Gu Shi Yi was woken by a slap from Old Lady Gu, and upon opening her eyes, another calloused palm came smacking down.
"Shiyi, wake up! Wake up!"
Gu Shi Yi tried to move her hands and feet and realized that both her head and ribs were aching, but everything else was alright,
"Aunt..."
She sat up with the help of Old Lady Gu,
"Aunt..."
Looking around, she noticed everything in the cabin was as usual, and through the window, she saw their boat was still smoothly sailing on the river's surface. Gu Shi Yi examined Old Lady Gu from head to toe,
"Aunt, are you alright?"
Old Lady Gu shook her head and pointed to her ears, miming,
"Shiyi, can you hear..."
She took a small bottle from the small table nearby and gestured again,
"Shiyi, this is medicine given by the elders of the Bishui Sect, they say it can cure deafness, take one..."
Without checking if Gu Shi Yi could understand, she opened the porcelain bottle, poured out a medicine pill and handed it to Gu Shi Yi. Gu Shi Yi's ears weren't deaf, but she still accepted and popped it into her mouth. The pill, although tiny, was bitterer than coptis, and, taken aback, she nearly bit her tongue in disgust,
"Ah ah..."
She clutched her throat and shouted to Old Lady Gu, who hurriedly fetched a bowl of water. Watching Gu Shi Yi gulp it down, she said,
"The medicine is bitter, but it's very effective. I took one and could hear in less than the time it takes for an incense stick to burn!"
Gu Shi Yi nodded and passed back the bowl to Old Lady Gu. Oblivious to anything unusual, she took it and said,
"You get some sleep, and once you can hear, we'll talk!"
Gu Shi Yi nodded again, looking speechlessly as Old Lady Gu left. As soon as she did, Gu Shi Yi frantically reached for the oilcloth pouch on her chest. Her hand brushed against something soft, and she impulsively pulled it out,
"Ah..."
She screamed, threw the thing onto the bed, and scooted to one side to stare at it,
"A... finger?"
It was pale, long with joints, what else could it be but a finger?
Gu Shi Yi was stunned for half a second, and then the memories of last night came flooding back like a tide,
"This is... is this a finger from the belly limbs of the Fish Kui Beast?"
Gu Shi Yi remembered, at which point Li Yaner, from inside the oilcloth pouch, called out,
"Shiyi, Shiyi, what happened?"
Gu Shi Yi quickly retrieved her,
"Look... this thing... this is what hit me on the head last night..."
Reaching up to touch the bump on her head, the pain made her grimace,
Li Yaner, hearing her shouting and thinking something had happened, peeked out and saw the finger, sighed in relief, and said,
"I thought it was something serious. Didn't you put that in your chest last night yourself?"
Gu Shi Yi thought about it and vaguely remembered, in the haze, it was as if she was on a pirate ship, hastily stuffing the thing into her chest. Li Yaner walked over, picked up the finger, and turned to Gu Shi Yi,
"Shiyi, this thing is quite useful to me..."
"Really!"
Gu Shi Yi's eyes widened in disbelief,
"How so?"
Li Yaner said,
"I don't know why..."
Last night, being inside the oilcloth pouch wasn't easy for Li Yaner either. The roars of the Fish Kui Beast caused vibrations that would have burst the eardrums and muddled the minds of ordinary people; for her, those vibrations were so strong that they almost shook her soul out of her clay figure. Then an oppressive force almost scattered her soul. It was this thing that Shiyi had put against her, the cool Yin Energy emanating from it that had saved her from a dreadful fate!
"Really... so this thing can calm souls?"
After hearing her sister's account, Gu Shi Yi closely inspected the finger. It was true, this appendage from the Exotic Beast looked just like a human finger. Who would have guessed it had been chopped off a monster as big as a mountain?
Narrowing her eyes in thought, she said,
"My guess is this thing has lived in the Five-Color River for years, inherently containing extreme Yin Energy. And these sixteen pairs of belly limbs are the essence of all its Yin Energy – that's why it's useful to you!"
Heh heh! To think that last night turned out to be a stroke of accidental fortune!
So with a cheerful grin, she stuffed the finger back into the oilcloth pouch,
"Since it's useful to you, let's keep it!"