The Well-Read Idiot

Li Qi felt around on his person. He had 992 coins.

Damn it—the new boss had only given him cultivation methods and that willow branch, not any money!

He could make do on his own. He could sleep in the wild, under a bridge, or, at worst, on the street.

But now there was a woman beside him... and this woman happened to be dressed in extravagant finery: gauze scarf, real silk, spotless white clothes—the sort of look that screamed wealth at a glance.

No, officer, this didn't seem safe at all. How could they dare sleep on the streets like this?

Most importantly, they did not even have a guard. The only person accompanying her was Li Qi himself, a shabby boat-hauler who looked like an obvious pauper.

Walking out dressed like this felt like they were telling everyone: "Come rob me! Come steal from me! Not only am I rich, I clearly have no ability to resist!"

So Li Qi took a couple of steps down the street, diverting Miss Shen's attention, then said to her, "Miss Shen, my name is Li Qi. You should already know that."

"Mm. Li Qi, I'm Shen Shuibi." Shen Shuibi's attention had already been diverted, and she seemed to have forgotten her earlier indignation.

Li Qi could not help but sigh.

These demons really were missing a screw. No wonder this was a world ruled by the Human Race. With brains like that, it would be strange if it weren't the Human Race's world.

Oh, no, that was not right. It should be called... innocence, shouldn't it?

He truly hoped everyone in the world could be this innocent.

Li Qi led Shen Shuibi all the way to a riverbank.

He crouched by the water, while Shen Shuibi stood behind him in puzzlement, seemingly unable to understand what they were doing.

Then Li Qi spoke. "Miss Shen, we'll be traveling together from now on... ah, no, embarking on a journey together. We ought to get to know each other, right? Other than your name, I know nothing about you."

"But getting acquainted has to go both ways, so I'll introduce myself first."

As he spoke, Li Qi began introducing himself.

His life had always been exceedingly thin. Aside from being a person of the Outer Path—which was not something he could discuss too much—he could hardly tell her he was a transmigrator, could he?

Though people of the Outer Path did not seem all that unusual. From the look of Young Master Zhu, there appeared to be quite a few of them...

He wondered whether he might ever run into someone from his hometown.

Beyond that, he simply introduced himself as a boat-hauler, telling stories about things he had encountered while pulling boats.

Things like his battles of wits and courage with Shan Dazhuang, or the mountain Essences and water monsters he had come across while hauling boats.

Whenever they encountered such strange creatures, the important figures aboard the boats would generally handle them. They would not send the boat-haulers to their deaths.

After all, those capable of working boats were not people the boat-haulers could compare to.

There were also the legends and tales he had heard while coming and going around the docks—water gu insects, water monkeys, witches casting spells, and such things.

As he told his stories, Shen Shuibi's attention was completely captivated. She had never heard such things before, and had clearly begun treating Li Qi as a storyteller.

"So because of the Shamanic arts, here in the Great Deer Kingdom, when children fall seriously ill, people will usually not seek out doctors. Instead, they look for Shamanic Masters to treat them." Li Qi spoke of strange things he had seen in the Baiyue region.

By now, he had happened to reach the subject of the street-wandering witches. In Li Qi's view, they were a profession that took the place of barefoot doctors, using medicinal herbs or mysterious cultivation methods to cure illnesses.

But just then, Shen Shuibi suddenly spoke.

"I know about this. A scholar of the Confucian Way once wrote a book recording the affairs of Baiyue. He said: 'Baiyue customs revere Shamans. Whenever someone falls ill, they ask a Shaman about their eight characters. When the Shaman arrives, they crack a chicken egg and examine the yellow and white within to determine whether the illness is light or severe. If light, they avert it with wine and offerings. If severe, they paint an image of a god in the hall. The Shaman dresses as a beautiful woman, blows an ox horn, rings a gong, and dances, carrying a chicken upon a flowered pole while singing. Their dances are called the Dance of Redeeming Souls and the Dance of Breaking the Womb. Their songs are called the Chicken Song and the Warming Flowers Song. As for Warming Flowers, whenever a male infant falls ill, the Shaman binds together five-colored flowers in a garland around him, having each relative point to a flower and offer a blessing. Once the blessings are done, they sing; this is called Warming Flowers. The Shaman cuts open their own arm and smears blood upon talismans; this is called Manifesting Yang.' It describes how the Baiyue region uses Shamans to treat illness rather than doctors."

"So that scholar also rebuked them, saying that Baiyue was ignorant: in the countryside, one could often find ten Shamans, yet struggle to find a single physician. The people were bound to live in hardship. One must understand that though Shamans can treat illnesses, they cannot prevent them. Physicians, beyond treating illnesses, can trace matters to their source, investigate the causes of disease, and treat them at their roots. Cure one person, and a hundred others may no longer fall ill. Shamans, however, can only treat one person for each person who comes—no more than a cup of water against a cartload of firewood."

Hearing this, Li Qi turned to look at her, his face full of astonishment.

This woman... no, this demoness, had struck Li Qi as stupid and clumsy, yet she always spoke in polished passages. It had been the same earlier when she discussed the willow branch—she casually cited classics and drew upon texts, as though she had read countless ancient books.

But if she had read so many books and possessed such a wealth of knowledge... why did she still seem like she was missing a screw?

"That is indeed the case. That scholar made a great deal of sense." Li Qi deeply agreed. Those Shamanic Masters could cure illnesses, but once they did, that was that. Sometimes they did not even know how the illness had been cured.

Li Qi himself had suffered from it. While hauling boats along the waterways, he had been parasitized by water gu. His belly had swelled enormously, round as a drum, packed full of writhing worms. He had spent money to hire a Shamanic Master, who performed rites and danced for him. Before long, all the water gu had died, and he had excreted every last one of them.

But though the illness had been cured, Li Qi had no idea how to prevent it afterward, how to keep others from falling ill. Even the Shamanic Master himself did not know; he could only treat whoever came before him.

Hearing Li Qi agree with her, Shen Shuibi let out a smug little hum.

She truly was... carefree and untroubled.

After chatting for roughly twenty minutes, she seemed to have completely forgotten the unpleasantness from before.

But that was exactly what Li Qi had wanted to accomplish. Even he had not expected the effect to be so immediate.

He did not know whether his conversational skills were simply too good, or whether his target was too easy to fool.

So he struck while the iron was hot and continued, "I've said so much about myself, but Miss Shen, you still haven't told me about yourself. How did you end up in the Great Deer Kingdom?"

Since the conversation had reached this point, Shen Shuibi sensed nothing wrong. "Me? I don't have as many stories as you. I'm just Your Highness's rabbit. I've followed Your Highness since I was little. When Your Highness studied, I studied too. When Your Highness cultivated, I cultivated too. When Your Highness ate, I ate too. That went on for around a hundred years, I suppose? Then came what you already know. Your Highness was being hunted down, and while fleeing, she feared I would be killed by the aftershocks, so she left me in Great Deer."

"It was simply that my luck was poor. I was tainted by one of the pursuers' techniques. That thing turns into my defensive qi, feeds upon my cultivation, and can also reveal my location."

"Qi that does not follow the meridians is defensive qi. Yet defensive qi and nutritive qi follow yin and yang together, linking outer and inner as one, and cannot be eradicated. I could only abandon all my cultivation and destroy my own cultivation foundation to break free of that technique."