Sichuan's Mad Dragon (Novel) - Chapter 17 - If Poison Can Become Medicine

Chapter 17 – If Poison Can Become Medicine

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Translated by Heavenly Cat

Read it only at Novelbyu.com & Utoon.net

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Heavenly Killing Star.

Those who know, know.

It is a name that makes one’s spine go cold just hearing it. In the martial world, there exist those born with various constitutions.

The first is the Iron Bone Physique. This is a constitution where one is born with bones so hard that imagination fails, allowing one to achieve mastery in any external art.

Another is the Nine Yin Severed Meridians. For those with this constitution, their meridians are blocked by yin energy, causing early death before coming of age. However, if resolved, they show immense aptitude for martial arts handling yin energy.

Beyond these, there are constitutions like Pure Yang Physique, Heavenly Martial Physique, and so on.

Heavenly Killing Star, or more precisely Heavenly Killing Physique, is also one of them. Those born with this mostly became legendary masters of their era, and nine out of ten were consumed by that murderous nature and became killing ghosts.

This had nothing to do with whether they had trained in martial arts or not.

Usually, those born with the Heavenly Killing Star were hated for their murderous disposition from a young age and killed.

But if talent and luck followed and they rose to a high position, the story changed.

Daji, the wicked woman of ancient times, was also one born with the Heavenly Killing Star. Did she not bewitch her husband King Zhou and commit all manner of slaughter?

Gi Sam-bok’s expression hardened as he spoke.

“Why did you not kill him the moment you saw him?”

Wi Ji-baek looked directly into Gi Sam-bok’s eyes and said.

“Sam-bok, you know me. I am a person who saves lives.”

Sam-bok snorted. His old friend’s ironclad rule of non-killing did not stem from conviction. It was merely that the last words left by someone precious to Wi Ji-baek had become his habit.

In reality, his friend did not mind pushing people toward death as long as he did not kill them with his own hands.

“Wi Ji-baek, think back to your younger days. Remember how you deliberately transplanted the miraculous medicine you found to make dark path sects kill each other? Because of you, the Five Great Dark Paths of Guizhou became Three. If you set your mind to it, you could have killed that boy easily, could you not?”

Wi Ji-baek looked up at the sky for a moment. The white-covered clouds up there, were they there to prevent humans from gauging heaven’s will?

He lowered his gaze to look at his old friend. And he spoke in a strong voice.

“Sam-bok, that boy is still a human, not a killing ghost. He knows right from wrong with his heart, a human among humans. If I killed him in the name of the greater good, what would my life’s work become?”

Sam-bok had never seen his old friend like this.

It was quite different from when he had taken the physician Seo-baek as his disciple.

-Sam-bok, I will put aside my life until now.

At that time, there was a sense that he hated the path he had walked and wanted to start living anew.

-I was too foolish until now. My eyes were blinded by rage and I wasted my time.

It was a life lived solely by the single-minded determination to complete an unidentified pill and seize revenge, caught up in lingering attachments and rage.

-My past self was not really me. I was terribly deluded.

It was a resolve to settle that life and shed his resentment. His friend then had certainly been like that.

But now, at this point, Wi Ji-baek seemed to have accepted even that time as part of himself.

It was hard to believe that having taken someone as a disciple for not even that long could bring about such a change in his friend.

What was so special about that boy that this lonely man came to wholly affirm his long, long life?

He could not know. But Gi Sam-bok was sincerely glad.

For his friend’s sake, no, for his disciple’s sake, he decided to share one piece of information.

“Listen, Wi Ji-baek. There is something I should tell you. About the Celestial Senses, there is actually something I held back and did not tell you. There is a hidden function to the Celestial Senses…”

A moment later.

Wi Ji-baek’s expression twisted.

“You damn thieving dog! You are only telling me now?!”

* * *

-Swaaaaaah.

The waterfall is cold.

Ju-seong, feeling the chills, shuddered with his body shivering. He sat in lotus position under the waterfall, concentrating all his nerves on sounds.

He tried to pick out the chirping of birds, the sound of fish swimming, and the rustling of leaves through the sound of the waterfall.

After sitting like that for two hours, the waterfall was so cold that he had no choice but to start getting some clues.

For some reason, after conversing with Gi Sam-bok, the Divine Physician urged him to drop everything else and master the Celestial Hearing first.

Then he threatened that Ju-seong should not even think of crawling out from under the waterfall before mastering “Hearing Purely,” the first stage.

-Disciple, this is all for your own good. Tsk, humans do not die that easily. And you are a martial artist, are you not?

“It is d-damn c-cold.”

Teeth chattering, Ju-seong concentrated desperately. If he did not want to freeze to death, he had to master hearing purely within the next hour.

He recalled the teaching Gi Sam-bok had written down for him.

-When a human is born into this world, all sounds are heard without differentiation, with no sound unable to reach the ears. Returning to this state is the first step, and choosing the sounds you want by will from among them is the second.

Sounds he would not normally hear, no, sounds that his unconscious filtered out.

Ju-seong started with his own breathing and heartbeat.

“Sseup, ha.”

-Thump, thump.

Next were sounds from nearby.

-Pong, pong, pong.

Amidst the symphony of waterfall sounds.

He began to hear the sound of water droplets forming on the rock he sat on and falling to the water’s surface.

-Swaaaah…

He also heard leaves rustling against each other, swaying in the wind.

Before he knew it, the waterfall sound had receded to the back of his consciousness, and the sounds he wanted to hear, the tiny sounds, revealed themselves.

“Whew.”

He opened his eyes that had been closed and said.

“Good thing I figured it out before dying.”

A moment later and his perked-up ears would have been listening to King Yama’s verdict.

* * *

One year later.

Ju-seong had mastered the Celestial Hearing and could also use the White Phoenix Nine Heavens Movement Technique without difficulty. His level in the Flame Crow Six Stage Art constantly rose, and before he knew it, he was climbing toward the peak of the Black Crow level.

The Three Yang Fist went without saying. His proficiency in the Three Yang Fist alone exceeded the level of a second-rate martial artist. Just as the next level was coming within reach.

“From today, I will teach you medicine.”

So said the Divine Physician.

Before Ju-seong reached the Yellow Crow level, that is, first-rate, and departed to venture into the martial world, he needed to be at least passably qualified as a physician’s disciple.

From that day on, he began learning medicine and pharmacology, and about the various miraculous medicines and poisonous herbs and creatures of the Central Plains.

In the case of medicine, the main focus was on the various pressure points of the human body and acupuncture.

“There are pathways through which vital energy and blood pass, those running vertically are called meridians and those running horizontally are called collaterals, which together are the meridian system. Along the meridians are pressure points, numbering 365. On the Hand Greater Yin Lung Meridian there are eleven, which are connected to the lungs…”

The material about the human body was easy. Ju-seong was a martial artist accustomed to observing his own body, and he himself was the best learning material.

Of course, using oneself as a learning material also meant accepting some degree of risk.

“Disciple, why are you silently opening and closing your mouth?”

“…!”

“Are you mocking me right now? Why will you not speak…?”

“…!!”

“Ah, you pressed your own Mute Point. How did you succeed on your first try…? Hm? You want help? Tsk tsk, no. Figure it out yourself.”

Pressure point technique was the skill of injecting energy into pressure points to cause various effects on the target’s body.

Knowing the 365 pressure points of the human body naturally led to understanding its principles.

Ju-seong studied by pressing his own points, finding the corresponding release points.

Knowing this, the Divine Physician deliberately offered no help even when Ju-seong pressed his own Mute Point like this.

The same went for when he pressed a Numbness Point.

Ju-seong pressed his own Numbness Point and became stiff as a board, unable to move a single finger. Naturally, pressing the release point was also impossible.

The Divine Physician still did not help.

“Move your energy slowly to dissolve the point pressure. The energy used for point pressure is like ice. Ice can be melted with water.”

Ju-seong, stiff as a plank of wood, barely managed to make sounds with his frozen vocal cords.

“Uh-buh, uh-buh-buh.”

“Yes, yes. So you want to realize it yourself. I will come back in half a day.”

About one hour later, Young Lady Wol-hyang sneaked over and tried to help him, but his master came running over in a flash and stopped her.

“Please, Young Lady. My disciple may be lacking, but he is not one with a weak will. How can you disturb the path when a man has set his purpose and is striving for progress?”

“Lord Divine Physician, I was short-sighted. The Young Hero’s eyes seemed to be desperately pleading for help…”

“Tsk, what do you take my disciple for! Please go inside! It is chilly in the morning.”

“Yes, understood.”

Ju-seong watched the Young Lady turning to return to her quarters and screamed silently.

‘Young Lady! Young Lady! Please help me…!’

In the end, only when dusk fell did he grasp the beginning of enlightenment and manage to melt the internal energy injected into his body from the point pressure.

By studying in this manner, directly colliding with it physically, Ju-seong became an expert in pressure point techniques within three months.

-Ting! Ti…ing!

Clear sounds rang through the quadrangle in the evening. It was the sound of tiny needles flying and embedding into a wall.

-Deureureuk.

“Disciple, what the hell are you doing to disturb your master’s evening rest?”

The Divine Physician, who had opened the door grumbling as he entered, froze in his expression. His disciple had drawn a human body on the wall and was throwing needles to stick into it.

“You wretch. Needles are medical tools, and yet you are thinking of using them to harm people?”

Ju-seong’s dart-throwing skills combined with his Master’s acupuncture.

‘How can he be upset seeing this collaboration between master and disciple?’

Ju-seong smoothly replied.

“What are you saying? If I refine this skill, I can treat patients even from a distance, so it is a truly beneficial skill.”

“…This will not do. I was too easy on you. Remember when you were learning to read? Bring the medical texts I gave you and come to the training ground tomorrow.”

The Divine Physician finished speaking and closed the door.

He went down to the training ground while recalling what he had just seen. He recalled the position where each and every needle was embedded, along with their depth and angle.

He murmured softly.

“In just three months, he memorized all the pressure points, mastered their combinations and effects, and practically achieved mastery in pressure point techniques. That boy is truly…”

At first, he had thought him somewhat clever and quick on his feet, but the more he looked, the more it was a world-overturning talent. Come to think of it, the expression felt peculiar.

“That world-overturn-er…”

Wi Ji-baek did not like his disciple applying his skills in such a manner. However, he had no intention of blocking his disciple from honing himself.

Anyway, hidden weapon techniques were arts of the side schools, so their limits were clear. Even if he took a roundabout path, time spent colliding with reality was necessary.

Through trial and error, people grow.

* * *

Ju-seong studied not only the human body but also pharmacology.

“The poison of the centipede causes extreme pain, but when dried and ground, it becomes a medicine that disperses blood stasis. The venom of the toad, when processed as medicine, is called Huachansu and is effective against tumors.”

Pharmacology became more interesting the more he learned, because he realized that poison and medicine were not divided as if by a knife.

Even fearsome poisons could have their own effects when diluted and compounded with other medicinal ingredients.

Even herbs known to be miraculous could act as poison if consumed excessively or if the fruit had been picked at the wrong time.

Poison is ultimately what is harmful to humans, and medicine is what is beneficial, but depending on the constitution of the human taking it, poison and medicine could switch.

Therefore, there was no such thing as absolute poison in the world.

Ju-seong, following his master’s teaching, spent all day before the furnace sorting, grinding, mixing, boiling, and steaming medicinal ingredients.

In this process, on the pretext that he must not let his mind wander, martial arts training was also suspended.

Of course, the Way of Medicine was a field as broad and deep as martial arts, so Ju-seong could not attain mastery. There was not enough time.

Still, as a result of his diligent efforts, he succeeded in making his master’s special wound salve, detoxification pill, and calming pill.

“Disciple, these skills will be invaluable help as you live your life in the martial world going forward. How many martial artists can make their own medicines?”

“I will not forget your teaching and will strive in pharmacology as well as martial arts. However, I have one question.”

He was curious.

“What is it?”

At the Divine Physician’s question, Ju-seong spoke.

“Even this wound salve contains diluted bee venom for pain relief, and the detoxification pill contains monkshood to push out other poisonous energy.”

“Yes, that is correct. That is precisely the principle of using poison to control poison.”

“Thus, I have learned that poison can become medicine.”

“Yes, you are right. To say that it affects the human body is to say it contains energy. If you can turn that energy’s direction toward a positive path, poison can be used as medicine.”

He looked straight up at the Divine Physician as he continued his explanation and asked.

“If poison can become medicine, can killing also become saving?”