Shang stood on the ground in the middle of the northeastern forest, his eyes showing a look of concentration.

Silence.

BANG!

Shang unleashed a Fire Blast as he turned around, his sword ready.

Shang's legs parted the grass on the ground, but they weren't touching the earth.

SHING!

A black gleam created a half-moon as Shang swung his sword at seemingly an empty place.

An instant later, the corpse of a nearly translucent snake fell to the ground in two pieces.

'And that's five,' Shang thought with a smirk. 'I knew that traveling along the southern part of the northeastern forest would be profitable.'

Yes, Shang was in the southern part of the northeastern forest, which was a risky zone. Beasts from the Wasteland would come here from time to time to have their young.

Fortunately, Shang knew a couple of the beasts from the Wasteland now. After all, teacher Niria had talked about General Stage beasts one could find in the northeastern forest in her last lesson. She hadn't been able to get through all of them, but she had talked about a lot.

Because of that, Shang felt confident in hunting in this risky part of the forest.

First of all, the beasts of the Wasteland were mostly very direct predators. There were only a few beasts that hunted via ambushes in the Wasteland.

The Wasteland simply didn't have many ways to hide, which meant that there were only very few ambush predators in general there.

On top of that, those beasts only came here to have their young. They generally weren't very interested in Soldier Stage beings since they gave nearly no Mana.

Sure, if they saw something like that directly in front of them, they might as well kill it, but if that thing was very good at running away, they wouldn't bother. At most, they would release one or two casual attacks, and if the target managed to survive them and run away, they would simply stop.

But surviving two casual attacks from a General Stage beast was still very difficult.

That's where Shang's left arm came into play.

By now, Shang had become very good at using his left arm to move around.

And it had already proven to be a lifesaver.

During the night, Shang had seen a big pangolin walking through the forest. When Shang had seen it, he had directly known that it was a General Stage beast.

The pangolin had noticed Shang on one of the trees, and earthen spears appeared around its body, similar to what the Ice Spear Bear had done.

But there were six spears instead of one or two, and they moved with far greater speed.

The pangolin had shot them in a spread at Shang.

Meanwhile, Shang had used his left arm to jump over the crowns of the trees and then used an Ice Blast to shoot into the distance.

The earthen spears missed after destroying a couple of trees.

When the pangolin saw that its prey had fled into the distance at such speeds, it gave up.

Sure, the pangolin was very fast, and it could charge forward, destroying all the trees in the process.

But that was too much effort just to kill something at the Soldier Stage.

It wasn't worth the hassle.

Of course, this maneuver cost Shang a lot of Mana to regenerate his left arm, but it was worth it.

After all, this ability to quickly flee was precisely how Shang was able to hunt in the southern part of the northeastern forest.

Luckily, there weren't that many General Stage beasts, and the pangolin had been the only General Stage beast Shang had seen during the night.

Shang pocketed the corpse of the Vanishing Snake he had just killed and ran towards the west.

Hunting in the southern part of the northeastern forest had been worth it!

Shang hadn't seen many Swamp Millipedes, and even the Pest Cats weren't as numerous in this place. After all, the young of the General Stage beasts walked around this place, and they were generally more powerful than Pest Cats.

But Vanishing Snakes thrived here.

The young of General Stage beasts were great nourishment for Vanishing Snakes, and they loved hunting here.

And that showed once again why the Vanishing Snakes were worth so many Contribution Points. Most progenies of General Stage beasts from the Wasteland were on the blacklist. After all, the Wasteland was the biggest moneymaker for Warrior's Paradise.

Yet, the Vanishing Snakes kept killing these young.

On top of that, the fact that the Vanishing Snakes could kill so many young also showed how dangerous the Empress Cobra Zone actually was, and by extension, the Swamp Millipedes.

If the Swamp Millipedes managed to expand the swamp towards the Wasteland, the Wasteland might actually stop existing.

The Empress Cobra Zone was just very dangerous in general.

After about an hour of traveling, Shang exited the northeastern forest after a profitable night of hunting.

Shang looked towards the east and saw that the sky was a bit brighter than in the middle of the night, but it also wasn't nearly time for dawn.

He guessed that it was probably around 4 am.

Shang ran towards the west and reached the street rather quickly. This time, he wasn't near the Farm Line since he had been hunting in the southern part of the northeastern forest.

On his way, Shang saw another dog that was interested in the beast sack. He simply let the dog sniff the beast sack for a bit. The dog eventually became bored and left.

Shang reached Warrior's Paradise shortly before sunrise. The big gates were still closed, which meant that Shang had to go through a manual inspection.

"Good job killing all these Vanishing Snakes," the inspecting guard said with a smile as he closed the beast sack again. "You're protecting Warrior's Paradise's prosperity and the lives of many young hunters!"

Shang only smiled politely, something he hadn't done in a long while. "Thanks," he said.

The guard nodded and gestured to the smaller door behind him. "Get on it, rich boy," he said with a smile.

Shang nodded and entered the city.

Shang reached the academy rather quickly as the first people started to wake up inside Warrior's Paradise.

"Teacher, I want to enter the academy," Shang said as he saw teacher Loran sleeping near the closed gate.

Teacher Loran lifted his head with boredom. "Just jump over the gate," he said. "I don't want to stand up right now."

Shang shrugged and jumped over the gate. The gate wasn't there to stop people from entering, which was also why it was only two meters high. It only symbolized if the academy was open or closed.

At the moment, the academy was basically empty. Only a couple of students that lived inside the academy were walking around the empty streets as they began training.

Shang walked towards the Exchange Hall leisurely and reached it shortly before the gates of the academy opened officially.

When Shang entered, he saw an older man packing. Apparently, his shift had just ended.

pᴀɴdᴀ nᴏveʟ However, Shang was a bit surprised to notice that the old man was actually at the Commander Stage.

The clerks Shang had seen during the day had all been at the General Stage.

The older man noticed Shang and his beast sack. "Make it quick," he grumbled.

Shang put the beast sack on the counter without saying anything.

The older man went through the contents at record speeds. Obviously, he was very used to doing this.

"Emblem," he ordered.

Shang put his emblem on the table, and he quickly got it back after a short burst of light.

Shang looked at the number on the emblem, and he smiled brightly.

,760.

"Two Middle Rank Two units of Ice Affinity ore, please," Shang said.

The older man sighed, quickly entered a side room, and came back with two blue pieces of ore.

Shang put the emblem on the table, and the Contribution points went down to 1,260.

Then, the older man left with astonishing speed before Shang could say anything else. Obviously, he didn't want to work anymore.

"Do you need something?" a young woman asked Shang as she had just arrived in the Exchange Hall.

"No, I've got everything I need," Shang answered as he looked at the two pieces of Ice ore.

Shang grabbed the ore and left the Exchange Hall.

'Only Fire ore left.'