Coiling Dragon Book 6 (Chp 8 onwards)

Book 6, The Road to Revenge - Chapter 12, The Investigation

Just before his death, Patterson finally understood.

He had, after all, participated in Linley's father's funeral. He knew that Linley's father was already dead.

The funny thing was, just now, he had been hoping that he could leave with his life. But now, he completely understood why Linley had done what he had done. Deep in Patterson's heart, he was unwilling to be resigned to dying like this. Based on his prowess as a warrior of the seventh rank, it wouldn't be too hard to live for another two or three hundred years.

His life should still be long.

"I'm dying, but Clayde, your life won't be much better." As Patterson's soul was drawn to the Netherworld, it contained a thread of hatred, hatred for his brother Clayde.

.....

After watching Patterson die, Linley returned to his normal form.

"Clayde. So the man behind this event was Clayde." Linley frowned deeply.

Clayde himself was a combatant of the ninth rank. Even if Linley was in full Dragonform, he would be at most an early eighth rank combatant.

Clayde was on a totally different level compared to him. Even if Linley were to ambush him, he simply could not harm a warrior of the ninth rank. The gap between them was too great.

And Clayde had tremendous power at his disposal as well.

As the revered ruler of Fenlai, how could he not have many fighters under his banner? And, having been the ruler for many years of the Kingdom of Fenlai, the leading kingdom amongst the six kingdoms of the Holy Union, he had a very close relationship with the Radiant Church. His roots were extremely deep.

In terms of both strength as well as forces available, Linley could not compare to Clayde.

"Perhaps my only advantage right now is that I am operating hidden in the shadows." Linley constantly pondered how to deal with Clayde.

Doehring Cowart appeared from within the Coiling Dragon ring. He immediately urged Linley, "Linley, don't waste any more time here. What you need to do right now is to destroy anything that might reveal you were here. Get back to your own estate immediately, otherwise, if you return too late, when they begin investigating who killed Patterson, they might suspect you."

Linley was startled awake.

Right!

His only advantage was that he was operating from within the shadows. No matter what, he couldn't allow Clayde to be on guard against him.

"Time to burn the evidence to ashes." Linley immediately generated several dozen fireballs which surrounded Patterson's body. Based on his current spiritual energy, the temperature of his fireballs was quite high.

Patterson's body quickly began to burn, while at the same time, an extremely foul odor began to fill the air. After a while, only a few charred yellow bones and ashes remained.

That foul odor made Linley frown.

"Linley, your clothes." Doehring Cowart reminded.

Linley looked down at his clothes. Indeed. After having gone through the Dragonform transformation, his clothes had been totally ripped apart. Linley retrieved his things, and then removed his outer jacket and pants without the slightest hesitation. Instantly, he burnt his clothes to ashes as well.

Linley immediately activated the mechanism.

"Rumble rumble." The stone door once more opened, and Linley hurriedly walked out, then closed the door again.