Death... and me

Rean smiled at the elder before shaking his hand, introducing the four of them to the elder as he said in response, "Hello, Senior Aien. I'm called Rean. These people behind me are Roan, Langara, and Fatax. There's no need to worry as we mean no harm whatsoever to your village or the people inside."

Aien didn't completely trust Rean, but it was true that Rean's group had the power to do whatever they wanted in his small village. The fact that they didn't was already a good start. "I see...is there a reason for you to stop by our village?

"We were just passing when I noticed your village," Rean replied. "Since we needed to let our Demon Bird rest, I thought we could simply stay here for the moment." Rean then took ten Divine Stones from his spatial ring and passed it to the elder. "This should count as payment."

The elder was taken aback. As mentioned before, Divine Stones were very rare, let alone in a place like this. If not for the things the twins went through, they most likely wouldn't have much of them. Of course, Rean hadn't tried to start any businesses so far either.

"This..." The elder quickly put the Divine Stones away before looking back at Rean with a smile in response. "Of course, of course! These Divine Stones will be of great help to our small village. This friend's group can stay here for as long as you need."

The elder then pointed at a place where they had a few Stage One Demon Beasts lodged. "You can have your Demon Bird rest there. Just make sure it doesn't attack our demon beasts as we use them for our day-to-day work."

"Sure thing, Senior Aien." Rean then patted Rascal and passed it a bag with its food. The Demon Bird's eyes lit up, and it immediately flew to the location the elder appointed. There, it gorged itself in the food, surely falling asleep once it finished.

Seeing that the Demon Bird was well trained, Aien nodded in satisfaction. "We don't have much here, but I can still provide you with a few simple rooms for you to rest."

"That would be great!" Rean immediately thanked the elder.

On the way, Rean couldn't help but ask, "Senior, why are you living in such a remote place? We flew four days straight through this region, but it was the very first settlement we found. Could it be that I'll find more villages ahead from now on?"

Aien sighed when he heard that question, explaining, "No, you won't find any more villages around here. If I consider the speed of that Demon Bird of yours, I would say that the next city is still six days ahead. If we talk about another humanoid race settlement, you won't find another one for the next four days at least."

Rean became curious after hearing Aien's tone. "Why do I feel like you aren't here because you want to be?"

Aien nodded, saying in response, "Because that's exactly the case."

It was then that Fatax remembered something. "Oh! Now I remember those brown spots all over your body. You guys are part of the Cosgles Race, right?"

Aien smiled back at Fatax and said, "This little friend seems quite knowledgeable."

Even Langara didn't know about them with her long age. "Cosgles? Do you know anything about them?"

Fatax nodded as he explained, "They're a very odd and extremely rare humanoid race. However, don't think of it as a good thing. I just so happened to read about them when I was studying back in the clan. If I'm not wrong, those brown marks on their bodies are connected to the land itself. They need that connection to stay alive as well. I think it had something to do with the concentration of Earth Element in a specific region."

Rean's group then looked at everyone around them and could see the same traits. However, neither of them seemed very happy after Fatax mentioned their race's connection to the land. With that, they looked at Aien to see if he would confirm it.

Aien could only nod as it was the truth. "That's correct. Our Cosgles Race has evolved to become dependent on Earth Element. If a place doesn't have a certain abundance of it, our bodies will start to slowly deteriorate. Even for me, I can't stay out of this place for more than a month if I don't want to incur some irreversible damage. That's why we're living in this place and have so few members."

Roan found it strange, though. "Abundance of Earth Element?" He didn't have Earth Element Affinity, but that didn't mean he could feel it. "How come I don't feel anything different from the Earth Element outside?"

Aien shook his head as he told him, "You won't. Without our race's traits, you can't connect to the Earth Element Source deep below this region. For you, it really is as if there isn't anything different in this place. That's also why you don't see any power trying to take control of the region because of the Earth Element's abundance. It's too deep to be worth creating an organization in this place."

Rean's group nodded in response. Indeed, if the abundance in Earth Element was readily available to anyone, there would be no lack of sects or other organizations trying to claim this land. After all, Earth Element Affinity was one of the five mainstream affinities.

As the elder guided them to his own residence, Rean noticed a group of people cultivating close to the village's center. However, what caught his attention wasn't their cultivation but what was happening in the center of that group. 'Hmm?'

Rean then used his Divine Sense and could see that in the middle of those Cosgles Race cultivators, there was a lot of Earth Element being gathered. But above that... "Elder Aien, what's that thing in the middle of those people?"

Aien looked at the cultivators and quickly noticed a yellowish rock slowly taking form there. "Oh! We call that the Earth's Remnants. It has no value if that's what you're thinking about. It's too soft, like wet clay. It's a side effect during cultivation after we process the Earth Element. We cultivate together like that so we can gather it all in the center. It's a lot better than letting it accumulate over our body as it's quite annoying to remove."

Rean narrowed his eyes in response, saying, "Is that so...?"