When Kiel opened his eyes, there was no one by his side. When he walked out of the room, there was no warm food waiting for him, and when he exited the house, he found no man preparing for his daily hunt.

"Oh yeah, I'm alone now." Kiel said with a downcast expression. But as he enjoyed the images in his mind and held onto the bangle on his wrist, Kiel managed to smile.

His young body moved; he went to prepare food in the kitchen. He knelt down and lifted three of the floorboards to see a cover on the ground, Kiel pulled the brass handles, and a cold air passed his face.

He shivered from the cold as he saw the body parts in this Storage. He picked one of the meats and a rice bag. He placed everything to how it used to be and then went to cook himself food, "Mother said the [Ice Stones] layer should last for about twenty more years… I don't have to worry about it."

The Storage was sealed once more, and Kiel lit the wood-burning stove. This would be his morning routine going through the following days.

Today was the first day of the nine-day week, and as it was the start of the day, Kiel began to plan out his life.

On the first day, he would have breakfast and then go out to clear out the lawn and then clean the house in the afternoon. After doing that, Kiel would cook dinner; he need not eat lunch as he could survive without. After dinner, he would sleep after using the body's remaining energy to refine the 720 apertures in the body.

Refining the 720 apertures of the body. Refining the 720 apertures actually meant opening the pores to let Spirit Energy in his body. Kiel rejected the Spirit Energy. He only wanted to increase his body's vitality and heal faster. Without cultivation, that's why he did this kind of thing.

On the second day, he would chop wood that would be used for the entire week until the second day comes. On rainy days, he already had a separated stock that would last him for a month if anything dire was to occur.

On the third day, he would go and hunt for wild animals in the nearby forest. It was not so hard moving around with a body like his.

On the fourth day, he had nothing of importance to do; thus, he would close his eyes and watch the life of the experts of his time. He didn't watch their fights, but the way they conversed and spoke with others. The way they smiled and moved, all of it was observed and analyzed by Kiel.

On the fifth day, he would stroll around the hills with the Ox while talking to it as if it was sentient. He wanted to polish off the conversational skills he had learned from memories. Kiel wished to be able to speak to others clearer and easier than he was before.

On the sixth day, he would go about and clear out the lawn once more.

On the seventh day, he went and bought the necessities he would need, like grains. He purchased different spices to begin experimenting on some things. Though he had no talent for alchemy, he could at least appreciate cooking as he only needed to follow a recipe.

On the eighth day, he would have a medicinal bath. Medicinal herbs were expensive, and he didn't touch the savings of his parents to buy them. The extra wild animals he hunted would be sold to buying herbs. There would be times when Kiel was without a catch, so he decided to stock up four weeks ahead of time.

On the ninth day, Kiel would not do anything. He would rest with the Ox and try his conversational skills that never seem to improve. During the night of this day, he would use parchment and poor-quality ink and brush to write his experiences for the entire week.

Kiel would speak of what he had done to let his parents know what happened in his life. Though it was a static life, there would be a moment where things would deviate from his plan; thus, this man who had lived for eons would be excited to write about it.

Like a child preparing to speak with his parents about his day at the academy, Kiel did not miss an event. This was his life, and of course, there would be times when Ame visited him every three months.

As Kiel waited for his parents to return home, this reunion with his sister would be the highlight. He would prepare food for her, and she would tell him stories of her life in the world outside he rejected.

"I was trapped inside the tomb of the ancestors, and that bitch Riel attempted to have me eaten by the Heart Earth Beast. Stones flew into the air, and I was beaten, but just as I was about to be beaten, I used my trump card, the mastered First Level of Heaven and Hell Palm! I blasted the Heart Earth Beast and then slapped that bitch to death; she was bleeding all over when I did it. Tsk, and all of that was just because I stole the first ranking from her younger sister."

"So, did you uproot them properly?"

"…I did, and managed to get some good treasures from them, do you want some?"

"No, I cannot use such things in the society of Mortals."

She would tell Kiel stories, stories of light and death bout, and even arrogant people who tried to claim her as theirs. Ame's experience filled Kiel's life with colors, but even that didn't last as five years passed since she left for the Celestial Phoenix Mountain. Ame came home as an Ascension Realm Cultivator.

"I have reached the peak of my peers; none could match my strength, and I won the right to join another power. I need to go to another Sect called the Fire Demon Sect as I have already reached this level. The Fire Demon Sect is a faraway place, it tens of thousands of kilometers away, and I might not be able to…"

She was shushed by her brother, and as Kiel looked Ame in the eyes, he said, "I know and do not worry about me. This is the path you have chosen, and I would support you with anything you would do. Like you, I have been in such a situation before; as you grow stronger, the more we need resources. It is only natural for this to happen.

"Never fear, Ame, never fear that I am lagging behind. Never fear that I am being left behind because this path that you took is much harder than mine… you will face danger and meet companions and, if at the end of it all, you feel lonely, come back, and I will welcome you and listen to your stories with Mother and Father. We are Family wherever you go."

When Kiel finished his words, he showed her the smile he had been refining for years. Ame hugged Kiel before giving him a book.

"I do not know for how long I will be gone; I do not know if I will be able to come back home quickly, but I'll try to write to you. This book has all the names and locations of the companions that I have made over the years. If you ever need help, contact them. I do not know if I'll be able to return home, but — ow! I was acting really emotional at that time!"

Ame complained as she rubbed her forehead. Kiel just used a portion of Intent to flick her forehead.

"Don't say anything stupid and just go! I will remain here no matter what happens… I will be waiting for you, Mother, and Father. Who knows, you might come back that they are already here with me."

"…that would be nice." Even Ame wished for such a thing.

The day would end, and the next day would follow. Ame left with hesitation, and just before she reached ten kilometers out of their Mental Connection, she spoke to him one last time, [See you later, brother.]

Ame's words were filled with warmth, and without sounding forced, she had long accepted Kiel as her brother, but she repeated it one last time before leaving as if to remind her that someone would always come to find her if she was to become lost.

Ame kept something from Kiel, and that was the fact that when she leaves for the Fire Demon Sect, she would soon be going after the people who killed her in her previous life.

She knew that Kiel would do anything for Ame, even if that anything was to break his oath of never stepping into the World of Cultivation.

'For my Family, I am willing to do anything, even if it means becoming the one thing I do not want…' that was Kiel's words to Ame when they were young.

Ame did not want that, and he did not wish to endanger her brother. She would hunt the bastards who took her down one by one, "I'll kill them all and return…"

Kiel was once again left alone, and his life continued without anyone being there to watch him grow. The Ox died in the eighth year of his parents leaving him, and on the tenth year, the letters he received from Ame every year stopped.

In the eleventh year, Kiel reached the age of 18. He was alone when he celebrated it. The Town didn't want anything to do with him, for they think of him as a weirdo. Though there were times when women came to meet him for, they were attracted by his elegant demeanor and face, none managed to even make Kiel's heart go beat faster than it should have been.

On the eleventh year, every woman stopped trying to approach him, and Kiel was suspected of being interested in people of the same sex or had no balls. Kiel didn't care for them, just like how he ignored women of poor attitude and knowledge.

In the twelfth year, Kiel reached nineteen, and no news was made.

On the thirteenth year's fourth month, Kiel opened his eyes. With hurried steps, he stepped out of the house with nothing but a stick.

He walked away from their home and now empty barn that he still kept clean, and after walking for five hundred meters, Kiel stopped.

He held onto a stick that he carved out from a tree that had been hit by lightning. It was stronger than an ordinary stick, but it was still a stick.

Where he was, there were no trees, nor were there any bumps. It was a clearing without anything to hide him. Kiel looked at the moon, "Do you really think I walked all the way here for no reason?"

Kiel spoke, and five men appeared dressed in black while wearing bamboo hats appeared, "Kiel Zarta, we came here to take your dead body. You can try to fight us, but it appears the information was correct. You do indeed, do not have any cultivation. Don't worry, we'll make this quick, you'll soon be with your parents."

All of them were at the 9th level of the True Spirit Realm. Kiel knew he could not win, but something else mattered more than the fight.

He lowered his head and began thinking. A smile appeared on his face, and as he raised his face to meet with one of them again, he had an askew expression on his face.

A broken smile as if he was holding onto a notion of impossibility, "Huh? What did you just say? My parents? You do not mean Noah and Ava Zar—"

The five men's figure disappeared from sight, and as Kiel lowered his head, he saw five swords skewing him.

Kiel coughed up blood, but he didn't care as he looked the one in front of him in the eyes as he asked in confirmation, "Are… my… parents, my family… dead?"

There were tears in his eyes as he asked this question. He was hoping that they would shake their heads before a dying man, but the man before him only let out a snicker, "I confirmed it with my own eyes."

Shhsssk!

The sword rendered Kiel's flesh, and he began bleeding out as he fell to his knees.

Kiel's tears fell, and then… he screamed, "AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!" he was in pain, but it was not the stab wounds that were hurting him. It was the fact that his parents had died.

Kiel's tears flowed, and then his eyes revolved and showed a Serpent Biting its own tail, a ten-meter diameter dome appeared with his scream, and time was reversed!

Fifteen seconds was returned.

"Kiel Zarta, we came here to take your dead body. You can try to fight us, but it appears the information was correct, you—"

The man was talking when Kiel bursts out laughing. He held onto his gut as his laughter turned into a guffaw, tears of blood escaped his eyes, and as the men in black robes began to get a weird vibe around Kiel, this target of theirs abruptly stopped.

With tears of blood still streaming down his face, he looked at one of them with a smile, "So… this is pain?"

"Wha—?'

Kiel's figure disappeared as an unimaginable amount of pressure appeared and almost made the men's knees in black robes buckle.

Everyone was confused, and then, when Kiel reappeared, he was before one of the men, and as the man lowered his head, the sight of his heart on Kiel's hand appeared.

At that moment, the man who vowed to never step into the world of cultivation ever again had reached Pseudo-True Spirit Realm from being a non-cultivator in a manner of seconds.

As Kiel watched the dead body plopped down, he whispered, "You should've beheaded me…"