Jiang Wang pondered for a long while, then said under the bald commander's expectant gaze, "If this plague toxin really can harm Transcendent cultivators, then where can you even run now? Which route do you plan to take back to the State of Qi? How can you guarantee that no one you meet along the way carries the plague poison?"
"Well..." The bald commander hesitated.
Jiang Wang continued, "Within the Green Goat Town domain, at the very least, all of the afflicted have already been isolated from the outside — they cannot affect you or me. And if the plague toxin really does mutate, we will detect it the moment it happens."
"If things are truly as bad as you imagine, then running around everywhere right now is precisely what's dangerous. Staying in Green Goat Town is the safer choice."
It wasn't that Jiang Wang truly admired this guard commander or was thinking so much of his welfare. Rather, he was thinking of Green Goat Town's shortage of manpower.
The harsher the environment, the more it needed to unite every force it could. Used well, this batch of Four Seas Trade Alliance guards could accomplish a great deal.
But after hesitating for a long time, the bald guard commander still said, "I still want to return to the State of Qi, Lord Jiang. Even if I accidentally contract the plague poison on the road, I'll accept it! It's better than waiting for death here."
Gritting his teeth, he said, "Our trade alliance has dealt with the officials of the State of Yang plenty of times. To be honest with you, I don't trust the Yang court! Once we're back in the State of Qi, nothing will happen to us!"
Since he had put it that way, Jiang Wang no longer had grounds to stop him.
Fighting the plague was not like other matters; forcibly keeping someone would mean nothing. Resentment in their hearts would only backfire.
"And them? Do they all understand how dangerous it is to be running around right now? Who's willing to go back with you, and who's willing to stay?" Jiang Wang asked.
"We want to go back to the State of Qi!"
"We're all willing to go back!"
"Lord Jiang, you should leave too. This wretched place truly won't do."
Not a single one of the Four Seas Trade Alliance guards remaining in Green Goat Town was willing to stay; they all wanted to return to the State of Qi. Even though the situation before them made Green Goat Town the safer place to be.
Good or evil, wise or foolish, all of these people had an almost blind faith in the State of Qi.
Such was the cohesion of a hegemon-level nation.
Such, too, was the pride and sense of belonging that a powerful nation gave its people.
Jiang Wang sighed inwardly and waved his hand. "If you want to go, then go. But don't take so much as a single item from Green Goat Town."
After releasing these people, he said to Xiang Qian and Dugu Xiao, "Let them go. Don't spread word of this for now. In a bit, once everyone has gathered at the town hall, we'll talk it over in detail."
Jiang Wang headed back first, intending to take a look inside the Ethereal Realm.
With a matter this big, if a mere steward of the Four Seas Trade Alliance had already gotten word, then Chongxuan Sheng's side surely hadn't missed it either.
...
When he entered the Ethereal Realm, Chongxuan Sheng's fat paper crane had already been circling for some time.
Jiang Wang opened the letter and read — "Leave the State of Yang at once. The plague has worsened; it can now kill Transcendents."
He had stayed out of the Ethereal Realm for only two days, and he had nearly missed news of this magnitude.
Judging by the timing, Chongxuan Sheng's message should have arrived even earlier than the news Steward Qian of the Four Seas Trade Alliance had received.
But Jiang Wang naturally refused to leave.
Never mind what he had told the trade alliance's guards — at this moment, anywhere in the State of Yang, the safest choice was to stay exactly where one was. Never mind that "fleeing" now would mean declaring an end to all the effort he had poured into the State of Yang.
Just one point was enough — the many innocent commoners throughout the Green Goat Town domain.
The moment he decided to leave, Zhu Biqiong, Xiang Qian, Zhang Hai, Dugu Xiao, and even the two medical cultivators of the Chongxuan family would all refuse to stay behind.
Under the State of Yang's current circumstances, pulling out every last Transcendent — the very backbone of the fight against the plague — the order of Green Goat Town would collapse at once.
At a time like this, to abandon them... was the same as killing them.
He immediately wrote a reply to Chongxuan Sheng, waited a while, and received no answer. So he withdrew from the Ethereal Realm for the time being.
In the town hall, Zhu Biqiong, Xiang Qian, Zhang Hai, and Dugu Xiao had all arrived, and the two medical cultivators Chongxuan Sheng had sent were called over as well. They were medical cultivators trained by the Chongxuan family itself, with no ties to sects like the East King Valley.
Medical cultivators were precious talent. Since Chongxuan Sheng had delivered confirmed news, and since Jiang Wang himself would not leave, there was no need to force them to stay either.
Jiang Wang asked first, "How many of the afflicted remain? How soon can treatment be finished?"
Both medical cultivators had been sent by Chongxuan Sheng, so naturally neither would put on airs before Jiang Wang.
The elder of the two, a Heaven-Piercing realm old gentleman, said, "There are twenty-three cases of the afflicted remaining. If we work without rest and there are no new cases, treatment can be finished by tomorrow at the earliest."
The younger one, his disciple, was only at the Roaming Meridian realm and stood to the side without a word.
"Chongxuan Sheng sent me word that the plague within the State of Yang has mutated and can now harm Transcendents... You understand better than anyone what that means; I needn't say more. Once you have finished treating the last of the afflicted in Green Goat Town, you may decide for yourselves whether to go or stay."
At these words, Zhu Biqiong and Zhang Hai were both startled; Xiang Qian and Dugu Xiao, who had already known beforehand, reacted far less.
"If we leave, what happens if there are still afflicted in town whose illness hasn't yet flared up?" The old gentleman thought for a moment. "I take it Young Master Jiang does not intend to leave?"
The reason was simple: if Jiang Wang had wanted to leave, he wouldn't have needed to say any of this to them. He could simply have gathered his people and gone — and no one present could have stopped him.
"I am naturally not leaving."
Hearing Jiang Wang's words, Zhang Hai couldn't tell whether he had breathed a sigh of relief or felt his heart leap into his throat.
In the town hall at this moment, only he and Dugu Xiao were natives of the State of Yang.
Speaking of himself alone, his feelings were complicated. If it were possible, he would of course wish for peace and prosperity in the State of Yang. But at the same time, he had no desire whatsoever to place himself in danger — seeking advantage and avoiding harm was the instinct of every living creature.
While he was still agonizing over it, the old gentleman from the State of Qi spoke first: "Then this old man will not leave either. But to guard against unforeseen changes, let my disciple go."
A healer's heart holds all patients as it holds its own parents.
In ages past, Shennong tasted the hundred herbs, brushing past death countless times — for what? For nothing more than "saving people."
The school of medicine was born of "benevolence" from its very beginning.
"Elder, your disciple may leave at once." Jiang Wang took a ten-thousand-yuan stone from his Storage Casket and set it on the table. "Aside from the fees the Chongxuan family has paid, this is a token of my personal regard."
"Master..." The young medical cultivator's face showed his reluctance.
The old physician made no pretense of refusal. He picked up the ten-thousand-yuan stone, pressed it into his disciple's hand, and said sternly, "Now get yourself back to the State of Qi this instant. A mere plague poison is nothing this old man can't handle."
The old physician was rather strict in daily life, and his authority had long run deep. The young physician dared not talk back; clutching the ten-thousand-yuan stone, he just stood there, as though his feet had taken root.
"Go!" The old physician gave him a kick, and only then did the young man leave the town hall, looking back every few steps.
As a medical cultivator, he understood all too deeply the terror of a plague poison that could now harm Transcendent cultivators — one need only think of that helplessness of ordinary people who, once infected by the plague, could do nothing but wait for death!
And the old physician choosing to stay at a time like this was the truest proof of his healer's benevolence.
His choice to remain let Jiang Wang breathe a sigh of relief. Without a medical cultivator present, there would in truth be only one path for any newly afflicted — isolation from within and without, left to live or die on their own.
Relying on Jiang Wang's Poison-Devouring Blossom alone, he would likely be devouring poison until the end of time, and even then it might not work.
Only after reaching this understanding with the "outsiders" did Jiang Wang turn to the "his own people" and say, "You all know the situation by now, and I have nothing more to say. Go or stay — decide for yourselves. Those who go, I will not force to remain. Those who stay, we will join hands and weather these hard times together."
After talking for this long, everyone had had time to brace themselves; those who needed to make a decision had already made it.
"Wherever you go, Master, I go." Dugu Xiao spoke first.
"Death comes to every man." Xiang Qian said flatly, "Dying of one thing is the same as dying of another."
Jiang Wang dearly wanted to spit at him — to pledge one's resolve in a way that so battered morale! But these were the very days when he needed every hand, so he swallowed it and let it go.
Zhu Biqiong hastily stuffed something into her robes and declared with great spirit, "The half year I promised you isn't up yet. I keep my word."
Jiang Wang looked at her meaningfully. "The Fortune and Misfortune Sphere has been quite calm?"
"There's just a teensy bit of misfortune energy. A drizzle, nothing more!" Zhu Biqiong waved her hand grandly, then suddenly realized she had given something away. She stuck out her tongue and shrank down like a startled quail.
This time Zhang Hai truly did breathe a sigh of relief. Even if he wanted to run, there was really nowhere for him to go. The State of Yang was his homeland. He had taken part in this fight against the plague with his own hands, and compared with anywhere else in the State of Yang, he had far more confidence in the conditions in Green Goat Town. Besides, if even Zhu Biqiong's Fortune and Misfortune Sphere showed no movement, it meant the next few days at least were safe.
"Lord Jiang! Of course I'm not leaving either." His voice rang out loud and clear.
"This needn't be made public." Jiang Wang made his decision. "Move all the commoners from the villages under the town's domain into the town proper and resettle them in one place; leave the outskirts entirely to the fierce beasts. All other measures remain as before."
For the fierce beasts from the various parts of the Jia City domain whose depredations were severe, it was the Jia City authorities who dispatched Transcendent cultivators to deal with them.
When the Hu father and son took over Green Goat Town, they also took up the responsibility of holding back the fierce beasts.
Now that it was Jiang Wang's turn, it was the same.
But now, to fight a plague far more terrifying after its mutation, there was no longer any possibility of sending manpower out. Abandon the outskirts and consolidate control: with the plague inside the town already under control, simply sealing Green Goat Town's four great gates would be enough to keep the plague from outside from breaking in.
Under the present circumstances, this was the option that strained them the least.
...
Only after making a trip in person did Jiang Wang finally grasp the State of Yang's current situation.
The intelligence, verified by both Chongxuan Sheng and the Four Seas Trade Alliance, was not wrong: the plague rampaging through the State of Yang had indeed mutated to the point where it could harm Transcendent cultivators.
The first Transcendent cultivator to truly die of the plague appeared in the Yue City domain.
Two more cases followed in quick succession.
In an instant, all of Yue City domain was gripped by panic, and the situation, only just barely improved, plunged back into chaos... and then collapsed outright.
The chief reason the Yue City domain collapsed so quickly was this —
After confirming that the plague had mutated, the Lord of Yue City chose, at the very first moment, to abandon his city and flee.
Abandoning several hundred thousand commoners of his city domain!
Le Wen