Chapter 171, The Three Stooges

Grand Master of the Crimson Blood Sect, Tang Yifeng, knew little about the life of his young student in the Battlefield, but he saw with his own eyes the many cuts, abrasions, lacerations, and bruises that mottled the body of the sixteen-or-so-year-old, Lu Ye, when Shui Yuan was dressing his wounds. He did not neglect to note that several of the wounds could have killed Lu Ye. 

 

That was enough for him to know how dangerous life had been for Lu Ye for the past six months. 

 

That his youngest student had to endure such hardships and perils, Tang Yifeng could only blame himself. He attributed it all to his incompetence and to vent his anger, he went a rampage into Yun Zhou right after Lu Ye came back.

At least, he needed to ensure that no injustice like what happened at the top of Goldentip would ever repeat. The Thousand Demon Ridge faction clearly needed a reminder that he was still Grand Master of the Crimson Blood Sect and so long as he still lived, he would never allow his students to suffer the threat of death and humiliation for nothing!

 

To that end, he even exposed his true power. True power that he had kept hidden for at least decades.

 

Back inside the chamber where Lu Ye was still recuperating, Tang Yifeng placed a hand on his youngest student. “It’s good that you are safe and you’re back here now, son. Have a good rest,” he beamed proudly. 

 

“Yes, sir,” Lu Ye responded reverently. 

 

Nevertheless, he was very curious. Tang Yifeng looked absolutely beat up with all the bruises and swells that littered his face. Was he doling out the beating or was he actually on the receiving end?

 

But that would explain the bed that Sister Shui Yuan was carrying in earlier. 

 

“So are you coming here yourself or do you need me to give you a hand?” Shui Yuan barked sharply,

 

Tang Yifeng got to his feet and dismissed it with a casual smile, “It’s just some light wounds. Like I said, there’s no need to— ARRGGHH—”

 

“Teacher!” Lu Ye cried as he watched so much blood spewing out of Tang Yifeng’s mouth all of a sudden that all colors left his face. 

 

Tang Yifeng struggled to maintain a grin, “No problem. It’s just some clotted blood inside. Once it’s out, I’ll— Arrgghh!”

 

Shui Yuan drifted over at once and whisked Tang Yifeng off into the other bed to administer some healing magic and stabilize his condition. At length, she grumbled, albeit with her eyes red and moist that belied her thorny temperament, “Quit pretending you’re strong! Sooner or later, you’ll get yourself killed out there. How do you suppose we’ll be able to collect your dead body then?”

 

Funnily enough, Tang Yifeng did not seem to dare chastise her. All he could do was grumble and lament about his misfortune at having such a disrespectful student.

 

Meanwhile, Lu Ye was frightened by Shui Yuan’s rapid change in demeanor. Suddenly, Sister Shui Yuan who had been so gentle and soft with him did not look so gentle and soft after all…

 

Sister Shui Yuan had only just finished her chores of babysitting both Tang Yifeng and Lu Ye when a voice began hollering from outside, “Hey, Old Man! Sister Shui Yuan? I’m back!”

 

Lu Ye recognized the voice. “Is that Brother Baxian?” he called. 

 

A tall and rangy figure appeared at the door. It really was Li Baxian.

 

Their eyes met. Li Baxian flashed Lu Ye a grin, only to fall facedown into the ground amid a puff of dust and soot the next second, much to everyone’s shock.

 

“Brother Baxian!? Are you all right?!” Lu Ye exclaimed. 

 

Li Baxian rolled himself around and sat on the ground. He flashed Lu Ye a thumbs-up, saying, “Don’t worry about me. I’m fine!”

 

Shui Yuan, who had just finished tucking Tang Yifeng into bed, came around in the blink of an eye. She seized Li Baxian by the scruff of his neck and surveyed him briefly. A tinge of annoyance fleeted by her stare, “What in Heaven’s name did you get yourself into?”

 

Li Baxian beamed broadly at Shui Yuan, “Well, at any rate, I’ve given Yan Xing a good walloping myself! The honor of the Sect is intact!”

 

Although he immediately blacked out the next second. 

 

Shui Yuan delved into round of tucking in another one that needed her care and help.

 

She only finished two hours later, standing at the ends of the three beds, observing her handiwork with beads of perspiration lining her face and her limbs weighing like lead after all the work.

 

But that did not stop her from grinning. It has been years since the Crimson Blood Sect stronghold had been so boisterous!

 

That began Lu Ye’s bizarre and awkward stint in the chamber with his mentor Tang Yifeng to his right and Brother Li Baxian to his left while all three stooges recuperated together. 

 

Three of four members of the Crimson Blood Sect were bedridden and that left only Shui Yuan to deal with all the chores alone… 

 

Three more giant tubs were added to the chamber two days later, each steaming with an emerald-green concoction filled to the brim. Tang Yifeng, Li Baxian, and Lu Ye were placed in their respective tubs so they could soak in the concoction that would help to heal them. 

 

The concoction was Shui Yuan’s very own creation, a medicinal draught that would work tremendously well for their injuries. 

 

In the meantime, Lu Ye discovered that his hair had turned shorter than he last remembered it to be when his bandages were removed. It must have been singed by the flames during his final round against the Sacred Child of Cult Blackfyre. Fortunately, he had not become bald or he would have to find a hole to worm into whenever he saw anyone. 

 

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But most of his external wounds had all healed, all thanks to Shui Yuan’s extraordinary healing skills. 

 

The last few days being in the same chamber with Li Baxian and Tang Yifeng had helped to deepen his knowledge about the Sect’s history. 

 

Before his arrival, there was only Tang Yifeng and Shui Yuan. But even with him, the entire Sect was just the three of them. 

 

To describe the Sect as “dwindling” was more than just a mere understatement. No wonder the Sect was about to be defunct.

 

Li Baxian might have been a Crimson Blood Sect acolyte back when he was still a young boy, but he later joined the Devoted Ones. Apparently, the same could be said for the third Crimson Blood Sect acolyte; he was also recruited into another order despite being once an acolyte of the Sect a long time ago. 

 

On the other hand, Lu Ye had not seen Wei Yang since he woke up. He tried speaking to Li Baxian about her, but all he got was a cryptic “she’s the mysterious kind” speech. 

 

But it only served to substantiate the feeling that Li Baxian was trying to hide something and this was puzzling enough. No matter what, Lu Ye wished to thank Wei Yang himself. She was the first to come and it was her timely intervention that saved him.

 

But Li Baxian did explain why a Crimson Blood Sect acolyte like him was so vehemently hunted down. 

 

And it was all because of an incredible person who was once a Crimson Blood Sect member—the first acolyte of the Sect’s present generation and Tang Yifeng’s first student, Feng Wujiang. 

 

It was by his leadership that the Crimson Blood Sect was once the leading order in the Grand Sky Coalition. A call to arms by the Sect would lead to a huge muster of all Grand Sky Coalition Cultivators. That demonstrated how powerful and influential the Sect was in its heyday; a name that commanded both the respect and fear of its peers. Every sect and order in the Thousand Demon Ridge cowered the moment they heard his name or saw the standard of the Crimson Blood Sect unfurled. A few Tier-One orders had even suffered so many losses that they were no longer Tier-One; Cult Blackfyre was one of the many ones in this case. That was why the Sacred Child would rather stake her own future and the Cult’s just so that she could defeat and slay Lu Ye with her own hands. 

 

It was the over-inflated sense of self-worth and hubris that ruined him; he turned vain and stubborn, refusing to listen to the caution of others, until a battle thirty years ago, he led a large company of Cultivators to conduct an ill-advised assault on a Tier-One Thousand Demon Ridge stronghold. It was an ambush. Feng Wujiang was killed and the Grand Sky Coalition lost many good men. 

 

That defeat was what almost extirpated the Crimson Blood Sect. 

 

It was due to that fateful battle that the decline of the Crimson Blood Sect began and continued to this day. Once the pride and the banner of the Grand Sky Coalition, those who had suffered the Sect’s wrath all those decades ago were circumspect to see its existence preserved. Hence, when Lu Ye’s identity was revealed, that sparked a great war.

 

“That is why this is not your burden to bear, Lu Ye. Brother Wujiang was the architect of all this mess, not you,” quipped a naked Li Baxian who was leaning his back on the side of the tub with an arm on the edge while he took a swig of wine off his gourd. “Well, there’s also Old Man. He failed to keep the show running after Brother Wujiang was gone,” he did not neglect to add. 

 

“As if you know everything,” snorted the “Old Man” from Lu Ye’s other flank. “You’re still soiling your pants when all that happened. I’d hardly rely on his account for the full details,” Tang Yifeng added for Lu Ye’s benefit. “The Crimson Blood Sect was never a high-tier order in the first place. It was Wujiang who single handedly elevated us all. He’s the sole reason we’re even Tier-One back in those days. Thus, with him gone, so falls the Sect. He’s an extraordinarily gifted one, that boy… But alas… Fate just tends to act in the cruelest fashion; Wujiang was killed and the only legacy that he’s managed to leave was a sackload of mess.”

 

“Extraordinarily gifted, eh?” Li Baxian chuckled, “What do you think about Lu Ye then?”

 

Tang Yifeng went silent. Comparing Feng Wujiang and Lu Ye would not be easy; the former might be known as an extremely gifted Cultivator, but he was virtually nameless in Lu Ye’s stage. In fact, he accomplished nothing remarkable until he reached the Cloud River Realm when the late-bloomer suddenly had a growth spurt that saw him rising in both strength and prestige to become the Grand Chieftain of the Grand Sky Coalition. 

 

“Yi Ye,” Tang Yifeng said with a sudden grave tone, mistaking Lu Ye’s name, much to Lu Ye’s chagrin, “You will need to be very careful henceforth. The Battle of Goldentip might have made you famous, but it basically placed you in the enemies’ crosshairs. The last thing the Thousand Demon Ridge faction wants is a second Feng Wujiang. If anything, they’d be more persistent in trying to eliminate you.”

 

Tang Yifeng’s original plan was to have Lu Ye transferred to another sect or order. But the Battle of Goldentip had made Lu Ye famous enough to know that he was now the newest face of the Sect and the one slated to reach great heights. 

 

Lu Ye’s jaw hung loose. He wanted to insist that his name was not “Yi Ye” or “Lu Yi Ye”, but the grimness of the message robbed what he wanted to say. “Yes, sir,” he responded.

 

[Le Shan!] he grimaced sourly as he recalled the name of the Righteous Sect acolyte who gave him this thrice-damned nickname. [I’ll settle this score with you one day!]

 

“But you won’t have much to worry about, Lu Ye,” Li Baxian said, hoping that he could calm some of Lu Ye’s anxiety. “Two days ago Old Man —um—sent a loud and clear message. Something like the Battle of Goldentip will not be happening again, so long as Old Man is still Grand Master. Even if the Thousand Demon Ridge faction wishes ill upon you—which they would, undoubtedly—they will still have to play by the rules.”

 

“Rules?”

 

“That is, what happens inside the outer circles of the Battlefield is a matter handled by those within the area itself. There won’t be another instance of enemy Cultivators from the inner ring or core areas of the Battlefield trying to hunt you down anymore. Another turbulence like this most recent war would not only risk destabilizing the whole Battlefield but the real world of Jiu Zhou as well.  The Coalition and the Ridge might be opposing factions that would salivate at the opportunity to vanquish each other, but rules exist, which would have been adhered this time, too, if not for the fact that the Thousand Demon Ridge side was panicking.” 

 

Lu Ye nodded. That was good news. Being a Fifth-Order Cultivator would mean that he could still wreak enough havoc in the outer circles before he rose to the Seventh-Order. Only then did he have to move to the inner rings of the Battlefield. 

 

[Bang!]

 

The door swung open like someone had given it a heavy kick from the outside and in the open threshold, cryptic mists billowed, obscuring the clear sight of whoever it was standing there menacingly. 

 

The cold and steely voice of Shui Yuan resounded eerily, “Who is drinking?”

 

Li Baxian stiffly swiveled his head and responded hesitantly, “N-Nope… N-No one…”

 

“You’re so badly wounded, how dare you drink liquor now!? I told you before, no drinking during your recuperation! So you love to drink, eh? Alright! Have your way then!” Shui Yuan stormed up to Li Baxian’s tub, rolled up her sleeves, and grabbed his head, dunking it into the concoction and holding him down. 

 

[Gurgle! Gurgle! Gurgle!]

 

Lu Ye and Tang Yifeng both shared a furtive glance and in tacit unison, they sank themselves deeper into the potion with only their eyes above the water level with hopes that they would be left alone.  

[She’s scary!]

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