Of course, Tang San hadn’t forgotten to investigate the cause of Lin Tian’s death.
After all, Lin Tian’s death was simply too suspicious.
With Lin Tian’s abilities, could he really have accidentally fallen off a cliff and died?
Tang San would never believe such an explanation, even if he were beaten to death.
However, it was one thing not to investigate.
Once he actually did, he was immediately shocked.
When Tang San secretly circulated his Mysterious Heaven Skill into Lin Tian’s body, he was stunned to discover that although Lin Tian appeared to have died from a fall, every bone in his body had been shattered, and all his internal organs had ruptured.
Those injuries absolutely couldn’t have been caused simply by falling off a cliff.
It looked much more like someone had used a heavy object with some special method of exerting force to kill him before throwing his body off the cliff.
And anyone capable of doing something like this had to be an expert.
At the very least, in his previous life, there had been extremely few experts capable of achieving such a feat.
Even across the entire Tang Sect, Tang San couldn’t find a single person who could do it.
Thinking of this, Tang San subconsciously looked around.
Apart from himself and Xiao Wu, the only other person present with him was Lin Yuan, a Soul Warrior.
There wasn’t a single other person with soul power.
Could it have been Xiao Chenyu?
Impossible.
As far as he knew, Xiao Chenyu’s father was only a Soul Ancestor.
A Soul Ancestor alone absolutely couldn’t accomplish something like this.
The trail had gone cold…
Lin Yuan had no idea what Tang San was thinking.
Right now, he had no interest in paying attention to Tang San.
He was completely focused on crying together with the villagers.
At the same time, he made sure to firmly establish the fact that Lin Tian had died after accidentally falling off the cliff.
Only then could Tang Hao finally shift his attention away from the people of Bamboo Ridge Village.
Otherwise, if Lin Yuan had been crying and shouting about finding the murderer and avenging Lin Tian, no one knew what that bastard Tang RiHaotian might have done.
After Lin Tian’s funeral ended, Tang San and Xiao Wu left.
Lin Yuan, however, remained behind in Bamboo Ridge Village.
As he put it:
“This place is filled with memories of me and ‘Brother Lin Tian.’ I want to stay here and accompany ‘Brother Lin Tian’ through the final part of his journey.”
He asked Xiao Wu to pass a message to his mother and tell her not to worry about him.
Seeing how deeply Lin Yuan cared about Lin Tian, Xiao Wu was naturally moved and readily agreed.
After watching Xiao Wu leave, Lin Yuan endured it for another two whole days without cultivating either of the two techniques he had obtained from Lin Tian.
Instead, he wandered around Bamboo Ridge Village all day, ‘mourning’ Lin Tian and putting on a convincing display of brotherly affection.
It wasn’t until the evening of the third day that he finally went to the back mountain of Bamboo Ridge Village.
In a secluded location, he found the largest Ten-Year Lone Bamboo and dripped some of the green liquid from the Palm Heaven Bottle onto it.
Only then did he enter a hidden cave, light a campfire, take out Lin Tian’s bloodstained clothes, and begin studying the two supreme techniques.
After weighing the advantages and disadvantages, he chose the Five Thunder Heavenly Heart Art first. This story is hosted at novelping.com.
There were three reasons.
First, one couldn’t bite off more than one could chew.
For a complete novice like him, it was better to take things one step at a time.
Second, the Supreme Holy Qiankun Skill was extremely Yang and extremely rigid, leaning toward the fire attribute.
It wasn’t particularly compatible with a plant-type martial soul.
Third, Lin Tian had already displayed the Supreme Holy Qiankun Skill in front of everyone.
If Lin Yuan cultivated it and fused it with his Lone Bamboo Martial Soul, it would be far too conspicuous.
It would inevitably arouse suspicion.
The Five Thunder Heavenly Heart Art, however, was different.
If he fused it with his Lone Bamboo Martial Soul, it could instantly mutate into a Thunder Bamboo Martial Soul.
That would make up for the Lone Bamboo Martial Soul’s lack of offensive power.
Just thinking about how unstoppable the Lone Bamboo Martial Soul would become after gaining the power of lightning made Lin Yuan’s heart surge with excitement.
…
At the same time, after returning to the academy, Xiao Wu had spent two whole days drowning in grief.
Under Tang San’s tireless consolation, she finally returned to her former carefree self.
While this made Tang San happy, it also reminded him of Lin Tian’s death.
On the very day he returned to the academy, he had already told Yu Xiaogang about the suspicious circumstances surrounding the incident.
As expected, Yu Xiaogang had immediately shifted the blame onto Spirit Hall without hesitation.
According to his reasoning, Lin Tian had been assassinated because he refused to join Spirit Hall, after which the murderer had disguised the scene to make it appear as though Lin Tian had accidentally fallen off the cliff.
What puzzled Tang San, however, was that he could understand why Spirit Hall might target him, since Blue Silver Grass was universally recognized as a useless martial soul.
But Xiao Wu wasn’t a waste martial soul!
They both possessed innate full soul power.
Logically speaking, if Spirit Hall had really made a move, there was no reason for them to target only Lin Tian.
“Xiao San, what’s wrong?
Why do you look so troubled?”
Xiao Wu tilted her head.
“Come on, tell me.
After seeing how you’ve comforted Sister Xiao Wu these past few days, Sister Xiao Wu is willing to listen to your troubles.”
Tang San smiled wryly.
“It’s nothing…”
He didn’t want Xiao Wu to hear anything related to Lin Tian and become sad again.
But with women, especially someone like Xiao Wu, the more you refused to tell them something, the more curious they became.
“Stop wasting time.
Tell me.”
As she spoke, she put on an expression that clearly said she would get angry if he refused.
“All right.”
Tang San had no choice but to tell her his suspicions.
“I suspect Lin Tian didn’t die from accidentally falling off the cliff.
“Someone killed him…”
In an instant, Xiao Wu thought of the Clear Sky Douluo, Tang Hao.
The man who shared the same name as Tang San’s father and possessed the Clear Sky Hammer, the world’s strongest weapon-type martial soul.
Could he have done it?
Tang San had no idea what Xiao Wu was thinking and continued.
“I examined Lin Tian’s body.
Every bone in his body was shattered, and his internal organs were ruptured.
It doesn’t look like he died from falling off the cliff.
It looks more like someone first struck him with a heavy object before throwing him off the cliff…”
Xiao Wu didn’t listen to the rest.
Her face suddenly went deathly pale.
It all matches.
Everything matches.
No wonder Lin Tian had suddenly gone to the back mountain in the middle of the night.
No wonder he had inexplicably fallen off the cliff.
So someone had deliberately arranged all of this.
As for the reason…
Other than someone coveting her soul ring and soul bone, Xiao Wu couldn’t think of any other possibility.
But why hadn’t that person simply captured her?
Why had they chosen to kill Lin Tian instead?
…
Time passed, and soon the day came for Nuoding Academy to reopen.
During this period, apart from collecting the green liquid from the Palm Heaven Bottle and using it to accelerate the growth of the Lone Bamboo, Lin Yuan devoted himself to cultivating the Five Thunder Heavenly Heart Art.
Thanks to Lin Tian’s plain-language version of the Five Thunder Heavenly Heart Art, it even thoughtfully included his cultivation insights and recorded the mistakes and wrong paths he had taken during his own cultivation.
Lin Yuan realized that his dearly departed classmate Lin Tian had apparently been the kind of diligent student who loved taking notes in class.
So he put everything he had into cultivating.
He managed to cultivate a trace of the technique’s essence.
Even that was enough to make his cultivation speed increase rather than decrease, despite not using the Palm Heaven Bottle’s green liquid to improve his martial soul’s quality.
Based on his calculations, once he returned to the academy and used the Palm Heaven Bottle to collect green liquid for cultivation, he would be able to raise his soul power to rank 9 in less than twenty days.
If he could cultivate the first layer of the Five Thunder Heavenly Heart Art beforehand, that period could be shortened even further.
The only unfortunate thing was that there had been several days of intermittent torrential rain this month, leaving him without any moonlight.
On top of that, the days lost because of Lin Tian’s death had also delayed him.
As a result, he had only managed to collect three drops of green liquid.
Even with the one drop he had stored beforehand and used to accelerate the growth of the Lone Bamboo, it had only reached a cultivation age of slightly over 400 years.
Still, it wasn’t a major problem.
Once he broke through to rank 10 and returned to Bamboo Ridge Village, he could simply accelerate its growth again.
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