Sailing the Sky

Ye Mo swept the whole residence clean of his victims' remains, crushing the bones on the ground and putting the dust in his spatial ring. As of now, it looked like a vast abandoned house.

"Deep down, Fang Jishen knew I was aware he sold me, he just didn't want to face this truth. That's why even before the competition, he began isolating himself home, rarely moving out and avoiding me at all costs. Only he knew from how unsocial I am that it would be easy for me to deduce who was the culprit behind the Liu clan's ambush and indeed, after giving it some thoughts in the jungle while leading blood beasts towards their members, I quickly realized it could only be him. He held on the glimmer of hope that I might have not realized it, secretly aware that reality isn't that beautiful."

"Everyone's actions leads to others considerations, Fang Jishen gambled I would never return and lost, from this moment on, I made my mind. The only question was when to deal with him and in answer to that, I found the best moment was the night before students are sent in their peaceful trip to the Raging Saber Sect. Everyone will have their attention on this event for a few days and won't notice his disappearance. Fang Jishen believed I wouldn't be bold enough to simply intrude his house and take his life while he wasn't aware I possessed the Shadow Walk battle skill to avoid prying eyes."

"Thanks to the Nine Revolutions Fiend Body refining technique, not a single trace of the slaughter that took place here is left and since Fang Jishen has been holed up in his residence all these days, no one will find it strange he's not seen anymore for some time. Fang Jishen thought rather than his Fang family, the Tiger Martial Institute was the best place to remain in safety, but this instead works in my favor. Outsiders are not allowed in the institute's ground outside of certain periods so his family won't be able to check on him, there is thousands of students, it will probably be weeks before anyone find something strange and alert the higher-ups, by this point they still need to find what happened and the most likely culprit. If they ever identify me as the killer, it would be when I'm already very far from Azure Water City and whatever action they wish to take against me will be insignificant."

In a few weeks, the scenery in sight would be completely different. By then, Ye Mo won't fear any reprisal from the institute.

When forging you can be burned and when killing, you can expect to be the one losing your life. If someone tried to assassinate him then of course, Ye Mo would retaliate. As long as it didn't require too much efforts or yielded clear benefits, Ye Mo wouldn't hesitate to act. Someone who hated him enough to attempt at his life had to be eliminated, getting rid of enemies was never disadvantageous.

After quite some time, he finally made his first steps towards the third revolution of his body refining technique.

"No one should freely plot my fall, life is the most important, if one tries to take mine, there has to be consequences. For the likes of Li Zhen or Liu Hao I can't do much, but Fang Jishen should have known his limits. In addition, I'm not leaving empty-handed here."

Ye Mo's eerie eyes rested on the pendant he took from Fang Jishen.

It looked like a small blood core, but rather than blood red, it had a deep blue color. There was a small suction force emanating from the gem that attracted the surrounding Qi, increasing its density around the wearer.

Ye Mo returned it to his spatial ring and before leaving, he rummaged a bit in the residence. It didn't take long for him to find a stash of letters in a drawer of Fang Jishen's desk.

These letters carried the Liu clan's seal, but didn't seem to have been opened at all. It could be seen Fang Jishen was unwilling to entertain ties with them any longer as he refused to even read them.

"Useless trash, wether you read them or not, those are evidences that should have been burned." Ye Mo thought discontented, placing the letters in his ring as well.

After some time, if investigators had come here to search the truth, they could effortlessly find this stash of letters. With those evidences they would discover Fang Jishen's connection with the Liu clan and at this point it would have been a breeze to link everything back to Ye Mo.

Although it would still be a long time for suspicions to arose and investigators to come here, if Ye Mo could make their job more difficult, why hold back?

He kept searching everywhere for anything valuable or that could reveal himself while being careful to not move anything away. The dirt-poor member of the Fang family didn't possess much in his pouch, only low tier pills, some utensils and a book for children recounting fairy tales along three gold coins. The servants didn't have any pouches, they were only mortals for most of them with a few in the low layers of the Qi Gathering realm.

Ye Mo went around the house several times, going through any suspicious places until he was sure there was nothing else before he opened the back door and left.

Outside, it was still raining heavily and the garden was covered in mud.

Ye Mo bent down and took a scoop in his hands before smearing the mud all over his body till he looked like a clayman.

"This should suffice to cover myself if they use a scent tracking technique to get back to the killer, the rain will wash any lingering exterior traces. To uncover my identity, well, it will depend on how much efforts the institute is willing to put, after all, Fang Jishen was only an unimportant student. There is merely an empty house left now so if they want to sweep the matter under the rug they can just say he disappeared on his own and not bother with it, but if they announce it as a murder then to save face, the institute will have to go to the end of this matter and protect their honor."

"No matter how they choose to handle the situation, it won't change anything for me once I leave."

Ye Mo wasn't reckless and have been planning this for a long time, he wouldn't personally act if he wasn't certain no repercussion he couldn't handle would stem from this massacre.

He was filthy and the smell of earth filled his nostrils, but he didn't care.

In life, there were only advantages and disadvantages, benefits and losses, strength and weakness. Useless emotions didn't have their place here, all that mattered were the results, even if he had to eat bugs, crawl on the ground or go through the pain of a thousand deaths as long as it was helpful, he would do it without complaint.

The dark clouds drifted gloomily in the sky, spewing lightning snakes on earth that illuminated the land, like a last act of defiance before the scorching heat of summer would pervade the air.

In the garden, the flash of light revealed the well built body of a teenager standing silently under the rain only to be consumed by darkness once again.

Another flash of light quickly followed, but this time, no one stood in the garden, as if the lingering figure was but a fading mirage.

Using Shadow Walk, Ye Mo quickly reached his stone house. When he saw no one was present in the surroundings, he left the shadows and entered inside.

He cleaned and changed himself before he sat on his bed and retrieved the pendant from his spatial ring.

After he put the pendant around his neck Ye Mo began revolving the Black Vortex cultivation technique in his dantian as he observed his rate of refinement.

He could feel the quantity of Qi around him slightly increased and the amount he could draw in his meridians grew.

In a short time, he stopped his cultivation as he noted, "Ordinarily, I'm but a mere rank 2 talent, still with the help of the meridian purifying pill my cultivation became much faster and now coupled with the help of this gem, my speed doubled and the rate at which I fill my dantian is currently no different than a rank 3 talent."

"Though it's only useful to generate new wisps of Qi, when breaking through, I am on my own battling against the heavenly wall of a rank 2 talent, these resources can't help me in this aspect."

When he was done, Ye Mo returned the gem to the space in his ring. He wasn't stupid enough to incur suspicions by wandering in broad daylight around the institute with this pendant suddenly hanging around his neck.

"It has been a week already, Hei Qiong must have rentabilized our deal to the fullest. It was part of the trade after all, I am sure he must have his hands full making weapons after revealing my wrist guards to justify my performances. This isn't detrimental to me at all, if others can underestimate my abilities by giving all the credit to my weapon, I will gladly welcome this change. This way, people should stop their research on me and will put my achievements on my wrist guards. I never planned to keep them hidden anyway, I only wished for them to stay concealed until the end of the competition so I could take my opponents by surprise, now I don't need to fight anymore so I couldn't care less wether they are known or not."

If Bing Jia, Li Qiang or Shen Xue had prior knowledge of his wrist guards, the situation could have been completely different. Revealing nothing and appearing unimportant before suddenly bursting with enormous strength to crush your enemies in a short time, this was one of Ye Mo's favorite methods.

What was the point of a chivalrous duel or a spectacular fight, this world obeyed the law of the survival of the fittest. Kill or be killed, fight or die! A battle was all about who survive in the end, as long as you eliminate your opponent, no matter the methods employed, you are the strongest.

This was a principle everyone followed, some persons like Li Zhen wanted to kill him, it wasn't because he used underhanded means to murder Li Qiang, but because it was his son and the heir of his clan. If it was anyone else, even some low ranked members of his clan, Li Zhen wouldn't give a shit.

"There is a couple of hours remaining before daybreak, I should sleep a bit, the next few days will be intense."

Ye Mo's heart flickered in expectations as he thought of the future.

It was still dark when he rose up and went to the plaza center. It wasn't that he was impatient to the point he couldn't wait anymore, but he didn't wish to meet students on his way wasting his time.

The rain had subsided, but dark clouds lingered in the sky.

Fortunately, when he reached his destination, there were already four instructors posted at each corner preventing members that wouldn't depart to approach the students that were chosen.

However, it was so early yet there already were students waiting eagerly in the area. Ye Mo walked under their curious gazes and sat beside the fountain in meditation.

The sun slowly rose while the number of students gathered increased gradually, from less than ten to a dozen then half a hundred.

At this moment, Han Zhen Jun made his apparition, "We have been notified yesterday that the Raging Saber Sect envoys have been delayed in their trip and have an important affair to deal with. They have sent a servant with their spiritual tool to pick you all up, after a few days of travel, you will reunite with them in the neighboring Willowshade town before continuing on your way to the sect."

After this announcement, many wondered what could have delayed the envoys, but no one was alarmed. Those members of the Raging Saber sect were too strong and influential for anything to happen to them.

The students who noticed Ye Mo on the ground shot strange gazes at him as they whispered between each other, but Ye Mo made abstraction of the ambiant noise and focused on himself.

In his mind, fighting scenes flashed while moves were unleashed. Countless opponents emerged from the darkness, each unleashing a flurry of strikes—punches, kicks, elbows, and feints. His thoughts raced, his body tensed as he visualized every counter, every dodge, every perfectly timed strike. A fist came for his ribs—he twisted and parried. A sweeping kick aimed to shatter his balance—he leaped, pivoting to return a counterblow. Again and again, he refined his responses as he drilled in his brain the adapted reactions to any situation.

Ye Mo dwelled for hours in this mental stretch, even if he could do nothing but wait, he still sought to improve himself.

Obviously, this kind of exercice couldn't replace real combat experience, but it was still a good way to anticipate actions you might face in the future and react accordingly, the most important point was to be honest with yourself and not imagine reactions you wouldn't be able to pull in real life practice.

This was similar to chess players practicing against themselves, they would pull a move then think of the counter of this move before they plan a strategy to oppose this counter, rinse and repeat until the game came to an end.

In his mind's arena, Ye Mo threw a punch—then immediately envisioned the best way to block or evade it. That counter became the next attack, forcing him to devise a new response. Step by step, strike by strike, he dissected every possibility, layering reactions upon reactions like an endless, shifting game of strategy. Just as a master chess player anticipates moves far ahead, he sharpened his instincts, ensuring that when real combat came, his body would already know the answer before the question was even asked.

The human mind had no limits, no matter how low the means or negligible the improvements, there was always a way to perfectionate yourself.

His meditation was soon broken as he felt an arm laying over his shoulder, a flippant and lively voice resounding beside him.

"Sly bastard, where have you been hiding this past week. It's been a year but we still didn't fight because you keep avoiding me, you will make it up to me right? By the way I heard about your iron wrist guards, are they really as durable as the Ironheart Weaponsmiths claim them to be, let me see if they can handle a strike of my stick, I will give you a bit of my sugar mint cakes if I can't damage them."

"Hey, have you picked your peak-tier battle skill already, show it to me, I'm sure I can take it head-on, I have been hit by the tail of a rock python in the past but I only suffered a broken arm. What, you don't believe me, when fire surround me, there is nothing I am afraid of, this is what it means to be a cultivator haha!"

"By the way, I didn't expect you to steal Shen Xue's token, you really surprised me there, people tend to avoid him in general. You showing up at this moment, was it because you wanted to climb the precipice and fight us as agreed? But why have you come this late when you knew we were fighting him already, Hao Tian and I have been waiting for you the whole day, thinking about it makes me want to fight even more now."

Ye Mo frowned deeply as Ma Shinfei prattled unceasingly by his side. Wether he listened or not didn't seem to bother this blabbermouth.

"Don't you see you are disturbing everyone? We are all joining the Raging Saber Sect, you will have all the time to fight him once we're settled."

Fortunately, Jin Hao Tian came to his rescue and brought back Ma Shinfei who finally calmed down after hearing his friend's remark.

Shen Xue, Yan Mei and all the other elite juniors of the institute gathered in the plaza, hung in suspense.

Quickly, a big shadow approached the city from the sky while pedestrians pointed in the air in amazement.

When it stood above the Tiger Martial Institute, many people could recognize its form.

It was no less than an enormous flying boat, floating in the air the same way it would glide on waves.

It loomed like a fortress in the sky, its hull as large as a city gate and its sails spread like the wings of a heavenly beast.

The boat slowly went down until it gently landed in a corner of the plaza, casting its shadow over the surrounding buildings.