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The Moon of Yutom was hanging from the sky, and it's reflection on the forest below, created a silent picture that masked the presence of the dangers lurking in the dark.
It was a full moon, and the moonlight illuminated the trees, as if tough they were filled with silver lights. The Moon seemed to gaze affectionately on the vast expanse it covered.
Inside the silver trees, a shadow was moving at high velocity. It jumped from tree to tree, with neither sound, nor any kind of indication that it was there a moment ago.
The shadow was fast and ever-changing, making it hard to discern it's features. One moment it was there and the next, complete silence.
After a few moments, like a ghost, someone appeared in the middle of a meadow, that was in the deepest parts of the forest.
This meadow was directly under the full moon, making the figure look extremely daunting.
Under the moonlight, the figure was looking away from the moon, and so one could only see his back side, the rest was shrouded in darkness.
Suddenly the figure turned around, and looked at the night sky, appreciating the countless little dots that surrounded the majesty of the celestial body.
It was a 1.6 meter tall figure, a relatively small build. His cheeks were just enough puffy, to make him look both young and handsome. His hair was long, silky smooth, and tied in a knot, with two strands falling on the side of his face. His eyes had the colour of the sea, and one could feel calm, looking at them. His body, although a bit skinny, had toned muscles that exuded power. The only difference between a human and himself, was a tinge of green on his skin.
With his tranquil expression basking in the moonlight, the scene could only be described as a painting...
Suddenly, a growl could be heard. A bear, as huge as one story house, walked out of the luminescent forest, and stared hungrily at the figure. This was no normal bear, it's fur was blue and it's build was bulky. It's forelegs where a clammer of muscles, it looked extremely ferocious.
The figure smiled, and then turned to face the bear. He pulled out a pair of purple daggers, and the moment he did, his smile turned into a deep grin.
The bear was startled for a moment, but still attacked. It stood up on its hind legs, and tried to squash the figure.
Only the figure almost instantly disappeared. No sound, no movements. Nothing could be heard or seen for a split second. After a moment the bear fell back on all four, and its eyes now looked empty, devoid of life.
It turned back, to see behind him the figure appear like a ghost, placing the daggers back from where he pulled them from. And then, it turned to look at it's body, where multiple deep cuts made his guts almost spill on the floor. It looked like it was viciously attacked by a hurricane.
It fell limp on the floor, unable to realize how it died. One moment he was staring at his midnight lunch, and the next his intestines where spilled in the moonlight illuminated meadow.
Pitiful creature.
It had been three years since Iono started training with his dad, and he was now almost 8 years old. Under his father's guidance and Iono's plentiful experience, Iono had now stepped in the Blood fusion step.
He had integrated his chaos-infested Prana, in his Blood vessels, Organs and Blood itself. Right now, his flesh was as strong as iron. It was a painful and arduous process, much harder than Flesh tempering. But it was virtually nothing to him.
He trained with the scythe, and although he was once again at the fusion stage, his energy was far from enough, meaning he was strong, just not as much as he could be.
He was now very used to using Aura-dominated Prana, and he was slowly perfecting his small experiment.
He had tried a lot of different experiments over these years, some succeeding, but most ended up in failure, either because of his still growing body, or because they were simply impossible to happen. He tried tapping into Mana-dominated Prana, but he was still trying to perfect the ratio for his weird Aura so he hadn't made any improvements in that section.
Other than that, his ego space grew double it's previous size, now fitting something other than the egg. He mastered many different dagger arts, many at the Graduate's level, courtesy of his grandfather, who once learned he had a grandson, slipped away from the palace in secret to come and visit.
His grandfather was a weird man. He, and the whole Eastern kingdom, held an innate resentment towards demi-humans. So when his daughter told him she wanted to wed Yusef he was, to say the least, disapproving.
He made Yusef commander of the Royal army, only because he appreciated his strength, not Yusef himself. But, his daughter was stubborn and given that she wasn't the crown princess, she could marry whoever she wished.
Therefore, he wed Anna and Yusef in secret, and made them move to a village in the outskirts of the kingdom, around people he knew and trusted. If the kingdom learned that the princess married a demi-human, there would be severe complications, that weren't exactly wanted.
His grandpa was indeed dissatisfied, but when he learned he had a grandson, he ran like crazy to meet him. Undoubtedly, he still held some reservations, but the moment he laid eyes upon Iono, every inclination to disapprove became a leaf in the wind.
He showered Iono with love and gifts from the capital. Candy, toys whatever his heart wished. Iono had mixed feelings about this man. He loved Iono, but he was still against the marriage, and so he didn't really care about him. He still kept the gifts though.
No matter, he didn't really think about his grandpa, only about the fact that right now, he was the strongest 8-year old on Yotum. Not even regressors could stand up to him, much less normal 8-year olds. Of course, normal children just barely entered foundation stage, and this was a natural process, not their own doing. Other than that, they only played and laughed. Therefore the only probable opponents were regressors, and children of big families, that were trained since young. But even so, he was sure he could smoke anyone, without revealing any heaven-defying abilities, like fusion or Kyomu.
He was now ready to start fusing Prana in his bones, entering Bone Tempering.
An 8-year old in the Bone Tempering stage, how scary would that be?
Bone tempering is something, that people in their mid teens would do. But even so, it wouldn't be as thorough as Iono's.
There were only two problems he had to deal with now. One of them was the Jester's wish. The deadline to kill that guy was close, and he had no way to leave home for such a long time. Even worse, he wasn't sure he could take him down, after all, this guy was probably already in much higher stages of tempering, not the baby steps Iono was making.
The second problem, was the year away at Iono's(Dragon) lair. He would spend a year training there, and he had to mask any kind of weird abilities that would give up the fact that he was something of a regressor. After all Iono(Dragon) was sharp. He was called the The Sage of the East for a reason.
Therefore Iono had to find a way to slip away from his home for a couple of days, and kill the guy, without being noticed, while trying to come up with explanations, in case Iono(Dragon), caught him red handed.
"Maybe I should pay a visit to that damn housecat... ", he thought while grinning.