# Chapter 169: The Cause of Death
These old, cunning foxes! Each one more devious than the last, each one better at hiding!
Jiang Wang cursed inwardly.
He was curled up at the side entrance, but his gaze remained fixed upon the main hall.
And so he could clearly see the corpse on the ground—Tian Yong's corpse—rise to its feet.
What was happening?
A reanimated corpse?
Or yet another refined zombie?
But the voice was powerful, full of vitality.
As the figure chanted "the crime deserves death—the intent is equally abhorrent," the traits of death gradually faded from his body.
The stiff flesh softened, the ashen grey receded, and the flush of blood returned.
His heart beat. Blood and vital energy surged.
In the span of a single blink, Tian Yong transformed from a corpse back into the figure Jiang Wang had first seen upon entering the hall!
The instant Tian Yong shed his state of death and spoke, the cloaked zombie reversed course and hurtled toward him at full speed, its fingernails elongating, raking downward in a killing blow.
But Tian Yong was faster. The cloaked zombie had barely turned when his hand was already pressed against the crown of Zhao Fangyuan's head.
He had chosen to act precisely when Zhao Fangyuan was directing the zombie to kill Lian Que—exploiting the gap in attention, catching Zhao Fangyuan completely off guard.
The cloaked zombie froze mid-charge.
Zhao Fangyuan stared at Tian Yong in horror. "Who else refined a corpse? No—you're not a zombie!"
He realized at once. "The kill-urge corrosion was your doing. All of this was your scheme!"
*Thump.*
A muffled sound.
At first, Zhao Fangyuan's head showed no abnormality. But a moment later, blood began streaming from his eyes, nostrils, mouth, and ears.
The interior of his entire skull had been shaken into pulp.
Tian Yong glanced at the hand that had been forming a seal, interrupted halfway, and let out a contemptuous laugh.
Zhao Fangyuan might be a gifted actor, but Tian Yong was no careless fool.
From the very beginning, he had been playing dead.
No—he had truly died once.
Because had he not actually died, he could not have deceived Ji Xiu of Eastern King Valley. The Nine-Death Poison that Ji Xiu had released using his corpse as a medium would not have succeeded either.
He had used some method to genuinely "die," and then revived himself at this moment.
Because he had truly "died," the Nine-Death Poison itself had no effect on him.
And the sole truth was this: he was the one who had set the kill-urge corrosion in motion.
He had been the second to enter the Fourth Heavenly Treasury Dragon Palace. The moment he arrived, he had already conceived his plan—first persuading Jiang Wang to search the wing halls while he slipped back to secretly carve the majority of the formation patterns.
After every cultivator in this Dragon Palace had arrived and no more were expected, he guided them to different areas with the same words.
Then he returned to the main hall, inscribed the final stroke of the formation, and drew everyone back with a scream—immediately feigning death to remove himself from the board.
His death itself was the greatest frame-up against Lian Que. All he had to do next was wait for the Dragon Palace's competitors to slaughter each other.
Everyone would lose control and kill one another. He would then "revive," sweep up the remnants, and harvest the fruits of victory with ease.
This had been his entire design.
And now, he had succeeded.
Though the process had encountered some complications—none of the rivals competing within the Heavenly Treasury Secret Realm were weak—
The final outcome had unfolded exactly as he had planned.
He had nearly succeeded.
The reason it was only "nearly" was because of Jiang Wang.
...
After killing Zhao Fangyuan, Tian Yong wasted no time. He swept the blood from Zhao Fangyuan's face, condensed it into an arrow, and flicked his wrist, sending it straight at Lian Que.
This sudden turn of events allowed the flush of blood on Lian Que's face to surge back as far as his lips. But now, ambushed by the blood arrow, he could only temporarily halt his struggle against the death aura, shifting his body slightly to avoid the vitals.
The blood arrow pierced through his abdomen, and the death aura surged back up to the bridge of his nose.
Yet Lian Que did not even cry out in pain. He simply persisted in his battle against the death aura.
From Ji Xiu to Zhao Fangyuan and now to Tian Yong—the blood and the death aura had wrested control of his face back and forth in this manner, each time reclaiming a sliver of hope only to have it snatched away.
Anyone else would have fallen into despair.
But Lian Que showed not the slightest inclination to give up. He seemed not to understand the meaning of the word.
And while Tian Yong pressed his killing blow and Lian Que fought to survive, Jiang Wang had already launched himself upward like a flood dragon. In an instant, he crossed half the hall and brought his fist crashing down upon Tian Yong's head.
This was something entirely beyond Tian Yong's imagination.
Because if Jiang Wang still possessed the strength to fight, why had he never moved during all those previous opportunities?
When Tian Yong had moved to eliminate his rivals out of caution, he had subconsciously chosen Lian Que first—and the reason was his assessment of the situation.
The more intelligent a person, the more they trusted their own judgment.
It was confidence accumulated from countless correct decisions and countless victories.
And now, that confidence had doomed him.
Tian Yong spun and threw a punch of his own, meeting fist with fist.
But halfway through, Jiang Wang shifted from fist to palm. In his palm, a Flame Flower bloomed.
Jiang Wang held himself aloft with his powerful ability to hang in midair. The Flame Flower shot outward and collided with Tian Yong's fist.
*Boom!*
The entire fist was blasted away.
Amid Tian Yong's uncontrollable cry of pain, Jiang Wang's palm descended once more.
Gritting through the agony, Tian Yong swung his remaining left hand in a counterpunch.
Jiang Wang retracted his hand, evading the fist at its peak force, then lunged forward and seized it—twisting it in a reverse lock!
From the point of contact, Tian Yong's entire left arm erupted in sequence, muscles and bloodlines bursting outward in a spiraling chain.
Bones cracked and shattered.
Jiang Wang seized the momentum and yanked him forward, driving his knee upward in a devastating strike.
The knee strike launched Tian Yong's entire body, sending him flying upward to crash against the hall's pillar.
Jiang Wang tumbled backward through the air.
Tian Yong slid down the pillar, every organ within his body pulverized by the impact. He was irreversibly dead.
Pitiful indeed—all his learning, the techniques and secret arts of the Daze Tian clan, even the ability to manipulate killing intent, none of it had been given the chance to be deployed.
If one spoke of combat readiness, compared to Tian Yong—who had paid a tremendous price to feign death and revive—Jiang Wang was the one who had maintained the most complete fighting strength throughout.
Tian Yong had misjudged only one thing today, one person.
And this was his cause of death.
Jiang Wang stood alone in the hall. Of the cultivators who had competed for this Dragon Palace, all were now dead. Only Lian Que remained, lying on the ground in a dying struggle.
Killing him would make the divine-power Inner Prefecture opportunity his for the taking.
It would be easy—even drawing his sword would be unnecessary. A single Flame Flower would suffice.
But Jiang Wang did not so much as glance at him. Instead, he resumed searching the hall—not looting corpses, but primarily seeking clues to the divine-power opportunity, lest he had overlooked something.
These cultivators who had entered the Heavenly Treasury Secret Realm undoubtedly carried treasures on them. Though the secret realm's rules prevented those items from functioning, the remains of any single corpse would be enough to make Jiang Wang wealthy overnight.
But he could not take a single piece.
Though nothing would be remembered after leaving the Heavenly Treasury Secret Realm, those "relics" would serve as undeniable evidence.
Whichever items he took would indicate whom he had killed. No one would give him the chance to explain.
Even though unrestrained killing within the Heavenly Treasury Secret Realm was tacitly accepted by all, once they left, no one would acknowledge it.
Because nations required rules, humanity required rules, this world required rules.
Jiang Wang had not made a move, but Lian Que could not hold back from speaking first.
"Are you not going to kill me?"
The death aura had been forced below his neck, giving him enough strength for a few more words.
Jiang Wang was examining the pattern on a screen, attempting to uncover some hidden clue, and responded offhandedly, "You have no intention of killing me. Why should I kill you?"
This was a perfectly reasonable statement.
But Lian Que was momentarily stunned, then as if deeply insulted, shouted furiously, "At a time like this, in a place like this, don't play the saint! If you want to kill me, come on—I won't even furrow my brow. Spare me those disgusting, torturous tricks!"
"Disgusting, torturous tricks? What do you mean?" Jiang Wang's eyes were nearly pressed against the dragon painting, yet he still had not found any clue.
He continued aloud, "Flaying the skin? Pulling the tendons? Starting from the toes and roasting over a low flame? Planting grass in your nostrils?"
With each description, Lian Que's eyes widened further.
On that ugly face already contorted by the battle between blood and death, a third color appeared—pale, deathly white.