Plague Doctor

Translator: Lonelytree

The team members, Gu Jun and the land’s travellers had no trace of infectious disease on them so they were shuttled onto a private jet and sent back to the Spell Department’s base at Da Hwa City. Da Hwa City was where Phecda’s headquarters was located, it was adjacent to the metropolis Northern State City and it was a veritable metropolis in itself.

Repatriation of the 300 plus normal citizens though would take longer. This was due to two reasons, one, it was unknown whether any of them was the member of this new organization, the Yellow Brotherhood; and two, they were all foreign citizens and returning them required some diplomatic haggling. Regardless, Gu Jun was spared from dealing with this because he had something more imminent to attend to. Even though he was one of the founding members of the Spell Department, this was the first time Gu Jun had entered the base. Driven by Cai Zixuan, he was given a tour of the base by Wu Siyu. The base was repurposed at one of the headquarters’ old addresses. They added new buildings like admin building, Dreaming Building, Parapsychology Building, Assessment Building, Medical Study Building, Library, Canteen and hostels…

“And that is the recreational centre.” Wu Siyu looked at a cluster of buildings that included a five-star hotel not far away. The recreational centre was definitely the best feature of the Spell Department, there was a gym, soccer field, bistros and restaurants, art centres… and even a large garden. Elder Tong knew how important recreation was for the members so the budget was not loose on this matter.

“By the way,” Wu Siyu was reminded of something, “Your friends are here as well, they’re currently working under me.”

“Who?” Gu Jun was startled and instantly one of the names came to him, “Lee Yuerui?”

“That’s right.” Wu Siyu nodded. “And his friends, Wu Dong and Lin Xiaotang.” Gu Jun then found out Elder Tong had requested for them to be moved here due to their supernatural experience at Longkan Seabelt as well as their talent at party-planning. Currently all three of them were tasked to work under Wu Siyu and they were quite hardworking. However, based on her observation, Lin Xiaotang had shown interest to become an official member of the Spell Department while the two guys were satisfied with their current post…

The last stop of the tour was the Medical Building where ‘project ancient seal stone cleansing’ would be conducted. Since cleansing was in itself an activity of mental exhaustion and Peacock claimed that accidents had happened during cleansing for the heavily corrupted before so the project was situated here where medical attention could be immediate. At the entrance, Gu Jun encountered a familiar face who was there to greet him, Uncle Dan. Inside the Spell Department, there was only a small amount of people who knew about the mission to save Gu Jun much less the knowledge that Gu Jun had returned, but as a member of Xue Ba’s Special Mobile Force as well as due to his personal relationship with Gu Jun, Uncle Dan was told the truth.

“Ah Jun…” Uncle Dan’s kind face was filled with smiles as he patted Gu Jun heavily on his back. “It’s great that you’re back, I’ve already made reservations at the club.”

“The recreational centre has all kinds of clubs,” Wu Siyu explained, “Fishing club, barbeque club, chess club.”

“Fishing club?” Gu Jun frowned, “Can you fish dirty-minded fish there, if not, I’m not going.”

“Well, that’s quite a unique request.” Wu Siyu pretended to be thinking, “I’ll send your request to the Scientific Research Department, perhaps they might come up with something.”

Cai Zixuan added, “When there’s a will, there’s a way.” Uncle Dan was not the only senior who had joined the Spell Department, due to their experience at Eastern State, both Prof Qin and Prof Gu had joined the department as well. However, Prof Qin had retreated from the frontline and was mainly focusing on his recovery; Prof Gu still maintained his lecturing post at Eastern State Medical University, providing new talent for Phecda. In the earlier secret video conference, Gu Jun had met up with his two mentors and promised to meet them in person when he returned to Eastern State. Now he was ushered to a surgical consultation room on the fifth floor called the ‘Cleansing Room’ where Gu Jun reunited with Elder Tong as well as had his first meeting with Prof Jiang, the representative from Angell’s Order.

“Doctor Gu, I’ve heard so many things about you.” Prof Jiang greeted him respectfully, “I hope to hear more about the Dreamlands from you.”

“I too hope to hear more about the R’yleh Cult from you.” Gu Jun nodded, he had already been given a briefing of the man’s background. The shadow of the R’yleh Cult bothered him, there were still problems like the Afterlife Cult, his parents, the Seagull as well as the Shaman in the forest…

The Cleansing Room was a monitored surgery room. The surgical bed had been removed and replaced by a table and chair where the rock with the Ancient Seal sat. Gu Jun and the land’s travellers provided the instruction from the side while the room was guarded by armed Action Department members from outside, they would burst in to control the situation should anything go wrong. Possible threats included the cleansed member going berserk or the strange stone acting up. The first to attempt the cleansing was Elder Tong, the groaning that he made when pressing against the stone sounded more like something one would make during deep tissue massage. Elder Tong sweated profusely and felt rejuvenated afterwards. His face was practically glowing, “Ah Jun, you’ve brought back something magical indeed.”

The excitement for Elder Tong came not only from the Ancient Seal but also the land’s travellers, whom he was told were Atal’s direct disciples, all five of them had mastered the first five chapters of the Seven Cryptical Book of Hsan. They were indefinitely loyal to Gu Jun so the Spell Department would have to take them, negotiation with Australia should not be a problem.

Gu Jun also predicted that cleansing for members who had not reached the third chapter would not pose any problem, the best examples included Wu Siyu, Cai Zixuan and Xue Ba. When they finished the cleansing, they reported that it was like going through a detoxing sauna. The real challenge was the members who suffered from Seven Cryptical Books of Hsan training syndrome.

Lou Xiaoning who had remained mostly sentient throughout the mission survived the cleansing with a grit of her teeth; but it was not as easy for the other members, some were in such pain that their backs arched into impossible degrees while others screamed like they were being operated on without anesthetic. Cleansing of heavy corruption could not be done within a day, which meant that they had to go through the same tormenting process every 3 days. Gu Jun and the land’s travellers would step in to stop the cleansing from going too far each time.

“Aiz…” Prof Shen sighed as he watched the proceeding in the surveillance room, even Elder Tong’s excitement was dampened. Even though the Spell Department was newly built, and both the leaders of the department as well as higher-ups at the headquarters had expected a rocky start but they did not expect things would go so south. These people were selected because they were the most talented members of Phecda, so why were they being punished for their hard work?

The headquarters had not yet decided how to deal with this incident, so they decided to wait and see the cleansing effect of the stone first.

At that moment, a heavily-monitored patient was sent into the Cleansing Room. Wang Ruoxiang, disciple of the fifth chapter, was taken under the Brotherhood’s control to betray Phecda, she almost killed her teammates and was called the descendant of Cassilda by Mr. Wang Erde.

“Monitor, good luck, I believe in you.” Gu Jun comforted his old friend. “I know for sure you will pull through.”

“No matter the result.” Wang Ruoxiang smiled slightly, “At least I know I would have contributed to the advancement of medical science.”

With Gu Jun and Peacock looking on, she sat on the chair and reached out towards the rock. Instantly her brows creased and her face started to distort with pain.