Chapter 228: Nature

~~~

Liu Jin’s men have been split up, separated into five groups and shoved into small houses while the Brotherhood decides what to do with them. No group has made contact with any of the others.

Yet, somehow, all five groups end up talking about the same thing.

“He’s insane!”

The words are said in a hurried whisper. Loud enough to be heard by the other nineteen men crammed in the room but quiet enough not to be overheard by the guards stationed outside the house.

“We’re all thinking it, right?” Quan asks, nervous and pale-faced as he looks around. He’ll occasionally glance over his shoulder as if expecting to find something there. “He’s crazy, and he’ll get us all killed!”

“Is he?” asks Zei, another Five-Man Commander.

“Look around you!” Quan says, raising his voice. He winces and continues at a lower volume. “We’re prisoners!”

“And somehow, not one of us is dead or wounded,” Zei counters. “Doesn’t that say something?”

“Considering what these people have been dealing with, yeah. I’d say it does,” says another one of the commanders. “You all saw those people. If someone did that to my sister, I’d break their bones.”

The looks around the room range from dark and uncomfortable to annoyed and uncaring.

Quan is in the latter group.

“Are we supposed to feel sorry for every victim?” he says, rolling his eyes. “The commander was right the first time. The City Lord has the authority to do that. What are we supposed to do about it? Are you going to tell me you want to fight the City Lord?”

“The commander would win!” says a soldier. He gets several nods and murmurs of agreement.

“And then what?” asks another. “Killing a City Lord is a crime. We’d all be traitors.”

“It’s already too late to think of that.”

All heads in the room turn toward Zei.

“Where are we right now? What is the commander doing?” He asks everyone in the room. “He’s negotiating with the City Lord’s enemies. He said he wants to help them. He’s already a traitor.”

“See!” Quan says, pointing at him with his finger. “Even you admit it! All the more reason why we should cut our losses.”

“You aren’t listening,” Zei says, annoyed. “The commander is already a traitor. What does that make us?”

Understanding flashes across their faces. Someone gulps. Someone whimpers. Someone manages to frown audibly.

“But that’s… But we…”

“Are traitors by association,” Zei finishes. “Do you think the City Lord will care enough to give us a proper trial? You saw how he treats his people.”

“Civilians,” Quan corrects him. “Soldiers get preferential treatment. We all know this.”

“Commanders, real ones, not like us, get preferential treatment,” Zei says. “We are little better than civilians as far as people like the City Lord are concerned. Why should we put ourselves at his mercy?”

“Because we are strong,” Quan says, puffing up his chest. “More than a few of us are already at the Nascent Realm. With enough training, we can all reach that.”

“Why?”

Quan blinks. “What?”

“Why are you that strong?” Zei asks, not just at him but at the whole room. “Have you already forgotten? We are strong because Commander Qing has made us strong.”

“We are strong because we fought Spirit Beasts and ate their meat!”

“And the Commander didn’t take it,” Zei says. “You have heard how it is in other companies. The commander always takes most of the meat and treasure for himself. However, Commander Qing has always made sure we ate the bigger part. Come to think of it, I don’t think I have ever seen him eat. That’s what’s allowed us to grow. Otherwise, we’d be right where we started.”

Zei looks at the people around the room one by one.

“I don’t know about you, but I don’t see why I should take the side of some spoiled City Lord who has done nothing for us rather than the commander who has always done his best for us. Even now, I’m willing to bet the commander is hard at work on some brilliant plan.”

~~~

Liu Jin can scarcely recall the last time he has felt so relaxed.

“Are you sure, Doctor Qing?” One of the healers of the Brotherhood of Thunder asks him. “With only Spirit Grass as a catalyst, I do not think one can achieve the effects you speak of.”

“Because you keep boiling them in water first,” Liu Jin explains to the healers assembled around him. “Boiling the Spirit Grass dilutes its potency.”

“Perhaps, but the risk of infection-”

“Is non-existent,” Liu Jin says. “The heat of the furnace will eliminate the bacteria, so there is no need to boil it. In that way, you will have a much stronger catalyst.”

“Of course!” the healer says, hurriedly writing down everything Liu Jin says. He’s not the only one. All the healers in the room are hanging on Liu Jin’s every word. “But what about the Three-Hundred-Year-Old Fright Roots. How do they enter into the process?”

“Excellent question,” Liu Jin says, smiling as he begins to explain. Anyone looking at him now would only see a teacher surrounded by eager students, but it had not started that way.

To ensure that Liu Jin is not trying to deceive them, Leader Liu gathered the healers of the Brotherhood of Thunder and made them watch as he prepared the medicine for Elder Liu. The healers were suspicious of Liu Jin at first, but the ease with which Liu Jin answered their questions and his clear mastery over the medical field quickly won them over.

“Are you quite done?” Leader Liu asks darkly, glaring from the back of the room. The healers around Liu Jin jump back in fright, like children caught misbehaving by their parents.

“Almost,” Liu Jin replies as he changes the temperature of the pill furnace.

“And you are sure this medicine will work?” Leader Liu asks.

“Oh, absolutely,” a healer replies, nodding several times and rubbing his hands together. “Elder Liu’s health will be much improved. Not only that, I believe the knowledge Doctor Qing has shared with us today will greatly help us with-”

“That’s all I needed to hear,” Leader Liu says. “You can leave.”

For a moment, the healer looks like he wants to object, torn between the desire to converse further with a knowledgeable doctor like Liu Jin and natural respect and fear for his superior.

Respect and fear win out. He and the other healers quickly hurry out of the room.

“That was rude,” Liu Jin says. “There was no harm letting them stay to ask more questions.”

As he speaks, Liu Jin takes the pills out of the furnace. He’d have liked to use Direct Resonance to make them, but there is no telling how Leader Liu or the healers would have reacted. It means this medicine is not as good as it could be, but it should do the job.

“I’ll decide what is harmful to them,” Leader Liu says.

“You certainly have,” Liu Jin says, presenting a box with medicine to Leader Liu.

“The blue pills are for his respiratory problems. He needs one every morning, afternoon, and evening, but never on an empty stomach,” Liu Jin says, pointing to the pills. “The green potion is for his heart and arteries. He needs to take two spoonfuls after waking up. The red pills are for the pain.”

Leader Liu’s gaze snaps to him. “Pain? Your medicine will cause him pain?”

“No, the medicine is for the pain he’s already in.”

“My father is not in pain.”

“Yes, he is,” Liu Jin says with complete certainty. “It appeared gradually, so he has become used to it, but make no mistake, his body is in pain. That is what happens when one grows old.”

Elder Liu is not the victim of some esoteric disease or deadly virus. He’s simply a man whose body has started to give out on him. His lungs, his heart, his muscles. They all have begun to fail him, and pain is the natural result. Man is not made to be eternal.

Stolen novel; please report.

Cultivation wouldn’t be so hard otherwise.

“I see,” Leader Liu says, his tone somber. “It seems I’ll have to talk to my father about his symptoms.”

“I will go with you.”

Leader Liu narrows his eyes. “You were not invited.”

“I am a doctor. He is my patient. I will not be elsewhere when you give him the medicine,” Liu Jin says, his tone every bit as firm as Leader Liu’s. Neither of them raises their Qi in the slightest, but the tension caused by their clashing wills is almost palpable.

“You are quite daring for someone who is supposed to be a prisoner,” Leader Liu says at last.

“I prefer to think of myself as an ally in probation,” Liu Jin replies. “Besides, if Elder Liu has any questions regarding the medicine, I’m better suited to answer them than you or your healers.”

Leader Liu clicks his tongue and turns away.

“Suit yourself,” he says, walking out of the room and trusting Liu Jin to follow.

Some would say Leader Liu is being too careless by taking his eyes off Liu Jin. He has not even put any guards around him, but they both know no amount of guards or security would make a difference. Liu Jin is in the True Realm. If he wanted to escape, they wouldn’t be able to stop him.

His position as a prisoner is nothing more than a polite fiction that allows the Brotherhood to save face.

“Were you the ones who made this city?” Liu Jin asks as they walk through the streets of the Brotherhood’s hideout. “I ask because I don’t believe I have ever seen a place like this.”

The hideout of the Brotherhood of Thunder is a small city carved into the side of the cliffs, and that’s no exaggeration. There are many houses and small buildings, but not a single brick. Everything has been carved out of the same rock. It is a tremendous feat of engineering.