Chapter 301: The Fire in Chang’an (3)

The city was nearly rebuilt.

Of course, with so many lives lost, it would never be the same again.

Still, the fact that the flood damage had been repaired in just one month was an achievement worth recording in history books.

And much of the credit went to the so-called “Heavenly Lady,” who never seemed to rest.

She worked nonstop, and with her setting that pace, no one else could afford to slack off.

Everyone thought the same: Sure, she’s divine... but couldn’t she slow down just a little? And then they got back to work.

In just a month, the ruins gave way to rows of houses, a bit rough but with proper roofs, standing where there had been nothing.

The blood and sweat poured into that month would become a point of pride for the people of Naknyeong.

“Hey! Just when I thought you were finally settling down to study. Where are you off to now?”

“Uh... Sir, I was never really meant to be a physician—”

“Bah. You studied medicine and treated the sick. That makes you one. Here. Keep this with you and memorize it bit by bit. I’ll be quizzing you on it later.”

“Later? You think there’ll be a later?”

“Hmph. Who knows what the future holds? With how nosy you are, I have a feeling we’ll meet again.”

The old doctor clicked his tongue and slapped a medical book into her hand.

He never said it, but he’d been secretly stunned at how fast Qing picked things up.

Medical texts are full of archaic, convoluted language—most people get stuck every few pages and come running with questions.

But Qing never asked a thing.

He thought maybe she wasn’t reading them at all. But when he threw questions her way, she rattled off the answers without hesitation.

What the old man didn’t know was that Qing was already one of the most skilled anatomists in the martial world.

She knew the human body down to the last tendon, vein, and organ—how everything connected and where.

Reading medical texts with that background made her understanding ten times faster than normal.

Of course, not knowing that, the old man simply thought, What a waste of talent. At the very least, I should give her a book.

Had she been born a man, he would’ve followed her around to train her into a real physician.

But fate had played a cruel trick—she was a woman.

No matter how talented, a woman could only ever be a low-tier healer. She’d never be recognized as a full-fledged doctor.

The same man who’d once wandered as a free healer had now, suddenly, become just another average Central Plains male.

Still, in fairness, for a crusty old man, giving a medical book to a woman was practically revolutionary.

If Ximen Surin had been here, she’d have torn out his beard and then lectured him.

But Qing? She didn’t think much of it.

He was a respected elder who’d spent his life helping others. He taught, so she learned.

Somehow, through circumstances, she’d ended up playing apprentice.

But she’d always been a fighter, not a healer.

“You’re doing fine, but try losing the ego. You announce your name every time you do something—‘This is from Ximen Qing, special service from Ximen Qing, house number one built by Ximen Qing’—really?”

“Ah... well, I had my reasons.”

In truth, she had said those things constantly.

“This meal’s on Ximen Qing.”

“This diagnosis is a special favor from Ximen Qing.”

“This is house number one, two, three, and four—all by Ximen Qing.”

And yes—she had done it on purpose.

Because she’d let some of the bandits get away.

Ideally, she’d have wiped them out completely.

But she couldn’t chase down every last insect flying in different directions on her own.

That useless freeloader Seol was too busy getting her ass kicked to help.

And then she’d left the young noble’s corpse lying in plain sight.

Whether it was the Green Forest or some other gang, revenge was already a given.

So she made sure everyone knew her name, loud and clear—I’m the one you’re looking for. Don’t take it out on anyone else.

If she’d known more about the Green Forest, she would’ve tossed the corpse off a cliff or hidden it better.

But Qing didn’t even grasp the fact that officially organized bandit factions existed in the world.

The ones she’d met had been the kind that vanished the moment she flexed her aura—clowns, really.

She’d underestimated them.

If they wanted revenge, fine.

Let them come crawling to her.

Free targets delivered to her door? Sounds like a win.

Still, just in case they decided to harass the townspeople, she made sure everyone knew: I did it.

And so, in Naknyeong, a full-blown cult of personality sprang up—Divine Lady Qing.

Thanks in no small part to the subtle propaganda campaign by agents of a certain shadowy organization.

The stories painted her as a messianic figure who’d one day lead the people to salvation when the world collapsed—a twisted version of millennial religious belief, tailored to match the cult’s doctrine.

Qing hadn’t intended it that way, of course.

But in the end, she’d laid the foundation, raised the pillar, and paved a grand highway for their conquest.

A massive, grotesque act of accidental collaboration.

And naturally, her karmic virtue skyrocketed.

She’d helped an evil plan succeed and gained heavenly points for it.

A cunning and thoroughly wicked woman.

“Oh, my lady... When will these poor eyes once again behold such dazzling beauty? I, Geol Taran, now understand what it means to feel my organs torn from grief...”

“Geez. Anyway, thanks for everything. I guess I had a pretty comfortable stay—well, did I?”

Thinking about it, not really.

She hadn’t eaten a single lavish meal during the flood crisis—

Not because she couldn’t, but because she refused.

Geol Taran had offered to throw banquets three times a day, but she waved it off.

How could I feast when the people are starving?

She spent her days working on construction, treating patients, taking care of Seol Iri, and reading medical texts late into the night.

The bed had been luxuriously soft, at least, and after all that exhaustion, she did sleep like a log.

“Anyway. Thanks for treating me like royalty when I just showed up out of nowhere.”

“Hrrgh... ngh...”

That was when Geol Taran finally failed to hold back his tears.

“What is it now?”

“For someone like me to receive such honor... sniff... I’m so grateful... so, so grateful...”

Geol Taran was a good man. Just a little... off.

He’d gotten teary every time she said thank you for the past month.

Eventually, Qing just chalked it up to him being a weirdo.

Funny how you get used to people like that—so used to it that even the weird starts to feel normal.

“Hah... Anyway, once you get to Chang’an, you can stay at the Sun & Moon Couriers.”

“Sun and Moon? That some place connected to the old man?”

Geol Taran had his answer ready.

“Not exactly. But our company doesn’t work alone. Since we don’t have our own distribution network yet, we’ve partnered with them—basically like sworn brothers. They’ll treat you as an honored guest.”

“Sure, that’s fine.”

Qing didn’t know anything about trade networks.

Hell, she didn’t know much about anything, let alone business.

She just figured Sun and Moon was some friendly courier company they got along with.

Honestly, a name like Sun and Moon Couriers sounded a bit too on-the-nose for a secret cult...

But Qing wouldn’t know.

She didn’t know Sun and Moon Sect from White Lotus or Heavenly Demon Cult.

Didn’t even care.

When she left Naknyeong, the whole town turned out to see her off.

Her carriage had been upgraded to something truly fancy.

And among the horses pulling it, she recognized one of them—the clever little guy with the familiar spot on his rear flank.

Just like that, Qing left the city behind.

Before the cult had even begun its full-scale invasion of the Central Plains under the banner of “benevolent reform,” they’d already cornered the luxury transport market.

So the ride? Silky smooth.

Qing sat down with a sigh.

Seol Iri climbed up right beside her, taking the seat as if it were hers by birthright.

...Huh? Why sit here?

Seol Iri’s intentions were simple.

It was mid-August now.

The peak of summer heat.

And Seol Iri was, without a doubt, one of the most heat-sensitive people in the land.

What passed for a cold day in the Central Plains was like springtime back home in the North.

So summer here felt like being locked in a sauna.

But Qing’s hands were cold.

So Seol Iri grabbed one, wiped the sweat off her forehead with it, wrapped it around her wrist, and then pressed it to the back of her neck.

The image of a proud, righteous heroine using demonic ice arts to survive the summer—well, a mostly useless one, anyway.

Of course, if Seol Iri felt cooler, it meant Qing felt the heat from her touch.

Qing opened her mouth to say something... but stopped.

The poor girl was practically melting.

She looked less like a person and more like someone had dragged a fountain into the carriage.

You could slap her and it’d probably go squelch squelch.

“Hey. If it’s that bad, just use your ice technique—”

“I need to conserve energy. Just in case of an ambush.”

“What? The driver works for our people. You can relax.”

“No. I can’t.”

Qing gave up right there.

The girl was stubborn as steel cable.

Not my problem. She’s the one sweating to death.

If she wanted to endure the heat to save energy, so be it.

Qing didn’t overheat easily anyway, thanks to her own internal energy technique.

She opened the window and let the air blow in...

Well, it was hot air.

Maybe she should use her own technique for cooling? Wait—

Suddenly, something occurred to her.

Why doesn’t it work on me? When I use the ice technique, I don’t feel any cooler.

“Wait. How come you feel cooler when you use yours? I thought these techniques don’t actually cool the user down.”

“It’s... the Pathetic Heart Technique.”

“The ‘Pathetic Heart Technique’? That’s seriously the name of your martial art?”

“Yes. That’s right.”

Qing’s tone was naturally condescending now.

And Seol Iri, at some point, had just gotten used to it. She accepted it like it was normal.

The Pathetic Heart Technique wasn’t some fancy secret art—it was a survival method.

And not a joke. The Ice Palace, where Seol was from, was a place so harsh, most people wouldn’t survive a single winter.

Even the natives of the North Sea didn’t actually live on the ice.

They lived on what little land existed, and when the worst of winter came, they migrated south.

When the cold lessened, they’d go back up. It was a constant cycle.

But the people of the Ice Palace lived year-round on the frozen tundra.

This technique was how they survived that.

Originally, it wasn’t meant to cool the body but to preserve heat—to regulate body temperature and stop people from freezing to death.

To put it in Qing’s hometown terms: it’s like putting a fridge in the Arctic and discovering the inside’s warmer than outside.

“Hmm. Blue aura.”

Seol Iri turned and looked at her, puzzled.

“What does that even mean?” was written all over her face.

Qing simply ignored her. That was her way of saying, mind your business.

“But it looks nice...”

“Want me to teach you?”

“...Wait, seriously? You can?”

“Probably.”

So, not entirely sure.

“‘Probably’ isn’t an answer.”

“I’m still learning.”

“Can you say a full sentence for once?”

The North liked to think of itself as having its own martial world—its own “Murim.”

People in the Central Plains would scoff at that.

A couple of minor sects banding together? Hardly worthy of the name.

Still, aside from the Ice Palace, the North had its own collection of martial sects.

And every single one of them trained in the Pathetic Heart Technique.

So, it wasn’t technically exclusive to the Ice Palace, nor representative of Northern martial arts as a whole.

In fact, calling it a martial art at all was generous.

Outside the North, it had one function: cooling you down.

It didn’t build much inner strength, barely accumulated energy, and even at its peak, the “ice aura” it generated was lukewarm at best.

It wasn’t combat—just a survival skill, a basic necessity in the North.

“Alright then, teach me. Starting with the breathing pattern.”

“Yes. Okay.”

Seol Iri obediently demonstrated the technique’s breathing and energy control sequence.

Qing folded her legs and began to mimic it.

“Can you let go of my hand for a second? If you’re hot, just use your own technique for a bit.”

“No. I mean... yes. No.”

And with that, Qing officially learned the Pathetic Heart Technique.

The aura that formed around her was light blue—non-threatening, easy to control—and she leveled it up to full mastery in no time.

She could now feel a tiny, almost laughable pool of inner energy settle into her core.

As expected, the technique was garbage for actual cultivation.

Curious, Qing tested it out and drew up her energy.

Of course, she was no beginner.

Thanks to her mastery of the Muscle-Bone Cleansing Sutra, her energy channels were like highways—wide, clear, and strong enough for two freight wagons to race through side by side.

Any energy she lacked was easily supplemented with her Jade Maiden Energy or the demonic Ice Demon Force she carried.

The result?

She became a walking air conditioner.

A cool, soothing aura spread from her body, cascading outward.

“...Haaahhh...”

A deep, involuntary sigh of pleasure escaped her lips.

In the middle of August, the sensation of cold air seeping into your clothes like a breeze through silk—

Anyone would groan.

The chill slipping under her collar, brushing down her spine... Qing hated to admit it, but God, it felt good. Like she was about to—

No. Not saying that out loud.

And then someone else couldn’t resist.

“...Haaah...”

Seol Iri immediately pressed up against her.

Wet. Overheating. Suddenly unbearable.

Qing’s face scrunched in annoyance.

“Why don’t you use the damn ice technique? I’m hot too, you know.”

“I can’t.”

“Oh, come on. Why? What are you saving your energy for?”

“Next time... I’ll protect you.”

That shut Qing up.

Goddamn it. Why was that touching?

Like one of those my child has changed! heartwarming moments.

Apparently, Seol Iri was enduring the heat, sweating bullets, all to conserve her internal energy—just in case she needed to protect Qing.

It was a sweet sentiment.

Ineffective, given her actual combat ability, but sweet nonetheless.

At the very least, the thought was there.