The firewood crackled and popped, while the wolf meat in the pot gave off a strong, gamey stench.
Wild game never tasted good, and wolf meat was especially tough and stringy. If it wasn't bled properly, its stench could shoot straight up your nose.
Still, to someone starving, that pungent smell was an irresistible temptation.
Chen Ye ladled out meat broth for the family of three and reminded them, "Don't wolf down meat after being hungry for so long. Drink some broth first, then have a little minced meat."
They thanked him in a flurry, too famished to care that it was scalding. They raised their bowls and gulped it down. They were truly starving; when they finished, they even licked their battered bowls clean.
After downing most of a bowl and feeding a few mouthfuls to the child, the family of three finally seemed to have been dragged back from the gates of hell, a little life returning to them.
Chen Ye discreetly sized them up. Though all three were filthy, anyone with a discerning eye could tell they weren't ordinary poor folk.
The man was dressed like a scholar. His long robe was torn in several places, but the fabric was clearly fine. The woman was dressed like a farmer's wife, yet her skin was fair and smooth, nothing like someone who had spent her life laboring in the fields.
How had people like them ended up in this desolate mountain temple, looking as though they were fleeing famine?
Feeling Chen Ye's gaze, the man finally mustered his courage, cupped his hands, and bowed to Chen Ye. "I will never forget your kindness in giving us a meal. I'll repay you handsomely one day."
"You're too kind. We just happened to cross paths, and it was only a pot of meat broth." Curiosity glimmered in Chen Ye's eyes. "You don't look like you're fleeing famine. Why did you come all the way out here into the mountains?"
To ordinary people, climbing a mountain was no easy feat. These days, mountain paths were formed one footstep at a time, and even in broad daylight they were treacherous. One wrong step and a person could plunge to their death.
Unless they were woodcutters or hunters, ordinary folk rarely ventured into such desolate wilderness.
The man hesitated for a moment, then explained, "My name is Zhao Hezhou. My family of three is from Cui County. The county recently issued an order to gather three thousand children under the age of ten and send them to the Qinghe Sword Sect to cultivate. My child has only just turned one, yet he isn't exempt. How could my wife and I bear to be separated from our flesh and blood? But the county magistrate was determined to seize our son. With no other choice, we fled in the middle of the night and ran all the way here."
"The Qinghe Sword Sect? That's no ordinary immortal sect." Chen Ye's brow creased slightly.
He'd heard the name Qinghe Sword Sect far too many times. The leader of the righteous path was the Qinghe Sect's master. Of the eighteen Demon Venerables who had turned on one another, thirteen had died, and two of the five survivors had fallen to that master's sword.
Legend had it that a sword scar left by the Qinghe Sect's master still marked the battlefield, cleaving open eight hundred miles of sky. Hundreds of years had passed, yet the wound had never healed.
Chen Ye's master, Mo Ci, had also encountered juniors of the Qinghe Sword Sect and been beaten to the brink of death several times. Left with no choice, Mo Ci had possessed one body after another, exhausting his lifespan before his time. Whenever members of the demonic path ran into Qinghe Sect cultivators, they fled at once, whether they could win or not. No matter how powerful they were, could they possibly be a match for the Sword Venerable? He was famously protective of his own. Once, two Demon Venerables had merely killed some Qinghe Sect juniors, and he'd come to their doorstep and fought until heaven and earth crumbled.
That was also why the Qinghe Sword Sect was so strict in choosing disciples. Its members were few; it was said that even counting those who had already died, there weren't a hundred in all.
Hearing Chen Ye say this, Zhao Hezhou looked surprised. "Could this really be an immortal opportunity? Were my wife and I wrong?"
Chen Ye glanced at Zhao Hezhou and thought, How can this man have so little backbone? Someone says one thing and he's already wavering.
Zhao Hezhou's wife was quicker on the uptake. Hearing her husband's uncertainty, she hurriedly reminded him, "Even if this really is an immortal opportunity, don't you know what kind of man the county magistrate is? If it were truly something good, would he be so eager to hand it over to others?"
Prompted by his wife, Zhao Hezhou nodded repeatedly. "Exactly. That magistrate is insatiably greedy. In just three years in office, he's scraped the land bare. Why would he give the people of the whole county an immortal opportunity for nothing?"
Chen Ye offered no opinion, but he also suspected there was a trick behind this. What immortal sect recruited disciples like that, especially the Qinghe Sword Sect, known for its strict standards? What use could the county magistrate have for all those boys and girls? Most likely, someone from a demonic sect was masquerading under the Qinghe Sword Sect's name. Ordinary people wouldn't know the truth and would be deceived—or they were being coerced.
Chen Ye couldn't help shaking his head with a sigh. There really were people who didn't fear death, daring to impersonate even the Qinghe Sword Sect. Fortunately, Cui County was still a hundred miles away. Surely this wouldn't implicate him.
Zhao Hezhou's family was exhausted and starving. After eating a little, they fell fast asleep on a pile of straw. Under cover of night, Chen Ye slipped out of the ruined temple.
When Zhao Hezhou awoke, he found two lively wild boars in the temple, along with several birdcages woven from vines. The birds inside chirped incessantly.
Chen Ye was busy stuffing Wolf Blood Pills into the animals' mouths.
Wolf Blood Pills surely weren't harmful only to humans. It made no sense that wild boars could eat them without consequence while people suffered. Chen Ye was going to test that today.
To compare the effects of different doses, Chen Ye had specifically caught a two-hundred-pound wild boar and a tiny bird no bigger than his palm. He wanted to see whether the poison that damaged the soul was related to body size.
He'd even drawn up a detailed chart, carefully recording control groups with different doses and time intervals. Now all that remained was to see when the Wolf Blood Pills would take effect.
Zhao Hezhou didn't understand what was going on. He assumed Chen Ye had caught the boars and birds for food, and felt both astonished and impressed. I must have met an expert. Otherwise, how could a boy this skinny capture two enormous wild boars alive? I doubt I could even carry them if they were dead.
The thought made his stomach growl again. Last night's meat broth had pulled them back from the gates of hell, but after so many days without food, one meal couldn't fill them up.
But Zhao Hezhou had fled in haste and had no money. They'd only just eaten a pot of meat broth from Chen Ye the night before. To ask for more food today would make him seem unbearably greedy. Yet if they didn't eat, how long could his wife and child hold out?
He had always taken things one step at a time. Now that they'd left the ruined temple, the three of them didn't even know where to go.
After agonizing over it again and again, Zhao Hezhou still couldn't bring himself to speak.
Chen Ye's senses were sharp, and he'd already noticed the man's predicament. He spoke first. "Yesterday, I noticed how refined your speech was, Mr. Zhao. I take it you're literate. Would you mind helping me with something?"
Zhao Hezhou answered at once. "Please, just tell me what you need, sir. You saved our family of three. I'll do anything you ask, without hesitation."
"Good. Then let's have breakfast first. This will take time and effort, so you should eat your fill and build up your strength." Chen Ye pointed to the iron pot nearby. It was already brimming with meat stew, with wild vegetables added. It was far better than yesterday's thin broth.
Zhao Hezhou no longer held back. He filled a bowl and ate in great gulps. As he ate, though, his eyes gradually reddened, and tears slipped down his cheeks.
Chen Ye pretended not to notice. Once Zhao Hezhou had finished, he took out several pieces of writing-covered hemp cloth and handed them to him.
"I've fed the wild boars and birds some medicine to test a prescription. But I have things to do today and can't keep an eye on them to see when the effects take hold. Please watch them for me, Mr. Zhao. If anything unusual happens, be sure to record it carefully—the time it begins, the symptoms, everything. Don't leave out a single detail."
Zhao Hezhou hurriedly took the hemp cloth. "Don't worry. I'll keep careful records and won't miss a thing."
"Then I'll trouble you with it, Mr. Zhao."
Chen Ye picked up the white banner and hurried out of the ruined temple. He was running low on blood pills, so he had to go hunt more game today.
He'd barely gone a hundred paces when Mo Ci's voice came from the Ten Thousand Soul Banner. "Disciple, did you keep those three around because you wanted to use them to test the medicine?"
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