He also gained the corresponding Hearth Points.

As such, even when they were cursing at him, Finn saw them all off with a large smile on his face.

"If you're gonna come back, be prepared with more money~"

The mercenaries and merchants glared at them, but they knew that if they attacked now, not only would they be hurt, but they could also be blacklisted.

For example, Evo tried punching the barrier in anger, despite his own injuries, but was blocked like how the beasts were blocked.

…

Finn watched them disappear into the forest, hoping that, after they walked for a few hours, they would open up his lunchboxes either to eat or to throw away.

Either way was a sure method to get monsters attracted to them!

Because essence food was rare, even in settlements, most people didn't actually know how effective they were in attracting beasts.

Besides, how many people could actually afford essence meals when heading to the danger zone? It would be too wasteful.

It was best to eat them while warm, so it was estimated that the people who knew this effect were only a few handfuls—that was, if there were anyone other than Finn and the staff members, who had seen how the jerkies and other things had been used.

"We cannot kill them here, at least not yet, because some of them have that magic rune that records the last place one has been to," he said, looking apologetically at Katnia.

"However, we can at least make them suffer."

…

For the next few days, Finn did his usual exercise: Killing monsters.

Fortunately, the bastards left a lot of carcasses outside, and some purposely opened up, possibly to cause him a little trouble, but that was fine because he had more convenient targets when he needed them.

The goblins continued doing their jobs, though Ranran opted to learn cooking a bit more, while Katnia helped lure more monsters in.

He also found out that Katnia had an impressive defense ability. It wasn't the strength of what pureblooded beastkin had—her defense skin had so many limitations and lacked long-term durability—but it was really quite useful.

As long as she had mana, she was practically invincible to monsters of the same level and below. Of course, due to the mana limitation, how long this would be couldn't be too extensive.

After the killings, Durgan would then take the corpses inside and butcher them. If there were cores, he'd put them aside for Finn.

That night, after taking a nap and making sure his stats were decent, Finn started his absorption session. He obtained a lot in the past couple of days, including the payments from the mercenaries.

He decided to be one with nature today, absorbing the cores in the garden, which had been further improved over the past few days.

The goblins were really hard workers and did a lot of things without his instructions. The garden now had a small hardscape area with a cushion made from hide in the middle. It was a wonderful place to meditate while being one with nature.

He simply had to hold the core with his bare skin and imagine the energy inside melsh with his body. Since he was a physical awakening type, the energy should combine with his muscles, his skin, and his bones.

Hnnggg

For some reason, the absorption this time was a bit more challenging, like he was trying to eat when he was already full to the brim. However, he hadn't absorbed a single core today, and he couldn't bear not doing so.

He gritted his teeth, drenched in sweat, but pushed through. He didn't want to feel helpless anymore. He had been lucky so far because of all the magic potions and the spirit next to him, but when the real threat came, how could those be enough?

It wasn't to say absorbing in the latter stages was not painful, but his pain tolerance wasn't low.

Anyway, he remained stable and absorbed the power. He was behind so many people his age here, and he had a lot to catch up on.

Many people, even battle-hardened ones, would not attempt to absorb so many every day because it was painful, but despite his lean frame, Finn was surprisingly strong-hearted.

As for why he suddenly felt a bit pressured, it was because of the guests before. If he had been stronger, he could've just followed them deeper in the forests and killed them there while in disguise, but he did not have the ability.

This was only his third group of customers. It was inevitable he'd be seeing more of that kind. What if they just decided to sneak around outside to attack him while he was foraging or something? He'd be helpless against many strongmen.

Durgan went out to check on him and saw that there were already many crystals that had disintegrated within a couple of hours. The dwarf blinked and watched, realizing the stone was so spent that it turned to ashes afterwards.

One had to know that most people would just absorb as much as they could, but very, very rarely would the crystal be completely out of power. In those cases, they would sell the 'empty' crystal as items to create jewelry. It was quite an industry, in fact.

Durgan stared. "Really amazing…" he said. "His aura is so… solid," he said, not really talking to anyone. "I can't quite put it in words."

Finn continued and continued until—

"ACH!"

Finn felt like a car had hit him again, and the strength he had was vacuumed away, leaving only softened limbs that he couldn't move.

He felt his muscles and veins expand just a little bit, and he could feel the mana flowing in and being absorbed into them.

He felt dizzy, and he seemed to have lost his consciousness for a bit.

"Are you alright, Boss?" Durgan asked, kneeling next to him

Finn was exhausted, but he found himself smiling as he looked at the notifications.

[Congratulations! You have now reached Tier 3!]

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