Chapter 124: Fair Exchange

'Ai! Yai! My arm and leg… they’re broken! But! Heh! Argh! Th-the treasure's still with me!' Struggling to drag his body over to a tree and lean against it, the disciple felt around his inner pocket with his one good hand. Confirming everything was still there, he momentarily forgot the unbearable pain wracking his entire body.

"Huh, would you look at that... they really did a number on you. Don't worry, I've come to help." Suddenly, he heard a slightly tired voice right beside him. Startled, the disciple jerked his head up.

Standing right in front of him, or rather, above him, was a young man in dirty, torn blue robes, ripped in dozens of places. Looking higher, he saw messy hair, hanging just below the chin. When he focused on the face, he noticed faint traces of dirt, but he barely registered any of that, distracted entirely by the eyes. Green, cold eyes, for a moment, he almost thought they were glowing.

Looking into that hollow, joy-draining gaze, the disciple felt his insides twist into a knot, every instinct screaming that this couldn't possibly end well.

"Gulp!" Swallowing hard, the disciple tried to relax his own expression, doing his best to look fine. "I-I'm fine! Ha-haha! I-I'm just re-resting!"

Still waving his one good arm, the disciple watched this strange stranger crouch right down beside him. 'S-something's definitely wrong with him!! I need to get rid of him, fast!'

"Hey, hey! I-I told you! I-I'm fine!" Forcing his already-broken arm too, he started waving both, straining not to scream from the pain.

"Eh, come on now... Helping out a junior brother's no trouble at all for me! We're all part of the Four Alliance, after all!" Grabbing the disciple's broken arm, An squeezed hard enough that the crack of bone was audible.

"A! A-AAH-" Before he could even finish screaming properly, the wounded disciple passed out.

'Hm. Where is it... You've got so many pockets, and none of them is the right one...' Digging through dozens of pockets sewn into the young man's robe, An finally found what he was looking for.

Pulling out a small wooden box, he opened it and found a fruit inside, black as the void, roughly the size and shape of a walnut.

Holding it in his hand, An smiled slightly. 'Where did you even find something like this... A fruit made entirely of Death Qi... I didn't even know that was possible... Could this actually be my first stroke of real luck?'

Taking the fruit and tucking it into his ring, he pulled out a few pills from what remained of his stock, stuffed about a dozen of them into the small box, and tucked it back into the unconscious disciple's hidden pocket.

"Hey! What are you doing?!" Suddenly he heard a woman's voice behind him. Since he'd been constantly scanning everything around him from the very start, An had already known exactly where everyone was and what they were doing. The sudden question from behind was one he'd fully anticipated.

Turning, An looked at the girl in front of him with a smile. "I was thinking of checking his wounds, but the moment I started, he passed out from the strain... Eh, couldn't even hold on that long..."

Brushing invisible dust off his hands, An got to his feet, turned fully to face her, looked her in the eye, and pointed toward the large group of disciples. "Could you go fetch someone who knows medical skills? Seeing as you're just wandering around with nothing to do."

"Ha-ah?! Do you even know who I am?! Talking to me like that, disciple-?" Crossing her arms, she got visibly angry, but suddenly stopped.

"Wait! Who are you, anyway?!" Realizing she'd never seen this disheveled disciple before, she pointed a finger at him without thinking.

"I'm just… always standing at the back of the group." Glancing at her sideways, An scratched his head, thought for a moment, and added, "Just, um... I'm a little cowardly..."

"At the back of the group? I don't remember ever... Wait! A c-coward? You just called yourself a coward?" All her commanding energy suddenly evaporated. Standing frozen, she'd never expected anyone, especially a cultivator, to describe themselves that way.

"Are we just going to keep wasting time like this? You can see he needs help... and your questions aren't going to close his wounds. Go on, go!" Pointing at the wounded disciple by the tree, An started waving his arms, shooing off the stunned, tattooed girl, who happened to be Ruste Zen's senior sister, Onie Alia.

"Eh?! O-oh!! R-right away!" Not knowing what else to do, caught for the first time in such a bizarre situation, she just nodded, turned, and ran toward the large crowd where the healers were darting between a dozen or so wounded disciples.

Turning back to the unconscious disciple, An glanced once more at the spot where the box had been hidden. 'Essentially, this was a fair, well, close to fair trade... That fruit would've been taken from you eventually anyway. And if you'd tried hiding it and eating it yourself... you wouldn't even have realized you were already caught in the reincarnation cycle before it was over. So really, I'm not just giving you resources, I'm saving your life too... which means you still owe me one.' Nodding, he hopped up into the branches and, with a few light movements, vanished from the clearing, wiping away every trace he'd left behind.

….

Running up to the group of disciples, Onie Alia looked around and, spotting her junior brother Ruste Zen along with the disciple helping tend to his wounds, hurried over to them. "You're exactly who I need! Come on, we need to help someone-!"

Feeling his arm suddenly grabbed, the healer froze slightly. "I-I'm already helping Brother Zen!"

Glancing at Ruste Zen, she kept tugging at the healer anyway. "Come on, I said! His wounds are minor! They'll heal on their own in a couple of days!"

Yanking him along with more force, she pointed toward the tree where the unconscious wounded disciple lay. "There, you see him and the second one next to- Hm? Where'd the second one go?"

Turning her head around and not finding the disheveled disciple anywhere, she shook her head and focused on what actually mattered right now. "There, by the tree, a disciple's unconscious, possibly with serious wounds. Go help him! Come on, hurry!"

Shoving the healer's back to point him in the right direction, she looked around. "Hm, strange..."

Sitting nearby, rubbing medicinal ointment onto his skin, Ruste Zen lifted his head and looked at his senior sister. "What's strange?"

"Hm? Oh, that disciple. There was a second one there... and now he's gone." Touching a hand to her face, she started tapping a finger against her upper lip.

Hearing this, Ruste Zen decided it was best to just ignore her, but her next words pulled his attention right back.

"Actually, now that I think about it, that disciple himself was kind of strange. I didn't really register it at the time..." She watched, deep in thought, as the healer started examining the wounded disciple, trying to figure out what was wrong with him.

"What do you mean?" Zen suddenly asked her.

"Blue robes, just like the Heavenly Soul Sect wears, except it looked like it'd been through dozens of owners already, covered in stains and holes... Even his face was smeared with dirt, hair a mess... Hm, he looked less like a cultivator and more like a beggar off the street!" Shaking her head, she tried to recall exactly what he'd looked like.

"Green eyes?" Zen looked at her, his expression turning serious.

"Oh? How'd you know that? Do you know who that is?" Nodding, she turned to face him.

….

Ruste Zen just nodded, sinking into thought, when he suddenly heard the old man's voice in his head. <"You're overthinking this... He showed up here because of that wounded cultivator. Nothing more.">

<"He took something from him... While the rest of you weren't paying attention, he took advantage of that.">

Thinking it over, Zen felt a flicker of uneasy, <"So he's been following us, following this disciple specifically, this whole time? That sounds strange.">

<"You're right about that... I've got more and more suspicions about him, honestly.">

Hearing this, Ruste Zen frowned. <"Teacher, what do you mean?">

<"Hm? Oh! Never mind. It's still too early for you to know some things... For now, focus on what's in front of you.">

Not fully satisfied with this answer, wanting to keep pushing the subject, Ruste Zen still didn't dare argue with his teacher, trusting his judgment completely, and simply nodded.

….

"Hey! Are you going to answer me or what??" Giving him a light punch on the shoulder, Onie Alia stood directly over him, drilling her eyes into him.

"Remember that disciple a lot of people thought was a spy?" Ruste Zen rubbed the spot she'd hit. Even though she'd tried to go easy, given her terrifying physical strength, even her 'light' hits could crack bones for some people.

"Hm? Oh, you mean the one who wandered into our camp alone. And you all had some clash up in the mountains, in that area sealed off from disciples? That spy?" Remembering the camp, and how she'd heard about that spy during a meeting, she frowned. "So he really was a spy, then. He was clearly gathering intel for their attack. And now, after all that, he suddenly shows up here again, hm..."

"He's not a spy... Just like the other times, we probably ran into him here because one of us happened to have something he needed." He pointed at the wounded disciple, who'd finally opened his eyes.

Onie Alia followed his finger and, watching the trembling disciple suddenly pull something out of his pocket. "You mean-" Before she could finish, a scream cut her off.

"Where?! Bastard! THIEF!! I knew it!! Thief!! THIEEEF!!" Ignoring his own injuries, the wounded disciple sprang up onto his broken leg and started dumping the contents of the box onto the ground, then everything else he could find in his pockets.

"Oh? What's that?"

"Pills?"

"They look kind of strange..."

Many of the disciples nearby, seeing pills rolling across the ground, instantly lost interest in the shouting disciple, their attention locked entirely on the ground instead.

Walking closer, everyone gathered around, picking up the pills and studying them.

"A-a vein?! There's a vein on this pill!"

"This one too!"

"Almost all of them have veins!"

"Look! Look! This one's got two veins!"

"Hey, you! Where'd you find perfect-quality pills like these?! Huh?!"

One of the disciples couldn't resist and tried to slip a pill into his own pocket while no one was looking. But the moment his hand reached his robes, he felt someone grab it.

"Put it back. It's not yours." Seeing the serious look in Ruste Zen's golden eyes, the disciple flinched slightly and, nodding, tossed the pill back onto the ground.

Seeing this, everyone else calmed down instantly, snapping back to themselves, and put the pills back exactly where they'd picked them up.

The wounded disciple, who'd been screaming a moment ago, fell silent too, looking, for the first time, at what he'd just dumped out of the wooden box onto the ground.

Walking closer, Ruste Zen crouched down and picked up a few of the veined pills, looking at the wounded disciple. "What exactly did he take from you, and are these pills-?"

Hesitating for a moment, the wounded disciple realized there was no point hiding it now, since his treasure had already been stolen anyway. "A fruit... I wandered by accident onto a clearing covered in black plants, and at the center stood a massive white tree, with a single fruit hanging from it, black as pitch... Th-the moment I picked it, the whole tree instantly rotted and turned to ash..." Looking down at the pills by his feet: "As for the pills... I have no idea, I've never seen them before in my life."

"Hm, looks like he made a trade with you. While you were unconscious." Ruste Zen set the pills back down on the ground.

"Ha! Trading one fruit for a dozen veined pills! Which one of you is the real thief here?"

"Hahaha!"

Everyone around started teasing the wounded disciple over his earlier outburst, trying to lighten the mood, seeing the sour look on his face.

….

<"These pills-?"> Sending the thought to the old man in his ring, Zen got an answer right away.

<"Hmm, I knew it... My suspicions were correct after all."> Getting such a strange response, Zen was about to ask him to clarify what he meant, but the old man beat him to it.

<"Now's not the time to know. As for the pills, I've never heard of anything like them before... and I doubt anyone has."> Letting out a heavy sigh, the old man gave his disciple one more warning. <"For now, don't let your mind wander on this. Your priority is reaching the Upper World as fast as possible, and to do that, you need to secure even stronger backing within the White Dragon Sect.">

Hearing this guidance, Ruste Zen nodded seriously, fully agreeing with his Teacher, since reaching the Upper World was, after all, his primary goal right now.

….

"Tell me, Junior Brother Ruste, you're an alchemist, right? What kind of pills are these?" Standing beside him, Onie Alia looked at him.

Her voice pulled him out of his thoughts, and looking at the pills once more, he stood up straight. "I don't know. I've never seen pills like these before. But one thing I can say for certain, they shouldn't be dangerous for you." Looking at the wounded disciple, he continued. "And in this trade, he clearly gave far more than he took."

The wounded disciple nodded, even he understood the value of that many pills far exceeded a single fruit, even without knowing what the pills actually were, just from the veins on them alone were worth a fortune.