Chapter 53: The Murderer
After returning to the Tea Mountain Outpost, everyone went about as if nothing had happened, each returning to their respective homes.
Su Hao and Wu Yuntian sat facing each other at the stone table in the courtyard, talking about the events of the past year.
Su Hao spoke three sentences. The first was about the good qualities of the instructors at the Warrior Academy, the second about how friendly his classmates were, and the third about how he had learned a lot and advanced to the level of Master.
Wu Yuntian only said one sentence, "The Tea Mountain Outpost is the same as before."
In those simple statements, both father and son were able to see the stories that had happened to each other, demonstrating their strong understanding of one another.
After a moment of silence, Su Hao unpacked his large package and introduced each item to Wu Yuntian one by one.
Wu Yuntian listened attentively without saying a word. After Su Hao finished introducing everything, he didn't even ask where Su Hao got so much money to buy all these things. He simply moved the items into the house.
When Wu Yuntian came out again, Su Hao asked, "Father, have you made any progress with the Blood Qi Enhancement Wave?"
Wu Yuntian furrowed his brows, nodded and shook his head, saying, "I can feel something, but I can't achieve the level of control you described."
Su Hao understood. Without the support of systematic data, it would be extremely difficult for someone to accurately locate that trace amount of special substance within their body.
The reason he was able to discover the Blood Qi Enhancement Wave smoothly was that the system had collected a large amount of data and presented the results directly to him after processing.
Even he didn't know how to help Wu Yuntian. He couldn't display the data from the Elastic Ball Space to others.
Su Hao nodded and said, "Take it slow. Feeling something is a good start."
Suddenly, Su Hao thought of something and asked, "Father, do you know about 'Beast Patterns'?"
Wu Yuntian shook his head and said, "I know, but I only know that it's related to advancing to Grandmaster. I don't know anything else."
Su Hao said, "Indeed, Beast Patterns are indeed the key to advancing to Master. As long as you successfully imprint the Beast Patterns into your body and construct a new Blood Qi circulation network, you can advance to Master. So as long as you have the corresponding Beast Patterns, Father, you can also advance to Master."
"But I can't give you the Beast Patterns in my body. They are too complex, and the academy has regulations that prohibit unauthorized teaching. I promised the teachers as well. So in the future, I will help you..." Su Hao hadn't finished speaking when Wu Yuntian interrupted, saying, "I understand!"
He continued, "Even if I have the Beast Patterns now, I still can't advance to Master."
Su Hao asked in confusion, "Why?"
Wu Yuntian sighed and said, "My Blood Qi intensity is stuck at the last bottleneck and hasn't reached the limit of my body. So I am far from meeting the minimum requirements to advance to Master."
Su Hao pondered for a moment and said, "Is that so?"
Wu Yuntian smiled bitterly and said, "You've never encountered the so-called bottleneck since you were young, so you can't feel it. My previous teacher told us that to advance to Master, one must condense their Blood Qi close to the limit of their body in order to have a chance of success."
Then he looked at Su Hao and said, "With what you told me about the Blood Qi Enhancement Wave, I have some clues and a slight chance of breaking through the bottleneck. Without it, I'm afraid I would be stuck here for the rest of my life, unable to make any progress."
Su Hao felt Wu Yuntian's helplessness and fell into deep thought.
He didn't believe he was a genius, so if he could master the Blood Qi Enhancement Wave, then others could certainly do the same.
Therefore, Su Hao added a long-term task to his log: Simplify the path of advancement for warriors.
After thinking for a while, he added another one: Decrypt the secrets of rune specialization.
If he could complete these two tasks, Su Hao would be able to change the whole world with his own strength.
Warriors would no longer exclude ordinary people, the transformation of Blood Qi would no longer be as difficult as ascending to the heavens, and the inscription of Beast Patterns would no longer be a secret.
If a large number of Master warriors emerged in this world, the situation of the human race would improve.
He had gained unimaginable knowledge from this world, and he was grateful for it. This was the best way for Su Hao to give back to this world.
"My knowledge is still not enough. What I need most now is to learn more about Beast Patterns and Blood Qi theory."
To thoroughly study a matter, break it down into simple steps, and write it into a set of materials that everyone can understand is not a simple task. Besides requiring an imaginative mind, it also requires extensive knowledge.
...
After staying at the Tea Mountain Outpost for three days, Su Hao bid farewell to Wu Yuntian and returned to Lingyun Town, where he moved into the dormitory of the Lingyun Warrior Academy.
At this time, the Lingyun Warrior Academy had become desolate. The teachers were all on vacation, reportedly going out to explore the wilderness. None of them could be seen. The only people he encountered were a few scattered students staying at the academy and an old man who looked after the Lingyun Library.
In Su Hao's perception, the old man's Blood Qi was extremely rich and powerful, reaching the level of a high-ranking Grandmaster, even stronger than a high-ranking Master. However, he had never seen the man go anywhere else and had almost always stayed in the Lingyun Library.
"Don't you need to use the restroom?" a question popped into Su Hao's mind, but he quickly dismissed it.
The atmosphere of the academy suited Su Hao's taste. He liked studying in this quiet environment.
What surprised Su Hao was that he actually saw Xiao Mei, the little girl who had cried when he frightened her in the library. She was absorbed in reading, just as before.
He hadn't expected Xiao Mei to stay at the academy as well.
But they were strangers to each other, at most familiar strangers, and Su Hao had no intention of paying attention to her. He simply focused on his own reading.
Time passed quickly.
In the first half month, Su Hao intensified his efforts to replenish his Blood Qi, aiming to fill the rune network within his body as soon as possible. He also spent his time in the Lingyun Library reading books.
After half a month, Su Hao had finished reading all the useful materials in the library. He began visiting other libraries in Lingyun Town. Whenever he found something useful, he bought it and brought it back to the Lingyun Library to read. After finishing a book, he placed it directly into the library as supplementary material.
If he couldn't afford it, he would quickly flip through it and record everything in the Elastic Ball Space, then read it slowly when he got back.
Because of this, he was stopped by the library owner several times.
So
Su Hao came up with a compromise. If he couldn't afford it, he would spend ten copper coins to rent it for ten minutes and return it afterwards.
For the library owner, ten copper coins were practically free money, so he agreed to Su Hao's proposal.
In this way, Su Hao actually managed to borrow a book for free using ten copper coins, and both sides felt like they hadn't lost out.
Suddenly, one evening as Su Hao was leaving the library, he heard a topic being discussed by almost everyone on the street.
"Be careful tonight, I heard that five more people went missing last night!"
"It's terrifying. People were mysteriously disappearing in the northern part of the city a few days ago, and now it's happening in the southern part. I wonder if it will come to our area."
"Why are you saying such nonsense? Do you want to die faster?"
"They say it's the work of a murderer, but what if there's a savage beast lurking in the city, devouring people?"
"That's highly possible!"
"For the past seven days, people have been disappearing every day. It's definitely not a coincidence."
"Don't worry! Our Lingyun Town's guard team has already started investigating. Whoever is behind this will soon be exposed. Who cares about that nonsense!"
...
Su Hao listened along the way and couldn't help but furrow his brows. "A murderer? Could it really be some savage beast that has infiltrated the city?"
After thinking for a while, Su Hao quickly dismissed the idea. It wasn't something he needed to worry about, as there was a guard team for that!
The guard team of Lingyun Town may be small in numbers, but they were the most powerful organization in the town. The ordinary members were elite high-ranking warriors, and even the lowest-ranking squad leaders were Master warriors. Those in higher positions included high-ranking Master warriors, and the commander of the guard team was a Great Teacher-level warrior.
"Studying books is still the most important."
After reading a large number of books recently, he had gained a better understanding of powerful wild beasts in the wilderness. He understood that obtaining a complete Beast Pattern was not easy.
It wasn't as simple as he imagined, where killing a random savage beast would yield a complete Beast Pattern. Instead, one had to slaughter numerous savage beasts of the same kind, extracting incomplete initial Beast Patterns from each one, and then compare them to finally obtain a complete Beast Pattern.
Su Hao held a book titled "Warrior Ah Qiang's Wilderness Exploration" as he walked towards the academy. With this book and another one he recorded in the Elastic Ball Space called "The Secrets of Savage Beasts Exploration," he had enough material to keep him occupied for a day.
(translated by begs)