Morning light shone into the room. Liu Pucheng entered and saw a disciple pouring the medicinal decoction from a pot onto white cloth held by another disciple.

The medicinal liquid filtered down into a small basin below.

“Lady Qi, do you think this needs to be boiled again?” the disciple asked in a low voice, carrying the small basin to Qi Yue’s side.

Qi Yue was bent over carefully at the table, brushing water droplets from a small basin held by Hu San.

“Add the medicine residue again with water and boil for another half hour,” Qi Yue said seriously after examining the medicinal liquid.

The two disciples responded and hurried away.

“What is Lady Qi doing?” Liu Pucheng looked around the room. Everything he saw was familiar, yet somehow appeared very strange.

Why were there heavy stones pressing down on that pot?

The smell of meat broth permeated the room.

And this strange behavior of brushing water droplets…

“I need distilled water…” Qi Yue said, standing up and looking at the water in the basin below, which wasn’t even half full. “Steam it again.”

Hu San nodded and placed the basin on the charcoal stove nearby.

Having stayed up all night and concentrated intensely, everyone’s eyes were bloodshot.

“How is the injured man?” Qi Yue asked, rubbing her eyes to relieve them slightly.

“Not very good,” Liu Pucheng said.

Qi Yue didn’t panic; instead, she smiled.

“Looks like I need to speed up,” she said, clenching her fists.

By noon, Liu Pucheng and the others watched as Qi Yue filled small porcelain bottles with medicinal liquid diluted to different ratios, each tied with different colored ribbons as markers.

Two disciples brought over a steamer, arranged them one by one, and placed it in a large pot that had been temporarily set up.

This large pot had a pot inside a pot, covered with a lid, then weighed down with stones, with the lid and pot body wrapped in layers of wet white cloth.

“Half an hour. Everyone stay back in case the pot explodes,” Qi Yue said.

Hearing this, everyone was startled and quickly retreated.

“But please don’t explode…” Qi Yue couldn’t help but clasp her hands together, murmuring prayers to the gods and Buddha.

“Teacher, now go cut some rotten flesh from the injured man’s wound,” she said again.

Liu Pucheng responded, looking at the wide-open pot and listening to the banging sounds inside, feeling somewhat afraid.

“This is…” he couldn’t help asking.

“Attempting high-pressure sterilization,” Qi Yue smiled with some self-mockery.

Liu Pucheng didn’t find it amusing. Instead, he nodded seriously with admiration, becoming even more curious about Qi Yue’s master in his heart. What kind of extraordinary and shocking expert must that person be?

The rotten flesh was carefully cut into pieces by Qi Yue wearing gloves.

“Everyone come over,” Qi Yue said.

Immediately, everyone gathered around.

“Each of you watch one piece,” Qi Yue said.

Everyone didn’t know what she wanted to do, but they each chose a piece to observe carefully, as if they were looking at the world’s rarest beautiful jade and precious stones.

“Remember the state of the rotten flesh you’re each observing,” Qi Yue said. “After tonight, when we take them out again, you need to see if there are any changes. This can only depend on everyone’s eyes and memory, and it’s also the final step to determine whether we can find effective injection liquid.”

She paused here, looking at the disciples who were watching the rotten flesh even more seriously.

Success or failure depended on this final step. If they couldn’t find it tomorrow…

Qi Yue took a deep breath. Then it would be failure, and there would be no more time for her to experiment.

She lowered her head and also looked seriously at a piece of rotten flesh, wanting to imprint it firmly in her mind.

“Young Madam, do you think this temperature is enough?” another disciple was guarding a wooden box surrounded by charcoal stoves on all sides and below.

Qi Yue hurried over and reached inside to test the temperature.

Roughly, perhaps, it was about right.

“Good,” Qi Yue said.

She placed the rotten flesh into the porcelain bottles one by one. Each disciple responsible for their own piece tied on their marked ribbons, arranged them neatly on a wooden board, carried them over, and placed them in the wooden box.

A thick quilt covered the wooden box.

After completing all this, the disciples’ faces showed nervous excitement. They had done many strange things over the past day and night, but hopefully, they could create strange results.

Compared to this side that needed constant heating with charcoal fires, the room where the hunter was kept had ice blocks constantly being brought in.

“Wear gloves properly, especially those with wounds on your hands. Don’t touch anything to avoid infection,” Qi Yue walked in, looking at A’Ru and others who were busy caring for the hunter, smiling. “I can only make enough medicine for one person over there.”

A’Ru and the others laughed upon hearing this. The laughter coming from behind the wide masks was muffled, but it sounded very pleasant to the heart.

Chang Yuncheng stood outside the courtyard gate, hearing the laughter from inside, and stopped his advancing foot.

When she was happy… seeing him might remind her of unhappy things. Better forget it…

He turned to leave, but the door behind him opened. Unable to resist, he turned back and saw Qi Yue walking out, stretching her arms in a very ungraceful manner. Seeing him looking over, Qi Yue’s movement paused slightly, but she quickly continued her actions and moved her gaze away from Chang Yuncheng.

Chang Yuncheng withdrew his gaze and walked away.

When morning light shone into the room again, everyone’s eyes were tensely fixed on that wooden box.

Qi Yue looked at the water clock nearby.

“Good, time’s up. Take them out,” she finally raised her hand and said.

The disciples who had been waiting for this sentence found their hands and feet somewhat restricted when they actually heard it, trembling as they lifted the cotton quilt and took out the wooden board from the steaming hot wooden box.

The wooden board was placed on the table, and all the disciples stood in front of their responsible bottles according to their marked ribbons, each holding a small pair of tweezers that had been temporarily made.

“Good, let’s begin. Look at the rotten flesh in the bottles and find the one that hasn’t continued to deteriorate but has instead improved slightly,” Qi Yue said. She also lowered her head and opened the bottle she was responsible for.

The rotten flesh was picked out…

“No good,” Qi Yue put it down. “One to sixteen, failed.”

A disciple nearby marked an X on a paper filled with dilution ratios with trembling hands.

In the patient’s room, it was particularly quiet, with only the unconscious injured man making vague groans.

Liu Pucheng had also gone to see the results. Only A’Ru remained in the room, wearing a large gown and wide mask, with a headscarf covering her hair. She was wringing out a towel with gloved hands and placing it on the injured man’s forehead.

“Sister A’Ru, the ice blocks are here,” a disciple entered carrying a wooden basin full of ice blocks.

A’Ru nodded and efficiently came over to arrange the ice blocks around the sickbed with him.

“Sister A’Ru, aren’t you going to watch over there?” the disciple asked.

A’Ru wrung out the towel again to wipe the injured man.

“No need to watch,” she said.

No need to watch. The Young Madam would definitely succeed, definitely.

“One to one hundred twenty-four, ineffective.”

“One to one hundred forty-six, ineffective.”

…

With each report, sweat on Qi Yue’s forehead increased.

Please succeed. Please succeed. Must succeed…

She stared at the hands of each disciple, afraid they might see incorrectly.

How ridiculous. She had never thought there would be such a day when she would kneel and pray to gods and Buddha for the success of something she had once tried so hard to refute, the result she least wanted to see in experiments.

As more and more ratios were crossed out on the paper, everyone’s expressions became increasingly disappointed.

It was originally impossible, so it was still impossible after all…

Watching the woman lean on the table and hang her head, Liu Pucheng couldn’t help but sigh.

“No matter what, having tried is success,” he walked over and said with a smile.

“Although that’s what you say, the result is still the most important,” Qi Yue said with her head down. “In our profession, whether you work hard or not, what the world ultimately judges is still the result. If you cure someone, it’s success. If you don’t cure them, it’s failure. Simple… and ruthless.”

Just like Dad, for that brain surgery, he made many preparations and wrote many plans, but so what? Failure was failure, and failure required paying the price, regardless of whether you had tried your best.

The sound of counting suddenly stopped, or rather, they hadn’t noticed.

“Qi Qi Qi Qi…” a trembling voice murmured.

Everyone suddenly looked toward the person making the sound.

This disciple used tweezers to pick out a piece of rotten flesh. The small piece of rotten flesh was shaking violently at this moment. Of course, it wasn’t the meat shaking, but the person holding the meat.

“No no no no…” he continued with a shaking voice.

No one urged him. Everyone just stared at him intently, holding their breath.

“No change…” he finally shouted this sentence, just before everyone was about to suffocate.

Qi Yue stepped in front of him and carefully took the piece of meat with her gloved hands.

This piece of meat that even dogs probably wouldn’t look at if thrown on the ground was now held by Qi Yue like the world’s rarest treasure. She looked at it again and again, again and again, until sweat blurred her eyes and she had to close them.

Qi Yue took a deep breath, straightened up, and looked at the ribbon tied to the bottle.

“One to three hundred twenty-four, effective.”

When the cheers from this side reached the other room, A’Ru, who was changing the injured man’s wound dressing, finally couldn’t control her trembling hands. But she said nothing, just tremblingly and clumsily completed changing the dressing.

She knew, she had always known, the Young Madam would definitely succeed. The Young Madam always kept her word!

“It’s been six or seven days already. What’s the use of them dragging it out like this!” In the Rejuvenation Hall, the disciples spoke irritably.

Wang Qingchun sat in his chair, leisurely sipping tea with some composure.

“Let them drag it out day by day. Let them be,” he said with a smile.

“Master, the people queuing outside haven’t dispersed,” Wu Shan said with some boastful complaint as he entered.

“It’s getting quite late…”

“Master has been seeing patients all day…”

“Don’t get too tired…”

The other disciples immediately chimed in with various concerns.

These words were like spring breeze caressing Wang Qingchun’s internal organs, making him extremely comfortable.

“A physician has a parent’s heart. Since they’ve come, how can we not care for them?” He put down his teacup and stood up. “I’ll go take a look.”

“Master’s benevolent heart and skilled technique…”

“…truly a blessing for our people…”

Amid the disciples’ flattering words, Wang Qingchun walked out of the back hall and came to the front hall to hold consultations.

But stepping into the front hall left him stunned, and the disciples following behind him were also stunned.

Where were the people in the empty hall?

“This is… where are the people?” Wu Shan was immediately somewhat embarrassed and angry, shouting.

A clerk sorting medicine nearby looked terrified.

“Senior… Brother, they all ran away…” he stammered.

Wang Qingchun’s face could no longer maintain its composure.

“What do you mean they all ran away? Did you chase them away?” Wu Shan demanded.

“No,” the young clerk looked aggrieved, pointing outside. “Just now someone said the injured hunter walked out of Marquis Dingxi’s mansion, and everyone ran to see…”

What?

Everyone in the room was stunned.

They hadn’t heard wrong, had they? The injured hunter didn’t get carried out but walked out?

Could dead people also walk?

Those who could walk were naturally not dead people, only living people. Could it be that the hunter was really saved?

Cold sweat instantly broke out on Wang Qingchun’s forehead.

How… could it be… possible…