Chapter 24 A cat that saves people is a good cat
The crane flapped its wings and landed with difficulty outside the gate of Hanyuan Peak in the biting wind.
The snow under my feet made a crisp crunching sound when I stepped on it. It was ankle-deep.
Several errand disciples wearing thick gray coats were mechanically waving huge bamboo brooms to clear the new snow.
They had no reaction to the crane's arrival, not even bothering to lift their eyelids.
Bai Qingchen looked at the three words on the plaque, but felt frightened and tightened his robe.
He took a deep breath and pushed open the heavy wooden door.
In the dim light, an old steward with white hair and beard was bent over a desk piled with miscellaneous items. He was slowly fiddling with a thickly patinated abacus by the light of an oil lamp.
"Disciple Bai Qingchen has come to Hanyuan Peak to report." Bai Qingchen's voice was particularly clear in the empty room.
The old steward paused his hand on the abacus, without raising his head, and reached into the drawer with his skinny hand to grope around.
"You are the new inner disciple, right?" The voice was dry and hoarse, like sandpaper rubbing against each other.
"It's really rare. It's been almost ten years since an inner disciple chose Hanyuan Peak."
As he spoke, he took out a wooden sign and a booklet with yellowed pages.
"Your name is Bai Qingchen, right? This is your ID card. With this token, you can enter and exit Hanyuan Peak freely. But remember, you must not go to the top of the peak to disturb Jian Zun's retreat."
Bai Qingchen stepped forward and reached out to take it.
Just as his fingers were about to touch the token, the old steward's cloudy eyes seemed to turn and his gaze fell on Bai Qingchen's face.
It was an extremely subtle change, but Bai Qingchen caught it.
The old steward's cloudy pupils suddenly contracted, and were then covered by a thick layer of indissoluble coldness.
The wrinkles on his face tightened instantly, and the corners of his mouth suddenly turned downwards, unlike his gentle attitude just now.
He pushed the wooden sign forward and stopped talking.
He lowered his head and started fiddling with the abacus again, making a louder crackling sound, as if he was driving away something.
Bai Qingchen's fingers paused in the air for a moment.
He silently picked up the token without saying anything else, nodded slightly, turned around and left.
The biting cold wind outside the house immediately blew towards me, carrying snow foam.
Bai Qingchen walked along a half-trampled path through a dead forest covered with icicles.
On the way, several outer disciples huddled in the leeward area were talking in low voices, and faint short laughter could be heard.
But when Bai Qingchen's figure appeared on the path, all the sounds stopped abruptly.
Several pairs of eyes were fixed on him, with a look of scrutiny, indifference, and undisguised rejection.
The air seemed to freeze in an instant, and the expressions on their faces froze, as if the laughter and joy just now had never appeared.
Bai Qingchen ignored their indifference and asked, "Excuse me, fellow brothers, where is Hanyuan Peak's residence?"
Seeing that no one answered, Bai Qingchen wanted to move forward.
At this moment, a man reeking of alcohol, his face flushed, muttered, "Where to stay? Go forward... turn left, there's a ton... a ton... of empty rooms. Take your pick!"
After saying that, he burped.
"Chen Yi, you're secretly drinking outside again! Didn't I tell you to go back to your doghouse if you want to drink?"
"Next time you pass out drunk outside, I'll just freeze you to death."
When the disciples saw the drunkard popping out from the corner, they frowned slightly.
Although he said he didn't care, he still felt sorry for the person and helped him away.
Bai Qingchen followed the directions and found a group of houses.
There were still lights on in the first few rooms, indicating that someone was living there.
Bai Qingchen chose a small courtyard near the edge because he liked quietness.
The courtyard is not big and is covered with thick snow.
The furnishings in the room were simple, and Bai Qingchen walked to the window.
Through the gaps in the broken window covered with yellowed old paper, you can see a faint glow flowing towards the main peak in the distance.
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He was so close, yet so far away.
The days at Hanyuan Peak are simple and repetitive.
The manager didn't assign him any work, so Bai Qingchen had some peace and quiet.
At the beginning of the Mao hour every day, when the sky was pitch black, Bai Qingchen would start practicing the magic formulas. When he finished meditating, it was often past the Chen hour.
Most of the people on Hanyuan Peak did not practice fasting. When Bai Qingchen went to the cafeteria to eat, the disciples he met avoided him like the plague.
As we walked back past a group of wind-eroded rocks, the suppressed sounds of quarreling from inside drifted in with the wind.
"...It's that same face again. It's so annoying! It's the same old thing!"
"You think you can just take advantage of the fact that you look a bit like me..." A rough voice full of disgust said.
"Third brother! Shut up!" another voice interrupted sternly.
"It doesn't matter who he looks like, just make sure he doesn't cause any trouble."
"Have you forgotten the rules of the Peak Master? If you do something wrong again, we will all be kicked out." The rough voice was suddenly choked, leaving only heavy breathing.
Bai Qingchen's footsteps stopped in the shadows.
All the clues were connected instantly. Why did the old steward change his expression? Why did the disciples look at him with cold and repulsive eyes?
He gently stroked his cool cheek, feeling bitter. Was this face a bad symbol here?
After all, four hundred years have passed, and the Medicine King Valley has changed a lot.
People will change eventually.
At this moment, a muffled thud came from the other side of the strange rocks, accompanied by painful groans and the sound of a wine jug breaking.
Bai Qingchen walked around and saw Chen Yi curled up in the snow, his face as pale as paper, his lips dark purple, and his body shaking violently like a sieve.
He pressed his hands tightly against his chest, his knuckles turning white from the force, and a painful groaning sound came from his throat.
His eyes were unfocused, veins popped out on his forehead, and cold sweat instantly condensed into ice beads.
He had met this man a few days ago, and his name seemed to be Chen Yi.
"Senior Brother Chen?" Bai Qingchen quickly stepped forward and squatted down.
With his experience from his previous life, he could tell at a glance that the meridians in this person's body were in disarray and his spiritual energy was dissipating, which was a sign of a recurrence of an old illness.
"Get... away... don't... touch me..." Chen Yi's dilated pupils barely focused, and he struggled to push Bai Qingchen away.
"Ah! It hurts...you...get away...ah!" His voice was hoarse and broken, full of desperate rejection.
"Your old injury has flared up, and the poison has attacked your heart. You will die!" Bai Qingchen's voice was calm, but his hands were extremely firm.
Ignoring Chen Yi's weak struggles and curses, he quickly half-lifted his heavy body and leaned it against a huge rock in the leeward direction.
Chen Yi's body was so cold and stiff that he didn't look like a living person. His teeth were clenched and he was convulsing in pain.
Bai Qingchen unbuttoned his collar without saying a word.
I saw that the skin under the left ribs near the heart was a strange blue-black color, and there seemed to be countless ice-blue lines wriggling under the skin, slowly and stubbornly eroding the heart veins.
"A bone-eating poisonous spider? It also damaged the foundation of my heart meridian..." Bai Qingchen frowned, obviously recognizing what kind of poison it was.
This poison is insidious and stubborn. The poisoned person's spiritual roots will definitely be damaged. In the early stages, the spider venom will slowly erode the meridians of the poisoned person and cannot be easily detected.
By the time he was discovered, it was already beyond cure. Toxins had spread throughout his meridians, preventing the flow of spiritual energy. The man was considered useless.
This shows how insidious the person who poisoned the food was.
The reason Chen Yi is still alive today is entirely due to his strong cultivation foundation, but every time he has an attack, it's like walking through the gates of hell.
Bai Qingchen quickly took out a flat jade box from his personal storage bag.
When it was opened, there were silver needles of different lengths and as thin as cow hair inside.
The needle tail has a hint of dark gold color. This is a set of high-quality gold needles he bought when he left Lingdu.
"Bear with it!" Bai Qingchen growled, no longer paying attention to Chen Yi's vague resistance and curses.
He released spiritual power from his fingertips, picked up the three longest golden needles, and attacked with lightning speed!
Tsk! Tsk! Tsk!
The three golden needles pierced into the three major acupoints in Chen Yi's chest, namely Tanzhong, Juque and Guanyuan, with incredible precision.
The needle tail vibrated slightly, making an inaudible hum.
The moment the needle tip pierced his body, Chen Yi's body suddenly stiffened, the roar in his throat was forcibly blocked, and his white eyes revealed extreme pain.
Bai Qingchen kept moving, his hands flying so fast that only an afterimage remained.
Several more golden needles fell and pierced around the injured area under Chen Yi's ribs, as well as several important acupoints on his arms and legs.
Every time the needle fell, it precisely pierced the nodes where the ice-blue threads were wriggling.
He carefully guided the spiritual power from his fingertips through the golden needle. The poison had taken root for a long time, and if it was dispelled hastily, it would instantly take Chen Yi's life.
The only way is to divert the stubborn toxins little by little from the heart and meridians to the extremities, just like draining a flood.
Following the guidance of the golden needle, the terrifying blue-black color under Chen Yuanyi's ribs began to fade at a speed visible to the naked eye, and the thin ice-blue line also became dim.
His violently shaking body gradually calmed down, and the death convulsions and feeling of suffocation disappeared.
The dilated pupils refocused, filled with the confusion of surviving a disaster.
He stared blankly at the handsome new disciple in front of him.
The other person's brows were tightly furrowed, and beads of sweat oozed out of his forehead, instantly condensing into frost in the cold wind. His expression was so focused that it was almost solemn.
Those slender and powerful fingers were twisting the golden needles on his body steadily and accurately.
The fingertips carried warm spiritual power, which slowly dispelled the piercing pain that had been raging in his body for many years through the cold golden needles.
Bai Qingchen's face turned slightly pale. The spiritual energy and mental energy consumed by guiding the spider poison were extremely great.
Finally, when the last trace of stubborn poison was drawn out of the heart meridian by the golden needle, Bai Qingchen let out a long sigh and stopped.
"I can only suppress it temporarily. As time goes by, it will slowly erode my heart meridians."
Bai Qingchen actually knew that there was a way to completely dispel it, but he couldn't do it with his current strength, and he didn't want to give the other party uncertain expectations.
Bai Qingchen took out all the gold needles with swift movements and put them into the jade box.
He then took out a small porcelain bottle from his storage bag, poured out a crimson pill, and handed it to Chen Yi.
"Hold it in your mouth, don't swallow it. Nuan Yang Pill strengthens your body and replenishes your energy." Bai Qingchen's voice was a little tired, but still calm.
"Next time this happens, you can always come to me."
The pill melted in his mouth, and a gentle warm current quickly spread out, dispelling the coldness from Chen Yi's limbs.
Chen Yi leaned against the cold stone, feeling a relaxation in his body that he had not felt in years. He no longer needed to numb himself with alcohol.
He watched Bai Qingchen pack up his things, stand up, as if preparing to leave, and finally found his voice.
He spoke hoarsely, with a complex emotion that was unfamiliar even to himself:
"……Why?"
Bai Qingchen paused and turned his head to look at him.
In the wind and snow, the lines of his profile were clear and his eyes were calm.
"Just consider it as a thank you for showing me the way that day." He said lightly.
After he finished speaking, he did not stop, turned around and walked into the increasingly violent snowstorm, and his thin figure was soon swallowed up by the flying snow.
Chen Yi sat alone under the cold rock. The effect of the Nuan Yang Pill in his mouth was still lasting. The warmth in his body formed a sharp contrast with the biting cold around him.
He looked down at his hands which were no longer trembling, then looked in the direction where Bai Qingchen had disappeared.
He muttered to himself, his voice so low that it was instantly swept away by the wind and snow: "...You...are...different...from them."
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