image [https://i.imgur.com/czos91H.png]

Zhi's store

The Duke

“Say you can really heal me; how would you go on about it? Holy water has its limits too.”

“You can't be taking the old lady seriously, Your Grace!” Joshua exclaimed.

“She is the only reason Tarion is still alive. Give her a chance.” Vanessa responded. Her nervous hand shook around my fingers.

“Ahem.” The doctor coughed with her arms on her hips. “It will hurt a lot. But seeing the state of your body, you are probably very used to that.”

“What I will prescribe for you is the destruction and rebuilding of your meridians and heart by using the very poison that made you this way.”

“Kuwei…?”

Zhi nodded. “Sad state of affairs. Even this country is infested by the Cult.”

I perked up, almost sitting up, before remembering the pain and the needles stuck in my flesh.

“The what?”

“The cursed men of the northern lands. Responsible for the increase in people fleeing my country. Never in my years here have I seen so many of my people arrive.”

She looked to the ground with a sombre expression.

A cult sold its poison to my father-in-law? A Cult… sounds familiar.

“A Demon Cult?” I asked.

“One of their many names. How did you know…?”

“I'm a learned man.”

A switch in genres? This world fascinates me more and more. And this war in the Liu states was never mentioned in TAPLM. I need to learn more.

“So, how do I rebuild my meridians?”

“By teaching you a technique unheard by you backwards Friedmen, cultivation.”

I simply smiled.

“Set your price.”

"Brother, you must be kidding!”

“When do we start?” I asked, ignoring my brother.

“Now that you have woken up, right away. You already wasted two days of my precious time.”

How many days?

40minutes later.

8 days until the ball.

Midday, in a Liuen's store, I laid on a mat with my shirt off on the ground. Needles poked me as I grew bored. In bouts of boredom, I think back to when I saw Vanessa still wearing her pyjamas.

Did she stay with me? This whole time…? And the coat?

Disgusting feelings of jealousy wiggled within me. I put down the stupid emotion and I thought about what had gone on since I fell in the brothel. Shocked by my sudden fall, many ran to aid me. The most helpful was my dear madam, who recommended Zhi’s Store as a place to heal. In the past two days that I have been asleep, celebrations have continued until a day and a half later. Black Shade had been completely taken over, with a lot of the mercenary survivors being locked up top for now. I am still deciding their punishment. Execution would be harsh but I don’t have the money to feed them or the patience to keep them alive for long. As for the madam herself, she worked hard and fast, taking control of the horn's former businesses with her commoner ravens and Beatrice by her side. My uncle had been sleeping off the poison, as expected of a seventh. After a short rest, he should be right as rain.

My name is still shouted and cheered in the streets, but my presence at the battle for the red light district is still treated as a rumour. I mean, why would a Duke fight a pimp? He has more important stuff to do.

After shooing away everyone, only Charles sat far to the side, observing. Old fingers pinched some candles and the room darkened with the curtains blocked. Zhi sat on her calves with her metal fan pointing to my body.

I couldn't flipping believe it. I was learning how to cultivate. What's next? Flying on a sword?

“You know the problem you Westerners have is that you rely too much on one Dantian to regulate and create energy, ignoring a vital organ.”

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Zhi’s fan tapped my heart. “Quick lesson. The Middle Dantian or what you call the mana heart moves Qi through the meridians like a real heart does with blood.”

“Qi is Mana?” I said, feeling like a medical school’s cadaver.

“Not quite. The mana you Friedmen use has almost no change from the mana found in the air and food. Qi we easterners use is born from within us.”

The granny tapped just below my navel with her fan.

“The Lower Dantian. Just like how your intestines take food and creates the energy needed for life, the lower Dantian transforms the useless 'mana’ collected from breathing and eating and turns it into life essence. Qi.”

Zhi saw Charles writing her words down and smiled. “The Lower Dantian stores and creates its own energy with a special quality.”

“So the Lower Dantian is the reason we can use mana to create a circle?” Charles asked from the corner.

Zhi was intrigued by the question. “Yes. But with untrained Dantian, you might as well put water from one cup into the other.”

Zhi held her finger up and a white mist aura glowed from her finger. Calm like floating fog in the early dawn, unlike the raging storm of mana. “The Lower Dantian transforms the unwieldy energy flowing around us into something we can better use.”

“Meaning we can use more qi than mana?” Charles probed.

Zhi smiled as she nodded. “In theory.”

“Fascinating…” I watched her energy bop like a wave on a beach's shore, imagining what kind of combinations and uses Qi could be used for.

“If there is a lower and middle, then there is an upper?” I inquired with curiosity.

“Exactly. But that is more of a mage's domain. Martial artists practice in the use of their Mid and Low Dantians for battle.”

The doctor held up two cups. Kuwei and the Zhenxing.

“Carl brought back the revitalising brew you were making to mend yourself. Tried to replicate our Zhenxing? Horrible attempt. But I will praise you for your tenacity.”

With the white cup placed down, “With Kuwei, we will destroy the meridians and unlock the lower Dantian to heal them back to a healthy state with Zhenxing’s help.”

The doctor's face turned grave. “Are you ready, Your Grace?”

I sighed. “Just give it to me.”

Zhi carefully lifted my head up to drink from the black clay mug. This familiar taste made me almost hurl. Once my only hope of getting better, it is now the bane of all my troubles. But I must drink, no matter how much I feel like vomiting. The cup was lifted from my mouth, and the doctor brought me back to my pillow.

“Brace yourself.”

I closed my eyes, bringing my mind to different places and people. I thought of the cult and how much influence they must have, the Hodges and their plan to kill me, the dowager and her hawkish glare, and my brother kneeling. Venessa and how much I want to apologise.

Pain exploded from every capillary. Agony pulled me apart as if every cell wall was cut off by a laser. My body jerked and twisted out of my control but a gentle hand on my chest, exuding strength beyond my imaginings, pushed me back on the mat. Her right hand glows white, as do the needles on my body and the pain goes on.

An hour passed, the pain simmered down and I opened my eyes.

“Easy…..work…..Heh.” I huffed, sweat dripping on my pillow.

“Um. You dealt better than I thought you would, even without pain relief. Well done. Your Grace. I thought the nobles in this country were pansies. Alright, around twenty-two more times. Give or take." My head was picked up again, and I sipped on the poison that destroyed my life.

6 more days until the ball.

The Duchess

Back from Desaw

For two days, I stayed by his side. And for two more, I worked, worked, and worked some more. Inspections, planning, and exhausting meetings with the main topics, my husband's exploits, and the criminal underground that is under new management. Such a workload would be hard to bear if I didn't have my people, Jen, Kurt, and the new addition, Joshua, by my side. But the long days helped take my mind away from how I missed him. The castle filled with maids and footmen felt lonely for the first time.

I remembered his eyes when he woke up. His eyes asked me why. Why did I wait? The answer was obvious.

After the last inspection of the day, I sat in the carriage, and as it bounced, I looked at the city I tried to fix to help. My eyes were unfocused. In a daze, I remember running to Liuen’s store and finding Tarion lying unconscious. The blood stains on tattered clothes could have broken apart with a small breeze. His moonlight skin. Purple with bruises and black and red with charred skin. My scream strained my voice to this day.

Jen held my forearm. “He is going to be okay. Right, Kurt? He can pull through?”

“I do not know. I am not a doctor.”

“HAHA,” Joshua laughed, “never ask a guard about emotional matters. They don't even know what emotions are.”

I turned opposite me and found Joushua with a kind, encouraging smile. Strange. He has done a good job escorting me, despite the constant bickering between Kurt and him. But he has come a long way from the horny boy he was on the journey to Osberg. And his former disdain for commoners was now just annoyance, which was better than nothing, I guess.

“Sister-in-law, my brother is stronger than you can imagine. He has been through worse and with fewer people by his side.”

The carriage shook violently. I tried to hold something while I bounced like a juggler's ball.

“What the hell…Driver! What's going on out there?!”

The carriage flipped, giving everyone a whiplash. Crashing to the road on the vehicle's right side, windows smashed and cut Jen as Kurt moved with mana-aided speed to protect her. The arm of my brother-in-law protected me before my head hit the door that had become the floor.

“Phew, lucky.” I hear him whisper and groan.

I heard the cries of battle. Swords clanged and tinged and I was transported back to the blizzard. I shook and froze. My mind raced to a conclusion that scared me.

Tarion won’t come…

I pushed my brother-in-law aside and slipped out my weapon from under my skirt as Kurt and Joshua unsheathed their own.

My one circle spun in my chest and I crouched with my knife out. Explosions vibrated the wood and we waited, looking up at the door above. Cries of the dying, the squelching of bodies being ripped apart. Thuds from stone broken shook the earth and someone landed on the carriage. My hand sweated on the grip of my knife as I prepared myself.

A knock on the carriage door and our weapons sprung out. I looked upward and instantly calmed as I saw a dumb hat on a dumber man.

The carriage door opened and George brought his arm down. His garments were dusty, and his hat was clean of dirt. “More are coming! The guards are holding them off! We better hurry!”