He was satisfied with his status.

He was just a step away from reaching the peak of the mutation realm. So, he resumed his cultivation.

Time kept on going. Days turned to weeks, weeks turned to months, and months turned to years.

While he was cultivating, changes were happening in the forest. But, he was oblivious to those changes.

In the first year, small beasts ran out of the deep region of the forest.

It didn't bring much change to the outer region.

In the fourth year, medium-sized beasts ran out of the deep region.

It brought changes to his surroundings.

While he was cultivating, those beasts would show up and fight among themselves. It created a disturbance to his cultivation.

At first, he would go out and scare them away. However, they would come again and repeat the same thing.

He was getting annoyed by it. One day, he decided to kill one of the beasts in hopes of scaring others away.

It worked for a few days. But, it repeated.

He could no longer cultivate. So, he decided to fly away to check if it was happening in other places.

He could see the same sight every few minutes of the flight.

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After an hour of scouting, he had a rough idea of what was happening.

There was a battle going on among smaller beasts for the authority of territory.

Five beasts had claimed territories around his nest.

The north had been claimed by the mutated lion, the south by the mutated golem, the east by the mutated wolf, the west by the mutated bear, and the mutated gorilla had claimed the northeast.

He had never claimed the entire forest as his own. So, he didn't care much, and they had similar strengths as him.

He swiftly made his way home and started using his 'water blade' to mark an area of a square kilometer (247 acres) around his home.

His attack had made trenches around his surrounding, it would serve as the mark for this territory.

He would dispose of any beast that was foolish enough to enter the trench and leave its corpse to mark his territory.

After a few weeks, animals had stopped trespassing. Now, there were six territories in the forest, including his.

They would keep each other in check.

He resumed his cultivation.

It took him four more years to break through.

When he came out to get a breather, he felt changes in the forest.

The aura had become heavy, and it was mixed with death.

He soared away to find the reason behind such an environment.

He had only flown for a minute when he spotted monkeys and gorillas heading his way. They had no good intentions.

He could feel it. So, he disposed of them and made his way toward the territory of the mutated gorilla in the northeast.

He couldn't find it there. So, he decided to scout other regions of the forest.

He found it in the North. It was sitting in the stone chairs covered by bones, and there was a skull below its feet.

He looked carefully and got a clear vision of the skull.

"It's the skull of a wolf. Now, I know why monkeys were heading my way." A hint of killing intent appeared in his eyes.

Swish!

He used 'water blade' to initiate the attack.

The Mutated Gorilla dodged the attack and started throwing boulders at Grim. A ranged battle had begun among them.

The battle lasted for an entire day. However, his poison gave him the upper hand in the battle of attrition.

It had been the longest battle of his life. Nevertheless, he had achieved victory.

He disposed of the body and flew away. It was not safe to stick around while he was exhausted.