Chapter 863: The Way of the Sail Swordsman (10)

Three times a day, Qing feeds the Blood Cultist.

The Blood Cultist’s meals were loaded with the good stuff—setting aside the taste, they were such an excellent source of nutrition that most tonics couldn’t even compete.

And on top of that, the food was handmade by Qing herself—by the Heavenly Flower Sword, no less (nutrient porridge).

You could even say that, for a bottom-feeding piece of human trash from the Blood Cult, he was living in outright luxury.

“Even that has care put into it. Isn’t it a hassle?”

“Come on. This is what I live for these days. I’m seriously thinking about reducing the portions and splitting it into, like, ten meals a day. Hm. At this rate I’m going to get attached. Is this what it feels like to bring home an animal and raise it? They say if you bring home weeds and raise them, they become spiritual herbs.”

“If you bring home weeds and raise them, they become spiritual herbs....”

Gilun strokes his chin.

“Even if it’s only weeds, if you raise them with affection, they won’t envy any rare spiritual herb. Mm. I’ve heard something good. Of course, how could mere weeds compare to spiritual herbs—but, well. It’s the kind of excuse a man uses when he’s ruined his ‘crop’ of children and disciples. Still... mm. It’s a question worth thinking about at least once.”

If the Deputy Great Lord heard that, [N O V E L I G H T] he’d lose his mind.

This Righteous Sect bitch was shoving a funnel into someone’s throat and pouring pig slop down it, saying it was fun, saying this was what she lived for these days—

And yet, somehow, the conversation slid along like it was nothing.

Is the future of the Righteous Sect really okay like this?

“Now. You’re hungry, right? Ah—total paralysis, so you don’t even know you’re hungry? Then we’ll just count it as hungry. Here we go. Ugh, the smell. Mm. That part’s a bit of a problem.”

She’d laid him on a bed with a hole cut out at the butt, and draped a cloth down between his legs. There was a bucket underneath, and it was still going to be a while before it filled. Well. Whatever.

Qing removes the gag she’d kept in his mouth to stop him from biting himself, grips his jaw and forces it open, then shoves in the funnel’s metal tube.

“Alright, food’s going in. GLUG. GLUUUG-GLUG-GLUG.”

“...! ...!”

“And now—today’s tooth, too, right?”

“...!!! .........!!!!!”

Only then does Qing carefully trickle water onto the cloth covering his airway, wetting it.

“Now, confess and see the light—no, find death. You still don’t have anything to say? You want to live like this until you die of old age?”

“Ghh... just kill me.”

At that, Qing’s face bloomed into a grin.

It was a dazzling smile that scattered radiance in every direction as if the sun had risen—an impossibly bright laugh from a beauty beyond compare.

It was enough destructive power that even the Blood Cultist blanked out for a moment without meaning to.

Of course he did.

Right in front of her, a villain was reduced to misery, begging her to kill him.

Out of every reaction a villain could offer, it was the one Qing loved the most.

“Hey, patient, you can’t say things like that. I’m taking such good care of you so you don’t die, and you say that shit to my face?”

“Please.”

“Wow. Someone hearing this would think I’m deliberately keeping you alive. You’re the one clinging on and struggling, you know? I said I’d kill you if you spill everything you know. Even if I promise to kill you, you’re the one refusing. What, you think anything in this world is free? If you want to ask for something, show some sincerity first. Sir, we require payment up front. Now—let’s start with personal information. Name, position, special skills, hobbies.”

“......”

The Deputy Great Lord clamps his mouth shut.

Mm. Still no intention of opening it.

But Qing didn’t bother pressing him further.

Because his stubbornness was draining away little by little—he looked like he’d talk eventually.

Even now, look.

The moment Qing lifted the gag again, he panicked and hurriedly opened his mouth.

“Wait—hold on. What happened to the Five Poison Sect?”

“Oops. Small talk is prohibited.”

“Wait—mmph, mmmph!”

Qing gags him again, blindfolds him, too. Then she wraps earplugs around his ears in the right spot and ties them snug under his jaw.

Why was it that people said the hardest emotion to endure was boredom?

Qing thought that was mostly bullshit.

If you had brutal cramps from a wrecked gut, or a headache so severe it felt like your brain was being crushed, you’d think, I’ll take being bored forever—just please don’t let it hurt.

Still, she could agree that boredom was hard to endure, so she’d prepared these measures.

His torso had no sensation anyway.

He couldn’t speak, couldn’t see, couldn’t hear. What did it feel like—breathing alone in pitch-black emptiness?

The throbbing pain from having teeth ripped out was a bonus.

Qing didn’t know.

But judging by the way he kept trying to force out one more word, one more exchange, even while staring at his hateful enemy—maybe it really was horrific.

And yet he still wasn’t talking.

Was it because this wasn’t pain, so it was bearable?

That was when—

SKRRRK! The sound of a door opening.

“Sister! Ugh—what is that smell?”

Even fully clothed, the sheer presence of his hulking, massively developed muscles was overwhelming. Those shoulders, especially—twice as wide as Qing’s, with trapezius muscles rising like a mountain.

A giant a head taller than Qing covers his nose the moment he steps in.

Qing, however, calmly lifts her palm.

“Oh. Jegal. You’re here? Then the Diancang Sect people all arrived, too?”

“Yes, Sister. But Sister Gyeon said she’d look after Jayeo, so she stayed in Diancang. Still—I heard you captured a Blood Cultist, but... was it really like this?”

“Yeah. I think he’ll talk soon.”

“As expected of you, Sister. If we can break him without using cruel methods, we can secure testimony we can trust.”

That was Jegal Ihyeon for you—looking at this and saying it wasn’t cruel.

Is the future of the Righteous Sect really, really okay like this?

Of course, it was only because what Qing usually did was so much worse.

Compared to the thick stench of blood, the fact that it was just a different kind of stink might count as humane—relatively speaking.

Like the saying about a frog slowly being boiled, maybe he was gradually getting dyed in the water of Qing’s intensity.

“Senior Brother, it’s clearly something that benefits the world, but I don’t think our sect can shoulder it alone. And the Five Poison Sect? The main hall of a sect that old is practically a death sentence.”

“Hah. Diancang hasn’t loosed an arrow in a long time—rust has already eaten into it. How can you spew something so pathetic? Since when does an arrow weigh pros and cons before it flies? You want to leave those vile bastards alone?”

“No, Senior Brother. Who said leave them alone? I’m saying our sect shouldn’t be the only one to move.”

“Fine. Say we send a carrier pigeon to inform the Martial Alliance—when would support arrive? Even fast, it’ll take two months. And in the meantime, do you know what the Blood Cult will do?”

“There’s no need to report it all the way to the Martial Alliance. We can request support from the Sichuan martial world, can’t we? At minimum, we need the Tang Clan. If we’re dealing with poison, we have to secure at least the Tang Clan’s support—don’t we?”

Voices bickering drifted out of a side room.

Qing wasn’t trying to eavesdrop.

With her sharp hearing, she just heard it.

But if she hovered awkwardly, it really would become eavesdropping, so Qing knocks on the door.

When she opens it and steps in, Gilun, Daoist Master—and one elderly Daoist.

From what she’d heard, the old man had been calling Gilun “Senior Brother,” so he was probably an elder in the same generation-name line as the Diancang Sect leader.

He was far older than Gilun, who still carried the heavy elegance of a strong man in his prime—

Though that was partly because Gilun had reached the Manifest Realm, so you had to account for how unnaturally young he looked.

“Oh, Heavenly Flower Sword. You’re here. This is Gillyeon—my junior brother.”

Qing flinches.

Daoist Master Gillyeon? So there really was someone who used that name—well, it was a Daoist name, not exactly a birth name, but still.

She’d been thinking of going with something like “Supreme Bandit Lord Lotus” or “Lord Lotus”—

Supreme Bandit Lord Lotus, meets Lotus!

But you could tell from Gilun that the Diancang Sect leader line’s generation-name syllable was “Gil.”

And “Yeon” was a character Daoists and Buddhists loved, so it was common to use in disciples’ Daoist names.

So it wasn’t strange that it existed.

“Seomun Cheong, a late student of the martial world, greets you.”

“Heh heh. Yes. I heard from my senior brother. You’ve done something truly admirable. You might as well say the Yunnan martial world owes you a great debt.”

Gilun snorts.

“HMPH! A great debt, my ass. And you know it—yet you’re whining that you can’t raid them because you’re scared of the Blood Cult. Hey, you see this? Isn’t what this bastard says just unbelievable? He says he can’t raid them because he’s scared of the Blood Cult.”

“Senior Brother, when did I ever—and you don’t have to tattle like that, ahem.”

Old men were like that.

They got stern in front of juniors, but when it was just them, they spoke comfortably like friends.

Only—when it was just them.

If they kept calling each other “you bastard” and “this guy” even with Qing present, where was the listener’s dignity supposed to go?

Even Qing felt secondhand embarrassment.

Mm. Now I get why the sect leader kept warning people about keeping their mouths shut. Seriously.

And then—ah.

If the sect leader normally warned them so hard to keep quiet, but didn’t do it this time...

That meant it was deliberate.

“Hah. Yunnan is our land—and a land we must protect. If Blood Cult bastards have built a nest in our land, why are you saying we should beg the Martial Alliance for help?”

“Senior Brother. Is the Blood Cult only Yunnan’s problem? And does it make any sense to charge in like idiots? The Five Poison Sect isn’t just any sect—its defenses have been cultivated for over six hundred years, and poison users aren’t just poison users. Is it too much to say we should at least request the Tang Clan’s support?”

“Since when did the great Diancang retreat with an enemy before it for the sake of personal safety?”

“Who said retreat? I’m saying we go more carefully—more safely—”

“Enough! Is there such a thing as an arrow so afraid of breaking that it can’t leave the bowstring?”

Oh.

That was a cool line. Somehow it had weight.

But Qing agreed with Daoist Master Gillyeon.

Even if the point of an arrow was to be loosed, if you could conserve it, shouldn’t you conserve it as much as possible?

That was why she’d talked all that big talk about living as Seomun Cheong, a martial artist, and then—despite herself—scurried to the magistrate’s office to borrow cannons.

Even now, the memory made her face burn with shame.

“Um, Elder, that’s—”

Qing was about to say that the booming cannon fire you could hear from far outside the city right now was live training ahead of a real operation.

That they were calibrating the cannons and setting their aim—

And then they’d finish preparations to encircle the city and bombard the Five Poison Sect.

“I’ve made up my mind. I need to ask Diancang’s disciples that question myself.”

“Senior Brother! No—wait!”

“Elder! Just a moment!”

But to stop a Manifest Realm martial artist, the two of them were far too weak.

How could a mere Transformation Realm whelp dare block a Manifest Realm master’s path?

And Diancang’s martial arts pursued extreme speed—so Gilun, already a ghostlike master among Manifest Realm martial artists, was exceptionally fast even among them.

Qing sends Daoist Master Gillyeon a warm, sympathetic look.

Daoist Master Gillyeon shakes his head slowly and lets out a heavy sigh, then returns a look that seems to say, Thank you for understanding.

Is this how another old man gets caught in the clutches of the elderly-slayer?

But first—

Qing and Daoist Master Gillyeon charge out at the same time.