Life as a Rogue Cultivator

Chapter 275: Failed to Nurture

Liu Xiaolou had already been dragged out twice, yet each time he came back perfectly fine. The small guy was dying of curiosity, so he scooted over and asked what was going on.Liu Xiaolou told him, “I’m injured. I guess the wounds haven’t healed yet. They’re waiting for me to recover before they make their move.”

That only made the small guy even more curious. “Just how badly are you hurt? That old scoundrel Zhu may be a terrible person, but you can’t deny he’s brilliant at alchemy. His two sons are expert healers too. How has it been half a month and they still haven’t fixed you up? Those rice cakes are supposed to be top-notch medicine.”

“How should I know?” Liu Xiaolou snapped. “All I can tell you is they send me to the hall once every seven days.”

He’d dodged danger twice now, but the others locked up with him weren’t so lucky. Every couple of days, someone else got hauled away. Most of the time it was for a soak in the medicinal vat, but twice it was to test a pill. Nobody knew what happened to the ones used for pill testing, but it probably wasn’t good... because neither of them ever came back.

“That damned Foundation Pill,” the small guy muttered, glum as wet ash. “Father and son have been brewing the stuff for years and haven’t managed anything but corpses. Far as I’ve seen, five... no, six poor souls have been hauled off to ‘test’ it. None came back. Three of ’em are still swinging out there on the chains above the cliff. I really don’t know what’s going on in those beasts’ heads. They’re demons… and who knows when it’ll be my turn.”

Liu Xiaolou lowered his voice. “That Qin fellow who was taken last time, he’s hanging on the chains now. I caught a glimpse. It was like a butchered pig. His stomach was split open, and everything inside… gone.”

The small man clutched his head, fingers knotted in his own hair like he meant to tear it out by the roots. “I want to die,” he groaned, voice cracking. “Heaven help me, I do. But I’m too scared to go through with it. ’Cause what if the Zhu monsters don’t let me rest even then? What if they string me up on those chains after I’m gone, same as the others?”

Liu Xiaolou patted the small guy’s head, ruffling his hair like you might calm a frightened dog. Another few months, he told himself, and I’ll be just like him. Won’t even have the will to keep breathing. At this point, staying alive is just about not ending up on those chains.

Seven days later, both Liu Xiaolou and the small guy were taken to the main cavern. The small guy didn’t resist at all; he simply jumped straight into the giant vat bubbling with hot medicinal liquid. Liu Xiaolou, on the other hand, was brought before Lord Zhu.

He waited for an hour before Lord Zhu finally tore his gaze away from the pill furnace and turned to him. Reaching out, he gripped Liu Xiaolou’s wrist and began examining his meridians for the third time.

The late–Foundation Establishment cultivator’s true qi surged back and forth through Liu Xiaolou’s Foot Greater Yang Meridian, hammering every acupoint that was already on the verge of giving way. The pain was unbearable. So intense he felt like he was dying and coming back again.

But then something strange happened. His vision followed the two Ghost Banyan seeds as they darted around inside the Foot Greater Yang Meridian, slipping away whenever Lord Zhu’s qi got close, even leaping into other meridians at times to avoid detection.

After Lord Zhu finished his examination, he had his two sons take over. They each checked him, compared their findings, and still couldn’t pinpoint the root cause of the weakness in Liu Xiaolou’s Foot Greater Yang Meridian.

Lord Zhu thought for a long moment, then ordered two more spirit herbs -- aconite grass and purple mountain ganoderma -- to be added to Liu Xiaolou’s medicinal rice cakes.

Youngest Son wasn’t thrilled. Those two spirit herbs were incredibly rare, hardly worth wasting on an injured nobody. But Eldest Son thought it was worth a try. If they could figure out why Liu Xiaolou’s meridians were so weak despite reaching the tenth layer, it might even help with refining Foundation Establishment Pills later on.

And so, Liu Xiaolou was “returned” for treatment a third time. This round, his spiritual food came with two new, precious herbs mixed in.

They turned out to be extraordinary. After the seeds absorbed the herbs for seven straight days, something changed. Liu Xiaolou found himself connected to them in a completely new way. Before, it was only "visual tracking," but now he could sense their emotions, their reactions... almost even the faint outline of their thoughts.

What’s more, the two seeds had clearly grown sturdier. Before, they could only wander through a few acupoints near Kunlun. Now, the entire Foot Greater Yang Meridian had become their playground.

Seven days passed, then another seven. Over the next half month, Liu Xiaolou was examined twice more. But the spiritual meals still weren’t doing much for him; the spiritual energy and medicinal power from the herbs were mostly being devoured by the two seeds instead. Liu Xiaolou still couldn’t meet the requirements to “enter the vat.”

This time, Lord Zhu finally ran out of patience. There were plenty of other “pill materials” locked up in the prison; no need to keep wasting time on Liu Xiaolou. With a flick of his hand, he ordered, “Hang him up. Take whatever parts are useful for pill refinement.”

Two men from the Miao Feng Alchemy Sect grabbed Liu Xiaolou without a word, hauled him up like a sack of grain, and hooked him onto the iron chain. A moment later the crank began to turn, screeching, lifting him higher and higher toward the ceiling.

Terror seized Liu Xiaolou. As the chain dragged him higher, he drew closer and closer to the rows of corpses hanging above. Bodies split open, their organs long since removed. Paniced, he shrieked, “Lord Zhu, you can’t kill me! I’m useful! I’m a formation master; I can refine formation disks! I can—”

“Eldest Son, get the knife. Take his organs,” Lord Zhu ordered calmly.

“No, wait! I know Yan Sanfei from your sect! The same Yan Sanfei who sells spirit pills at the Tianmen Mountain market! He’s the one who told me to join Miao Alchemy Mountain!” Liu Xiaolou shouted, mind racing for anything that might save his life.

“Brother, do we have anyone on our side named Yan Sanfei?”

“Never heard of him. What about under Father’s command?”

“No. Youngest Son said not to use a blade when working on the Foot Greater Yang Meridian. Use the alchemy furnace to draw it in instead.”

Liu Xiaolou was inches from giving up, mind unraveling like a frayed rope, when a name suddenly clawed its way to the surface. “Don’t. Don’t touch me!” he blurted, words tumbling over each other. “I’m with He Taichang! You know him, right? He said he’s from Miao Feng Mountain. I know what he’s looking for, that thing he wants. I came to join him! You can’t kill me if...”

The wail actually seemed to work. The two Zhu lads froze, then slowly turned their eyes toward Lord Zhu.

Lord Zhu paused, then said, “Youngest Son, go ask your sworn brother if any of this is true.”

Youngest Son bolted off in a hurry. Liu Xiaolou let out a shuddering breath. Sweat pattered to the ground, forming a little puddle beneath him.

A short while later, Youngest Son came trotting back. Someone following behind him. A middle-aged man. From his perch on the chain, Liu Xiaolou peered down at them, and his nose stung all of a sudden, eyes blurring. He was that close to crying.

It was the very cultivator he had trailed for half a month. If he hadn’t followed this man into the Ten-Thousand Great Mountains, how would he have ended up in such a mess?

The middle-aged man bowed to Lord Zhu. “Uncle Zhu, I heard someone was asking for me?”

Lord Zhu pointed at Liu Xiaolou, who was hanging from the iron chains. “Take a look. That fellow, calls himself Li Mu, claims he’s got something you want. I bought him for twelve spirit stones and fed him rare herbs. Cost me a fortune. If your Second Peak wants him, I can hand him over. I won’t even raise the price, just the same twelve stones.”

The middle-aged man looked up, studying Liu Xiaolou. “What is it that you have?”

Liu Xiaolou burst out, “Are you He Taichang? I know Feng Buji; remember him? You asked him to fetch something!”

He only knew about He Taichang because back on Xiushan, he’d heard it straight from Feng Buji -- the guy who stole the Sect Leader’s token. Feng Buji had confessed that he did it on He Taichang’s orders. Now, seeing the man in person, Liu Xiaolou recognized him as the one who had commissioned Liu Daoran to refine the Formation Disk key... but he couldn’t admit any of that. He couldn’t exactly say he had secretly followed him all the way into the Ten-Thousand Great Mountains. So he clung to the Sect Leader’s token as his story’s anchor.

The man was indeed He Taichang. He asked calmly, “And how do you know about that?”

“I was on Xiushan at the time,” replied Liu Xiaolou. “I happened to run into him. We knew each other, and he told me.”

He Taichang pressed on, “Where is Feng Buji now? I’ve been waiting ages for him, but he never came to deliver what he owed.”

Liu Xiaolou let out a weary sigh. “He’s dead. No idea how it happened. By the time I found him, he was already done for. Right before he died, he told me to come to Miao Feng Mountain to look for you.”

He Taichang thought for a moment, then turned and bowed to Lord Zhu. “Uncle Zhu, I’d like to take this man off your hands, if you don’t mind.”

Lord Zhu waved casually. “If you want him, take him. I won’t even charge you extra.”

He Taichang thanked him and pulled out twelve spirit stones. Eldest Son ordered his men to unhook Liu Xiaolou from the iron chain. “Brother, he’s yours now.”

He Taichang hoisted Liu Xiaolou up and left the cave. Once they were outside and sure no one was watching, he quickened his pace and asked in a low voice, “So… where’s the thing?”