In the middle of his explanation, Rand paused, as if contemplating what to say next. Byron seized this opportunity to clarify something:
"Let's say, although it's hard to believe, that neither I, nor any other elders, nor anyone else noticed Weed's 'miraculous persuasive power,' and only you, the subject of his influence, felt it. Let's assume, since I don't sense any lies in your words. But tell me, my dear disciple, why didn't you report this 'incident' during the competition, afterwards, or in the following days to me or anyone else? What stopped you?"
This reasonable question seemed to hit Rant in a "sore and shameful spot," he didn't want to discuss. He lowered his gaze further, spending a few seconds in this position, then inhaled deeply and exhaled heavily, as if resigning himself to share the story:
"Yes, master, I was about to explain this.
I was afraid no one, neither you nor anyone else, would believe me since I had no proof of his guilt, reducing it to my word against his… Forgive me, that's what I would say to a stranger, and it would be even partly true, as those were my thoughts in the first few minutes after his 'attack.' But you are my master, you've always treated me kindly and fairly, and I no longer want to hide or withhold anything from you. Actually, master, I deliberately chose not to tell you about the incident. I had two significant reasons tied to my desire to avenge that bastard's humiliation and eliminate a future dangerous opponent…
The first reason was trivial. I feared that if you or anyone else in the sect learned of Weed's powerful and unique talent, I wouldn't be allowed to touch him, no matter what offense he committed. The sect would turn a blind eye to any of his possible misdeeds. I believed that in such a future, Weed would rise to an unattainable height for me, perhaps even becoming the sect master's disciple. This would render him practically untouchable for me. Given Weed's malicious nature, which he hid well, my future life in the sect would be extremely unpleasant and possibly short-lived.
The second reason was that I wanted to handle everything myself, to deal with this danger personally, to solve this problem on my own, even if it was quite challenging.
Master, you may not understand because I believe you have always been strong, but I, master, I've been utterly helpless all my life, and it's not even about cultivation. All serious problems were solved for me: by parents, other village elders, as soon as I told them about them. I grew up as a weak person. And due to my weakness, the day I lost my parents, I could do nothing, change nothing, although I may be had chances. All I could do was hide in the basement, as I was told…
In the days following that event, I thought a lot about life and the person I wanted to become. Yes, I decided many things during those days. And one of those decisions was that, unless absolutely necessary, I wouldn't rely on anyone else, that I would try to solve problems by myself, to become the kind of person who could handle anything that came his way. A person whom loved ones could rely on, not someone who would rely on everyone else.
And after becoming a cultivator, and as it turned out, a talented one, even one of the best among the novices of a great sect, this desire only strengthened. I didn't want to rely on anyone anymore. Not even on you, master.
For myself, I decided that I needed to deal with Weed without resorting to anyone's help.
But... fate, as it often does, played a cruel joke on me in this matter.
After this, I started making various plans for what I would do with Weed. But an observant person, without any help from me, also noticed Weed's "quirk" and even more, he realized that I was aware of it and extremely wary of it. This person was Eyron, also my groupmate, whom you recently saw with me.
On the day we received various rewards for the competition, he approached me and said that he also noticed Weed's "persuasive power," that it scared him immensely, and that he wanted to deal with it once and for all. He didn't want to involve the sect because, like me, he feared that once the boy's talent was discovered, the sect would do everything to protect and nurture him as an heir.
He proposed a relatively simple plan for his elimination, which would have no consequences for us. The essence was that we would invite Weed and a few others to perform a simple task of catching a small beast in the village of Irbis, near which a large wolf pack had recently appeared. Using the Wolf ` Bane potion, which Eyron had recently acquired, we would lure the wolves onto Weed. Given the known strength of the wolf pack, they should easily deal with someone who had just reached the first level. All the blame for the murder would fall on the beasts, and there would be nothing for the sect to punish us for.
Eyron suggested we execute the plan a few days after the competition, when everyone would start running out of prize resources for cultivation and feel what it's like to cultivate without spirit stones and pills. They would want to get them again by taking part in a simple but well-paid task.
After long deliberation, I agreed to participate in his plan. It seems foolish, I understand…
And yes, I strongly desired to do everything alone, but Eyron's intent to execute his plan soon, even if I refused, changed a lot and left me with very limited choices. You could say, only three options: agree to help him with the plan, remain a passive observer hoping someone else fulfills his wish, or somehow thwart Eyron, after which I can eliminate Weed later on my own.
Although the first option didn't appeal to me much, the second appealed even less. I almost didn't consider the third because I didn't want to respond to Eyron's trust, revealed by sharing the plan, with pointless treachery that would bring me no benefit.
Overall, my groupmate's plan seemed relatively good, but much remained partially or completely unknown. I knew practically nothing about the Wolf ` Bane potion, the village of Irbis, or the strengths and weaknesses of the wolf pack that appeared there.
I didn't want to rely entirely on Eyron in these matters. Firstly, I believe it's always necessary to check any information from at least two sources, and secondly, I felt Eyron hadn't told me everything on purpose.
So after reaching the second level of Qi Condensation thanks to the resources I won in the competition, I went to the city for information. Initially, I thought about learning everything I needed within the sect but later decided that would be unwise.
Upon reaching the city, I visited many small and large shops, asking local vendors about everything possible: their product range, the properties and qualities of their items, the characteristics of various potions, the appearance of beast groups in nearby villages, and much more. At the Heavenly Beasts Palace, I learned about almost all the beasts in the nearby lands, including the wolf subtype that settled near the village of Irbis. Thanks to my status as a novice of the Fire Dragon sect, all this was quite easy to do.
From that trip, I gained significant knowledge and even discovered that Eyron hadn't told me about the "unusual spread properties" of the Wolf ` Bane potion. However, the main thing, though I didn't realize it at the time, was the persistent feeling that someone was closely watching me throughout my walk. That day, I wasn't sure if it was just my imagination, as I couldn't find this "someone" no matter how hard I tried. I had some guesses about who it might be, for example, I even thought it could be someone from your people, master.
But after what happened in the forest today, I'm almost certain that Weed or someone helping him was following me back then, which greatly changed my fate, but more on that later.
Some time after my return to the sect, Eyron managed to convince Weed and a few of our fellow novices to join us in completing a simple task of eliminating a small beast in the village of Irbis.
Yesterday morning, we headed to the village. The journey was relatively straightforward as we encountered no problems along the way. Weed remained almost completely silent and didn't use his ability on us throughout the trip.
However, the situation in the village itself was somewhat different from what we had been told. In short, they no longer cared much about the small beast terrorizing them because a much greater threat had recently befallen them. The village had been in a semi-siege by an organized wolf pack for some time.
Thanks to some on-site discoveries and my deductions, I realized that this situation was orchestrated by Eyron and his family: the wolves besieging the village were not a wild pack but a controlled weapon of his family. The motive was to seize the land belonging to the settlement, where a valuable metal deposit had been discovered.
Realizing this, I understood that since Eyron hadn't told me about it, he likely planned to use his family's scheme to destroy the village and simultaneously get rid of not only Weed but also me and possibly the other members of our group.
His actual plan was to lure us all to the village, then quietly leave and order the wolf handlers to launch an attack on the village, during which, according to his plan, no one would survive: neither me, nor Weed, nor any of the villagers.
But fortunately, I managed to thwart him and prevent him from reaching his family members. How I did it is not so important now; I'll tell you more about it later, master.
What matters is that after everything that happened, Eyron, wounded and unable to reach his family, had to hide near the village. The other novices, Balron and Fara, went back to the sect for help against the wolves, leaving only me and Weed in the village under the pretext that we didn't want to leave the task given by the sect unfinished.
Yes, master, despite everything that happened, I didn't want to miss the opportunity to deal with the problem. But apparently, Weed had the same idea.
Weed and I went into the forest to hunt the small beast, a fox. Once we ventured deep into the thicket, I planned to injure and immobilize him, then feed him to some large beast.
But, as you can surely guess, everything did not go according to my simple plan. Some time after we entered the forest, Weed stopped and told me several fascinating things: he had known for a long time that I wanted to kill him there and had figured it out back when I was wandering around the city asking people about the village of Irbis.
He said he was actually very grateful to me because I had made his task of eliminating the best novices of our sect's current generation much easier. He mentioned that he had thought I would be one of the "difficult parts" of his task, but I turned out to be the "easiest part."
He said many more things, but I couldn't understand why he was telling me all this. Where did he get such confidence that he could silence me forever? After all, I was stronger than him at the second level, and I had many artifacts given to me by you, master.
Then I realized where his confidence came from. Weed showed me his true cultivation level: he was actually at the eighth level of Qi Condensation. Somehow, he had managed to hide this fact even from the artifacts and the elders of the sect.
And I probably would have died there if I hadn't secretly used the potion Eyron had given me long ago. I wasn't even sure it was genuine, but I got lucky.
When Weed was almost bored with our conversation and was preparing to attack me, the wolves appeared along with Eyron's family members. I feared they might talk and leave peacefully, so I was ready to attack them myself to prevent such an outcome. But it wasn't necessary; Weed didn't want to let them go.
A fierce battle ensued, during which Weed demonstrated terrifying combat prowess. Even though his opponents had an incredible numerical advantage, and some of them had higher cultivation levels, Weed did not yield. In fact, he was pushing them back. The wolf pack and the people controlling them focused all their efforts on restraining Weed, paying little attention to me. Thanks to this, I managed to escape.
As I distanced myself from the battle, I heard a monstrous roar coming from that direction.