Normally, with Mo Sigui’s appearance and his clear, lofty gaze, he would have appeared somewhat otherworldly. However, he had forgotten that his nose was now bruised purple, with two silk strips hanging from his nostrils. This visage was nothing short of comical.
Looking at him, An Jiu felt her teeth itch. She clenched her fists, resisting the urge to plant a few more punches on his face.
Elder Qi, capable of “reviving the dead and mending broken bones,” hadn’t needed to use comprehensive observation, auscultation, inquiry, and palpation to diagnose illnesses for many years. But the case before him was truly rare. Out of caution and curiosity, he asked, “Fourteenth Miss, do you feel anything unusual yourself?”
This question was both profound and difficult for An Jiu. If she denied it, she might lose the opportunity to change the current situation. If she admitted it, Elder Qi would certainly inquire about the details. How could she conceal the fact of the dual souls and let Elder Qi understand part of the situation?
This matter wasn’t difficult. She just needed to make up a story, reveal a little of what she wanted to disclose, and claim ignorance about the parts that couldn’t be explained. How simple! But for Mei Jiu and An Jiu, it was challenging. Neither of them was good at making up stories or lying.
“You speak,” Mei Jiu tossed the problem to An Jiu. “Didn’t you once say that humans are above animals because they can pretend?”
An Jiu decided to take a gamble. “It seems… a bit different.”
Seeing her willing to open up, Mo Sigui excitedly pursued the question, “How is it different?”
“I don’t know,” An Jiu had developed an extremely cautious nature. An assassin could only trust their weapons; blindly trusting others was a way to seek death. Therefore, she would never easily trust anyone. “I can’t explain it, it’s just a feeling.”
An Jiu wasn’t afraid of death, but she couldn’t seek it recklessly. When faced with unfamiliar things, one should always be skeptical. It would be easy for her to admit to having two souls in one body, but what if they treated her as a monster? An Jiu didn’t want to be treated as a mental patient again, living under constant surveillance.
“I can also detect two layers of spiritual force,” Elder Zhi said with certainty. “Is there a way to resolve this? The unstable spiritual force causes her state to fluctuate too greatly, which is unfavorable for martial arts practice.”
Elder Qi stroked his beard, pondering for a while before saying, “We could try either suppressing the weaker spiritual force or merging the two into one.”
An Jiu absolutely couldn’t tolerate the idea of merging with someone like Mei Jiu!
Mei Jiu was stunned. She knew she was the weaker one. And she realized that An Jiu wouldn’t agree to merge, which meant she had to die! Even if, taking a step back, An Jiu was willing to merge, they were individuals with their consciousness, personality, and memories. What would they become after merging?
“Which method is more reliable?” Elder Zhi asked.
No one had even considered keeping the weaker spiritual force. Elder Zhi certainly wouldn’t allow his disciple to become useless.
“Merging the two,” Elder Qi said.
An Jiu was extremely dissatisfied with this result. She was about to object when she heard Elder Qi continue, “The relationship between the physical body and the three hun and seven po spirits is mysterious and subtle. I’ve been practicing medicine for most of my life and still find it difficult to explain. Take ‘living dead people’ for example. Most never wake up, but some manage to awaken through their own strength and opportune moments. Whether life is fragile or tenacious has a great deal to do with spiritual force. If a person has a strong will, they will exert their strongest spiritual force to resist when severely injured. What I’m worried about is…”
Everyone held their breath, listening intently as Elder Qi continued, “If Fourteenth Miss were to suffer a severe injury, the stronger spiritual force might emerge to resist. The weaker one might hide away, meaning we could only suppress the stronger one. However, this is just my speculation. I can’t be certain.”
Hearing his explanation, which seemed quite accurate, An Jiu felt somewhat convinced. “Elder, is the spiritual force you speak of referring to the hun and po spirits?”
“It could be said to be part of the hun and po spirits. For us martial artists, besides strengthening our bodies and cultivating internal energy, we also need to temper our spiritual force. Spiritual force can also be called fighting spirit or will to battle,” Elder Qi explained.
Mo Sigui grinned, “Cousin hasn’t practiced martial arts, so of course she doesn’t know. Let me give an analogy. The Taoist school speaks of spiritual consciousness, primordial spirit, and original spirit. Spiritual force is probably close to what Taoists call spiritual consciousness.”
Elder Qi nodded, “Although Sigui’s analogy isn’t entirely accurate, it’s not without reason when you think about it.”
“But why is the stronger spiritual force more easily damaged?” Mo Sigui asked, puzzled.
“The reason martial artists temper their spiritual force is that when consciousness becomes stronger, it can permeate throughout the body, making one’s senses more acute. This allows for more precise control of the body. Conversely, weak spiritual force leads to sluggish movements,” Elder Zhi explained. “Precisely because the strong spiritual force permeates the entire body, any attempt to suppress it could potentially cause harm.”
It’s like a forest where strong winds break the tallest trees, but the smaller ones survive.
An Jiu agreed with Elder Qi’s explanation. The last time she fell from the horse, it was she who was injured, while Mei Jiu had no problems.
Mo Sigui’s medical skills were still at the stage of healing injuries and illnesses. Although he had made considerable progress, he hadn’t yet touched on this aspect. His curiosity was intense, and he couldn’t help but ask, “So, does this mean that whichever spiritual force is controlling the body at the time of injury will be the one to suffer trauma?”
An Jiu glanced at Mo Sigui. This fellow’s character was terrible, but his mind was quite nimble. Although everyone had been discussing the concept of spiritual force in martial arts and hadn’t guessed about the two souls in one body, An Jiu felt they were already very close to the truth.
However, what An Jiu learned wasn’t exactly good news.
Elder Qi said, “What I’ve just said is based on years of experience and speculation. If my speculation is correct, then merging would be the safest option. If we were to keep one and remove the other, I’m afraid I only can keep the weaker one.”
Elder Zhi remembered that moment when the arrow was shot, and then the trembling, fearful appearance. He was certain that they should choose the former option. Even as a last resort, they absolutely couldn’t harm the stronger spiritual force. “What would the situation be like after merging?”
Elder Qi was silent for a moment. “It’s still unknown. The best-case scenario would be that the stronger spiritual force could absorb and encompass the weaker one, with the weaker aspect not showing itself normally. I need to investigate further.”
Elder Zhi didn’t even consider asking the opinion of the person involved. He decided on his own, “Brother, please do your best to keep the strong and remove the weak.”
Elder Qi nodded, then frowned at Mo Sigui, “Have you found the Soul-Calming Powder?”
“Here,” Mo Sigui handed him two small bottles.
Elder Qi took the bottles and sniffed them, his expression immediately relaxing.
“Cousin is more charming when she’s timid,” Mo Sigui said, seeing the glares from the three of them. He weakly added, “I mean… her destructive power. After all, heroes have always been vulnerable to beauty…”
The three of them couldn’t be bothered with his nonsense, but Mei Jiu was sobbing quietly. Everyone wanted to get rid of her, and only cousin was speaking up for her. Although his words were quite frivolous, at this moment, it was enough to make her feel grateful.
“Go and prepare the medicine,” Elder Qi tossed the bottles to Mo Sigui.
“Oh,” Mo Sigui truly felt that this cousin was extremely beautiful when she was gentle. If only a female tyrant remained in the future, it would be a waste of such a pretty face and good figure.
“Ah!” He sighed heavily and went to the next room to prepare the medicine.
During this interval, Elder Qi carefully examined An Jiu’s physical condition again.
A moment later, Mo Sigui returned, placing the medicine cup in front of An Jiu.
Meeting An Jiu’s cold gaze, he remembered the disastrous failure of the dream-locking technique last time and said with schadenfreude, “This time, you’re truly out of options!”
Cousin, whose side are you on? Mei Jiu thought, angry and heartbroken.
An Jiu lowered her gaze, staring at the reddish-brown medicine. After a moment of consideration, she decisively chose to take a risk.
She picked up the cup and drank it all in one gulp.
She had thought that with her willpower, she could at least maintain a shred of consciousness after drinking this kind of sleeping medicine. However, to her surprise, the potency of the drug was so strong that she completely lost consciousness within half the time it took to drink a cup of tea.
The moment An Jiu lost consciousness, Mei Jiu automatically filled the void. Unfortunately, due to the drug’s effect, she also passed out within two breaths.
After a moment, Elder Qi stood up and found a bamboo tube from the medicine shelf behind him. He opened the sealed cap and placed it near Mei Jiu’s nose.
“Cough!”
A sharp, cool scent shot straight into her brain, and Mei Jiu instantly woke up.
The three men stared at Mei Jiu intently.
Faced with their inquiring gazes, Mei Jiu remembered their earlier words and burst into tears.
This pitiful appearance made Mo Sigui feel both happy and resentful. “I told you I’ve seen her changes before. Elder, do you believe me now?”
Elder Qi held Mei Jiu’s wrist, closing his eyes to focus on her pulse. He divided his true qi into thin threads and injected them into Mei Jiu’s pulse, following her meridians and blood vessels, carefully feeling every difference.
Elder Zhi carefully observed Mei Jiu, an incredible thought forming in his mind – Mei Fourteen now looked timid, crying so heartbrokenly. Could it be that she heard them talking about removing the weaker spiritual force earlier? These two spiritual forces had their thoughts! Could it be that they weren’t two spiritual forces, but two primordial spirits?
Primordial spirit was a Taoist concept. Several generations of Song Dynasty emperors had believed in Taoism, and the current emperor was particularly zealous in promoting Taoism and suppressing Buddhism. People like Elder Zhi who insisted on practicing Chan Buddhism were becoming rare. Nowadays, there were too many Taoist priests putting on airs of mystery, and he had always felt that many Taoist concepts were just mystification. If Mo Sigui hadn’t mentioned it today, he would never have had this thought.
Elder Zhi waited patiently for a long time until Elder Qi withdrew his hand before asking, “How is it?”
“This time, there’s no abnormality in the Ren and Du meridians,” Elder Qi was proficient in mystical and esoteric arts, and medicine was closely related. He naturally knew a great deal about Taoist theories, so he had even earlier than Elder Zhi considered the possibility of dual primordial spirits. However, he was more cautious by nature and hadn’t spoken of it casually. “The spiritual force is extremely weak, even weaker than Ting Zhao.”
Elder Zhi’s expression darkened. Mei Ting Zhao was only a seven-and-a-half-year-old child who had been sent to Elder Qi to study medicine due to poor innate physical condition. To be even weaker than Mei Ting Zhao meant she was worse than an average person!
Elder Qi said, “When Yanran took her away, she was just a child. She would inevitably be frightened amidst the glint of swords and the glare of blades. Yanran deliberately pampered her, never letting her practice martial arts or undergo hardships. It’s normal for her spiritual force to be weaker than ordinary people. On the contrary, it’s that strange, powerful spiritual force that’s worth suspecting.”
“A doting mother ruins the child!” Elder Zhi was displeased, but his current meaning also agreed with Elder Qi’s explanation.