Chapter 125: Poisoning (5)
Translator: bjgoofy
The verdict on the two young lovers guilty of, shall we say, excessive physical contact resulting in bodily harm was handed down: a rushed wedding.
"I'll speak with my brother and, well, it seems we'd better hurry the wedding along.... At this rate, a grandchild might arrive before the ceremony even takes place...."
"N-no! We haven't done anything besides kissing, I swear!"
"Hm?"
"Th-that's not what I.... I mean.... Waaaaaah...."
Her wail rang out with such resonance one might have thought she'd woven Internal Energy into the sound itself, Sound Phoenix's weeping echoing with genuine sorrow.
Sound Phoenix's anguished cry of injustice burst forth, but in this era, kissing? To borrow Hwa-eun's words, that was practically the kind of intimacy reserved for married couples.
Since the two were already betrothed, perhaps the conclusion had simply nudged things in the direction they both wanted anyway.
And so the case of Wisdom Dragon's poisoning was officially closed as a youthful blunder by two hot-blooded young lovers who couldn't contain themselves, but the aftermath of the incident ended up affecting me, Hwa-eun, and our children as well.
What I mean is this: both Hwa-eun and I were still at too low a level in Poison Technique to do more than identify the type of poison. We couldn't draw the toxin that had spread through his body back out.
To treat Wisdom Dragon, we needed someone on the level of my father-in-law, the head of the family, or Grandfather the Man of Ten Thousand Poisons, a true master of the Tang family. For that reason, Divine Thief, who was supposed to escort us, had to make another trip back to the Tang family.
When poisoning symptoms affect the nervous system, the sooner treatment begins, the better.
Leaving neurological problems like frequent convulsions unchecked could lead to permanent nerve damage.
The nerves are an extraordinarily sensitive system; sustained excessive stimulation can cause damage in the blink of an eye.
When I relayed this to Zhuge Hu, the strategist, the person he chose to send was Divine Thief.
After all, when you need someone brought back fast, the bullet-train taxi of the murim world, Divine Thief, was the only option.
That was why our journey ended up being delayed by several more days.
"Wait, you want me to carry that old coot, the Man of Ten Thousand Poisons, on my back?"
"I must ask this of you, Elder Divine Thief. They said his condition shouldn't worsen, but I'm told it's not good if the symptoms persist for too long...."
"Can't you just send some fast runner to fetch the old man?"
"No one is as fast as you, Elder...."
"I refuse. Of all people, the Man of Ten Thousand Poisons! Just being near him makes me feel like poison is creeping up my skin...."
Well, at first, Divine Thief dug his heels in.
He and Grandfather seemed to have something of a rivalry between them.
But when the highest-ranking elder of the Murim Alliance stepped in, he couldn't utter a single word of protest and had to sprint straight to Sichuan.
"Divine Thief, let me ask you a favor. With Blood Cult matters requiring our attention on external affairs, how can we function if the strategist is distracted by family business?"
"Ah, fine. If the Fist Emperor himself says so, then...."
Perhaps it was the thief in him, unable to stand his ground before the head of the murim's governing body?
"Elder, please make sure to tell the children that we'll be a few days late."
"Yes, yes, I heard you."
Even Grandfather the Man of Ten Thousand Poisons, who hated being carried on someone's back, couldn't refuse after receiving a personal letter from the Alliance Leader. In the end, he must have hurried, because he arrived at the entrance of the Murim Alliance faster than it had taken us to come here, roughly two days one way and three days round trip, wearing an uncomfortable expression on his face.
And so, treatment for Wisdom Dragon was carried out.
Sound Phoenix too, as a bonus.
"I've managed to draw out most of the poison qi scattered through your body, but it seems you'll need long-term treatment.
The period of poisoning was extensive. The toxin has been absorbed too deeply into your body to extract in a short time. For now, you should have no difficulty moving around and your body will return to normal, so once you're feeling well enough, come visit the main estate.
Also, for a while, your eyes and lips may tremble, and you may develop a limp in your arms or legs. Thanks to Soryong's advice, we started treatment quickly, but given how long you were poisoned, it will take quite some time for the symptoms to improve."
"Thank you, Elder Man of Ten Thousand Poisons."
"And you, come here too. The fact that you ate the same thing and show no symptoms only means they haven't manifested yet. You're probably severely poisoned as well."
That evening, after Grandfather the Man of Ten Thousand Poisons had arrived.
Having finished the lengthy treatment, Grandfather returned to his quarters in the evening, so Hwa-eun and I went to the Guest Hall.
A visit to check whether the treatment had gone well, a courtesy call of sorts.
Since Zhuge Qiao belonged to a family among the Seven Great Families, it was proper etiquette to pay a visit.
When we arrived at the quarters in the Guest Hall where Wisdom Dragon was staying, laughter could be heard from inside.
"From now on, your epithet isn't Wisdom Dragon, it's Gecko!"
"Bwahahaha! Gecko!"
Inside, we could hear the familiar voices of Wisdom Dragon, his girlfriend Sound Phoenix, and their friends, Sword Dragon, Fist Dragon, and Bow Phoenix.
"Cheonrang, do something about them, please!"
"Hey, you lot, give it a rest already!"
"That's right, knock it off. Sound Phoenix looks so flustered. But why are you flustered, exactly?"
'Gecko? That means wall-climbing lizard, doesn't it?'
They were clearly close enough friends to tease each other mercilessly, but still, "Gecko" referred to a wall-climbing lizard.
Curious, I announced myself at the entrance.
I was going to go in anyway, and a conversation that piqued my interest was already drifting out.
"Is anyone in? Wisdom Dragon? It's Soryong of the Sichuan Tang family."
"Oh! Young Hero Soryong! Please, come in!"
The moment he heard my voice, an enthusiastic welcome rang out.
Stepping inside, I found, as expected, the remaining members of the Five Dragons Three Phoenixes minus Peng's group, all seated in chairs.
Sound Phoenix's ears were flushed red, though.
"I heard your treatment was finished, so I came to see how you're doing."
"Goodness, I should have been the one to come visit you, but in this state of mine.... From what Sound Phoenix told me, I owe you a great debt, Young Hero."
When we first met, his face had been somewhat irritable and stiff, but that must have been the effects of the mercury poisoning; now both his expression and his manner of speaking had softened considerably.
"Not at all. A great debt, you say? The Man of Ten Thousand Poisons, my grandfather, was the one who treated you. I merely offered a few words."
When I responded to Wisdom Dragon's gratitude with a modest deflection, he stared at me with a serious expression and spoke.
"No, you identified what had poisoned us, saving not only me but Sound Phoenix as well. It's only right that I express my gratitude."
Wisdom Dragon's left hand was still trembling, and even the corner of his mouth quivered from the effects of the poisoning, yet he struggled to raise his fists in a formal salute toward me.
After the brief exchange of courtesies, Sound Phoenix poured us tea.
That was when I asked about the Gecko business I'd overheard at the entrance, curious what it was all about.
"By the way, I wasn't trying to eavesdrop, but as I was coming in, I happened to hear something about a 'Gecko.' What was that about?"
-Pfft!
-Pfft!
At my question, Sword Dragon and Fist Dragon, who had been sipping their tea, sprayed it right out of their mouths.
Bow Phoenix, who'd been sitting between them, looked as though she'd been struck by lightning out of a clear sky.
She stared at the two of them with a blank face.
"Ugh...."
Even as they handed Bow Phoenix a piece of cloth to wipe herself off, stifled snickering leaked out, impossible to contain.
"Pfhh...."
"S-sorry, Bow Phoenix. Pfft...."
Hwa-eun and I exchanged bewildered glances, and Wisdom Dragon scratched his head sheepishly before answering.
"Well, you did save my life, so I can hardly refuse to answer.... It's, um.... It's nothing, really...."
"Cheonrang!"
"But our savior is curious, so I can't exactly not tell him...."
"B-but...."
Sound Phoenix tried to stop Wisdom Dragon from explaining, but the explanation continued.
"Cinnabar isn't something people are supposed to consume in the first place, is it? Ahem...."
"Yes, that's true."
"The only creature that actually eats cinnabar is the lizard, isn't it?"
"The lizard?"
Lizard referred to a type of reptile, but why on earth would a lizard eat mercury?
Seeing the confused look on my face, Hwa-eun spoke up quietly beside me.
"Ah, you're talking about the lizards raised for the Chastity Mark, aren't you?"
"Yes, th-that's right."
"Ah...."
I wondered what they were getting at, and it turned out Wisdom Dragon was talking about something I'd heard about once before at the Namgung family.
It was the story of those poor, mistreated lizards raised for the purpose of testing a woman's virginity.
The utterly absurd claim that if you kept a lizard in a jar, fed it nothing but cinnabar its entire life, ground it up, and applied the dye to a woman's body, the mark would never fade so long as she remained a virgin.
"But what does the lizard have to do with anything?"
Just as I was wondering why they'd suddenly brought up the subject of mistreated lizards, Sound Phoenix was poking Wisdom Dragon in the ribs again, signaling him to stop.
Avoiding Sound Phoenix's gaze, the explanation spilled from Wisdom Dragon's lips.
"Ahem.... So, the lizard raised for the Chastity Mark, it confirms a woman's purity, doesn't it?"
"Yes, I suppose so."
Whether it truly confirmed anything was debatable, but the Namgung family's daughter had used it to prove her innocence, so I nodded along.
Then came the answer.
"Yes, well, in other words, it protects a woman's honor....
And since I also consumed a jar laced with cinnabar and thereby protected Sound Phoenix's purity.... I protected her honor, so to speak. Those friends of mine said it was as if I'd acted just like a lizard raised for the Chastity Mark...."
"Excuse me?"
"And since I'm one of the Five Dragons, they thought Gecko, with the 'tiger' character in it, suited me better than plain 'lizard.' It's, well.... a joke, you could say...."
So in other words, despite kissing so frequently, so often, so constantly, they had never gone any further, and for that, he was being likened to a lizard fed cinnabar to preserve a woman's virtue.
"Pfhh...."
I tried to hold it in, but the laugh escaped anyway.
I'd wondered what sort of people the Five Dragons were, and it turned out they were quite the entertaining bunch.
***
"Bwahahaha! Really? You call Blade Dragon a sworn brother? Then just call me brother too."
"Of course, if you're Blade Dragon's sworn brother, you're a brother to all of us."
"Hey, you lot, why are you making my savior into your little brother?"
"Because that way we become your elders, don't we? Soryong saved your life, so by rights he should be honored as a senior, after all."
"What!?"
"Bahahahaha!"
Sword Dragon was the chief disciple of the Zhongnan Sect, his Daoist name Mujin. Fist Dragon was the eldest son of the Hwangbo Family, and his name was Hwangbo Yeong.
They were bold and spirited in temperament.
Natural social butterflies, it took only a few exchanges before things felt comfortable, and though I'd intended to just pay my respects and leave, I ended up staying late into the night talking.
"But, do you really honor someone as a senior just because they saved your life?"
"Pardon?"
Bow Phoenix had a rather pronounced air of obliviousness about her, true to her appearance. She was a disciple of the Mysterious Flower Palace, a sect shrouded in mystery.
[Ah, don't mind Bow Phoenix. She's always like that.]
[She has a kind of innocent charm about her.]
Supposedly, no alcohol was sold within the Murim Alliance, yet somehow, someone produced drinks, insisting that a night like this called for it, and before long a drinking session was underway.
"You'll have a drink too, won't you, little brother?"
"I'm still not old enough...."
"I started drinking at twelve, so you'll be fine."
Once the drinks were set out, they couldn't let the occasion pass without music and began pestering Sound Phoenix to play them a song.
After teasing her like that earlier, no less.
"Sound Phoenix, shouldn't you give our savior a taste of the bamboo flute?"
"Exactly! Not for the drinks, but play the bamboo flute for our savior."
"Haah...."
Sound Phoenix looked reluctant, but since I'd never actually witnessed Sound Arts in person, I was genuinely curious and added my own request.
"If it wouldn't be too much trouble, might I have the chance to experience it? I've never seen Sound Arts before."
"If our savior, Young Hero Soryong, asks, how could I refuse...."
What Sound Phoenix drew from her sleeve was a jade flute.
So "bamboo flute" was the term for a Chinese transverse flute.
-Tweeet.
A single hauntingly beautiful melody was performed, and just as I was marveling at its beauty, what followed was a demonstration of Sound Arts.
Perhaps as payback for their teasing, she made Sword Dragon and Fist Dragon nod off drowsily, then snapped them awake with a clang.
'Oh!? What was that?'
When I reacted with surprise to the clang at the end of the Sound Arts, Sound Phoenix turned to me and asked.
"Was our Moon Shadow Palace's bamboo flute pleasing to listen to?"
"Yes, absolutely. I was deeply impressed."
Hwa-eun nodded in agreement.
Pleased by our admiration, Sound Phoenix smiled with satisfaction, then reached into her sleeve and pulled out a mother-of-pearl box, only for a look of dismay to cross her face.
What she had retrieved was the mother-of-pearl box containing the jar.
After all the chaos caused by the poisoning, she must have been mortified to realize she'd pulled it out again by sheer force of habit.
"Ah.... It's become such a habit.... Cheonrang bought it for me, but I should just throw it away."
"Next time, I'll buy you one made from safflower."
"But safflower rouge doesn't work well on lips...."
Listening to their exchange, I got the feeling there was more to the story.
When I asked the two of them about the details, I came to understand why she was so particular about applying something to her lips.
As a practitioner of Sound Arts, her primary weapon was the flute. Practicing martial techniques required extensive flute-playing, which often left her lips cracked and chapped.
Moon Shadow Palace, being a martial sect, didn't pay much attention to such things, and when it got really bad, she'd just apply some oil. But when Wisdom Dragon, feeling sorry for her chapped lips, bought her rouge, that was what sparked the beginning of their romance.
Their kisses, she explained, were a sort of treatment check, making sure her lips stayed moist and well-maintained.
"So that's how it was?"
"Yes, well...."
Having told the story, Sound Phoenix blushed with embarrassment.
The mood turned slightly awkward for a moment, so to change the atmosphere, I decided to bring up a question that had occurred to me during the end of her performance.
"Ah, Sound Phoenix, something came to mind while I was listening to your performance. If it's not too presumptuous, might I ask for your advice?"
"Advice?"
Sound Phoenix tilted her head at my words, then smiled and nodded.
"Of course. You saved both Cheonrang's and my life. I'd be more than happy to help."
"The truth is, among the Sound Arts you demonstrated just now, that clang, I actually heard something like it not long ago. The moment I heard it, my Internal Strength was shaken violently and I couldn't keep my wits about me. Is there any way to block something like that?"
"What? You've been hit by Sound Arts before?"
What the clang at the end of her demonstration had reminded me of was the sound produced by the wingbeats of the Strange Screaming Tiger, the disorienting tone that left a person unable to think straight.
If she was a master of Sound Arts, I thought she might also know how to counter it.
"This is confidential, but none of you five seem the type to go around spreading word. The truth is, back in Yunnan......."
It was classified, but since it was a creature we'd need to capture sooner or later, it was information worth knowing.
Moreover, with the Five Poisons Sect having joined hands with the Blood Cult, there was no guarantee that a Strange Screaming Tiger wouldn't appear in the Central Plains. This was knowledge worth sharing, so I explained everything in front of the five of them.
"......That's how it happened."
"Ah, so that's why you didn't give us the full details about Sword Phoenix and Brother Peng back then?"
"Yes, Brother Hwangbo."
"What about Sword Phoenix, is she alright?"
"Yes. The three of them are receiving treatment at the Beast Palace, so there's no need to worry."
"That's a relief."
After my explanation, a round of worried questions about Brother Peng's group went back and forth. Once the mood settled, Sound Phoenix poured liquor halfway into one of the drinking cups that had been set out alongside the refreshments.
Then she had Sword Dragon tap it with a pair of chopsticks.
-Ting. Ting.
"Sound spreads outward in steady waves, like ripples from a stone dropped on the surface of water. So if you can find the opposite sound and make them collide, they cancel each other out, like this."
When Sound Phoenix finished her explanation and raised her flute to play, the sound of her flute and the sound of Sword Dragon tapping the cup both vanished entirely.
'Ah! This is basically noise-canceling!'
And here I'd thought she was just a kiss addict; she was actually quite the talent.
Sound Phoenix, as it turned out, was a debuffer who could neutralize her opponents!
And a hard counter to the Strange Screaming Tiger, at that!
I decided to make her a deal right then and there.
"Sound Phoenix, if I were to call on you someday, would you grant me one favor? When I go to hunt the Strange Screaming Tiger, I'd like you to come along and block its sound. If you do, I'll make something the two of you need."
"It's a matter for the good of the murim, so of course I should help, but.... something we need?"
Sound Phoenix tilted her head at the mention of a gift.
She seemed curious about what I could possibly make for them.
What else could it be?
A non-toxic lip balm that would keep their lips perfectly moisturized, so they could kiss to their hearts' content.
'Go ahead and kiss all you want. Don't even worry about it.'
*****
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