Chapter 83

  The Eternal Veil (V)

  Elder Qin's gaze shifted as he moved from the young woman toward me. Gone was the chilliness and distance, replaced with... curiosity.

  My words remained hanging for a long while as he seemed to deliberate on what to do, while Cao Qiu remained entirely unmoving, as though frozen in time. Others looked at me oddly, too, as though I'd come out and said something so otherworldly it left them befuddled. Well, if my interceding on her behalf left them befuddled, I wonder what my proposed 'punishment' would entail?

  "... very well," he said. "You can punish her." Phew, glad he agreed. And from the sounds of it, there were no insane conditions like 'but only if you make her your disciple!'. Hah, can you imagine? Okay, gotta move quickly before the old man actually considers it...

  "Thank you, Elder Qin." As my words faded, I saw Cao Qiu turn, still on her knee, and face me. Well, "face me" would be a metaphor of sorts--her head was glued downward, hair falling over and blocking her expression. "My punishment is simple: you will have to stand with me and watch as my disciples resolve what you deemed undoable. It will become your shame and dishonor, and something you will have to live with for the rest of your life."

  "..."

  Yeah, it looks like my stern words didn't really fool anyone, not even Light.

  Everyone looked at me oddly yet again, as I was basically not even punishing her. It was like saying, 'Hey, why don't you take a seat, relax, and wait for it all to blow over?'.

  Whatever.

  Not like I was really going to punish her. She's not a kid like the others, sure, but she was a kid to me. And, besides, I'm sure that near every Disciple in the sect said something just as bad, if not worse, about Lu Qi in private. While the rule is 'don't say it out loud, you nimrod', it holds little weight to me.

  I want to earn a new reputation--and killing a kid because she thought I was stupid? Yeah. That's not the new reputation I want.

  "Okay, you three. Long Tao, you'll lead," I said. "Go out and have fun. If anything happens, Elder Qin will save you."

  "..."

  Wow. The silence really can be like a thousand arms tickling at the back of your throat.

  "... yes, Master," Long Tao shrugged. Dai Xiu's eyes still burned with anger as she couldn't peel them away from Cao Qiu, while Xi Zhao simply nodded, seeming hurried.

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  The three left, heading for the main road, while Cao Qiu stood up and walked over toward me, stopping by my side. She still hung her head low, fingers digging into the palms of her hands, her body faintly shaking.

  Perhaps it was humiliating in a way I couldn't really compute--being punished by someone other than her own Master, especially someone like me. Maybe she would have preferred going in there and dying due to some sense of honor that I just didn't understand. Regardless, she'll have plenty of times for heroic suicides later. She can skip a night.

  "... why did you intercede on my behalf?" Surprisingly, she broke the silence and asked me. Her tone still lacked the tenth of respect she held toward Elder Qin, and she seemed to realize it quickly, adding right after: "I mean, I have done an injustice toward you, Elder Lu. It was only right that I be punished."

  "You are being punished."

  "Is it pity?"

  "... does it matter?"

  "Of course it matters."

  "Why?"

  "Because I don't want your pity. I don't want anyone's pity." Okay, well, this clearly wasn't just about me but about all the other demons she carried.

  "It's not pity."

  "Then what is it?"

  "... you were honest," I said, seemingly startling her as she finally looked up and faced me. "I mean, it was honesty that hurt, but honesty nonetheless. And you were scared."

  "I... I wasn't--"

  "--Long Tao is an idiot for not being scared," I added with a chuckle. "Being afraid of the unknown... it's part of who we are, no matter how strong or weak. And you were supposed to entrust your life to me--somebody who you only ever heard the worst things about--when there was somebody else right here with us who could stop the sky from falling."

  "..."

  "Elder Qin is... just," I said. "And just to a fault. Me? I'm not. I don't care that you insulted me, or that you insinuated I'm incompetent, or that my disciples are insane. Frankly, all those things are kind of true. No," I added quickly. "They were true. But... I want to change. And I want to do it by my own hands, not relying on Elder Qin to mete out 'justice' when the kids badmouth me. Heavens know I deserved most of it." I turned to the side and faced her, smiling as gently as I could. "Your life, your struggle to swim against the currents of the world... they are vastly more important than my honor. I'd rather Elder Qin beat me black and blue than stand idly by and watch a life, a completely innocent life, be discarded because of something so... inconsequential."

  The tip of her nose twitched as her eyes grew watery; before any tears could stream out, however, she rapidly looked away and fell silent. As I knew the old man was listening to us, too, I tossed in a few 'nuggets' for him.

  Yeah, I can't change the sect, let alone the world, and it's unlikely that I can change the old man's ways, either. These were their customs, their laws, and their beliefs; it'd be like a tourist coming into a foreign country trying to change it from the ground up.

  But just because something was a custom didn't mean I had to subscribe to it with the zealotry of the others. I'd carve out my own little compass and enforce it the best I can. My disciples would never be swords or blunt tools; if I surrender that much of myself to the system, all in a desperate attempt to 'farm' them for points...

  I'll have to change many things about myself; I know that much. At some point, I'll probably have to kill, and I'll probably have to turn a blind eye to the things and many, many other changes that I can't even fathom just yet. But for now... I can endure.

  "... that's stupid." she mumbled under her jaw.

  "Pfft, ha ha ha," it was kind of funny, honestly. Here I was, building a pedestal atop which I placed the worth of her life, and there she was, summing it up to it being 'stupid'. "Hm, I guess it kind of is stupid. Well, one thing we can both agree on is that there's unlikely to be a soul out there who ever called me smart. So, it's par for the course, is it not?" She squeezed out a smile as well as I turned forward to face the town. "The show's about to start. Let's watch and have some fun, eh?"