Zhao Wen

In the days that followed, Li Tui settled into an unusually regular routine.

By day, he stayed at Zhao Yuanchong's side, accompanying him everywhere he needed to go: the school, the Martial Arts Arena, the banquet hall. Li Tui didn't say much, but he was thorough in everything he did, serving tea and grinding ink, putting things in order. Even when Zhao Yuanchong occasionally traded words with someone, Li Tui could chime in at just the right moment with a few trivial remarks and steer the conversation elsewhere.

Zhao Yuanchong didn't bring up the West Suburbs again. But now and then, Li Tui could feel his gaze settle on him, appraising him with an interest that was hard to describe.

Li Tui pretended not to notice. The wound on his left arm had mostly healed; the scab had hardened and itched, a sign that new flesh was growing. Each night, he regulated his breathing, and the sluggishness in his meridians left by his forced attempt to break through the acupoints was slowly fading. Everything pointed to recovery, and it was happening too quickly to be entirely reasonable.

He knew the reason.

At midnight, all was still.

Li Tui bolted the door and listened for a moment to the sounds outside in the corridor. Only after confirming there was no one around did he take out the coarse cloth pouch he had hidden.

The dark-red lump of flesh rested in his palm, warm to the touch and faintly throbbing like a sleeping heart. In the dim light of the oil lamp, the patterns on its surface shimmered with a strange glow.

He went to the window and lifted the tile covering an earthenware jar. Inside were several woodlice, scurrying in panic.

He pierced one woodlouse's shell with a thin bamboo pick. Green fluid seeped out as its legs writhed violently. Then, with another sharpened sliver of wood, he scraped off a nearly invisible speck of dark-red gel from the lump and gently smeared it over the wound.

At first, nothing seemed amiss.

But after only three or five breaths, the woodlouse's struggles suddenly intensified. Something seemed to writhe beneath its shell, and the fluid seeping from the wound was no longer green, but a cloudy, pale-red slurry. A moment later, the woodlouse stopped moving. Its shell hardened at an unnatural speed and darkened, as if it had gone through days or even weeks of drying in an instant.

Li Tui furrowed his brow.

This wasn't healing. It was overdraw. Some kind of power was frantically stimulating its life force in exchange for a brief burst of vitality, followed by rapid decline.

He tried again, this time letting the tip of the wooden sliver barely graze the lump's surface before dabbing it onto the back of another unharmed woodlouse. The insect first spun frantically in place, then actually tried to take flight. It moved more than twice as fast as before, but after less than half a tea's time, it suddenly stiffened and died. Its shell shriveled just as quickly.

"So that's how it is..."

The Earth Lizard Demon's unnatural ferocity and slightly rigid movements might have been because this thing was embedded inside it, constantly and domineeringly stoking its aggression and strength until it went mad.

This lump of flesh could indeed awaken vitality and heal wounds, but at its core, it was more like an exceedingly potent drug—or a double-edged sword. Used well, it might save a life; used carelessly, it would hasten death.

He thought of the bizarre speed at which his own wound had healed, and his heart tightened. He had been exposed to far more of it than he had smeared on the woodlouse. Why hadn't he shown such obvious signs of being drained? Was it because he had a spiritual root and a stronger life force? Or was there some other reason?

The questions were piling up.

He wrapped the lump of flesh tightly again, layering it thickly in cloth and dry lime soil. Then he sealed it in the earthenware jar, tucked it back into the hidden compartment, and piled miscellaneous things over it.

The oil lamp's tiny flame illuminated Li Tui's calm face.

He spread his palm open. His fingers were long and thin, his knuckles slightly thickened from labor, his palm covered in calluses. These were the hands of a lowly tenant farmer—and the hands that, in this life, had grasped the "Samsara Mirror."

And yet... he was too weak.

Li Tui opened his palm, then slowly clenched it again. His finger bones gave a faint crack.

The situation was like walking on thin ice. Zhao Yuanchong's suspicions had not faded, and the mysteries of the West Suburbs were many. His meager cultivation and limited knowledge left him painfully weak in this whirlpool. If he couldn't grow stronger quickly, then forget seeking the truth or planning for the future—even protecting himself would be difficult.

This lump of flesh was the only known possibility for quickly breaking the deadlock.

Li Tui drew a deep breath, his eyes sharpening.

Three days later, in the afternoon, Li Tui was ordered to collect a fresh batch of spirit tea from the steward's office in the outer courtyard.

On his way back, he passed the well beside the West Courtyard's side corridor. Huang Bao was hunched over, struggling to lift a large bucket of water. The heavy wooden bucket's rope dug deep into the thin homespun cloth over his shoulder. When he saw Li Tui approaching, Huang Bao first darted a glance around, then quickly lowered his head. But his hands slowed even further, and he nearly stopped in place.

Li Tui kept his pace steady. Just as they were about to pass each other, Huang Bao's voice, barely audible beneath the scrape of the bucket against the flagstones, drifted over:

"Big brother... about the person you asked me to keep an eye on... there's someone mighty strange."

"Speak." Li Tui kept his eyes straight ahead, letting only one word slip between his lips.

Huang Bao swallowed, his voice dropping even lower, tinged with fear. "There's a boy from a branch family named Zhao Wen. He's only ten. Last month, a fire broke out at his home in the middle of the night. It was wickedly fierce and wiped out his whole family... The old servant who brought him back whispered that when they found him, he was curled up in his mother's arms. His mother's body was... But apart from being scared witless, he didn't even have a scratch on him."

A fire. A whole family wiped out. Only the youngest survived.

"Go on."

"The strangest part came after." Huang Bao's voice trembled. "The clan tested his spiritual root. The Spirit Testing Jade suddenly flared up, so bright it was terrifying. He was definitely a promising talent. But not even two days later, the story changed... They said his life was too strong, that he was a jinx who'd killed his whole family. They claimed the light from the spiritual root might've been an evil flame and couldn't be trusted. Now he's been shoved into the most remote courtyard in the southwestern corner. No one pays him any attention except when they bring him food."

His family had been destroyed, and his talent had appeared only to be swiftly smeared and suppressed. In one night, a ten-year-old child had fallen from the clouds into a muddy pit, branded a "jinx."

This fit the definition of an "anomaly" all too well. It was even so conspicuous that it seemed deliberate, as if an unseen hand were impatiently trying to yank this sapling out of the earth...

Li Tui's steps slowed slightly. "The courtyard in the southwestern corner... keep an eye on who goes near him and what he does himself. Especially at night."

"Yes, big brother."

Li Tui said nothing more. His sleeve shifted slightly, and a small oil-paper-wrapped bundle soundlessly slipped into a gap in the empty bucket Huang Bao was carrying. It had some weight to it, and felt strangely warm.

"Take it. Cultivate well." As they passed each other, the low voice brushed past Huang Bao's ear.

Huang Bao quickly clamped the oil paper tight. His chest heaved, and his eyes stung. This little bundle was nothing to a true cultivator, but to him—a member of an outer family struggling at the threshold of drawing in qi, liable to be expelled at any moment—it was a genuine treasure that could help him steady his breath and buy him time!

Li Tui continued on, his expression unchanged. Giving Huang Bao spirit rice had been a casual gesture. If it helped Huang Bao hold on a little longer and keep an eye out for more information, then it was worth it. If not, the loss was hardly worth mentioning.