Matron Song said in surprise, “So Doctor Wei knows these two maidens?”
Wei Caiwei said, “I met Shang Qinglan during maiden selection at the Baoding Prefecture office, and Li Jiubao is my neighbor from the same street.” The roof tiles of my house were repaired by Li Jiubao, in fact.
As Wei Caiwei spoke, she set down her medicine bag and first examined Shang Qinglan’s vomit—there was so much that one spittoon couldn’t contain it all!
Wei Caiwei asked Li Jiubao, “Does she have diarrhea?”
Li Jiubao shook her head, “Only vomiting, no diarrhea.”
Matron Song said, “Yesterday during etiquette practice, she did frequently ask for leave to use the privy. Among all the maidens at Chuxiu Palace, she had the most bowel and bladder movements. Today was better though.”
With Matron Song present, Li Jiubao couldn’t tell Wei Caiwei the truth that yesterday Shang Qinglan’s toilet excuses were actually to rest for a moment.
But Wei Caiwei had shared a room with Shang Qinglan in her previous life, so naturally she knew her character—just being lazy. Now with only vomiting and no diarrhea, it shouldn’t be from eating spoiled food, but from overeating.
Wei Caiwei took her pulse and asked, “Starting from this morning, what have you eaten?”
Shang Qinglan said weakly, “This morning I had milk, goose-fat rose cakes, fermented shad fish, pigeon eggs, spring greens stir-fried sprouts, egg pancakes, and two buns, one meat and one vegetarian.”
Wei Caiwei asked, “And after that?”
Shang Qinglan said, “During etiquette practice breaks, I ate some pastries and drank some tea.”
Li Jiubao added, “They brought over ten different plates of pastries—she tried every kind, plus tea. The palace has many varieties of tea. She drank plum-pickled melon seed tea, osmanthus sesame bamboo shoot tea, walnut pine nut tea, candied golden orange tea, and coriander sesame pine nut chestnut tea.”
Ming Dynasty tea brewing was like modern bubble tea five hundred years later with various nuts and jams added. Shang Qinglan had essentially consumed five cups of fully-loaded milk tea.
Shang Qinglan said, “After eating and drinking all that, I felt rather greasy, so I had another cup of Liu’an tea to settle it down. But it wouldn’t settle—the food kept rising up. I really couldn’t hold it down anymore, so I vomited.”
Just hearing Li Jiubao list the foods made Wei Caiwei feel stuffed, confirming her diagnosis. She said, “You have no other ailment—you’re just overstuffed. Vomiting it out is actually good. I’ll give you acupuncture and you won’t need medicine. Matron Song, don’t send her lunch or dinner today. Just have the imperial kitchen send a pot of hot rice soup to nourish her stomach.”
Matron Song asked, “What about tomorrow?”
Wei Caiwei said, “I’ll come take her pulse tomorrow morning and examine her tongue, then decide based on her body’s recovery. However, Qinglan must not overeat like this again—it harms the body.”
Upon hearing she could only drink rice soup today and couldn’t eat solid food, Shang Qinglan felt like she’d been struck by lightning. “I don’t usually behave like this. I just wanted to taste all the palace delicacies so that when I’m eliminated and leave the palace, I can boast about it for a lifetime.”
Wei Caiwei thought to herself: Foolish girl, from the moment you stepped through the palace gates, you were destined never to return.
Wei Caiwei said, “Even so, you must have some sense and eat within your capacity, or else you’ll be stuck drinking rice soup. Li Jiubao, keep an eye on her.”
Both agreed.
Wei Caiwei lit moxa sticks and performed moxibustion on Shang Qinglan’s upper epigastrium, middle epigastrium, lower epigastrium, and left and right gastric points. After the treatment, Shang Qinglan immediately stopped vomiting and spent the day consuming only rice soup as sustenance.
Matron Song said, “You’ll need to examine Shang Qinglan again early tomorrow morning. The journey is tiring—let me speak with the supervising eunuch about having you stay in the palace tonight and leave tomorrow. How does that sound?”
Wei Caiwei agreed.
The palace still respected female physicians quite highly. The supervising eunuch arranged a quiet room in Chuxiu Palace for her to stay. That day, whenever maidens sprained ankles practicing etiquette or had acne breakouts from anxiety, they all came to see her, and Wei Caiwei treated them all one by one.
Seeing that despite her youth, she worked efficiently and had good medical skills, the supervising eunuch took it upon himself to keep her at Chuxiu Palace specifically to treat the maidens until the selection process ended.
Wei Caiwei’s palace waist token only allowed movement within the palace. To stay overnight in the inner palace for ten days or half a month required going through cumbersome procedures. Palace female physicians had to follow Ceremonial Directorate summons, so Wei Caiwei made a trip to the Ceremonial Directorate to exchange her waist token.
At the Ceremonial Directorate, Wei Caiwei deliberately lingered, purposely dawdling. After filling out various rosters and forms, it was already dusk—precisely when the young eunuchs from the Inner Academy were getting out of school.
The Inner Academy teachers were all Hanlin scholars—genuine jinshi degree holders who had passed the imperial examinations. From among the jinshi, the most outstanding were selected to enter the Hanlin Academy for scholarly pursuits. Even the teachers at the Directorate of Education, the empire’s highest institution, were mostly only juren or even xiucai degree holders. Therefore, the young eunuchs selected for the Inner Academy all had their own extraordinary qualities.
The Inner Academy had a three-year curriculum. Within three years, they had to cram all knowledge of classics, laws, and other subjects into the young eunuchs’ heads. Teaching was extremely strict—there were virtually no rest days throughout the year, comparable to modern-day elite high schools.
Even at dusk after classes ended, the young eunuchs had to line up outside the Inner Academy, where Hanlin scholars would test them on poetry and literature.
A Hanlin casually picked up a fallen leaf from the ground. “Today, use this as your topic and compose a poem. Regardless of meaning or word choice, focus only on proper parallelism and rhyme.”
The young eunuchs composed poems on the spot. Those who couldn’t produce one stepped out of line, then paired up to slap each other across the face. The Hanlin scholars didn’t need to personally administer punishment—this was the Inner Academy’s rule.
Both the slapper and the slapped showed no emotional waves on their faces—clearly they were used to it.
After the slapping, they silently returned to formation and filed out of the Ceremonial Directorate.
It happened that Huang Jin, the Ceremonial Directorate’s seal-bearing chief eunuch—also the highest-ranking eunuch in the palace—was returning and encountered the lined-up Inner Academy students on the road.
The students maintained their orderly walking formation as usual, but Huang Jin yielded the path, standing aside in the corridor and even bowing respectfully, waiting until all the Inner Academy students had passed before proceeding himself.
This too was a palace rule. Though the Inner Academy students held no official positions, they were highly respected because among the palace’s twenty-four directorates, including the Eastern Depot, almost all seal-bearing chief eunuchs were Inner Academy graduates. Especially the Ceremonial Directorate that assisted the Emperor in handling government affairs—from the seal-bearing chief eunuch down to ordinary clerks, the unwritten rule was that they must be Inner Academy graduates.
Yielding the path to Inner Academy students was an established custom. Huang Jin had received the same treatment when he studied at the Inner Academy, so he voluntarily yielded the way.
The students filed out of the Ceremonial Directorate and dispersed. Wei Caiwei stood at the Ceremonial Directorate entrance, carefully observing each student. Finally, she spotted an old acquaintance among them. After dispersing, he pulled out a scroll from his wide sleeves and read earnestly while walking.
Wei Caiwei hurried to catch up with small steps, calling out, “Chen Jingji.”
Chen Jingji paused upon hearing this, as if from another lifetime. Outside the palace, he had made a living from his ancestral brokerage business, and everyone called him Chen Jingji. No one knew his real name. But since entering the palace, everyone called him by his name, Chen Ju. He had never heard “Chen Jingji” again.
“Doctor Wei?” Chen Jingji quickly led Wei Caiwei to a secluded place to talk. “How did Doctor Wei enter the palace? Did something happen to Li Jiubao?”
Since entering the palace, Chen Jingji had been recommended by his godfather Huang Jin to the Inner Academy. Once you enter the palace gates, it’s as deep as the sea, especially the strictly regulated Inner Academy. Students had three years to pass examinations and graduate, or they’d be expelled to do menial labor in the palace with no hope of advancement. Only through study could one ascend to success.
So Chen Jingji focused solely on his studies, deaf to outside affairs. He didn’t know Wei Caiwei had passed the palace female physician examination, much less that Li Jiubao had stolen her family’s household registration and entered the palace for maiden selection.
Wei Caiwei briefly explained the current situation: “…That’s how things stand. Prefect Wang of Shuntian Prefecture has high hopes for Li Jiubao. I think she has an eighty percent chance of being selected—you should prepare yourself mentally.”
In her previous life, Li Jiubao had entered the palace probably to climb the social ladder and avenge the tragically deceased Chen Jingji. Wei Caiwei hadn’t known Li Jiubao during the selection and had no idea how Li Jiubao had passed selection or been sent to Prince Yu’s mansion the following year. She had always been with Shang Qinglan, the two practically inseparable.
In this life, Chen Jingji hadn’t died, and Li Jiubao’s reason for entering the palace was probably also for him—to be closer to him. This created variables. Wei Caiwei didn’t know what would happen in the future, but she was certain that given Chen Jingji and Li Jiubao’s past relationship, if either of them stood out in the future and blocked someone else’s path, their past romantic connection, once discovered, would become a huge liability that opponents could exploit.
Therefore, Wei Caiwei had to find a way to see Chen Jingji and inform him of this matter so he could be on guard.
Upon hearing that Li Jiubao had stolen household registration papers to enter the palace, Chen Jingji gripped the book in his hands tightly, veins bulging on the backs of his hands.
After his castration, his beard had disappeared and his Adam’s apple had shrunk. Studying daily at the Inner Academy instead of running around as a broker showing houses to clients in wind and sun, his skin had become fair and delicate with an androgynous quality—just like Wang Daxia’s temperament in the previous life.
After a moment of silence, Chen Jingji said, “Thank you for telling me, Doctor Wei. I understand everything. I entered the palace for her, and she entered the palace for me. A single palace wall has trapped us both here. Please tell her that matters have reached this point—I respect her choice. Whatever happens in the future, I will support her and never betray her. We have affinity but no matrimonial fate and cannot become husband and wife, but in the palace, we can watch over each other.”
Chen Jingji drew a simple map on the ground. “I live in this row of rooms west of Wanshou Palace. If there’s anything that requires my help, don’t hesitate to find me. I would go through fire and water without hesitation.”
Wei Caiwei agreed and hurried back to Chuxiu Palace.
The next day, at the Brocade Guard headquarters.
After roll call, Lu Ying led her subordinates in practicing martial arts from Yu Dayou’s “Sword Manual,” pairing up for sparring. Wang Daxia was distracted and was repeatedly tripped and thrown by Wu Xiaoqi’s staff.
Lu Ying was frustrated with her subordinate’s poor performance and called him aside. “What’s wrong with you? You can’t even beat Wu Xiaoqi, a newcomer. Didn’t you sleep last night?”
Wang Daxia, sporting two black eyes, nodded. “Doctor Wei was summoned to the palace by the Ceremonial Directorate and hasn’t returned all night. I don’t know what happened. I tossed and turned, unable to sleep. Commander Lu, you have connections everywhere—could you get me into the palace to check on her?”
Author’s Note: Shedding tears for Chen Jingji.