Advanced Sickroom

Although the battle dispatches showed that the expedition to the Red Sand Oasis had suffered a few setbacks, Wei Yuan was not particularly worried. Xu Yi was an exceptionally clever woman who had lived through nearly every war since Qingming's founding. Her wealth of combat experience was matched by very few. Her cultivation was already close to the perfection of the Dao Foundation, and she was diligently tempering her spirituality. At present, she could effortlessly manage eight tasks and was striving toward sixteen. To the rear, Cui Yu was leading troops to reinforce her. The actual combat power of Cui Yu's dharma idol was formidable—when all twelve heavenly soldiers swarmed forward together, even an opponent an entire realm above him would be sent fleeing in disgrace. Moreover, he was now the leading figure of the younger generation of the Ji-Zhao Cui family. After Cui Tianlin suffered that blow last time, before he could mend his Dao heart, Cui Yu had beaten him to the punch by forming a dharma idol. As a result, the Cui family held Cui Yu in immense esteem, bestowing upon him three top-grade magic treasures in succession—two for life preservation and one for offense. Cui Yu also commanded a full ten thousand elites, including two thousand Dragon Wing iron cavalry, and carried abundant military rations. If he still could not win under such conditions, he might as well pack it in. In truth, Cui Yu's command abilities were outstanding, slightly surpassing even Li Zhi's. That was why Wei Yuan felt confident leaving him in independent command. At this moment, Cui Yu had already advanced his army directly to provide support, so there should be no trouble. The Red Sand battlefield was far away, and Wei Yuan's Dao Foundation and dharma idol warriors could not stray too far from his true body, so he left them to act on their own initiative. Bao Yun was also of the mind to wait and see: observe the developments once Cui Yu and Xu Yi combined their forces, by which time Wei Yuan should be ready to set out for the battlefield as well. Seeing Bao Yun arrive, Sun Yu checked the time and said, "Take the second dose of medicine in six shichen, and the third in twelve. For these twelve shichen, stay lying in bed; you can only leave once your time is up. All right, I have other patients. You two take your time talking." With that, Sun Yu left the sickroom, followed by several lovely female disciples. Seeing Wei Yuan lying motionless in bed, Bao Yun approached the bedside and placed her hand upon him. Wei Yuan was startled and hurriedly said, "Martial Uncle hid several strands of divine sense in the room! Don't mess around!" "No matter." A faint glow lit between Bao Yun's brows, casting down a wispy light screen that enveloped them both. This was Bao Yun's concealment divine ability; even Sun Yu could not pry past it. Wei Yuan had no choice but to say, "The poison hasn't worn off yet, and my body is numb. I... can't do anything." Bao Yun offered a half-smile, her hand slowly moving over Wei Yuan as she asked, "What do you want to do?" "I..." Bao Yun leaned forward, her voice soft and sweet. "What is it you really want to do? Tell me. If you don't say it, how am I supposed to know?" Wei Yuan gave a wry smile. "Stop teasing. Even if I told you, I couldn't do it." "That's not necessarily true..." Wei Yuan's heart could not help pounding wildly, so much that even Sun Yu's poison temporarily lost its effect. The place where Bao Yun's hand drifted grew increasingly nerve-racking as she whispered softly, "Since you always love risking your life like this, keeping certain cumbersome things around is rather useless anyway. How about I help rid you of all your worries first, so you can have complete peace of mind from now on? What do you say?" Wei Yuan finally understood what she wanted and immediately blurted, "If anything like this happens again, I'll definitely talk it over with you first!" A smile finally surfaced on Bao Yun's face. "There's no need to discuss it with me—just let me know. I told you last time, I don't want to always be the last to find out about what happens to you." Wei Yuan immediately began, "I swear..." Bao Yun pressed a hand to his mouth. "No need to swear. Just don't forget what you've said." "Don't worry, I won't forget." "All right then, I won't torment you anymore." Bao Yun chuckled softly and slowly withdrew her hand. Wei Yuan let out a breath of relief, yet felt a trace of disappointment. Meanwhile, in a quiet chamber of the clinic, Sun Yu was looking at a humanoid projection before him while several female disciples stood around, listening attentively to his lecture. "This formation array can precisely monitor the vital signs of a patient in the Heaven-grade sickroom and present them in the most rudimentary form. This requires keen perception on your part, along with long hours of diligent study and practice, to accurately grasp the crux of an illness. For example..." Before Sun Yu could finish, the humanoid image suddenly reacted. The color over the chest region turned bright red in an instant, indicating that the heart rate was accelerating wildly. Next, the overall color shifted from light blue to yellowish red, mottled in places. The hues represented body temperature; the redder the shade, the higher the temperature. Looking at the reddened areas, the female disciples all wore rather peculiar expressions. Sun Yu gave a snort and thought to himself, 'You think putting up a barrier means I won't know anything? Bet you didn't expect me to have this trick! Hmph, I knew keeping me from looking meant no good was afoot! 'Hmm, should I refine a few furnaces of top-grade spirit pills to stabilize pregnancy and nourish the spirit to send to Martial Niece Bao? I'll need to discuss this with Henshui...' Sun Yu had only explained a few more sentences when the humanoid image's colors rapidly subsided, returning to normal in the blink of an eye. One of the younger female disciples, whose natural beauty meant she lacked composure, covered her mouth and blurted, "...So fast?" The female disciples all wore bizarre expressions. It turned out the Domain Lord really did suffer from a hidden ailment; the moniker of Three Spears was not unfounded after all! Sun Yu was taken aback as well. He mused silently, 'No wonder people always talk about Three Spears. I thought it was just baseless rumors. Looking at it now, pregnancy-stabilizing medicine will have to wait. I must refine a furnace of Golden Spear treasure pills first. 'Hmm, the recipe I just researched is rather potent; I wouldn't dare take it myself, but it should be fine for him. It needs a good-sounding name... Vermilion Bird Li Fire Qian-Forging Pill? That's a good name. But would "forging" be better, or would "tempering" capture the spirit more vividly?' Wei Yuan naturally had no idea the clinic had such a covert feature. Bao Yun took down the barrier and bade him farewell, saying she would head back to prepare some food and return later to visit him with a meal. Once the barrier vanished, Sun Yu sensed everything inside the sickroom through his lingering divine sense. Seeing both of their clothes completely neat and orderly only cemented his resolve to refine the pills. In such a short time, they even had their clothes back on. Didn't that mean the actual deed lasted only the flick of a finger? Just as Sun Yu prepared to keep observing after Bao Yun departed, the door opened and Zhang Sheng walked in. For some reason, Sun Yu instinctively sensed danger. He immediately concealed all his lingering strands of divine sense—hearing nothing, seeing nothing, speaking nothing, stirring not at all. Zhang Sheng walked up to Wei Yuan's bed, glanced at him, and asked, "Why didn't you chat with the Bao girl a bit longer?" Before Wei Yuan could come up with an excuse, Zhang Sheng's hair ribbon suddenly burst apart, her bound hair fluttering wildly as the entire room was instantaneously filled with whirling sword qi! A few inconspicuous, faint wisps of origin soul aura were triggered by the sword qi and flushed from their hiding spots. Yet before they could even attempt to flee, they were shredded to pieces beneath the sword qi! In the quiet chamber, Sun Yu grunted softly as a trickle of blood ran from his nose. The female disciples were astonished. What on earth had their teacher been thinking about that caused his nose to bleed? Sun Yu maintained an impassive expression, channeling Dao force to draw the nosebleed right back in, before saying nonchalantly, "A patient's condition can sometimes change in the blink of an eye. What if you aren't paying attention and miss it? No need to panic. This formation array of ours can replay all the images from the past twelve shichen..." Sun Yu's head throbbed with excruciating pain, yet leaning on the Palace of Grand Beginning disciple's virtue of saving face at all costs, he forced himself to look calm and detached. Inside, he was thoroughly terrified: every single strand of divine sense he had left behind had been eradicated by the sword qi, not one spared. Zhang Sheng's Dao Foundation had clearly been destroyed and she had dispersed her cultivation to rebuild from scratch, so why did she feel even more terrifying than before? Back in the sickroom, Wei Yuan asked in surprise, "What happened?" Zhang Sheng appeared somewhat puzzled as well. The sword qi had naturally returned to her body, leaving almost no trace in the room except for a few barely noticeable fissures in obscure corners. Thoughtful, she said, "Likely your Martial Uncle Sun went off enforcing justice for the heavens again and dragged back some lingering vengeful souls. Those foul things bore malice toward me and showed themselves, so my sword qi reacted automatically to protect me and wiped them out."