Chapter 1388 — Found It At Last! Elder Yu had not dared to go in at first; but seeing Wei Zhao stride in so brazenly and come to no harm, he followed him inside. What gnawed at him beyond all bearing, though, was that this single venture had not only left him without posterity but cost him an eye besides - a wretched loss, and no mistake!

The wounds on his hands and feet were easy enough to recover from; but with his manhood run through and his eyes poisoned blind, recovery would be another matter altogether.

There was nothing remarkable about this stone chamber. It seemed to be a bedchamber: a bed, a table, a small cabinet, and a few simple articles of daily use, as though it were the very place where its master had lived out his days.

If Wei Zhao's guess was right, these collection rooms and this stone chamber had all been fashioned after the places Zhang Liju had inhabited in life, the objects and furniture inside being just what they had been then. Zhang Liju had passed his entire life without son or daughter and without a disciple, alone to the very end; yet the number of people to whom he had shown kindness was beyond all counting, and naturally someone had stepped forward and paid to raise this ancient tomb for him.

On the wall of the room was written a single line: "A fellow devotee of the healing art can draw out the poison himself; a gentleman of the beam has no cure."

Reading the words on the wall, Wei Zhao could not help a bitter smile. Perhaps this was nothing more than Zhang Liju's small punishment dealt out to tomb robbers.

Or perhaps this little contrivance had always stood in Zhang Liju's own house. Fellow professionals and old friends who came to call were, naturally, his dearest intimates and knew how to set the poison right; but as for those gentlemen of the beam, they could only go blind, repent, and find themselves another trade.

Elder Yu stared at the writing on the wall, quivering with fury; but the master of the tomb had long been dead, and there was no one left to hold to account. How does one quarrel with a dead man?

Wei Zhao let his gaze travel once around the room, and at last it came to rest on a small box at the head of the little bed. He could not help but be amused: this Zhang Liju was truly a match for the old man back home.

At the head of the old man's bed there stood just such a little wooden box, holding a few odds and ends - paper, brushes, reading glasses and the like, the usual trifles. And, of course, the old man kept a set of medical practice notes too, right in that box!

So without a word Wei Zhao walked straight to the bed, took the box down and opened it. Sure enough, two books lay quietly inside, together with a few common little things. One supposed that brush, ink, paper and inkstone had not been so simple in ancient times and were not easy to stow away in a chest, which was why there were none here.

Of the two books in the box, one was thick and one was thin.

The thick one was the medical practice notes!

A flush of excitement rose across Wei Zhao's face. Found at last! The medical practice notes - and in them, surely, word of the Fire Spirit Sacred Fruit!

The whole purpose of this expedition had been Zhang Liju's medical practice notes, and now at last they were found; how could Wei Zhao not be thrilled!

He smiled to himself: at last there was hope!

Wei Zhao nearly could not keep himself from leaping up and shouting hurrah three times; even a man as capable of self-possession as Wei Zhao could not stop his body trembling with excitement!

Still, so as not to betray too obvious an emotional波动, Wei Zhao held himself in check for the time being.

The thinner volume, however, gave Wei Zhao a moment's blank start: Notes of an Alchemist's Experience? What was this?

At that very moment Elder Yu too caught sight of the two books in Wei Zhao's hands, and reached out to snatch them.

Elder Yu might be an expert of the Earth tier, but Wei Zhao's reflexes were quicker than his; and Wei Zhao had all along been watching Elder Yu's every movement. This was a book of incomparable importance to him - how could he possibly let Elder Yu wrest it away?

"What? You want to snatch it? Once I've copied it, I'll naturally hand it over," Wei Zhao said coolly.

"What's that other book in your hand? Let this old man have a look." By now Elder Yu did not care a fig for the medical practice notes; his eyes were fixed on the alchemist's notebook in Wei Zhao's hand!

The medical practice notes were nothing more than an optional trifle to Elder Yu. The Yu family had merely hoped to find something alchemical in them; but now that the alchemist's notebook had appeared, the medical practice notes suddenly seemed much less important!

As for the medical lore contained in them, neither Elder Yu nor the Yu family cared much about it.

"Some alchemist's notebook - it isn't what you want. What are you staring at it for?" Wei Zhao had not the slightest intention of surrendering the alchemist's notebook to Elder Yu.

In truth, Wei Zhao had been every bit as astonished when he saw the book. Elder Yu had earlier explained at such length how formidable alchemists were and what advantages they enjoyed, and Wei Zhao had been green with envy; now he had happened upon just such an alchemist's notebook - how could he fail to make it his own?

If Wei Zhao did not keep it, he would be a fool. And as for letting Elder Yu take it - that was entirely out of the question. One snatch makes a robbery and two make no difference; if it came to a head-on clash, who was afraid of whom?

"Hiss -" Elder Yu drew a sharp breath through his teeth. He had not expected it really to be an alchemist's notebook! Originally his plan had been simplicity itself: once inside the tomb, he would use the Qi-Gathering Pill and the medical practice notes as decoys to throw these people off, then quietly locate the alchemist's notebook and slip it into his own pocket.

In Elder Yu's earlier reckoning, for a man of his Earth-tier standing this should have been no great difficulty. But the moment he entered the ancient tomb he realized that the perils within had surpassed all his imagining; worse, he had the feeling of being led by the nose by Wei Zhao. All these things had been found by Wei Zhao - to expect to discover them for himself was simply too hard!

Elder Yu had underestimated the trap-work of the tomb and overestimated what his Earth-tier prowess could achieve inside it; and so he now found himself bitten by bitter regret. Had he only known, he thought, how much better it would have been to say everything at once when Wei Zhao had pressed him with questions! And he had gone and held things back. Now look at it: the fellow had found them and would not hand them over, and he himself could do not a thing about it - who but himself was to blame for not asking for this in the first place?

Elder Yu forced down the urge to charge over and seize them. For one thing, they were inside an ancient tomb; to come to blows with Wei Zhao over nothing would do him no good, and he might still need this tomb-robbing thief's help to walk out of the place in one piece. If he injured Wei Zhao or got him killed, he need never think of getting out either.

For another, Elder Yu's own wounds had not yet properly healed. If he fought now, he might fail to finish Wei Zhao off and instead be blown to bits by the desperate man - a poor bargain indeed.

So Elder Yu swallowed his anger and said to Wei Zhao: "Youngster, what would you say to a bargain between the two of us?"

"What bargain?" Wei Zhao blinked, at a loss to know what hare-brained scheme Elder Yu was about to produce next.

"That set of medical practice notes - this old man doesn't want it; it's yours. But that alchemist's notebook in your hand, how about giving it to me?" Elder Yu said. "Just take it as this old man trading his medical practice notes for it!"

"..." Wei Zhao stared at Elder Yu in blank astonishment, at a complete loss for words. The things this old man could come out with were truly world-shocking and startling to all; he could say absolutely anything. Such a breathtakingly generous exchange offer really opened Wei Zhao's eyes!

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