Chu Feng found a small bag of embroidery needles in the sewing basket on the table. He immediately took one out and began treating Eunuch Wei with golden-needle acupuncture.
The embroidery needle precisely pierced the Tianshu point on his abdomen, the Yinlingquan point on his leg, the Neiting point between his toes, and the Quchi point on the inside of his elbow.
He used the reducing method of acupuncture, inserting the needle quickly, then swiftly twisting and turning it and lifting and thrusting it with wide movements. His technique was practiced and efficient.
With ordinary acupuncture, the needles had to remain in place for twenty minutes after deqi before it took effect. But after barely two minutes, Eunuch Wei’s eyes lit up, and he cried out in delight:
“Oh! My stomach doesn’t hurt anymore, and I don’t feel bloated or like I need to go! I’ve never heard of this way of treating illness, but it’s astonishingly effective. Impressive!”
This time, even Chu Feng was surprised. How could the acupuncture take effect so quickly?
It turned out that people of the Great Jing Dynasty were extremely sensitive to acupuncture, and its therapeutic effect was far faster than normal.
Thus, curing an illness with a single needle and seeing immediate results would become a reality here.
He turned around, walked to the table, picked up the brush, and wrote down a classic prescription for stopping diarrhea—Ge Gen Qin Lian Decoction—then handed it to Eunuch Wei.
Eunuch Wei looked at the three medicinal materials listed in the prescription, dumbfounded. “You’re using so many herbs? In the past, we used only a single herb to treat an illness.”
It turned out that doctors in the Great Jing Dynasty had always used only one herb at a time.
This Ge Gen Qin Lian Decoction of his used three medicinal materials. It seemed the Great Jing Dynasty had no concept of compound prescriptions, and treated illnesses with single herbs alone. No wonder Eunuch Wei was so shocked.
Of course, a prescription was far more effective than a single herb.
Before long, a guard returned with the herbs. After checking them, Chu Feng confirmed they were correct. The herbs of the Great Jing Dynasty were just like those in the modern world, and even had the same names. That was a relief.
Chu Feng personally went to the inn kitchen to prepare the decoction.
By then, the acupuncture had stabilized Eunuch Wei’s condition, and the diarrhea, bloating, and pain had mostly subsided.
When the decoction was ready, it was brought over. The warm medicine went down, resolving the symptoms both inside and out and dispelling the damp-heat. The damp-heat congesting his intestines was completely cleared, and the qi mechanism of his bowels returned to normal.
In a short while, Eunuch Wei had completely recovered his energy and spirit. Gone was the listless, drained state caused by his earlier diarrhea; he felt refreshed and invigorated.
He was a straightforward man. Overjoyed, he pulled out a five-tael silver ingot and pressed it into Chu Feng’s hand.
“First Prince, your medical skill is extraordinary. This servant thanks you! It’s late, so you should all get some rest.”
With a smile on his face, Eunuch Wei hummed a cheerful tune and left with the guards.
The scene left Cheap Old Mother dumbfounded. Only after everyone had left did she hurry to ask, “Feng’er, when did you learn such remarkable medical skills?”
“I was browsing through miscellaneous books in my spare time and happened to remember a folk remedy. It was just a lucky coincidence.”
Cheap Old Mother had no doubts. She gathered up all the hair that had been cut off the floor, wrapped it in a piece of blue cloth, and urged him to get some rest before returning to her room.
Chu Feng lay on the bed, his thoughts churning as he tossed and turned, unable to sleep.
So far, pretending to be the dead Deposed Crown Prince had gone smoothly. No one suspected him.
But on this trip to the capital city, the old Emperor wanted his heart’s blood as medicine. It was a dead end. If he could resolve this crisis, there would be hope of turning things around.
Medical arts in the Great Jing Dynasty were backward, while his own skills were far superior. If he could find an opportunity to cure the old Emperor, he would not only avoid the dead end of having to save the Emperor with his heart’s blood, but also earn the Emperor’s favor.
Then there would be hope of regaining the Emperor’s favor. Once he regained the position of Crown Prince, there was still a chance he might one day ascend the throne.
Fortune favored the bold. He would go for it!
The next morning.
The group set out for the capital city.
Since he had cured Eunuch Wei’s diarrhea, the eunuch and several guards were warm toward him and his mother. Eunuch Wei even paid for their meal out of his own pocket, chatting and laughing with Chu Feng.
Thus, along the way, Chu Feng learned many useful things from the deposed empress, Eunuch Wei, and several guards:
The deposed empress was named Shen Lingshu. Her father—the deposed Crown Prince’s maternal grandfather—had been the Grand Tutor and the Emperor’s teacher. But he had been implicated in the Crown Prince’s treason case, stripped of his official position, and forced to leave the capital city with his entire family and return to their old home in Jiangnan.
The deposed Crown Prince’s wife, the former Crown Princess, was named Zhu Qingyuan. She was the eldest granddaughter of Zhu Bingcheng, the Great General Who Guards the Nation.
Zhu Bingcheng commanded the Capital Imperial Guards. During the Crown Prince’s treason case, he had proactively distanced himself from the Crown Prince and kept himself out of it, escaping any implication.
Thus, the Crown Princess had not followed the deposed Crown Prince and his family to their fief for confinement. Instead, she had remained in the capital city at her maternal home, living a stable life under the protection of her grandfather, Zhu Bingcheng.
The deposed Crown Prince’s father—the current emperor—was named Chu Jin, courtesy name Haotian, and was known as the Qianyuan Master. Since his reign title was Xuande, he was called the Xuande Emperor. He had fifteen sons and eight daughters; the deposed Crown Prince was the First Prince.
Chu Feng also learned the names and preferences of his younger brothers and sisters. At the same time, he gained a rough understanding of the imperial concubines in the Imperial Palace, important court officials, factions at court, the capital dignitaries, and more.
After a long and arduous journey, they finally arrived in the capital city that day.
Since the Crown Prince had been deposed, he could no longer live in the Crown Prince’s Eastern Palace. So they went to the mansion of the former Crown Princess Zhu Qingyuan’s maternal family—the Great General Who Guards the Nation, Zhu Bingcheng—to see if they could stay there.
On the way, Chu Feng asked Shen Lingshu, “Mother, do you think my father-in-law will take us in?”
Shen Lingshu’s tone was firm. “Of course he will! Back then, your father-in-law Zhu Bingcheng was only a fifth-rank deputy general, and he did everything he could to curry favor with me, the Empress, begging to marry his granddaughter to you.”
“I recommended him to your Father Emperor, and only then was he able to rise through the ranks and become a first-rank Great General Who Guards the Nation and Commander of the Capital Garrison.”
“Later, during the campaign against the xuanmo khanate, Zhu Bingcheng feared death and delayed the battle. Your Father Emperor was so furious that he wanted to kill him, but I persuaded him to spare Zhu Bingcheng’s life and even saved his official position. He was only caned and made to forfeit his salary.”
“So, Zhu Bingcheng owes us a debt of gratitude, and this recent disaster hasn’t implicated the Zhu family. We’re only asking for somewhere to stay for a while. It shouldn’t be difficult.”
With Eunuch Wei accompanying them, they arrived at the mansion of the Great General Who Guards the Nation.
Chu Feng stepped forward and knocked.
When the gatekeeper saw them, he smiled broadly and deliberately curried favor with Eunuch Wei. But he showed not the slightest respect to Shen Lingshu and Chu Feng, treating mother and son with cold detachment.
He led them to an elegant, spacious reception room in the Flower Hall to wait.
Soon, Great General Zhu Bingcheng arrived at the Flower Hall with his granddaughter, Zhu Qingyuan.
When they saw Chu Feng and his mother, there was not a trace of warmth between relatives. Instead, impatience and loathing were written plainly on their faces.
Chu Feng raised his eyes and studied Zhu Qingyuan. She wore a simple yet luxurious moon-white summer-and-autumn palace dress of gauzy silk. Light and graceful, it was free of elaborate gold ornaments, yet she possessed an air of nobility.
She had a pretty oval face, skin like polished jade—clear and luminous white—and long, naturally arched brows like distant mountains. Her almond-shaped eyes were as captivating as autumn waters. A delicate pearl hairpiece adorned the space between her brows.
She had a straight nose and rosy lips, with exquisitely beautiful features and a slender, graceful figure. She was a peerless beauty who outshone all others in the capital.
At that moment, however, her eyes were cold as frost, and the arrogance and sharpness in them utterly crushed her gentle air.
Just as he was about to look away, observant Chu Feng discovered that the thin pearl hairpiece between her brows was deliberately concealing a tiny, inconspicuous red and swollen poisonous sore.
The sore was small, and its surface looked smooth, but dark purple toxic heat was brewing within.
Ordinary people would assume it was just a common pimple caused by excess internal heat. But Chu Feng was an experienced Traditional Chinese Medicine Doctor, and at a glance he recognized the danger of this carbuncle. It was no ordinary heat-toxin boil, but a facial carbuncle with stagnant poison buried deep beneath the skin!
The poisonous sore looked small, but its root was actually very deep, especially given its location in such a critical spot between her brows.
This was the dangerous triangle of the face, where the blood vessels ran directly to the skull. Ordinary squeezing or improper application of medicine could cause the poison to spread. Ancient physicians called it “toxic qi spreading”; modern medicine called it septicemia.
For Chu Feng, treating this kind of poisonous sore was no more than a trivial task.
But with medicine as backward as that of Great Jing, once toxic qi spread—that is, once septicemia set in—the mild outcome was ulceration, scarring, and permanent disfigurement; the worst was an intracranial infection, high fever, coma, and death from the poison.
Before Shen Lingshu could ask to stay, Zhu Bingcheng spoke first:
“You and your son plotted treason. Fortunately, His Majesty saw right from wrong and did not vent his anger on my general’s mansion. And now you have the nerve to come to our door. Is implicating the Zhu family still not enough for you?”