The news that Noah had been able to defeat a cultivator with a rank 4 dantian was kept a secret among the elders of the Hive, they didn't want the forces of the continent to learn more about their power after all.
Of course, the Elbas family was aware that their assassin had died, even though it didn't know the exact details behind his death.
Evan was a soldier that had been nurtured till the heroic ranks, his value inside the ranks of the Royals was high, he was meant to lead the army of criminals one day.
Yet, he died in an insignificant nation, fighting a cultivator in the human ranks.
Also, Chasing Demon began to contact them in secret, asking for explanations and, eventually, compensations.
The Elbas family simply rejected any affiliation with the assassin and even offered to send an expert to examine the runes on Evan's body, there didn't seem to be hope in extorting a better deal with the Utra nation.
However, the branch of the Royal family that handled the creation of a secret army clearly understood one thing: Noah Balvan could only be killed by complete heroic cultivators!
The Royals didn't believe that Noah had defeated the assassin by himself, he was only a rank 3 cultivator in the gaseous stage during the battle for the independence of the archipelago after all.
Yet, the truth was that one of their promising heroic assets had died, implying that Noah was most likely heavily protected.
That forced the Elbas family to completely give up on killing Noah for the time being, all the heroic cultivator in the Utra nation were either part of the Royals or of the noble families, deploying those forces would be a public breach in the treaties signed after the Hive won the war, the Elbas family simply couldn't do that.
The first big nation that broke those treaties would create the excuse needed for the cooperation between the other two big nations which would be further aided by the Hive, it was simply too dangerous to act in that way.
Meanwhile, Noah had returned to the Coral archipelago.
The encampment in Efrana nation had been disbanded and his mansion had been brought back on island nineteen where he was currently resting.
Noah knew that the force that had sent the assassin was now aware that he could fight cultivators with a rank 4 dantian or that he had some sort of protection that had allowed him to survive, meaning that the next assassin would probably be a complete heroic cultivator.
He didn't have the power to fight a being with that power, he had been able to deal with a martial art fueled by rank 4 "Breath" but he would have had just died against a cultivator that could also match the power of his spells.
That's why he had decided to temporarily return to the archipelago to focus on his battle prowess and to find a solution to his precarious situation.
Evan's space-ring didn't contain much, only a few drugs and a seemingly endless stash of arrows, everything inside was useless to Noah.
Heilong's half-transparent figure inside his mind was rapidly healing thanks to the nourishment of the dense mental energy below it, it wouldn't take long before it returned to its peak form.
Noah finally had time to properly test the growth of his new body: He had reached the middle tier after absorbing the "Breath" contained in the black clouds but Evan's dantian hadn't been able to make him reach another tier, it had only solidified his position in the middle tier.
Also, even the small pieces of the magical beasts' corpses inside his space-ring didn't seem to increase his power that much, Noah soon began to evaluate the amount of nourishment that each resource gave him according to its rank.
'Magical beasts have a stronger body than cultivators but they also need more "Breath" to grow. It must be considered that I'm a hybrid, meaning that I would need an even higher amount of "Breath" since my power surpasses both races… I'd say that only the dantians of heroic cultivators and magical beasts of a higher tier can significantly make me improve. There is to consider the lifespan of the magical beasts too, age is an important aspect in their world.'
Noah could randomly eat anything containing "Breath" like a magical beast but he knew that such behavior would eventually put him in some trouble.
That's why he decided that, unless he was completely sure that no one was watching, he would only eat what would give him a substantial nourishment.
As for his hunger, he had a better use for it.
Becoming a hybrid made him realize that he lacked something vital in the creation of an item through the Elemental forging method: A proper will!
His ambition had been enough to fuse him with a magical beast but the forging of a rank 4 item required something more specific, something that truly expressed the purpose of his creation.
Noah didn't consider his body as his first inscribed item in the fourth rank, its level was the consequence of the material that he had used.
That's why, in his mind, he still thought that he hadn't been able to cross the human ranks with his forging ability.
The creation of his martial art could wait, it would be useless to create an offensive method that could be only fueled with liquid "Breath".
After all, martial arts needed a balance between the physical strength and the "Breath" used while performing the forms of the art, the consumption of the Shadow sprint martial art had increased due to the power of his body.
His dantian was barely able to fuel a few spells and one martial art, adding other offensive methods wouldn't solve the core of the issue, Noah needed to create a cultivation method and become a complete heroic cultivator!
The "Breath" blessings had continued to acc.u.mulate inside his space-ring, Noah had had enough resources to experiment in that field again for a long time.
What he had lacked was a meaning to imbue his creations with.
His endless hunger gave him the idea that he needed.
Magical beasts were always hungry, they would go crazy when starving or in front of an appealing resource.
Such endless hunger, such desire to devour anything that contained "Breath", such implacable greed, there was no better meaning to add to an item meant to absorb "Breath".