156: Chapter 156 Solution

Finally, it was resolved! Lin Tian breathed a sigh of relief.

This battle had not been easy to win because the opponent's strength was formidable; he had only managed to gain the upper hand and kill the opponent by relying on his footwork.

If they had been on land, he would have had no chance at all.

In this battle, he had also sustained some minor injuries. He first circulated his blood Qi to suppress the injuries within his body, then opened his eyes and swam forward.

Jin Ze's corpse lay quietly on the silt at the bottom of the water, with several unknown small fish pecking at his wounds, scattering in fright when the current brought by Lin Tian's approach disturbed them.

Lin Tian stopped beside him and reached out to check his neck—the skin was icy cold, there was no pulse, and his breath had completely ceased.

Those eyes were still half-open, the pupils dilated, with a trace of solidified unwillingness remaining in their depths.

Lin Tian withdrew his fingers and began to search his body.

First, his chest.

Several silver banknotes had been soaked soft by the water, totaling over three thousand taels; he carefully peeled them apart and smoothed them out layer by layer.

There were several bottles of Medicinal Pill; the stoppers of the porcelain bottles had been sealed with wax, providing good airtight protection, so no water had gotten in.

Lin Tian pulled out a stopper and sniffed; the medicinal fragrance was rich. It was a high-grade Qi Gathering pill for assisting in Cultivate, of a higher grade than the Qixia Pill, and it was likely worth quite a bit of money.

Next was his waist. There was a package sewn from animal hide, tied tightly.

Lin Tian untied the cord and opened the package; inside were seven Spirit Medicine neatly arranged.

The roots were intact, the leaves were plump, and each one was individually wrapped in special oil paper, preserved with extreme care.

Lin Tian identified them by the faint light filtering down from the surface—three Jade Marrow Ganoderma, two Red Sun Ginseng, one Purple Vein Ganoderma, and another he could not name, but judging by its quality, it was at least a fifty-year-old treasure.

Seven Spirit Medicine, plus the water lotus and scroll he had just obtained from the skeleton, along with these Medicinal Pill and silver banknotes, made for a harvest far exceeding his expectations.

Finally, his gaze fell upon the two chains still clutched in Jin Ze's hands.

The chains were entirely azure blue, emitting a faint, cold light in the dim underwater rays.

He reached out to pry open Jin Ze's stiff fingers and pulled the chains from his grasp.

The chains felt icy cold in his hand and were much heavier than they looked. The texture was smooth and fine, and the runes engraved on the chain links were extremely exquisite; each rune was only the size of a grain of rice, arranged neatly, with light faintly flowing across them.

He held the two chains in his hand and tried striking them with the autumn water sword.

With a crisp clanging sound, sparks flashed and vanished underwater. Not even a scratch was left on the chain.

Lin Tian raised an eyebrow. The autumn water sword was, at the very least, a precious blade capable of cutting through iron like mud; ordinary iron chains would have broken long ago under a single strike. This chain was completely undamaged; its material was definitely extraordinary.

He coiled the two chains and hung them at his waist, then checked Jin Ze's body one more time to see if anything had been missed. After confirming there was nothing else, he tapped his feet lightly against a reef at the bottom, his figure flickered, and he swam rapidly toward the surface.

Outside the pool, Jin Shuanger was sitting under a large tree.

She leaned against the rough trunk, hugging her knees with both hands, the tips of her deerskin boots gently kicking the moss on the ground rhythmically.

This was already her third position—at first, she had stood by the pool, craning her neck to look, but after watching for a long time without the water surface moving at all, her neck had grown sore.

Later, she switched to squatting, but after squatting for a while, her legs went numb, so she found this tree to lean against.

She looked up through the gaps in the branches at the sky; the morning light had already turned into bright daylight. Calculating the time, her brother had been down there for quite a while.

But she wasn't very worried. Back at the Bailong River, her brother could dive in and stay at the bottom for nearly half an hour; no matter how deep this pool was, it was nothing to her brother.

Her gaze was somewhat unfocused, and various messy thoughts churned in her mind—she wondered if the person who had jumped in holding a stone earlier was still at the bottom, and if her brother had found any good treasures.

Just as she was thinking this, the water surface suddenly rippled.

Jin Shuanger's eyes lit up. She scrambled up from under the tree, brushed the grass clippings off her skirt, a smile blooming on her face, and started running toward the edge of the pool: "Brother—"

The tail end of the word "Brother" hadn't even left her throat before it was abruptly stuck there.

The head that emerged from the water was not Jin Ze's.

That face was younger than Jin Ze's, with delicate features, and hair soaking wet, plastered against his forehead; he was treading water while raising a hand to wipe the water droplets from his face.

Jin Shuanger's footsteps came to a sudden halt; her deerskin boots slipped on the gravel ground, and she nearly fell.

Without thinking, her body instinctively flashed, and she hid behind the large tree. Leaning against the trunk, she held her breath.

Just as she hid, Lin Tian walked out of the water. He was soaked through, his clothes clinging to his body, water dripping from the hem of his clothes and pooling into a small puddle at his feet.

He stood by the pool, circulating the blood Qi within his body. The Purple Qi Diagram Mind-Cultivation Technique roared through his Meridians, and a surge of scorching Qi rose from his Dantian, spreading along his Meridians throughout his entire body.

A layer of white mist rose from the surface of his skin, and his soaked robes were steamed dry within a few breaths.

The hem of his clothes no longer dripped, his hair no longer clung to his face, and he looked completely refreshed; even the puddle of water at his feet had been baked into a faint water stain by the heat radiating from his body.

He looked left and right; the surroundings were quiet and still. Apart from the rustling of leaves in the wind and a few vague bird calls in the distance, there was no sound at all.

He did not linger; his figure flickered, and employing the Cloud Shadow Step, he vanished into the depths of the dense forest in a few flashes.

Jin Shuanger peeked half her head out from behind the tree, watching Lin Tian's back flicker a few times in the shadows of the dense forest before disappearing.

She slowly exhaled the breath she had been holding for so long, her back pressed against the rough tree bark, her heart pounding violently. She didn't dare to go into the water, so she could only continue to wait.

She sat back under the tree, hugged her knees again, and stared straight at the deep green surface of the pool, barely even blinking.

She waited for another long while.

She couldn't say exactly how long; she only knew that the tree shadows had moved from the left to the right, and the angle of the sunlight filtering through the branches had changed several times.

Suddenly, the water surface rippled again. This time, the ripples were much larger than before, as if something heavy was slowly floating up from the bottom of the water.

Then, a figure surfaced. The person was tall and burly, with broad shoulders, wearing clothes exactly the same as Jin Ze's.

Jin Shuanger sprang up from under the tree, a brilliantly radiant smile blooming on her face, and ran toward the edge of the pool: "Brother!"

She ran two steps, but on the third step, her pace slowed abruptly, and on the fourth step, she stopped. Something was wrong.

Her brother wasn't swimming up to the surface; he was floating up. His body was drifting face down on the water, limbs splayed, motionless, swaying gently with the ripples.

A long gash had torn through the clothing on his back, the exposed flesh turned white from being soaked in water, and the edges of the wound were neat—it was clearly sliced open by an extremely sharp sword blade.

Jin Shuanger's smile froze on her face. She stumbled toward the edge of the pool, reached out to grab Jin Ze's collar, gritted her teeth, and used all her strength to drag him out of the water.

Jin Ze's body was heavy—the kind of heavy that felt dead-weight. She dragged him a few steps, fell sitting onto the gravel on the bank, then climbed up to keep dragging, her deerskin boots kicking several deep gouges into the gravel.

Finally, she dragged him onto level ground. She knelt beside him, trembling as she extended a finger to check Jin Ze's breath—there was no breath.

She checked his neck—no pulse. Then she touched his chest—the location of his heart was silent; there was no movement at all.

Jin Shuanger was completely stunned.

She knelt beside Jin Ze's corpse, maintaining the posture of checking his neck pulse, and remained kneeling, motionless, for quite a while.

The mountain breeze blew over, causing the stray hairs on her forehead to sway gently, making the leaves by the pool rustle, and causing the pool water to ripple with fine waves.

Jin Ze lay there; he would never stand up again and say, "Little sister, you wait outside," never again smile and say, "Your swimming skills aren't good, don't go into the water," and never again squat by the stream in the dense forest to wash his face, only to be dragged over by his little sister, shouting and yelling, to see the pool.

Her eyes turned red.

Tears welled up from her eyes, streaming down her cheeks and dripping onto the back of Jin Ze's cold hand. She did not wail; she just let the tears flow ceaselessly. As they flowed, she suddenly raised her hand and wiped fiercely, smearing tears and snot together on the back of her hand, then gritted her teeth and raised her head.

In those eyes, reddened from crying, the sorrow faded layer by layer, revealing the hatred beneath, which had been honed even sharper by the washing of tears.

"That young man." Her voice was as hoarse as sandpaper scraping against an iron plate, every word squeezed out from between her teeth. "There were only two people in the pool. It must have been him who killed my brother." She clenched her fists.

Her nails dug into the flesh of her palms, seeping a trace of blood. "Even if he wasn't the one who killed him directly, he absolutely cannot escape responsibility."

She knelt beside Jin Ze's corpse, head bowed, her shoulders trembling violently.

After a long time, she raised her head again, looking in the direction where Lin Tian had vanished. Her eyes were devoid of tears, leaving only cold hatred.

"Damnable brat, you just wait. Our Jin family will absolutely not let you off."