The Second Sect (A Thousand Li #5)

=Chapter 1=

Pain rose within his chest, gripping his innards tightly as it clenched and released, sending tendrils of agony through his entire body. Wu Ying bent over, waste effluence exploding from his mouth and nose, splashing against the edges of the chamber pot. His stomach clenched, his guts churned again, and Wu Ying desperately sucked in air before he forcibly expelled the contents of his guts once more.
Cold hands, clammy against the iron chamber pot, gripped tight as another racking shudder ran through his body. Wu Ying was forced to hunch over as his body expelled the numerous poisons and corruptions that had collected within him. Black, green, and yellow bile flooded the chamber pot, staining the copper in it. Cold and unpleasantly damp robes hung against his body, while the noxious fumes from within the pot assaulted his nose. As for the taste that coated his tongue—that was best left undescribed.
“Good. Now, finish the drink.” The aged feminine voice was cold and impersonal, a barked order rather than the warm embrace of a mother’s cajoling. It was a familiar refrain and tone for Wu Ying by this time, weeks after his return to the Sect.
Forcing himself away from the chamber pot, Wu Ying looked up to see Auntie Yi holding a porcelain bowl. She held it far away from her body, even though she’d made this same concoction multiple times for him in his manor’s kitchen.
The washroom was situated a short distance from the kitchen itself, connected to the autumn-leaf filled courtyard. Later on, after dealing with Wu Ying, he knew that Auntie Yi would sweep the bare stones clear, caring for his training grounds with the same cold and professional detachment as she tormented him.
Wu Ying’s nose scrunched up as he caught a whiff of the odious concoction, forcing words from his lips that he knew made him sound childish. “Do I have to?”
“Yes. Unless you want me to inform Elder Cheng that you are refusing to complete your treatment,” Liu Tsong spoke up, the senior apothecarist standing to the side with her hands on her hips. She glared at Wu Ying, almost taunting him to answer in the affirmative.
Wu Ying knew better than to take her up on the offer. Master Cheng had driven him even harder than Liu Tsong, intent on finding something to aid Wu Ying in recovering the time he had lost while recuperating and to fix the injuries he had incurred. The more esoteric the treatment, the more he seemed to enjoy inflicting it upon Wu Ying.
He would not let Wu Ying shirk. Not for any reason.
After taking the porcelain bowl from Auntie Yi feeling the light warmth emanating from it, Wu Ying gagged down the rancid concoction. As it passed his lips and tongue, he felt the gritty sand and tasted the charcoal that was part of the alchemical soup and felt the stab of beetle legs imperfectly crushed as it slid down his throat. He knew every single ingredient in the drink—to his poor imagination’s demise—forced to learn it by Liu Tsong as part of his training.
After swallowing the last dregs of the thick, greenish-brown slurry, Wu Ying handed the porcelain bowl to Auntie Yi before bending back over the chamber pot. The women quickly backed away, shutting the door behind the man and leaving him to wait. In short order, his body—aided by the swirl of chi he constantly formed—had drawn the essence of the drink into his body. It swirled through the pathways of his body, tugging at his muscles, his tendons and ligaments, even his bones before returning to its starting point in his guts.
Breathing hard, Wu Ying focused on his cultivation and his attempts at keeping the contents of his stomach still. The longer he held the substances within, the more impurities his body could draw into it before their eventual expulsion.
Long minutes later, Wu Ying finally was free from the torments of his body. He understood why they were doing this after his impromptu “medicinal bath” had forced numerous impurities into his body. Where he had once cleansed his body, now, he had to repeat the procedure that Body Cleansing was meant to have finished. Except this time, he had to do it in an even more invasive manner due to the extent the bath had combined the impurities into his body. A fact that could be easily discerned by the darker skin tone he had gained, a permanent alteration to his body. Thus far, the treatment prescribed by Liu Tsong required him to imbibe this drink every day.
This and one other.
The second drink, Wu Ying took from the waiting ladies when he exited the building. Another alchemical soup, this one tasting significantly better. It had, among other ingredients, a dose of wild honey mixed within, as well as a touch of rare rock salt from Yu county, both of which helped to wash down the rancid taste in his mouth. He would still brush his teeth later, then chew on mint, but for now, it would do.
A few steps farther, and he took a seat in the prepared meditation area in the middle of the courtyard. A small cushion, stuffed with discarded linen to provide comfort beneath his body, sat upon bare cement, the early-morning sun shining upon it. Seated with crossed legs, the liquid rolled through his body and spread a diffuse warmth that seeped into the smallest portion of his mortal form.

Release Date: June 1, 2021

Pages: 403

Genre: Cultivation Fantasy

eBook ISBN: 9781989994788

Language: English

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