Chapter 432 — A Healer's Heart

Shen Mu took up his brush and wrote down the spirit medicines and poisons he required. The prefect of Zijing City came to pay his respects, and Xue Hu'er blocked his way: "The young master is not receiving visitors these days. " The prefect had no choice but to withdraw.

Si Yunxiang, meanwhile, was busy contacting the Si family, having them notify their brethren in the cult, ordering that word be carried to the Emperor with all speed, and asking the cult's elders to carefully select adepts well versed in the Five Ghosts Transportation Art and send them here as quickly as might be.

Shen Mu handed her the prescription. Si Yunxiang looked it over and saw that the various ingredients upon it numbered in the hundreds, many of which she had never seen nor even heard of. "I fear these spirit medicines will be very hard to find," she said.

"We shall have to search the apothecaries of every city thoroughly before we can gather them all. It will cost us no small amount of time. " Shen Mu let out a breath of turbid air and smiled. "The reason I granted the Baixi Deity these few days was to seek out spirit medicines, and also to await the arrival of the cult's masters and the Emperor. Otherwise, why would I have let him deliberate so long?

" Si Yunxiang sighed. "To be your enemy, one must take care not to choke to death even while eating. I have already notified the Holy Cult.

As for the Five Ghosts Transportation Art, apart from a few elders, it is Miaoshou Hall that has the greatest mastery of it. " "Miaoshou Hall? " Shen Mu was taken aback, and his face took on a questioning look.

"Nimble hands, empty pockets - naturally they are thieves.

" Si Yunxiang laughed.

"Miaoshou Hall is mostly thieves. In years past they often went to rob the great houses, carrying off the treasures of wealthy families, but it was all petty business. Later the Emperor conscripted them into the army to transport the enemy's grain and fodder, and many of them won merit; their official posts are not small at all. " "So that is how it is.

" Shen Mu understood, and praised them: "Every trade produces its champion.

Even a thief can rise in office and grow rich. This must be told to Grandpa Cripple.

" Yet worry stirred in his heart again: the Lame Elder and the others were blocking the gods of the High Heavens in the Divine Severance Mountains, and he did not know how the fighting went. "With Grandpa Alchemist there, there should be no great trouble.

" Even so, he could not help but worry.

The Alchemist could save the dying and heal the wounded, but that place, after all, was a battlefield of gods and demons; if a man were struck dead outright, even the Alchemist had no medicine for him. Si Yunxiang went to have the cult's disciples prepare the ingredients, while Shen Mu wrote out the pill formula for his own treatment and sent Xue Hu'er to buy medicines from the city's apothecaries, so that he might properly nurse himself back to health. After all, the toll the Soul Boat took upon his life was no small matter; if it could be replenished, then of course he must do his utmost to make it whole.

Two or three days passed, and Shen Mu felt much better. He brought Jiao Wangshen and the flood dragons to the Fragrant Well courtyard again and asked, "Senior Brother Baixi, do you need me to treat your wounds? " "No need! " The Baixi Deity said warily, "One skilled in healing is naturally skilled in poison.

If I take your medicine, I fear I shall die without even knowing how. " Shen Mu glanced at his wounds. The wounds on his body no longer bled, but many bones were broken, a most pitiful sight.

"If your leg is not treated further, it will be ruined, and you will walk on one leg alone.

In another two days, that ruined leg will have to be sawn off. And the injury in the ruined leg will spread, corroding the healthy parts, and your body will rot away piece by piece.

" The Baixi Deity sneered. "Trying to frighten me? I am a deity; how could my flesh and blood rot? You struck me with a moon - that was no divine ability, only brute force. Without a divine ability to damage me, my flesh and blood will not rot! " Shen Mu sighed.

"That moon was a treasure forged by a god of the Kaihuang era. How could there be no divine ability within it? The moon is Taiyin, the Great Yin, and the qi of Taiyin is the most adept of all at ruining a man's flesh. Concealing the disease and shunning the physician - I never thought that even a lofty deity would be so vulgar.

" With that, he flicked his sleeve and departed. The Baixi Deity sneered on and on. Shen Mu walked out of the Fragrant Well courtyard. Si Yunxiang had prepared part of the spirit medicines.

"There are still some we have not found," she said, "but I have already had the cult's brethren search with all haste.

The moment they are found, they will be sent by fast boat. " Shen Mu inspected the medicines. "The medicines I have now cannot take his life," he said.

"They can only take one of his legs. " Si Yunxiang was startled, and hastily whispered, "You mean to take his leg?

" Shen Mu smiled slightly and gave his orders: "Tell everyone nearby who has so much as the tiniest external wound - even a pinprick that broke the skin - that they must not live in the vicinity.

Have them move a li away from the Fragrant Well. " Si Yunxiang probed, "And if someone was pricked by a needle and has not yet moved away? " "Then he is in for it. " Shen Mu selected his medicines without raising his head.

"The place where he was pricked will first become a small hole, then gradually widen, and within two or three hours at most it will rot through his whole body, and his bones will die as well. " Si Yunxiang shuddered with dread and hurried off.

The Fragrant Well was a famous scenic spot of Zijing City, and few people lived there, so Si Yunxiang simply instructed the prefect to have all these people move away.

Shen Mu refined and decocted his medicines; the fragrance of the medicine was colorless and odorless, extremely hard to detect. Two days later, the Baixi Deity sent someone to invite Shen Mu. Shen Mu put away the finished medicine, sealed it for later use, and came again to the Fragrant Well courtyard. He saw the Baixi Deity sitting on the ground, his injured leg already rotted, and the rot still spreading toward the healthy flesh.

"You have been working on me?

" The Baixi Deity's eyes blazed as he stared fixedly at him, his voice hoarse. "My leg has gone bad so fast - it must be your secret handiwork!

" Shen Mu stepped forward and examined it carefully, then shook his head. "I told you it was because you concealed your illness and shunned the physician, and still you do not believe me. That moon of the Soul Boat is no trifling thing. You were wounded by the moon. Had you asked me to treat you earlier, this leg could still have been saved.

Now it cannot.

The flesh and blood have rotted, the marrow is dead. The leg must be amputated, and only then can the rot be halted. " The corner of the Baixi Deity's eye twitched.

He stared fixedly at Shen Mu, and seeing that his expression showed no pretense, he said dejectedly, "If you cut it off, I shall have only one leg left, and even less power to bargain with you. " Shen Mu said earnestly, "My medical skill is rather high. I can even attach another man's leg to you. I have three legs here. Choose whichever you like. After I cut off this leg of yours, you rest for two days, and I can fit you with a new one.

" The Baixi Deity's face shifted between light and dark, and he hesitated, then suddenly said, "Do you know why I am called Baixi? " Shen Mu shook his head. "A white colt passes a crack - in an instant, and no more.

" The Baixi Deity said calmly, "That speaks of my speed. My speed is first under heaven. You cannot see my form at all; in an instant I flee a thousand li. With this leg ruined, how am I to use my speed?