Chapter 233| Chapter 234| Chapter 235
Chapter 233: Confused
Lu Yunxi quickly scribbled down a list, shoved the parchment into Shen San’s hand, and ushered him out to get the medicine.
He took the list with a bewildered look on his face, wandering the trails for a long while before the city gates finally came into view.
This certainly wasn’t the city they had just broken out of, but a considerable number of people from the Medical Immortal Sect were roaming the streets here as well.
Identifying them was a simple task. Every member of the Medical Immortal Sect dressed identically, wearing white robes with green leaves embroidered cleanly across the hem. While the quality of the fabric varied depending on the individual’s rank, you could easily tell from a distance that they belonged to the same faction.
These cultivators bore incredibly stern expressions, their eyes sharp as searchlights as they scanned the passing crowds back and forth. When Shen San walked past them, their intense, probing glares made him break out in a cold sweat.
“Stop right there!” a harsh, commanding voice barked.
He froze, his heart instantly sinking.
“Who are you? Raise your chin!” The cultivator’s tone was ice-cold, carrying the haughty arrogance of an official interrogating a criminal.
Shen San lifted his head, quietly looking toward the source of the commotion. Two steps behind him, a pretty young girl had been forcefully intercepted.
Sure enough, the man demanding answers was clad in white, and the green embroidery on his robes caught the sunlight, woven from incredibly high-grade silk. The man held his chin high, completely blocking the poor girl’s path. If his expression weren’t so domineering, one would have assumed he was simply a local thug harassing a civilian on the highway!
The girl shrank back, terrified, refusing to look up for a long time. “I…”
Rationally speaking, if a young lady is abruptly cornered in public and ordered to display her face on command, who would be pleased? Refraining from throwing a punch was an act of pure politeness!
“Are you the brat who stole our sacred medical records and fled into the night?!” The cultivator narrowed his eyes, his features twisting into a vicious grimace.
The girl quickly raised her head, tears of pure terror welling in her eyes as she shook her head vigorously. “No! I haven’t! I am not the person you are looking for, My Lord!”
Only then did the man leisurely unroll two scrolls, critically comparing her face against the portraits one by one. After a brief silence, he waved a dismissive hand. “Begone!”
The girl let out a massive breath of relief, scurrying away as fast as her legs could carry her, completely oblivious to the cold sweat soaking through the back of her robes.
Witnessing the display, Shen San shook his head in silent disapproval. Locating the nearest apothecary, he hurried inside to secure the herbs.
The resident physician critically reviewed the list, a deeply puzzled look settling across his face. “Who exactly is this prescription for? What specific ailment is it meant to treat?”
How on earth was Shen San supposed to know the exact pharmacology? It was undoubtedly meant to stabilize the unconscious Miss Luo, but he couldn’t articulate the precise clinical effects.
His brow furrowed as his mind raced. Remembering his master’s casual advice to remain discreet before he left, a sudden spark of inspiration struck him.
“Ah, this medicine is a highly classified, ancestral fertility remedy passed down through my clan,” he lied smoothly, puffing out his chest. “Our ancestors have utilized this exact formula for generations.”
The clinic was exceptionally small, run by a lone physician without the aid of a medical apprentice. Hearing the explanation, the doctor’s eyes flickered with intense curiosity. “Oh? Is this hidden formula truly that potent? Can it guarantee the birth of a male heir?”
Shen San patted his chest with absolute, manufactured confidence. “The formula is naturally miraculous, guaranteed to bless a household with children… However, the balancing properties yield either a son or a daughter; it cannot explicitly manipulate the gender!”
The physician was practically drooling with professional greed. His eyes turned into searchlights, scanning the paper over and over again as he desperately tried to commit the exact ratios to memory.
Shen San turned a blind eye, pretending not to notice the doctor’s lips silently muttering the names of the herbs as he memorized them.
The physician hesitated for a long moment, carefully copying the text onto his own desk before finally stepping away to weigh out the herbs.
Once the parcels were tied and the silver currency was exchanged, Shen San finally let out a long breath of relief. He hurried out of the establishment, but as he navigated the crowded streets, he quickly realized that his earlier encounter hadn’t been an isolated incident.
Dozens of cultivators in white robes caked with green leaf embroidery were aggressively stopping pedestrians across the thoroughfares, meticulously matching their features against their scrolls. The vast majority of their targets were young women around seventeen or eighteen years of age—right at the age of marriage eligibility.
Being abruptly accosted, the ladies naturally resisted, but the moment anyone refused to bare their face to the Medical Immortal Sect, a massive horde of white-robed disciples would instantly surround them. At that stage, no amount of weeping or public scolding would save them from scrutiny. Left with absolutely no alternative, the civilians were forced to comply, submitting entirely to the sect’s tyrannical demands.
Curiously, the enforcers completely ignored the elderly women and the men.
Surveying the chaotic streets, Shen San’s brow knit tightly together. Are these cultists simply utilizing a generic bounty as an excuse to harass beautiful women? A cold, dangerous light flashed through his eyes.
However, upon approaching the main exit, he found a massive wall of bodies gridlocking the city gates.
At this sector, the gathered crowd consisted entirely of men. They were locked in a raucous, animated debate, their collective gazes pinned directly to the stone wall. Shen San felt a brief surge of curiosity, but remembering that his master was still waiting in the wilderness, he chose not to halt his pace.
Yet as he brushed past the perimeter of the crowd, the loud chatter of the bystanders drifted over.
“Is this truly the girl who smuggled the medical records out of the sanctuary? She is remarkably breathtaking!”
“How bizarre! Did the initial reports not claim they were hunting a simple sweeping maid? Why on earth are there two distinct portraits posted on the stone?”
“I heard the second portrait depicts the accomplice who orchestrated the maid’s escape! The Medical Immortal Sect has officially blacklisted her. It’s rumored that from this day forward, the sect will refuse medical care to her or anyone associated with her house.”
“To think the rogue who assisted her escape was actually a woman as well…”
“…”
Shen San’s footsteps faltered slightly.
A sharp glint flashed through his eyes, replaced an instant later by a simple, naive grin. He tapped the shoulder of an elder standing at the edge of the crowd. “Uncle, it’s incredibly lively today. What is everyone debating so fiercely?”
The old man chuckled, eagerly sharing the local gossip, which aligned perfectly with the chatter he had just overheard.
But looking past the old man’s shoulder to inspect the portraits pinned to the stone, Shen San went entirely rigid.
Aren’t those two faces explicitly Master and Miss Luo?!
The accuracy of the brushwork was terrifying, capturing roughly eighty percent of their true features. Thank the heavens his master was currently lying low in the deep wilderness; if she were to step foot inside the city gates today, the sheer exposure would trigger a catastrophic crisis!
“Hey! Hey, kid! Wake up!”
Following a sharp shove to his shoulder, Shen San snapped out of his daze, blinking rapidly. “Ah?! My apologies, my apologies!” He quickly stepped aside, carving a path for the other travelers to pass.
The surrounding men chuckled, shaking their heads in amusement. “You’re completely mesmerized, aren’t you, boy? It’s a tragedy, but a fairy-like beauty of that caliber isn’t someone commoners like us can ever hope to approach!”
“Exactly! There’s no harm in staring and daydreaming for a bit, but once you clear the gates, you had best return to your fields and farm the land honestly! After all, only the grain locked in your own barn is real!”
Shen San’s eye twitched slightly. Pretending the comments were directed at someone else, he tightened his grip on his medicine parcels and quietly moved away from the wall.
Before he could clear the perimeter, the booming voice of a Medical Immortal Sect disciple echoed over the crowd. “Listen closely, everyone! Examine the features carefully! Anyone who provides valid coordinates regarding these two fugitives shall receive an immediate reward of fifty taels of silver! And anyone who successfully captures and delivers either head to our compound shall receive a bounty of five hundred taels of solid silver per individual!”
Gasp!
“Heavens! Fifty taels just for a whisper of information? If we manage to secure a physical capture, we’ll be set for life!”
Following a heartbeat of stunned silence, the crowd erupted into absolute, feral madness. The men charged forward like wild beasts, swarming the disciples with raised hands as they screamed to be heard.
“Me! Choose me! I’ve crossed paths with them before!”
Shen San’s boots froze against the dirt. He turned on his heel, his heart plunging into a cold abyss as he locked eyes with the speaker.
The disciples were ecstatic, instantly lunging forward to grasp the man’s arm. “Where are they?! State their coordinates!”
“Those two beautiful girls purchased straw sandals from my market stall just yesterday!” the vendor cheered proudly, hoisting a pair of woven shoes high into the air for the crowd to see. “Step closer, everyone! Witness the exact craftsmanship the fairy ladies deemed flawless! Hand-woven from the premium straw, incredibly comfortable, guaranteed never to leave your feet feeling stifled!”
Shen San: …
The Medical Immortal Sect disciples: …
The surrounding crowd: …
What was truly mind-boggling was that a significant portion of the dense crowd actually bought the pitch.
“Is that the absolute truth? The fairy beauties genuinely endorsed those exact sandals?”
“By the heavens, yes! This is the precise style they purchased. Would you like to try a pair on for size?”
Within seconds, the vendor’s straw sandal enterprise was booming with unprecedented success.
Shen San’s lips twitched violently as he shook his head in sheer disbelief. He had truly been driven out of his mind with panic just a second ago! As far as he knew, his master had never worn a pair of common straw sandals in her entire life. Furthermore, her master-level weaving skills were light-years ahead of this vendor’s crude handiwork; why on earth would she waste copper coins on such garbage?!
Shen San quickened his pace to exit the gates, but before he could put any substantial distance between himself and the city, the commercial uproar behind him grew exponentially louder.
Seeing the sandal vendor strike absolute gold, the remaining street merchants caught onto the marketing strategy, raising their own voices in a competitive frenzy.
“Me! Look over here! Those two fairy maidens purchased a basket of fresh eggs from my farm!”
“Behold the exotic fruits the goddess ladies consumed to maintain their flawless complexions! Step closer and take a look!”
“…”
Chapter 234: Shock
Shen San quickened his pace, slipping through the city gates and channeling his lightness skills to sprint all the way back to his master.
Lu Yunxi was focused on grinding herbs under the shade of a massive tree. Hearing his approaching footsteps, she didn’t even look up as she asked, “Did you secure everything on the list?”
“Yes, Master, I got them all.” Shen San unslung the bulky package of medicine from his shoulder and untied one of the paper parcels to show her.
She reached out, carefully sifting through the dried roots and leaves before bringing a handful to her nose. A satisfied smile played across her lips. “Excellent. The quality of these ingredients is top-tier. Miss Luo should be waking up shortly.”
“Master…” Shen San hesitated, shifting his weight uneasily.
She looked up, raising an eyebrow. “What is it? Speak your mind.”
“Just be careful if you plan to head out. When I was at the market, I discovered that the Medical Immortal Sect has officially posted a bounty for you.” He figured it was best to lay it out bluntly; if he didn’t explain the stakes clearly, his master might casually stroll into the next town and trigger a massive security lockdown.
“For me?” Lu Yunxi finally paused, setting her heavy stone pestle down as her brow furrowed in annoyance.
How utterly ridiculous, she thought. What on earth had she done to warrant a province-wide manhunt? It was that squad of black-clad assassins who had ambushed her on the public highway first! Sparing their lives was clearly her first mistake.
“Yes. They’ve offered five hundred taels of silver for you and another five hundred for Miss Luo. That’s a cool thousand taels in total!” Shen San rubbed his chin anxiously. “It’s going to be a real headache if the player base catches wind of this. Opportunities to farm that much raw silver are incredibly rare at our current level. A bounty of a thousand taels is going to tempt a lot of rogue players.”
What Shen San had deduced, Lu Yunxi understood with even greater clarity. She paused for a moment, absorbing the information, before offering a curt nod.
“By the way, Master, while the apothecary was weighing the herbs, he grilled me on what the prescription was for. I panicked and claimed it was an ancestral fertility remedy to aid conception. That won’t cause any issues, will it?” He certainly didn’t want to accidentally poison some random civilian who copied the formula.
“Don’t worry, this specific blend is formulated to deeply nourish the physical foundation and replenish vital energy. It’s perfectly safe for women trying to conceive,” Lu Yunxi reassured him with a nod. “I anticipated you might need a cover story, so I structured the properties accordingly. Set your mind at ease.”
Relieved, Shen San immediately rolled up his sleeves to help her prepare the decoction.
Lu Yunxi’s master-level medical expertise, combined with the premium grade of the purchased ingredients, worked wonders. Within half a day, the rich medicinal broth had done its work, and Miss Luo slowly blinked her eyes open.
She stared up at the master and disciple in absolute silence, a profound wave of guilt washing over her features.
“…Did you not confidently declare that you could navigate your way back to the capital entirely on your own?” Lu Yunxi asked casually, stirring the remaining contents of the pot.
“Ahem! I… I truly underestimated them!” Miss Luo croaked, her face flushing with embarrassment. “Who could have anticipated they would dispatch hunters so far beyond their territory just to trap me?!”
Once she had slipped past the regional borders, she had falsely assumed the threat had passed, allowing her guard to drop. She never expected a casual slip of her tongue would expose her identity to a local informant, triggering another lethal pursuit.
Recalling the harrowing, exhausting days she had spent fleeing through the wilderness, her eyes grew heavy with sorrow. She rubbed her forehead sheepishly, glancing up at Lu Yunxi. “Well… given the circumstances, perhaps we should…”
The moment she opened her mouth, Lu Yunxi deduced exactly what she was plotting. The girl was clearly preparing to slip away into the night again to spare them the burden of her problems.
“You’re traveling with us,” Lu Yunxi interrupted smoothly. “There’s no point in separating now. The Medical Immortal Sect has officially blacklisted me as well; we’re both sitting on the wanted manifest.”
“What?!” Miss Luo gasped, her jaw dropping.
However, realizing that her benefactors had already been dragged into the crosshairs, she abandoned all thoughts of running away alone. Her initial departure had been an attempt to shield them from the fallout, but her carelessness had only exacerbated the crisis. Overwhelmed by a deep sense of accountability, she racked her brain, desperately trying to unearth any tactical information that could aid their survival.
“The hidden mountain route you mapped out was truly flawless!” Lu Yunxi looked up at the towering, majestic stone walls looming in the distance, letting out a long, appreciative breath.
The imperial capital was a spectacular sight, operating on a scale entirely different from the provincial trade hubs. While standard cities featured tightly crammed, chaotic blocks of vendor stalls and tenements, the capital was meticulously organized. Massive, elegant siheyuan courtyards lined the wide thoroughfares, each estate boasting its own private, sculpted garden. It resembled a sprawling, ultra-luxurious version of a grand metropolitan sector.
Reaching her familiar home turf, Miss Luo let out a massive sigh of relief. Thank the heavens her memory of her late father’s private military trail had been accurate; if she had led her savior into a territorial trap, she would have died of mortification.
Wasting no time, the trio smoothly cleared the security checkpoints and entered the city.
The moment they crossed the threshold of her family’s ancestral manor, Miss Luo commanded her stewards to thoroughly prepare a grand, private courtyard for her guests, ensuring they were provided with fresh baths and premium delicacies. Barely pausing to change into her formal noble silk robes, she climbed into a royal carriage and flew straight toward the imperial palace to petition for an audience.
As the daughter of a legitimate Princess, even though her household’s political influence had waned since her parents’ passing, she still maintained a direct line of communication with the Emperor and Empress.
The moment she presented her formal grievance within the throne room, detail-recording the illegal execution orders issued against a member of the royal bloodline, the Emperor flew into a towering, imperial rage. He immediately signed a decree mobilizing high-level imperial enforcers to descend upon the Medical Immortal Sect and bring them to justice.
It wasn’t necessarily that the Emperor harbored a deep, profound affection for Miss Luo as a distant relative. Rather, the fact that a remote, backwater medical guild possessed the audacity to post a public execution bounty on a member of the imperial lineage struck a massive blow to the authority of the throne. It was a blatant display of disrespect that a sovereign ruler could never tolerate.
With the full might of the imperial military deployed, Miss Luo finally let go of her anxiety, returning to her manor to enthusiastically play the host for her guests. Lu Yunxi and Shen San, thoroughly exhausted by weeks of relentless overland travel, happily accepted her hospitality, utilizing the time to fully restore their baseline attributes.
To everyone’s astonishment, the imperial strike team returned within a few short days, dragging the core leadership of the Medical Immortal Sect back to the capital in heavy chains.
The findings of the military raid sent shockwaves through the imperial court.
The Medical Immortal Sect had originally been evaluated as a minor, harmless guild operating out of a destitute mountain valley. In terms of raw combat capabilities, they were entirely insignificant; a single elite battalion from the palace could have wiped them out in an afternoon. The only reason they had generated such widespread prestige across the continent was due to a brilliant, aggressive marketing apparatus. They had effectively engineered a grand illusion of divine medical prowess out of thin air.
Yet behind that facade of humanitarian care, this seemingly fragile faction had been orchestrating a horrific, dark enterprise in absolute secrecy.
They had been covertly abducting vulnerable travelers and local patients, locking them inside subterranean dungeons to utilize as living “medicine men.”
These captives were used as human test tubes to evaluate unverified, volatile prescriptions. The sect’s researchers would inject them with various experimental concoctions—ranging from agonizing skin-eroding toxins to volatile stimulants—to log the physical degradation.
If that had been the extent of their crimes, it would have already been a monstrous scandal. But the reality uncovered by the enforcers was infinitely more depraved. A significant portion of the captives had been subjected to physical mutilation that defied description.
The prison cells housed missing children alongside the elderly. Because their natural constitutions were already fragile, the relentless chemical testing had warped and deformed their bodies, leaving them trapped in a living hell. The horrific rumor Miss Luo had overheard was entirely factual: the five-year-old girl who had been screaming in the dark had indeed had her eyes systematically gouged out by the researchers. Others had been subjected to amputation to test experimental bone-knitting salves. The sheer cruelty of the facility left even the hardened imperial enforcers visibly shaken.
“To gouge out the eyes of a helpless five-year-old child… what an absolute abomination! Did none of you monsters fear the judgment of the heavens?!” Miss Luo stood outside the subterranean cells of the capital’s grand tribunal, her brow furrowing so tightly with pure disgust it could have crushed steel.
“Judgment?!” a captive elder from the sect sneered from behind the iron bars, let out a sharp, mocking cackle. “What could a sheltered noblewoman like you possibly comprehend about the pursuit of science?! We executed those procedures for the ultimate advancement of medicine! Only by thoroughly testing the lethality of our prescriptions on human flesh can we safely administer finalized remedies to our paying clients! Every single person who buys our medicine is a direct beneficiary of our methodology! What right do you have to judge our sacrifice?!”
Miss Luo’s face drained of color, her frame trembling with immediate revulsion.
“If you had simply adhered to the foundational ethics established by the ancient medical texts, your research still would have yielded magnificent progress. There was never a clinical necessity to mutilate children to evaluate pharmacology. In the final deduction, you simply utilized science as a convenient shield to indulge your own twisted, sociopathic cruelty,” a measured, quiet voice drifted down the stone corridor.
Miss Luo blinked, turning her head to see Lu Yunxi and Shen San walking slowly toward the bars.
She let out a quiet breath of relief, stepping aside to grant them room.
Lu Yunxi’s eyes were filled with a profound, complex mixture of sorrow and cold fury. She stopped directly in front of the primary cell, her gaze locking onto the handsome, elegant young man in white who sat bound in heavy spirit-repressing chains.
After a long pause, she asked softly, “Why? Young Master Bai… what could possibly drive a man of your status to orchestrate such horror?”
The imperial records confirmed it explicitly: the horrific operation that had systematically blinded the five-year-old captive had been executed personally by this refined, gentle-looking physician. It was entirely jarring to reconcile.
Young Master Bai lifted his eyelids, a thin, indifferent smirk curling the corners of his lips as he recognized his former patients. “Ah, so it’s you two… I must commend your resourcefulness. I never expected a pair of passing vagrants would possess the political leverage to breach the imperial dungeons.”
Lu Yunxi drew a sharp breath, her eyes narrowing. “When you took us into your hovel that day… your ultimate intention was to turn us into medicine men as well, correct?” At the time, her instincts had screamed that something was anomalous about his behavior, but assuming it was merely a eccentric personal quirk, she hadn’t pressed the issue. Who could have imagined the scale of the horror hiding beneath that dirt-floored village?
“Hahaha… ha!” Young Master Bai suddenly burst into a wild, mocking laugh, the chains rattling violently against the stone floor. “What is the point of asking such obvious questions?! That is precisely correct! I fully intended to dissect your bodies and test our newest neural toxins on your nervous systems. But who could have predicted you would turn out to be such absolute anomalies! Who could have guessed that a pair of oblivious fools wandering the wastes would actually be core disciples of a legendary hidden sect?!”
At that, he pinned them with a venomous, bloodshot glare, a deep-seated arrogance flashing through his eyes. “I genuinely cannot comprehend how a pair of brainless losers like you managed to catch the attention of a grand sanctuary like the Misty Rain Palace! The system is entirely broken! You are both utterly dim-witted!”
Years ago, he had sacrificed everything, training his intellect to the absolute limit to challenge the entrance examinations of the continent’s apex sects—only to be rejected as unworthy. Yet, the very idiots he looked down upon navigated the world with the backing of a legendary hidden faction. The sheer injustice of reality had broken his mind.
Driven by spite, he had abandoned the righteous path, joining the Medical Immortal Sect to build his own dark kingdom…
Chapter 235: That’s It
Young Master Bai was ultimately sentenced to death by beheading.
As it turned out, the Medical Immortal Sect had not been so brazen or cruel at its inception. It had started out as an entirely ordinary, low-tier sect. The monstrous strategy of utilizing living “medicine men” had been introduced and implemented solely under Young Master Bai’s direction.
Though several elders had initially raised frantic objections, those voices quickly vanished as the results rolled in. Under his methodology, the Medical Immortal Sect transformed into a legendary entity that boasted a flawless, hundred-percent cure rate. Their prestige skyrocketed across the continent, and a massive, endless wave of desperate clients swarmed their valley for treatment.
Consequently, the faction evolved from an impoverished village of destitute doctors into an incredibly wealthy powerhouse hidden behind a humble facade. With the coffers overflowing, no one dared to challenge Young Master Bai’s vision again, and he was promptly elevated to the absolute highest tier of leadership, second only to the Sect Leader himself.
Once the full scope of the Medical Immortal Sect’s atrocities was laid bare to the public, the entire empire was shaken to its core.
Initially, when word first spread that the imperial guards had raided the valley and shackled the physicians, a massive crowd of former clients had vehemently defended the sect, even attempting to block the prison carriages. But the exact second the official tribunals revealed that nearly five hundred innocent civilians had been systematically abducted and tortured as test subjects, the public outrage turned apocalyptic, and the protests ceased instantly.
With the facility dismantled, Lu Yunxi and Shen San stayed behind to assist the survivors.
The rescued medicine men had been forcibly injected with experimental, volatile compounds on a daily basis and kept in absolute isolation for months. Having suffered such intense physical and psychological trauma, they were utterly terrified of reality and struggled to reintegrate into normal society.
Locating a clear, open courtyard within the ruins of the sect’s compound, Lu Yunxi retrieved a simple wooden table and a set of chairs from her inventory space. Hanging a hand-painted sign that read “Free Medical Consultations,” she sat down to wait.
Shen San took up a position beside the path, projecting his voice across the courtyard. “Step closer, everyone! High-level consultations with Doctor Lu, entirely free of charge! Absolutely no fees, no hidden costs! Step right up!”
Amusingly, the louder and more enthusiastic his shouting became, the more it panicked the traumatized survivors. Within less than half an hour, a massive, thousand-meter dead zone formed around their table. The fleeing medicine men vanished into the surrounding structures, leaving the thoroughfare entirely deserted.
“Master, what if I simply go out, round them up by force, and drag them over for treatment?” Shen San muttered, thoroughly depressed as he watched a distant group of pedestrians aggressively take a detour to avoid their sector.
In his estimation, his master’s diagnostic attributes were light-years ahead of any imperial physician; it was mind-boggling that these people were actively running away from her!
Lu Yunxi quickly shook her head, refuting the idea. “We are rogue cultivators, not bandits. How can we possibly force people to submit to medical treatment? If no one wishes to approach our table, we will simply pack up our gear and take our leave.”
The exact second the words left her mouth, a small boy nervously peeked out from behind a nearby wooden pillar.
“Is the care provided here… truly free of charge?” he asked, summoning every ounce of his courage.
“It is,” she replied, momentarily startled.
The boy let out a sharp breath, whirled around, and sprinted away, returning a moment later cradling a fragile infant in his arms.
Lu Yunxi’s eyes went wide at the sight of the baby; the infant’s health bar was flashing red, hovering on the absolute brink of systemic failure. Quickly relieving the boy of the bundle, she focused entirely on the child. She could instinctively feel the eyes of dozens of hidden survivors tracking her movements from the shadows of the ruins, but she couldn’t be bothered with palace politics or public relations right now. Her entire master-level concentration was locked onto stabilizing the dying baby.
As the infant’s health bar steadily climbed back into the green, the pervasive fear gripping the courtyard finally broke. An endless stream of survivors began trickling toward Lu Yunxi’s station, the crowd quickly mutating into a massive, twisting queue that stretched out the gates.
Fortunately, with Shen San managing the crowd logistics and organizing the intake, she wasn’t entirely overwhelmed by the volume.
The patients approached her table with hollow, grief-stricken expressions, only to depart with radiant smiles, their physical trauma entirely mended. Before long, Lu Yunxi’s reputation as a miraculous healer began spreading like wildfire. Of course, the acclaim remained localized among the immediate community of medical practitioners and survivors; the broader player base outside the Water Continent remained entirely oblivious to her exploits.
After sending her final patient away with a warm smile, Lu Yunxi leaned back against her chair, letting out a long, exhausted breath. “Shen San, you’ve worked incredibly hard over the past few weeks. Go find a comfortable spot and restore your attributes…”
Before she could finish her instructions, a man standing a few yards away caught her eye, frantically gesturing for her to step into the shadows of a nearby wall.
Her eyebrows raised in confusion. Standing up, she walked over to the secluded corner. “Is something the matter? Why are you lurking around so suspiciously?”
“Doctor Lu!” The man hunched his shoulders furtively, scanning the open courtyard to ensure no imperial guards were monitoring the sector before leaning close to her ear. To accommodate his paranoia and catch his whispered words, she lowered her chin, mirroring his tight posture.
“You are an exceptionally saintly, honorable person!” the man delivered with absolute, deadpan gravity.
Lu Yunxi: …
“Did you seriously orchestrate this entire cloak-and-dagger routine just to hand me a basic compliment?”
“Of course not! You mended my shattered skeletal structure and completely saved my life; you are undeniably a legendary miracle doctor!” He shook his head in profound admiration before gesturing for her to follow him deeper into the compound. “You have granted me a second lease on life, and a destitute survivor like me possesses absolutely no silver to compensate your household. However, during my captivity inside these walls, I accidentally stumbled upon a highly anomalous structural chamber… I am entirely convinced a legendary treasure is sealed within!”
A treasure?
Lu Yunxi’s interest was instantly piqued. Could this hidden chamber house an ancient artifact left behind by a supreme cultivator, identical to the hidden legacy vaults her system’s intelligent interface had hinted at previously?
A razor-sharp curiosity burning in her eyes, she raised an eyebrow and fell into step directly behind him. She was so thoroughly absorbed in calculating the possibilities that she completely failed to notice the utterly bizarre, deadpan expression washing over Shen San’s face a few yards away.
His arm, which had been raised to bid her farewell, froze awkwardly mid-air. Left standing alone in the center of the courtyard, he muttered blankly, “Did he just say… treasure?”
Who exactly did this guy think he was trying to entice?
Tracking the man guiding his master through the ruins, Shen San silently evaluated his metrics. While the survivor’s baseline character model was relatively decent, his hyper-vigilant, hunched walking posture made him look exactly like a low-level alley thief. With that terrible stance factored in, his aesthetic appeal plummeted from a solid eighty percent to a tragic forty.
Before long, his mind clicked, realizing the man was baiting his master with rumors of a hidden cache. Recalling her near-obsessive fixation on tracking down legacy maps during their previous continental legs, he sank into deep thought.
Shen San opened his inventory panel, systematically rifling through every slot and container he possessed, but his search yielded absolutely nothing resembling a local treasure map. Left with no other alternative, he opened his messaging interface, drafting an urgent inquiry to the premium information brokers he frequented.
Meanwhile, Lu Yunxi followed her guide straight into the absolute center of the ruined Medical Immortal Sect headquarters.
They stepped into a moderately sized thatched structure located near the main pavilion. The interior was entirely desolate, containing nothing but a solitary wooden table resting flat against the dirt floor.
After circling the perimeter of the room several times without spotting a single anomaly, she turned to the man, thoroughly perplexed. “Where exactly is this legendary treasure you boasted about?”
The man pulled a heavy iron shovel from his inventory space, effortlessly shoved the massive wooden table aside, and began aggressively tearing into the packed earth beneath it. “It’s sealed directly beneath the foundations, Master! During my labor rotation last month, I explicitly witnessed a senior elder conducting a secret excavation in this exact spot. My absolute instincts scream that this structural layout is anomalous!”
Only then did Lu Yunxi properly evaluate the displaced table. Despite the violent military raid that had smashed the surrounding pavilions, the piece of furniture was in pristine, immaculate condition, its surface polished to a mirror-like shine as if it had been meticulously wiped down every single day. Stepping closer, a subtle, cooling aroma of rare spiritual timber wafted from the grain, pleasant to the senses.
Intrigued, she pulled her own high-tier shovel from her inventory, joining the man in hollowing out the dirt.
With her grandmaster-level physical attributes backing her swings, she cleared the soil exponentially faster than her companion. Within minutes, her blade struck a solid metallic surface, exposing the contours of a reinforced chest.
She let out a dry chuckle. She had encountered an absolute cascade of identical locked boxes over her recent quests!
Clapping the loose dirt from her palms, she retrieved a simple broom to sweep the caked sediment from the lid before hoisting the container out of the trench. This particular box featured a highly detailed, striking lacquer painting of an apex tiger stretching across the wood, its features radiating a ferocious, domineering aura.
She paused, tilting her head to look at the survivor, who was eagerly peeking over her shoulder. “Since you were the one who uncovered the initial coordinates of this cache, how do you propose we distribute the loot?”
The man hesitated for a fraction of a second before offering an easy, grateful laugh. “Doctor Lu, you restored my body without demanding a single copper coin. Consider this asset a formal token of my gratitude! However… would it be terribly imposing to ask if I might catch a glimpse of the contents? I am losing my mind with pure curiosity.”
Lu Yunxi nodded smoothly, reaching out her hand to unlatch the lock. But a sudden memory of the patronizing, scam-like messages left behind by the previous trial entities flashed through her mind, and she instinctively took a step back, her eyes narrowing. “You open it.”
The man was absolutely ecstatic. Rubbing his hands together in wild anticipation, he grinned, “Then I shall gladly accept the honor!”
The moment the words left his mouth, he planted his fingers beneath the rim and shoved upward with all his might.
To his complete bewilderment, the lid remained entirely rigid, completely unmovable as if it were a solid, carved block of fake wood. His brow knitting tightly, he braced his feet against the dirt and strained against the metal, but the mechanism refused to budge a single millimeter.
A sharp, knowing glint flashed through Lu Yunxi’s eyes. It appeared the chest possessed a hardcoded attribute lock.
Stepping forward, she placed her hand over the latch and lightly lifted. The lid swung open smoothly without the slightest resistance.
Resting within the velvet interior of the chest was a solitary, antique book. The binding looked incredibly ancient, its parchment edges heavily curled and yellowed with time.
The man’s jaw dropped, his face twisted into an expression of raw, unadulterated disbelief. He leaned over the rim, squinting hard into the empty space, but no matter how many times he scanned the corners, the container held absolutely nothing aside from that single piece of literature.
Lu Yunxi gently lifted the text, carefully leafing through the initial pages. Her eyes widened as she recognized the underlying formula: it was a high-tier body-refining cultivation technique. Unlike standard immortal cultivation arts, a body-refining matrix could be executed flawlessly without the requirement of internal spiritual roots or active mana reserves.
Within the broader lore of the cultivation world, individuals born without spiritual aptitudes who still burned with the desire to transcend mortality typically chose the grueling path of physical cultivation. However, while history was overflowing with legends of orthodox cultivators achieving ascension, an immortal rising purely through physical body-refining mechanics was practically unheard of. The vast majority of high-tier scholars openly doubted whether a physical cultivation tree alone possessed the capacity to pierce the heavenly gates.
She let out a long, measured breath.
Regardless of its limitations within the lore, this specific technique was precisely what her current attribute build required. Although her interface had yet to detail how a Grandmaster-level player was supposed to officially cross over into immortal cultivation, enhancing her baseline physical quality was an undeniable advantage. Furthermore, according to the ancestral archives stored inside her private spatial inventory, physical body-refinement and orthodox spiritual arts could be trained simultaneously without triggering an internal elemental conflict.
“This… this is the entirety of the treasure?” the man stammered, his face a picture of absolute disappointment as he stared at the ragged book.
“It is,” she replied calmly. “Would you like me to hand-copy a duplicate manuscript for your household?”
“Heavens, no!” He waved his hands dismissively, backing out of the hovel without a shred of hesitation, muttering under his breath as he crossed the threshold. “And here I was thinking we had struck a literal gold mine! It’s just a bloody book… The scholar living next door to my estate practically drank himself to death over his poetry scrolls; I refuse to touch a cursed object like that!”
Lu Yunxi: …
“The reality is that this text is an exceptionally rare, secret martial manuscript,” she called out after him, a dry smile playing on her lips. “If you dedicate yourself to training these forms, you possess the capacity to transform into an elite grand master.”
The man halted, snapping his head back to look at her with an expression of pure, unadulterated shock—as if he were staring directly at a total lunatic.
