The surroundings fell silent.

The plum tree at the entrance spread like a net full of accumulated snow, wrapping the medical clinic within.

A’Cheng snapped back to attention, dropped the carpet and rushed into the room, watching the man in front of him warily, hesitating whether to call the boss and Yin Zheng from the back courtyard to help.

Miao Liangfang stared at Lu Tong, his expression shifting unpredictably.

“Please sit and talk, Medical Officer Miao,” Lu Tong said.

After a long standoff, Miao Liangfang snorted and finally hobbled with his wooden stick to sit at the small table in the inner room.

Seeing this, A’Cheng quickly brought over a teapot and filled two cups on the table, then looked at Lu Tong. After getting Lu Tong’s signal, he lifted the felt curtain and went to the back courtyard to help Du Changqing and Yin Zheng with their work.

Only Lu Tong and Miao Liangfang remained in the medical clinic.

Lu Tong pushed the tea in front of her toward Miao Liangfang. Miao Liangfang didn’t take it, instead turning his head to survey the surroundings. When he saw the “Examination Questions Simplified” that Lu Tong had placed on the table, he couldn’t help but freeze.

After a long while, he turned back and looked at Lu Tong: “How did you know my identity?”

Straight to the point—essentially acknowledging what Lu Tong had said.

“I guessed.”

“Guessed?”

Lu Tong said: “The booklets you wrote are different from other medical texts outside. They cover all nine medical specialties and have a unified format. I heard that Imperial Medical Bureau spring examination papers cannot be circulated externally. If not from the Imperial Medical Bureau or someone who passed the spring examination, it would be impossible to fabricate such well-organized test questions just by making them up.”

Miao Liangfang narrowed his eyes: “Just based on this, you concluded I’m from the Medical Officer Academy?”

“Not just that.” Lu Tong gazed at her teacup. “I couldn’t confirm your identity, so I asked Master Hu to inquire through medical guilds about the roster of commoner medical workers who passed the spring examination in the past thirty years.”

Miao Liangfang’s expression shook.

Lu Tong smiled faintly.

Commoner medical workers who could pass the spring examination and enter the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy were extremely few over the years—one sheet of paper would be enough to write all their names. When a medical guild produced a Hanlin Medical Officer, they would beat gongs and drums in celebration for everyone to know, so inquiring about it wasn’t difficult.

“Twenty years ago during that year’s Imperial Medical Bureau spring examination, there was a commoner medical worker surnamed Miao who passed the spring examination with third place honors, becoming the only commoner medical officer in the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy that year.”

Lu Tong’s voice was unhurried: “I heard this person had remarkable medical skills and deep understanding of pharmacology. He was originally highly valued by the Academy Director, but ten years ago, he was expelled from the Medical Officer Academy for committing an offense and has been missing ever since.”

With each sentence Lu Tong spoke, Miao Liangfang’s face grew paler, and his hand holding the teacup trembled slightly.

Lu Tong raised her eyes: “Sir, are you that Hanlin Medical Officer who passed the spring examination?”

Miao Liangfang stared at Lu Tong. In those dim eyes hidden under his messy hair, something flashed by, but soon he began laughing as if he’d heard some joke.

He spread his hands and pointed to his tattered jacket: “Me? A Hanlin Medical Officer—do you believe that?”

“Yes.”

Miao Liangfang froze.

Lu Tong looked at him: “I believe it.”

These past days, she had repeatedly examined the booklets Du Changqing bought, becoming increasingly certain this person was extraordinary. Du Changqing had inquired and learned that Miao Liangfang had lived on West Street for many years, making a living copying books for others and sometimes doing odd jobs. When he had money, he would buy rice to cook porridge; when he had none, he would go hungry.

No one knew where he came from or his family situation. They only knew he was addicted to alcohol, drunk all day, and no one looked up to him. While Du Changqing could at least earn a smile by maintaining the small medical clinic his father left behind, Miao Liangfang on West Street was a worthless drunkard that even beggars could step on.

But it was precisely this worthless drunkard who couldn’t bear to remove those flourishing medicinal herbs in front of his home, letting them grow freely and cover most of the door panel.

Those medicinal herbs couldn’t survive without proper tending.

The man in front of her looked at Lu Tong, the smile on his face no longer sustainable. He clenched his fists and said in a low voice: “What exactly do you want by inquiring about all this?”

“As I said, I want to take the Imperial Medical Bureau spring examination and enter the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy to become a medical officer.”

“Stop fooling around!” Miao Liangfang laughed angrily in his fury. “Every year at the spring examination, how many commoner medical workers can become medical officers? Little girl, just to spite the Grand Secretary, you’re single-mindedly focused on the spring examination—what do you take the medical path to be?”

“Moreover,” seemingly realizing his words were harsh, Miao Liangfang picked up his teacup and gulped it down, slightly calming himself before continuing: “What’s so good about being a medical officer? When nobles in the palace have problems, medical officers are often made to accompany them in death. Who do you think those accompanying medical officers are? Naturally, it’s these commoner medical officers who have neither background nor connections!”

He rambled on: “Do well and others steal your credit; do poorly and you take the blame. The official salary can’t buy a few cabbages, but the risk you bear is losing your head. You only see the surface glamour, but how can a little girl like you bear the price?”

Lu Tong asked: “What price?”

“What price?” Miao Liangfang murmured, then suddenly rolled up his trouser leg. “This is the price!”

Lu Tong focused her gaze, her eyes moving slightly.

The wide trouser leg was rolled up to the knee, revealing the scarred leg of the man across from her. That leg was completely atrophied from the calf down, showing a terrifying dark purple color like a dried, withered piece of wood without moisture, rigidly grafted onto a human body.

Seeing Lu Tong’s expression, Miao Liangfang snorted, then let his trouser leg fall back down: “Did you see? You…”

“Who injured your leg?” Lu Tong interrupted him.

Miao Liangfang was stunned.

Was this the point to focus on?

Lu Tong looked at him: “Why were you expelled from the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy?”

“You…”

“Who harmed you?”

“…”

The person in front of him asked question after question in a calm tone, leaving him bewildered. Miao Liangfang’s hand by his leg clenched slightly. He lowered his head, took a deep breath, and said: “These aren’t things you should…”

“I can help you get revenge.”

His words stopped abruptly, and he suddenly raised his head.

Lu Tong looked at him: “I don’t know who harmed you to this extent, but if you help me pass the spring examination and enter the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy…”

“I can help you get revenge.”

The young female physician’s expression was serene, the cold promise coming from her mouth as if it were the most ordinary conversation. The wispy steam from the teacup covered her beautiful face with a layer of pale mist, but her eyes were as cold as the deep sea.

She was tempting him to accept the conditions.

Miao Liangfang’s face twitched several times. He felt that his leg, which had been numb for many years, somehow began to ache with shallow pain again.

“What kind of joke…” he murmured, then his expression became angry as he glared at Lu Tong: “What kind of joke is this!”

With a “clang,” the teacup was swept to the floor by his sleeve, spilling water all over the table.

Before Lu Tong could speak, Miao Liangfang grabbed the wooden stick beside him and rushed out the door.

The spilled tea dripped from the table corner to the floor, pooling into a small wet puddle on the ground.

Du Changqing and the others, who had been eavesdropping behind the door, quickly lifted the felt curtain and entered. Du Changqing looked toward the door, puzzled: “Hey, why did he leave?”

Lu Tong also looked out. Miao Liangfang’s figure was no longer visible outside the door. Only messy footprints and marks left by the walking stick remained on the snow-covered ground, reminding them that this person had just been here.

“He’ll come back,” Lu Tong said softly.

…

Night gradually deepened.

The shops on West Street closed their doors one by one, and the red brocade lanterns under the eaves lit up successively.

Bright moonlight spilled onto the snowy street, but stopped abruptly when it reached the grass hut. It seemed that whether day or night, sunlight or moonlight, no light could penetrate inside.

The wild grass growing in front of the door was pushed aside. The half-old broken wooden door made a muffled “creak,” accompanied by several sounds of a walking stick hitting the ground as Miao Liangfang entered the house.

It was already nighttime, and no lamp was lit in the room.

He never lit lamps.

Like a foraging beast returning to its pitch-black cave, the darker it was, the more at peace he felt.

After wandering dazedly on the street all day, only upon returning home did he feel the soreness in his other leg. Usually at this time, he would just grope his way to bed and sleep when drunk. However, today, as if possessed by ghosts, Miao Liangfang supported himself against the wall and hopped to the window, forcefully pushing open that not-very-spacious small window on the wall.

A sliver of moonlight slipped through the window crack into the room. Miao Liangfang instinctively raised his hand to shield his eyes. After a long while, he slowly lowered his arm and gradually adapted to the bright nighttime.

A wine jar sat on the table. Miao Liangfang reached for it and tilted his head back, pouring for a long time but only getting a few drops of remaining wine.

He disappointedly wiped his face and threw the wine jar to the floor with a “thud.” The sound was particularly crisp in the night. He paid no attention to the shards on the ground and looked up at that small piece of moon visible through the window crack.

The crescent moon was small and bright, with a blurred white edge, like a small glowing banner unfurled against the pitch-black sky.

He suddenly remembered the woven banner carpet that the young helper at Renxin Medical Clinic had been drying earlier that day. The embroidered text on it also shone brightly and caught the eye like this.

“Benevolent physicians heal with compassion, divine skills cure silently”—

Such banners symbolizing honor, words of gratitude, even wealthy rewards… he had once possessed them all.

Those flattering compliments, the coming and going of deference, the envious gazes of others—he had once accepted them all without question.

It was just that later…

Miao Liangfang lowered his head, his gaze falling on his completely numb right leg.

Moonlight fell on him, illuminating that dirty trouser leg particularly clearly. That small stain of unknown origin—whether oil or something else—appeared even filthier under the light, like blood continuously seeping out from within, making him suddenly short of breath from pain.

Chaotic shouting suddenly rang in his ears.

“Miao Liangfang, you are stubborn and willfully made a wrong diagnosis, causing the empress to be poisoned. You are heartless and unvirtuous, unfit to practice medicine, and should be punished!”

He heard his own helpless voice: “Injustice, this official is wronged—”

Someone’s shadow passed in front of him, official robes neat and flat, boots new and unstained by dust, then heavily stepping on his bloodied leg and grinding down hard.

“Miao Liangfang, oh Miao Liangfang,” he saw countless faces—joyful, smug, full of condescension and malice—taunting: “Did you think that because your name means ‘good prescription’ and you knew a few remedies, you could run wild in the Medical Officer Academy?”

They contemptuously patted Miao Liangfang’s face and spat out two words: “Lowborn.”

Lowborn…

Miao Liangfang sat by the window, his expression dazed.

His family had practiced medicine for generations. He had compiled a hundred years of experience into volumes, vowing to write a book called “Miao’s Good Prescriptions” to benefit commoner medical workers. But later, when he was condemned and expelled from the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy, that volume of “Miao’s Good Prescriptions” was still compiled by the Medical Officer Academy, but under another person’s name.

He had fought and protested, but it all sank like a stone in the sea, coming to nothing.

He couldn’t protect his family’s inherited prescriptions, which became someone else’s accomplishment. He dared not return home and had no face to meet the Miao family ancestors, so he wandered in Shengjing for decades, living on alcohol. As time passed, he only knew he was “Lame Miao” of West Street, forgetting that he had once been the spring examination sensation, the proud “Medical Officer Miao.”

That female physician, that female physician with calm eyes, seemed to see through the pain and anger in his heart, the secrets and grief, and said to him: “I can help you get revenge.”

She didn’t even know what had happened.

Miao Liangfang smiled self-mockingly.

He shouldn’t have hoped.

In the first few years after the incident, he had sought out old friends everywhere, but former friends and colleagues all avoided him, afraid of getting into trouble. Those he had saved instead accused him of using favors to coerce others, their righteous expressions frightening him.

No one was willing to help him.

No one would risk helping a commoner-born criminal who had caused great trouble. Moreover, ten years had passed, and those who harmed him held high positions with unshakeable status.

She was just an ordinary resident physician, yet she boasted about avenging him.

How ridiculous.

“Ridiculous…” Miao Liangfang hunched over, covering his face and laughing softly.

“So ridiculous…”

But as he laughed, clear drops of liquid fell through his fingers, moistening the moonlight by the window.

…

The winter night was cold, with wind sounds like weeping.

Yin Zheng stood at the table, leaning over to forcefully close the window, shutting out both the cold and the night.

The room was dimly lit with lamplight. Yin Zheng trimmed a section of the wick, and the flame brightened.

Yin Zheng put down the scissors and turned to look at Lu Tong, who was organizing medical texts: “Miss, will that Master Miao really come again today?”

“Probably,” Lu Tong said.

Actually, she wasn’t very certain either. He had left decisively without leaving an extra word. Whether he would return ultimately depended on the obsession in his heart.

However, it had been twenty years since Miao Liangfang’s spring examination triumph, and over ten years since he left the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy. Time was a magical thing—it could change everything, wear down ambitions, and turn heroes into ordinary people.

“But,” Yin Zheng asked curiously, “how did you know that Master Miao was framed?”

This “Lame Miao” had lived on West Street for many years. The neighbors in all four districts weren’t familiar with him, and because he was alcoholic and slovenly, few people inquired about his affairs. Yet Lu Tong had immediately determined he wasn’t ordinary, uncovered his medical officer identity, and even declared she would avenge him.

Lu Tong said: “I don’t know.”

Yin Zheng was stunned: “But Miss, you said…”

“I only said I’d help him get revenge on whoever made his leg lame. I didn’t say he was framed.” Lu Tong put away the medical texts. “Whether he’s good or bad doesn’t matter to me.”

She didn’t care about whatever entanglement existed between Miao Liangfang and the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy. She only cared whether Miao Liangfang could be useful to her. Just as when Yunniang saved Lu Tong’s family years ago, the condition was that Lu Tong would go with her. Today, between her and Miao Liangfang, it was just a transaction.

Money couldn’t move Miao Liangfang, but naturally there were other things that could. In life, people lived for nothing more than love and hate.

Yin Zheng was silent for a long while before carefully asking: “But what if Master Miao won’t agree to Miss’s conditions?”

Miao Liangfang seemed impervious to reason. Du Changqing had personally visited and offered substantial rewards, but he remained unmoved. Today he had come to the medical clinic aggressively to confront Lu Tong, but after just a few words, he stormed off. He seemed to regard no one highly and might not necessarily agree to others’ requests.

Lu Tong lowered her eyes.

“There isn’t only one path to take.” After a while, she said: “If he won’t agree, I’ll think of other ways.”

Roads were dead, but people were alive. While having Miao Liangfang’s help would certainly make things easier for her goal of entering the Hanlin Medical Officer Academy, she wouldn’t be completely helpless without him.

There were always other methods.

Yin Zheng nodded and said nothing more.

That night they slept late, and in the second half of the night, light snow began falling in Shengjing again. The next day when Lu Tong woke up, it wasn’t yet fully light.

The red plum blossoms by the window had bloomed several branches overnight, with a few lonely flowers adorning the long branches, appearing even more sparse in the snowy weather.

Lu Tong opened the window and saw the red plum and snow scene, beautiful and brilliant. For a moment, she felt somewhat dazed.

She seemed to return to Luomei Peak years ago. Waking up, there were empty bowls from testing medicine beside her. She climbed up from the ground and stumbled out of the room. Looking up, she saw vast snow covering the mountains.

Someone behind her called: “Miss?”

Lu Tong suddenly came back to her senses. Yin Zheng stood at the door rubbing her eyes: “Why did you wake up so early?”

She was slightly stunned for a moment, as if gradually understanding that this was Shengjing at the feet of the emperor, not Luomei Peak in Sunan thousands of miles away.

Yin Zheng didn’t notice anything unusual in Lu Tong’s expression. She just yawned and pulled her clothes tighter: “It’s so cold. Miss, come inside quickly. You can’t be blown by cold wind—catching cold would be bad.”

Lu Tong followed her inside. After they simply washed up, Yin Zheng boiled water and went with Lu Tong to open the door.

Winter days were cold and dawned late, so the vendors on West Street also opened late. When the medical clinic door opened, the tailor shop and silk shoe shop across the street were still closed. It had just started to get light, and the sky after snow was gray and misty in the early morning, as if shrouded in white fog.

Yin Zheng picked up a broom, planning to sweep the accumulated snow at the entrance. As soon as she reached the door, she cried out “Aiya!” and nearly fell backward in shock.

Lu Tong asked: “What’s wrong?”

Yin Zheng pointed under the plum tree: “Miss…”

Lu Tong looked over.

A person sat under the plum tree. No one knew how long he had been sitting there, his whole body covered with a layer of white snow. At first glance, he looked like a corpse. When he moved, snow particles fell from his felt hat, revealing that greasy, deeply lined face.

Lu Tong was slightly stunned.

That person was Miao Liangfang.

Miao Liangfang supported himself against the tree and slowly stood up.

Whether because of his lame leg or because he had been frozen here too long, his movements were somewhat stiff, stumbling like a child learning to walk.

No one spoke.

After a long while, Miao Liangfang shivered and looked at Lu Tong, his tone still as impatient as yesterday: “Do you know how difficult the spring examination is? In the past three years, the commoner medical workers who passed the spring examination could be counted on one hand.”

“I know.”

“And you still want to take it?”

“Still want to.”

He walked forward two steps, rubbed his nose, and said uncomfortably: “Do your words from yesterday still count?”

Lu Tong looked at him.

Miao Liangfang still wore yesterday’s jacket with exposed cotton. The hole in the chest seemed to have gotten bigger. His hair was gray and white, his eye sockets were red, and he stood under the plum tree, clumsy and stiff like a snowman.

Like the snowman that A’Cheng had carefully built, which was then kicked apart by the Grand Secretary’s servant woman.

The snowman’s black eyes were like two dust-covered black dates, yet carried a trace of earnest, fragile hope, looking at her timidly.

The snow had stopped, West Street’s morning was quiet, and the medical clinic’s plaque faced directly toward the plum tree at the entrance. The branches couldn’t hide the two characters “Renxin” (Benevolent Heart).

Lu Tong smiled and nodded: “Of course.”

“Lu Tong” invited “Miao Liangfang” to join the group chat [Renxin Medical Clinic Loving Family]

“Miao Liangfang” is not friends with other members of the group. Please pay attention to privacy and security.