The Perfect Path To Insanity-Chapter 44: Celestial Pests

This person was no other than the Great Lu Yuan’s younger brother.

General Bai remained on the ground.

Forcing his gaze forward, his eyes fixed on a young charming man. "Master Lu Tian?"

Lu Tian inclined his head, staring down at the fallen soldier. Long dark hair hung loose past his shoulders. He wore a plain white linen tunic, sleeves rolled to the elbows. Faint ink stained the cuffs. A small, round leather pouch hung from his fingers.

Tired lines sat under Lu Tian’s eyes. He smiled.

"Why are you here, Master Lu Tian?" Bai managed to say. "Has your brother sent you in his stead?"

Lu Tian looked down at him. He laughed, the sound rolling low from his chest and building into a full, easy burst that shook his shoulders for a moment.

His brown eyes then narrowed into crescents.

Three feet away, he crouched, one hand settling on his thigh. The pouch rose to his mouth and he drank, hiccuping afterwards as his smile widened.

"Hahaha. Funny, General. Why call me master when I’m anything but?" He wiped his mouth with the back of his wrist. "I’ll always be the second son, won’t I? The apathetic second son of Lu Chuan."

Bai dragged himself backward an inch. Elbows scraped against the concrete. The uniform pulled tight across his shoulders.

With his flushed face and his breaths even more shallow, Bai asked again,

"Did he send you in his stead?"

Lu Tian finished the pouch in one long pull. The liquid sloshed inside until it was gone. He tossed the empty leather aside. It slapped the ground and rolled away.

Furrowing his brows, Lu Tian carried a stern expression, but then he sighed, and his face softened.

"Poor bastard wouldn’t even let me run the family business. What do you think?"

He stood up. Shoulders squared, smiling once again.

"Your plea reached me instead. Looking at you now, your ’prisoner’ escaped. You look terrible."

Bai coughed. The sound tore up his throat and blood flecked his lip. "Do not come close to me," he said. "There’s a plague. I have it. The prisoner holds the cure. He wants to negotiate his freedom for it. But... but Master Lu Yuan would not want that."

Lu Tian stepped closer.

"...hmm." He crouched again. Close enough for Bai to catch the faint sweet smell on his breath from the drink.

Hands hooked under Bai’s arms and he lifted him up.

The general’s legs stayed limp. Lu Tian shifted him onto his back, looping his arms under Bai’s thighs to hold him. The white tunic stretched across Lu Tian’s shoulders under the added weight.

"How could such a prideful man work for a sex-driven grasshopper idiot?" Lu Tian said. His voice stayed light. "That bastard put a kill order on his own cousin, putting me in the dark. He’s my blood relative, too. You should have seen my face when your urgent letter arrived."

Bai’s hands rested on Lu Tian’s shoulders. Fingers tensed and gripped the fabric. Skin pressed against skin at the neckline.

’Never in my life have I been this humiliated,’ he thought.

Pulse hammering, he heaved. "...Master Lu Tian. Let me down now. You risk infection."

Lu Tian laughed again.

He kept walking. "Then you must call off the bounty now that a higher official has the disease."

Looking down at his own boots and watching them move, he added, "For my sake. Consider it. The prisoner you held captive is my cousin. As far as I know, that bastard of your master doesn’t care about Father’s death. The only thing he cares about is his rotten corpse collection."

Heat spread through General Bai’s chest. His mind turned over the pieces.

Fei Ming... tied to the Lu family?

He hadn’t known.

"Thousands could die, Anubis." Lu Tian said. "Your pride won’t take you that long."

He stopped at the entrance to a soldier tent. Canvas flaps hung half-open. Lantern light spilled out in yellow wedges across the dirt. Inside, low voices murmured.

"Ah. We’ve reached a tent. Yours, perhaps?"

Lu Tian bent his knees. He eased Bai down slowly and carefully. Bai’s boots touched the ground.

He almost tripped, catching himself on Lu Tian’s arm for a second. Then let go.

Bai leaned against the tent pole.

Now what was he to do in this situation?

Even without Lu Tian’s interference, the truth was obvious now.

They were in no position to refuse negotiation. 𝙧𝙚𝙚𝔀𝒆𝓫𝓷𝙤𝓿𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝙤𝓶

In no time, the plague would spread. If it got transmitted to the higher ups, it would be much to their own disadvantage.

If Fei Ming truly held the cure, the bounty meant nothing beside a spreading plague.

And Bai had no intention of dying to sickness like a nameless foot soldier.

There was no honor in that.

General Bai leaned in. Taking another deep breath in, he looked at Lu Tian. "Are you still in connection with RiaKai? Could we call on them for help? The Hawks have Wrath and Yimin, don’t they?"

Lu Tian’s smile faded. He wiped the sweat beading on his forehead with the sleeve of his tunic. The motion left a damp streak on the linen.

"Ahh..." He sat down beside Bai on the dirt, knees drawn up, elbows resting on them.

"No," he said. His voice lost its lightness. "If RiaKai could help us, they would have interfered already. Without anyone’s permission, even so. And it would be desire driven, rather than just pure enthusiasm."

Staring down at the ground between his boots, the lantern light from inside the tent cast long shadows across his face.

"The world runs on their whims. We exist inside them. If this plague spreads, it is because they permit it," he paused, fetching himself another pouch of wine, and continued.

"Human loss means nothing to them. Anubis, don’t you think so too? That our lives are nothing but chess pieces, like a playground mimic for these celestial... pests."

Lu Tian turned his head, his mouth slightly agape. "Ah! Did I say too much?" He looked straight at Bai.

"Anubis, don’t think too much about this. Nothing comes from chasing after a deranged man. You’re lucky to be alive. More so," he chuckled. "I don’t wish to see my cousin’s head placed like a trophy back at home. Neither do I wish to see his eyes displayed on a wall."

Pausing to study Bai’s worried look, his fingers flexed once against his knee.

"Don’t fret. I give you my authority. Drop my brother’s orders. Get the cure. If you don’t, you may die as a dishonored soldier. That should be enough motivation, yes?"

Lu Tian glanced around the corridor. The canvas flaps stirred slightly in the breeze.

A small smile tugged his lips. "I... I also have a bit of delight in seeing my baby brother-cousin. He couldn’t have gone too far, could he?"

Bai sighed. His fingers curled loosely against the tent pole. The wood felt cool under his palm.

"Like you said," he replied. "He escaped. But I will see to it."

’Even if death is not scary... I don’t want to die.’