CHAPTER

23

A Lesson on Human Anatomy

I

“Are you all right?” Hao Zhen asked, walking up to Tian Jin.

Tian Jin looked up, allowing Hao Zhen to see his face. He looked exhausted, his expression pale. Hao Zhen himself felt rather drained by what he had just done, but Tian Jin seemed much worse off. “Yeah. Just… catching my breath a little.”

Hao Zhen nodded his head, giving him an understanding look. Tian Jin had had to hold down a second-level monster twice. That was no easy feat. He doubted even the average third-level redsoul would have been able to pull it off.

“Anyway...” Tian Jin narrowed his eyes at him, curious. “What happened at the end?”

“It’s… It’s a bit complicated,” Hao Zhen said, furrowing his brow a little. He’d need some time to think things over before he gave his explanation. Not only did he need to get his own thoughts in order, but he also needed to come up with excuses. “I’ll tell you later. For now, we should set up camp.”

Tian Jin didn’t press the issue, simply giving him a nod.

Hao Zhen then turned around to look at Duo Lan, who had walked up behind him. Out of the three of them, she was in the best condition, though it was still clear, from looking at her, that she had been in a scuffle. Her hair was in complete disarray, and there was blood on her hands, with some red splatters on her robes too.

She gave him a silent, scrutinizing look before inclining her head forward in assent.

They then considered their options before deciding to set up camp in the clearing, coming to the conclusion that the location didn’t really matter. There weren’t any protected locations in the forest, nor did they have any means of hiding their tracks, so the priority was getting themselves back in shape as soon as possible—before Du Qing made his move—and that meant that the sooner the three of them started resting, the better.

The three of them then took some spiritual recovery pills before going about setting up camp. From her spatial ring, Duo Lan produced three small gray tents, which they had procured before the mission. They weren’t anything special, but they were made from magical materials, making them much more resistant than mundane ones. Hao Zhen helped Duo Lan set up the tents while Tian Jin set down some surveillance talismans around them, and soon their camp was pretty much done.

The moment they were done setting everything up, Duo Lan walked up to him. “All right. Now spill,” she said, not even bothering to mince words.

Hao Zhen blinked, not because of her words, but because he had just realized that she was back to looking like her usual self—her hair perfectly done and her robes once again clean, the blood stains on them gone. Her hands were also clean. Just when had she managed to tidy herself up?

Hao Zhen glanced at Tian Jin and saw that the other boy was looking in their direction, clearly attentive.

“All right,” Hao Zhen said, seeing that he wouldn’t be able to postpone this conversation any longer. In any case, he had thought up a good enough excuse while they were setting up the camp, so he was ready. “Let’s sit.”

He then made to sit down, but he stopped mid-movement when Duo Lan’s spatial ring flashed, and three chairs appeared in front of her. Tian Jin, who had also been about to sit, similarly froze.

The chairs Duo Lan had just produced weren’t outdoor chairs, but indoor ones, and like the ones in her living room, they looked expensive. They were made out of some dark, deep wood, with burgundy cushions on the back and seat.

The sight of such an extravagant indoor chair in the middle of the forest, on top of the grass and under the sun, had Hao Zhen blanking. Tian Jin also had a stunned expression.

Paying them no mind, Duo Lan promptly sat down on the middle chair before looking over at them expectantly. “Well?” she said, crossing her arms in front of her chest as she settled into her chair. “Aren’t you going to sit?”

Hao Zhen really should have known better than to expect Duo Lan to willingly sit on the grass and dirt. At least she had also brought chairs for him and Tian Jin. Hao Zhen didn’t particularly mind sitting on the ground, but it’d definitely be odd, if not awkward, if Duo Lan was the only one in a chair.

With that, he and Tian Jin repositioned the chairs slightly so they formed a circle before sitting down.

“All right,” Hao Zhen said, leaning back on the chair. He had to admit—he felt incredibly comfortable. He had been on his feet for a while now, so it felt nice to rest on something so cushiony and soft. Maybe Duo Lan’s idea to bring chairs with her wasn’t that outlandish, after all.

Hao Zhen took a moment to organize his thoughts one last time before starting his explanation.

“I used One String Puppetry on the glistening horn rhinoceros a couple of times,” he said, figuring that that was the best place to start. “The first time, I did it the normal way, trying to restrict his movements. It worked, to a certain extent.” He looked at Tian Jin. “You managed to hold its head down, and Duo Lan stabbed it in the eye. The problem was that the eye wound Duo Lan gave it pretty much drove it mad. I tried to use the skill on it again, but it didn’t work. The glistening horn rhinoceros instinctively rejected any attempts to impede its movements the moment I tried exerting my control. You probably didn’t even notice those attempts, as they didn’t have any effect.”

Tian Jin leaned forward, inclining his head in assent.

Duo Lan, on the other hand, fixed with Hao Zhen an intense stare. “So how did you do it at the end?” she demanded. “What changed?” As usual, Duo Lan wasn’t just curious—she was scrutinizing him, demanding an answer instead of simply asking.

By this point, Hao Zhen had already grown somewhat used to Duo Lan’s antics, so he wasn’t that affected. He still couldn’t just shrug off her glare like Tian Jin, but he could at least hold his own. He simply nodded at her. “I realized that the reason I couldn’t control the glistening horn rhinoceros was because of its pain—it was clouding its mind, overwhelming its senses. It then occurred to me that there might be a way to dull, if not get rid, of its pain.”

He paused. This was the important part—one of the reasons why he had bought himself some time to think first. He had to proceed carefully. “Duo Lan, earlier you said you didn’t know what a nervous system was. Is that right?”

Duo Lan furrowed her brow. “I’ve never heard the term. What about it?”

Ignoring her question, Hao Zhen turned to Tian Jin. “You?”

“I’m not familiar with it, either.”

“Then I assume it’s not common knowledge,” Hao Zhen said, nodding his head, doing his best to keep his expression neutral. “You two know what the brain is and what it does, right? You know, how it pretty much rules your body.”

The brain and most of its functions were common knowledge in this world. Hao Zhen had had tutors growing up, hired by his father, and they had gone over it and many other organs in anatomy lessons. He couldn’t remember ever learning—or even hearing—about the nervous system, so he had been unsure whether that was just something that wasn’t widely known in this world or something that wasn’t known at all.

Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.

Now that he had confirmed that Duo Lan and Tian Jin had no idea what it was, he could at least assume that cultivators weren’t generally taught about it, either.

Now it was time to put to test his skill at lying.

“The brain is actually part of something called the nervous system—just like how the stomach is part of the digestive system.” Duo Lan and Tian gave him blank looks. Hao Zhen froze, realizing his mistake. So they were also unfamiliar with the idea of grouping body parts into systems. Before they could ask anything, Hao Zhen started explaining, “Your body has many systems. A system is a collection of body parts, and…”

Over the next few minutes, Hao Zhen gave an explanation of what systems were, finally putting to use what he had learned back in biology class. Never could he have imagined that one of the things he’d do if he transmigrated to another world would be giving an anatomy lesson. The situation was so absurd that he soon found himself having a hard time keeping a straight face.

Hao Zhen didn’t go into too much detail. In fact, he went out of his way to act uncertain at times. He had already thought up an excuse for why he knew these things, and if he wanted Duo Lan and Tian Jin to buy it, he couldn’t appear too knowledgeable.

Duo Lan and Tian Jin listened in silence. He had thought Duo Lan would be constantly trying to interrupt him and challenge his claims, but she turned out to be a surprisingly good listener, even if an intense one.

“Now, the nervous system is what actually rules your body, your brain just being part of it. Throughout your body are tiny, fiber-like things called nerves,” Hao Zhen said, constantly pausing to think of the best way to go about his explanation.

He had already come to the conclusion that Duo Lan and Tian Jin knew very little of biology and anatomy, at least compared to a high school student from Earth, something he found rather surprising. It was rather common, in cultivation novels, for cultivators to study the body. The setting of traditional cultivation novels was based on ancient China, after all, and even the idea of cultivation was derived from traditional Chinese medicinal theory. But Duo Lan and Tian Jin didn’t even appear to have the kind of esoteric, fantastical perception of anatomy, either. They simply didn’t know much about it.

Then again, Hao Zhen reckoned that the cultivation system of this world was already fairly different from what cultivation was like in more traditional novels, which revolved around ideas from traditional Chinese medicine such as meridians and vital energy—both terms he had yet to come across in his current life. Hao Zhen guessed that cultivators in this world were far more interested in the spiritual and the conceptual than in the physical, so they didn’t put too much emphasis on anatomy.

In light of that, Hao Zhen was careful not to use any terms Duo Lan and Tian Jin probably weren’t familiar with. He didn’t want to branch into an entirely new explanation again. The briefest he kept his explanation, the fewer chances he’d have to slip up. Right now, he could still explain his knowledge, but if he ended up revealing too much, Tian Jin and Duo Lan would definitely become suspicious, and he wasn’t ready to share the truth—his actual circumstances—with someone else just yet. There were still more things he wanted to ascertain before deciding whether it was safe to tell others about his transmigration.

“There are different types of nerves, sensory nerves being one of them. It’s through these nerves that you perceive the world—physically, at least.” This time, Hao Zhen didn’t even have to fake uncertainty. He wasn’t really sure what the relationship between the body, the soul, and the mind was like. “And one of those perceptions is pain,” he said, emphasizing the word.

He focused on Duo Lan. “Before, you asked me what changed, right? Why I was suddenly able to subdue the monster.” Duo Lan gave him a nod, and he continued, “As I said, I realized that the monster’s pain was the problem—the reason why it was so hard to control it. While trying to come up with a plan, I thought about how living beings only felt pain because of their sensory nerves, so it occurred to me that I might be able to use One String Puppetry to control the monster’s nerves, getting rid of its pain.”

Despite how calm Hao Zhen was right now, back then, after watching Duo Lan’s attack to kill the monster fail, he had attempted to use his spiritual skill on it a few times, failing each time. Hao Zhen had then desperately wracked his head to come up with an alternative, and it was then that he came to that realization—almost like those flashes of enlightenment Hao Zhen had often read about in cultivation novels. He had never thought he’d experience one himself, and he had almost jumped in excitement at the realization.

He had then tried to use One String Puppetry on the glistening horn rhinoceros, and the moment the Ethereal String attached itself to the monster, he instinctively realized that what he had in mind was possible. He had then tested it out once, trying to slightly dull the monster’s sense of pain, and he ended up feeling no resistance whatsoever.

That made Hao Zhen realize he wouldn’t even have to fight to impose his will on the glistening horn rhinoceros. It wanted the pain gone, so it had no reason to resist.

Hao Zhen had then hurriedly taken out his sound-transmission token from his spatial ring, and sent Tian Jin and Duo Lan, a sound transmission, telling them what to do, before concentrating fully on the nerves around the monster’s eye, deactivating them. Sure enough, the monster didn’t put up any resistance, ending up dazed by the sudden disappearance of the pain.

With that, Tian Jin had then taken advantage of the glistening horn’s rhinoceros confusion and lack of resistance to hold its head down while Duo Lan went for the killing blow. At the very last moment, the monster snapped out of it and tried to move away, but Hao Zhen, who had already been expecting it, used up almost all of his remaining willpower to momentarily shut down all of the monster’s sensory nerves, allowing Duo Lan to finish it off.

“And that was exactly what I did.” Hao Zhen shrugged, feigning nonchalance. “I first sent you two a sound transmission, then got rid of the monster’s pain. That left it dazed, and because of that, you two were able to finish it off,” he summarized.

“Well…” Tian Jin said, leaning back on his chair, clearly still processing everything he had just heard. “That does explain things, I think?” He shook his head, then smiled at Hao Zhen. “In any case, great job. You did splendidly.”

Hao Zhen couldn’t help but smile back, feeling something warm build up inside him. He wasn’t used to feeling appreciated, and it was definitely a nice feeling. Just as he was about to reply, Duo Lan spoke up.

“There’s just one thing I don’t get,” she said. Unlike Tian Jin, she wasn’t smiling. Instead, she was still glaring firmly at him. “Where in the world did you learn about all of those things?”

Hao Zhen turned to look at her. Her question hadn’t caught him by surprise.

For a moment, Hao Zhen felt tempted to turn the question around on Duo Lan, to voice his own suspicions about her since she was now questioning him.

He quickly decided against it, however.

It wasn’t the time for that yet. Hao Zhen didn’t know when the time would come, but it certainly wasn’t in the middle of a forest, where they were in danger of being attacked at any moment, not just by monsters, but also by other cultivators.

“My father was a merchant,” Hao Zhen said, “and he wanted me to have the best education possible, so he hired all sorts of tutors to teach me.” That was the truth. Now for the lie. “One of those tutors was a scholar who used to be a doctor. He had dedicated his life to studying the human body, and he was the one who taught me all of those things. I actually thought it was common knowledge, so I’m rather surprised that you two didn’t know about it.” He shrugged. It was a simple explanation, but in his experience, such explanations tended to be the most believable ones.

If Duo Lan and Tian Jin wanted to, they could investigate his background, find out who exactly his father had hired to tutor him, and then track down the man who had taught him biology. His lie was in no way airtight. Still, based on what he knew of Tian Jin and Duo Lan, there was no way they’d do something like that. Both were very upfront, straightforward individuals.

Sure enough, once he was done with his explanation, Duo Lan frowned, seemingly pondering his words for a moment, before she inclined her head, accepting his words. Hao Zhen glanced at Tian Jin, who simply gave him a nod.

Realizing that they believed him, Hao Zhen almost breathed out in relief. Next, he thought that they’d have some questions, but neither Duo Lan nor Tian Jin said anything, both of them wearing pensive expressions, their gazes becoming distant.

Hao Zhen shifted rather awkwardly in his chair, wondering what to do now. He looked around the camp, and it occurred to him that the only thing missing was a campfire. They weren’t graysouls, however, so it wasn’t as if they really…

Hao Zhen blinked, shifting his gaze to the glistening charge rhinoceros’s corpse, which lay just beside their little camp, before returning his attention to Tian Jin and Duo Lan. They were still immersed in their thoughts, and some gloom had settled on their face.

Hao Zhen realized what exactly was going on—what was on their minds.

Although Duo Lan and Tian Jin were both in a much better state now compared to how they’d been right after the fight thanks to the magical pills they had taken, they were still in low spirits. Clearly, they were still affected by the fight with the glistening horn rhinoceros. Both of them had been pretty confident, and even though they did manage to beat it, there had been some hiccups. Considering how proud they were, what had happened didn’t sit well with them.

He wasn’t certain about Duo Lan, but he was confident that Tian Jin could have faced the glistening horn rhinocerous on his own. It’d have probably been a tough battle, but Tian Jin would have likely triumphed in the end. At least that was how the first fight between the protagonist and a magical creature usually turned out in cultivation novels. Because of his and Duo Lan’s participation, however, that climactic fight didn’t happen, and Tian Jin and Duo Lan probably thought that since they hadn’t been fighting alone, they should have done much better.

Maybe…

A way to increase their morale occurred to Hao Zhen. He wasn’t sure it’d work, but it was his go-to strategy for getting his sister out of her occasional funks, so he decided it wouldn’t hurt to try it.