It was the most unpleasant type of travel Harry ever experienced.

His surroundings blurred, then a massive force yanked him and started spinning him around, like how one might spin before launching a ball, and then he was flying through the void, rotating all the while. The spinning and whirling seemed to go on forever, sending him to wherever he was destination was.

Was this the afterlife? Was this what happened to someone when they died?

Harry couldn't even string his thoughts together. He felt like he was going to throw up.

Abruptly, the spinning stopped, and Harry was dumped onto the cold, hard ground.

"Blurhghhh" Harry managed. His head and eyes were still dizzy, it took all he had to just stay conscious and not vomit.

A few minutes later, the vertigo passed, and he got himself into a sitting position.

He was in a large clearing, sitting on a field of green grass. It was still in the late evening, the Sun just inches away from setting. On the other side of the sky hung the moon.

Off in the distance stood a massive city lit up with thousands of lights.

For a moment, Harry forgot about the dizziness and pain and just stared.

His entire life, he had lived in Crystal Mine City. The tallest building was two stories high, most buildings were made of rocks and wood, and the city "wall" was nothing more than a line of boulders and logs that didn't even reach his waist. But the city in front of him…

Thousands of buildings of all shapes and sizes dotted the clearing. Each one was more magnificent than any building in Crystal Mine City. Behind the buildings was a massive city wall, stretching high into the sky. The buildings he could see were just on the outskirts of the city. Behind the wall must have been even grander structures.

'Am I still in the Scarlet Phoenix Empire?' he wondered. 'Is this the capital city, the Scarlet Phoenix Capital?'

Harry knew only of the basic geography of the Scarlet Phoenix Empire. The central power was the Scarlet Phoenix Capital, which was a holy place for cultivation. The strongest cultivators and clans were based there, making it the indisputable strongest power of the empire. Those in the capital had reached heights of cultivation that Harry couldn't imagine.

Other than the capital, there were three Tier 1 cities: Green Jade City, White Mourning City, and Yellow Hero City. Though not as powerful as the capital, each were still strong powers in the empire. None of them were places that Harry dared to go.

After that, there were 20 Tier 2 cities, which were smaller and weaker than the Tier 1 cities, for a total of 24 cities in the empire.

And as for places like Crystal Mine City, they were so weak and remote that they didn't officially count as cities. Compared to the high walls and towers in front of him, Harry felt that Crystal Mine City should really be named Crystal Mine Village.

Slowly, his mind started to piece together what happened.

He was about to be hung in front of Grunnings Drill Company.

He remembered the sound of Vernon pulling the lever on the gallows, and remembered the floor falling from under him.

It seemed that in the fraction of a second between him falling and him dying, he had been teleported away.

Reaching to his neck, Harry pulled the necklace out under his shirt. It looked the same as always. A simple loop of string, with an inconspicuous red metal bird hanging off of it.

His entire life, he had thought it was just an ordinary necklace. It was something he kept for sentimental value, as he assumed it was related to his parents.

He never imagined the necklace had such a use.

"Thank you," he whispered to the necklace. He knew it was silly to thank a piece of metal, but it felt appropriate.

However, he also felt worried.

The necklace was obviously a life-saving treasure. Most likely, when the wearer was about to die, it would teleport him away.

Such treasures were extremely precious. Not to mention the life-saving aspect, just a teleportation device was incomparably rare. There was no chance that anyone in Crystal Mine City could possess such a thing. In fact, Harry felt that this necklace, if sold, could fetch a price higher than all the Qi Crystals he had seen in his entire life. Such items could only belong to the wealthiest people in the empire.

Then the question was, how did it end up in his hands?

If it really belonged to his parents, then didn't it mean their lives were in danger, or that they had enemies? Why would an ordinary person need such a necklace, unless their life was at risk?

And wouldn't it also mean his parents had powerful backgrounds? But if so, why would they need the necklace?

Ultimately, this necklace raised more questions than answers.

He pushed these thoughts out of his mind, as it was no use to dwell on them for now. He just felt grateful, towards both the necklace and whoever gave it to him.

But he also felt regret. If he had known his necklace had such a function, he would have used it years ago to get away from the horrid Crystal Mine City.

Sighing, he looked back towards the city in the distance.

No matter how many times he looked, it was impossibly enormous. He had never seen such a thing. How many people lived in that city? Crystal Mine City had a population of around two thousand… maybe this city had twenty thousand? A hundred thousand? It was impossible for Harry to estimate.

He began to wonder why he was teleported here.

Was the location randomly chosen? Or perhaps it was designed to teleport the user a certain distance away, in a fixed direction. There was certainly nothing remarkable about the clearing Harry was currently sitting in.

Or perhaps it had something to do with the city. Perhaps there was someone in the city that could help him. But there was no way he could reach it, not with his broken legs. Even if he wasn't injured, it would take hours for him to walk to the city. If he crawled? He'd be lucky to get there by dawn.

He turned around to look behind him, and his mouth dropped wide open.

If the city in front of him was enormous, then he had no words to describe what was behind him. There were a few more kilometers of empty clearing, then a massive forest of towering trees that stretched to the left and right as far as he could see.

'I'm safe,' he thought in relief.

'I'm safe!'

He had been worried the necklace hadn't teleported him too far away. He knew Crystal Mine City was not too far from West Minster City, one of the 20 Tier 2 cities of the empire. He had assumed that the city in front of him was none other than West Minster City, and he was only a day's travel away from Crystal Mine City.

In that case, there was a chance Vernon Dursley could find him again.

But the forest changed everything.

Crystal Mine City was located in a dry, rocky region, with no forests anywhere in the near vicinity. It was said that one would have to walk for weeks to arrive at the nearest forest. Therefore, the presence of such a massive forest meant he had been transported far away.

However, Harry had no time to dwell on his unexpected luck.

While he was staring at his surroundings, the Sun had nearly set. The clearing was close to being submerged into darkness, lit only by a few pale rays of moonlight and the faint flickers of the city. The temperature had plummeted, and he was beginning to shiver. He had to rub his arms to warm himself up.

'The city or the forest?' he asked himself.

The city was the obvious choice. With so many people and buildings there, he could probably find someone willing to help him. The problem was, the city was too far away. By the time he reached it, it would be the next morning, assuming he had the strength to reach it in the first place.

The forest was closer, and he could crawl there in a few hours. But the forest was an unknown, and there was no guarantee he could spend the night there.

A cold wind blew through the clearing, rustling the grass and sending chills through his body. If he didn't find some shelter soon, he'd freeze to death.

'The forest it is.'

The journey to the forest had been tiring and painful. His legs refused to respond, so he used his arms to drag his body along the ground. From a distance, he probably resembled a worm crawling on the dirt.

It had taken him almost two hours, and he was exhausted. His arms felt like they were about to fall off. Mustering the last of his strength, he had dragged himself behind a clump of trees, and huddled against them to protect himself from the wind.

But even that hadn't helped against the cold, which had pervaded the atmosphere.

'I'm going to freeze to death,' he moaned.

Was this the proverbial 'out of the frying pan and into the fire'? To be saved from execution, only to die of hypothermia?

Perhaps the necklace would teleport him away again? But unless it sent him to a warm hospital, Harry didn't see any way out of his predicament.

Scattered around him were pieces of broken leaves and small rocks, which he was desperately using to start a fire. But no matter what he did, the pitiful sparks he made refused to ignite.

Harry threw the rocks in his hands away in disgust. If he hadn't been injured, perhaps he would've had a chance. But with his injuries and unresponsive fingers, there was simply no way he could get a fire going. He instead began to rub his arms, trying to warm his body up the old-fashioned way.

Being homeless, hungry, and cold had given him a new perspective on his life. Maybe having to mine Qi Crystals every day wasn't so bad, since he at least had shelter. Maybe being beaten by Dudley was a fair price to be fed and warm.

Where had it all gone wrong?

It was just yesterday when Harry was still full of hope for the future.

Maybe he was in a dream. A twisted hellish nightmare.

Harry pinched himself.

A cold wind came blowing through, chilling Harry to the bone. He quickly picked up the scattered sticks and redoubled his efforts to start a fire.

The entire time, he cursed his weak strength.

If he had a stronger cultivation, starting a fire wouldn't be such a challenge.

In fact, if he had a stronger cultivation, he wouldn't be in this situation in the first place. If he had been at the 3rd or 4th level of the Body Tempering Realm, like most of the other children at Crystal Mine City, then Dudley wouldn't have singled him out. In reflection, the reason Dudley bothered him was almost certainly because his cultivation was the weakest.

At Crystal Mine City, most children would start cultivating in their teenage years. It would take them a few months of absorbing Qi from Qi Crystals to open the first meridian, the Lung Meridian. At that point, they would be in the 1st level of the Body Tempering Realm.

The next three meridians were the Heart Meridian, the Heart Protector Meridian, and the Triple Burner Meridian. Typically, by the time a child had transitioned to an adult, they were at the 4th level of the Body Tempering Realm.

Dudley, who had the support of his father, had reached the 5th level.

Harry, however, was still at the 2nd. Like the other children in Crystal Mine City, he started cultivating when he was just under 15 years old.

But unlike everyone else, it had taken him a year to open his Lung Meridian!

And then, it had taken him another year to open his Heart Meridian!

What took other people six months, took him two years! No matter how hard he tried, his cultivation moved at a snail's pace.

Over the years, he had realized his meridians had a problem. When he refined the Qi in a Qi Crystal, it would flow through his open meridians fine, but through closed meridians like mud. When he asked other people about their experience, no one else reported such a problem.

Harry was no Healer, in fact, there was no Healer in the whole Crystal Mine City. As such, he had no idea what was wrong with his body. All he could do was slowly cultivate.

In retrospect, all of his problems could be traced back to his faulty meridians.

If his meridians didn't have issues, his cultivation wouldn't be so slow.

If his cultivation wasn't so slow, Dudley wouldn't have picked on him.

And if Dudley hadn't picked on him, he wouldn't be freezing to death in the middle of the woods on a cold winter night.

A piercing howling noise suddenly came from the depths of the forest, interrupting his thoughts, and Harry dropped the branches in his hand in shock.

Wolves!

Just when he thought it couldn't get any worse! Wolves! And if they saw the fire, they'd be attracted and find a tasty snack waiting for them.

'What do I do?' he thought frantically. 'If I don't start a fire, I'll freeze to death. If I do start a fire, the wolves will come. But maybe I could drive the wolves off with the fire – forget it, I can't even start a fire in the first place! Maybe I'll climb this tree…'

But Harry knew he couldn't, not with a pair of broken legs.

"Would you like some help with that?"

Gasping in fright, Harry's head shot up and looked around… and saw no one.

"Down here."

Harry focused his gaze downwards. In the dim moonlight, he faintly saw a small shape near the undergrowth. It looked like a small animal, a raccoon maybe, with bright yellow eyes.

"Would you like some help? Starting a fire, I mean."

"Er, yes please," Harry said hesitantly.

Was he hallucinating?

Deftly picking up the branches Harry had tossed aside, the animal rubbed them together for a few seconds. A few sparks were produced in no time, which caught on the pile of leaves Harry made and turned into a small fire.

With the fire illuminating his surroundings, Harry could clearly see the speaker.

It was a cat.

No matter how Harry looked at it, it was a cat.

Its fur was a dark yellow color, bordering on gold. There were a few streaks of brown running through it, mostly on its head. Black fur rimmed two brilliant yellow eyes, and on top of its head were two sharp, triangular ears.

It was a beautiful cat, but it was just that. A housecat.

Except, it had spoken.

"You're a cat," Harry said dumbly.

"Well, you're not blind."

"But, how can you talk?"

"This Exalted Cat is highly intelligent. Talking is no problem for me."

As it spoke, it gathered branches and leaves and tossed them in the fire. Soon, a roaring fire was going, and Harry gratefully scooted nearby it. He felt better. Warmer. Thawed. Alive.

"Thank you for lighting the fire."

But the cat wasn't listening. Instead it stared at Harry, as if puzzled.

"2nd level of the Body Tempering Realm," it muttered, seeing through his cultivation with a glance.

'Even this cat is going to make fun of me?'

"Boy, have you been wasting the last 17 years of your life?"

If Harry hadn't been crippled, exhausted, and freezing, he might have retorted something back. But in his current state, he had no idea how to respond to the odd cat.

"Wait," he said suddenly. "How do you know how old I am?"

The cat gave him a long glance, almost as if it was judging him for being an idiot.

"There's a lot I know about you, Harry Potter."

"W-w-what? How do you know my name?"

Harry instinctively backed up in fear. He was positive he had never seen this creature before, he would definitely remember if he met a talking cat. How could it know his name?

"Boy, I'm here to help you. Your pendant activated, didn't it?"

"What pendant? Wait, you mean this?"

Harry fished the pendant out from under his shirt.

"Exactly. It activates when the wearer's life is in danger, and teleports you away."

"Oh," Harry said simply. He had guessed the pendant had such a function, but this was confirmation.

"Did you give me this pendant?"

"No," the cat shook its head. "But I gave it to your mother, who gave it to you."

"What – wait, you knew my mother?"

"I did," the cat nodded. "You look just like your father. Except your eyes, they're green like your mother's. How else would I have recognized you?"

This cat… it knew his mother? And father? The mystery had plagued him his whole life, was he about to find answers now?

"Can you tell me about my parents?" Harry immediately asked.

"Now isn't really a good time," the cat said casually. "We have company."

Right after the cat spoke, there was a rustling noise and a pack of wolves stepped out of the forest. There were four of them, snarling and showing their sharp teeth. Slowly, they approached Harry and the cat.

Harry grabbed a branch out of the fire and held it as menacingly as possible.

'Damn it,' Harry swore.

"Oh, put that twig down," the cat scoffed. "Each of these wolves has strength at the high-level of the Body Tempering Realm. With your trivial strength, what are you going to do?"

"Well I'm not going to just let them eat me," Harry shot back.

"Hmph. At least you have a good attitude."

Getting up, the cat faced towards the wolves and let out a hiss.

It was just the normal sound a cat might make, but for some reason, the wolves backed down, clearly frightened. Whimpering, they looked at each other, and then turned around and ran away with their tails between their legs.

"What – how – how did you do that?"

"You must be tired," the cat responded. "Rest, while I am here, you will be safe. We will talk in the morning."

Harry was indeed exhausted. Without a doubt, today had been the most eventful day of his life. From the fight yesterday to his execution, then crawling around for two hours, and finally nearly freezing to death, Harry had never been so worn out.

Far too much had happened today, and although Harry wanted to question the cat on so many things, he just couldn't find the energy to. Nodding, he lay down next to the fire and fell asleep as soon as his head hit the ground.

The forest was bright again when Harry awoke, feeling much better now that he was rested. Stretching, he rolled over and opened his eyes – coming face to face with the mysterious cat.

"I examined your body as you were sleeping," the cat said casually.

An odd feeling tingled up Harry's spine.

"Your legs are broken, and so is your nose. You have three cracked ribs, and fourteen bruises on your chest and back. And over 25 bones in your hands are broken."

"I was attacked," Harry muttered. "Two days ago, someone beat me until I was unconscious."

"Two days ago? Why didn't your pendant activate then?"

"I guess he hadn't beaten me to the point of death," Harry replied bitterly. "The pendant activated when his father tried to hang me from the gallows."

The cat's eyes narrowed, and for an instant, the very air around them seemed to thicken and tremble. The next moment, everything returned to normal.

It passed by so quickly that Harry didn't even notice it.

"I see," it finally said. "Swallow this."

It tossed an object over to Harry, who caught it. His eyes grew wide.

In his hands was a pill!

A pill was an object created through Alchemy, by combining various parts of plants, animals, and other natural ingredients. There were a countless number of pills, with a wide range of functions. Some could save lives from the brink of death, some could aid in cultivation, others had miraculous functions that Harry couldn't even begin to imagine.

Regardless of what type of pill it was, it was precious. Alchemists were rare because the process of concocting pills was very difficult. Therefore, the supply of pills was always in shortage, while the demand was great.

In a place like Crystal Mine City, there were no alchemists anywhere nearby. An Alchemist's profession was one of status and wealth. Why would an Alchemist choose to live in the backwater Crystal Mine City? It would be like a man deciding to roll in the mud and live with the pigs. An Alchemist could go anywhere in the empire and make a living for themselves there.

As such, Harry knew very little about Alchemy. He knew nothing of the pill concoction process, nor could he identify the pill on his hand. But he knew that this pill was the most precious thing he had ever touched, besides maybe his necklace.

"What does this pill do?" Harry asked. "And is it an Ordinary Grade pill?"

Just like how cultivation was divided into realms, pills and objects were divided into grades. Naturally, the higher the grade, the better its effects, but also the more difficult it was to concoct and more expensive it was to buy. Each cultivation realm corresponded to a grade. Ordinary Grade was the lowest grade, corresponding to the Body Tempering Realm, the first realm of cultivation. Pills and other objects within a grade were then split by quality, from low to middle to high.

'Perhaps this is a middle-quality Ordinary Grade pill,' Harry thought to himself.

"The pill will heal your injuries," the cat replied. "And no, it's not."

Harry almost dropped the pill in shock.

It wasn't Ordinary Grade? Then it must be above Ordinary Grade!

Above the Body Tempering Realm was the Qi Absorption Realm. Though Harry had no understanding of that realm, and no one in Crystal Mine City had ever reached that realm, he at least knew it existed.

As for above Ordinary Grade, Harry didn't even know what the name of that grade was. Something above Ordinary Grade, and someone in the Qi Absorption realm, those were no different than legends.

However, he was now holding a legend in his hand.

"But, this is too precious, I can't –"

"Boy, if you don't shut up and refine the pill, you will die of internal bleeding."

Not hesitating any longer, Harry popped the pill into his mouth, and entered a state of meditation to help guide the energy contained in the pill through his body. Refining the Qi in this pill was extremely easy. Refining Qi Crystals had always been a tedious and slow experience, like trying to suck a few drops of water through a narrow straw. But the Qi in the pill flowed smoothly through his body, like drinking out of a fountain.

That was one of the benefits of Alchemy. Alchemists could take Qi that humans normally had difficulty refining, and turn it into pills, which humans could easily refine.

In mere minutes, he could feel his body mending. His bones were growing and straightening, and his bruises faded at a speed visible to the naked eye. Around 15 minutes passed, which Harry spent meditating on the ground, concentrating on sending strands of medicinal energy through his body. When the pill had finally been refined, he got up and stretched.

To be able to stand up, what a wonderful feeling!

'Pills are truly miraculous,' Harry thought happily. Without this pill, his injuries would have taken weeks to heal.

He turned to thank the cat, only to see it staring at him with a shocked expression.

"Is there something wrong?"

The cat just continued staring at him, like it had seen something unbelievable.

"Uh, hello?"

"What? Oh. Right, right. Boy –".

The cat paused for a long moment, before shaking its head and speaking again.

"Never mind. Come, let's head to the city. There is a man we must meet."

As it turned out, the city in the distance was Ox Ford City.

It was one of the 20 Tier 2 cities of the Scarlet Phoenix Empire, just like West Minster City. However, it was quite far from West Minster City and Crystal Mine City, alleviating Harry's concerns.

The man they were meeting was the person the pendant was keyed to. The pendant was designed to teleport him to the vicinity of a specific person. The reason he had arrived at the outskirts of Ox Ford City was not a coincidence, rather, it was because the person was residing there.

As for who the person was, the cat just said that he was an old friend.

Meanwhile, Harry tried to start a conversation with the cat, but what made him speechless was, this cat was an extreme narcissist!

The cat even refused to walk, and forced Harry to carry it in his arms. Whenever Harry asked a question, the cat would evade him with a self-flattering answer.

"What do I call you? Do you have a name?"

"Call me Exalted Cat. Everyone does."

"How did you scare those wolves away last night? And how did you get that pill?"

"Boy, this Exalted Cat is the strongest being in the empire. A mere pill is nothing in this cat's eyes."

"Can you tell me about my parents?"

"Let's wait until we meet this Exalted Cat's friend. Meanwhile, I will tell you a tale of…"

Rolling his eyes, Harry gave up on further questions, not believing any of the words coming out of its mouth. After the cat finished bragging, it began asking Harry questions, which Harry answered as best as he could.

It wasn't too difficult for Harry to summarize his entire life in a few minutes. He spoke about being an orphan, growing up in Crystal Mine City, mining Qi Crystals, his lousy attempts at cultivation, and finally, the events that had transpired in the past few days.

For that, Harry received a pitying look and a promise the cat and its friend would help him.

After a few hours of walking, they reached the main road into the city.

Up close, the city only looked more impressive. There were thousands of buildings, each house or store constructed better than any building Harry had seen in Crystal Mine City. The massive city wall must have been 10 times his height, and was made of large carved rocks with bastions evenly spaced along its length. He could even see groups of men patrolling along the top of the outer wall, with guards stationed at the entrances.

The huge words OX FORD CLAN were carved onto the city wall.

"They are the rulers of Ox Ford City," the cat explained. "The clan occupies the inner city, and provides protection and law enforcement to everyone living nearby. In return, the people pay them a yearly tax."

Harry nodded. Such arrangements were common in feudal systems.

The cat steered Harry around the outer city as if it knew the city like the back of its paw. They left the main road, entering a side street, and then left the side street, entering a sketchy dark alley. A few more twists and turns later, Harry was thoroughly lost, and only more baffled by his surroundings.

Based on the cat's bragging, he had expected this person to live in the nicest part of the city, maybe even within the inner city, yet the cat continued giving out instructions that took Harry to poorer and more rundown areas. Some of the buildings there were clearly abandoned. Others were barely better than those in Crystal Mine City.

Just as Harry was about to ask if they were in the right place, the cat told him to stop.

"We're here."