The two, with a weariness from hasty travel weighing down on them, seemed to have paid a visit to every corner of the Central Plains.
Upon meeting them, the Great Shaman did not waste any time on words, and started his examination of Zhou Zishu. Reflexively, Zhou Zishu presented his left wrist first; it was only halfway through bringing his arm up when he realised that this wrist was currently a little unpresentable, and silently retracted it for the other wrist.
Casting a glance at this, the Great Shaman asked offhandedly, "Did you injure your wrist?"
Zhou Zishu replied impassively, "Oh, it's nothing. A dog bit me."
The pulse at the wrist was one of the vital areas that a martial artist would guard fiercely; the Great Shaman, an honest man, paused upon hearing this, and reached out to place his fingers on Zhou Zishu's wrist as he asked in bewilderment, "What breed of dog is so capable as to land a bite on you?"
Zhou Zishu was silent. Wen Kexing, who was sitting to the side and listening quietly, suddenly reached out to bring his arm to Zhou Zishu's mouth, sighing, "I knew that you'd hold a grudge, petty as you are. You've not let me enter your room for three days because of this trivial matter. Here, for you, bite me back."
Lord Seventh, who had just sat down to drink some tea, choked. Gu Xiang clutched at her face and turned away, expressing that she had seen nothing, nothing at all.
The corner of Zhou Zishu's eye twitched. Reaching out to yank Wen Kexing's hand out of the way, Zhou Zishu said, expression unchanging, "We're in public. You should still preserve some sense of shame."
Wen Kexing smiled, but this smile was a little perfunctory, like he could not eke out any more energy to tease Zhou Zishu with. Turning all his focus onto the Great Shaman, he stared at him unblinkingly as though a flower had suddenly bloomed on the Great Shaman's face.
After a long while, the Great Shaman finally released Zhou Zishu's wrist. Immediately, Wen Kexing asked, "How is it?"
The Great Shaman hesitated, then spoke honestly. "It is a little more severe than I thought--Manor Lord Zhou, have you suffered another injury these few days?"
Zhou Zishu pulled his wrist back, adjusted his sleeve with light movements, and dropped his gaze. As though it was nothing, he smiled and said, "When one roams the jianghu, injuries he does accrue."
Being Nanjiang-born, there were some slight differences to the Great Shaman's features from those of the Central Plains. His eyes were very deep-set, and appeared some degrees darker than those of others. He looked at Zhou Zishu with a steady gaze, then, after a while, said as though a revelation had dawned on him, "Manor Lord Zhou, if I did not have the slightest bit of confidence, I would not have come to look for you and cause you more trouble. You may be a little more at ease."
Zhou Zishu lifted his gaze to look at him, and squeezed out a laugh. "If it involves crippling my martial abilities…"
In that instant, a trace of fragile vulnerability, as though he could not maintain his expression any longer, flashed across the man's face, though it disappeared in an instant, as if it had only been a trick of the eye. The Great Shaman caught it clearly, so he nodded and said, "I will not suggest anything of the sort again. I have a method that can preserve your martial arts and save your life."
Wen Kexing sat up straight, about to speak up, but Zhou Zishu cut him off abruptly by asking, "If it can save my life, and preserve my martial arts...what will I need to sacrifice?"
His expression did not reveal the slightest bit of any other emotion. There was no trace of joy to be seen on his face; his gaze darkened, gravely solemn, as though he was not discussing his own injury with a healer and a friend, but was instead negotiating with some other party. Careful and thorough, paying close attention to all details, brimming with wariness--
How could such an effortless bargain exist in this world? Never could one have both fish and bear's paw for the same feast.
Even though the time he had spent alive could not be considered 'long', Zhou Zishu felt that it was sufficient for him to understand this lesson--that there was no such thing as a free lunch. Even if these two people before him could be considered 'friends' if he were hard-pressed to, even if he was familiar with how the Great Shaman operated, he still dared not believe it so easily.
Because…it could hurt, this thing called hope.
Lord Seventh gently set the tea bowl in his hand aside, and spoke. "In these six months or more, we have sought out not a small number of places--you are aware of the might of the Shaman's Valley, you even helped build it yourself back in the day. As long as the herbs exist in this world, getting them is no trouble. Though these few herbs are more rare, we have, regardless, gathered all of them now."
As he spoke, the Shaman took out a small bottle from the front of his own robes. Zhou Zishu took it and opened the cap. In it was a full bottle's worth of pills. A medicinal fragrance with a slight hint of bitterness wafted out from within. The Great Shaman said, "Keep these. Take them at midnight. They can keep your Three Autumn Nails of the Seven Acupunctures from acting up, and gradually neutralise the poison on the nails."
Lord Seventh continued, "Even though the poison is troublesome to deal with, it is but a minor issue. The crux is your pinned meridians. If the nails are removed all of a sudden, your meridians will be unable to withstand your internal energy. You are unwilling to rid yourself of your martial arts, so it will take much effort to treat it, and I'm afraid that it is arduous to endure. However…"
He smiled. Looking at Zhou Zishu, he said, "While others might not be able to survive it, I feel that you might be able to give it a try."
The Shaman picked up where he left off. "We need someone with immense martial power, who can sever all your meridians in one instant--you can do this yourself too."
Hearing this, Gu Xiang, Cao Weining, and Zhang Chengling were shocked into stillness. Gu Xiang asked falteringly, "Once all his meridians are...severed, won't he die?"
The Great Shaman lifted his head to look at her. He did not deny it, but said, "There is indeed such a possibility. However, with how immense Manor Lord Zhou's martial power is, he will not die immediately. In this period of time, as long as someone preserves his meridians…"
Wen Kexing asked, "Do you mean that we can reconstruct his meridians?"
The Great Shaman nodded.
Wen Kexing's eyes brightened. He asked, "Will you be able to do it?"
The Great Shaman paused. Always very careful with his words, he never made overt promises. He said, "If I operate alone, I have a thirty-percent confidence of success. But this still depends on…whether the Manor Lord can hold out through it."
"Thirty-percent…" Wen Kexing's brow creased. "Only thirty-percent?"
The Great Shaman nodded. "Pardon my lack of expertise."
Yet, Zhou Zishu laughed out loud, the last of the gloom clearing from his face. "Fine, forget thirty-percent, I'll be willing to take my chances even if it's ten-percent. Anyway, it's no big loss."
He kept the small medicine bottle, and solemnly saluted the Great Shaman and Lord Seventh with his palm over his fist. "Many thanks."
The Great Shaman did not express much in reply--he merely nodded briefly, as though he had not presented someone with a bottle of life-saving medicine, but two mantous instead. On the other hand, Lord Seventh smiled and said, "What do you have to thank him for? If you do not let him repay the favour that we owe you from those years back, Wu Xi, this silly lad, will not be able to live out his life in peace."
The Great Shaman glanced at him, but did not refute it. He said, "Reconstructing your meridians will not be that easy. I will need a place of extreme cold, and you may be left with some vulnerability to frost. However, as you regain your martial abilities and attend to your health habitually, it should not be a problem."
Wen Kexing considered it, then asked, "What do you think of the peak of Changming Mountain?"
Legend had it that the peak of Changming Mountain was like an ethereal realm, on which resided the ancient monk and immortals--clouds and mist shrouded the halfway point of the mountain, and the snow on the peak stayed unmelted all year round. The Great Shaman thought about it, nodded, and said, "Why not give it a try?"
Wen Kexing said, "What a coincidence, that old glutton owes me so much money for food. Let's go to his den, and hold him responsible for our meals--A-Xiang."
Gu Xiang responded immediately.
Wen Kexing said to her, "Go run an errand for me. Find Ye Baiyi, and I'll line up two streets' worth of dowry for you, how's that?"
Gu Xiang bargained, "Three streets."
Wen Kexing tapped her on the head. "Two and a half, will that do? Stop peering into the gift horse's mouth, and get lost."
Rubbing her head, Gu Xiang tugged Cao Weining up to go prepare the luggage, but Wen Kexing stopped Cao Weining and said, "Don't listen to her. A man like you need not do the trivial chores like packing; don't accommodate her insouciant behaviour, come with me. Little tyke, cease your incompetence and get back to practice. You've slacked off from your training these few days. Are you waiting for your shifu to reprimand you? Get going, now--A-Xu, carry on with your conversation."
After speaking, he dragged Cao Weining out without further explanation. Zhang Chengling could read the room; sneaking a glance at his shifu, he sensed that the gaze with which his shifu was looking at him was starting to become a little unfriendly, and immediately scurried out with his tail between his legs. In an instant, only Zhou Zishu, Lord Seventh, and the Great Shaman were left, and the room became a lot more tranquil.
Lord Seventh gazed at Wen Kexing's retreating figure, and suddenly spoke. "This… jianghu friend of yours comes from a complex background, doesn't he. Have you been travelling with him all this while?"
Taken aback, Zhou Zishu paused, but did not deny it. Not understanding what Lord Seventh was intending by bringing this up out of the blue, he raised his head to look at Lord Seventh, only to see Lord Seventh smile and say, "Though he really treats you quite well. Apart from…I have never seen you be this serious about anyone--it's rather good, too."
Zhang Chengling was reciting his mantra in the small courtyard, and started to practice his martial arts move by move, exactly as he had been taught. Truth be told, with so many people arriving at this moment, and with so many events happening, this little youth's heart couldn't help but be a little agitated. He wanted to follow Gu Xiang and Cao Weining to look for Ye Baiyi. Zhang Chengling's reactions were slower than most children's, but he was not dumb.
About the matter with Black Poison Hag, Zhou Zishu did not say anything else outside of punishing him with an extra shichen of practice every day after knowing about the details. Zhang Chengling had acted rashly, but it had also allowed Zhou Zishu to witness his potential--even after experiencing all these ordeals, so numerous and so cruel, he still retained his purest heart. He never concealed his cowardice, but when the time called for bravery, he would never disappoint.
Zhou Zishu had always felt that if a boy didn't have a few scars on him, he was a piece of useless trash tucked under someone's wing, one that would never learn how to fly even if he reached adulthood peacefully and successfully.
Zhang Chengling did his own reflection too--he could not keep relying on shifu. Shifu was teaching him many things the way one would force feed a duck, and he had inscribed them into his memory by any means necessary. But there were many areas he did not understand, and still could not even with shifu breaking it down into fine pieces for him. He needed to train through practical experience.
Now that shifu's injury was at its most critical juncture, Zhang Chengling felt that he shouldn't stay by shifu's side, clueless and confused. He should leave for the world beyond, and do something for him.
As he started to daydream, the moves he was executing descended into turmoil.
Wen Kexing spotted it from afar, but did not say anything. He was in turmoil himself--only a thirty-percent confidence of success. In his life, he had faced countless life-or-death situations; each time, surviving with thirty-percent confidence was already a very decent performance. But…it was A-Xu.
Wen Kexing only came back to his senses when Cao Weining called out to him. Cao Weining was looking cautiously at him, waiting for him to speak. Gu Xiang had said that she was raised by this man. A sudden sense of fearful respect, as though he was facing the father-in-law, rose within Cao Weining, and he smiled ingratiatingly, "Wen-xiong summoned me out here because…"
Wen Kexing looked at him. It was as if he suddenly did not know where to start; after a long while, he finally began, "I...when I was ten or so years old, a half-grown child myself, I took A-Xiang in. I knew her father and mother--they had died, and she was too young then, still swaddled in blankets. Her mother had hidden her somewhere; their enemies had not noticed her, and she managed to escape with her life."
Cao Weining didn't even dare to make a single noise, listening on with an expression near pious.
Wen Kexing continued, "She's actually not my maidservant...although we address each other like master and servant, I have never treated that lass as an outsider--she is like my own little sister."
He smiled, paused, then added, "If I were to feign some seniority--I watched her grow up, so she is a little like my daughter. The place we stayed in when we were younger is not somewhere meant for humans to live in. I was a child too, and stumbled many times over the course of raising her. I burnt her mouth the first time I fed her congee--for A-Xiang to survive until now, it wasn't easy on me, but in truth...it wasn't easy on her too."
Vaguely understanding what Wen Kexing was getting at, Cao Weining said with a serious expression, "Rest assured, Wen-xiong. In this lifetime of mine, from now until the moment I die, every single day and every one moment included, there will not be even a single instance where I do something that will fail A-Xiang."
Wen Kexing glanced at him, and said with the ghost of a smile, "Don't make such promises."
Cao Weining raised a hand, and made an oath to the sky, "The heavens and earth are my witnesses."
As though he feared that Wen Kexing did not believe him, Famous Scholar Cao uttered in desperation the only sentence in his life that--even though it was, as expected, wrong--a listener could not bring himself to laugh at. He said, "Even the eternal sky and earth will fade one day, but this love is everlasting."
Wen Kexing looked at him with a strange expression, and asked, "Even if she might not be who you think she is? Even if...you will realise that you don't know her, after all?"
Cao Weining said, "Be rest assured, of course I know her."
Wen Kexing smiled, and picked up a pebble. He threw it at Zhang Chengling, calling out, "Little tyke, what are you daydreaming about? Don't be distracted!"
Be rest assured, of course I know her--A-Xiang, you've worried unnecessarily