Chapter 74: The Itinerant Doctor

Two sharp fangs pierced deep into my flesh as Zhang Ruyue, acting on instinct, drank my blood with ferocity. In the haze, Zhang Ruyue opened her blood-rimmed eyes to find a pair of gentle eyes gazing at her. That gaze was warm, like sunlight in the chill of winter. Sunlight—it felt so distant now. Zhang Ruyue closed her eyes again, her fangs withdrawing as she slipped into a deep sleep. Her body surged with newly gained blood, mending her injuries.

Behind me, Ayuoduo was visibly moved; this man was unlike any she had ever known. I picked up Zhang Ruyue and carried her out of the underground chamber, step by step, Ayuoduo following close behind. As soon as we emerged, a group of people hurried toward us; Nightingale was among them.

"Qin Feng," Nightingale called as she came to my side.

Cradling Zhang Ruyue in my arms, I passed her by indifferently, moving past the others as if they were invisible.

In the blink of an eye, ten days slipped by. The Bai Dong Miao Village had thoroughly purged the White Lotus cultists; tranquility had returned. In truth, for most ordinary people, nothing seemed to have happened at all.

I sat beneath a large tree at the edge of a cliff, hair disheveled, beard unkempt, a cigarette dangling from my lips as I watched the sun rise and set, clouds drifting by. It wasn’t as if I hadn’t faced death before—in fact, since becoming an Onmyoji, I’d experienced it several times. Yet this time I felt utterly exhausted, body and soul weighed down, unable to recover.

I often recalled what Old Li once said: “Wouldn’t it be better just to be a doctor?” He was right. How wonderful it would have been to be an ordinary doctor—saving lives during the day, flirting and joking after work. Looking back, those were truly days fit for an immortal.

I took a deep drag from my cigarette and exhaled slowly, the smoke rings drifting one into another. Just then, a hand reached over, scattering the rings with a brisk wave.

“You’re blaming me,” Nightingale murmured as she sat down beside me.

“No,” I replied flatly.

“Then why are you ignoring me?” Nightingale gazed at me, her eyes brimming with grievance.

“Am I not talking to you right now?” I said.

“You’re just brushing me off.” Nightingale pouted.

“As long as you know, why say it out loud?” I stubbed out my cigarette.

Nightingale seemed about to cough up blood in exasperation, but she took a deep breath and said, “The points for this mission have been distributed. You alone received six thousand, while I only got a thousand.”

“Oh,” I responded nonchalantly. Points, spells, cultivation—none of these things interested me at the moment.

“Also, Director Zhou has decided to accept Zhang Ruyue into the Ninth Bureau,” Nightingale added.

I was taken aback, finally showing some interest. “Really? But she drank blood.”

“She drank your blood, didn’t she? Besides, your blood seems rather nourishing. She drank maybe two jin at most, which not only helped her recover, but appears to have advanced her zombification. So if she wants to drink blood again, just let her take yours,” Nightingale said.

“I was bitten—why didn’t I turn into a zombie?” I asked suddenly.

“You’ve watched too much TV. Ordinary people bitten by zombies have their blood drained and are poisoned so badly an elephant would die. They’d be dead before they could turn. But Zhang Ruyue is half-human, half-zombie. She doesn’t seem to carry any corpse venom; rather, her body and healing abilities are extraordinary. She has the attack and defense of a zombie without the dangers that come with it,” Nightingale explained.

“So how long until she wakes?” I asked.

“Hard to say. Could be days, months, a hundred years, maybe even a thousand,” Nightingale replied.

I rolled my eyes. That was as good as saying nothing at all.

“I’m not wrong, though,” Nightingale continued. “Zombies are immortal. There’s a legend that a Maoshan Daoist priest once turned himself into a zombie and slept for centuries, waking only to help the sect through a crisis.”

“Is that true? Why didn’t any Maoshan priest rise as a zombie hero during the warlord chaos eighty years ago?” I retorted.

“Who knows? It’s just a legend,” Nightingale said.

I shrugged, saying nothing more.

After a moment of silence, Nightingale said, “Let’s go down the mountain.”

“You go ahead. I want to stay in Bai Dong Miao Village a while longer,” I replied.

She thought for a moment. “Alright, but…don’t stay too long. I hope you’ll come back to the team soon.”

Nightingale stood up, glanced at me, then knelt down and pressed my head to her chest for a few seconds before rising and drifting down the mountain.

“Is that supposed to be comforting?” I muttered to myself. It wasn’t bad—soft and fragrant.

I, too, got up and leapt off the cliff.

A few meters below was a large boulder jutting out, sheltering a cave beneath. Inside the cave was a stone bed, and on it lay Zhang Ruyue. The churning blood aura had settled; she looked simply asleep.

“Ruyue, when will you wake?” I sighed softly.

…

Days passed, then months. Winter gave way to spring, and the mountains bloomed in a riot of color.

One day, in the small town at the foot of the mountain, a bearded itinerant doctor carrying a medicine box walked the streets, drawing many curious glances. Traveling doctors were rare these days, though now and then you’d see one hawking miracle plasters. But this man wore ancient-style robes and had a banner stuck in his medicine box boasting “Healing Hands, Master of Fortune and Fate.”

He didn’t linger in town, but walked straight out toward the countryside.

At the town’s entrance, Ayuoduo, dressed in traditional Miao clothing, watched his figure disappear into the distance. Only when he was gone did she turn away, catching sight of Ming Xue in the distance, holding her daughter, her face full of wistful longing.

I left the small town below Bai Dong Miao Village and began my journey as a wandering physician. It was a sudden impulse—after three months of waiting for Zhang Ruyue to awaken, I had hit a bottleneck in both mind and cultivation. I remembered that Li Yan, whom I had impersonated, had once apprenticed under a traveling doctor. So I decided to do the same, to see more of the world and temper my heart.

Though Xiliang was remote, economically backward, and rather isolated, its landscapes were extraordinary, drawing many travelers. The southern mountains and northern deserts offered both verdant scenery and vast wilderness, popular among road-trippers and hikers.

Walking along, I drew more than a few curious looks and jests. I didn’t care, but after a while, the attention grew tiresome. So I took a remote dirt road, finally finding some peace.

“Beep-beep!”

A red off-road vehicle pulled up beside me. The window rolled down and a stunningly beautiful girl with a ponytail in the passenger seat grinned at me. “Uncle, where are you headed? Want a ride?”

I glanced at her, noting the sly glint in her eyes. “If I walk over and open the door, you’re just going to floor it and leave me in the dust, aren’t you?”

The girl’s jaw dropped. “How did you know? Have you been pranked before?”

I looked at her and said mildly, “Miss, your blood is weak and you’re full of cold energy. You have nightmares every night, don’t you? Want me to cure you? Only a hundred thousand yuan.”

“Pfft, a hundred thousand? Why not just rob a bank? Besides, I’m perfectly healthy, you big fraud!” She wrinkled her nose and made a face at me.

“I’m lying? Listen, your brow shows a clash with the Wolf Star, your main meridian is blocked. I predict you’ll have a little mishap soon,” I said.

“Who’d believe you?” The girl rolled up the window and the car sped away.

Driving a multimillion-yuan car but complaining a hundred thousand is too expensive? If not for my self-cultivation, I wouldn’t bother for a million. I grumbled inwardly.

Inside the car, the girl was complaining to the sunglasses-wearing woman driving. “Sis, can you believe these quacks? A hundred thousand just like that—he must think we’re suckers.”

“Biyun, weren’t you the one who started it? Can you behave and stop stirring up trouble?” the driver said helplessly.

“I was just having fun! Who believes in these conmen now anyway? The outfit’s impressive, but he can only fool uneducated country folk.” The girl giggled.

Just then, the car hit something sharp—BANG!—and a tire blew out.

Both women screamed, slamming on the brakes, hearts pounding.

“Sis, what did that conman say just now?” Lü Biyun blurted.

The woman in sunglasses was startled too. “Probably just a lucky guess.”

“Maybe he jinxed us on purpose,” Lü Biyun muttered angrily.

They got out, staring in dismay at the gaping hole in the tire.

“Aren’t these run-flats? We don’t even have a spare—what now?” Lü Biyun said. Dusk was falling, and this was a deserted road with no cars passing by.

“Call for roadside assistance,” the woman said, pulling out her phone—no signal. Neither of their phones had any.

After a while, night fell. The two women sat in the back seat, glancing nervously at each other.

“Sis, what if some bad guy comes by and sees us sisters, so beautiful and alone—what if he, you know…” Lü Biyun fretted.

The woman in sunglasses smacked her head. “Don’t talk nonsense. I’m a black belt in taekwondo. If there’s trouble, I’ll take care of it.”

“That’s fine, but what if it’s a ghost?” Lü Biyun whispered.

A ghost? The woman shivered slightly.

Knock, knock, knock.

Just then, there was a tapping at the window. The two women shrieked and clung to each other.

Seriously? Am I that scary?

“Sis, I think it’s that conman,” Lü Biyu whispered.

The woman in sunglasses peered out. Despite the darkness, she could make out the comical banner stuck in the man’s medicine box.

Remembering her black belt rank, she mustered her courage. The two of them opened the door and got out.

“You should listen to your elders or you’ll suffer for it. See? Was I wrong?” I said with a smile.

“Did you jinx us?” Lü Biyu snapped.

I frowned. What’s wrong with this one?

Forget it. I was about to do a good deed, but now I can’t be bothered.

I glanced behind them, shrugged, and said, “Suit yourselves.”