Chapter 7 All Roads Lead to the Same Place

A moment later a maid did come with clothes. She glanced at Xue Mu with open curiosity, hid a smile behind her hand, and asked, "There's a bath barrel upstairs. Shall this servant draw the water for the Young Master now?"

Xue Mu noticed there was a well right there in the courtyard. He waved a hand and smiled. "What sort of man makes a girl fetch his bathwater? Off you go, I'll handle it myself."

Perhaps Meng Lan had told her not to make trouble, because the maid did not insist. She left, still smiling.

He drew water from the well in the middle of the courtyard, sank himself into the barrel, and washed the weariness off.

So why come on to me...? If it wasn't a deliberate test, then there's only one other possibility—I'm the Sect Master's relative, and isn't that plenty of reason for these local disciples to cozy up? Who knows, maybe she figures she can ride the chance into running this place herself. The girl's just too eager; we barely met... The Demon Sect was the Demon Sect, after all. However lofty its martial standing, there were still times it left a man feeling... well, like that.

He idly flipped through the clothes laid out by the barrel, inner and outer garments both. The fabric felt wonderfully comfortable, and even at a glance the patterns worked into them had real beauty. Xue Mu turned them over absently, musing to himself.

The so-called four necessities—food, clothing, shelter, transport—branch out to cover a great deal. Clothing alone takes in cotton and mulberry, spinning and weaving, tailoring, dyeing, and even aesthetic design. It was easy enough to say this is the kind of world where martial strength is everything, but if nothing besides martial force was held in esteem, how had all the rest ever developed? Sometimes, reading novels, Xue Mu felt the stories had everyone shut up cultivating for dear life, and yet nobody in them ever seemed to go around without clothes.

So ever since landing in a world of this kind, Xue Mu had been watching such things closely. Not out of curiosity alone—understanding the world was the precondition for everything else. The sort who plopped down and buried his head in cultivation was the sort who walked out the door and got fleeced.

From what he had gathered so far, this world's worship of martial strength was beyond doubt, but that did not mean nothing else had developed. In his own world, antiquity revered only Confucianism; folk crafts were looked down on, yet they had advanced all the same.

Same principle.

Because wanting a better life is human nature—so long as a society is stable, people will naturally do all they can to make life more convenient. The brand-new men's ready-made clothes were proof enough.

By Xue Mu's recollection, ready-to-wear garments had not appeared in his own history until the Song dynasty, which was hardly early, and here they already existed—and in material, workmanship and cut they were not one bit behind.

So... revering letters or revering arms came to much the same thing in the end.

In his own world, some who studied letters in ancient times may have carried grand ambitions, but most were simply after fame and gain, after standing above the crowd. Was everyone in this martial world really chasing the true essence of the martial Dao, every last one of them defending the justice in his heart?

Wasn't the great majority just the same—wanting to rise above their station, wanting to live better? The martial Dao was merely one road to that end. Put another way, if some other road led to all of it, they wouldn't necessarily bother practicing at all.

Meng Lan could crush him with a single finger, and yet she had still come sidling up to flirt with him. Wasn't that the very same reasoning?

Xue Mu let out a breath and a light, easy smile surfaced. Whatever the world, all roads led to the same place.

He was still turning all this over when his vision blurred and a slender figure appeared out of thin air before him. He focused: Yue Xiaochan stood by his bath barrel, head tilted, sizing up the shoulder above the waterline, smiling in a way that was decidedly suggestive.

Xue Mu made no show of covering himself. Lounging against the side of the barrel, he said, thoroughly speechless, "I already told you I didn't get a good look back then. You really have to look your fill to even the score? Fine, fine—enjoy the view."

Yue Xiaochan propped her elbows on the rim, set her little fist under her chin, and said with a grin, "A certain someone hasn't a shred of cultivation, yet he held out against the seduction arts by sheer stubbornness. Master says she admires that restraint very much. I, on the other hand, was dying to know how you managed it, so I came specially to see whether you're carved out of wood—and look, you're obviously flesh and blood after all."

"You both knew about that? So Meng Lan really was sent by you to test me on purpose?"

"Not at all—we have no idea what she was up to... The truth is, from the moment the two of you left, Master has been quietly watching how you performed, and she's very satisfied. Congratulations. This time Master truly means to make you her accountant." Yue Xiaochan smiled. "So how did you do it? Is Meng Lan not pretty enough?"

"I have to say, aren't you two a little too sure of yourselves? That seduction art is tempting enough, granted, but it's not as though nobody under heaven can hold out. Besides, she wasn't even giving it her all, was she?"

"Our secret art is not as feeble as you imagine. What it stirs is the most instinctive craving in the human heart—it strikes straight at the soul, and willpower alone cannot fend it off. Even with Meng Lan holding back, it is all but impossible for an ordinary man with no cultivation to withstand it. Unless you carry some treasure that clears the heart and wards off evil—but you had nothing at all on you." Yue Xiaochan's eyes rolled. "Hey, you don't actually like women, do you?"

Xue Mu had no attention to spare just then for being mistaken for a cut sleeve. What flashed through his mind was the pattern on his palm. Could it be that I held out so easily not because of my battle-tested experience, but because my cheat was holding it down? He asked, testing the water, "Could it be something to do with the effects of that World-Suppressing Cauldron?"

"The World-Suppressing Cauldron does have that power—it suppresses evil and drives out demons, vast and upright, without equal under heaven." Yue Xiaochan spoke carelessly. "But it isn't yours. It won't fend off evil on your behalf."

Xue Mu drew a slow, quiet breath. So I really do have a cheat, and maybe this cheat of mine is already thick as a thigh—so far I'm only seeing the tip of the iceberg... Afraid of betraying himself, he did not dare stay on the subject. He hastily changed tack. "Hey—you're a young girl. Do you really mean to sit there and watch me get up?"

"What difference does it make? You don't like women anyway."

"I can tell you with absolute certainty that the thing I like best in this life is women." Xue Mu could not be bothered to say more. The girl isn't shy, so why should I be afraid of being looked at? He rose straight up, throwing a great splash of water.

One great spear stood tall, propping up heaven, earth, and little brother into the bargain. Yue Xiaochan's eyes nearly bulged out of her skull. She spun around in a fluster and stamped her foot. "You really did stand up! You lecher!"

"Oh? Hearing the word 'lecher' out of your mouth is a novelty." Xue Mu was rather amused. "I thought you people didn't care about that sort of thing at all."

Yue Xiaochan went quiet. She said nothing, only flung the clothes over to him.

Listening to Xue Mu towel himself dry behind her, Yue Xiaochan suddenly sighed, very softly. "If we truly didn't care about such things, why do you think I went to gouge out your eyes when we first met? Just out of cruelty?"

Xue Mu was taken aback. That sigh, appearing so suddenly from her, rang oddly against his picture of her—and her words rang odder still... He truly had trouble linking a sect that always gave off such a come-hither air with any notion of chastity, especially since they ran a brothel on top of it. But from the sound of things, had he been misunderstanding something?

All at once it came to him...

So all that flirting on the surface, and you don't actually let anyone touch you... Do you have any idea how unfair that is? Those young heroes you string along until they're bleeding out the face—of course they hate your guts...