster feigned surprise, "wow really? what good luck I had hahaha".

The old man doubted Aster's story a bit, finding a wounded beast from the earthly origin realm was something quite fortunate but then he thought that probably his family sent a protector to help him in case of encountering some extreme danger, "maybe his protector was the one who half killed the snake so this young man could finish it off", he thought.

"Very good young man, as surely you already know all things whose grade is equal to or greater than the earthly origin realm are exchanged for spiritual stones, from what I see these materials come from a purple scale snake in the middle stage of the earth origin realm, so I will give you 5 spiritual stones do you agree?".

Although Aster had a lot of spiritual stones, more wealth never hurts, so he accepted the payment offered by the old man.

When he was about to leave, he saw something that he thought it will be really helpful in the future so he immediately told the assistant he wanted to buy it, after he paid for it, Aster said goodbye to the old man and left the store, he returned to the inn because he wanted to speak with the owner, but he couldn't find her.

"Hmm it seems that I will have to talk to her later then... hopefully I get to see her before tonight", he thought.

With nothing else to do he decided to go to the forest to train again, after an hour he had entered the forest near the area where he fought with the purple scale snake.

As Aster was looking for a spirit beast to fight, he heard noises coming from the nearby bushes and with a small smile he said aloud.

"Why hide, since you guys bothered to follow me all the way here, get out at once".

Aster's voice echoed in the forest and after a few seconds several people came out from behind the trees, in total there were 5 people led by the man Aster had seen in the Ghale family store.

Aster saw the leader's angry face as he asked.

"Where did you get the materials of the purple scale snake kid?".

Aster realized that probably this guy was the one who fought against the snake he killed.

"I found it on the forest, it attacked me and I killed it do you have a problem with that?".

The guy smirked.

"Don't you think that since you stole our prey there should be a compensation for us?".

Aster looked at him as if he was looking at a stupid.

"So what do you want as compensation?"

The man had a slight grin on his face, "how about you give us your spatial ring so we can see for ourselves and take what we want".

Aster shook his head.

"Heh so you basically want to rob me huh? well you might be stupider than I thought if you really believe that I guided you to a secluded place without a way to deal with you all".

As soon as Aster finished speaking, the barrier that Lilia had given him appeared around him.

"Only that guy has the ability to hurt me, first I'll finish off the other four", thought Aster.

While the bandits were surprised since they did not see the boy in front of them activate any talismans, Aster pointed to the bandit farthest from him.

A moment later the other four saw the bandit that Aster had pointed with his fingers holding his neck as blood leaked from his fingers, you could see the despair in his eyes as life was leaving his body.

*Thud * the bandit fell to the ground ... dead.