by Pegaz
The first day working at the Royal London Hospital was the most nerve-wracking experience she had ever had, but she got through it. Two years into the job, she made a mistake and killed her first patient. At that point, she had passed the intern exam and was in her first year of residency.
Sarah had made a few friends but her best friend was like her: same family background, education, and in residency, too. Her friend’s name was Rebecca Fuller. The only difference between them was Rebecca’s adventurous side.
In their seventh and final year of residency, Rebecca was in a traffic accident and died shortly after. Sarah almost dropped out because of it. The police found out that Rebecca’s attendant had been sleeping with her but broke up weeks before the accident. After further investigations, they found the attendant hired someone to cause the accident.
To honour Rebecca’s memory, Sarah swore to clean up the hospital when she became an attendant.
Sarah became a fellowship member the next year, specialising in trauma because of Rebecca’s accident. She kept thinking of new ways to save people that were in a serious accident like her friend. Two years later, she had completed her fellowship, passed all exams, and became a trauma surgeon. All at the young age of thirty-four.
When she was in her third year of attending, they called her to the trauma bay for a drive-by shooting. Expecting a ruthless man full of tattoos, she was shocked when she found out the patient was a young woman who had been training as a veterinarian. She heard the paramedics report while she checked the woman’s pulse and tried to restart the heart. A few minutes later, she called time of death and in the written report wrote DOA.
She still remembered the man that came into the hospital following the ambulance and the conversation some staff members had afterwards. They talked about the man and who he was. He was the biggest loan shark in London and the woman that just died was his fiancée. The answer surprised Sarah because the man looked like he was in his early twenties; she thought he was too young to be the biggest loan shark in London.
She followed the news, which reported that what she heard was true. Completely enveloped in the story, she followed the trial and found out the man had attacked the person on trial and was sent to prison himself. The man disappeared after he got released from prison a year later, so she carried on with her life.
Eighteen years later, the biography of the man got released. The man who John made a deal with, the leader of the gang back then, had come forward to tell the story for money after he retired from gang life. She was shocked beyond belief when she found out that man in the hospital crying over his fiancée had indirectly killed over two hundred people in revenge.
There were a few who saw the biography that went as far as calling John and Lisa the modern-day Beauty and the Beast with a Romeo and Juliet’s tragic ending.
One year later, at fifty-nine, one of Sarah’s patients died due to a complication during surgery. The family blamed her because of her age. The son of the dead patient attacked Sarah and wound up stabbing her to death in the hospital.
The first thing Sarah remembered upon waking was the horrible, stinging pain in her stomach from the knife. The Toxic system then opened in front of her and she discovered she had the body of a fifteen-year-old girl. Although she was surrounded by trees and plant life, she was not afraid of losing her way.
She wandered about, accidentally stumbling into a poisonous vine that tried grabbing her legs. To her amazement, the plant withered as soon as it touched her.
The Toxic system’s ability had activated because of the vine’s poison.
Arriving at a village a mile away from the forest, she did odd jobs while absorbing all poisonous flowers and herbs she could find. She eventually found out about immortals when she had turned eighteen, which caused her to have a new resolve. She wanted to become an immortal.
At twenty years old, she found an age test crystal inside a cave. Not realising what it was at first, she held it in her hand to check it every day. It was through pure luck that she held it on the day she turned twenty-one, which caused her to become an immortal. Realising what it was, she put the crystal inside a small bag inside her robes for safety.
She met her master a few months after and joined the Anti-Assassin. Realising that nobody knew she had reincarnated or knew about the Toxic System, she decided not to tell anybody. She bought all poisonous flowers and herbs she could afford inside the Anti-Assassin sect, searching for them when she was out on missions. Sarah levelled up fast.
After coming back from being defeated by the assassin she now knew as John, the Elder’s son found out about her talent. That was the first domino that caused her wanting to leave the sect for good.
Chapter 6
Taking Precaution Against Divinations
After she finished describing her past life experience, she looked at John, waiting for him to speak.
“How come you included my past life’s doings in your story?” was John’s only question.
“It affected me.”
“Oh, how?”
“When I read your biography,” she started slowly, “it made me wish I had someone who would do that for me.”
“No…” John shook his head. “I didn’t do it for Lisa, though. I did it out of revenge, so I could move on. There was no other motive.”
With a sigh, John ran his fingers through his hair.
“For now, I’ll trust you a little more,” he concluded. “I will help you get away from the Anti-Assassin sect. My plan was to head to the Sword Sect to learn all I could from their library. Will you be tagging along?”
“For now, I just want my freedom.” Sarah shrugged. “I’ll follow you to the Sword Sect if that’s where you’re going. I can learn about this universe and maybe open a medical practice using toxins to cure. With my medical experience, it should be easy.”
“All right, then,” John said, clapping his hands. “I need to go experiment a couple of things before we go to the Sword Sect. We’re both only thirty-two years old and Rank three, so we can get in. I even have a token from the personal disciple of the sect master in case something happens. You’re on your own until I get back. Go back to bed and get some sleep, you look… tired.”
As John finished his sentence, he noticed Sarah had completely nodded off while he was talking. She had placed her head on top of her arm on the table and fallen asleep in a matter of seconds.
John sighed, stood up, and walked over to Sarah. He picked her up in a princess carry and walked to the connecting door. Making sure not to hit her head or feet on anything, he carried her to her bed and placed her down, covering her with the blanket afterwards. He shut the connecting door then left his room and out of the hotel.
What he didn’t know was that Sarah had woken up while he tucked her in. When the coast was clear, she buried her blushing face deep under the covers. She’d never been princess carried to bed before.
Meanwhile, John scanned the town. He looked for mortals or low ranked immortals with sins. He soon cornered one and knocked them unconscious. Looking at the person, it was a man with a dagger attached to his belt on both sides of his waist. John assumed he was a thief.
???
Rank: 0
Level: 0
Sin: 193
Right, the first experiment.
John grabbed the man by his neck, then placed the icon in the map to teleport. It asked if he wanted to teleport to the location which was normal, but when he clicked yes a second pop-up came up.
Do you wish to transport the person connected to you through the teleport?
John smiled and answered yes.
Five miles away, John appeared. He looked down towards the unconscious man, who seemed unharmed.
First experiment is a success!
John teleported back to where he knocked the man out since it was a quiet place. Taking out the teleport rune to his master’s private planet, he placed it down and stepped on it while holding the man by the neck. He arri
ved at the house on his master’s planet, still holding the man. John checked him out, the man was still breathing.
Great! Teleport by runes or my skill can bring more than one person at a time safely. Now I can take Sarah through the Rogue Sect’s teleport system. The only problem now is how to get her into the teleport room. That security system they have in place is such a pain...
Stepping back through the runes, he threw the man on the floor and picked up the piece of stone with the rune on it. He put it inside his Storage Space.
Guess we can only try gaining access to the teleport room.
John then teleported back to the entrance to the hotel. He walked up to reception and asked if they had any ‘do not disturb’ signs since they were both going into a closed-door cultivation session. The receptionist gave him two pieces of parchment that John needed to put onto the doors. John thanked them.
After placing the parchments as instructed, John returned to his hotel room and carried on scanning books he hadn’t read yet. A few hours later, Sarah knocked on the door so John opened it to let her in. Sitting at the table, he told her of his plans.
“For the next month, we’re both vulnerable to Divination skills which could lead our enemies here. I have a teleport rune with me to go to my master’s private planet. We’ll both live there until my two skills are complete and we’re no longer vulnerable.” John took a deep breath and continued. “What I need you to do is make your deadliest, colourless and odourless poison. Then fill this up with it.”
John took out a chest made of metal.
“I will put the teleport rune inside this box. The rune is on stone, so you need to make sure your poison can’t destroy the metal box, the stone, or the blood that creates the rune,” he finished with an encouraging smile. “Can you manage that?”
“I can.” Sarah nodded. “The deadliest poison I can make can kill anybody below Rank 6. It should do the trick.”
“This chest has a special contraption inside,” John explained. “Once the blood rune inside lights up, the lid opens which gives us enough room to teleport back. Assassins use this trick all the time to get inside a guarded location. The only downside is you can’t lock it. If someone has a look at what’s inside, the plan fails. You would not believe how many people don’t check inside a chest that’s given as a present.”
Finally, John took out the dark red, round communication device he won in the auction and gave it to Sarah. He also gave Sarah a few Grade 7 Life Stones.
“Also, in case something happens, take these.”
Sarah nodded and they continued with their work. John placed the chest in a corner of his room, then Sarah filled it with the poison. He couldn’t tell but Sarah said she could sense it, so he assumed it was like how he could sense his threads.
When they were done, Sarah went through the rune first. John followed shortly, tilting the lid of the chest towards him so it would close behind him.
Appearing at the house on his master’s planet, he saw Sarah had walked outside and was looking about. He walked out of the house and stood next to her.
“It’s beautiful.” Sarah took in the scenery.
“It’s untouched by humankind that’s why.”
“Will your master appear here soon?”
Silence.
“The assassins... murdered my master.”
‘Ding!’
Emotional state back to normal.
John took a deep breath but still clenched his fists.
“I’m so sorry...”
After a moment, John was able to smile again.
“It’s all right,” he said with a look in his eye. “I’m hunting the assassins down.”
“For revenge?”
“If I don’t kill them, innocent people will die.” He frowned. “They’re being controlled by the new sect master now. The new master has… a different way of doing things.”
“What?” Sarah snorted, rolling her eyes. “It’s not like you assassins didn’t kill innocent people before.”
“No, it’s not like that.” John shook his head. “We had investigators who made sure the targets deserved to die. People who kidnap and sell children, rapists, mass murderers, people who torture for pleasure... Those are the types of people we go after.”
There was a penetrating silence in the room. Sarah’s eyes widened in realisation as John continued.
“The new sect master got rid of the investigators and they will now kill anybody for a price, including children or a whole family. Though they’re being controlled, I can’t stop the puppeteer. My master was the sect master and would not allow this to happen. The mastermind killed him to take over.”
Sarah lowered her head.
“I’m sorry.”
“I’ll get revenge for my master one day.”
The silence carried on until finally, John spoke up.
“Enough about that, though.” He clapped his hands. “Let’s decide where to go to cultivate for the month.”
Chapter 7
Creating Cultivation Caves
John looked around with his Life Vision and Immortal Eye.
“The closest creature near us is a Rank 3,” he stated. “While it’s not a danger to us, it could be fatal if they disturb us at the wrong time while cultivating. Is your mask able to help you breathe underground?”
“Actually”—Sarah put her finger on her chin, thinking—”I think my ex-master once mentioned it had that function, but it’s been almost a decade since then. I’m not sure if I remember it right.”
“Well, we need to find out.” John smiled. “I’ve been to two places underground on this planet. One is full of corpses. We can dig a small cave out for each of us at that depth. The other one is much further down and full of lava. I have immunity to heat but you don’t. I’m not sure if you can stay there for a long time, or even get close at all.”
“I see.” Sarah listened to the two options and thought again. “Let’s go with the shallower one first.”
Coming to a decision, the two of them walked towards the hole where Danny was buried. Coming to the holes entrance, John checked with Life Vision, Immortal Eye, and his Scan to make sure nothing had climbed down while he was away.
“This hole does straight down.” He glanced at Sarah. “Are you able to fly or climb down?”
Sarah shook her head.
“All right, then.” John walked towards Sarah and picked her up and floated into the air.
It embarrassed Sarah at first, but when she noticed they were flying, she panicked and gripped John’s clothes while burying her head in his chest. John smiled and thought she looked like a scared little animal at that point.
“Do you have Acrophobia?” he asked. “That’s the fear of heights.”
Sarah just shook her head against John’s chest, which tickled him a little. With a smile, he created a drill under his feet using his threads, it was six feet wide and two feet long. The drill got to work on the ground below them. Because it was made of threads, the drill reached a point where the drill couldn’t spin any further because it was wound too tight. John spun it anti-clockwise then clockwise, repeating this action until his work was complete.
As John descended with Sarah in his arms, the drill shifted the earth to make the hole wide enough for them to fly down. It took over an hour to reach the cave where the corpses were. John flew slowly; he enjoyed holding Sarah like this.
While still holding Sarah, he explained the cave’s origins regarding Danny the Sider.
“I don’t know the country or what year it was when he died,” he concluded. “I only saw TV’s in the windows and skyscrapers. I’m guessing late 90’s at the earliest. I still have one major question that’s been bugging me since. I only absorbed his memories, he died thousands of years ago, but in his memory, he knew I was watching and even knew my name somehow. He’s the one who told my master to create this cave so I would find his body.”
Sarah lifted her head and looked around. The sight of th
e corpses in the cave everywhere made her pale and the smell made her nauseous. She somehow put the words together.
“I remember watching a movie, they called something similar a time paradox,” she commented shakily. “If it’s real, then something will happen that causes your memory to go to Danny while he’s still alive.”
“Hey, you don’t look so good…” John tried consoling her. “Weren’t you a doctor? I thought you’d be fine around corpses. As for the time paradox, only time will tell I guess...”
As they stopped hovering above the ground, Sarah jumped down from John’s arms and walked over to the nearest body.
“Even as a doctor, I’m not used to corpses that have rotted for thousands of years.” She scrunched up her nose. “It’s like a big coffin...”
“Scared of being buried alive?” John smirked, causing Sarah to roll her eyes in denial.
John walked to the middle of the cave and tossed out Life Stones all around. The stones created light so that Sarah could see. He created a bullet made from two hundred Life Power units between his fingers and palm, which was the limit before his skin would tear apart. He then fired it upward. Shooting a few more in the same spot, he created a small air vent.
That will have to do for now. It’s only to get rid of the smell. Hopefully, the earth doesn’t shift and close the hole for at least an hour.
John went to the four corners of the cave and made the same hole to the surface.
Approaching the tunnel he made when he dropped-kicked Danny, he walked to the end and made a cave to his left and right. After two hours, John made two large rooms with Life Stones on the ceiling for light. Taking his shoes off, he used his earthen element to control the earth around him. He created doors for both caves, then a table, two chairs, a bed, and a desk in each room.
John could control the five elements as long as he connected the corresponding body part to what he wanted to control. The earth was the easiest since he could just stand there rather than kneel or place his elbow on the ground. The metal element would be the most awkward to control since he might have to do a kowtow to touch the metal pieces he wanted to control with his head.