Chapter 712: When Going Out, Maintain Your Dignity (7)

Qing’s flesh was immune to all poisons; she’d gulped down, raw and whole, the ultimate state all martial artists longed for from the moment she’d stepped out into the martial world.

In the past, she’d only had a rough understanding of it through experience.

Something like, Whatever I eat, I don’t get sick.

A side effect of having, in a blaze of starving madness, eaten all sorts of things people absolutely should not eat.

It was probably because of her Corpse-Blood Poison Body constitution.

Ah, it had been a while; she should really offer her thanks.

Mr. Strategy Guide, I somehow managed not to die and stay alive thanks to you. If you ever end up in this primitive era too, I’ll lay a real flower road out for you. For real.

Now, she understood it much more clearly.

Thanks to seeking instruction from the spell-loving True Person Danlun, she’d realized that this Corpse-Blood Poison Body’s purifying function didn’t belong to biotechnology but to cosmic mystery.

Not because of the liver, but because of ideology.

What change would there be if you poured poison into a body that had already died?

To put it simply, you might call it a “setting.”

The setting was that Qing’s flesh was already dead—she’d probably died together with that Alchemy Princess. And then I went, bam, just slipped right in and possessed a body that was already dead!

That was why poison didn’t work.

Poison was a tool that harmed the living; it didn’t harm the dead.

Taken this way, poison sounded like some evil existence with a will of its own that attacked people.

But when it came to sorcery, it could be done.

Ever since ancient times, this had been the way people perceived poison, and sorcery was the act of taking humanity’s shared, baseless perceptions and embodying them as ideology.

The so-called omnipotent sorcery theory.

In Qing’s view, it was nonsense.

But in this astonishing pseudo–Central Plains, there already existed an even more astonishing cosmic mystery: qi.

In a world where people wrapped their swords in light, sprayed out internal energy, and flew around, how could there not also be sorcery?

So this damned status window... Well, the Central Plains was wide, and outside the Central Plains was wide too; somewhere out there, maybe someone else was using something similar, or something close.

In any case, neither poison nor food poisoning actually functioned on her, but that didn’t mean the poison itself disappeared.

Because her body operated under the setting of already being dead, it didn’t detox at all—everything simply piled up neatly inside.

Right now, the poison-eating salamander Bottlesnout was doing the detoxing instead, and if that wasn’t a fateful encounter, nothing was.

If not for Bottlesnout, her liver and intestines would have filled to the brim with poisons, overflowed into the bloodstream, and she’d have been walking around literally bleeding highly toxic blood.

And would blood have been the only problem? Toxic saliva, toxic tears... Hm. Toxic saliva actually sounded kind of useful.

The even more convenient point was that when she ate something, the good parts still worked on her.

Take alcohol, for instance.

She still got that burning heat going down, and the pleasant buzz that followed came through to her just fine.

According to True Person Danlun’s interpretation, a body that goes dull under the influence of alcohol was the “white,” that is, the flesh acting; feeling good was the “soul,” that is, the spirit acting.

The setting was that her body was dead, but her soul wasn’t.

So the state of feeling good from drinking was part of the mental domain.

Anyway, that was why Qing liked alcohol.

Drink and you feel good, with absolutely no side effects—a truly flawless luxury food.

So Qing’s drinking style was bold and lighthearted.

When she poured, she never left even a single drop in the cup; she’d tip it back in one cool, clean swallow.

When someone offered her a drink, she never refused; she’d push her cup out with a delighted expression right away, so wherever, whenever, and with whomever, she was the most pleasant drinking companion imaginable.

And she truly drank deliciously.

She’d reached the realm of drinking for taste. With yellow liquor, she savored the subtle sweet grain and the sweet-and-sour harmony; with clear liquor, its fiery heat and aroma; with unrefined rice wine, its straight-out sweetness, sourness, and powerful flavor and how glorious its richness was.

So after throwing back a drink in one bold gulp, the peerless beauty’s loose, blossoming smile, the soft “Kyaaah” of bliss, and the crisp landing sound of her glass when she set it down—

Anyone who saw Qing knocking back alcohol would inevitably swallow their own saliva, thinking, Wow, that looks really good. What kind of liquor is that, that she drinks it that happily?

Even people who didn’t usually enjoy alcohol would feel that way.

She was, literally, a liquor promotion agent, or the best appetizer you could enjoy with your eyes.

Which was to say, when you drank with Qing, you’d end up overdrinking without realizing it.

Qing herself never pressured anyone past the first cup; after that she simply left everyone to drink according to their own limits.

But what good did it do to tell people to drink moderately when she herself was drinking that deliciously?

“Heh-heh, my lady. I, um, have something I feel a little hurt about.”

“Mm? Moyong? Are you drunk?”

“I’m not, I’m not drunk. You know that. I can drink like a bottomless pit. I never lost even once—oh, I did lose. Heh-heh, I lost to you, didn’t I. Right?”

Yeah. She was drunk. Very drunk.

But Qing didn’t particularly stop her.

Because high-level experts (by Central Plains standards) possessed the ultimate awakening skill: “expel drunkenness.”

If they chose, they could just vent the alcohol through every pore and instantly return to a sober state; such techniques did exist.

Of course, if you did that at a drinking party you drew quite a bit of resentment—

If you’re going to do that, why are you even drinking?

Or, You deliberately blasted alcohol smell everywhere, didn’t you?

Do you not know this isn’t just smell, it’s drunkenness itself, and if people sniff it they get tipsy, and you’re the only one sobering up while the rest stay drunk? And so on.

So it was a skill you only used in emergencies or when heading home, but still.

If you could sober up whenever you wanted, there was no reason to stop someone just because they were drunk.

So for Qing, it was simply entertaining.

In truth, Moyong wasn’t even the only one who was drunk.

In the back, they’d pushed several chairs together and Seol Iri was lying perfectly straight asleep—ZRRRR.

Thanks to that, Changbin had been freed from the female barrier on both sides and was now stuck to Peng Daesan’s side, chatting away with a blissfully relieved expression.

Peng Daesan was humoring him, but his face very clearly said, Please go away, while faint displeasure showed in his eyes.

And there was also a bright, ringing background noise that had been going on non-stop for quite a while now.

“I, Sima Chunbong, simply cannot stand it. How can the common herd be so utterly trivial? It amazes me how they even manage to breathe with such intelligence, and if superior figures do not lead them, it is obvious they will fall into mutual slaughter and self-destruction. Thus, geniuses like us—ah, pardon me, my apologies. Geniuses like me, and lesser geniuses like Heavenly Flower Sword, and gifted talents like all of you—unless we lead them, they are pitiable beings doomed to extinction...”

Sima Chunbong sat hunched with her chin propped on her hand, her heavy “wisdom pouch” plopped on the table, and continued a speech no one was listening to.

Qing’s lips curved in a lazy arc.

This kind of atmosphere was nice too.

You couldn’t be swinging wooden swords around doing productive things all the time. A slackened mood like this had its own charm.

And there was a particular joy in watching everyone be drunk and ridiculous while you yourself stayed stone-cold sober.

In fact, it had been like this even before she’d come out into the martial world.

Whenever she joined a drinking party, she was the one who stayed clear-headed to the end and sent everyone home.

Strictly speaking, it wasn’t that she was trying not to get drunk, just that she didn’t get drunk—but anyway.

There was a certain faint, hard-to-express feeling in staying sober and watching everyone play around in their cups.

“How come, Moyong. What are you hurt about?”

“I’m not, I’m not upset. How could I ever feel hurt by you? I’m always grateful, heh-heh.”

And then immediately—

“But, I’m a liiiittle hurt. I’m hurt,”

Yup. Definitely drunk.

This was an illogical phenomenon that absolutely could not come from just pretending to be drunk.

“Mm. What do we do, then. What are you hurt about?”

“Mm, no, it’s not, it’s nothing.”

“It’s nothing?”

“Yes. But, just a bit? A liiittle?”

This was the infinite loop of hurt feelings.

Not that Qing minded, since it was fun.

“So are you hurt or not hurt?”

“I don’t know. You don’t understand my heart.”

“How am I supposed to know when you don’t know it yourself? Come on, tell me.”

“No. It’s not that. Um. Then... There’s just one thing I’d like you to do. Could you please grant me one favor?”

“Hmm. I’ll listen and think about it. What is it?”

“Um, can I sit on your lap?”

It was a rather cute request.

Had Jayeo curled up in Qing’s arms looked secretly nice to her? Well, drunk people’s thoughts never had foundations; analyzing them was pointless.

Qing patted her own lap.

“Here. Come here, then.”

“Heh-heh. You really are the best for me.”

And Moyong Juhee wobbled and climbed up onto Qing’s lap—

“Mm. Moyong? Is this really right?”

“Heh-heh.”

Normally, if you asked to sit on someone’s lap, you sat facing the same direction, didn’t you?

So why was this face-to-face?

Moyong Juhee wrapped her arms around Qing’s shoulders and set her chin on Qing’s neck.

Then she began to wriggle.

Not pleased with something, she kept shifting forward and back on Qing’s lap, changing her position again and again.

“Mm, this isn’t it. Why is it like this?”

“Well, maybe the direction is the problem?”

“This isn’t it. It’s not. Change. We have to change it. Please switch it, okay?”

And then she sat back down on her chair and, cheeks flushed from drinking, spread both arms wide.

“Come on. Right here.”

“You want me to sit on your lap? Then it’ll be hard to drink, you know?”

“Yes. Is that not okay? Ah, but why do you always say you ‘eat’ alcohol? Alcohol is something you drink. But it’s fine because it’s you. You must have your reasons. Someone like me wouldn’t know. Hurry. Is it not okay? Pleeease?”

“I don’t remember your drunk habits being like this before.”

Back then, Moyong Juhee had been one lump of pent-up resentment—

Resentment itself, inferiority complex itself, concentrated in one body.

Alcohol weakened her self-control, and the feelings she’d been bottling up burst through a thinned line.

But now, she didn’t have that kind of explosive anger.

Qing sat down on Moyong’s lap.

Oh. Hard. Moyong’s thighs really were the “Central Plains’ Number One Legs”; they were just solid blocks of muscle, wow.

When quadriceps developed, they didn’t grow sideways but front-to-back.

Moyong’s thighs looked impressive enough from the front, but from the side they really did look like they could launch you into flight; maybe that was why the seat was a bit—no, a lot—high...

Reaching for her cup, she had to stretch out her arm and bend her waist, so it was stiff, tall, and very, very uncomfortable.

On top of that, Moyong’s arms wrapped around her waist like a belt, her body pressed tight against Qing’s back.

“What is this? Is this right?”

“Yeees... You’re, uh, lighter than I expected... I wish you were heavier...”

In truth, with her height, Qing wasn’t exactly light—but Moyong was also a minor super-beauty, after all.

Still, why did she have to be heavier, exactly?

Was Qing supposed to be some kind of weight stone? Had she asked her up there to use her for thigh training? The thighs felt rock hard, like she was bracing with all her strength; it wasn’t unreasonable to suspect it.

And then it happened.

“No, Heavenly Flower Sword? That won’t do at all.”

“Eh.”

“To be seated above me? In terms of sitting height, this is clearly my victory. Hoo-hoo, I see. So that’s what you were sensitive about, were you? But this too is the pain of defeat. Heavenly Flower Sword, rather than seizing victory through such illegitimate means, you ought to overcome through effort.”

Qing’s expression went “Eh” again.

Victory in sitting height, what was that even supposed to mean.

If your sitting height was greater, that just meant you had short legs and a long torso, didn’t it? And what kind of effort could possibly make your sitting height grow—how were you supposed to lengthen only your upper body?

“This is such bullshit—”

“Your effort is admirable, but Heavenly Flower Sword, get down right now. Victory must be fair. Exemplars like us must not resort to such underhanded tricks. Also, it actually makes me a little unhappy to have to look up at you from below.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Apparently her ribs needed regular destruction for her to come to her senses. Who would have thought there’d be a need for a localized destruction regimen in a situation like this.

Qing started to stand, ready to administer appropriate punishment—

And this time, from behind, Moyong tightened her arms around Qing’s waist and held her down.

“Moyong? Let go a little.”

“No, I can’t, I can’t. Ugh, just a bit more, just a liiittle more.”

Drunk people had no logic.

If they said no, that meant no. So what could you do.

Chunbong should count herself lucky.

Once she sobered up, she’d owe Moyong a thank-you drink.

And then Qing would wedge herself into that and drink for free, and another scene like this would happen, and Moyong would earn one point of grace and have to buy drinks again to repay it.

Oh. An infinite drinking engine. Unlimited banquets.

They kept on drinking like that for a while, until—hm. It really was too uncomfortable.

The seat itself was absurdly high, and the torso pressed against her back wouldn’t stay still, constantly rubbing left, right, up, and down, pushing and pushing.

If there’d been some kind of padding, it might have felt soft and not bad, but as it was—

It was like bone grinding on bone. Ribcage (front) against ribcage (back). What was this, a duel of ribcage versus ribcage?

“Hey, Moyong? Could you stay still for a bit? It’s a little uncomfortable.”

But when had a drunk person ever listened to reason?

She didn’t answer; she just kept pushing Qing’s back with her torso.

What, was this revenge for feeling “hurt”? Making her uncomfortable like this?

She wasn’t even pretending to listen intently.

Still, there was a way.

“Ah, Moyong, I need to go take care of something for a moment.”

Qing gently peeled away the arms gripping her waist as she spoke.

Though it looked gentle, those arms had been holding on with every bit of strength Moyong had, so this was also a little demonstration that Qing’s strength was beyond human.

“Ah...!”

“I’ll be right back. San, keep an eye on the kids.”

Qing said this, then darted out of the top-floor special room.

Since she was out anyway, she emptied her bladder while she was at it.

On her way back to the room, just then, she heard a rather desperate voice.

—You mustn’t do this, I’m not a courtesan, sir, please, please...!

The good mood from drinking evaporated in an instant.

The voice was faint, the sort you’d only catch if you put your ear to the door and strained to listen—but Qing’s hearing surpassed human limits; if she’d heard it, she’d heard it.

“What kind of bastard is this time. Hm.”

Come to think of it, it might not be a bad opportunity.

Maybe it was about time she enjoyed the feel of using her hands again.

The timing was all wrong, but here it was: the hour of chivalrous action and punishment had presented itself.

Thinking that, she suddenly felt her mouth water.

Qing clenched her fist and let a cold smile spread.