Jenne immediately blushed.
Ever since the night of the banquet, when Keane had openly said that Linley was Jenne’s fiancé, all of the citizens of the prefectural city of Cerre had really come to believe this was the case. Even the servants believe it. Naturally, this made Jenne quite embarrassed.
“Oh, right.” Linley waved his hand with a smile.
Suddenly, in front of the courtyard, four large chests appeared out of nowhere. The chests were all open, and they were filled with all sorts of artworks, valuable magicite cores, and some rare, highly precious materials.
“What is this?” Keane and Jenne were both stunned.
“These are the possessions of Holmer’s clan. I’m not too sure what the valuation of these four chests is. Most likely, over a million gold coins. Take these as well.” Linley took out eight magicrystal cards. “These are the un-imprinted magicrystal cards of Holmer’s clan. There’s eight cards in total. Each of them should have a million gold coins stored within.”
Linley had overheard this information from Madame Wade’s conversation with her two brothers. Only then had he learned about the value of these magicrystal cards.
“This… this…” Keane and Jenne, and even Lambert, stared at Linley in shock.
“All combined, this should be worth nearly ten million gold coins, right? With these… you won’t have to be too stingy and tight-fisted in managing the prefectural city of Cerre. Alright, time for me to go train.”
Linley casually tossed the eight magicrystal cards into the chests, then turned and left.
Jenne, Keane, and Lambert all stared at the four chests, as well as the eight runed magicrystal cards. They didn’t know what to say.
“Sis.” Keane looked at Jenne.
Jenne was stunned. “Originally, when I asked big brother Ley to help us, I said I would give him ten thousand gold coins. This…”
The two siblings really had no idea as to what they should say. They had offered ten thousand gold to Linley to ask him to help them out, but he only took a single gold coin… and now, gave them this fortune worth ten million gold coins!
Ten million gold coins!
This was an extremely amazing fortune.
When the Debs clan of the Kingdom of Fenlai was at its most flourishing, its net worth was only around a hundred million gold coins. After the repercussions of the smuggling affair, their net worth dropped to around ten million gold coins, but despite that, they were still a major clan of Fenlai.
“Miss, young master, this Mr. Ley really is no ordinary person.” Lambert’s expression was very solemn.
Jenne and Keane both nodded.
That went without saying. How could an ordinary person so casually toss out ten million gold coins?
“Just then, when Mr. Ley waved his hands, these four chests appeared out of nowhere. If my prediction is correct… Mr. Ley is in possession of a legendary interspatial ring!” Lambert’s face was extremely serious.
“An interspatial ring?” Jenne and Keane had never even heard of such a thing.
Lambert nodded. “Right. Interspatial rings are priceless treasures. In the Yulan continent, they are a proof of one’s stature and power. In the legends that I have heard, even when people offered to buy one for hundreds of millions of gold coins, no one has ever been willing to sell one.”
“Hundreds of millions of gold coins?!” Jenne and Keane were wide-eyed.
What would hundreds of millions of gold coins look like if you put them all in one place? They didn’t even dare imagine what an enormous fortune like that would look like.
“In the entire Northwest Administrative Province, only the legendary clan leader of the Jacques clan, the governor for the entire province, has an interspatial ring.” Having been in the prefectural city of Cerre for many years, Lambert knew quite a bit about the affairs of the Jacques clan.
“Are you talking about… Great-Grandfather McKenzie?” Keane immediately said.
The two greatest source of pride for the Jacques clan was their first clan leader, Jacques, and their legendary clan leader, McKenzie Jacques.
In the past Jacques had been an ordinary commoner. He ended up joining the army, and was continuously promoted through the ranks, and also made major contributions to the O’Brien Empire. In the end, he even founded a new legion for the O’Brien Empire; the Jacques Legion.
As Jacques grew famous, he founded his own Jacques clan.
The Emperor even gave the Northwest Administrative Province to Jacques for his clan to manage. From this, one could tell how greatly Jacques was favored by the imperial clan.
But of course… the first clan leader was famous because of his military abilities in leading armies. With regards to how personally powerful he was, up till his dying day, he still was still just a warrior of the eighth rank.
But McKenzie Jacques was the pride of the clan. Over fifty years ago, McKenzie had entered the Saint level before the age of two hundred.
A Saint-level combatant!
Once a clan produced a Saint-level combatant, so long as that combatant didn’t perish and the clan didn’t rebel, the clan’s glory would never diminish.
“Great-Grandfather McKenzie, has an interspatial ring?” Keane was surprised.
“Right. And he has one only because in the past, his Imperial Majesty, the Emperor himself, personally gifted it to him,” Lambert said emotionally. “The Jacques clan has always been proud of this fact. You must understand, even many of the kings of various kingdoms in the Yulan continent do not possess an interspatial ring.”
Only now did Jenne and Keane completely understand how rare and valuable these interspatial rings were.
“But I didn’t expect… that Mr. Ley would also be in possession of an interspatial ring. No wonder… no wonder ten million gold coins was nothing to him.”
Jenne and Keane felt as though they couldn’t breathe.
“I thought I had a very high rank as the successor to the city governorship. I thought I could give big brother Ley a really, really important official position to serve in. But it seems as though… big brother Ley…” Keane was now beginning to understand.
The governor of a prefectural city, to the ordinary people, was someone as high above them as the heavens were.
But to experts such as Linley, it was nothing at all. He could kill one whenever he wanted to.
111
The Vast Earth
A month later, the order came down from the clan leader of the Jacques clan; Keane was to assume the position of city governor of the prefectural city of Cerre. However, prior to achieving the age of maturity, his sister, Jenne, was to assist him in managing the affairs of the city.
“Big brother Ley, you are leaving?”
Jenne, Keane, and Lambert all looked at Linley with astonishment.
With Keane the governor of Cerre and Jenne his steward, the two of them now had comparatively relaxed lives. Just as the two of them wanted to find a way to repay Linley, he suddenly declared his intention to depart from the prefectural city of Cerre.
“Big brother Ley.” Jenne’s eyes were starting to turn slightly red.
Linley was carrying his heavy sword, and Bebe was on his shoulders. By his side was Haeru, his Blackcloud Panther. Smiling, Linley said, “In this developed, urbanized environment within Cerre City, my training is negatively influenced. I won’t be going too far. I just intend to go to a valley in the mountains near Cerre City to quietly train for a time.”
To Linley, the most important thing was still training. Linley, who was still constantly improving himself, hadn’t yet reached a bottleneck, which made training all the more important. At a time like this, he had to seize the opportunity to raise his power as much as possible.
There were records of Dragonblood Warriors of the Baruch clan reaching the Saint level and dominating the world in a matter of decades due to intensive training.
Experts had to be able to endure loneliness.
“Valley?” Jenne an
d Keane both inwardly let out sighs of relief.
“Alright, if I have some free time, I’ll come visit. I’ve already helped you as much as I can. In the future, you’ll have to rely on yourselves,” Linley said with a laugh.
When he looked at these two siblings, Keane and Jenne, Linley would often think of his own younger brother, Wharton. Right now, he and Wharton also had lost their parents.
“I wonder how Wharton is doing. After I finish understanding the level beyond ‘impose’, I’ll go pay him a visit.”
Linley knew very well that there was no need for him to disturb Wharton over the course of Wharton’s training in the O’Brien Empire. In addition, only by learning on his own would Wharton grow fastest.
Once Linley was by Wharton’s side, in all likelihood, Wharton would be inadvertently influenced in a negative way.
East of Cerre City, there was a vibrant, green mountain range with an unassuming little valley. Linley erected a wooden room here, then began to engage in quiet training.
Late at night, within the mountain valley. There was a green plain of grass, and even a little lake in the middle of it.
Linley was seated in a meditative trance close to the lake. His eyes were closed as he attuned himself to nature. By his side, there was a lit campfire, casting a flickering light across Linley’s face.
Linley could feel the expansiveness of the vast earth, the flows of the wind, and the streams of water. He could feel the passion of the flames…
As a magus, especially one with exceptional affinity for both wind and earth elemental essence, Linley’s ability to attune with nature was far superior to most warriors.
This was the reason why that ancestor of the Baruch clan who used a heavy warhammer as his weapon only managed to reach the level of ‘impose’ after entering the Saint level. After all, it was harder for warriors to become one with nature, compared to magi.
“The ‘Thunderbolt’ technique learned when I reached the level of ‘wielding something heavy as though it were light’ contained explosive force, like the eruption of a volcano. As for the so-called ‘impose’, it contains the ‘imposing force’ of nature itself, of earth, fire, water, and wind. However…”
After meditating for a long time, Linley suddenly understood.
“The ‘impose’ level is merely an ‘imposing force’ that borrows from the strength of the surrounding nature. The level that is above ‘impose’ should be all-embracing. I need to pursue the most suitable avenue for this.”
In the darkness of the night, Linley remained there in the meditative pose. His eyes then suddenly opened, and they were as resplendent as the stars in the night sky.
“Different weapons will need to be used in different ways. The strength of the heavy sword lies in its weight! As for this heavy sword, Bladeless, it naturally doesn’t rely on a sharp edge. It openly relies on its tremendous weight and makes open, direct assaults.”
Linley’s spirit was dimly sensing something.
The principles of training with the heavy sword were very similar to the fundamental principles of the earth itself.
“The vast earth is dense and heavy. The vast earth is boundless. The vast earth is stable…” Linley was holding the adamantine heavy sword in his hands, but his heart had totally merged with the throbbing pulse of the earth.
The unique vibrating pulse of the earth had a one-of-a-kind, heart-shaking rhythm. Generally speaking, only people who had reached a very high level of attunement to the earth would sense it.
Linley rose to his feet.
He began to silently wield the adamantine heavy sword about. As the adamantine heavy sword danced about, Linley’s own movements and the movements of his sword began to enter into a certain unique rhythm.
This was a rhythm that was like the pulse of one’s heart.
“Whoosh.”
The adamantine heavy sword seemed to carry a million pounds of force, as it heavily slashed through the air again and again. As Linley swung his heavy sword repeatedly, he felt as though he had totally become one with the earth. Just by training with his heavy sword, he felt as though he himself now carried the weight of the earth.
“Boom.”
Linley’s heavy adamantine sword suddenly pierced directly up into the air. Several explosive booms could be heard in succession. This empty stab upwards had caused the air itself to explode. This was inconceivable! This was because no matter how fast a weapon could move, it could at most cause a single sonic boom. To cause multiple sonic booms was virtually impossible.
“Hrm?” Linley’s eyes suddenly lit up.
But just like that, upon becoming distracted, Linley was no longer absorbed with that near-miraculous feeling of being one with nature.
“What happened just then? I didn’t use any battle-qi, but my power split into multiple rhythmic pulses in that attack.”
Linley began to ponder this question.
When in the middle of training, people would sometimes enter into a certain state and reach an astonishing level of power. But if they weren’t able to totally understand the state they had entered, they wouldn’t be able to wield its power again so easily.
What Linley needed to do now was to constantly ponder and constantly train.
He needed to master everything and be in complete control!
The sky was ocean-blue, a pure azure color without a hint of other colors. A few beautiful, lazy clouds drifted across it. Linley’s life in the valley was indeed very quiet.
The blowing wind. The rippling lake.
Right now, Linley wasn’t training. He was fishing in the valley lake. A person couldn’t always be training; if they did, it could actually be counter-productive.
If he wanted to go fishing, he would. If he wanted to go to sleep, he would.
His heart had become one with the world, one with nature.
When he did train, this made his rate of improvement extremely high.
“Big brother Ley.” From outside the valley, a happy voice could be heard. Linley turned and saw Jenne on a fine stallion. Behind her, there were two pretty female servants on horses. These two female servants were clearly quite talented, as their movements on their horses were those of practiced riders.
“Jenne.” Linley put down his fishing pole and stood up.
Neither Bebe nor Haeru were currently present. The two of them would often go deeper into the mountains to hunt for wild beasts to eat. The beasts in this mountain range Linley had chosen to stay in were all ordinary animals. Magical beasts were extremely rare.
“Big brother Ley, these are some of the dishes that I prepared.” Jenne removed a package from the back of her horse. The package was well wrapped. “You definitely can’t have been eating too well here. Come, big brother Ley, have a good taste.”
Jenne unwrapped the package, one layer at a time. Inside was a metal box, which was filled with all sorts of dishes as well as rice.
Linley took a sniff.
“Mmm. It really does smell good.” Linley laughed.
Jenne’s face immediately turned red with excitement.
But in his heart, Linley was sighing. How could Linley not tell how Jenne felt? In terms of both appearance as well as temperament, Jenne was all but perfect. But having experienced so much, it was hard for Linley to open the depths of his heart and let anyone else in.
“Love?”
Linley sighed to himself.
He didn’t have any interest in affairs of the heart. The most important thing for now was to focus on his training. Right at this moment, a scene couldn’t help but suddenly flash through Linley’s mind.
After Linley’s father had died, all the nobles had come to pay their respects at the town of Wushan. That night, Delia had come to visit him. She had wanted to tell Linley that she was returning to the Yulan Empire. And that night, before she had left… Delia had kissed him.
“Delia?”
Aside from Alice, perhaps the only person Linley felt some romantic affection toward
s was this girl whom he had known since his very first year at the Ernst Institute, especially after the open displays of affection Delia had shown him. Although Linley had never admitted it openly, in his heart, Delia’s image had been engraved in his mind.
“Big brother Ley, eat up!” Jenne said hopefully.
Linley sighed to himself. “I can’t let Jenne waste her youth like this.” As he thought to himself, Linley began to eat heartily while praising, “This really is excellent. The taste is wonderful.”
Hearing Linley’s praise, Jenne was all smiles.
“Jenne, in the future, though, you don’t need to come visit me. When I am training, I don’t like to be disturbed,” Linley said to Jenne.
Jenne was startled.
“Oh,” Jenne mumbled, then she squeezed out a smile. “Then when you have some free time, big brother Ley, come visit us at the castle.”
“Sure.” Linley could only respond affirmatively.
The days of Linley training in the mountain valley passed by very quickly. In the blink of an eye, over a month had passed. With regards to how to properly use his adamantine heavy sword, Linley had gradually begun to find the proper path.
So long as he persevered down this path, in a few years’ time, he definitely would be able to reach a new level that was beyond the ‘impose’ level!
Within a secluded hotel in the prefectural city of Cerre.
This hotel was very dimly lit, and the atmosphere tended towards the dark, giving the impression of dusk. Each table was arranged in a very orderly manner, and between each booth, there was a screen.
This was a very quiet hotel with a great deal of atmosphere. The first time Linley had come here, he had taken a liking to it.
The expenses here were fairly high as well.
While he was training, generally speaking, every seven or eight days, Linley would come here and drink wine while listening to the elegant, beautiful music of the hotel. Every so often, he would hear some gossip from travelers.
Dragonblood: Book 2 of the Coiling Dragon Saga Page 87