My Disciple Wants to Tease Me Every Day - Chapter 52

: Reincarnation Pill
Di Jiufeng pulled Ning Guang inside. The stone path split into two forks slowly winding down, two narrow and endless paths moving slowly apart until they disappeared into the darkness, like a ferocious beast lying in wait for a chance to explode into motion.

Under the cover of the luxuriant vegetation, only some pinpricks of light spilled across a square meter’s worth of space at the mouth of the tunnel.

Because they had dawdled for a bit, Di Jiufeng already could not see the two people who had gone on ahead. She hesitated for a bit, but before she could decide which path to take, Ning Guang took her hand and led her inside. “All the paths are the same, all the paths here lead to the same place, it’s a… a…”

The words rose to her lips, yet she could not speak them aloud. Ning Guang knew what it was, but just as she was about to speak, her head went blank. She paused, but could not continue.

The cave was dark, but not damp. An everlasting scent of blood wrapped around the two, seeping in through every pore.

Even as a cultivator with night vision, Di Jiufeng could not see anything in this cave. All that entered her eyes was an extremely thick layer of grey smoke and a bone-chilling cold.

––Cold to the extreme, and dark to the extreme. To make an ugly comparison, it was like a natural morgue. If a corpse was placed inside, it likely wouldn’t decay even after thousands of years.

Di Jiufeng shivered. Assailed by the stench of death, she felt a bit faint.

She couldn’t help but push Ning Guang, taking a faster pace forwards.

The tunnel was not long. After walking for half a cup of tea’s time, the view opened up before them. All the smoke stopped at the entrance of the tunnel, making this place seem like a panoramic view in comparison–– it was a stone room carved in the center of the cave, an orderly rectangular prism, four walls, a ceiling, and a floor, all carved out with a blade, smooth without a single protrusion.

This cave had the air of an outer coffin, but there were no coffins in this room. It was wide and empty, and other than the two women, there was only a stone tablet.

The green-clothed woman took out a matchstick and struck it on the ground. In an instant, eight fiery dragons burned from the stone tablet to the walls.

The cave lit up in an instant, every corner ilLuminated bright and clear.

Di Jiufeng finally saw what was in the wall. Eyes wide in fright, she staggered backwards a step!

As a modern person, Di Jiufeng’s life had always been tranquil and calm, she had never seen a dead person before. Even after transmigrating into a novel, she had never seen death on a large scale, not to mention such sinister and terrifying corpses.

She was wondering why this stone cave was so cold. Turns out that it was not stone at all, but never-melting dark ice.

And in these four walls of ice, the only adornment was these sinister giant corpses, twisted into contorted poses.

“Ning Guang, what is this?!” Seeing the pitch-black giant corpses kneeling on the ground, faces sinister, limbs twisted into poses difficult to imagine, Di Jiufeng dragged Ning Guang in front of her in fright.

What horrible luck, why did an optimistic and upright youth like her have to be wronged in this way!

She had never done a bad thing in her life, but now this sea of corpses was going to give her nightmares!

“I can’t, I can’t, I feel faint, Ning Guang, I want to leave.” She closed her eyes, but as soon as she did, it felt like there were people staring at her from all around. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up one by one, and her limbs all turned cold.

She really wanted to cry, she did not want to be here at all.

Just when Di Jiufeng felt she had nothing left to live for, Ning Guang furrowed her brow and said, “This place, A-Feng, these people are all of the witch tribe.”

Seeing that Di Jiufeng had taken such a fright, Ning Guang covered her eyes with her hands, then pressed her into her embrace. Ning Guang’s eyes were like a pair of daggers, tearing gashes open on Lu Yi’s body. “Extinguish the fire, right now!” Lu Yi shivered in fear at this cold voice without a hint of emotion.

[T/N: Lu Yi is the woman in green. Her name has the characters 绿, ‘green’, and 漪, ‘ripple’.]

Her face was deathly pale, head lowered, unable to muster the courage to look up. “Benefactor, benefactor, I beg of you, she is injured, she needs treatment, I need the light to see!” She was afraid to lift her head, and could only forcefully kowtow on the ground, sound after sound beating into Di Jiufeng’s heart.

She covered Ning Guang’s hands with her palms. Warmed by this gentle heat, her wild heartbeat finally recovered its calm.

“Ning Guang, it’s alright, let her go.” Moved by the pure love between the two women, Di Jiufeng thought about it, then stopped Ning Guang. Still afraid to look, she turned around, burying her whole face in Ning Guang’s chest.

They were only standing in silence, but a wisp of warmth rose up in the air between them.

Lu Yi kowtowed a few more times in appreciation, then finally stood back up, her forehead mottled green and purple. She was a common person, and she was still young. Seeing so many corpses who had died in such a miserable state, she was very afraid as well, but in comparison to the bloodied person at her side, all of this seemed like nothing.

“Chu Yi, Chu Yi, I will go refine some medicine for you right now. Don’t be afraid, you will not die.”

[T/N: Chu Yi, with the characters 初一, meaning ‘the first of the month’.]

She caressed the person laying by her side, so weak she could only let out gasps of breath. The grey smoke around her was already all gone. Half of her exposed face was bloody white bone, and the other side was rotting flesh covered with oozing sores. A single eyeball hung suspended, nearly about to tumble from its socket.

Chu Yi had been burned severely. She grimaced in pain, hissing through her teeth.

She had mostly lost her senses, but her single eye stared straight at Lu Yi without a single blink. She obediently let Lu Yi apply medicine. Even though she was trembling in pain, she did not struggle the slightest bit.

Ning Guang watched for a while. She wanted to look away, but just then, she discovered that wisps of grey smoke were rising from the corpses in the walls of ice, boring into Chu Yi’s body. Then, wrapped in vital energy, it drilled out of her limbs and poured into the stone tablet.

This was…

Ning Guang pursed her brow and strode up to them. She looked down at Chu Yi, catching a wisp of vital energy in her palm.

Ning Guang asked, “You said that she is afraid of fire and cannot see the light, she can only hide inside this cave?”

Lu Yi nodded.

Ning Guang continued, “Then, have you brought her to other lightless places?”

“I have, but she… maybe it’s because Chu Yi’s body has suffered serious decay, she is only comfortable here. She refuses to stay in other places, at most we’d stay for a cup of tea’s time and then return. Benefactor, what is it, is there something wrong with Chu Yi?”

Ning Guang shook her head, and did not continue.

But the Di Jiufeng in her arms grew curious. She blinked, then fixed her gaze on Ning Guang’s chest and asked through a telepathy spell, “Do you know what kind of person Chu Yi is?”

Ning Guang did not hide anything from her. She explained patiently, “This place is shaped like a coffin, and the dragons of flame spread out along the directions of the bagua. Though the corpses are scattered messily, upon closer inspection, they are all set in the kan hexagram. Kan, the abyssal waters, is the best array for storing a body, and this Chu Yi is the array spirit which activates the ghostly energy to preserve it.

A-Feng, I’ve looked, all of these are the corpses of witch race people. Something that could make them willingly sacrifice themselves to preserve a body, do you think…”

“The body of the ancient witch!” Di Jiufeng’s head jolted up, her gaze moving past Ning Guang’s neck to land on the body. She shivered in fright.

She’s going to cry and faint on the spot…

Di Jiufeng’s lips pulled into a thin line. About to pass away from fright, she said, “No wonder you said this place felt familiar, it’s the body of your previous self. Then you…” Di Jiufeng was going to tell her to retrieve the body from the wall. After all, according to the original novel, the ancient witch would have encountered numerous dangers on the way to find her previous body. Since they could now avoid those difficulties, they might as well take the opportunity.

But before she could speak, Lu Yi suddenly screamed!

“The whiskers, where are Shifu’s whiskers?!” Lu Yi searched through her clothes in a panic, a pill cauldron placed before her and a recipe pressed below her foot.

Ning Guang swept her a glance. She did not have much of a reaction, until she saw the name written on that recipe!

Reincarnation pill! That was the recipe for the reincarnation pill.

Ning Guang’s eyes went cold. She strode over to Lu Yi in a single large step. “This recipe of yours… this recipe of yours, it’s, it’s, the reincarnation pill!” Her voice hoarse, it trembled in unconcealed joy.

Lu Yi was already agitated, and with her forceful pull, she had to look up.

Her joy was so strong that Lu Yi even began to smile with her. “Yes, this is the recipe for the reincarnation pill, my Shifu gave it to me… right! My Shifu’s whiskers!” She suddenly furrowed her brow again, hands wildly searching all over her body.

After looking all over herself several times with no result, Lu Yi’s eyes grew red in urgency.

“How could this be, I always kept them on me, how could I have lost them!” Before long, tears began to fall. She turned to look at Chu Yi. Seeing her hanging by a gossamer, without even the strength to speak, her tears flowed down with even more force.

“Without the reincarnation pill, she, she…”

Lu Yi sobbed soundlessly. She reached out several times, but in the end did not take Chu Yi’s bloodied hand.

She cried in despair, a grief strong enough to shake the heavens and the earth.

But this sight before Ning Guang’s eyes did not move her a bit. She was always cold and indifferent, she had given all her last bits of affection to Di Jiufeng. If not for the reincarnation pill, she would have turned and walked away right then. “Your Shifu’s whiskers? What use are they? An ingredient?”

Lu Yi nodded as she cried, sobs in her voice. “My Shifu was the king of medicine, he was a ginseng plant who had cultivated into a spirit. Someone had scattered his soul, and before he died, he collected all of his medical power into his whiskers. They are the most crucial ingredient of the reincarnation pill. Without them, the reincarnation pill cannot be refined.”

Hearing Lu Yi’s words, Ning Guang finally furrowed her brow.

Her voice was tense and urgent, showing clear signs of panic. “Then do you remember where you might have lost these whiskers?”

Lu Yi thought carefully. When the villagers had arrested her and taken her to the execution platform, they had not been courteous, but they did not pull and drag her very much, the whiskers had probably not been lost then. They could only have been lost when Chu Yi had taken her away. Right, just then, when she had struggled free of the ropes, the pouch in her lapels must also have fallen out.

Whether it had fallen into the fire or somewhere else, Lu Yi could not remember. But in that sort of fire, there was no way the pouch could have survived!

She was sure of it deep down, but she refused to accept this reality. She leapt to her feet and started to rush outside. But as she passed Ning Guang, Di Jiufeng grabbed her arm.

Di Jiufeng held her neck stiff, refusing to let her eyes fall anywhere they should not look. “Is it this?” She reached out her hand, a bunch of long silvery-white whiskers quietly lying in her palm.

Lu Yi looked, and nodded over and over. “Yes, this is it. Benefactor, where did you pick them up?”

Di Jiufeng thought, but couldn’t make up any particular place, so she just dodged the question. “Does it matter? Either way, they have returned to your hands. Right, I have something I want to ask you. How many reincarnation pills can you refine?”

“Just one,” Lu Yi replied.

Di Jiufeng was someone who could die at any moment, she needed to have a reincarnation pill on her. Yet, Chu Yi was going to die right now. Lu Yi would not give up on Chu Yi, so how could they acquire the reincarnation pill?

Notes:

This chapter was translated by Lily.
Ancient Chinese ‘matchsticks’ did not work like our modern ones, check out this video for an example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3knpcMdd_c