Coiling Dragon (Pan Long)

In terms of both furnishings and layout, this estate was definitely first rate.

Linley was particularly fond of the Hot Springs Garden.

The Hot Springs Garden within the estate was the place where his Majesty would engage in training when he lived here. Clayde was a warrior of the ninth rank. In order to become such a mighty warrior, naturally he didn’t rely solely on his personal ability. He also spent years of painstaking effort.

The right half of the Hot Springs Garden was covered of a large, grassy area, filled with all sorts of exercise equipment.

On the left side of the Hot Springs Garden, next to a man-made hill, was a hot springs pool. The hot springs within this pool came naturally from underground. After a day of wild training, spending some time relaxing in the hot springs pool definitely was a godly, wonderful feeling.

Linley was currently bathing nude within the pool. The bubbling hot water rushed against his skin, making Linley feel so comfortable that his eyes began to close.

“Boss, when are we going to kill that Patterson guy? Last night, during the dinner, I really wanted to kill him for you already.” Bebe hopped out of the pool, all the fur on his body wet.

“Don’t be impatient.”

Exiting the hot springs, Linley changed into a clean set of training clothes, then walked over to the grassy area while beginning to mumble the words to a spell. After a few moments, an earthen glow began to cover the ground beneath Linley in a certain area as earth elemental essence began to swirl about him.

Earth-style magic – Supergravity Field.

Linley immediately leapt into the air, then inverted himself, head pointed down, feet pointing up. Using his two hands, he kept himself upright. Next, he moved to holding himself up with just one finger on each hand. Relying on just one finger, under the pressure of the Supergravity Field, Linley began to push himself up and down.

“One. Two…”

Linley counted silently. Each time he reached a thousand, Linley would change to a different finger.

The most important thing for a fighter was the quality of his body. Only a strong body would be able to accommodate a high amount of battle-qi. Only through this method would he be able to quickly grow strong! Even though he was now a Dragonblood Warrior, he still needed to maintain his daily training regime.

“Hrm?”

After training for about half an hour, Linley returned to the normal upright position. Linley stared coldly at the attractive female attendant who had just entered the Hot Springs Garden, carrying a tray with tea and fruit on top of it.

“My…my lord, this is your tea and fruit.” The female attendant was made somewhat uneasy by Linley’s stare, and she stammered a bit.

“Who instructed you to come in?” Linley said coldly.

The female attendant started. Stammering, she said, “Milord, I…I was worried that you were thirsty.”

“Thirsty?” Linley glanced at her expressionlessly.

“Attend to me!” Linley shouted.

Instantly, four burly warriors rushed in from outside the Hot Springs Garden. These four warriors all belonged to the Radiant Church. After all, the Radiant Church had dispatched over a hundred knights to safeguard Linley.

“Mercy, milord!” The attendant was so scared, she fell to her knees.

In the Yulan continent, nobles had a much higher status than commoners, especially high ranking nobles, who could casually kill a commoner without repercussion. As for Linley, whom even the king of the Kingdom of Fenlai treated courteously, without question Linley was one of the highest ranking nobles in the Kingdom of Fenlai.

Linley glanced at the attendant. In a cold voice, he said, “Remember, in the future, when I am in the Hot Springs Garden, no one is permitted entry. Anyone who does enter will be punished with twenty strikes of the military rod.”

“Twenty strikes of the rod?” The attendant’s face turned pale.

Military rods were extremely heavy. Even most muscular warriors would not be able to move for ten days or half a month after receiving twenty strikes of a military rod. A physically weak female attendant might very well die from such a beating.

“Mercy, milord, mercy!” The female attendant hurriedly pled.

Linley continued, “Since this is your first time committing this offense, I sentence you to twenty lashes of a rattan whip. If you make this mistake again, I definitely will not be merciful.”

“Thank you milord! Thank you milord!” The female attendant felt relieved.

In terms of pain, the strikes from a rattan whip might even be more painful than that of the military rod, but it would cause nothing more than a superficial wound. It wouldn’t cause any harm to the bones or to the organs. It would hurt, but it wouldn’t kill.

“Remove her.” Linley ordered the four warriors.

“Yes, Lord Linley.” Two of the warriors stepped forward, pulling the attendant away and frog-marching her out. As for the tea and the fruit on the tray, those were all left on the floor.

Linley turned and once more returned to the grassy area.

The Bloodviolet Godsword was one of Linley’s secret weapons. Although whenever he trained with it, Linley usually made sure to keep it straight and hard, on occasion, Linley would also let it remain flexible and wield it in a bizarre, flowing manner. Linley had to make certain that this secret of the Bloodviolet Godsword was not discovered by anyone.

Naturally, he could not allow anyone to watch him train.

With his right hand, Linley stroked his waist. Instantly, with a cold, violet flash, an extremely thin, violet blade appeared in Linley’s hands.

“Swish!”

From within the Hot Springs Garden, one ray of violet light after another began to appear, while Linley roved back and forth within the garden like a wandering dragon. Having totally merged the support of the wind-style Supersonic spell with his own power, not only was Linley’s movement speed fast, it was also extremely agile.

Through the usage of the Secret Dragonblood Manual, Linley trained his body. When he was relaxed, he would engage in the carving of sculptures to raise his spiritual energy, while he would enter the meditative trance in the middle of the hot springs to refine his mageforce.

His training permeated his every daily activity.

Only, Linley still had not been able to find the best time to make his move against Patterson. After all, he had relatively few encounters with Patterson. If Linley went directly to Patterson’s manor, or Patterson came to Linley’s residence, once Linley killed Patterson, within perhaps just half a day, King Clayde would know what had happened.

No matter how great Linley’s potential was, if he murdered King Clayde’s own brother, Clayde definitely would not be gentle with him.

Within the main hall, Linley was gracefully eating lunch.

After he finished his lunch, Linley once again began thinking about Patterson. “This Patterson fellow hasn’t come to visit me at all. Seems like I’ll have to personally pay a visit.” Linley decided to no longer be the hunter setting a snare for the rabbit. He would head directly to the Patterson manor.

“Milord.” Just at this moment, an attendant ran over from outside. “Milord, Lord Cardinal Guillermo of the Radiant Church has arrived.”

“Guillermo?”

Linley’s body trembled, and then he immediately headed for the door, going out to personally welcome Guillermo.

Within the main hall.

“Linley, I hear that recently, your life has been leisurely and carefree. Every day, either you are training, resting in the hot springs, or engaging in stonesculpting. This sort of life really makes one envious of you.” Guillermo said with a laugh to Linley.

Linley nodded and laughed as well.

“But Linley.” Guillermo said solemnly, “I must remind you that although your sculptures are worth money, the thing which truly determines a person’s status is power! Just look at that nearby Debs clan. Don’t they have money? But in terms of status, they are inferior to you.”

Linley understood this rationale as well.

True, money was a useful thing.

But when one’s power reached a certain level, the uses of money would grow fewer and fewer. For example, to a Saint-level combatant, money was nothing more than a worldly possession. This was also why the Dawson Conglomerate had been willing to offer a hundred million gold coins to acquire Linley and have him join them.

To these trading unions, the support of a super-combatant was simply too vital.

“Lord Guillermo, I thank you for your reminder.” Linley said with a smile.

Linley didn’t say, of course, that it was stonesculpting that was the true reason behind him becoming a seventeen year old dual-element magus of the seventh rank.

“I’m just making small talk. After all, when you need to rest, you should.” Guillermo glanced at one of the Vicars behind him, who immediately opened the package he had been carrying on his back. After opening the silver-white package, a stone case was revealed within.

The Vicar then placed this stone case between Linley and Guillermo.

“Lord Guillermo, this is?” Linley already had an idea as to what this was.

Guillermo laughed with self-satisfaction. “Linley. Open it up yourself.”

Linley slowly opened the stone case, lifting up the lid. Within the stone case, there were two tomes made from silk thread. Both of these two tomes appeared to be colored a dark gold color.”

“This is?…” Linley looked towards Guillermo.

“Linley, didn’t I previously say that I was going to give to you books regarding magical incantations for wind-style and earth-style spells? That’s what these two tomes are.” Guillermo laughed.

Linley couldn’t help but feel excited.

Magical incantations and the proper method by which one cast the spell were both very important. Otherwise, even if one had enough spiritual energy and mageforce, one still wouldn’t be able to cast more powerful spells.

Linley immediately withdrew one of the two books and opened it up.

“Wind-style!” Upon reading the first page, Linley saw that the first page was a general summary regarding this tome.

After the summary, it began to describe one wind-style spell after another. This tome explained everything in great detail, and also clearly explained what to focus on for every single spell.

Linley flipped directly to the section on spells of the seventh rank.

Linley felt astonishment as he read about one powerful, intricately designed spell after another. Linley had to admit, the bygone people who had invented these spells in the past were, without a doubt, absolute geniuses.

“Spell of the ninth rank – Windshadow Technique. It was derived from a combination of the ‘Supersonic’ spell and the ‘Airwings’ spell. It possesses the special effects given by the Airwings spell, great speed, and great agility. It can be described as perfect…”

Seeing the deep, in-depth explanation of the Windshadow spell within this tome, Linley felt all the more excited.

A brand new world of magic was beginning to open up in front of him.

In the future, with his prowess in earth-style and wind-style magic, as well as the power of a Dragonblood Warrior, his future offensive potential would be enough to cause anyone to shudder in their heart.

Seeing how Linley had become totally absorbed with these magical tomes, Guillermo didn’t make a sound as he quietly left by himself.

….

Within the Hot Springs Garden.

Linley was seated cross-legged on the grass, all of his muscles and bones quivering as that special Dragonblood battle-qi was permeating every part of his body with its force, causing Linley’s entire body to experience a constant strengthening.

“Boss, Patterson will be arriving tonight. You still are in the mood to train?” Bebe mumbled, lying next to Linley.

Linley opened his eyes and looked at Bebe.

“In the mood?”

Linley felt bitter in his heart. Early this morning, that Duke Patterson had sent word via messenger that tonight, he wanted to come have a one-on-one visit with Linley. As the Minister of Finance, naturally Duke Patterson felt the need to have good relations with all the other important nobles. These past few days, he had been handling and worrying over the issue of illegally mining and smuggling water jade, which was why he hadn’t had the time to visit Linley yet.

“I’m not in the mood, no, but I must train. Only when I have enough strength will I have confidence.” Linley said to himself.

Per his current plans.

Within the next half year, he would kill Patterson as well as find out who the person behind Patterson was.

After finding out who the person behind Patterson was, Linley would, before the next anniversary of his father’s death, find out what happened to his mother, or kill the person behind Patterson.

“Swish! Swish!”

“Ahhhh!” Outside the Hot Springs Garden, a miserable scream.

With a leap, Linley jumped atop the man-made hill within the Hot Springs Garden. Standing on the top of the hill, he could clearly see that the bodies of those ten or so Knights of the Radiant Church had begun to decay. They screamed in agony nonstop as their blood began to stain the ground.

At the same time, from every direction, a dense black fog began to billow at high speed towards the Hot Springs Garden. Wherever this black fog passed, everything, be it animal or human, would begin to corrode, then die.

Linley looked up into the sky.

The sky above him, as well, was now covered with that dense black fog. The surrounding black fog swept towards him at high speed.

“Someone’s here.”

Linley could sense that within that dense black fog, there were several black blurs that were charging towards him at high speed.

At this moment, there was nowhere for Linley to flee!

“Haaaargh!”

At a high speed, Linley descended from the man-made and, as though he were a fish, jumped into the hot springs pool.