Chapter 30
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When the guards felt, Ben release them from his aura they all visibly sighed in relief. They even became aware that the surrounding crowd recognized Ben as a cultivator and when they heard them say spirit food cultivator these guards then knew who, Ben was through the rumors that had spread throughout the city recently.
Everyone had heard of a young man who was thought to be a con artist but turned out to be a cultivator selling food that had the properties of some spirit plants at a price the common people could even afford. He sold his food for a few weeks and before anyone in the Royal Palace or the guards had found out about him he suddenly vanished from the city only leaving behind the rumors of his magical food.
Even the old-man cultivator who had bought food from him could not be questioned about Ben because he had been in closed-door cultivation since then.
Everyone had heard how the young cultivator had won in an aura duel face-off against one of the kingdoms respected cultivators and not only that he was selling unbelievable foods that could help heal old or new internal injuries, help cultivators and magicians boost their training speeds, and in some cases had helped children discover they had latent talents making them serious prospects for future cultivator or magician apprentices.
When Ben heard the guard ask him for his name even though he was confused he still answered him after the shock of their sudden change wore off.
"My name is Ben King. As I was trying to tell this guard here who had falsely accused me of being a thief and stealing this Hemic fur I am from a distant continent and had only arrived here a few months ago. I had been adventuring in... what did he call it again the Wayward Woodlands?"
When the gathered people heard that Ben had been out adventuring in the Wayward Woodlands there were startled gasps all around from the crowd of onlookers.
Ben glanced around at the people nodding to them that what he said was the truth before continuing to speak.
"When I was hunting profound beasts in that forest I was ambushed by this Hemic. The two of us battled and in the end, I killed it and took its fur as my trophy. "
"I had also spent some time a few weeks back in this city selling my spirit foods in the central market area and had returned once again with an even larger variety of goods to sell."
Ben paused for a moment to look down at the guard he crushed before continuing.
"I had hoped to develop a good relationship with this city and open a store here one day to continue selling my goods, but if I am going to be treated like a common criminal by the guards of this city I am sure the neighboring kingdom would be more than happy to buy by spirit food and other products."
Ben said to the guards who had remained on their knees this whole time.
When the crowd heard Ben was talking about taking his food to another kingdom to sell it was obvious that they did not want him to go and began to curse the guard who was either playing possum on the ground or was truly unconscious.
"No please my lord I apologize on behalf of this idiot. Our city would love to have you and we were even given orders by the Royal Palace to bring you to meet our king if you were to return once again." The guard said with a pained look on his face.
Both suspicious and curious, Ben wondered why the king would want to see him?
'Does he want to buy some of my food for himself or is he going to try and strongarm me into handing it over to him?'
Ben's curiosity won out over suspicion, so he questioned the guard.
"Why would you king wish to meet me? I am not even a subject of his kingdom. I am only a traveling merchant cultivator looking for a place to sell my goods." Ben asked with a hint of lingering suspicion in his voice.
The guard who Ben had been talking to suddenly realized since Ben was a foreigner he had no idea that all cultivators were held in such high regard here.
Before answering the guard looked around at the crowd blocking the city gates and the ever-growing line of merchant carts and travelers waiting to get into the city.
"My lord, could we go somewhere else and then I can explain the situation to you? There is a long line of people wanting to still enter the city and we are currently blocking their arrivals." The guard humbly asked hoping he would not anger this young cultivator.
Ben then noticed how his argument with the guard had completely shut down the only entrance to the city. There was a huge crowd of people blocking the gates and half of the guards who should be checking carts and giving people permission to enter were tied up with him right now.
When he looked further up the road, he spotted a nice restaurant that he had always wanted to try but he never came to this side of the city except when he was arriving or departing.
Ben walked forward with a smile now trusting this guard a little more and held his hand out and pulled him to his feet.
When the guard stood up he gave a couple quick commands out.
"Take this idiot to the barracks infirmary he said and gave the guard on the ground a swift kick to the ribs. The rest of you disperse this crowd and get back to working the gates."
"Follow me," Ben said when he noticed the guard was ready to go.
As they walked down the street Ben asked the guard for his name.
"My name is Ruben Steele, my lord, I am the captain of the day guard."
"Nice to meet you, Ruben, there is a restaurant just there that I have wanted to try. Let me buy you lunch and you can explain the situation to me while we eat."
When Ruben saw the place that Ben pointed out he almost swallowed his tongue.
"Haha, my lord that place is one of the most expensive restaurants in town. It caters to rich merchants and nobles." Ruben nervously whispered to Ben as they walked down the street hoping to not embarrass him."
"Don't worry about it I have plenty of money on me!" Ben announced as they walked through the door.
A nicely dressed young woman with long red hair showed them to a table and let them know what was available today. This was another thing that drove Ben crazy about this world. There was no such thing as food menus in the restaurants and inns!
Ben assumed it had to do with not having refrigeration so only so much food could be kept on hand at a time limiting what they could serve their customers.
Soon they were served a large juicy steak of some creature with rich dark mushroom gravy. They were also served a few sides of vegetables soaked in an oil and vinegar dressing and some type of drink that tastes like watered down berry wine.
Even though Ruben was the captain of the day guard he did not make enough to frivolously eat at a place like this and the food to him was an incredible gourmet meal. Ben had been spoiled by Earth food and his new Restaurant back at the fortress. To him, this was a typical meal that you would be served at any family restaurant back on Earth.
Ruben was enjoying the food so much Ben just smiled while letting him enjoy the meal. Once they had finished their meals they could talk about why the king wanted to see him.
After their meal, Ben found out everything from Ruben about how cultivators were treated and that the king more than likely wished to see him so that he could give him a nobility title and possibly land or an estate so that Ben would settle down here in the Aregard capital.
Ben was assured nothing bad would come from meeting the king. The last thing they would want is to offend him and have him leave to some other kingdom. At most what would happen is the king's royal cultivator would test Ben with a special technique to find out his cultivation stage.
Ruben explained that royal cultivator had a certain technique that could accurately read a person's cultivation stage. This would allow them to decide a suitable title depending on the cultivator's current stage.
Ben wasn't in any real hurry and if he could acquire some benefits through meeting the king why would he turn them down? He was actually already beginning to form a plan on how to proceed. If he were to be offered property, Ben wanted to see if he could get a commercial property instead of an estate.
He already had a home along with plenty of land around his fortress to build whatever he could want. There was no reason he would need a house in the city when he would be spending most of his time at the fortress.
Ben paid for their meals and let Ruben lead him across the city to the Royal Palace.
The palace wasn't all that impressive to Ben, but for the current era of architecture, it would be considered an impressive building to these people. It couldn't be compared to the castles and palace built on Earth, but it was quite large and well maintained.
With Ruben escorting him they passed through the palace gates without any difficulties and were escorted toward the throne room without any delay.
It seemed the king was holding court and there was a large gathering of nobles from the city present. The king, the king's advisors, and the present nobles were presently discussing if they should increase the import tax on products from a kingdom that they did not seem to have the best relations with as a type of warning/punishment.
This neighboring kingdom had recently begun to build outposts along the two kingdom's borders and seemed to be more distant in their diplomatic relations.
The Aregard kingdom was unsure of why their relationship had gradually become distant over the past two years with the Trareniel Kingdom. There was a time that both kingdoms had an open friendly relationship and had worked together on projects to benefit both kingdoms.
Now Aregard scouts began to report the buildup of Trareniel troops conducting large-scale patrols along their borders and recently these small wooden outposts began to spring up as well. When the Aregard kingdom sent diplomats to ask what was going on they were coldly told they were only securing their borders and it had nothing to do with the Aregard kingdom.
While Ben listened to all this the first thing that he thought was that the Trareniel Kingdom was preparing to invade this Aregard Kingdom sometime in the future.
Ben was somewhat of an ancient and modern war buff and read books on war and military training. He had heard a few similar situations like this throughout Earth's history. A country suddenly begins to increase their armies and war machines while securing their borders. This was the prelude to war that he had read about many times before.
This was not a place for him to speak up though and he had no way to prove what he thought. So he stood beside Ruben and their escort while listening in on the meeting. When there was a pause in the discussions the person who escorted Ben and Ruben to the throne room approached the king who sat on a large ornate upholstered wooden throne.
The escort whispered that Ben was the spirit food cultivator that the king had been eager to meet. The king was told Ruben the day captain was present and had escorted Ben to the Royal Palace.
This conversation was to quiet for anyone to hear except for Ben who was using his Enhanced Hearing skill. He wasn't taking any chances and at the first sign of trouble, he would activate Whirlwind and zip out of here.
Just then the Royal Palace escort turned to Ruben and waved him forward. Ruben walked forward and knelt down before the king. After a quick discussion, the king was informed of what had happened at the gate with the guard who tried to lock Ben up and how they discovered he was the spirit food cultivator when he crushed the offending guard with his aura.
Ben watched the king's expressions to see if he was going to get mad at how he used his aura on one of his guards, but if anything the king appeared that he was mad at the guard instead. Not wanting to keep Ben waiting alone too long the king wrapped up their quiet discussion and turned toward Ben.
"Spirit food cultivator Ben King would you be so kind as to step forward" The king's question sent a stir throughout the throne room. There was a new cultivator in the kingdom that none of these nobles knew and he was the rumored spirit food cultivator. They were curious about him and apparently he was here in the throne room.
Ben walked forward to stand between the kneeling Ruben and the palace escort. He used the salute that Ruben and his men had shown him earlier and bowed from the waist toward the king. He did not mind showing respect toward the throne but he would not kneel down on the ground like Ruben. He was a free man from Earth and the thought of kneeling down to someone just because they had the title king was absurd to him.
"It is a pleasure to meet you, your majesty. I am Ben King a foreign merchant cultivator who is currently traveling across the continent looking for a city to sell my goods. I was just encouraged by the respectable Ruben Steele captain of the day guard to visit his Highness. I was so impressed with Captain Steele's bearing that I allowed him to immediately escort me to the Royal Palace." Ben explained as if he had not heard what they had quietly discussed a moment ago.
"Very good I am pleased to meet such a splendid young man. I have heard that one of my guards had given you a hard time when you entered the city?"
"It was nothing your majesty the guard had questioned me about my cape. It is made from the fur of a Hemic and I had no idea of its rarity. I had hunted for some time in the Wayward Woodlands and ended up fighting the beast. I was injured during the fight, but as you can see I killed the creature and took its fur as a trophy. Your guard was unaware that I am a cultivator and am capable of handling myself. This is why I could single-handedly defeat the Hemic." Ben explained with a smile all the while making it sound as if it wasn't a big thing between him and the guard.
The king smiled knowing that Ben had taught the guard a serious lesson and gave him a taste of his cultivation aura.
The king then turned to Ruben, he had obviously heard the respect Ben had for him when Ben spoke of Ruben and he had even pointed out it was Ruben who was responsible for bringing him here.
"Ruben Steele, Captain of my day guard, for your excellent service to the crown your pay shall be doubled from this day forth. You may now return to your post!"
Ruben was shocked at this change of events. He knew that this was all thanks to Ben mentioning his name. For his wages to be doubled he could now move out of the barracks, buy a small house somewhere in the city, and he could even begin to make plans to marry his fiance.
With tears in his eyes, he thanked the king and whispered a heartfelt thank you to Ben as he turned to leave the throne room. Ben smiled and winked at him and turned his attention back to the king.
"Cultivator Ben King you have stated you are looking for a city to sell your goods and we would be happy to have you here. Before we proceed though would you please allow my royal cultivator to test you cultivation stage?"
"Not a problem your highness, I am more than willing to perform the test."
The king was happy to see Ben agree to the test, some cultivators were mysterious and did not wish to divulge their cultivation stage to anyone. They could only assume this was a form of protection so it would make other cultivators think twice about attacking them if they did not know who was the stronger of them.
The king had sent someone to ask the royal cultivator to come to the throne room. They waited five minutes for the royal cultivator to appear in the throne room. If Ben thought the first cultivator he met in the market looked old the royal cultivator could pass for the other old cultivator's father.
Even though the royal cultivator had long white hair and an extremely wrinkled face his eye looked clear and focused and he walked upright and without showing any signs of weakness.
The king explained the situation to the royal cultivator and asked him to perform the test. With just Ben and the royal cultivator standing before the throne, he was asked to direct his cultivation aura at the royal cultivator as he had done with the guard earlier.
Ben just hoped he wasn't of lower cultivation than him and ended up hurting this old guy. When the royal cultivator asked him to begin Ben no longer hesitated and used his aura to push down on him.
The old man stood perfectly still without moving or showing any signs of distress. This startled Ben because he instantly knew that he had found someone with a higher cultivation stage than him.
The royal cultivator stood still with his eyes closed for about twenty seconds and then his eyes shot open wide. He looked at Ben in amazement for a moment. He told Ben he could stop projecting his aura and turned toward the king to speak.
"Sire he is a Stage Four, Level Eight!" The royal cultivator turned back to seriously look Ben over for the first time.
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When the guards felt, Ben release them from his aura they all visibly sighed in relief. They even became aware that the surrounding crowd recognized Ben as a cultivator and when they heard them say spirit food cultivator these guards then knew who, Ben was through the rumors that had spread throughout the city recently.
Everyone had heard of a young man who was thought to be a con artist but turned out to be a cultivator selling food that had the properties of some spirit plants at a price the common people could even afford. He sold his food for a few weeks and before anyone in the Royal Palace or the guards had found out about him he suddenly vanished from the city only leaving behind the rumors of his magical food.
Even the old-man cultivator who had bought food from him could not be questioned about Ben because he had been in closed-door cultivation since then.
Everyone had heard how the young cultivator had won in an aura duel face-off against one of the kingdoms respected cultivators and not only that he was selling unbelievable foods that could help heal old or new internal injuries, help cultivators and magicians boost their training speeds, and in some cases had helped children discover they had latent talents making them serious prospects for future cultivator or magician apprentices.
When Ben heard the guard ask him for his name even though he was confused he still answered him after the shock of their sudden change wore off.
"My name is Ben King. As I was trying to tell this guard here who had falsely accused me of being a thief and stealing this Hemic fur I am from a distant continent and had only arrived here a few months ago. I had been adventuring in... what did he call it again the Wayward Woodlands?"
When the gathered people heard that Ben had been out adventuring in the Wayward Woodlands there were startled gasps all around from the crowd of onlookers.
Ben glanced around at the people nodding to them that what he said was the truth before continuing to speak.
"When I was hunting profound beasts in that forest I was ambushed by this Hemic. The two of us battled and in the end, I killed it and took its fur as my trophy. "
"I had also spent some time a few weeks back in this city selling my spirit foods in the central market area and had returned once again with an even larger variety of goods to sell."
Ben paused for a moment to look down at the guard he crushed before continuing.
"I had hoped to develop a good relationship with this city and open a store here one day to continue selling my goods, but if I am going to be treated like a common criminal by the guards of this city I am sure the neighboring kingdom would be more than happy to buy by spirit food and other products."
Ben said to the guards who had remained on their knees this whole time.
When the crowd heard Ben was talking about taking his food to another kingdom to sell it was obvious that they did not want him to go and began to curse the guard who was either playing possum on the ground or was truly unconscious.
"No please my lord I apologize on behalf of this idiot. Our city would love to have you and we were even given orders by the Royal Palace to bring you to meet our king if you were to return once again." The guard said with a pained look on his face.
Both suspicious and curious, Ben wondered why the king would want to see him?
'Does he want to buy some of my food for himself or is he going to try and strongarm me into handing it over to him?'
Ben's curiosity won out over suspicion, so he questioned the guard.
"Why would you king wish to meet me? I am not even a subject of his kingdom. I am only a traveling merchant cultivator looking for a place to sell my goods." Ben asked with a hint of lingering suspicion in his voice.
The guard who Ben had been talking to suddenly realized since Ben was a foreigner he had no idea that all cultivators were held in such high regard here.
Before answering the guard looked around at the crowd blocking the city gates and the ever-growing line of merchant carts and travelers waiting to get into the city.
"My lord, could we go somewhere else and then I can explain the situation to you? There is a long line of people wanting to still enter the city and we are currently blocking their arrivals." The guard humbly asked hoping he would not anger this young cultivator.
Ben then noticed how his argument with the guard had completely shut down the only entrance to the city. There was a huge crowd of people blocking the gates and half of the guards who should be checking carts and giving people permission to enter were tied up with him right now.
When he looked further up the road, he spotted a nice restaurant that he had always wanted to try but he never came to this side of the city except when he was arriving or departing.
Ben walked forward with a smile now trusting this guard a little more and held his hand out and pulled him to his feet.
When the guard stood up he gave a couple quick commands out.
"Take this idiot to the barracks infirmary he said and gave the guard on the ground a swift kick to the ribs. The rest of you disperse this crowd and get back to working the gates."
"Follow me," Ben said when he noticed the guard was ready to go.
As they walked down the street Ben asked the guard for his name.
"My name is Ruben Steele, my lord, I am the captain of the day guard."
"Nice to meet you, Ruben, there is a restaurant just there that I have wanted to try. Let me buy you lunch and you can explain the situation to me while we eat."
When Ruben saw the place that Ben pointed out he almost swallowed his tongue.
"Haha, my lord that place is one of the most expensive restaurants in town. It caters to rich merchants and nobles." Ruben nervously whispered to Ben as they walked down the street hoping to not embarrass him."
"Don't worry about it I have plenty of money on me!" Ben announced as they walked through the door.
A nicely dressed young woman with long red hair showed them to a table and let them know what was available today. This was another thing that drove Ben crazy about this world. There was no such thing as food menus in the restaurants and inns!
Ben assumed it had to do with not having refrigeration so only so much food could be kept on hand at a time limiting what they could serve their customers.
Soon they were served a large juicy steak of some creature with rich dark mushroom gravy. They were also served a few sides of vegetables soaked in an oil and vinegar dressing and some type of drink that tastes like watered down berry wine.
Even though Ruben was the captain of the day guard he did not make enough to frivolously eat at a place like this and the food to him was an incredible gourmet meal. Ben had been spoiled by Earth food and his new Restaurant back at the fortress. To him, this was a typical meal that you would be served at any family restaurant back on Earth.
Ruben was enjoying the food so much Ben just smiled while letting him enjoy the meal. Once they had finished their meals they could talk about why the king wanted to see him.
After their meal, Ben found out everything from Ruben about how cultivators were treated and that the king more than likely wished to see him so that he could give him a nobility title and possibly land or an estate so that Ben would settle down here in the Aregard capital.
Ben was assured nothing bad would come from meeting the king. The last thing they would want is to offend him and have him leave to some other kingdom. At most what would happen is the king's royal cultivator would test Ben with a special technique to find out his cultivation stage.
Ruben explained that royal cultivator had a certain technique that could accurately read a person's cultivation stage. This would allow them to decide a suitable title depending on the cultivator's current stage.
Ben wasn't in any real hurry and if he could acquire some benefits through meeting the king why would he turn them down? He was actually already beginning to form a plan on how to proceed. If he were to be offered property, Ben wanted to see if he could get a commercial property instead of an estate.
He already had a home along with plenty of land around his fortress to build whatever he could want. There was no reason he would need a house in the city when he would be spending most of his time at the fortress.
Ben paid for their meals and let Ruben lead him across the city to the Royal Palace.
The palace wasn't all that impressive to Ben, but for the current era of architecture, it would be considered an impressive building to these people. It couldn't be compared to the castles and palace built on Earth, but it was quite large and well maintained.
With Ruben escorting him they passed through the palace gates without any difficulties and were escorted toward the throne room without any delay.
It seemed the king was holding court and there was a large gathering of nobles from the city present. The king, the king's advisors, and the present nobles were presently discussing if they should increase the import tax on products from a kingdom that they did not seem to have the best relations with as a type of warning/punishment.
This neighboring kingdom had recently begun to build outposts along the two kingdom's borders and seemed to be more distant in their diplomatic relations.
The Aregard kingdom was unsure of why their relationship had gradually become distant over the past two years with the Trareniel Kingdom. There was a time that both kingdoms had an open friendly relationship and had worked together on projects to benefit both kingdoms.
Now Aregard scouts began to report the buildup of Trareniel troops conducting large-scale patrols along their borders and recently these small wooden outposts began to spring up as well. When the Aregard kingdom sent diplomats to ask what was going on they were coldly told they were only securing their borders and it had nothing to do with the Aregard kingdom.
While Ben listened to all this the first thing that he thought was that the Trareniel Kingdom was preparing to invade this Aregard Kingdom sometime in the future.
Ben was somewhat of an ancient and modern war buff and read books on war and military training. He had heard a few similar situations like this throughout Earth's history. A country suddenly begins to increase their armies and war machines while securing their borders. This was the prelude to war that he had read about many times before.
This was not a place for him to speak up though and he had no way to prove what he thought. So he stood beside Ruben and their escort while listening in on the meeting. When there was a pause in the discussions the person who escorted Ben and Ruben to the throne room approached the king who sat on a large ornate upholstered wooden throne.
The escort whispered that Ben was the spirit food cultivator that the king had been eager to meet. The king was told Ruben the day captain was present and had escorted Ben to the Royal Palace.
This conversation was to quiet for anyone to hear except for Ben who was using his Enhanced Hearing skill. He wasn't taking any chances and at the first sign of trouble, he would activate Whirlwind and zip out of here.
Just then the Royal Palace escort turned to Ruben and waved him forward. Ruben walked forward and knelt down before the king. After a quick discussion, the king was informed of what had happened at the gate with the guard who tried to lock Ben up and how they discovered he was the spirit food cultivator when he crushed the offending guard with his aura.
Ben watched the king's expressions to see if he was going to get mad at how he used his aura on one of his guards, but if anything the king appeared that he was mad at the guard instead. Not wanting to keep Ben waiting alone too long the king wrapped up their quiet discussion and turned toward Ben.
"Spirit food cultivator Ben King would you be so kind as to step forward" The king's question sent a stir throughout the throne room. There was a new cultivator in the kingdom that none of these nobles knew and he was the rumored spirit food cultivator. They were curious about him and apparently he was here in the throne room.
Ben walked forward to stand between the kneeling Ruben and the palace escort. He used the salute that Ruben and his men had shown him earlier and bowed from the waist toward the king. He did not mind showing respect toward the throne but he would not kneel down on the ground like Ruben. He was a free man from Earth and the thought of kneeling down to someone just because they had the title king was absurd to him.
"It is a pleasure to meet you, your majesty. I am Ben King a foreign merchant cultivator who is currently traveling across the continent looking for a city to sell my goods. I was just encouraged by the respectable Ruben Steele captain of the day guard to visit his Highness. I was so impressed with Captain Steele's bearing that I allowed him to immediately escort me to the Royal Palace." Ben explained as if he had not heard what they had quietly discussed a moment ago.
"Very good I am pleased to meet such a splendid young man. I have heard that one of my guards had given you a hard time when you entered the city?"
"It was nothing your majesty the guard had questioned me about my cape. It is made from the fur of a Hemic and I had no idea of its rarity. I had hunted for some time in the Wayward Woodlands and ended up fighting the beast. I was injured during the fight, but as you can see I killed the creature and took its fur as a trophy. Your guard was unaware that I am a cultivator and am capable of handling myself. This is why I could single-handedly defeat the Hemic." Ben explained with a smile all the while making it sound as if it wasn't a big thing between him and the guard.
The king smiled knowing that Ben had taught the guard a serious lesson and gave him a taste of his cultivation aura.
The king then turned to Ruben, he had obviously heard the respect Ben had for him when Ben spoke of Ruben and he had even pointed out it was Ruben who was responsible for bringing him here.
"Ruben Steele, Captain of my day guard, for your excellent service to the crown your pay shall be doubled from this day forth. You may now return to your post!"
Ruben was shocked at this change of events. He knew that this was all thanks to Ben mentioning his name. For his wages to be doubled he could now move out of the barracks, buy a small house somewhere in the city, and he could even begin to make plans to marry his fiance.
With tears in his eyes, he thanked the king and whispered a heartfelt thank you to Ben as he turned to leave the throne room. Ben smiled and winked at him and turned his attention back to the king.
"Cultivator Ben King you have stated you are looking for a city to sell your goods and we would be happy to have you here. Before we proceed though would you please allow my royal cultivator to test you cultivation stage?"
"Not a problem your highness, I am more than willing to perform the test."
The king was happy to see Ben agree to the test, some cultivators were mysterious and did not wish to divulge their cultivation stage to anyone. They could only assume this was a form of protection so it would make other cultivators think twice about attacking them if they did not know who was the stronger of them.
The king had sent someone to ask the royal cultivator to come to the throne room. They waited five minutes for the royal cultivator to appear in the throne room. If Ben thought the first cultivator he met in the market looked old the royal cultivator could pass for the other old cultivator's father.
Even though the royal cultivator had long white hair and an extremely wrinkled face his eye looked clear and focused and he walked upright and without showing any signs of weakness.
The king explained the situation to the royal cultivator and asked him to perform the test. With just Ben and the royal cultivator standing before the throne, he was asked to direct his cultivation aura at the royal cultivator as he had done with the guard earlier.
Ben just hoped he wasn't of lower cultivation than him and ended up hurting this old guy. When the royal cultivator asked him to begin Ben no longer hesitated and used his aura to push down on him.
The old man stood perfectly still without moving or showing any signs of distress. This startled Ben because he instantly knew that he had found someone with a higher cultivation stage than him.
The royal cultivator stood still with his eyes closed for about twenty seconds and then his eyes shot open wide. He looked at Ben in amazement for a moment. He told Ben he could stop projecting his aura and turned toward the king to speak.
"Sire he is a Stage Four, Level Eight!" The royal cultivator turned back to seriously look Ben over for the first time.
When the guards felt, Ben release them from his aura they all visibly sighed in relief. They even became aware that the surrounding crowd recognized Ben as a cultivator and when they heard them say spirit food cultivator these guards then knew who, Ben was through the rumors that had spread throughout the city recently.Everyone had heard of a young man who was thought to be a con artist but turned out to be a cultivator selling food that had the properties of some spirit plants at a price the common people could even afford. He sold his food for a few weeks and before anyone in the Royal Palace or the guards had found out about him he suddenly vanished from the city only leaving behind the rumors of his magical food.Even the old-man cultivator who had bought food from him could not be questioned about Ben because he had been in closed-door cultivation since then.Everyone had heard how the young cultivator had won in an aura duel face-off against one of the kingdoms respected cultivators and not only that he was selling unbelievable foods that could help heal old or new internal injuries, help cultivators and magicians boost their training speeds, and in some cases had helped children discover they had latent talents making them serious prospects for future cultivator or magician apprentices.When Ben heard the guard ask him for his name even though he was confused he still answered him after the shock of their sudden change wore off."My name is Ben King. As I was trying to tell this guard here who had falsely accused me of being a thief and stealing this Hemic fur I am from a distant continent and had only arrived here a few months ago. I had been adventuring in... what did he call it again the Wayward Woodlands?"When the gathered people heard that Ben had been out adventuring in the Wayward Woodlands there were startled gasps all around from the crowd of onlookers.Ben glanced around at the people nodding to them that what he said was the truth before continuing to speak."When I was hunting profound beasts in that forest I was ambushed by this Hemic. The two of us battled and in the end, I killed it and took its fur as my trophy. ""I had also spent some time a few weeks back in this city selling my spirit foods in the central market area and had returned once again with an even larger variety of goods to sell."Ben paused for a moment to look down at the guard he crushed before continuing."I had hoped to develop a good relationship with this city and open a store here one day to continue selling my goods, but if I am going to be treated like a common criminal by the guards of this city I am sure the neighboring kingdom would be more than happy to buy by spirit food and other products."Ben said to the guards who had remained on their knees this whole time.When the crowd heard Ben was talking about taking his food to another kingdom to sell it was obvious that they did not want him to go and began to curse the guard who was either playing possum on the ground or was truly unconscious."No please my lord I apologize on behalf of this idiot. Our city would love to have you and we were even given orders by the Royal Palace to bring you to meet our king if you were to return once again." The guard said with a pained look on his face.Both suspicious and curious, Ben wondered why the king would want to see him?'Does he want to buy some of my food for himself or is he going to try and strongarm me into handing it over to him?'Ben's curiosity won out over suspicion, so he questioned the guard."Why would you king wish to meet me? I am not even a subject of his kingdom. I am only a traveling merchant cultivator looking for a place to sell my goods." Ben asked with a hint of lingering suspicion in his voice.The guard who Ben had been talking to suddenly realized since Ben was a foreigner he had no idea that all cultivators were held in such high regard here.Before answering the guard looked around at the crowd blocking the city gates and the ever-growing line of merchant carts and travelers waiting to get into the city."My lord, could we go somewhere else and then I can explain the situation to you? There is a long line of people wanting to still enter the city and we are currently blocking their arrivals." The guard humbly asked hoping he would not anger this young cultivator.Ben then noticed how his argument with the guard had completely shut down the only entrance to the city. There was a huge crowd of people blocking the gates and half of the guards who should be checking carts and giving people permission to enter were tied up with him right now.When he looked further up the road, he spotted a nice restaurant that he had always wanted to try but he never came to this side of the city except when he was arriving or departing.Ben walked forward with a smile now trusting this guard a little more and held his hand out and pulled him to his feet.When the guard stood up he gave a couple quick commands out."Take this idiot to the barracks infirmary he said and gave the guard on the ground a swift kick to the ribs. The rest of you disperse this crowd and get back to working the gates.""Follow me," Ben said when he noticed the guard was ready to go.As they walked down the street Ben asked the guard for his name."My name is Ruben Steele, my lord, I am the captain of the day guard.""Nice to meet you, Ruben, there is a restaurant just there that I have wanted to try. Let me buy you lunch and you can explain the situation to me while we eat."When Ruben saw the place that Ben pointed out he almost swallowed his tongue."Haha, my lord that place is one of the most expensive restaurants in town. It caters to rich merchants and nobles." Ruben nervously whispered to Ben as they walked down the street hoping to not embarrass him.""Don't worry about it I have plenty of money on me!" Ben announced as they walked through the door.A nicely dressed young woman with long red hair showed them to a table and let them know what was available today. This was another thing that drove Ben crazy about this world. There was no such thing as food menus in the restaurants and inns!Ben assumed it had to do with not having refrigeration so only so much food could be kept on hand at a time limiting what they could serve their customers.Soon they were served a large juicy steak of some creature with rich dark mushroom gravy. They were also served a few sides of vegetables soaked in an oil and vinegar dressing and some type of drink that tastes like watered down berry wine.Even though Ruben was the captain of the day guard he did not make enough to frivolously eat at a place like this and the food to him was an incredible gourmet meal. Ben had been spoiled by Earth food and his new Restaurant back at the fortress. To him, this was a typical meal that you would be served at any family restaurant back on Earth.Ruben was enjoying the food so much Ben just smiled while letting him enjoy the meal. Once they had finished their meals they could talk about why the king wanted to see him.After their meal, Ben found out everything from Ruben about how cultivators were treated and that the king more than likely wished to see him so that he could give him a nobility title and possibly land or an estate so that Ben would settle down here in the Aregard capital.Ben was assured nothing bad would come from meeting the king. The last thing they would want is to offend him and have him leave to some other kingdom. At most what would happen is the king's royal cultivator would test Ben with a special technique to find out his cultivation stage.Ruben explained that royal cultivator had a certain technique that could accurately read a person's cultivation stage. This would allow them to decide a suitable title depending on the cultivator's current stage.Ben wasn't in any real hurry and if he could acquire some benefits through meeting the king why would he turn them down? He was actually already beginning to form a plan on how to proceed. If he were to be offered property, Ben wanted to see if he could get a commercial property instead of an estate.He already had a home along with plenty of land around his fortress to build whatever he could want. There was no reason he would need a house in the city when he would be spending most of his time at the fortress.Ben paid for their meals and let Ruben lead him across the city to the Royal Palace.The palace wasn't all that impressive to Ben, but for the current era of architecture, it would be considered an impressive building to these people. It couldn't be compared to the castles and palace built on Earth, but it was quite large and well maintained.With Ruben escorting him they passed through the palace gates without any difficulties and were escorted toward the throne room without any delay.It seemed the king was holding court and there was a large gathering of nobles from the city present. The king, the king's advisors, and the present nobles were presently discussing if they should increase the import tax on products from a kingdom that they did not seem to have the best relations with as a type of warning/punishment.This neighboring kingdom had recently begun to build outposts along the two kingdom's borders and seemed to be more distant in their diplomatic relations.The Aregard kingdom was unsure of why their relationship had gradually become distant over the past two years with the Trareniel Kingdom. There was a time that both kingdoms had an open friendly relationship and had worked together on projects to benefit both kingdoms.Now Aregard scouts began to report the buildup of Trareniel troops conducting large-scale patrols along their borders and recently these small wooden outposts began to spring up as well. When the Aregard kingdom sent diplomats to ask what was going on they were coldly told they were only securing their borders and it had nothing to do with the Aregard kingdom.While Ben listened to all this the first thing that he thought was that the Trareniel Kingdom was preparing to invade this Aregard Kingdom sometime in the future.Ben was somewhat of an ancient and modern war buff and read books on war and military training. He had heard a few similar situations like this throughout Earth's history. A country suddenly begins to increase their armies and war machines while securing their borders. This was the prelude to war that he had read about many times before.This was not a place for him to speak up though and he had no way to prove what he thought. So he stood beside Ruben and their escort while listening in on the meeting. When there was a pause in the discussions the person who escorted Ben and Ruben to the throne room approached the king who sat on a large ornate upholstered wooden throne.The escort whispered that Ben was the spirit food cultivator that the king had been eager to meet. The king was told Ruben the day captain was present and had escorted Ben to the Royal Palace.This conversation was to quiet for anyone to hear except for Ben who was using his Enhanced Hearing skill. He wasn't taking any chances and at the first sign of trouble, he would activate Whirlwind and zip out of here.Just then the Royal Palace escort turned to Ruben and waved him forward. Ruben walked forward and knelt down before the king. After a quick discussion, the king was informed of what had happened at the gate with the guard who tried to lock Ben up and how they discovered he was the spirit food cultivator when he crushed the offending guard with his aura.Ben watched the king's expressions to see if he was going to get mad at how he used his aura on one of his guards, but if anything the king appeared that he was mad at the guard instead. Not wanting to keep Ben waiting alone too long the king wrapped up their quiet discussion and turned toward Ben."Spirit food cultivator Ben King would you be so kind as to step forward" The king's question sent a stir throughout the throne room. There was a new cultivator in the kingdom that none of these nobles knew and he was the rumored spirit food cultivator. They were curious about him and apparently he was here in the throne room.Ben walked forward to stand between the kneeling Ruben and the palace escort. He used the salute that Ruben and his men had shown him earlier and bowed from the waist toward the king. He did not mind showing respect toward the throne but he would not kneel down on the ground like Ruben. He was a free man from Earth and the thought of kneeling down to someone just because they had the title king was absurd to him."It is a pleasure to meet you, your majesty. I am Ben King a foreign merchant cultivator who is currently traveling across the continent looking for a city to sell my goods. I was just encouraged by the respectable Ruben Steele captain of the day guard to visit his Highness. I was so impressed with Captain Steele's bearing that I allowed him to immediately escort me to the Royal Palace." Ben explained as if he had not heard what they had quietly discussed a moment ago."Very good I am pleased to meet such a splendid young man. I have heard that one of my guards had given you a hard time when you entered the city?""It was nothing your majesty the guard had questioned me about my cape. It is made from the fur of a Hemic and I had no idea of its rarity. I had hunted for some time in the Wayward Woodlands and ended up fighting the beast. I was injured during the fight, but as you can see I killed the creature and took its fur as a trophy. Your guard was unaware that I am a cultivator and am capable of handling myself. This is why I could single-handedly defeat the Hemic." Ben explained with a smile all the while making it sound as if it wasn't a big thing between him and the guard.The king smiled knowing that Ben had taught the guard a serious lesson and gave him a taste of his cultivation aura.The king then turned to Ruben, he had obviously heard the respect Ben had for him when Ben spoke of Ruben and he had even pointed out it was Ruben who was responsible for bringing him here."Ruben Steele, Captain of my day guard, for your excellent service to the crown your pay shall be doubled from this day forth. You may now return to your post!"Ruben was shocked at this change of events. He knew that this was all thanks to Ben mentioning his name. For his wages to be doubled he could now move out of the barracks, buy a small house somewhere in the city, and he could even begin to make plans to marry his fiance.With tears in his eyes, he thanked the king and whispered a heartfelt thank you to Ben as he turned to leave the throne room. Ben smiled and winked at him and turned his attention back to the king."Cultivator Ben King you have stated you are looking for a city to sell your goods and we would be happy to have you here. Before we proceed though would you please allow my royal cultivator to test you cultivation stage?""Not a problem your highness, I am more than willing to perform the test."The king was happy to see Ben agree to the test, some cultivators were mysterious and did not wish to divulge their cultivation stage to anyone. They could only assume this was a form of protection so it would make other cultivators think twice about attacking them if they did not know who was the stronger of them.The king had sent someone to ask the royal cultivator to come to the throne room. They waited five minutes for the royal cultivator to appear in the throne room. If Ben thought the first cultivator he met in the market looked old the royal cultivator could pass for the other old cultivator's father.Even though the royal cultivator had long white hair and an extremely wrinkled face his eye looked clear and focused and he walked upright and without showing any signs of weakness.The king explained the situation to the royal cultivator and asked him to perform the test. With just Ben and the royal cultivator standing before the throne, he was asked to direct his cultivation aura at the royal cultivator as he had done with the guard earlier.Ben just hoped he wasn't of lower cultivation than him and ended up hurting this old guy. When the royal cultivator asked him to begin Ben no longer hesitated and used his aura to push down on him.The old man stood perfectly still without moving or showing any signs of distress. This startled Ben because he instantly knew that he had found someone with a higher cultivation stage than him.The royal cultivator stood still with his eyes closed for about twenty seconds and then his eyes shot open wide. He looked at Ben in amazement for a moment. He told Ben he could stop projecting his aura and turned toward the king to speak."Sire he is a Stage Four, Level Eight!" The royal cultivator turned back to seriously look Ben over for the first time.
