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The sound of the gauze tearing from the roll finally broke Chu Wanning out of his trance.
For nearly a day, he and his three disciples had been travelling after defeating the ghost mistress and Chu Wanning himself had to deal with an excruciating wound in his shoulder the whole time on top of that. Going this long without treatment for an injury as bad as his was would likely kill a regular man but since he was strong in his cultivation, he was able to use a tiny bit of his qi to prevent the wound from festering too quickly.
Yet no matter how much it hurt, he forced himself to hold the air of an immortal, completely detached from the secular world, at least when he was in front of others. When he would finally get some time to himself, that was when he got the space to show weakness and pain.
It had always been like this from the beginning, he'd foolishly dug his own grave by acting like this in the beginning as a defense mechanism. He'd pushed others away in case they'd see the person inside and didn't like it but before he knew it, everyone believed that this was how Chu Wanning truly was; cold, self-dependent and someone who definitely didn't need or appreciate others' help. They'd seen him as the moon, high in the sky, unreachable and detached when what he really wanted was to be the water that sustained life, that others could come to to depend on. But it was too late to change, they'd already bought into his act and Chu Wanning feared they wouldn't accept his true self.
He sighed as he knew what he had to do. Putting a clean towel into his mouth to bite on as he began to cut the dead flesh off. Fortunately, the towel was also good for muffling his groans and grunts as he was forced to cut off pieces of his own flesh. He couldn't even see it but it wasn't like he had any other choice.
At least the knife was sharp enough that this could be done quickly enough. It wasn't like he hadn't done this before either, it just wasn't as easy when he was slicing nearly all the way down to the bone from the amount of dead flesh that needed to be cut out, especially when he couldn't see where. But just like everything else he'd done before, he could always manage on his own.
A knock came from outside. "Shizun, It's Mo Ran."
Chu Wanning didn't want him to see him like this but maybe for once, he could show weakness. After all, Mo Ran was the disciple that he had the most odd relationship with, consistently pushing him away, even more than he did to his other two and Mo Ran wasn't dumb, he knew what was happening. Maybe sharing some of his troubles with him could help.
"Come in." He said swiftly, still unable to change the way he talked to others.
When he came in Mo Ran saw the old and new cuts made into the back of his shizun's shoulder, he made an audible gasp, the wound now having a waterfall of blood from the jagged, messy cuts. It was clear Chu Wanning had done this himself, the precision being pretty terrible and him missing a couple of spots and the healing salve placed messily on top of everything. Despite that, the fact that he had even thought about doing it by himself in the first place was absolutely insane but him actually carrying out made Mo Ran respect him infinitely more.
To Chu Wanning though, it was beyond embarrassing to have to reveal this side of himself to his disciple but in his mind it was also a better way for them to bond if he showed at least a little bit of humanity and not like some entity or lofty higher being.
Behind him, Mo Ran picked up the knife and helped Chu Wanning cut off the parts he'd missed and applied the salve onto his shoulder gently and wrapped everything up with the gauze.
It was one of the first times Chu Wanning had gotten help for such a large task from someone else and though mortifying that he had to stoop as low as to ask a disciple to help him, he couldn't deny it felt much more relieving to know that he got help from someone else that could do it better.
Mo Ran was mostly just in shock, his shizun surprsied him every time with the sheer lengths he'd go to just to do something himself instead of asking for anyone else's help. In fact, he previously believed that Chu Wanning would rather perish than let someone carry him to the infirmary but after he'd asked for his help, Mo Ran couldn't help but feel his heart flutter a little. Seeing that he was finally taking a liking to him rather than preferring Xue Meng or Shi Mei over him.
With a sigh, Chu Wanning was finally able to relax for a while after their trek and the consistent festering wound in his shoulder all completed, he turned around and couldn't help but give Mo Ran a smile. "Thank you. You may leave now."
His disciple just stood there dumbfounded for a moment before coming back to reality, nodding quickly and dashing out but not before Chu Wanning could see the childish admiration Mo Ran had and the stupid smile he had.