Chapter 144: Senior Brother and Junior Brother
The two sat down, and Ba Shan Jijiu again asked about the Butcher’s health. Qin Mu said, “Everything is fine. His lower body is gone, but his cultivation is very high, and his hands move as fast as flying.”
Ba Shan Jijiu was puzzled and said, “Since we share the same master, why did you also study medicine with Yu Mian Du Wang? Is Yu Mian Du Wang also your master?”
Qin Mu nodded but did not tell him that besides the Medicine Master and the Butcher, he had other masters.
Ba Shan Jijiu was stunned, then suddenly said, “I think I know where Master’s lower body is! Back then, when he swung his blade at the sky, his body fell from the air, and it seems his lower body was snatched away by disciples of some sect. Junior Brother, you studied medicine with Yu Mian Du Wang and are highly skilled. I want to ask you, if we find Master’s lower body, can it be reattached?”
Qin Mu hesitated for a moment and said, “If it had just been severed, yes. You only need to stimulate the body’s vitality and use medicines that regenerate flesh and essence to reconnect the severed flesh, rejoin the severed tendons, and reshape the broken bones. But so much time has passed, I’m afraid his lower body is already dead…”
Ba Shan Jijiu slumped in dejection, then rallied his spirits and said, “We still have to find Master’s lower body!”
Qin Mu nodded and said, “Senior Brother, it’s best to first investigate which sect took it, to avoid targeting the wrong one.”
Ba Shan Jijiu stood up and returned after a short while, saying, “Master’s lower body was picked up over two hundred years ago. I don’t know if it’s still in that sect. I’ve already ordered people to investigate. Once we find out where it is, we’ll go and retrieve it.”
Qin Mu breathed a sigh of relief. If they could find the Butcher’s lower body, whether or not it could be reattached, it would still be a good thing.
The Butcher only had his upper body left, and his overall strength was greatly diminished. If his lower body had been taken by someone, it should still be preserved.
After all, his strength was immense.
As a master of the Combat Techniques School, reaching a state where the physical body is indestructible should not be difficult. Many enlightened monks of the Buddhist sect could achieve an indestructible body; after death, their bodies would not decay or rot and would be enshrined in temples as living buddhas.
However, the difficult part was keeping the body alive.
Those living buddhas in the temples—their bodies were actually dead. A living, undying body was a level above an indestructible one: blood does not coagulate, the body does not stiffen, the heart beats, and the nerves remain active. That is true bodily immortality.
“Senior Brother Ba Shan, do you know Butcher Grandpa’s given name?” Qin Mu recalled something and asked.
Ba Shan Jijiu shook his head. “No. I only know others call him Heavenly Blade. As for his secular name, no one knows. Master said he had an enemy who could learn a person’s name and use sorcery to harm them, so he rarely revealed his name to others.”
Qin Mu was taken aback. This sounded somewhat like the methods of the great shamans of the Man Di Kingdom. Could it be that the Butcher had once offended a great shaman from Man Di?
He calmed his mind and continued practicing the three sword techniques passed down by the Imperial Preceptor of Yan Kang. He had already mastered the Winding Sword technique and found it difficult to improve further, so he began working on the other two techniques.
Ba Shan Jijiu drank wine while watching from the side, intending to offer guidance on cultivation. But after observing for a while, he didn’t say a single word.
He had seen other scholars practice the Wandering Sword technique—some clumsy, some agile. But in Qin Mu’s hands, the Wandering Sword technique produced hundreds or thousands of sword energies that sometimes moved like schools of fish, sometimes like startled swans, sometimes like roaming dragons. The sword energies were not fixed in form; they were ever-changing.
To have such solid fundamentals and such versatility—only Qin Mu in the entire Imperial Academy could do this!
Qin Mu had practiced the Wandering Sword technique countless times, striving to unleash all his strength in a single strike.
The power of his Wandering Sword technique grew stronger and stronger, and Ba Shan Jijiu watched, forgetting to drink for a long time.
After practicing it a thousand times, Qin Mu switched to the Drilling Sword technique, again focusing on honing his basics, aiming to concentrate all his strength into the sword and unleash his full potential.
His potential was not limited to sword techniques alone. The Cripple’s footwork, the Butcher’s blade techniques, Ma Ye’s fist techniques, the Blind Man’s divine eye, the Deaf Man’s painting skills, and the Mute’s hammer techniques—all were used by him as methods to exert force.
After a long time, Qin Mu stopped, drenched in sweat. He took out the Heavenly Fragrance Handkerchief and wiped himself.
Ba Shan Jijiu suddenly said, “Junior Brother, was it you who drove away the Daozi and the Fozi?”
Qin Mu regulated his breathing and did not hide it from him. “The Daozi lost to me by half a move. As for the Fozi, I never fought him.”
Ba Shan Jijiu exhaled a turbid breath and muttered, “When I saw your sword techniques, I guessed it was you. Funny enough, were you the one who shouted ‘I’ve finally mastered turning Qi into Threads!’ during the Imperial Preceptor’s lecture on swordsmanship?”
Qin Mu’s face reddened slightly.
Ba Shan Jijiu’s expression turned strange. “You only achieved turning Qi into Threads at that moment? Then how did you defeat Ling Yun Daoren without mastering it?”
Qin Mu thought for a moment and said, “I thrust my sword out, and he was defeated.”
Ba Shan Jijiu was speechless. “What do you mean, ‘I thrust my sword out, and he was defeated’?”
Qin Mu scratched his head. “How about this, Senior Brother? Use the Five Radiance Realm to block my sword.”
Ba Shan Jijiu sealed his other divine repositories, his battle intent blazing, and shouted, “I’m ready!”
Beside them, Hu Ling’er and the Green Ox were drinking until their eyes were glazed, arguing about becoming sworn siblings. The little fox glanced at Qin Mu and Ba Shan Jijiu and snickered, “Ox, your master is about to be in trouble.”
The Green Ox grunted, “My master won’t be in trouble—”
Qin Mu picked up a piece of firewood, using it as a sword, and thrust it forward. Ba Shan Jijiu raised his hand to block, and with a thunderous boom, the door to Qin Mu’s scholar residence shattered into countless pieces, and even a large section of the wall collapsed!
Before the Green Ox could finish his sentence, he shut his mouth.
Qin Mu sheathed his sword and hurriedly ran out. Ba Shan Jijiu, covered in dust, stood up from the broken bricks and tiles, unsealed his other divine repositories, and chuckled, “I thought Ling Yun Daoren had taken a bribe! No wonder. If it were me, I wouldn’t have been able to block that either, caught off guard.”
He wasn’t injured. The piece of firewood Qin Mu had thrust into his chest was shattered into wooden splinters by his Yuan Qi, failing to harm him.
Many scholars from the scholar residences rushed out and saw that the door to Qin Mu’s courtyard had been demolished. They felt a secret satisfaction: “That bastard Qin, a disgraced one, dared to write insults about us Yan Kang scholars on his door. Now he’s gotten what he deserves! Ba Shan Jijiu personally came to tear down his door—let’s see where he can hide his face!”
Ba Shan Jijiu swept his gaze over them and waved his hand. “Disperse, disperse. Nothing to see here. I was just sparring with Scholar Qin.”
“So he really gave that Qin bastard a beating.” The scholars understood and looked at Qin Mu with schadenfreude.
To their surprise, Qin Mu was still immaculate, while Ba Shan Jijiu was covered in dust. It didn’t look like Qin Mu had been beaten; rather, Ba Shan Jijiu seemed quite disheveled.
Ba Shan Jijiu looked at the door and the collapsed wall, a bit troubled. “No wonder the Grand Jijiu said you nearly tore down the scholar residences. If you were to strike here, it wouldn’t take long to demolish them all. Your skills are extremely high, but it seems there’s a flaw in your technique—a weakness on your left shoulder.”
He didn’t deliberately lower his voice, and the scholars who hadn’t yet left heard him clearly. Their eyes lit up one by one.
“So his weakness is on his left shoulder!”
Shen Wanyun took a deep breath. He had sensed that Qin Mu’s technique seemed a bit sluggish but had never pinpointed the flaw. Now, Ba Shan Jijiu had finally pointed it out.
“Now, my position as senior brother can be secured,” he thought to himself.
“Have the servants come to repair this wall and door.”
Ba Shan Jijiu caught sight of Shen Wanyun and called him over. Shen Wanyun quickly bowed and said, “Teacher!”
Ba Shan Jijiu smiled at Qin Mu and said, “In the Imperial Academy, there are few scholars I appreciate. Shen Wanyun is one I’ve personally trained. Junior Brother, what do you think?”
Qin Mu nodded and praised, “No wonder Senior Brother Shen is so strong—it’s because you trained him. Senior Brother Shen is the senior brother of the scholar residences, with both cultivation and strength at a very high level. Once he reaches the Divine Abode Residence, he will surely shine brilliantly.”
“Senior Brother? Junior Brother?” Shen Wanyun was a bit confused.
Ba Shan Jijiu chuckled and said, “Junior Brother, why are you calling him senior brother? Call him junior nephew. If you call him senior brother, won’t that mess up our generational ranks?”
Qin Mu hesitated. Ba Shan Jijiu walked into the courtyard and continued, “I realized long ago that relying solely on the Imperial Academy to teach scholars can produce experts, but it can also waste talent. The Academy teaches too many people. For the same technique, some can learn it in one look, while others need ten or a hundred repetitions. But the Academy must treat everyone equally. Those who learn in one look have to study alongside the slow ones for a hundred repetitions. By the time the slow ones finally get it, the fast learners can only then move on to other techniques. This delays their progress.”
Qin Mu and Shen Wanyun walked into the courtyard. Ba Shan Jijiu tossed over his wine gourd and said, “I once mentioned this to the Grand Jijiu, saying that the Imperial Academy’s teaching method suits talents found one in a thousand, not those found one in a hundred thousand or a million. The Grand Jijiu told me to try it myself. So I found Shen Wanyun and taught him alone for a while. He lived up to expectations and became the senior brother of the scholar residences for several years. This shows that individual training surpasses the Academy’s methods. Shen Wanyun is exactly that kind of talent—one in a hundred thousand or a million.”
“I see.”
Qin Mu frowned and said, “But if that’s the case, how is the Imperial Academy any different from a sect?”
Ba Shan Jijiu sighed. “That’s why the Grand Jijiu and the Imperial Preceptor are troubled by this. The Grand Jijiu is about to resign, and now the one most worried about this is the Imperial Preceptor. He knows the Imperial Academy has its flaws, so he took on a few disciples himself and taught them carefully. But the geniuses held back by the Academy are likely not few in number.”
Qin Mu was stunned. What the Imperial Preceptor faced was whether to deny his own reforms, yet he couldn’t afford to deny them.
The Elementary School, Secondary School, and Imperial Academy far surpassed the sects in mass-producing talent. If they could solve the problem of nurturing geniuses, they could surpass the sects in every way!
“How does the Emperor teach the Crown Prince? When the Crown Prince is young, he has the Junior Guardian, Junior Mentor, and Junior Tutor. When he grows up, he has the Senior Guardian, Senior Mentor, and Senior Tutor. These guardians and mentors are all at the level of sect leaders or patriarchs. So, the Crown Prince trained this way becomes extremely powerful. Now, I’m trying to take on a few scholars, teaching them techniques and methods according to their aptitudes.”
Ba Shan Jijiu said, “The Grand Jijiu’s idea is that once I find the knack, it can be expanded. He said we should select the most learned and talented scholars from the student body for specialized instruction, separating them from the average scholars. Junior Brother, you are the first Imperial Academy Doctor in our Imperial Academy, Doctor Qin.”①
Note ①: The term “doctor” is not a foreign word but originated from the Warring States period, meaning a learned scholar. During the Han Dynasty, “doctor” became an official title responsible for teaching Confucian classics. In the Tang Dynasty, an Imperial Academy Doctor was a sixth-rank official. Interested readers can look it up—history is fascinating.