138: 4.3 Black Demon Weeping Blood

4.3 Black Demon Weeping Blood

Lu Yizhou dragged them to the nearest cave and leaned the man against the wall as he rummaged through the qiankun pouch[1] his sleeves for… for anything. He threw away a pack of talismans, a jade plaque, a money pouch, more money pouches, a few sets of similar robes he wore, wooden trinkets like the toy that a three years old children would play, until the end when his temper almost exploded due to frustration, he finally dug out a bag of medicine, pills and ointments. The pristine way the bag was tied told Lu Yizhou that, whatever his current identity might be, he seemed to not need these things often, opting to save it in the very bottom of his sleeves.2

Well, that was good. It meant that all the medicines were brand new.

He touched the man's hand and frowned at the heat that emanated from it. Lu Yizhou measured his forehead and without a doubt, he had already started to contract a fever. His pale lips almost turned blue. 

Lu Yizhou's face turned stormy and his jaws tightened. Whoever it was, he was going to make them pay for the wounds they had inflicted on him!

The next few moments were spent undressing the man, cleaning his wounds and applying the medicine. Lu Yizhou tried and failed to ignore the star-shaped birthmark on his chest that was half obscured by blood stain, tenderness surging in his chest and he reached out to trace the shape. The curl on the corner of his lips was tinged with sadness and bitterness. 

Finally, we met again. But I'm sorry...it seems like I am a little too late.

Lu Yizhou took a deep breath, decisively tore his eyes away from the man's chest and refocused on the man's wounds instead. He imbued his spiritual energy gently around his palm to help enhance the speed of his regeneration. When he got to the largest wound on the side of the man's stomach, a pained groan escaped his lips. "Hurts…"

Lu Yizhou paused before he reached out to dab the man's sweaty forehead with his sleeves. "Please bear with it for a while," he said softly. "It will be okay. I won't let anything happen to you." He hastened his movements after that, rolling the bandages around the man's waist. But to do that, Lu Yizhou had to support his shoulders and let the other's head rest on his shoulder. 

"Hmm…" Came another pained groan.

"It's okay." Lu Yizhou soothed in a low voice. "Good boy, you're enduring it so well."

The man nuzzled closer to the crook of Lu Yizhou's neck, his nose firmly stuck onto his skin as he inhaled. "You smell so good…" he said in an almost inaudible whisper in which Lu Yizhou couldn't help but chuckle.

"Rest." Lu Yizhou lowered him back to the ground that had been cushioned with the spare robes he had.

A frown instantly etched between the man's brows, presumably from the cold, and Lu Yizhou pressed his finger there to coax it away gently. 

His mind was running with a thousand thoughts per second as he gathered the woods around to start a fire. They couldn't keep on like this. The medicines in his possession were just a basic necessity to nurture skin wounds, not enough for the internal damage that the man suffered. Lu Yizhou needed to go into town if he wanted to get more but then, leaving the man alone wasn't an option either. Not when the possibility that the attacker was still roaming nearby, searching for his corpse. Flames burst out from the piles of dry firewood, illuminating the storm brewing in Lu Yizhou's eyes.

First thing first, he needed to know what was happening.

He sat down beside the man. [Pass me the plot.]

[666: Aye, aye, Host! Here it is!]

As he had guessed, this was a cultivation world where people flying on swords, fighting with spiritual energy and monster hunting was considered a normal thing. However, it didn't mean that all people could cultivate. They needed to either have natural aptitude toward it or trained in a cultivation sect from a tender age. 

Speaking of sect, then one should know Lingyan Sect, the most distinguished and prestigious sect in the entire cultivation world. It had produced the best cultivators, trained thousands of disciples and had strict requirements for their new apprentices. It was said that when Lingyan Sect's recruitment was opened every ten years, it would instantly be swarmed with people from all over the world, scrambling to test their luck to see whether they would be accepted as an outer disciple. Or if they were lucky, they could even be directly recruited by the elders!

All was peaceful and well, until one day a sect which practiced the unorthodox cultivation method showed up out of nowhere and took the world by storm! They were small in number, yet a force to be reckoned with. They did whatever they wanted, they stole, they partied, they killed, they brought chaos whenever they went. They practically went against every single rule that was carved in Lingyan Sect's Wall of Discipline. 

Slippery and cunning, the world named them the Demonic Sect.

And the figure that sat on the top of this sect was the villain. The fearsome man who gained the title 'Black Demon Weeping Blood'[2] for wherever he went, massacre would follow. He was the very image of a demon who took the fun of spilling blood and sprinkling misery. Nobody really knew what he looked like for there wasn't anyone who lived to tell the tales. As a result, rumors started to spread everywhere. Some said that his skin was hideously crimson and he was six foot tall, some said that he was so beautiful that he put the most famous courtesan to shame, and some even said that he was merely a legend created by storytellers to earn money. But one thing for certain was, he always wore black robes engraved with gold patterns on the hem. His signature color.

Black Demon Weeping Blood…

Lu Yizhou paused and crosschecked. [It isn't me?]

[666: Nooo, Host! It's the villain for sure! The man beside you!]

Lu Yizhou glanced at the unconscious, pale beauty beside him and hummed thoughtfully. Well, the role should have gone to Lu Yizhou instead, he thought in pity, because it was practically tailored for him. This man looked like he wasn't even cruel enough to butcher a chicken. Lu Yizhou reached for the hem of his black bloodied robes and yes, there was indeed the faint gold pattern engraved on it although it was already smeared with blood. Pain flickered in his eyes as he gazed at the other's sleeping visage.

Why, in every world, did you have to suffer so…?

Lu Yizhou inhaled deeply and continued to digest the plot.

Small fights between the righteous and demonic cultivators broke out every single time. They were like water and oil, cat and dog, as soon as they saw each other, they would instantly engage in a fight! The tense undercurrent lasted for almost a hundred years yet it still wasn't enough for them to fully turn against each other. The demonic cultivators seemed to enjoy the fight with the righteous whereas the righteous — most of them came from Lingyan — needed the demonic cultivators to set a jarring contrast between them in order to set an example for future disciples so that they knew what kind of path they shouldn't threaded.

In a way, they were like yin and yang, unable to see eye to eye yet complementing each other completely.

Until one day the equilibrium was broken when the revered senior disciple of Lingyan Sect, Jingxue-Jun[3], was killed brutally in the middle of his investigation of a low level monster that had harmed the nearby village. On his mangled corpse was found the traces of Black Demon's spiritual energy as if he was proud to show the result of his deed. Audacious! Unforgivable! What was this but a blatant provocation?!

Once again, Lu Yizhou paused. Jingxue-Jun…? His eyes slowly fell on his sword as the facts unraveled in his mind. The snowy markings on his fucking white sword, his light blue robes. Ugh, don't tell him…

[666: Host, you're right again! You are indeed the esteemed senior disciple of Lingyan Sect, Jingxue-Jun, the one that is supposed to die today! Congratulations Host, you have managed to evade death twice in a row for the last two hours! Banzai! Banzai! Banzai!]

.

.

[1] Qiankun pouch = a pouch able to hold more than it appears able to carry. It is used by cultivators to carry large items.

[2] Black Demon Weeping Blood = Heimo Qixue 

[3] Jing = peaceful, tranquil. Xue = snow. Jingxue-Jun = a respected title.

Oh, it's a coincidence that their title both had 'xue' even though the meaning is totally different lol

Next, I will refer our ML as Heimo aka Black Demon because that's how people called him *wink*

pqdm.com