Chapter 66 – Internal Rot (I)

Chapter 66

Internal Rot (I)

Days fluttered by like leaves in the wind.

Okay, my rather poor attempt at poetry aside, they sure do not fly when you’ve got almost nothing to do.

No, seriously, it’s gotten so bad that I’ve started exercising. That’s right, EXERCISING. I haven’t exercised since I was 17 and the coach booted me off the team ’cause I went out on a date with his daughter.

And yet, here am I, running around the mountain peak, doing pushups and handstands and crunches and squats, feeling sore all over my body but refusing to use Qi to heal it because I’m unsure whether it’ll undo my hard work.

This body is utter crap; I can attest to that much. Even without having exercised in decades, I was in better shape back on Earth–perhaps the most depressing fact of them all. In Lu Qi’s defense, he didn’t exercise either, and he drank about twenty times more alcohol than I did, chugging wine like it was water.

Anyway, my workout sessions would occasionally be interrupted by Light swinging by and asking why I was making a fool of myself yet again, or Xi Zhao asking to be guided on that art that I gave him and me coming up with a whole new excuse as to why I can’t help him, or Dai Xiu following me around with a bucket of water and a towel, never even being short of breath.

Tsk.

What of my image as a Master? Am I really content just being a produce factory for martial arts for the rest of my life?

… oddly, no. Honestly, I thought my first instinct would have been to scream and shout ‘Yes’, but when I asked myself that question, it turned out… no, I want at least a bit more than this. Isn’t it a fantasy, after all? You don’t dream of becoming a superhuman of some kind just to hide yourself in some village and write books all the live-long day.

So, I don’t want to either.

Not like my aspirations are to become the strongest or anything of the sort, but getting to at least strong enough, in that I can pluck a mountain and chuck it at someone I don’t like… hey, I can see it.

Anyway, while I was having a fairly unfruitful few days, that wasn’t the case for Hua. The ‘mute boy’ had busied himself rather much, coming and going from the mountain at least thrice a day. It seemed odd, but I just let him be–a monster like that has plans of his own, after all–until precisely today, and even more precisely now, when I saw him standing at the doorframe, wildly gesturing with his arms.

I think the gist of it is, Follow me… you old fart.

Okay, I added the ‘old fart’ part, but the first portion did seem to be true.

“You want me to follow you down the mountain?”

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“!” he nodded, and just as I was about to ask ‘Why’… I stopped myself.

He wouldn’t invite me for no reason, and it wasn’t like he was going to disclose it directly to me. Thus, I stayed my lips, uprooted my legs, and followed behind him as we descended the mountain.

The atmosphere within the sect was… heating up, to say the least. Ever since the declaration of war was spread, more and more competitions were being held almost on a daily basis, winners blessed with increased fortunes and cultivation materials.

The Sect Master truly wasn’t holding back–pills responsible for breaking through, increasing mental power, providing a chance at Enlightenment, and then martial arts whose requirements were all lowered by one level…

It was quite reminiscent of the ‘war economy’ back on Earth, where every ‘industry’ seemed to orbit that one defining thing.

The number of stalls at the public market exploded–there was legitimately no room to even sit, and crowds had to squeeze by each other just to move an inch… and that was precisely where Hua was leading me.

Hm? Is this really it? Is he just too broke to buy something, so he’ll have me buy it? That can’t be it, right?

Anyway, he first led me to the stall of a fairly young woman selling some random knickknacks, none of which seemed particularly impressive. And while Hua was broadly gesturing toward one particular trinket, a skull embedded atop an incense stick, it looked more like he was gesturing toward… the woman.

Hell. Can’t hurt to check, right? So, I did.