Assassination

The instant the black-robed figure saw Cheng Yang, undisguised killing intent flashed through his eyes. Clearly, he meant to silence him on the spot.

Cheng Yang did not hesitate in the slightest. He turned and ran.

"You can't escape, kid."

The black-robed figure sneered and chased after him relentlessly, like a predator that had spotted its prey.

The two raced through the night, one ahead and one behind, locked in a tug-of-war for several minutes.

As Cheng Yang ran, he occasionally glanced back, calculating rapidly. The man behind him could not even match seventy percent of his speed.

If that was the case, what was there to fear?

He suddenly stopped, spun around, twisted his waist, and charged headlong at his pursuer.

The black-robed figure grinned. "Kid, you've finally stopped running."

The distance between them vanished in an instant. His five fingers curled into claws, the tips bent like five steel spears, and he lunged straight for Cheng Yang's throat with a razor-sharp whistle through the air.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

The attack was entirely within Cheng Yang's reaction range. He did not underestimate his opponent. With a slight shift of his feet, he met him with the Spirit Crane Fist he knew so well, and after two exchanges, the two became entangled in close combat.

After several moves, Peerless Bearing activated automatically.

Insights from hundreds of exchanges with this man flooded Cheng Yang's mind like a rising tide. In a single instant, he had grasped every detail of his opponent's techniques, force habits, and movement rhythm.

Once he knew both himself and his enemy, a thought arose in Cheng Yang's heart: practice his moves.

Real combat was the best way to increase martial skill proficiency.

So he began using the Vajra Fist, which he had only barely learned.

Vajra Pushes the Mountain, Vajra Subdues the Tiger, Vajra Shakes Its Scales—each move was still somewhat rough in his hands, yet carried an overbearing, unreasonable force.

The black-robed figure quickly sensed that something was wrong, and fury erupted from him. "You damned brat, you dare use me to practice your moves?!"

His fighting style changed abruptly. Like an enraged bull gone mad, his attacks grew fiercer and more desperate, every strike leaving no room for retreat.

Cheng Yang feared nothing. He answered brute force with brute force, strength with strength, meeting him head-on in a violent clash.

A few minutes later.

[Vajra Fist Beginner (35/100)]

[Vajra Fist Beginner (47/100)]

[Vajra Fist Beginner (67/100)]

[Vajra Fist Beginner (72/100)]

His proficiency soared as though riding a rocket. Meanwhile, the black-robed figure could no longer hold on.

Cheng Yang seized an opening. His back tightened and sprang like a great bow, his entire arm twisting into a spiral in an instant as his fist crashed down on the man's chest.

Crack, crack—!

The crisp sound of breaking bones was especially piercing in the night. The figure flew backward like a kite with its string cut, smashed viciously into the ground, spat out a mouthful of blood, twitched twice, and went still.

After throwing that punch, the pent-up gloom in Cheng Yang's chest from the entire night seemed to disperse somewhat.

He strode forward to finish him off and search the body, then dragged the corpse to the river and tossed it in, just as before.

The river churned a few times, and the body vanished completely from sight.

Back at the martial hall.

Cheng Yang learned from his mother that Senior Brother Yan and Junior Brother Chu had come by that day. Unable to find him, they had left the promised resources with her to pass on to him.

Taking the meat from his mother, Cheng Yang did not rush to train. After being tossed about all day, he was exhausted in both body and mind. He washed up and went to bed early.

The night was still, and all things were silent.

A masked figure agilely vaulted over the courtyard wall of the Chen Clan Martial Hall and landed without a sound.

Light as a cat, he leaped and shifted between rooftops and walls, bypassing patrols and lookouts before accurately making his way to the dormitory area and locating the target room.

He slowly drew three poisoned throwing darts from his waist. Their tips gleamed with a ghostly blue light beneath the moon.

"What a pity," he murmured coldly. "You had such a bright future in martial arts, but the employer paid one hundred taels of silver for your life."

"A Skin Tempering Realm martial artist cannot stop my darts."

"Goodbye, genius."

At a distance of more than ten meters, for someone who had mastered the Flickering Light, Blurred Shadow Hand, concealed weapons were almost certain to hit their mark.

Inside the room, Cheng Yang was deeply asleep.

He dreamed again.

That incomparably enormous golden dragon appeared once more in his dream. Its golden scales flowed with light like molten lava, while its deep vertical pupils stared straight at him.

"You big dragon again..." Dream-Cheng Yang had barely opened his mouth when an earth-shaking roar suddenly exploded beside his ears.

The roar tore apart the dream and violently dragged him back to reality.

Cheng Yang's eyes flew open. Before he could figure out why the dragon had done that, three sharp whistles cut through the air beside his ears.

Whoosh! Whoosh! Whoosh!

The window paper was instantly pierced with three tiny holes as the poisoned darts shot in on the night wind.

Every hair on Cheng Yang's body stood on end, adrenaline surging wildly. He instinctively rolled across the bed and dropped to the floor.

The three darts buried themselves deep in the bedboard where he had just been lying, their fletching still trembling lightly.

"Huff... huff... huff..." Cheng Yang gasped for breath, his heart pounding like a drum.

If Golden Dragon had not awakened him, those three darts...

His Adam's apple bobbed, and he did not dare think any further.

Thank you, Golden Dragon.

Cheng Yang sprang to his feet and immediately glanced toward his mother's room. Fortunately, there was no movement there.

Just as he was about to go out and investigate, the shadow outside the window had already vanished into the night like a ghost.

"One strike failed. I can only retreat."

The Star Tower assassin codenamed Killer Not So Cold cursed inwardly. He did not linger to fight, immediately leaping away and disappearing without a trace.

After confirming that his mother was safe, Cheng Yang hurried to find the senior brother patrolling the dormitory area that night.

When that senior brother heard that a core disciple had been assassinated, his face turned pale. He repeatedly gave thanks that Cheng Yang was unharmed; otherwise, he would never have been able to bear the blame for failing in his patrol duties.

The commotion soon awakened the entire dormitory area. Many people startled awake from their dreams, threw on clothes, and came outside to investigate.

Cheng Yang led several people in a search along the direction the darts had come from, but found nothing. The assassin had long since fled far away.

Not long after, Chen Feiyi arrived as well. He carefully examined the three darts embedded in the wall, his expression grave, before finally reaching a conclusion.

"This is the work of a Star Tower assassin."

"Star Tower? An assassin organization?" Cheng Yang asked with a frown.

"Star Tower is the foremost assassin organization spanning the two nations of Jin and Xuan. There is a branch here in Qinglin County as well." Chen Feiyi paused. "But even your master does not know where their base is hidden. Disciple, someone must have placed a bounty on you. Have you offended anyone recently?"

What a coincidence. I offended the Gu Family today. But we only became enemies that afternoon, and they sent someone to assassinate me that night? That was far too fast.

Cheng Yang did not tell his master about the Gu Family. He only investigated the possibilities one by one in his mind.

If it was not the Gu Family... then only one other possibility remained: Cai Qingwen.

The young master of the Cai Family whose invitation to the Lantern Gathering he had politely declined. Later, he had even sent Qian Biao to test him in full view of everyone and humiliate him publicly.

According to Chu Yunjiang, Cai Qingwen was extremely petty and would stop at nothing.

The death of Chu Yunjiang's father had also been at an assassin's hands, exactly like Cheng Yang's experience tonight.

If Golden Dragon had not awakened him, if those three poisoned darts had struck his body, whether he would live or die would truly have been hard to say.

The Gu Family was too large; for now, there was no way to begin with them. The Cai Family was smaller. On the surface, their strongest expert was only a Flesh-Tempering Martial Master, though it was possible they had secretly hired a Bone Tempering martial artist as a retainer.

All his information on the Cai Family currently came from Chu Yunjiang, and it was far from comprehensive.

"Sigh..." Cheng Yang let out a long sigh, and his clenched fist slowly loosened. "I'm still too weak. I only want to train quietly, train all the way until I am invincible. Why must there always be people forcing me..."