52 Chapter 50: Let them come.
Blue Wind Imperial City, the capital of an Empire bigger than any continent on Earth, the city itself was more massive than some countries, and in its center stood what I could only assume was the Imperial Palace.
It wasn't too different from classical Chinese architecture, but it was probably more massive than all of the ones on Earth combined.
This was only the poorest Empire on this continent; it made me wonder if it was by the god that brought me here's design that I found myself in the poorest place of the poorest country on the continent.
Maybe there were more continents that I didn't know about but were richer and more militarily powerful than this continent in every way.
Three months was the time it took us to reach this place from the ruins of that village, it probably took half an entire year from when we left New Moon City to get here.
While many powerful people of this world were power-hungry barbarians, they certainly knew how to build enormous stuff, I wasn't an expert in construction by any stretch, but that palace seemed too big to be manageable, the fact that even from this far my senses screamed at me that there was an enormous amount of Profound Energy inside of it made me think that they used it to build in some way.
"Kids, what do you think of this city?" I asked the two who were walking on either side of me.
Xue looked at the streets around us, his expression neutral, before pointing to one of the minor roads and saying, "It's bigger, but the same as the old one."
I looked where he had pointed and saw a man, collapsed to the ground, blood spilling out of his guts.
He was stuffed in a corner, somewhere I would have never thought to look at, but it was precisely where Xue had been looking.
"Stay here, and don't wander off," I appeared at the body, it was dead.
Stabbed repeatedly, with many broken bones, and there were some burns, but the greatest damage was at his nerves, seemingly being targetted and burnt off.
This was deliberate murder and torture, then he was left here to rot.
I sighed and went back to the kids, "Let's go, I was told to reach the Profound Palace, the city will know better than me how to deal with bodies on the road."
The city was big, I had to ask the shopkeepers on the way which direction I was supposed to go, but the ones I asked seemed nice enough, if a little annoyed that I wasn't there to be their big buyer of the day.
With the kids at my side, I approached the entrance of the Blue Wind Profound Palace, a building many, many times bigger and more ornate than the New Moon one, it bordered on being tacky, but they seemed to enjoy being tacky.
To each their own.
"This place is so cool!" Mumbled the boy. He seemed excited, it was nice, they were tired from our long trek in the wilderness, but now that we were here, I was going to let them enjoy their childhood while teaching them.
Calm days were on the horizon, I could feel it.
"What about you Zhu, what do you think?" I asked the girl, she hadn't talked in a while.
She looked at me and hesitated, "I don't like it, it's too… dark."
I had no idea what she referred to, this place was white and green, but I knew better than to argue against a child's gut instinct.
The fact that I didn't like this place's design was a bonus.
"Don't worry kid, we're just here to meet an acquaintance, she'll give us a place to settle in," I replied while ruffling her hair, which she didn't like, but I found fun.
I approached the guards at the gate, "Hello, I'm here to meet an acquaintance, what's the Profound Palace's protocol for visits?"
They weren't friendly, that's for sure. One of the two grunted, "And who might this acquaintance be?"
"Lan Xueruo, eighteen years old, I think, around this tall," I signaled her height with my hand, "Relatively beautiful, do you know her?"
The eyes of the guard widened, but not out of recognition, but evident mockery, "Who do you think you are, asking to meet Senior Xueruo? I bet you're just another toad that wants to eat the swan's meat!"
Toad eating Swan?
What the hell was this guy talking about?
Toads don't eat animal meat. Their diet is made up of insects; why would one of them even eat a swan in the first place? That would probably cause digestive problems for the poor toad.
But I digress. Debating about a weird idiom wasn't something I was keen on at the moment, any other day? Sure, but I was tired from the long trip and the kids were even more, "We became friends in New Moon City; you could just send her a message if you doubt me."
The guard's eyes narrowed before he took a stone and a strip of paper with some drawings on it, and crushed it, for some reason, I felt a strand of energy move to the stone, lighting it up and connecting it to another thing far into the Palace "Elder, we have someone at the gates that claims to know senior Xueruo, we attend instructions."
A few seconds later, I saw a middle-aged man moving toward us, he seemed familiar though, where had I seen him before…
He approached, his speed pretty impressive, way above even my maximum, "I recognize you, you're the doctor that disciple Xueruo bought for my coronation as Palace Chief of the New Moon Profound Palace."
I saw the face of the guard go blank, but I ignored it completely, even if Xue gave the man a smug look for some reason, "Yes sir, Miss Xueruo and I have an arrangement for me to open a new clinic in this city."
"Ah, yes, I am aware." The man replied, "Unfortunately, Disciple Xueruo is in closed cultivation at the moment, but your clinic was arranged from the moment she stepped foot back in the Capital, I'll arrange for someone to bring you there right now if you'll wait for a moment."
"Thank you, I'll wait," I replied.
"No, thank you, the Profound Palace is lucky to have found a talented doctor like you in a minor city like New Moon City, do you also happen to know how to deal with poisons?"
I thought about it for a second, "It depends on the poison, I don't know much about what kind of poisons there are in this area, but I can try to figure something out."
Poisons are not something I had much interest in before, never seeing the reason to dig deeper into them, but I could figure something out with my runes.
They had yet to fail me. I just needed a little bit of trial and error.
"Can you supply me a sample of this poison? It would be immensely valuable in my research for a cure." I asked.
"We will try to find a sample as soon as possible. The empire trusts your abilities doctor, I'll inform Xueruo about your arrival as soon as possible."
The empire trusts me, huh? That was a weird way of saying it, I knew that the doctors of this world were very subpar, but I hadn't even started to bring out the big guns that I planned on creating.
Or maybe what I had already shown was enough for them to realize that I was not going to stop anytime soon. I was going to make this world a better place.
Whether they liked it or not.
"And who are these two talented young ones with you?" The man asked with a benign smile on his face.
It was pretty funny seeing my adopted children's faces pass from absolutely bored to startled, seeing their guardian talk to another old person was boring in every world, not that I was old, I was at most six to eight years older than them.
Like when going shopping with your mother and you meet one of her friends, and they talk for what seems like an eternity while you only want to go home.
"They are my disciples, Xue and Zhu, kids, this is the Palace Chief of the New Moon Profound Palace."
"Actually," the elder stopped me, "I passed on the position, there was no reason for me to stay in that city and I came back here as an elder."
"I see," I replied without a second thought, not caring about their internal politics in the least.
We exchanged some final pleasantries and I said goodbye to the elder, being guided to our new residence shortly after.
And wow, it was huge.
Three floors with different rooms on each floor, I could already imagine the things that I could do with this new layout, much better than the old house.
I was somewhat close to the Profound Palace, which was something I didn't mind, they had to keep a close eye on their investment, and having a doctor close by was always good, it was also pretty close to the poorer areas of the city so that I could work on improving the lives of the common people.
They had to have given it some thought, I liked it a lot and it raised my opinion of this empire by a little, and of this supposed princess by a lot.
But I wasn't going to be the only person living here, "What do you two… think?"
Where did they go?
Why is the door open, wasn't it closed two seconds ago?
My brain did its thing and I understood.
I spaced out again, didn't I? I needed to stop that.
"Yes, you do." Replied the voice in my head.
"I know, oh so wise voice in my head!" I mumbled out loud.
"I'm not in your head, dummy, just go in already," chuckled Jasmine as she suddenly pushed me into the place from behind.
"Well, you can't blame me if you keep appearing behind me, I might think that I'm being hunted one of these days," I replied with a fake aggravated voice.
"No, you won't, and by the way, don't you think something is amiss?" She replied while looking around the entrance to the new clinic.
I already decided that the first floor was going to be the reception and patient treatment place, the second was our new living place, and the third floor was my new lab.
I needed to modernize everything, but it was going to be perfect, even better than the old clinic.
Not that it was a difficult feat with how much knowledge I gained since I opened the first clinic, but it was still progress that I had no intention of slowing down.
My research was only going to speed up.
"What's amiss?" I asked Jasmine, hoping that it was nothing serious, I was already head over heels for this place.
"They are being too accommodating with you, you're an unknown person, they definitely researched everything about you, even the person that owned that body before you, so they know that this situation is very weird, but they have also seen that your skill is real." She mumbled.
"It might be, but this world is a big and weird place, there are many possible answers," I replied.
"And the most likely is you having received an inheritance from an ancient sage," she replied, "That's what they are going to think."
"I don't think so, Xueruo has met you, who claimed to be my master-" "I am!" I was interrupted, but didn't care and kept going, "And she probably felt that you're super strong, plus, this is an Empire, surely they have historical texts, the things I do are new."
"It might be an inheritance from a different plane, or they might realize you're not the same person that had that face before all of this, an impostor wearing a different identity." She continued.
I sighed, this was going nowhere, "While I'd love to just be paranoid with you, Jasmine, I'd rather go and completely remodel this whole building, the children need a nice bed to sleep in, not the stuff they use in this world's inns."
"Disciple," a firm, but surprisingly small hand stopped me in my tracks, "there is an Earth Profound Realm cultivator watching this place."
I smirked at her, "So what? Turning this place into a fortress was already part of the plan."
hey lovelies, gimme them stones.
by the way, if there is anything specific you'd like to see just leave a comment, I read them all every time.
and of course, thanks to all of my usual commenters.
