The class stilled. Master Pan gave them all a pitying shake of his head. “Here, like nowhere else in your lives, as new shoots blossoming under the gentle summer rains of your cultivation journey, you have the chance to form alliances and friendships as strong as silver. As pure as gold!”
The man’s gaze toward broken and sobbing Sheng Jie held a father’s pity. “Aye. This poor fool misstepped, and badly. And here he is. A kung fu sibling who misjudged his opponent and was destroyed, who needs nothing more than a brother or sister’s love. Someone who will have his back through thick and thin, no matter his fumbles. Someone who will seek to guide, not condemn.”
He glared at them all. “Because someday, the poor fool sobbing at the feet of his or her enemies and in desperate need of rescue might be you. And save for the alliances you forge at this school, all you will receive are the contemptuous glares you flash so freely at your broken brother even now!”
Perception check made!
Yet nobody moved forward to the broken Sheng Jie’s aid.
Alex’s gut clenched at the choking gurgles Sheng Jie had begun to emit, saw the wide-eyed look of helpless fear in the young man’s eyes.
Having seen that look before. A lifetime ago.
Alex forced himself forward, forcing himself to fight against the overwhelming pressure of the Silver before him. “Master Pan.”
The full force of his mentor’s gaze locked upon his own. Alex crashed back down to his knees.
“Speak.”
Alex swallowed. “We are not so soulless that we don’t feel the weight of your words. Even I now feel that shame. They refuse to step forward not because they are callous jackals, but because your aura is freezing them with terror.”
Master Pan flashed the bleakest of smiles. “I know. And if no student of mine even has the strength to fight against it, if none of you have the strength to stand, then Sheng Jie will perish. And that shame will be one more burden we will all share together. Having failed this fallen fool, having failed a kung fu brother, having failed ourselves.”
Alex felt an awful chill race down his spine, gazing at the man in disbelief, as did the class entire.
His teacher shook his head. “Did you not sense the jolt of Qi you blasted into your foe with a move that should have been beyond you, Alex? Silver Swan is a killing art, and how amazing it is that Lady Feng Huang’s newest disciple knows it so well when she is just a basic cultivator, like you, and, word has it, once destined for the Purple Path.” He flashed a chill smile. “Her enemies no doubt expected her ruination, Clipped Wings kung fu echoing innocence sacrificed, power surrendered, savoring the despair beneath their victim’s smile. Yet instead she trains with us, disciple to a killing art, and somehow you too possess a fragment of her gift. Strange, how that all worked out.”
He then turned to the gaze upon the student Alex had crushed so thoroughly he appeared on the verge of death. “And now we see firsthand why some students were given scholarships without enduring the trials, possessing arts too valuable to risk losing forevermore.” He shrugged. “To say nothing of how many cultivators the girl might have killed in what were never intended as fatal duels, save for the Ruidian before us.”
He shook his head. “This former slave survived a half dozen death matches, and the silly boy dying at his feet was so arrogant as to think our Alex would be easy prey. The only thing more tragic is that not a damned one of you has it in them to save their kung fu brother!”
Master Pan suddenly roared. “Well, cowards? Who among you would dare say you didn’t hold Alex in just as much contempt before today? Are any of you hypocrites even worthy of standing before me?”
Alex winced and looked away, just grateful that Master Pan’s aura was now spread about the class entire. Though it served as a painful reminder that no matter how friendly they seemed, even the few masters who had showed Alex a lick of kindness were ruthless beyond belief. More than willing to let fellow students die, or let Alex drop from a hundred-foot ledge onto the rocky shoals below, if there was even a chance it would forge them into sharper, deadlier, more focused cultivators.
He could only wonder how many students perished each year to their methods, and if the number of cultivators that blossomed into Bronze or Silver could honestly justify this path. It was a question to which he knew he would never have an answer.
But gazing at the dying youth who couldn’t be any older than him, recognizing that desperate look all too well, having passed by the terminal ward every time he went in for chemo a lifetime ago, knowing one day it would be his turn… he already knew the choice he would make.
Feeling like his legs were being crushed between boulders, he snarled at his own trembling limbs. “Move, fuckers.”
And they did.
“Qie Qie?” Two words to the girl he dared call friend. She blanched and nodded, forcing herself forward as well.
The entire class’s wide-eyed focus bore through their backs almost as painfully as their mentor’s pressure, though it had eased, thankfully, once they actually took those first lurching steps.
“Shut up, worm. I don’t like this any more than you do,” Alex said to the choking, gurgling man who had been his enemy just minutes ago, he and Qie Qie gently shifting him to the stretcher always kept beside the training sands for just such an occasion, forcing themselves upright despite the pressure, carefully transporting the fallen cultivator to the academy infirmary.
And the moment they had taken their first steps, the pressure eased.
“And there is a lesson even in this,” Master Pan’s surprised voice echoed behind them, Alex no longer paying the madman any mind as he determinedly made his way down the corridor.
“Alex?”
“Yes, Qie Qie?”
“The spirit doctors are down the leftmost corridor. Not the right.”
“Right.”
“No. Left.”
Alex shook his head. “I can’t believe I’m doing this.”
Qie Qie chuckled softly. “Neither can I.”
And with a gurgling rattle, Sheng Jie stopped breathing.
“Run! Run, Alex, we have no time!”
And he did.
12
The spirit doctor looked gravely at the pair of them. “We have stabilized him. He will live.”
Qie Qie flashed a relieved smile. Alex said not a word, but felt a terrible weight lift off his chest. He still couldn’t believe he was waiting patiently here, two hours later, for news regarding the enemy he himself had smashed. Filled with righteous fury.
Until the stupid kid had almost died.
Had died.
But was brought to the infirmary in the nick of time.
“But his injuries are serious. And I don’t mean the superficial physical ones. He will need the most intensive care and remedies if he is to have any hope of making a full recovery.”
Alex dipped his head, hiding his confusion. “Thank you for telling us, doctor.”
The man’s expression was strangely apologetic. “Unfortunately, he has imbibed numerous tainted cultivation pills. The damage is subtle enough, his own body masking it perfectly while he was in the peak of health, that if I didn’t know better, I would say he was the victim of poisoning, not merely incompetent alchemy. His meridian framework is, consequently, as brittle as twigs. It began to collapse the moment his meridian channels were flooded with a violent storm of Qi.”
The healer sighed, shaking his head. “In order to assure a full recovery, we must begin an advanced series of treatments. Highly… expensive treatments, immediately.”
Alex frowned. Feeling a cold chill in his gut, recalling so viscerally at that moment Hao Hai, the infernal merchant’s son, flashing his vindictive smile while Sheng Jie gave in to a berserker’s hate.
An unnatural hate.
And the way Master Pan had painted him, before he had caught sight of Alex, he had been the most gracious of students, helping his fellow kung fu siblings whenever they had need.
“How much will it cost?”
The doctor locked gazes with the young Bronze before him. “It is a cost of three spirit pearls, and that is just for the cost in spiritually-infused ingredients, tinctures, and the worth of our own tapped life force. For even a day of our lives sacrificed is precious to us. We would, in fact, be taking a loss.”
Qie Qie blanched at those words. “Three spirit pearls… gods above, that’s a fortune!”
Alex frowned. “And their worth is measured in platinum, right?”
Hard eyes pinned his own. “Few cultivators would ever sell them, and even the most desperate wouldn’t do it for less than ten platinum. Sometimes fifteen or higher, depending on the market.”
Alex blanched, recalling that a purse full of platinum would be able to buy a luxurious, fully-furnished home, complete with bath, sauna, and cultivation garden, almost anywhere in the city. Which seemed to be just about the value of three spirit pearls.
Qie Qie dipped her head. “His family is not poor.”
His solemn gaze pinned their own. “Our fastest messenger raced for their house. He was perhaps foolish, blurting the dire nature of the situation before he had even been properly greeted. And though the servant raced back to the manor, our messenger was left standing by the front gate for half a glass, the entire courtyard empty.”
Qie Qie met the spirit doctor’s gaze. “I’m sure his master...”
“Has retroactively dropped him for being so foolish as to pollute his base with tainted pills, among other things,” he said, peering hard at Alex. The doctor gave a pitying shake of his head. “I will not tell you the exact words, but I fear the boy would take his own life, did he know the scathing contempt the man now has for him.”
Alex froze, gut twisting with fury and pity in equal measure. As much as he was furious at Sheng Jie for having a hand in Lai Wei’s ambush, to see him so utterly shamed and rejected by those who should have had his back no matter what, thrown to the wolves like broken garbage by the most important people in his life, was beyond tragic.
Forsaken by his kung fu siblings. His master. Even his own family. And worse, far worse, he hated the possibility that Sheng Jie might not have even been the mastermind. Rather, that he had been a patsy, fed tainted pills, perhaps to foster an unnatural hatred even as they ate him from within, from someone he had been foolish enough to trust.
And had Alex not been so damned soft as to actually rescue the student he had triumphed against, no one would even know what had really happened. The karma for killing a poisoned innocent would fall on Alex’s shoulders, not the vile infernalist who had set the ball in motion. Perhaps it would have kept Alex from ever using his fangtian ji again. Perhaps demonic cultivators were far more clever than even he had given them credit for.
It was a twisted scheme worthy, perhaps, of a certain infernalist’s son.
Alex clenched his fists, trembling with rage. Lai Wei, the bastard who had taken such joy in scalping Alex, and Hao Hai, Hao Zei’s vile son. They and the rest of their gang were the real orchestrators of this play, the foes he needed to destroy at all costs.
Not innocent patsies and fools thrown at him like poisoned bones to a dog, intended to poison his soul just like either Hao Hai or Lai Wei had poisoned poor foolish Sheng Jie’s base.
Alex felt an odd tingle of disbelief coursing through him, unable to believe his own stupidity as his hands slipped inside his cultivation uniform. He locked gazes with the spirit doctor who, strangely, didn’t seemed at all perturbed by the Ruidian before him.
“We are honored to greet you, doctor. And dare I say it, I think I stand before one of the very few men in this academy more interested in building students back up to health rather than tearing away at them, eager to see if they forge a blade of bright Bronze or Silver, and caring not a fig for the lives they shatter in the process.”
The spirit doctor flashed a jaded smile. “I have no comment as to that, lad, for I wish to be welcome here long after you have left.”
Alex bowed his head. “If I reveal a secret to you, can I trust you to keep it in confidence, to treat me fairly?” He lowered his head further. “And please forgive this foolish Ruidian if his request somehow offends.”
The doctor looked intrigued. “State your peace, Ruidian boy.”
His eyes widened at the brilliant sparkle now filling the room.
Qie Qie gasped, beholding a handful of lesser spirit beast cores.
“How many of these to treat the kung fu brother we brought in?”
Alex grimaced, feeling the weight of Qie Qie’s disbelieving stare as he quickly made his way back to his master’s residence.
“Alex?”
“Not listening...”
“Alex!”
“What?”
Disbelieving eyes gaze into his own. “How the hell do you own a fortune in spirit beast cores?”
Alex gave a bitter shake of his head. “First of all, keep your voice down. Second of all, I’m down ten! That’s a bloody fortune right there!” He laughed bitterly. “I’m paying for my own fury.”
Qie Qie pointedly looked around. They were already strolling along the more exclusive properties, no other cultivator in sight. “It should have cost fifteen. But he took pity on you, a student bearing the burden that all Sheng Jie’s so-called family and friends were happy to avoid.”
Alex nodded solemnly. “Five beast cores are worth one spirit stone. Which means fifteen beast cores should buy me a luxurious house anywhere in the city, save here or where the richest merchants and nobles live.”
“True. And if every spirit beast-hunting cultivator wasn’t so desperate to use them up in forging cultivation pills or magical treasures for himself, and they actually started hitting the real estate market in force, I doubt we could snag more than a double handful of houses before the market adjusted. And the beast core to spirit pearl to platinum ratio would quickly become much less favorable.”
Alex couldn’t help nodding in agreement. “Merchant background?”
Qie Qie grinned. “Yes. My mother’s clan. But that still doesn’t answer the question. How the hell did you get all those cores? And just as importantly, why did you save your enemy?”
Alex sighed, looking anywhere but at his friend. “Because now I recognize that Sheng Jie isn’t any mastermind, but patsy. A red cape being used to keep all my aggression focused on the wrong target, while the true villains do their best to destroy me. And yes, I pity a man who thinks himself so high, only to find all the people that he thought cared for him won’t give him the time of day, let alone come for his aid, the moment he is in dire need.”
He forced himself to look Qie Qie’s way. “And I recognized the son of a merchant I had tricked, who no doubt wants to destroy me however he can. I recall how vindictively he smiled when Sheng Jie had flown into a frothing rage, kicking me when I was down. Now that I think about it, Sheng Jie had acted more like a furious, tormented animal, and nothing like the helpful, decent cultivator Master Pan painted him out to be, once upon a time. And after what the spirit doctor told us, I think that maybe, just maybe, we were both being played for fools.”
Qie Qie suddenly paled. “By the golden light… that makes so much sense! As ruthless and free-spirited as his first match with you was, even then he was acting out of character. Had it been anyone else, he would have laughed off your victory, even congratulated you, before demanding an immediate rematch.” She sighed bitterly. “I should have realized something was wrong. Instead, I condemned him today as a suddenly arrogant hotheaded student who had once been so much better, finally getting put in his place.”
She winced, looking away. “As ugly as the wounds he suffered were, it should have been a simple matter to heal him, plenty of time for him to get his head back on s
traight. I think that’s what most of us thought, in the back of our minds. None of us thought he was actually dying.” Then she paled. “Then Master Pan made it clear that you had somehow delivered a deadly blow. And instead of demanding we take him to the infirmary immediately, he forced us to fight against his soul-pressure after shaming us all, squeezing down on the class entire! That stunt could have gotten Sheng Jie killed!”
Alex shook his head. “I wouldn’t be surprised. Friendly as their smiles sometimes are, Dragon Academy instructors are a hell of a lot more ruthless than any teacher I ever had before, more than happy to sacrifice any number of us as ‘examples,’ so that the best may prosper all the further. I kind of get the feeling that at least some professors are of the mindset that lesser students are intended as nothing more than bloody pedestals their elite students should not hesitate to step upon in their pursuit of greatness.”
Qie Qie flushed, sneaking a glance his way. “And I’m no saint, either. I was hard on you when first we saw the strange, arrogant Ruidian barging into our classroom, presented as if he was the chosen one.” She flushed. “By a man who wouldn’t even look at me twice.” She suddenly stopped, turned, formally bowing before him. “This one apologizes. Her actions the day we met were unworthy of you.”
Alex grinned. “Don’t worry. If my crush wouldn’t even give me the time of day, I’d be in a foul mood too.” His grin widened when she blinked and swallowed. “But at least there’s a happy ending, right? I saw how intently Zhao Doushi was looking at you when you two were having your last training session.”
She flushed and looked away, but Alex couldn’t help but notice her tiny smile. “I don’t know if it means anything, but when I asked if he’d give me future lessons… He said yes!” Her sigh of happiness turned to an arch grin. “Nice try, evading the question, but you still haven’t explained how the hell you managed to get so many beast cores.”
Silver Fox & The Western Hero: Warrior Forsworn: A LitRPG/Wuxia Novel - Book 3 Page 20
