The people of Chizhou firmly believe in gods and believe that all things have spiritual energy. If you take something, you must give it back. Only then can you breathe in and renew yourself forever.
If someone only takes and does not return, he will suffer retribution in the long run.
This is what people said when the news of Zou Sifang's illness spread from Huichun Hall.
As the saying goes, fortunes change, how can you expect all good things to happen to your family? If you take advantage of something for too long, you'll always have to pay it back with something else.
Especially since the Zou family makes money from blood and flesh, the "blood in front of the mausoleum" may not be worth many taels even if there are a hundred deer. No matter how big the swamp is, it is impossible to find it every year.
Shepherds had seen servants from the Xiong family and herders from the Zou family riding horses to drive a herd of deer, deliberately driving them deeper into the swamp. The trapped deer cried out every night, and for three days, those passing by the swamp's edge could hear the sound, like a child crying, before it finally vanished in the perpetual fog, leaving behind a deathly silence.
This is the Xiong family’s way to wealth, a way stained with blood.
And now, the toll for this financial path is the life of the Zou family's master.
In order to make it easier for servants to take care of him day and night, Zou Sifang's bedroom was moved from the north to the west wing. Braziers were lit everywhere in the room to drive away moisture, and the room was covered with heavy curtains for fear that the person inside would catch a cold.
Zhao lifted the last layer of gauze and finally revealed the person lying on the bed.
Zou Sifang's face was pale, his eyes were tightly closed, and his dry lips were half open, like a dehydrated fish thrown ashore. The air was filled with a foul and fishy smell, which was the smell of incontinence from someone who had been bedridden for a long time.
When Zhao saw this, an uncontrollable disgust welled up on her face. She spent a lot of money to hire some tight-lipped people to look after Zou Sifang, just because she didn't want to be trapped in this dead room every day.
Although Hao Bai was young, he didn't show much disgust on his face. He only reminded her, "Madam, please ventilate this room more often. Sometimes covering it up like this may not be a good thing."
Zhao covered her mouth and nose with a handkerchief and waved her hand to signal him to treat her quickly.
Hao Bai sighed and began to take Zou Sifang's pulse.
No one spoke in the room for a while, only the sound of breathing tickled Zhao's nerves.
The time Hao Bai spent on taking Zou Sifang's pulse seemed to be the sum of the time taken by all the doctors before him. Zou Sifang's somewhat skinny wrist was pressed back and forth under his fingers, leaving several fingerprints.
Just when Zhao was about to lose her patience, Hao Bai suddenly asked the maidservant who was serving beside her with her head bowed, "Do you have any candles?"
The maid took a look at Zhao's expression, then nodded and went to get a cigarette from the corner cabinet. Hao Bai lit one, moved close to Mr. Zou's face, and gently pulled open his eyelids with his other hand.
Zou Sifang's eyes were cloudy, but one could still see that his pupil, which was supposed to be round, had turned into a horizontal line and shrank slightly after seeing the light.
He understood what was going on, blew out the candle, and then stretched out three fingers to rub and explore Mr. Zou's face, neck, shoulders, and arms.
Zhao, who was watching eagerly from the side, finally couldn't help but ask, "Sir, what are you doing? Didn't you take the pulse?"
Hao Bai didn't reply. He finally stopped when he felt Zou Sifang's right index finger. He then took out a small mirror and examined it carefully. He saw a small, inconspicuous black spot at the tip of the index finger, which looked like a needle prick. Looking more closely, he realized that the black spot was like a thorn stuck vertically in the flesh, but there was no foreign body sensation under the skin, and it was smooth as usual.
He placed Master Zou's hand back into the quilt and bowed slightly to Madam Zhao: "Madam, the master is not ill, he is poisoned."
"What?!" Zhao was shocked and her face turned pale.
All sorts of possibilities flashed through her mind, and she became suspicious of everyone around her. Finally, she gritted her teeth and said, "My Zou family has given out a lot of benefits on a daily basis, and everyone is surrounding the master and calling him a brother. But it turns out that they are after our family's money and are actually resorting to such means to harm others?"
Hao Bai obviously disagreed: "The poison the master was poisoned with is very ancient. I'm afraid it's not easily available nowadays. If someone deliberately poisoned him, they would definitely kill him. It's strange that he's still alive."
Zhao gradually calmed down, but her hands were still shaking uncontrollably. "You mean, he won't die for a while?"
"This poison is at least a hundred years old. It was once used on cattle and sheep during sacrifices, so the victim wouldn't struggle on the altar, but would still have a breath of life, for the gods to consume. The sacrificial process often took nineteen days, and the poison's effectiveness lasted for a similar nineteen days. After nineteen days, no medicine or stone would work, and even the gods couldn't save the victim."
Zhao listened and listened, but only heard the word "death". Her face turned pale and she asked, "Sir, can you cure this poison?"
Hao Bai lowered his eyes, his expression clearly a little unnatural: "This... To be honest, I do know the secret recipe for the antidote, but there is an ingredient in it that is too rare, I'm afraid..."
When Zhao heard that there was still hope, she immediately said, "Sir, please prescribe the medicine. Even if it's a rare ingredient like thousand-year-old Ganoderma lucidum, the Zou family will definitely not be stingy with the money."
He knew that it was useless to say more, so he picked up the pen on the table and wrote a few words on the rice paper.
When Zhao picked it up and took a look, she was stunned.
******************
In the old northern city, far away from the Zou Mansion, in front of a shabby teahouse, an inconspicuous carriage stopped in front of the door. The driver was wearing a rather impressive long sword and was looking up and down at the door curtain of the teahouse.
The facade of the teahouse has long been weathered by wind and sun and its original appearance is no longer recognizable. The plaque on the beam has long since disappeared. Only the two lines of poetry engraved on the pillar at the door still have some traces of the former teahouse: they are: Clear wind, stone tripod, floating flower milk, night rain, spring plate, cold blue silk.
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