Saving the Sickly Junior Sister (2)
"Sniff."
Whether it was youth or the simple fact that martial arts kept a body hardy, a single night's sleep had all but cured the cold. His nose still ran a little, but there was no headache and no shivering, and that was near enough to recovered.
"Hrngh!"
One look at the master coughing himself raw with a cold right in front of him settled the ranking. Of the three of them, he was by far the most intact.
"I heard it from Seolhwa. You caught a cold looking after her when she collapsed with a high fever... Achoo!"
A whole ward of invalids. That was what they were.
"Well... that's about how it happened."
"I am truly grateful. In truth, climbing back up the mountain, I had already begun to think I might be too late. It is a blessing you were here."
The words themselves were warm enough. The picture was less so, the two of them wiping streaming noses on their sleeves.
Damn it. In the side story where Cheongha shows up, Seolhwa is already gone, so it all turns solemn — you're my only family now, I'll give you everything I have — and then he makes him chew the snow ginseng and stakes his life on the Meridian-Forcing Art to open the Conception and Governing Vessels.
Still. A little sordid and happy beats tragic and grand.
"How do you prepare the snow ginseng?"
"It must be eaten raw. The problem is the state of Seolhwa's body."
The snow ginseng had to rouse her yang energy. Even he, with a fair store of inner energy and meridians sound enough to take it, had only barely absorbed the root through his master's life-risking Meridian-Forcing Art. If Seolhwa swallowed it as she was, weak as her body was, she would melt on the spot, or fall into qi deviation and burst her meridians outright. So they were stuck puzzling over how she might take it safely at all.
"Couldn't we put something like chicken in with it and boil it for her?"
He had been hoping for ginseng chicken soup. Apparently not.
"Boil it, and the inner energy is lost. Raw is the proper way. And if impurities get in, the medicinal virtue clouds, does it not?"
Fair enough. Ginseng chicken soup was closer to something you added because it tasted good than to any true tonic.
"If it comes to it, I could eat it myself, restore my True Origin Qi, and keep forcing her meridians open afterward..."
Even that would only be pissing on a frozen foot. Unless they meant to feed her snow ginseng regularly as a tonic, the moment the True Origin Qi ran down, Seolhwa's life would be in danger.
"Then what if we tried feeding her a portion..."
"A ginseng root only has meaning if it is eaten whole."
"Mmm..."
He was walled in by his own assumptions. There was no talking to him.
"Had I known it would come to this, I should have run to a proper physician the moment I obtained the snow ginseng, not come racing back."
And what good was regret now? The ones left standing had to sort it out themselves.
"Now that I think of it, Master. What if we simmered it a long while, divided it into portions, and had her take it slowly?"
"Did I not say it must not be boiled?"
"Not boiled. Drawn off as steam, gathered, and allowed to flow back down."
He was thinking of red ginseng, the way it was simmered for ages into a sticky, thick liquid you drank.
"First you put the snow ginseng in the pot and seal the lid completely. Then you bring a gentle fire under it and let it..."
The only method he actually knew was one he had seen in a red ginseng advertisement. In any case, red ginseng worked about the same whether you chewed it or boiled it. All he was doing was dressing the notion up so it would sound plausible to his master. In the end he was still saying they should boil it.
"I understand. Then let us try that method."
A man with medical knowledge would have refused and called it nonsense. His master had no such knowledge, and so a plausible speech was enough to take him in. He slicked a little moisture around the inside of the pot, shut the lid, and pasted the rim with flour so the steam could not escape. Then he set it over a low flame to boil long and slow.
A tonic's good when the body's worn down, but... how much good can it really do?
This was a world where inner energy was real and ran through his own body, so the ginseng's virtue might well be stronger here than it had any right to be. Even so, if she couldn't eat the thing, better to boil it and get something down her than nothing at all.
And so, after seventy-two hours — three full days — of diligent boiling, he opened the lid. He had expected a ginseng stewed down to a pulp. What came out, strangely, was a pale, cloudy liquid like beef-bone broth. The smell was a fragrant green-herb scent, but by color it was bone broth no matter how he looked at it.
What is this. Did I stew beef bones in there?
"Oh! The snow ginseng's virtue has truly all been drawn out!"
The master lit up at the sight, fetched two porcelain jars, and transferred the liquid into them with exquisite care. He had already scoured and sterilized the pair of porcelain bottles. Once they were filled, he held one out.
"One of them is your share."
"And you, Master...?"
"What would this old man gain from a tonic at this late hour?"
Is this fate as well?
Even halved, it was still the fate of the snow ginseng's power entering Cheongha's body.
"Shared like this, you will be able to dissolve it on your own, without this body aiding you."
"Thank you, Master."
Well, why not. A fortuitous encounter handed over for free — there was no reason to refuse it.
"Then, Seolhwa... try one careful cup."
He poured the steeped snow-ginseng water carefully into a porcelain bowl and brought it to her lips. Seolhwa took the cup with equal care and drank — then suddenly flung the bowl aside and dropped to her knees on the floor.
"Aaaaah...!!"
Did something go wrong?
His own fate, to take the snow ginseng into his hands, had come true. Did that mean Seolhwa's fate was to obtain it and die young all the same?
But contrary to his fear, what erupted from her was nothing like a collapse.
White true qi burst from every inch of her body. The sickly cast she had worn until now vanished without a trace, and even her black hair bleached white and began to shine.
What in the world did I just make?
"Senior brother...! Master...! This power — what is it...!"
No idea... what even is that... terrifying...
There is such a thing as constitution.
In this life, ginseng had never agreed with him. Eat it or don't, he only grew a little warm and couldn't tell the difference. Among his friends there had been every sort: one who took to ginseng like kindling, one who broke out in hives the moment he swallowed it. If he had to judge Seolhwa's constitution, she was not merely someone who responded well. A single mouthful of snow ginseng was enough to turn a sickly constitution into a healthy beauty. Her absorption was that outrageous.
Now that I think of it... didn't Cheongha say something like that in the story?
That next to his junior sister Seolhwa's genius, he himself was nothing at all. That if she had lived, she would have resolved every one of these incidents with ease...
And those words turned out to be the truth...
A year had passed since the day Seolhwa took the snow ginseng.
Whoosh. Whoosh.
Watching her swing a slender sword of blue steel, charged full of true qi, he had to admit she was formidable enough to put even Cheongha — written, in his own right, as something of a martial genius — to shame.
Meanwhile a certain someone is still dutifully sucking down snow-ginseng extract that doesn't even agree with his mouth...
A single mouthful had made her that healthy, and they had judged that drinking any more of the concentrate would do her no further good. In the end, everything that remained became his. He offered a portion for his master's health and drank the rest steadily himself. With the master's inner energy restored, the old man worked the Meridian-Forcing Art on him slowly, and he could feel his own inner energy rising in real time. Perhaps because it had been drawn out so carefully, it seemed to sink in more easily, and to strengthen him more, than the original's account of eating the snow ginseng raw — the account in which his master died.
Even so, there was no comparing it to the speed of Seolhwa's growth. For now he still held a narrow edge. How long before she caught him?
I am glad I kept Seolhwa alive. I really am. But...
Wasn't she getting strong a little too fast? If she kept growing like this, then later, when the final boss came crashing in, wouldn't Seolhwa just smash the lot of them herself? From where he stood — a character in the story, and one who would very much like to still be alive at the end — that was wonderful. From the author's side, he could see exactly why they had written her off the stage so early. The ability she was showing off was that absurd.
Clang.
She slid the sword home at last and drew back the energy pouring off her body, and the hair that had been glowing white returned to black.
"Senior brother, how was I?"
"It'll do. Not bad."
"Yes. I'll devote myself even harder."
Once she had drunk the snow-ginseng concentrate, the sickly, fragile Seolhwa of before was gone. In less than a year she had grown into a mature woman. If before she had been like a small animal he wanted to protect every time he looked at her — anxious the moment she left his sight — then now she had the figure of a model who had filled out, lush and full. Her height was much the same. Certain other places, ahem, had grown.
More to the point, she's already nothing like the heroine... If Seolhwa had drunk even more of that concentrate... a powerful woman... distorted inner energy... she might have ended up with both.
Her temperament, at least, was as timid as ever. A body grown healthy did not rewrite sixteen years of character overnight.
A soft slosh. Little remained of the snow-ginseng concentrate Seolhwa had left him.
In the original, Cheongha spent that year nursing the master who had burned all his True Origin Qi for his sake, and once the master too had passed, he held the funeral and left their dwelling as if he were fleeing. And every year, when the anniversary of Seolhwa's death drew near, he would come and weep — then the next day drink with a woman on his arm as if nothing were wrong. A libertine, they called him.
So then... is it about time I went out into the Central Plains?
As he remembered it, the men Cheongha quarreled with and struck down in the early going were an advance party sent by the final boss, and that incident turned the two sides into mortal enemies. Afterward the protagonist, ignorant of the ways of the world, fell into danger. The heroine shared their table to help save him. Cheongha, reminded of his dead junior sister, approached her — and the protagonist picked a fight, more or less telling him to know his place. That was the early plot.
He clashed with a protagonist stronger than expected; matching one another, the two of them grew close. After that Cheongha appeared, slick as oil, as the heroine's rival in love, helped from the shadows, and made his exit in that glorious sacrifice. Such was the fate of Yeon Cheongha.
Now that I've transmigrated into him, that isn't going to happen.
Even so, if he moved according to the fate already laid down, things would proceed without stray variables — and if, at the last crisis, he used his true martial arts, smashed through, and lived, that would be a happy ending. Let the protagonist gather three wives and four concubines, or do whatever he liked. So long as he himself survived, that was enough. He could meet a good woman and marry afterward.
He swallowed the last of the snow-ginseng concentrate, made his report to the master — recovered enough, at least, for ordinary health — and prepared to set out into the martial world.
"Master. This unworthy disciple intends to journey into the martial world, so that he might gain experience."
Originally there had been no master left to grant permission, so he had gone out drowned in grief, as if fleeing. Now the master was here, and his junior sister as well. He ought to speak first. Sparring with Seolhwa alone had its limits in any case, and the master had already ordered them to begin preparing for a journey into the martial world. He himself had been watching for the season when the original Cheongha set out.
The fine details can change. The large frame has to be carried along the same.
Otherwise there was no telling when some strange butterfly effect would strike.
"Very well. When do you mean to leave?"
Whether because Seolhwa had grown healthy, or because he had recovered some measure of inner energy, the master asked after the schedule with an easy face, his worries cast aside.
"There will be a heavy snow tomorrow, so I will depart in three days, once it stops."
That had been the day. Standing in the blizzard, raising his master's grave, seeing the flower in bloom upon Seolhwa's, unable to bear it, and setting out.
"I understand. Then make your preparations together with Seolhwa."
"Yes... yes?"
"What is it? Did you mean to leave Seolhwa here and go?"
"No, I— yes... of course..."
"Hah. You've become a senior brother, and you mean to go off and abandon your junior sister all alone? How petty of you."
Abandon her? Her father was alive and perfectly well right here. How was that abandoning anyone...
"In any case, this body can no longer keep up with Seolhwa. Take her with you."
"That would differ from what I had anticipated."
"Why? Were you planning to go down, take a beauty on your arm, and enjoy a little refined dissipation?"
He hadn't particularly intended any such thing. The original, however, did exactly that. To forget the junior sister he had loved too deeply, he soaked himself in wine and women and spent his days in debauchery. Then a woman he had grown close to accidentally witnessed a secret organization's exchange and was kidnapped for it. He went to save her, found her horribly murdered, tracked the killer and cut him down — and that was how everything began.
"At any rate, take Seolhwa with you. Besides, even if you go alone, she will only pick up a sword and come after you."
The story hasn't even started, and it's already snarled?