Second Time Around

44. Extras 2: Animals to People

Wen Qing strode through the Unclean Realm with a stern face; QingheNie disciples of all ages wisely found themselves turning around and finding a route that did not involve crossing her path. The fights between their sect leader and the healer were legendary. She burst into Nie MingJue's audience chamber, "Ass! I'm leaving. Prepare a carriage for me."

"Bitch!" Nie MingJue responded. "Well riddance to Wen dogs."

"If I hadn't come, QingheNie would already have a new sect leader; I should have stayed home." She turned on her heel and strode back to her room.

She'd arrived eight days before to see him unconscious, bleeding heavily from six of his qiqiao (how his right ear wasn't bleeding, she still didn't understand). He'd woken, partially, when she started inserting her acupuncture needles. But not the decision making part of him woke up: no, his fighting instincts woke up. It took twelve disciples to hold him still long enough for her to get needles in that would paralyze him from the neck down. Cleaning the resentment from his body was an unfair fight at first.

Wen Qing was quite capable of cleaning meridians. She'd even healed several of her uncle's disciples that were having qi deviations at least as bad as Nie MingJue was having. Whatever was going on with him, was nothing she had ever seen or felt before; it was almost as if there was an echo, something that filled him with resentment nearly as fast as she'd clear it. She'd clean a section of his body and within minutes, it would be just as muddled and confused as it had been before she started. After three days of fighting the qi deviation, she decided to lock his spiritual energy away; it was a last ditch effort to save his life.

It worked.

She allowed him to wake the following day only for him to loudly curse her out. "I saved your worthless carcass and this is the thanks I get?" She turned to Nie HuaiSang, "At least one of you has manners."

"Wen Guniang," Nie HuaiSang bowed several times and hid his face behind his fan. "DaGe is very thankful you saved his life." In a much lower tone, he added, "Eventually, he'll be grateful."

"I heard that, you insolent pup!" Nie MingJue growled. "Am I glad I'm not dead? Yes. Am I glad you called a Wen dog? No." To Wen Qing, he ordered. "Get your needles out of me, Bitch. And then get the fuck out of my home."

She didn't remove the needles. Without a Lan to perform a silencing spell, she added a few needles that did the same job. She smirked as the sect leader tried to yell at her even with paralyzed vocal cords. "I told you back in Lotus Pier, I have more patience than you do. Don't try to out stubborn me."

The Nie disciples were not helpful in finding the reason for the strange echo she encountered. The junior disciples honestly had no idea. As did most of the senior ones. A few, however... were lying; they knew exactly what was causing the echo and refused to discuss it with her. "Ask Nie ZongZhu," was unhelpful when that man was still (deliberately) unable to speak.

Nie HuaiSang didn't know, either, which was a major concern. "There's something causing these qi deviations and you don't know what that secret is?" Wen Qing had asked for and received a list of disciples who had died of qi deviation in the last twenty or so years. It was not complete as wartime deaths were not accounted for. But it showed a harsh picture: fifteen to thirty cultivators (mostly men) died every year from a qi deviation. She handed the list to Nie HuaiSang to review. "What is common to all of these disciples? No other sect has more than three or four disciples die of qi deviation in a decade! This? This is ridiculous. It's obscene."

Nie HuaiSang's hands shook as he read through the names. "I knew we had several die every year... but this many? QingJie... please let me talk to DaGe."

She removed all of her needles and herself to the loud refrain: "Leave, Wen dog! Leave Qinghe! Go back to your Yunmeng kennel!"

A few hours later, a white-faced and shaking Nie HuaiSang bowed formally. "Qinghe Nie thanks Wen Guniang for her assistance. This is an internal sect matter; we will handle it from now on."