Chapter 436: Treating Injuries
Translator: chuchutrain Editor: DavidT, Rock
Just this word, this extremely humiliating and shameful word, was spat out carelessly from Ling Tian's mouth softly, as though he didn't even use any strength. He didn't purposefully increase his volume, but this soft reply was heard clearly by the 40 to 50 odd men around. It was as though they had received an imperial pardon. All their faces immediately showed traces of joy, and in fact, gratitude instead of anger as they picked up their injured comrades and sped off.
Upon leaving some of them even bowed towards him, saying, "Thank you young noble Ling for sparing our lives, your magnanimity will be repaid!"
Looking at the group disappearing over the horizon, Ling Tian quietly stood there with a sarcastic smile on his lips as he enunciated, "This is human character!"
"Why so?" Li Xue furrowed her pretty brows as she walked to stand beside him. Looking at the scene of blood and gore, she couldn't help but feel a little nauseous, her face turning pale. While her hands were bloodied with the lives of many, such a scene was something she had never seen even in her past life.
Seeing Li Xue's condition, Ling Tian smiled as he replied, "Why don't we walk as we talk. Let's find a place to recuperate first." As he spoke, he moved forward, throwing the sword he snatched from one of the ten experts carelessly on the ground. As it landed, the sword shattered into a multitude of pieces, totally unrecognizable. This sword had no special properties imbued within it during its making, and it was sustained purely by Ling Tian's strong internal energy. Now that Ling Tian had withdrawn his energy, the sword naturally reached the end of its life, totally disintegrating!
Li Xue shot Ling Tian a look that seemed to indicate that she had other thoughts, before moving to catch up to him.
"You mentioned just now that this was human character. What do you mean by that?"
"We were originally enemies and couldn't share the same sky. But because I spared their lives, not only did they not have the dignity of a martial artist and feel humiliated, they were even thankful that they could leave and expressed their gratitude towards me. This, I find extremely interesting." Ling Tian slowly began. "I don't term this sort of warrior as a martial artist, but rather trash! This is because they don't even possess the hot-bloodedness of a farmer who tends to his fields day after day! Thus, I let them go. To have such people in the Yu Family is a good thing for us." Ling Tian let out a meaningful smile.
"What if they would rather die than retreat? What if they were those sort of strong and determined men, would you really be willing to cut them down? Or would you be in admiration of them and let them go?"
Ling Tian suddenly stopped short and turned back to stare into her eyes as he snapped, "Li Xue, you must drill this into your head. I said before that I'm no gentlemen, nor am I some great hero! These are my heartfelt thoughts! An enemy will forever be an enemy! No matter if he's some great hero or some valiant warrior, ultimately they will be people that can threaten my life! I can admire and respect them, but when it's time to kill, I will not have any intention to let them off! Doing so is akin to leaving a tumor unchecked, letting them plot against you and your loved ones! Such an enemy can be said to be the most frightening one you can find! For a bunch of cowards, you can ignore, but for a warrior, so long as you leave him with a breath of life, there's always the possibility he will inflict tremendous damage towards you one day, which will leave you with irrevocable regret!"
"Heroes pitying heroes will only ever appear in stories. If they become reality, then that would be a tragedy." Ling Tian concluded.
"Just like your past? A cripple exploding a great portion of the elites of the two biggest clans? Are you that kind of valiant warrior?!" Li Xue stuck out her tongue as she jested. During this period of time together, following the release of their heart's burdens, their topic about the past lives was not as taboo as before, and thus Li Xue dared to bring up this matter to tease him.
Ling Tian gave a meaningful smile in return. "That differs to some extent. I wasn't killed because I was meant to be used as a form of humiliation, as well as to form a bait of sorts. This was to allow those who helped me to be punished as well."
Li Xue silently thought about it, before smiling to herself.
"I was merely lamenting just now. If we had never experienced hardships and suffered, we would probably be like those people just now, running with our tails tucked between our legs." Ling Tian mused out loud. "As the saying goes, 'A portion of hard work will reap a consequent portion of benefits'. This is very reasonable, and the ancient sayings have never lied to me!"
"That's right. In this world, if you don't work hard, then you only can let others step on your pride, forever remaining at the bottom rung of the ladder." Li Xue lamented as she sighed.
"Wrong!" Ling Tian laughingly scolded. "It's not just this world, even our old Earth also had the same principles! There's no difference anywhere we go!"
"Even if you are living on the bottommost rung, you still can use effort to succeed." Ling Tian resolutely spoke. "A person's life has always been about starting from the very bottom and fighting their way up for their entire lives. While one might not always succeed, but they at least can achieve something! And that is by allowing his or her descendants to borrow from his strengths, to stand on his shoulders to reach greater heights so that one day they might extricate themselves from the bottom. So long as they work as hard, there will be a place higher up for them. Even if their children can't, grandchildren, great-grandchildren… there will be one generation which will succeed, and that's the essence of 'where there's a will, there's a way'!"
"You're trying to say that if every generation works as hard as the one before," Li Xue laughed out, "that one day, someone will stand at the top of the ladder. So long as one doesn't stop working, their future is limitless! Is that the meaning?"
"Precisely!" Ling Tian solemnly replied. "There will always be people that tell their children, 'my life is gone, all my hopes are pinned on you'. For parents like that, they have basically given up on themselves and thus are destined not to progress further. If you wish for your children to seek out a good future, you have to first start from yourself!" Ling Tian let out a sarcastic smile.
Li Xue, however, retorted, "But in every society, there will definitely be people on the lower rung."
Ling Tian assented as he laughed out, "As such, only those who succeed through putting in the effort can enjoy the fruits of their labor! For example, you and me!"
As they conversed, the two of them had long left the mountainous regions, and in front of them came the gushing of water, which revealed to be a small creek. Ling Tian nodded his head in approval as he spoke, "Here will do. I'll help you to treat your injuries."
Li Xue suddenly turned bashful, as her cheeks flamed up. "I can handle my injuries by myself!"
Ling Tian's face sank, "You might be able to treat those at your chest, but those in your left shoulder and on your back? Don't make so much noise! I still have to rely on you to treat mine later. I really dislike having scars on my body. They'll spoil this perfect body of mine that I've built up!"
Li Xue's eyes lit up as she grabbed the chance to say, "How about I'll help you treat your wounds first? After all, your injuries are more serious than mine! I… I don't really mind having scars on my body!"
"Bullsh*t!" Ling Tian scolded. "How would I not know that your injuries are more severe than mine? How long would it have to take for you to finish treating me? Can you injuries even wait that long?"
Seeing Li Xue still being stubborn, Ling Tian could only sigh and say, "Xue'er, I'm your brother!" And adding on a fierce tone, he continued, "Don't tell me you need to be so polite about me treating your injuries? Don't forget, I saw you in your birthday suit when you were young!"
Li Xue blustered with a totally red face, "That was the past! I don't have any relations with you now, I'm called Li Xue, not Xue'er!"
Ling Tian really flared up at this point. He snapped, "Stop giving me rubbish, past and present, there's no difference!" As he spoke, he unceremoniously pulled Li Xue over to him, stretching his hands out to undress her.
Li Xue let out a lovable moan, as she snapped her eyelids shut out of embarrassment.
To think that she didn't even put up a token resistance, this was totally out of Ling Tian's expectation. However, following that he started to feel as though something was seriously wrong about this!
In front of him was a girl who resembled a flower in full bloom! The moment Ling Tian saw the spotlessly white corset and faintly observed the proud and unyielding lines and peaks underneath it that would cause a person's imagination to shoot towards the high heavens, as well as touched the snow white skin, carrying a tinge of heat, passing through from his fingertips straight to his heart, his face immediately turned red as well. It was then he realized the problem.
Seeing Li Xue still with her eyes shut, and her face completely red with her body slightly trembling, Ling Tian only felt an unbearable heat slowly rise up inside his body. Blaming his own lack of self-control, he angrily gave himself a tight slap on his face, the sound echoing crisply around.
Li Xue couldn't help but open her eyes and ask, "What are you doing?"
"Nothing, just a mosquito." Ling Tian could only raggedly turn his face away and dunk a piece of clean cloth in the mountain stream. Injecting his internal energy, the surrounding water in the stream started to bubble as steam rose, and as he pulled the cloth from the water, he used his other hand to unravel the final chest wrap on Li Xue's body, causing her snow white flesh to jump and bob out!
Ling Tian swallowed his saliva with difficulty, before focusing his eyes on the bloodied wound. He forcibly restrained his emotion as he slowly dabbed on it.
With her eyes closed, Li Xue let out a comfortable sigh from her nose, and suddenly started giggling as she asked, "Tian'ge, is my body good to look at? Is it better than my previous life?!"
The calm inner mental state that Ling Tian spent so long to achieve was quickly thrown into chaos once again. A womanly scent could be smelled with every breath he took, and all of his raging desires were hooked up with a single sentence from Li Xue, almost making him unable to hold back.
Ling Tian didn't know whether he should be angry, amused, or uncomfortable, and in the end settled by slapping her pert buttocks as he exclaimed, "Behave! Don't speak nonsense!"
"So crude! Oh, I almost forgot, you've never seen my grown-up body before!" Li Xue pouted before reluctantly shutting her mouth. It was only after Ling Tian had finished treating her three slash wounds that she suddenly laughed out, snorting as she spoke, "Tian'ge, you're so cute when your face is red! It's even cuter than your past life!"