Ao Ruang didn't stick around any longer than he had to and ran as quickly as he could to the Ao family courtyard.

"Ru'er you are back already?" his mother said concerned as he looked at her bruised son "What happened?"

Ao Ruang looked at his mother with an expression of 'leave it be' to which he immediately understood and let him go to his room to rest.

Later as the day progressed his mother knocked on the door before opening it letting in a small amount of light into the room which had the windows covered up. "Ru'er in a couple of days it will be the towns youth expedition into the mountain forests to search for rare herbs and other treasures. You need to be in peak condition if you are to survive. Their will be many rivals so the other should ignore you. Just find the minimum amount you need to pass and come back. Be safe for your mother...do you understand?"

Ao Ruang understood his mother's concern and probably knew how dangerous it was, but it was his chance to potentially find some sort of rare herb that would fix his weak constitution for cultivation. One such herb that he could use was Jade fire grass that grew in the mountain forests, but was exceedingly rare. If taken raw it would immensely help him break through to the next martial realm. If he didn't do this he would be accepting a life of mediocrity.

"I understand mother," he said solemnly.

Ao Ru knew his mother was correct. The chances were Ao would not encounter some miraculous treasure or herb. The chances were small, but he would rather have a small chance than to give up entirely.

…

YinWu town had an annual event that was, in a way, a form of determining which families and clans had the most outstanding youth of that generation. Of course it was always the Wen or Yang clans that would take first place, but the rest of the families would use this opportunity to try and get in good with the two clans in the town.

The secondary goal was to increase the overall resources that your family possessed. It would also give their youth a much needed chance to find miraculous medicines and treasures that would help them with their cultivation.

A clan was only as good as it's resources. If their resources dried up they would swiftly lag behind. This was of course unacceptable to any family or clan worth their salt.

Ao Ruang looked at the numerous members of all families of YinWu. The Ao family had the fewest and the lowest talent on average save for a single outstanding youth of the Ao family. Ao Fang who was a talent of the town who ranked in the top ten talents of the younger generations.

Ao Fang was 16 this year and was bold and calculating; he was already set to become the inheritor of the family's top position once he reached adulthood. For him that meant all the resources were thrown his way. Few if any were spared for the others let alone weak and talentless Ao Ruang.

"Alright guys!" Ao Fang turned to the rest of the Ao family's younger generation. "Today is a big day for the family and we cannot mess this up."

Ao Fang's eyes lingered on Ao Ruang as he continued to talk "Ao Ruang because of how important this event is we cannot afford to drag you along everywhere and carry your dead weight. You have no hope of great achievements in this expedition so I ask that you stick close to the town and don't bother going deep into the forests or you will not be able to defend yourself from savage beasts that may come out. Just pick some common herbs that our family is in need of. Do you understand?"

Ao Fang was right to hoist this responsibility onto Ao Ruang; it would free up the stronger Ao youth to help with the more important treasures and medicines deeper into the forest.

Ao Ruang nodded in understanding, but had no intention of sticking around where it was safe and no chance of finding a treasure that would help him break through.

Soon two men who looked no older than their late forties walked out in front of the crowd of YinWu youth. They were respectively the Patriarch of the Yang and Wen clans. Though they were much older than forty the realities of aging would slow down immensely once one reached the Silver warrior warrior realm. This was when the Ki in your dantian would begin to lengthen your lifespan.

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While it was the dream of most cultivators to reach such a level most cultivators who didn't have significant backing would never go much further past the silver rank.

The two patriarchs explained the rules which were simple enough. Killing was not allowed for youth. Sparring was allowed in competition for a treasure or herb. The Primary focus while out in the forest was to cull the savage beast population while they collected resources.

After stating the rules the nearly 600 youth entered the mountain forest and went off in different directions. Most had formed teams within their families or clans so to be safer in numbers.

As the Ao family left Ao Ruang lingered behind 'Fantastic. Now I will head out alone and hope to find something useful.'

Ao Ruang went north instead of south like most of the groups did mostly because while south was safer due to weaker savage beasts it was also picked clean over the years and was increasingly rare to find good quality things. Also to the north was the Yin river which laid in a gorge that was fed by the mountain rains. The Yin river spanned thousands of miles along the entire mountain rage towards the southern kingdoms and empires that controlled the south of the Wu Lan continent. Though no one in YinWu town knew much about the places that far south they still knew enough from the occasional hunting party that in the last ten years an Empire had united all the cities and kingdoms under one banner in the south.

Time passed slowly as Ao Ruang weaved through the trees of the forest and would occasionally pick up a low level spiritual herb. Being alone isn't all that bad, Ao Ruang thought to himself plus he had low risk of being harassed by other students in the academy.

"Look what we have here." a cruel, but familiar voice broke through the silence of the forest. Ao Ruang's eyes widened as he turned around to see his tormentor from several days prior had caught up to him. Yang Tian wasn't alone however several of the people who had been observing their conflict earlier were there as well.

"Wha--What do you guys want? Why are you wasting your time following someone like me around?" Ao Ruang broke out into a sweat as he spoke those words.

"We don't need to spend much time on you anyways. You insulted me, but on top of that because of you the patriarch had been treating all of us very harshly the last couple of days which really is starting to affect our mood."

"You all seem rather brave. Going 5 against 1." Ao Ruang said, backing up slightly.

With a ugly sneer Yang Tian laughed "we all suffered so you will suffer for each of us. Grab him!"

…

The beating lasted hours this time Yang Tian must have really received harsh punishment from his Patriarch...Ao Ruang wanted to curse the Yang clan Patriarch, but in his heart he knew that he had only wanted to help him out of pity. Ao Ruang's once youthful and slightly above average looks were not simple lumps and cuts and bruises. On top of that several of his teeth were knocked out and at least 3 to 4 ribs had broken or fractured. The internal bleeding likely was severe, but the pain had become basically nonexistent.

"Ackk" Ao Ruang hacked up a mouthful of blood and let it just drip out onto his chin he didn't even have the energy to spit.

If Ao Ruang's eyes were not almost completely swollen shut he would have seen several of the onlookers have concerned faces at this point. "Ehh Yang Tian isn't this enough? Surely he learned his lesson and won't even think of mentioning this to anyone."

Yang Tian stood up from his last punch to Ao Ruang's face, his knuckles dripping in Ao Ruang's blood. "Too risky. If he does tell and elder Patriarch won't be lenient and likely will give all of us at minimum 20 lashes."

Upon hearing the potential punishments several of the faces of pity turned to fear and they didn't open their mouths in his defense again.

“What are we supposed to do though? Ao Ruang is guaranteed to inform the elders of this and we are going to be in big trouble if we can't cover up these injuries quickly.” one of Yang Tian’s goons said out loud.

Yang Tian's eyes landed on Ao Ruang's pitiful state and he snorted, "Let's just throw him down the Yin river it will wash away the evidence and he will be out of our hair for good. We will just pretend we didn’t see him and they will assume he ran off, died from some beast, or got lost."

"Good idea Yang Tian!" Several of his lackey's cried out, impressed by the logic.

His assailants grabbed hold of Ao Ruang who had no will to fight back even if he had the energy at this point he doubted he would be able to survive in YinWu town even if he did make it back. He had no energy to weep even for his mother who would be heartbroken over this.

After hauling Ao Ruang for roughly five hours they came to the Yin River that lay at the bottom of a deep ravine. The spiritual palpations of the yin ki could be felt emanating from the waters below. No one was entirely sure what caused this river that flowed from even deeper in the mountains where his clan and town resided gained such unnatural yin energy, but it was particularly good for those who practiced dark cultivation methods.

As the group got closer to the edge of the ravine that had the river at the bottom they all looked down the cliff. The Yin river was called such because it had powerful yin ki in it that was highly beneficial to those who practiced darker cultivation techniques. Those were incredibly rare among humanity though and mostly dark races practiced dark cultivation methods. Unless a human was born with a Ki nature that was inherently based on Yin they would normally not practice such taboo methods.

"Throw him in! Bye wastrel, may you learn this lesson well in the next life!" Yang Tian couldn't help but taunt Ao Ruang once more before tossing him down into the river.

…

Ao Ruang fell. For him who was on the verge of death already being flung off the edge of a cliff was a death sentence. So none of his attackers bothered turning back to be sure their handiwork was finished.

The fall seemed to last an eternity, but in reality it was less than 5 seconds. Ao Ruang plunged into the river and was swiftly carried downstream. Everything went black around him and his consciousness faded away. The last words that drifted in the back of his mind was of his mother when she warned him to be careful. 'Sorry mother.' he thought pitifully.