Rebirth of an Idle Noblewoman

“What’s the matter with you guys?” asked Wei Xu upon noticing the three of them, sitting there in silence the moment he came in, which surprised him, to say the least.

Then, shifting his gaze over to Gu Xiqiao, his face became flushed with excitement.

Gu Xiqiao smiled back at him before she peered down at her phone. She then said to Zhuge Yan and the rest of them, “Let’s go. I want to bring you guys to a special place.”

Zhuge Yan took in a deep breath and tried as hard as he could to calm his mind down. He stopped himself from asking where their destination was.

As soon as the four of them exited the front door, they would discover that a black car was already waiting for them outside.

Standing next to the vehicle was a tall man, who was staring down at his phone. Perhaps his ears picked up the sound of their footsteps, as he peered up slightly in their direction as they made their way towards him, revealing that pair of ink-dark eyes of his.

“Do you guys have a car of your own?” Gu Xiqiao stopped in her tracks and asked Zhuge Yan.

Wei Xu answered immediately, “Yes we do! Wait a second Miss Gu! I’ll be back with it in a jiffy!”

The car he was referring to was a gift to them by the second elder. Wei Xu’s footsteps were brisk. Zhuge Yan grinned to himself when he saw how hasty that man was. As expected of Gu Xiqiao’s die-hard fan.

For the past few days, he had either been staring at the Gu Xiqiao’s little screen, or he had been talking to Wei Chenyan over at the Mountain Range of Death.

The two cars made their way swiftly towards the highway which led straight into the ancient martial arts world.

“Brother Jiang, you still remember how to drive?” asked Gu Xiqiao with a raised brow as she sat in the front passenger seat.

Jiang Shuxuan shot her a brief glance silently. “… I got Yi Bing to teach me the two days ago.”

“…”

The cars finally rolled to a stop outside the medical laboratory.

It was one that was built through a joint-project between Nine Heavens and Tang Enterprise. It was filled with top-of-the-line medical equipment and contained research data that was far beyond what any other medical institution was capable of producing. In short, such a place was the wet dream of many medical scientists across the globe.

“Why are we here?” asked Wei Xu quietly upon parking his car.

Wei Xi inhaled deeply before responding to his question. “To cure someone of his illness.”

Cure? Who? The young master?

No way! Wei Xu was slightly taken aback. Both he and Wei Xi was told over and over again that Zhuge Yan’s illness was incurable. It was his punishment, they said. And so, they had no other choice but to watch as Zhuge Yan’s organs started failing one-by-one, until the day he could wither no more. Back then, even the mighty Huangfu Xuan could only provide medicine that helped ease the symptoms, not cure him!

“Are you sure about this?” Wei Xu asked.

Wei Xi rolled her eyes at his question. “It’s Miss Gu we’re talking about. Do you not have faith in her?”

“Miss Gu?” Wei Xu’s expression changed immediately. “If Miss Gu said it was possible, then I have no doubt that the young master can be saved!”

“…”

***

In the laboratory, Zhu Yuan was administering needles into the patient lying on the bed whilst directing non-stop, questions at the person sitting next to the bed.

“Mr. Zhu Yuan, is it true that Miss Gu’s coming here?”

“Mr. Zhu Yuan, when is she arriving?”

“…”

“That’s right, she did tell me she was coming. She should be here any minute now, I reckon. Any more questions?” Zhu Yuan eyed them. “Very well, if there’s none, then start gathering the questions which I have failed to solve. I’m guessing that she won’t be staying here for too long.”

These people rushed out hastily upon hearing Zhu Yuan’s advice.

There was a massive plasma screen on the wall of the laboratory. At the moment, it was displaying the heads of multiple foreigners, who were intensely fighting over who gets to ask questions first. “Mister Zhu, are you positive that your laboratory has found a way to deal with the living dead?”

“I have repeated this time and time again, those people are not zombies. They are merely possessed by an evil aura.” Zhu Yuan was getting impatient with these buffoons.

“That’s simply impossible! Whatever the evil aura you’re talking about is, no matter what medical instrument we used, nothing could be picked up. But the patients are either getting weaker by the day, or they would go berserk. If we can’t find the source of this phenomenon, how do you expect us to save them?!” questioned one of the faces urgently.

This person was one of the more authoritative voices in the international medical community. He had come up with a variety of different methods to help patients with the zombie-like symptoms over in America. They were breathing, but for some inexplicable reason, they could not regain their consciousness. Many checks were done and yet they failed to pinpoint the cause of their peculiar disease. This was also partly why their reactions were so extreme when the prospect of a cure was suggested by Zhu Yuan.

Zhu Yuan glanced at him before pulling up a piece of paper on his desk, which he shook in front of the screen. “See this? This is a document provided by Miss Gu, detailing the pathology, treatment, and follow-up procedures for the disease.”

The international medical community wasn’t able to see in detail what the contents of the document were, but something in Zhuyuan’s statement caught their attention. Unsurprisingly, it was the name of Gu Xiqiao.

What was initially a commotion turned dead silent. The medical professors and doctors eyed each other.

They could doubt the validity of Zhu Yuan’s findings, they could even doubt his laboratory but ain’t no way were they going to doubt Gu Xiqiao’s work!

Why?

Simply put, they feared the painful humiliation when they would face should they be proven wrong!

To their understanding, cells from different bodies were never supposed to fuse and split but this person was able to prove them wrong, to make them doubt what they have learned up until this point!

What they viewed as a terrifying virus could simply be solved by Gu Xiqiao through the application of a couple of formulas.

They once held the firm opinion that patients in vegetative states were beyond saving; they could only wait patiently until the patient woke up from his or her coma naturally. That was again, disproven by Gu Xiqiao when she introduced her treatment manual that used acupuncture, which saved God knows how many lives!

***

These men had been following closely, the growth of China’s medical industry up until what it was today.

This was why they decided to shut up when Zhu Yuan produced the document, which he claimed was the fruit of Gu Xiqiao’s labor. Some of them wanted to squeeze through the webcam lens to see just what the document Zhu Yuan had was about.

Just when they wanted to start speaking, a slender figure suddenly entered the frame.

She did not lift her head when she walked through the door. However, nearly every one of them recognized who she was. How could they not? They had already seen this familiar figure countless times in medical-related articles, videos, and conferences. In fact, some would go so far as to say that they’d recognize who she was even after she gets burnt into a crisp. She was none other than the legendary Gu Xiqiao!

The sound of heavy breathing could be heard coming from the American researchers. Too bad, before they could say a word, the people in the laboratory had swarmed towards Gu Xiqiao, throwing questions relentlessly at her.

Zhuge Yan, who moved to one side, was shocked by how welcomed she was here.

He did not expect things to turn out this way.

Jiang Shuxuan on the other hand leaned against the doorframe. He watched with interest when the researchers flocked around Gu Xiqiao.

Half an hour later, these people had finally received what they were looking for, and so they headed back to their stations with satisfied expressions.

“How are the experiments coming along?” asked Gu Xiqiao.

Zhu Yuan was standing in front of his lab bench, carefully inserting the final golden needle into Huangfu Xuan’s meridian point before looking up at Gu Xiqiao. “Thank god I didn’t mess this up!”

And then, both Wei Xu and Zhuge Yan saw with their own eyes, the wisps of black smoke which appeared in the medical instrument positioned next to Huangfu Xuan’s body.

“What’s that?!” asked Wei Xu, who had no idea what that ominous looking thing was.

“Evil aura,” muttered Zhuge Yan. He then realized how much effort he needed in order to speak.

Unbeknownst to him, his words impacted Wei Xu and Wei Xi’s mind like an exploding bomb.

Evil aura was something which the people of the ancient martial arts world avoided like a plague, which it was!

So not only could these people manage to come up with a way for the evil aura to be seen using the naked eye, they could even extract it from one’s body?!

F*ck! Just what monsters were they?!

Wei Xi and Wei Xu stared with their jaws wide open at the machine.

“What are you looking at me for? Do you seriously think I am the one who came up with this contraption?” Zhu Yuan stared back at them with a bewildered look. He then pointed his finger at Gu Xiqiao. “Don’t look at me like that, look at her instead.”

They understood what Zhu Yuan was talking about in just a fraction of a second. They peered at Gu Xiqiao, who merely looked back at them with an unchanging expression.

Only a single phrase was present in their minds at that moment–nutjob!

She was already scary enough in the ancient martial arts world; who would’ve thought that she’d be as overpowered in the secular world as well!

It took them quite a while to snap back to reality. It was also the same moment that Wei Xi realized who the person lying on the lab bench was. “Why is she here?” she exclaimed in surprise!

“People like her should contribute to the betterment of humanity, don’t you think? She has simply killed too many people. I guess what goes around, comes around,” answered Zhu Yuan before continuing his conversation with Gu Xiqiao. “What were you referring to when you were talking about the new experiments last night?”

“Him,” said Gu Xiqiao as she pointed in Zhuge Yan’s direction. “But, I came earlier than I should have. You should carry on with your research. I’ll type out the report myself.”

She sat down in front of a computer and launched an empty document before she began hammering away on the keyboard.

Zhu Yuan was supposed to start his research on Zhuge Yan’s condition but was distracted by the sight of Jiang Shuxuan, which prompted him to call out in a congratulatory tone.

Jiang Shuxuan nodded in his direction but remained silent afterward.

Surprisingly, Zhu Yuan did not find anything off about him. That was because the usual Jiang Shuxuan would respond in the same manner. He shifted his attention back to Zhuge Yan, with a look of anticipation in his eyes. “Come over and lie down here. Let me see what ailment you’re suffering from.”

He pointed at a nearby scanning machine.

Zhuge Yan had no idea why, but he felt something different between the people in this laboratory and the doctors he usually visited. Silently, he laid down on the scanner.

“Mr. Zhu, has Miss Gu arrived?!” The faces on the screen came back to life and started shouting for his attention.

The voices attracted the attention of Wei Xi and Wei Xu. The former gulped when she saw the person on the screen. “Look! Wei Xu, isn’t that Dr. Mark? Remember the president of the International Medical Community from two years ago, where we had to wait for a month before we finally arranged for an appointment with him?”

Wei Xu looked at Mark, whose head was only inches away from his webcam while nodding his head listlessly. “That’s him?”

Never would he expect to see them in such a position.

“That’s her alright.” Zhu Yuan replied while meddling with the instrument.

Mark went silent upon hearing Zhu Yuan’s response. With a somber expression, he asked Zhu Yuan, “Mr. Zhu, in all seriousness, can you guys cure this weird disease?”

Zhu Yuan flipped over the first page of the document and glanced up at Mark. “While I can do that right now, there are still parts of this thing that I do not understand. I’ll have to get some clarification from Miss Gu afterward.”

So it was true. The doctors in the video conference froze up as they tried to stomach the news.

“Mr. Zhu,” said Mark upon taking in a deep breath. “I’m gonna break the truth to you. America has countless people with the same symptoms and there aren’t signs that it would slow down soon. Despite this, we still cannot locate the source of this problem.”

Zhu Yuan smiled back at them. “Now that we have broken the code, you guys should sit back and watch us with envy.”

F*ck!

The audacity of this bastard!

The doctors wanted to cuss out loud in front of the camera. Once, they wondered why the prodigy Zhu Yuan was willing to put himself below Gu Xiqiao. Now, the answer was getting clearer to them. That guy’s pretty darn lucky!

“Miss Gu!” yelled one of the guys over the mic.

Gu Xiqiao had finished typing her final line when she heard someone calling out for her over the sound of the printer noisily churning out papers.

“You want me to save the people of America?” Gu Xiqiao rubbed her chin as she peered up at Mark’s face on the screen.

Mark nodded excitedly in response.

“Come to our laboratory in China, I’ll teach you how,” was the response he got from Gu Xiqiao.

Their faces all froze up upon hearing her reply. It could be implied from her words that they had to reside permanently in China in order for their wish to be fulfilled.

This laboratory of hers in China was such a tempting bait.

So many secrets could potentially be uncovered in their laboratory that it started to seem as if there was no virus they could not combat, not to mention the fact that they would get to meet Gu Xiqiao, the healer from hell in person!

The temptations were too strong. In fact, it only took Mark three seconds before he finally made the painful decision.

The rest of the doctors almost suffered a stroke. It only took a single sentence from Gu Xiqiao to completely win over the most prestigious doctor in America?!

But to be completely honest, they would’ve taken up her offer too if they were put in a similar position.