Chapter 3:Silence Through Murder

Lin Ye swung his Coldiron Sword and smacked it right across Xu Ming's face. Several of Xu Ming's teeth flew out, and his entire body was sent flying, crashing hard into a tree trunk.

He coughed up a mouthful of blood. The searing pain from his injuries made his face contort in agony.

Gu Shusen and Jin Liangfei were busy holding off the nearby Icepool Crocodile when they suddenly heard the commotion behind them.

"Lin Ye?"

The two of them gasped. Among the three of them, Xu Ming was the strongest—yet he had been ambushed and seriously injured by Lin Ye!

"Kill him!"

They exchanged a glance, then grabbed a severely injured inner disciple nearby and threw him straight at the Icepool Crocodile.

"No! Don't kill me!"

The disciple screamed in terror.

But from the start, Gu Shusen and the others had never planned to let these inner disciples leave alive.

What use were they? The Wind and Thunder Sect only needed to focus its resources on training core disciples like them. Who would expect the inner disciples to bring glory to the sect?

Crunch.

The Icepool Crocodile leaped up and snapped the "offering" in its jaws, dragging it back into the icy pool.

Gu Shusen and Jin Liangfei split up, attacking Lin Ye from both sides.

Boom!

Qi Sea Stage Three!

Boom!

Qi Sea Stage Four!

The moment their power erupted, their profound energy surged around them, forming a shield-like whirlwind barrier.

This kind of barrier could block most attacks made of profound energy.

But in Lin Ye's eyes, such crude techniques were laughably weak.

With Coldiron Sword in hand, he stepped forward. The bloodfiend profound energy inside him howled like a storm as it surged out.

The energy gathered around his sword.

Bang!

With one strike, he shattered Jin Liangfei's defense. Jin's eyes widened—Lin Ye's sword aura was incredibly aggressive! His protective energy was like paper before it.

Swish!

Lin Ye's sword moved like a dragon, piercing Jin Liangfei's arm. With a flick, the entire arm—sword and all—was sent flying.

"Argh!"

Blood gushed from the stump as Jin Liangfei howled in pain, his face twisted from the agony.

If it had been the old Lin Ye, he would've been easily killed by the three of them. But now, he was completely different.

No longer the useless core disciple everyone mocked.

With a light swing of his sword, he knocked Jin Liangfei away, his head slamming hard into the ground.

Meanwhile, Gu Shusen's sword aura stirred up a flurry of flying leaves, all speeding toward Lin Ye like tiny blades.

Lin Ye dodged beside a large tree.

The flying leaves pierced the tree trunk easily, sending splinters flying.

With a single slash, Lin Ye cut the tree down. It fell toward Gu Shusen, who quickly swung his sword, slicing through the falling leaves.

"Lin Ye, I will kill you!"

Gu Shusen roared as the swirling leaves obscured his vision.

Suddenly, he felt a chill down his spine—then Lin Ye's sword pierced straight through his chest, nailing him to a tree. The tip stabbed through the trunk, leaving him completely pinned.

Gu Shusen couldn't move a muscle. His profound energy was collapsing—he couldn't even gather it anymore.

Three powerful Qi Sea core disciples, all defeated.

Xu Ming, whose legs had been severed, used his profound energy to seal his wounds. He spat out blood repeatedly, disbelief written all over his face.

"You... how is this possible...?"

Xu Ming stammered in fear.

Jin Liangfei, clutching his severed arm, collapsed onto the ground. He couldn't even get up. Lin Ye's moves were simple, yet they completely disrupted the flow of their profound energy.

To Lin Ye, these were casual strikes. But to them, they were terrifying.

Three elite core disciples of the Wind and Thunder Sect—defeated in less than ten seconds.

When Gu Shusen had bled enough while pinned to the tree, Lin Ye pulled out his sword. The cold energy from it left Gu Shusen partially frozen, though all three were still alive, thanks to their cultivation.

"Zhou Tai'an—he's probably already dead by your hands, right? So, who sent you?"

Lin Ye dumped the three of them together, the Coldiron Sword in his hand still radiating icy killing intent. The three of them looked at it with fear in their eyes.

"W-what do you mean, Lin Ye? Why are you attacking fellow disciples? That's a capital offense!"

Jin Liangfei's mouth was still tough, shouting back at Lin Ye.

"Wrong answer."

Lin Ye shook his head and slashed Jin Liangfei's throat. The man clutched at the wound, flailed for a moment, then collapsed, completely dead.

"You."

Lin Ye turned to Gu Shusen.

Gu Shusen was totally stunned. Even though he'd just been run through the chest, it wasn't until he saw Lin Ye kill Jin Liangfei without hesitation that he truly felt fear.

Lin Ye's ruthlessness left him unable to think, unable to lie. As soon as Lin Ye looked at him, he blurted out:

"It was Supervisor Xu Liang! He ordered us to kill you in secret!"

Beside him, Xu Ming shot Gu Shusen a murderous glare.

"Gu Shusen, you idiot! You really think he'll let you live just because you told him?!"

Then Xu Ming nervously looked at Lin Ye.

"Lin Ye, listen! I can help you. The one who wants you dead—it's not my father! There's someone else behind this! And someone inside Dragon Void Cave is trying to kill you too! Let me live, I'll tell you everything!"

Xu Ming was speaking quickly, spitting blood with every word, barely holding back the pain.

"Oh?"

A cold light flashed in Lin Ye's eyes.

He didn't expect that his new life would come with so many enemies. So much for peaceful cultivation.

"Talk. I'll let you live."

Lin Ye said.

Xu Ming looked like he had been pardoned from death. Just as he was about to speak—suddenly, from deep in the forest, an arrow shot out!

Whoosh!

It went straight through Xu Ming's head, blowing it apart.

"Hm?"

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

Three more arrows flew at Lin Ye.

These arrows were short-range but very fast.

Lin Ye deflected them easily with his sword.

Clang, clang, clang!

When he looked back, both Xu Ming and Gu Shusen had been shot dead.

"Silencing witnesses."

Lin Ye didn't even flinch. He looked calmly in the direction of the forest. Whoever was hiding there didn't dare make another move—they probably weren't confident they could kill him either.

"If it's games you want—fine, I'll play."

"In my last life, I was too soft. You all thought I was easy to bully."

Lin Ye stood where he was, unmoving.

Behind him, the Icepool Crocodile leapt out again, stirred by the heavy scent of blood.

Lin Ye ignored it as it dragged the corpses into the water.

"…Damn. That girl!"

Under a tree, Lin Ye found Liu Qingyu—fortunately, she was merely unconscious. A surge of profound energy entered her body, and she slowly opened her eyes.

"What happened? I feel like someone hit me..." Liu Qingyu rubbed the back of her head as she spoke.

"You were knocked out," Lin Ye replied. While speaking, he examined the surroundings—judging from the traces left behind, it seemed only one person had attacked. Still, that didn't rule out the possibility of the assailant going to find reinforcements.

A minor sect like Fenglei Xuanzong should've been focused on cultivation, yet it had instead fostered a toxic environment of scheming and backstabbing.

"Huh?? What's going on?" Liu Qingyu looked confused.

Lin Ye didn't answer. Instead, he took out several storage rings and began categorizing the items inside.

When Liu Qingyu saw the rings in Lin Ye's hand, she gasped—they belonged to Xu Ming and the others, each marked with their unique imprint.

"Senior Brother... What about Senior Brother Xu Ming and the rest?"

"They were eaten by the Frostpool Frenzied Crocodile," Lin Ye replied, expressionless.

Eaten?

That sounded far too perfunctory. Xu Ming and the others were top-tier core disciples. Even if they were overpowered, they should've been able to escape.

But seeing Lin Ye's cold, unreadable expression, Liu Qingyu didn't dare press the matter. After all, there was a clear gap in their status. Besides, ahead of them, the mist rising from the cold pool gave off the eerie feeling that a bloodthirsty killer might be hiding within.

Liu Qingyu didn't dare to investigate further.

She shrank back slightly, sticking close to Lin Ye. Ever since she encountered him, things had started to feel... strange.

The most bizarre of all was Lin Ye himself—his transformation was drastic.

And strangely, her beauty didn't seem to attract his attention at all.

"The one who attacked earlier must be near the Earth Transformation Realm—at the very least, Qi Sea Stage Eight or higher."

That was Lin Ye's initial assessment. His opponent had been extremely cautious. If they had attacked directly, Lin Ye was confident he could've kept them there. But they'd retreated immediately, causing him to miss his chance.

"No rush. Once I recover some of my cultivation, none of them will escape."

Two Yuhua Pills appeared in Lin Ye's hand.

"Yuhua Pills!" Liu Qingyu gasped. These were precious resources even inner disciples had no access to—only core disciples received them, two per month.

Lin Ye had also recovered his own storage ring, which surprisingly contained five Yuhua Pills.

That made him recall: two of them were his, and the other three were gifted to him by a senior martial sister he'd once been close with.

In addition, Lin Ye had gathered six more Yuhua Pills from Xu Ming and the others' storage rings.

"Which idiot refined these pills?" Lin Ye crushed one in his hand, letting the powder scatter across his palm. After inspecting it, he spoke with disdain.

"Senior Brother Lin Ye... y-you..." Liu Qingyu was stunned. A perfectly good Tier-2 pill—two of them, no less—had just been crushed like that!

Had Senior Brother Lin Ye gone mad? Was the earlier bloodshed too much for him? And now he was insulting the sect's alchemists on top of it?

"So much Jadeheart Grass left unrefined, and the pill condensation method is incredibly crude. What a waste of good ingredients!" Lin Ye, a 9th-rank alchemist whose skills had reached their peak, had always despised waste above all else.

To him, the Jadeheart Grass—a rare medicinal herb—had been horribly mishandled.

Fortunately, because it was difficult to refine, the alchemist had failed to completely melt it down. That left Lin Ye with a perfect opportunity.

He crushed the remaining nine Yuhua Pills one by one.

Each time he did, Liu Qingyu felt like someone was slicing her heart—so painful! She wished she could save the poor, innocent pills from Lin Ye's merciless hands.

Smack smack smack.

All eleven Yuhua Pills were crushed. Lin Ye collected most of the powder into a porcelain bottle. Liu Qingyu noticed there were still tiny bits of leaf fragments left in the powder, proof that the pills had been poorly refined.

"You got any Wind Spirit Fruit?" Lin Ye asked suddenly.

Liu Qingyu instinctively clutched her storage pouch in alarm. Just as she feared—he was after her Wind Spirit Fruit all along!

She regretted not finding a chance to flee earlier. Though Lin Ye was no longer the rumored useless waste, he was clearly a total maniac—cold-blooded and destructive.

"Senior Brother Lin Ye..." she said weakly, hoping to appeal for mercy. But seeing as they were alone and she couldn't beat him, she tried to compromise. "Can I... keep one for myself?"

"Sure," Lin Ye nodded.

He only needed one to refine the Wind Spirit Heart-Cleansing Pill.

Liu Qingyu obediently handed over two Wind Spirit Fruits. Watching Lin Ye destroy the Yuhua Pills and now take her precious fruit, she wanted to cry. What sin had she committed to deserve this?

Lin Ye summoned his profound energy. The blood fiend aura in his palm condensed into blazing flame. He poured the powder of the eleven crushed Yuhua Pills into it.

Before reaching the Qi Sea Realm, he hadn't had enough profound energy for this. But now, it was sufficient.

Liu Qingyu, observing Lin Ye's practiced movements, stepped back in astonishment.

"Is... is Senior Brother Lin Ye... refining pills?"

Alchemy was a highly advanced skill. Fenglei Xuanzong had nearly 8,000 inner and outer disciples, yet fewer than ten actual alchemists.

That was how scarce pill resources were, and why only core disciples had access to Yuhua Pills.

Inner disciples only received three Qi Condensing Pills a month—each worth less than a tenth of a Yuhua Pill.

She watched as Lin Ye crushed the Wind Spirit Fruit by hand, letting the juice drip into the flame.

The fire surged and swirled chaotically, but there was a hidden order in the chaos. Lin Ye then added other mysterious herbs—found in the storage rings of Xu Ming and the others.

Although Lin Ye's blood fiend energy wasn't real flame, he had developed his own pill-refining method. By rapidly circulating energy and applying pressure, he was able to solidify the liquid.

Eventually, three pills formed in his hand—smaller than Yuhua Pills, each about the size of a soybean.

Liu Qingyu looked skeptical. Had Lin Ye messed up and then hastily formed these to save face?

"This is a simplified version of the Wind Spirit Heart-Cleansing Pill. It'll help your cultivation." Lin Ye tossed one to her.

Though she was reluctant, she reminded herself—this cost her two Wind Spirit Fruits. She rushed forward and caught it.

The pill was tightly sealed with no discernible scent.

"Let's find a cave and rest for the night."

Everyone else was dead, but Lin Ye had noticed something under the Frenzied Crocodile's pool. If there hadn't been treasures, Xu Ming and the others wouldn't have risked their lives.

The Dragon Void Cave trial lasted a total of seven days.

Four had already passed.

If one couldn't leave by the seventh day, they would be trapped inside. Since he was here, Lin Ye intended to collect anything that might benefit his cultivation.

Night fell. Inside a mountain cave—

The wind outside howled bitterly.

Liu Qingyu was stationed outside as a guard. The icy air forced her to circulate her cultivation method just to keep warm.

Her thoughts, however, were fixated on the Wind Spirit Heart-Cleansing Pill in her hand. Could it really be consumed?

"Screw it! At least it has some Wind Spirit Fruit juice in it—it should have some effect!"

She swallowed the pill in one gulp.

Immediately, an incredibly pure energy spread through her body.

"What! This pill—!" Liu Qingyu's mind was blown.

Its effects were at least a hundred times more potent than any Qi Condensing Pill she'd ever taken!

As the raging energy surged within her, she quickly focused her mind and circulated her cultivation method, charging toward a breakthrough.