What on Earth Was Dad Thinking?

As the sun set, Pan Long paced anxiously atop Dingfeng Town's gate tower, gazing north at every opportunity.

In the sixteen years since he had crossed into this world, he had never felt so nervous or anxious.

"Dad, please come back safe!"

Seeing him fret like an ant on a hot pan, Han Ting, Commandant of the north gate, tried to reassure him. "Ah Long, stop worrying. Brother Zhuangwu is Dingfeng Town's finest fighter. He can tear tigers and leopards apart with his bare hands and shatter solid rock with his palms. He's led demon hunts plenty of times over the years, and every one has gone smoothly. This time will be no different."

Han Ting's son, Han Feng, who had grown up with Pan Long, nodded repeatedly. "Exactly. Ah Long, you're scaring yourself. What dangerous Demon Beasts are there around Dingfeng Town? Uncle Pan will be fine!"

Pan Long managed a weak smile but said nothing. His anxiety remained.

He knew how skilled his father was. As Han Ting, the Commandant, had said, an ordinary Demon Beast could never threaten "Iron Palm Pan Zhuangwu," Dingfeng Town's finest fighter. But that was when his father was healthy. Before setting out this time, his father had suffered an internal injury!

Half a month ago, his father had suddenly said he had urgent business elsewhere. He had returned in a hurry a few days ago and gone straight into his quiet chamber to heal. Since then, he had practically been drinking medicinal broth for his organs like porridge. The severity of his injury was worrying.

Yet despite that, he had insisted on leading the demon hunt. How could Pan Long not worry?

By any common understanding of martial arts, someone with a serious internal injury needed a long period of quiet rest. Fighting Demon Beasts was out of the question; even everyday training had to stop. Only after recovering sixty or seventy percent could they begin restorative exercise. As for fighting for their lives, they should avoid it at all costs unless they had no choice and death was a hair's breadth away.

His father knew all that better than he did. So why had he refused to listen and insisted on going?

Was this simply the stubbornness of age?

He's barely past forty. How did he get as stubborn as an old man?

Pan Long sighed inwardly, but he could not say any of it aloud. His father had told him to keep the injury secret from everyone.

Having lived two lives, Pan Long had more experience than most boys his age. Given how seriously his father had spoken, he could guess at least part of the reason.

As Dingfeng Town's finest fighter, Pan Lei—Pan Zhuangwu—inevitably had occasions when he needed to demonstrate his skills. With an internal injury that serious, he was unlikely to conceal it forever. But on this demon hunt, he could take the opportunity to get hurt. Once he returned, he could recuperate openly from that injury without revealing that he had already been injured.

In short, his father planned to put on a show to conceal his earlier injury.

There was nothing wrong with the plan itself. The question was why his father needed to hide that earlier injury.

Pan Long had been turning it over ever since the hunting party left.

Dingfeng Town was not large: a little over a thousand households and ten thousand people. His father was its finest fighter, held an official post, and had plenty of officials and martial experts in the Lineage. He was a local power. Even Count Beian's appointed Town Deputy and Commandant treated him with respect, as did Imperial Court inspectors touring the northern lands. He was a man of standing throughout Beian Commandery. With their family's position, trouble was unlikely to come knocking as long as they did not stir it up themselves.

A family like theirs could remain safe and prosperous simply by not digging in their heels and by going with the flow. Unless one of the great upheavals that came only once in centuries broke out, neither officials nor bandits would seek trouble with them.

So why was his father so tense that he would even take such a risk to hide his injury?

Was he trying to evade someone's investigation?

Clearly, Pan Long would have to wait until his father returned to get answers.

But would his father come back safely?

That was what worried him most.

Dingfeng Town lay in northern Yong Province. Though it was still on this side of the Golden City Defense Line and not truly deep in the Great Wilderness, it stood squarely on the frontier of the Nine Provinces. No colossal monsters as terrifying as mountains had ever appeared there, but dangerous Demon Beasts capable of slaughtering groups of hunters or even taking on armies had appeared more than once.

Some of those Demon Beasts were strong enough to rip through sturdy armor; others were fast enough to kill several people in the blink of an eye. Yet they were not the worst. The truly frightening ones were the especially uncanny demons. Some looked utterly unremarkable but possessed strange abilities that struck people without their noticing, leaving them dead without ever knowing what had happened.

About twenty years ago, Dingrao Town, two hundred li to the west, had encountered one such uncanny creature. In just a month, more than eight hundred people had died there. On the deadliest night alone, it had killed over a hundred!

The creature had left the whole town jumping at every rustle and fearing for their lives. Dingrao Town had nearly collapsed. In the end, an expert who had survived countless battles and entered the Great Wilderness many times to hunt demons was brought in from the Golden City Defense Line to kill it.

The expert had gathered more than a dozen skilled fighters to help him. A young Pan Lei had been among them. Over the years, Pan Lei had told his son about that battle more than once, and every time, lingering fear showed on his face.

Even with the expert leading them, nearly half the fighters were killed or injured. Only three came through intact, without serious wounds.

Pan Lei had been lucky enough to be one of the three, but that terrible night had left a deep scar on his heart.

Pan Long had never experienced a battle like that. But having come from a technologically advanced world awash in information, he could draw on images from films, television, and animation to picture what his father described.

The thought made his hair stand on end. It filled him with dread and left him feeling not the slightest bit safe in this world.

Ever since his father first told him about that hunt, he had keenly understood how dangerous this world was. From then on, he had trained hard every day to grow stronger. At just sixteen, he was indisputably the strongest of Dingfeng Town's younger generation. No one under thirty could defeat him.

But it was not enough. Not nearly enough!

He was still far weaker than his father. His father could take on ten "experts" like him at once, perhaps even more if he fought in earnest.

Yet even his father was no true powerhouse in this world. Against those terrifying demons, survival had depended more on luck than anything else.

Whenever Pan Long thought of that, unease filled him. His father's willingness to risk his life to conceal an injury made it far worse.

For the past few days, Pan Long had managed to keep his worry from showing. But today, the day the hunting party was due back, he could bear it no longer. Shortly after noon, he had hurried up to the gate tower, repeatedly scanning the north and hoping to see his father return safely.

Dad, it doesn't matter whether your act works. It doesn't even matter if the hunt fails. Just come back safe!

When the sun had almost reached the horizon, a broad scatter of black specks finally appeared in the distance to the north.

Everyone watching that direction perked up. Pan Long could not help shouting, "They're back! The hunt was a success!"

Smiles spread through the crowd. They understood his outburst; he had been tense for far too long today. Even a bow could not bear to have its string held taut for so long, let alone a person.

Some even praised him inwardly. They say Young Master Pan is obsessed with martial arts and isn't close to his family. What nonsense. He's clearly a devoted son!

In truth, the rumor was not entirely baseless. When Pan Long had first crossed into this world, he had still been attached to his old life. For years, he had kept his distance from his family. But his parents had not loved him any less for his aloofness. On the contrary, they had constantly tried to make him happy. After his mother returned to her hometown to enter seclusion and cultivate her unique technique, his father had devoted all his attention to caring for and teaching him, never begrudging him a shred of time, effort, or wealth.

His own hard work had helped make him the strongest of Dingfeng Town's younger generation, but his father's teaching and support had been just as essential.

Over the years, Pan Long had seen every bit of care his father and other relatives had given him. Who but grass and trees could feel nothing? He had long since accepted his identity in this life, accepted this man as his father, and accepted his family in this world.

As the hunting party drew closer, he made out his father's figure in the distance. Unable to wait for the gate to open, he jumped straight down from the tower and ran to meet them.

A moment later, he found his father, Pan Lei, on a large cart.

"Iron Palm Pan Zhuangwu," who usually cut such an imposing figure that even sitting still he made people feel as though a fierce beast stood before them, was now pale. He could not even ride a horse and had to sit on a cart with several animal hides beneath him. He looked thoroughly wretched.

But when he saw his son rushing toward him, a smile of genuine delight crossed his face.

"Dad, are you all right?"

"I'm fine. Went head-to-head with an Ironback Bear. That old brute was practically a monster by now. I took a bit of a beating before I finally killed it." Pan Lei spoke lightly, smiling. "Here, look at its teeth. See how long they are?"

As he spoke, he lifted an animal hide beside him, revealing an enormous bear's head underneath.

It was a hideous Giant Bear. Its head alone was nearly half the size of an ordinary person's body, and the fangs in its mouth were longer than the daggers most hunters carried. If a beast like that so much as grazed an ordinary hunter with its claws, there would be no chance to save them. Only an expert like Pan Lei could beat it to death and claim it as a trophy.

Pan Lei had suffered serious injuries in the process, but for an expert like him, an injury was nothing much. He had several months ahead of him to recover. To northerners, getting hurt on a demon hunt was only natural. As long as he had not lost an arm or a leg, he would make a full recovery.

Pan Long knew something else: if his father had not been putting on a show, he might have taken down that ferocious Demon Beast without a scratch, even with his earlier internal injury.

Dingfeng Town's finest fighter was stronger than people knew!

That only puzzled Pan Long more. He could not understand why his father had done this.

He knew his father must have a reason. But what reason could be so grave that he would hide it even from his own son?

At last, the new book was underway. Did anyone read this chapter and shout, "This is in the wrong category"? Well... it wasn't. The fantasy part comes later...

(End of chapter)