The Deity of War
chapter-49

Chapter 49: Qi Yan

Duan Huangye was dead. He had been decapitated less than a kilometer away from the Duan mansion. His horse had carried his headless body back to the mansion, much to the horror of the female residents. The severed head was only recovered late into the night. The entire Duan family erupted into thunderous rage again, and at the same time, many people were struck by a sense of terror.

The deaths of Duan Tianshan, Duan Yuan, and Duan Jin only raised the suspicion that someone was targeting their Duan family. However, the death of Duan Huangye in such close proximity to the Duan mansion had completely cemented that notion. The killings had been conducted in different manners; the thirty-seven disciples had all had their heads pulverized, while Duan Huangye had been decapitated, seemingly by an extremely thin and sharp blade. However, what they could be sure of was that the culprits on both occasions were all quite powerful, and were capable of killing from a distance.

Many people from the Duan family had already died; were there going to be more to follow?

The Duan family had been a force to be reckoned with in the Celestial River County for several generations. During their reign, they had accrued more than their fair share of enemies; could it be that someone was exacting revenge upon them?

If that were the case, then that person would definitely continue in his killing spree. Who was his next target going to be?

Everyone in the Duan family began to fear for their safety.

Within a room.

Duan Huangye’s head and body had been placed on a white sheet. About a dozen or so men of the Duan family stood by with solemn expressions and their fists clenched, while several women were situated off to the side, sobbing with grief.

“Huangye!”

Duan Hongxue leaned down and his white beard tremored as tears welled up in his eyes.

The rest of the Duan family members also wore expressions of sorrow and rage.

Duan Xilai’s eyes were shooting daggers. “How dare they do this to our Duan family… We must investigate this matter and see who it is that is targeting us! They have gone too far!”

“Huh?”

Duan Hongxue seemed to have discovered something.

Everyone turned to find him rummaging through the front of Duan Huangye’s robes, before producing a handkerchief.

Upon the handkerchief, some text had been written.

“We have a lead!”

Everyone gathered around to inspect the handkerchief.

Duan Hongxue narrowed his eyes as he tried to make out the smudged characters. “There are two characters… The first one is… Qi… and the second one is, Yan? Qi Yan? Who’s that?”

No one knew the answer to that.

There were many people with the surname Qi in the Celestial River County, but they had never heard of anyone with that particular name!

All of a sudden, a thought occurred to Duan Xilai. “Qi? Yan? It’s not a person named Qi Yan; it’s two different people! One of them has a surname of Qi, while the other has the surname Yan!”

Everyone in the room looked at one another upon hearing that. The person with a Qi surname that was the most heavily involved with the Duan family was Qi Ying, so he had to be one of the people referred to on the handkerchief. What about Yan? There were very few people with that surname in the Celestial River County, and the first person that sprang to everyone’s minds was Yan Thirteen!

Duan Hongxue scrunched up the handkerchief in trembling hands as he stood up. “Huangye must have discovered something and wanted to report it to us. However, he was silenced in the end… But the culprit mustn’t have expected him to have left some evidence behind for us! Qi Ying and Yan Thirteen! They are the culprits!”

A surprised look appeared on Duan Jinhong’s face upon hearing that. “Yan Thirteen? He is indeed powerful enough to commit those crimes! However, what motive does he have for attacking us? Besides, we can’t find any other evidence! Aside from this handkerchief, nothing else suggests that he was involved in the murders! On top of that, what is his relationship with Qi Ying?”

Duan Kai offered his insight on the matter. “Yan Thirteen is not related to Qi Ying, but he is the Colosseum’s boss. Meanwhile, Lu Feifei is a major shareholder of the Colosseum, and she was the one who bailed out Qi Ying from prison! As such, we can determine that these three are behind the crimes!”

A cold light shimmered in Duan Xilai’s eyes. “We are the Duan family; since when have we needed evidence to do something?! Lu Feifei and Yan Thirteen are going to be troublesome to deal with, but we can start off by eliminating that little b*stard, Qi Ying!”

…

A slight mishap had occurred following Qi Ying’s Colosseum battle with the Fire Kirin Beast. However, saving An Ruyi was a simple matter to him. Besides, he had saved her once already, and was afflicted by a string of troubles as a result. If she were to die on that occasion, then he would have gone through all of those troubles for nothing. After that, An Ping and An Ruyi had chased after him with an apology, as well as an offer of remuneration. However, he immediately refused. He had saved her for the sake of keeping a clean conscience, not for any reward from them.

Even though he had refused An Ruyi’s reward, he had to receive the Colosseum’s reward. Master Thirteen had gone somewhere, but Qi Ying still received two vials of Energy Explosion Pills from the female administrator with the long wavy curls. Aside from that, there were also some cultivation resources and a bunch of crystals that were given to him.

Qi Ying was very satisfied. He had received a small fortune that would be difficult even for the average rich family to cough up. After obtaining those resources, he could focus all of his energy on cultivation for the upcoming period. He had to prepare for the intra-academy tournament that was going to be held thirteen days later. Only through putting on a good performance there, would he be able to secure a spot to enter the Celestial River County Youth Battle Tournament, which would commence seventeen days later.

That would be the moment to prove himself!

Qi Ying hurried back to the mountain behind the academy, to find that the courtyard had been newly renovated. He saw the frail and exhausted Mother Yu, who had suffered from insomnia for several days as she had been worried sick about his safety. Upon “seeing” Qi Ying again, she was absolutely ecstatic.

Mother Yu went to bed, but Qi Ying went out to the courtyard.

It looked like the academy principal had been quite good to Mother Yu; they had even sent some people to do a simple renovation job on the courtyard. It was still just as simple and modest as ever, but it didn’t look so dilapidated anymore.

Qi Ying took an Energy Explosion Pill before activating his Purple Energy Cultivation Method. Cultivating at night wasn’t as effective as it was during dawn and dusk, but his cultivation base was nearing the bottleneck of the First Energy Martial Stage, and he was quickly able to reach the upper limit by drawing upon the Energy Explosion Pill’s power.

Within his dantian, a small swirl gradually began to appear on his purple energy vortex.

Whoosh!

Qi Ying sprang into the air and landed outside the courtyard.

Whoosh! Whoosh!

He threw punches and kicks, making his True Energy circulate relentlessly within his body, and the small swirl on his energy vortex began to rotate faster and faster. As a result, it was able to stir up more and more purple True Energy.

Finally.

Crackle pop!

After finishing seven complete cycles of the Purple Energy Cultivation Method’s internal and external sections, a series of cracks and pops erupted from his joints.

The True Energy within his body became more abundant, and his meridians were also expanded slightly.

However, the most important change took place in his dantian!

A second purple energy vortex had appeared, which was quite a bit smaller than the existing one, but it still indicated that his cultivation base had reached the Second Energy Martial Stage.

Whoosh!

True Energy erupted from the soles of Qi Ying’s feet, and he launched himself into the air.

He was able to jump up to a height of close to twenty feet, which was three feet more than what he had been capable of in the past.

He then launched a punch at the river.

Splash!

A splash that was several dozen feet in height emerged.

Qi Ying had a rough gauge on the improvements he had made. His power and speed hadn’t been enhanced by a lot, but his quality of and capacity for True Energy had improved to a certain extent.

For Energy Martial Stage warriors, the main improvements came not in the physical aspects, but more so in their True Energy.