CH 79

“You’d better start saying your prayers. Shifu said she’s going to deal with you personally,” Yuhu’s two Shijie said, looking at her with pity. Yuhu was curled up into a defeated ball in a corner of the firewood shed, and they couldn’t help feeling sorry for her. They’d grown up together, after all, and they couldn’t possibly feel happy about her impending doom.

“Shijie, how about we…” the Third Shijie Yuquan said, biting her lip as she looked at the eldest Shijie, Yuzhuo. 

“Don’t be dumb. Do you want to die with her?” Yuzhuo said, glaring at her Shimei. She pulled her out of the shed and locked the shed door.

Yuquan couldn’t hold back her tears and started sobbing out loud. She kept looking back at the shed as she was dragged off by her Shijie.

Things around the firewood shed quietened down. Yuhu sat on a pile of firewood. Her tears had stopped falling now; there was no use in crying. At midnight, her Shifu would come and “cleanse” the Sect by dealing with her.

Should she blame herself for having helped Chen Ziqi in a moment of foolishness? When Yuhu thought carefully about it, she concluded that even if she could turn back time, she would have made exactly the same decision. The Sect was holding on to his mother for no good reason, and she had to be returned to him. 

That official from King Wan’s residence – the one called Jiang Liangcai – shortly after he came to the Suxin Sect to pay his respects, the Sect Leader Abbess Wuyin had gone out, and when she returned, she had that beautiful and feisty women in her clutches. During Chang Er’s stay in the Suxin Sect, she scolded everyone she’d come into contact with, and all her sect sisters were deathly afraid of her. The extremely unpopular task of sending food to Chang Er’s residence therefore often fell to Yuhu.

“Bah, this Suxin Sect is nothing more than a brothel full of prostitutes! Sending your disciples to  be my son’s concubines – do you lot feel no shame?” she said, insulting Yuhu and her fellow disciples as she ate the food Yuhu brought. “The best part is, you lot don’t even want to admit that you’re just a bunch of harlots! Instead, you pretend to be some high and mighty female warriors. If I were you, I’d leave this place as soon as possible, so that I won’t find myself dead at the hands of my own sect members!”

That Taifei niangniang had really hit the nail on the head. Yuhu smiled bitterly. She was about to die, that was certain.

The metallic clang of the lock being unlocked sounded from outside the shed. Yuhu tensed up, all the hairs on the back of her neck standing as she stared at the shed door. “Creakkk…” The old, broken-down door made a sharp, unpleasant sound as it opened. Slanted rays of moonlight shone into the shed, outlining the person standing at the door and making that person look particularly fearsome.

It was midnight now. All was calm and quiet. Zhao Surou said that she was going to deal with her disciple personally, and she was as good as her word.

“Shifu,” Yuhu said, getting to her feet slowly. She looked at this woman who had raised her since she was a little girl. Zhao Surou was like a mother to her.

Zhao Surou’s face was cold and hard as she walked over to Yuhu step by step. Moving forward, she would be the Sect Leader of the Suxin Sect, and she needed to be as decisive and ruthless as the Abbess Wuyin. That was the only way she could keep this large, powerful sect within her control. She looked silently at her little disciple for a few moments.

“Yuhu, how old are you now?” she asked, finally breaking the silence. 

“Thirteen,” Yuhu said softly. “It’s the tenth year since you accepted me as your disciple.”

Zhao Surou didn’t say anything. She merely raised her hand slowly.

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Zhao Surou used a key to open the side gate and pushed Yuhu out of it roughly.

Yuhu fell to the ground; Zhao Surou had exerted a great deal of force. She stared in confusion at Zhao Surou. “Shifu?” she asked uncertainly.

“Shifu didn’t raise you for so many years just to kill you,” Zhao Surou said, her tone still cold and hard. “Go, and don’t ever come back.” When she finished speaking, she shut the gate with a clang.

Yuhu stared blankly into space for some time before realising what had happened. Tears flowed freely from her eyes now as she kowtowed respectfully three times in the direction of that side gate. 

“Little Miss Yu, let’s go now,” Wu Bujian said, appearing as if out of nowhere. He pulled Yuhu away with him immediately.

“Big Brother Wu, why are you here?” Yuhu asked in surprise.

“Wang ye asked me to follow you. He was worried something bad would happen to you,” Wu Bujian said. He was still experiencing some trauma from the stress he’d been under earlier; he’d been watching the two of them since they were at the firewood shed, and he had been vacillating about whether to just strike Zhao Surou down. It had all been touch and go, and he wasn’t sure if he would be able to save Yuhu. “Let’s go quickly. If someone sees us, we won’t be able to leave,” he said. After the words left his lips, he remembered that he had an unlucky crow mouth, and spat two times for good measure before tugging on Yuhu and breaking into a run.

Thus, Yuhu found herself back in the Cloud Palace. 

Chen Ziqi felt very sorry for her when he saw her red eyes, which were swollen from crying. He accompanied her for about half a day, chatting with her and trying to make her feel better.

“The Suxin Sect has fallen very far from its original ideals. It’s no loss to you if you don’t go back, really. Look at me – the Imperial family’s also in a terrible state now, and frankly, I think I’d be better off if my surname wasn’t ‘Chen’,” Chen Ziqi said. When she stopped crying, he gave her a copy of the Taisu Wuxin Gong that Dan Yi’s black-clad subordinate had copied out in the cave. “Dan Yi says that this last chapter has a tendency to make people lose control of their qi and go insane. I’ve stuck them together for now so you won’t look at it. Read it when you’re done with all the previous chapters.”

Yuhu looked at the last few pages of the book. It had indeed been stuck together like Chen Ziqi said, and she looked at him with gratitude in her eyes. “Chang Qi gege, thank you,” she said.

Chen Ziqi sighed. When he walked out of Yuhu’s residence, he saw Dan Yi standing on the field outside with his hands behind his back. Yuhu was a human, so she couldn’t stay on Jade Mountain, and had been given a small residence on Jade Bamboo Peak instead. 

The scorching sun of summer beat down on Dan Yi’s scarlet wide-sleeved robe, bathing his tall, toned frame in a golden glow. That beautiful Phoenix looked noble and dignified even when he was standing in a lowly field.

“Palace Master!” A few of the beauties who were working in the fields called out when they saw Dan Yi. They couldn’t resist coming forward to greet him.

They were all gifts sent by the various sects, but they had not been able to obtain the Palace Master’s favour. All they did every day was plant the fields. Some of the beauties had already gotten used to this worry-free lifestyle, but some others were still scheming to get the Palace Master’s attention.

Dan Yi gave them a noncommittal glance, then turned his gaze back to the young bamboo in the field without changing his expression. 

When everyone saw that the Palace Master didn’t respond at all, they all didn’t dare to say more. They bowed respectfully, then left quickly to continue doing their farm work. Only two of the new arrivals remained behind, walking closer to Dan Yi.

“Palace Master…” the two were a brother-sister pair, and they looked very much alike, even though they each also had their own charm. “We are Medicine Men cultivated by the Hundred Grasses Valley, and we can be of much more use working for you than farming the fields.”

“Medicine Men?” Dan Yi said, frowning slightly. He actually had never heard of such a thing before. The Hundred Grasses Valley often sent gifts over, and he vaguely recalled the White Cloud Envoy mentioning these two creatures to him before.

“Ahem ahem!” Chen Ziqi coughed loudly, and the three of them looked over at him. Chen Ziqi raised his chin and walked grandly over to Dan Yi’s side, looking interestedly at the brother-sister pair. “How does one use Medicine Men?” 

The siblings looked at each other, then blushed and lowered their eyes.

Chen Ziqi’s eyebrows shot into his forehead. The storybook he’d read had talked about some dark methods of practicing martial arts which relied on fornication to progress in cultivation. Perhaps these Medicine Men were such vessels of sexual cultivation?

“Perhaps they have to be eaten,” Dan Yi said, after thinking for a bit.

Eaten?! The siblings’ eyes nearly popped out of their sockets, and their jaws fell open. Chen Ziqi nearly choked on his own saliva as well. “Eat them? How would you eat them?” he asked. 

“Some years ago, the Hundred Grasses Valley sent my dad a mosquito-repelling Medicine Man. He just needed to sleep at the door, and mosquitoes and other insects wouldn’t enter the room at all. The type of Medicine Man that assists in cultivation probably needs to have his blood let and then boiled into a soup,” Dan Yi said matter-of-factly. It was true that in that case, putting these two to do farm labour was a waste. He signalled to the brown-clothed man standing watch to come over, instructing him to send the siblings to Elder Mu to see how best they could be cooked.

The two Medicine Men looked horrified as they were dragged off. The rest of the beauties who looked like they had been about to make a move of their own all lowered their heads fearfully, afraid that they would also be noticed by the Palace Master.

The corners of Chen Ziqi’s mouth twitched. “I say, what on earth are you planning on eating?” he asked, grinning.

“I don’t eat humans,” Dan Yi said. He knew exactly what Chen Ziqi was thinking. He gave him a benign smile. “The things I eat are all right here – bamboo rice, bamboo shoots, jade bamboo worms…” 

Worms? When Chen Ziqi heard this, he showed his white teeth in surprise and was about to ask when Dan Yi inched closer to his face, then whispered in his ear in a slightly embarrassed manner.

“… and you.”

—

The author has something to say: Mini-theatre 

“The Many Uses of Medicine Men”

Birdie Dad: The mosquitoes have been swarming of late. Get the Hundred Grasses Valley to send over a mosquito-repelling Medicine Man!

Hundred Grasses Valley Master: That’s not the point of the mosquito-repelling Medicine Man!

Birdie Gong: The bamboo rice has been attacked by worms lately. Get the Hundred Grasses Valley to send some worm-killing Medicine Men here! 

Hundred Grasses Valley Master: There’s no such thing as worm-killing Medicine Men!

Birdie Gong: This ice silk shirt is too small. Get the Hundred Grasses Valley to send over some silk-spinning Medicine Men!

Hundred Grasses Valley Master: There’s no such thing as silk-spinning Medicine Men!

Birdie Gong: Oh, in that case, find a few worm-killing medicine men 

Hundred Grasses Valley Master: There’s no such thing as worm-killing Medicine Men!

Birdie Gong: Then find a few silk-spinning Medicine Men

Hundred Grasses Valley Master: … … (vomits blood)