TL: Etude
After killing Li Hai, Ye Tian's figure once again vanished into the darkness.
"Any movement?"
Mo Shaobei heard a noise outside his room. It was the sound of someone falling. Although he wasn't sure what had happened, he still called out, "Li Hai, what's going on out there?"
No response.
"Something's wrong," Mo Shaobei muttered to himself.
Li Hai had just stepped out, and with his Martial Warrior stage keen hearing, he should have been able to hear him even from a hundred meters away. But now there was no response from Li Hai. Something had definitely gone wrong.
A sense of danger emerged, and Mo Shaobei inexplicably felt afraid.
"I can't go out; I absolutely can't go out," he thought.
Mo Shaobei had a feeling that if he went out, he would surely die.
"Someone, come here!" Mo Shaobei shouted loudly.
Although he didn't know if this approach would work, he certainly didn't want to sit and wait for death. The Mo family might not have many Martial Warriors, but if he attracted attention, the strong ones among them would rush over one by one. By then, even Elite Martial Warriors wouldn't be able to escape from the Mo family's grasp.
Outside, Ye Tian was hiding in the darkness in a shadowy form. Hearing Mo Shaobei's shout, he realized that waiting for Mo Shaobei to come out was unrealistic.
"Mo Shaobei is too cautious and too timid. It looks like I'll have to force my way in," Ye Tian thought to himself.
Immediately, he deactivated his shadow talent and activated his speed talent, rushing toward Mo Shaobei's room using his speed talent. In the blink of an eye, Ye Tian broke through the door.
"It's you!" Mo Shaobei was stunned upon seeing Ye Tian.
Then he saw the black knife in Ye Tian's hand and his expression changed dramatically. "Shadow's blade... did you kill Shadow?"
At that moment, he finally understood why he hadn't heard from Shadow for three days. It turned out that Shadow had been killed by Ye Tian.
"So it was you who sent someone to kill me!" Ye Tian had been ninety percent sure it was Mo Shaobei's doing, but now he was one hundred percent certain.
"You have no aura of elemental energy. A Martial Disciple might be able to assassinate a waste like Li Hai, but killing me is nearly impossible. Just wait another minute, and the experts of my Mo family will arrive. You're as good as dead," Mo Shaobei said, forcing himself to appear calm.
In reality, he was panicking inside. Shadow was a terrifying assassin who could make even Martial Warriors pale in fear. If he had fallen to Ye Tian, it meant that even as a Martial Disciple, Ye Tian was stronger than many Martial Warriors.
"One minute? No, you won't last ten seconds," Ye Tian moved.
"Shadow Kill!"
The black knife transformed into a streak of black light, slashing toward Mo Shaobei like lightning. This was a strike amplified by his speed talent, powerful enough to instantly kill an early-stage Martial Warrior.
Mo Shaobei was, after all, a genius, significantly stronger than his peers. He reacted quickly, attempting to block Ye Tian's Shadow Blade with his longsword.
Unfortunately, he had underestimated Ye Tian and the bronze-level knife technique.
In a flash of the blade, Mo Shaobei's right hand was severed from his arm, cut off in a single move.
Before Mo Shaobei could even scream, the second "Shadow Kill" move descended, this time targeting his neck.
"No!" Mo Shaobei screamed in despair within his heart, making every effort to dodge. However, no miracle occurred.
His head flew off his body, landing at a distance, his wide-open eyes filled with disbelief.
After killing Mo Shaobei, Ye Tian didn't even have time to collect the spoils of war. He hurriedly rushed out of the room, entered a shadowy area, and activated his shadow state, swiftly fleeing toward the outside of the Mo family estate.
With the cover of darkness, Ye Tian moved along the shadows. Even when he passed by the Mo family's guards, no one detected him.
However, Ye Tian didn't dare to linger. He was unsure if the Mo family had any Great Martial Warriors. On the surface, the Linhai Base didn't have many Great Martial Warriors, but was that the reality? Ever since he learned that Linhai Base had quite a few Martial Warriors with medium-level talents, he knew that there must be more Great Martial Warriors than meets the eye.
Perhaps these Great Martial Warriors were the trump cards of the major families, not easily deployed. But with the death of a genius with medium-level talent, if the Mo family had a Great Martial Warrior, they would surely be enraged. If he encountered a Great Martial Warrior, even a hundred Ye Tians would be doomed.
Not long after Ye Tian left, many high-ranking members of the Mo family gathered at Mo Shaobei's residence.
A middle-aged woman saw Mo Shaobei's severed head and cried out, "My son!" before fainting.
As for the other members of the Mo family, their faces were grim.
"Who killed my son!" A burly Martial Warrior roared.
His aura erupted, causing surrounding Martial Disciples and even ordinary Martial Warriors to retreat, not daring to approach. This was an Elite Martial Warrior in the mid-stage, just a step away from the late stage. He was Mo Shaobei's father, Mo En, the Tenth Elder of the Mo family.
"Tenth Elder, calm down!" An old man hastily said.
Mo En's eyes filled with bloody tears, his anger reaching its peak. "I only had this one son, and he had medium-level talent. Even I only have low-level talent and reached the mid-stage of Elite Martial Warriors at great cost, unable to progress further. My son had the potential to become a Great Martial Warrior. He was the hope of our Mo family. Now he's dead, and he died in the Mo family estate. How can I be calm!"
Just then, a powerful aura emanated from a distance. All the Mo family members bowed their heads, showing respect. Even Mo En calmed down slightly.
They knew this was the Mo family's only Great Martial Warrior, Elder Mo Changqing.
"Elder, Shaobei is dead!" Mo En knelt on the ground, his face covered in tears.
"I know!" Mo Changqing was also filled with uncontrollable rage, but at this point, the only course of action was to find the murderer and avenge Mo Shaobei.
Mo Changqing arrived at the scene and first looked at Li Hai's corpse, then at Mo Shaobei's. "Li Hai was killed in a single sneak attack. As for Mo Shaobei, he was killed in his room with two slashes. The perpetrator should be an early-stage Martial Warrior, skilled in concealment, otherwise, he couldn't have entered the Mo estate. Moreover, he managed to evade detection from Li Hai, who was also a Martial Warrior. This is definitely not ordinary concealment," Mo Changqing deduced.
"Shadow!" Mo En thought of someone, his eyes filled with intense killing intent.
"It should be Shadow," Mo Changqing nodded. "Only a Martial Warrior like Shadow, with special talents, could instantly kill Li Hai and even overpower Shaobei. Shadow is an assassin and normally wouldn't target the children of major families unless someone offered him an irresistible reward."
In an instant, the Mo family's high-ranking members directed their suspicions toward a few major families that were hostile to them. Mo Shaobei had medium-level talent, which was no secret. If the Mo family provided sufficient resources, they might've produced a second Great Martial Warrior within the next ten years. This was not something certain families would want to see. Sending Shadow to assassinate Mo Shaobei was not impossible.
"Search! We must find out which family did this. Also, offer a bounty for Shadow at any cost. I want to make Shadow regret this for the rest of his life!"