Chapter 1: Mountains
The blazing summer sun shines on a young boy as his sword stabs into a wild beast. The aura of the 5th stage of the foundation establishment realm erupts from his body as he swings his sword to behead the beast. A spray of blood erupts as the head of the beast is separated from its body.
"Congratulations on your breakthrough, young master," a voice said behind him. Then, a towel was handed to him. He took it, wiped the sweat on his forehead, and sheathed his sword.
"Let's have this beast for dinner", the young boy said as he made his way back to the cave in the mountain that had been his home for the past few months.
"Young master, a package came for you today while you were training. It's from the patriarch", the servant said as he brought out a small black box from his sleeve and handed it to the boy.
The boy whose name was Adrian Thorne collected it and stared at the box that had his family's insignia on it. What surprised him was that such boxes could only be opened with the blood of a member of the main family. If any other person tries to open the box, the runes engraved in it would automatically make it explode.
Adrian, a bit surprised at the sudden package, took out a small dagger from his waist and pricked his finger. A drop of blood dripped on the box, and he opened it to find a note and a pendant. The star-shaped blood-red pendant looked beautiful as it sparkled in the sunlight. Even the boy who has seen his fair share of jewelry could not help but be amazed at its brilliance. Under the pendant was a small note that read only one sentence, "Do not tell a soul about the pendant".
This shocked him because he recognized the handwriting as his father's, the patriarch of the Thorne family, Atlas Thorne. He wondered what was so special about the pendant that no one could know about it. He tried infusing his qi into it but found out that it wouldn't flow into the pendant.
After staring at it for a couple more minutes, he tried to put it in his storage ring but found out that it wouldn't enter. This surprised him because only items of a higher quality than the storage ring or very strange couldn't enter it. He stared at the pendant a few more times before putting it around his neck and hiding it within his robes.
He called the servant who was carrying the already butchered beast and asked him when the package arrived. The servant told him that the box was given to him by a black robed man, and he was told to give it to the young master as soon as he returned. This was somewhat surprising as the only ones who wore black robes in the Thorne family were his father's personal guards who were deathly loyal to the patriarch.
He dismissed the servant who went back to his work of preparing the meat for dinner. Adrian was in deep thought and tried to figure out the meaning of this weird pendant, but he just couldn't figure it out. However, judging from the importance his father placed on it, he knew it was no ordinary pendant.