It's An Accident!
The spring sun was up in the sky, shining through the Tang Clan's manor with its bright ever-encompassing light. Without realizing it, the day has already gone by and now it's the middle of noon.
During this time of the day, the true beauty of the place shone like a true gem.
Every single building from every corner of the city was bustling with people as the day got busy. Whether it be restaurants, smithies, inns, or every other place, it was filled to the brim with all kinds of people. Coupled with the beauty of the buildings around, it formed a picturesque scene that looked as if it came straight out of a painting. The Chengdu City truly was not called one of the most popular places of the Justice Faction for nothing.
Men and women, young to old, were roaming around the broad streets of Chengdu City as they went about their business. Some merchants were walking around selling their goods, some mercenaries were gathering at the restaurants as they shared their tales and stories, women sat back below the willow trees as they whispered the city's recent gossip while children ran along the bridges, looking at the enormous river flowing in between. It was a busy day just like any other.
In the middle of everything, Old Jiang was walking through the rowdy crowd, carrying a small bag packed with herbs. His long white hair fluttered with the spring winds as his gentle eyes scanned the surroundings.
Just a moment ago, he went outside to report to the patriarch of the Tang Clan, Tang Hwi, about Tang Soso's recent recovery. This was supposed to be a joyful occasion that anyone would be extremely happy about. Yet at this moment, Old Jiang's face was filled with a worried expression...
Sigh...
'To think that the patriarch only nodded at the news of the Young Miss' recovery before dismissing it immediately... At first, I thought he would be much more delighted when I reported to him about the Young Miss' recent recovery, but... it seems to be much more complicated than that.'
The more he thought about what happened just a moment ago, the more bitter he felt about the current situation. His slight frown only managed to contort deeper as he thought about the previous moment. It was more than clear that Jiang Sam was upset about this.
Initially, he wanted to report this news of Tang Soso's recovery as soon as possible so that she might receive some help to boost her recovery. After all, the power that the Patriarch, Tang Soso's father currently holds was extremely huge. Jiang Sam was pretty sure that if he were to simply give out the order, Tang Soso would be moved into a way better place and be served by dozens of servants who were many times more competent than him. If that were to happen, Tang Soso's recovery would also be many times faster than now and everyone would be happy.
Currently, Old Jiang couldn't even access the medicine storage that the Tang Clan possesses. Both he and Tang Soso were given the cold treatment and were only given the bare minimum to manage to keep on living their lives. If the Patriarch were to give them some help, this would all change for the better.
But for some unknown reasons, the Patriarch decided not to help her. He immediately dismissed Old Jiang and slammed the door of his office right in front of him.
Old Jiang was extremely confused about this. He was sure he could see some trace of worry in the Patriarch's expression when he delivered this news, but his actions were indicating otherwise.
Was it just simply an act to be seen as someone who cares about his family? After all, how could a father just abandon her daughter like this? Thus, there must be some other reason that he didn't know about.
'Although he seems to care very much about her, it seems like there's not much he can do to help her. My guess is that it was due to the clan's internal pressure. Ever since the Young Miss locked herself in her room, she has not done anything to further improve herself, let alone contribute to the clan. Such a thing does not bode well with the main pillars of the Tang Clan, such as the elders, and it seems like their evaluation of her will only get worse as time goes on. Right now, she was already looking like a burden to the clan.'
'If Tang Hwi had decided to help her, then it would make others question his position within the clan because his decisions would be seen to come from selfish reasons.' he thought as his hand crumpled into a fist.
His gaze slowly darkened as he continued to walk down the streets...
'This is bad... at this point, the Young Miss will lose all support from the clan and be demoted to an ordinary clan member...!'
It was more than clear to him that the Young Miss' position and life in the clan was in danger. All elders and heirs are starting to eye her by now and were just a few steps before preying on her life. Even he knows that her current situation is really dangerous.
Of course, Old Jiang wanted to do his best to help Tang Soso, but in the end... he was just a mere servant. His position within the clan was only slightly higher than ordinary people and as someone who came from a humble origin, there was not much going on in his head. There was simply no way someone higher up within the clan would listen to him, let alone help him to solve this problem. Now, he could only let the feelings of frustration and helplessness rampage in his heart as he watched things unfold.
'Oh, Young Miss. I truly wish that there were more ways that I could help you with, but my abilities are extremely limited... I helped you the best I could, and now it is up to you whether or not things will change. I hope your heart can take this harsh reality and move on...!' he muttered from the bottom of his heart.
As he slowly neared Tang Soso's residence, the bustling of the crowd slowly dimmed down and now only his inner voice could be heard. The more he sympathizes with Tang Soso, the more he remembers her expression filled with despair when other people started ostracizing her around a year ago. It wasn't always like this.
Looking up toward the cloudy sky, Old Jiang starts to reminisce about his first time meeting his Young Miss ten years ago when she still had a huge smile on her face. Playing around near the city along with other kids as she was showered with love. Just like how a child was supposed to be treated...
'How different it was back then...'
But thinking back upon reality, he simply sighed once again.
'Well, at least I can still obtain some money from the treasury to buy a few healing herbs. I think these should be enough to boost the Young Miss' recovery by a bit...' he consoled himself with a sigh.
With that, he continued to slowly march down back toward the Young Miss' residence.
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After ten or so minutes, he finally arrived.
On the very edge of the clan lies a small residence that looks extremely worn down, unlike the others. Small puddles of water were present in the surrounding yards due to the massive rain that occurred last night and judging by how wet the outer floors of the residence were, it was clear that this residence was extremely unkempt, unlike the others. Furthermore, the abnormally large amount of willow trees surrounding it made this residence feel rather eerie and unapproachable.
This was Tang Soso's residence, the furthest part of the Tang Clan that was isolated and restricted from most of the clan's population.
Jiang Sam strides with calmness as he slowly approaches the door of Tang Soso's room. He slowly walked through the rough terrain while avoiding most puddles around the area. After a few seconds, he made it toward the door and knocked on it.
TOK TOK TOK...
After a brief knock, a sudden sound of chaos and furniture crashing suddenly reached his ears. It sounds as if an earthquake is going on in Tang Soso's room. Weird, was the Young Miss in a hurry or something?
Without waiting for any confirmation, he barged through and slid the door open with a loud creak...
"..."
Old Jiang's eyes went wide open when he saw a spectacular scene.
Chairs and piles of books were scattered around her room as if an explosion had just happened recently. What was first a mess of a room turned into an even worse mess that would give even the most experienced servant a massive headache.
He saw Tang Soso still half-naked stumbling across her room in a hurry while putting on her white robe. Not to mention, her body was covered in some strange black filth that stained her white clothes, depriving them of any chance of recovery.
All of a sudden, an intense smell of excrement hit his nose making his face implode in disgust. The smell was so intense that it nearly made him puke out his recent lunch, and it was clear that this smell came out of that black stuff sticking on her clothes that she tried so hard to hide from him. Moreover, he could even see that there was some trace of this black stuff on the wooden floor below as if it was just cleaned up recently in a hurry. Anyone with a sane mind could tell that this won't be so easy to clean up.
[ I can explain. ] she hurriedly wrote on her signboard while chuckling nervously.
What on earth just happened while he was away...?
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A few moments ago,
Tang Soso stared at the filth that surrounded her in a worried expression. Although she was feeling euphoric after her first session of cultivation, her bedroom wasn't looking as great. Liquid impurities were still present on the surrounding floor and it was even slowly spreading across the room. How is she going to get rid of these without causing some misunderstandings?
'Uh... I messed up. I didn't expect this small body to contain that many impurities... It's even spreading everywhere! It seems like this is the reason why the original Tang Soso has always struggled to improve her physique...'
'Even a fifth of the total amount of these impurities could clog a martial master's meridians, not allowing them to improve their martial arts any further. Just how hard did this young girl work to be able to obtain her meager strength in the first place? Had she been born a little luckier and had a purer body, I'm sure she would have been the strongest genius of the Tang Clan already...' she pondered in her mind.
After getting a feel around the state of her room and making the mistake of taking another whiff of breath, her face immediately scrunched up in disgust. She must get rid of this black filth ASAP. Not a single soul must see the current state of her and her room!
After she concluded in her mind, she decided to get to work right away. However, at this time, a sound could be heard right behind the door.
Tok tok tok...
"!"
Tang Soso's heart immediately dropped as she heard that sound. Shock and perplexion riddled her face and both of her pupils immediately dilated out of fear. All traces of blood were immediately drained out of her face as her heart races into panic. Old Jiang is already here!
Uh oh.
'Crap, crap, crap! Why does it have to be now!? I-I need to put on my clothes... Uh... where was it again!?' she screamed in her mind as her body immediately moved as fast as it could.
Her slender arms shot toward the only piece of clothing that she remembered dropping before cultivating the Heavenly Martial God Divine Art. Had she known this would happen she would have done it way later in a secluded place!
'Ah! Right here! But this soft feeling... it feels like an expensive robe... and my body is full of... Ugh, it's fine! A small price to save my dignity!'
Without thinking, Tang Soso immediately put the soft robe on her body. She could feel the lingering dark liquid on her skin making contact with the robe, making it damp and staining it. The feeling of ickiness immediately scratched the back of her mind and sent shivers down her spine. How disgusting!
But hey, this small inconvenience is way better than exposing her new pearl-white body to some random servant she just met!
TOK TOK TOK!
"Young Miss? Are you still there?"
...
'Hiieeek! He's going to come in...! I have no time, I should also clean the rest!' her mind screamed in panic.
'Now, these black puddles... let's just shove them under the bed and hope it won't leak out...'
Stumbling around the room, Tang Soso immediately got to work as she multitasked in order to cover the recent mess she made in her room. Her feet moved like lightning as she shoved the puddle of black liquid under the bed, while her hands were holding the loose white robe in place in hopes that the loose robe didn't accidentally slip due to her shrunken figure. But it was in vain, the bottom part of the robe would occasionally snuck under her soles, making her trip over from time to time and undoing her progress of putting it on.
Due to this, she stumbled upon the surrounding furniture multiple times and thus causing some loud chaotic sounds, and crashed some fragile things around that she had no idea about.
All of this was done in under ten seconds!
But to her dismay, before she was done hiding everything, the creaking sound of the door being opened was heard...
Fear and panic were displayed on her face as she slowly turned toward the door. Tang Soso was currently wearing her robe just halfway up and some of her skin was still somewhat exposed. By the time Old Jiang landed his eyes upon the room, the remaining puddle of black stuff was not as evident for anyone to see. The only thing that Old Jiang's eyes could land on was her, with her body and robe covered in filth and panicked expression. To him, it was evident who the culprit of this decrepit smell was.
She could feel Jiang Sam's presence right at the door, staring at her in complete disgust. Tang Soso could only chuckle nervously at the sight of this.
[ I can explain. ]
"Young Miss... if you had needed to go to the bathroom, you should have told me long ago... I can't believe you decided that shitting yourself was a good idea..." Old Jiang muttered as he gagged.
[ YOU GOT IT WRONG! I DIDN'T! ]
"Yeah, yeah. I'm sure you didn't. I'll just... take my leave!" as he said that Jiang Sam left the small bag that he carried and ran out of the room.
'NOOOOOOO!!!!'
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Jiang Sam was a poor man. He didn't get paid enough to do any of this.
At this moment, he was running away with all his might through the road outside the small residence of his Young Miss. He could feel the bright sun flashing through his aged face as the spring wind blew along his servant robe. He was running away from a certain someone that is terrorizing him to his very core. In fact, this certain someone is right on his tail at the moment. Even with the winds blowing around, he could still smell the sharp, putrid stench following him as sweat started to drip down his cheeks.
Old Jiang turned around...
"Oh heavens... she's still here!"
He could still see her. A small girl with a pale complexion and sharp eyes sprinted with the wind, tailing Old Jiang like a ferocious hawk. Her long raven hair fluttered with the wind as her stained white robe spread a putrid stench like there was no tomorrow. Her expression was still full of desperation and her face was still flushed with embarrassment...
It was Tang Soso!
[ STOP RIGHT NOW! PLEASE! LET ME EXPLAIN! ]
Jiang Sam who was still running could only look at her with riddled eyes...
'What the hell is wrong with the Young Miss!? We have been running like this for the past three minutes and must have gone through more than five hundred meters...! She should've been running out of breath long ago due to her sickly body. Yet, she's still keeping up with me... no, she's catching up to me!' he pondered in his mind.
He really doesn't want to be caught by her. He really doesn't want to be bothered with cleaning up all that mess, especially her clothes!
At this moment, Old Jiang got slightly distracted by his own thoughts and his speed fell by a tiny margin. Tang Soso who was just a few meters behind Old Jiang caught wind of this small difference and took a deep breath.
It's a chance!
SWOOSH!
Within the span of less than a second, she crouched slightly in her position as her sharp eyes locked onto Jiang Sam's running figure. All of a sudden, she made an enormous leap as her figure flew in the air. The air current around her embedded and swept, supporting her small figure as she glided through the wind at twice the speed before.
Immediately, she caught up to Old Jiang and locked his wrist within her small hands, clutching it tightly.
"HMM!?"
Old Jiang could only stare with wide eyes at what had just happened. The feeble Young Miss that he had worked so hard to serve due to her sickly body just ran with an unbelievable speed that even surpassed his, a martial artist, even though he was holding back quite a bit!
Did he accidentally feed her some miraculous elixir during one of her meals or something? Or maybe she gained an enlightenment during her time in a comatose state? Or maybe it has something to do with the god-forsaken stench that she was covered in just then?
How in the world did she gain such strength!?
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Tang Soso quietly looked at the perplexed expression of his servant with a huge sigh of relief.
After locking Old Jiang's wrist with her small hands, both of them immediately stopped their movements and stood right at their spots. The road around them has widened a lot compared to a few minutes before and the presence of willow trees has diminished by a bit, signifying that they have left the area of her residence and were only a few distances away from the main clan.
She finally managed to catch him before he could get away any further. That was... extremely embarrassing if not humiliating. This servant just witnessed her at the worst time possible and misunderstood everything going on. If she had let him go at that moment, god knows what sort of rumor would have spread about her. Her already terrible image would sink even further into the abyss and she would have no way of recovering so. She knows that he's on her side... But still though. She will definitely need to do some explaining to him.
But other than that, she was more happy about her increase in power, even if it was just a little.
'Well, it's not bad, I guess... The internal energy that I absorbed through cultivation earlier seems to give me quite a bit of strength. At least right now, I should be able to handle most third-rate martial artists on my own...' she pondered as she reviewed her chase earlier.
After thinking for a moment, Tang Soso gave Old Jiang a slight glance. Suspicion and curiosity flashed in her eyes...
'But I also wonder... This guy was extremely fast... too fast for a mere servant! I could also sense that he was holding back quite a bit when I chased him. Is he also a martial artist?'
'Huh... Whatever. Judging by his actions and his tone of speech for the past few days, he seems to hold no malicious intentions toward me. I'll still look it up later, but right now I'm sure it won't be a problem!'
Tang Soso swiftly grabbed her signboard from her back and wrote some words on it.
[ It was the impurities! The impurities from my body suddenly leaked out and stained my body along with my room's floor! I swear it has nothing to do with what you are currently imagining! ]
As Old Jiang read Tang Soso's words that were written hurriedly. After reading what she wanted to say, he looked up to her flushed face and observed her expression. He could see some sort of desperation in her expression, but also... honesty. Old Jiang's gaze softened a little after realizing this.
"Is that so? How... did these impurities suddenly leak out just like that?"
[ I will explain to you what had just happened, but as you can see, I really need some cleaning. Look at this robe... ]
As she said those words, she twirled around showcasing Old Jiang the terrible state of her robe. Old Jiang simply sighs as he accepts his fate.
"Alright, Young Miss. There's no such thing as a bath in your residence, but I can help you prepare some tub and warm water. Just so you know, I am not cleaning that filthy robe of yours..."
[ Please clean it. ]
"..."