Chapter 44 An emergency, let Grandpa An help me apply it.
"Princess, you have a fever. Your forehead and body are burning hot!" Zhu Mu touched Zhao Liangxu's hand again. Her palm and wrist were dry and hot.
"Princess, please wait here, I'll go find you a doctor!"
Zhu Mu hurriedly filled a glass with water, watched Zhao Liangxu drink it with difficulty, and then rushed out the door.
She hesitated for a moment, then decided to go to the An family mansion through the newly built archway to seek a doctor.
Zhu Mu was anxious and ran up to Luo Fan to ask, "Guard Luo, do you know where the doctor is in the manor? Princess Zhao is seriously ill, and the doctor from the An family is the closest one."
"Princess Zhao is ill? The doctor is in that direction." Luo Fan pointed out a location to Zhu Mu, but worried that Zhu Mu might not be familiar with the layout of An Mansion, and thinking that he didn't want to continue sweeping, he said, "Princess Zhao's illness is so sudden? I'll lead you there."
"Who's sick?" a hoarse voice squeezed between the two.
Luo Fan took a deep breath; An He was back.
Anhe stayed in the palace last night, and Li Ying managed to persuade him to take a day off today.
This morning, as soon as I returned to the manor, I saw Zhu Mu pulling Luo Fan and speaking anxiously to him.
"Your Majesty, Princess Zhao has fallen ill. She has fallen ill very suddenly and is burning hot all over."
Upon hearing this, Anhe asked, "How did she get sick? What happened to her?"
"Your Majesty, the princess has been coughing slightly these past few days. I'm afraid she's been busy with matters at the residence and caught a chill from the wind," Zhu Mu replied anxiously.
An He and Zhao Liangxu, dressed in thin clothes all day long, were so weak, yet they couldn't stay idle: "Zhu Mu, take us to see a doctor. Luo Fan, invite the doctor over."
Zhu Mu responded and led An He over, naturally passing through the newly constructed archway. An He then realized that Zhao Liangxu's bedroom was the closest to the archway. If one were to pass through the archway from her bedroom to An He's study, it would be closer than the previous courtyard.
Anhe heard Zhao Liangxu coughing before he even entered the room.
He saw Zhao Liangxu with her hair down, lying on her side on the bed, reaching for the teacup on the bedside table.
Zhao Liangxu looked sickly. She was still wearing her sleeping clothes, and her hair was not combed. A few strands of hair were tangled and stuck to her cheeks, looking messy. Her once fair face was covered with a bluish-black color, making her look weak and frightening.
Anhe stepped forward, filled the teacup with water, and handed it to Zhao Liangxu.
Zhao Liangxu felt unwell, so she tossed and turned in bed, causing her undergarments to become wrinkled and messy, with the collar barely covering her face, and Anhe could even see Zhao Liangxu's thin collarbone.
He was exasperated and hastily tightened Zhao Liangxu's collar: "You know it's freezing cold, yet you still didn't wear enough clothes and went out in the wind. You've finally made yourself sick, haven't you?"
Zhao Liangxu took the teacup and sipped it; she could barely drink water these days.
"Is Eunuch An deliberately setting up this to mock me?"
The teacup was made of celadon, and its cool temperature cooled Zhao Liangxu's hands. She then placed her hands on her eyes, where they could feel the coolness of her palms, which slightly relieved the burning sensation in her head.
Luo Fan rushed over with a doctor. The doctor carefully examined Zhao Liangxu's symptoms and replied, "Princess Zhao has been exposed to cold wind. She may have had some symptoms before. I heard that Princess Zhao has been busy these past few days. She must have been sweating and then caught a chill, which is why the illness came on so quickly."
"The illness is not difficult to treat, but it cannot be treated hastily; it can only be treated slowly with medication."
The doctor prescribed a medicine and instructed Zhao Liangxu to rest well for the next few days and avoid being exposed to the wind.
Anhe sat to the side, grinding his back teeth, and said, "Did you hear that? The doctor said you can't be exposed to the wind anymore. How come we didn't notice Princess Zhao jumping around like this before? Now you're behaving yourself, aren't you? The New Year is coming soon, and you'll have to carry this illness into the spring next year."
Zhao Liangxu slowly lay back down, pretending to be a corpse: "Eunuch An always speaks so hurtfully. Even though I'm like this, Eunuch An doesn't even think of giving me a break."
She turned her head away, covered her mouth, and coughed a few times, the coughs hitting Anhe's heart.
Zhao Liangxu is now exhausted and too tired to even crack a joke.
He clicked his tongue, resigned to his bad luck, and finally softened his tone, saying, "Alright, Princess Zhao is sick, so we won't hold it against you. You should rest well, and don't go out again, understand?"
After he went out, he found Luo Fan still waiting outside. Luo Fan was a man, and it was neither proper nor reasonable for him to enter Zhao Liangxu's bedroom, so the doctor made a different suggestion.
An and he himself didn't care about any of that. Humph, anyway, he was a eunuch.
"You did a good job. Go back to your position as a guard. You don't need to sweep anymore." Anhe left Luo Fan with these words.
In the following days, he had people select ginseng, donkey-hide gelatin, and other tonics from the storeroom and send them to Zhao Liangxu.
Zhao Liangxu stared at the mountain of tonics piled on the table, her forehead twitching: "Anhe isn't trying to help me recover quickly, he's trying to kill me with tonics, isn't he? He's really something."
Ginseng is one thing, but they also send things like deer antler and dried seahorse here.
So you've come to give her kidney tonics, right?
Is this reasonable?
Anhe squeezed out a spare moment every day to check on Zhao Liangxu's recovery.
At this point, he actually thought the archway was a good idea, it was really convenient.
After more than ten days of treatment, Zhao Liangxu's fever gradually subsided, but her cough persisted. Every time someone entered the room, they would see Zhao Liangxu covering her mouth and coughing softly. Although she wasn't coughing up her lungs like before, she was still coughing constantly. Given the duration of the medicine, she should have recovered by now.
But this cough still seems to be bothering me.
This reminded him of Xu Huayue. Before she was a concubine, Xu Huayue had developed a cough that was prone to occur in winter due to her poor health. Could it be that Zhao Liangxu, who was so young, would also suffer from the same problem?
He didn't want Zhao Liangxu to develop a chronic illness. Zhao Liangxu was indeed special to him. Given his current status and position, could he really let Zhao Liangxu suffer more and more?
Remembering that a few days ago, when winter was approaching, Qiu Cheng was busy treating people in the palace, so he sent someone to summon Qiu Cheng.
Qiu Cheng should be skilled at treating these diseases.
When Qiu Cheng saw An He's people, he initially thought that the Empress Dowager's cough had worsened again, but upon closer listening, he discovered that Zhao Liangxu was ill.
"No wonder she hasn't come to Zhilan Hall these past few days." She thought Zhao Liangxu was also busy preparing for the New Year, but she didn't expect that she had been knocked down by illness.
Qiu Cheng remembered that Zhao Liangxu had not been to Zhilantang for several days, and the medicine she had given her earlier might be running out, so she picked up the ointment and put it in the medicine box.
As Zhao Liangxu was drinking her soothing medicine, she saw Qiu Cheng rush into the room.
Anhe sipped her tea and said, "Your health is so weak, let Lady Qiu take another look at you."
When Qiu Cheng arrived, he saw Zhao Liangxu's expression and roughly understood what was going on.
"How could you have gotten sick?"
As was customary, she took Zhao Liangxu's pulse to check, then rubbed her fingers together and sighed.
“I knew you couldn’t sit still when I saw you practicing martial arts with Lu Xuan, but you’ve been taking your medicine very diligently. Logically speaking, you should be someone who values your health, but when you get excited, you always seem to prioritize your interests over your health. It’s thanks to the medicine you took every day that your health didn’t completely collapse because of this illness. If it had, you would have been left with a chronic condition.”
“That’s right, Lady Qiu is absolutely right. Zhao Liangxu, did you even hear what she said?” An He chimed in from the side, pointing and commenting.
"Okay, okay."
Qiu Cheng continued, "The medicine the doctor prescribed is fine. You should take it for as long as he says. You also need to take the medicine to nourish your body. My presence here is just to confirm your condition. The most important thing is that you follow the doctor's instructions carefully."
As Zhao Liangxu listened, she felt like she was turning into a walking pharmacy.
Since Qiu Cheng was already there, she thought she might as well check on Zhao Liangxu's other injuries as well. She had also heard about Zhao Liangxu's help in capturing Zhao Chengxin, so she naturally knew that her arm was injured.
Zhao Liangxu's arm wound healed quickly, and now a thin scab has formed.
"That's alright. Once the scabs have formed, it's fine. As long as it hasn't gotten worse from being contaminated by anything unclean, we can just wait for it to heal."
“Also,” Qiu Cheng raised her left eyebrow and glanced at An He standing to her left. With An He inside, she couldn’t check Zhao Liangxu’s more hidden wounds, so she could only verbally instruct her, “I haven’t seen you in a long time, so here’s some more ointment for you. Be sure to remember to use this too.”
Anhe raised his chin, noticing Qiu Cheng glancing at him inexplicably. He then turned his gaze back to the seemingly ordinary-looking ointment and said nothing for the time being.
After Qiu Cheng left, An He picked up the inconspicuous medicine box on the table, examined it from all sides, and then opened it. Inside was a milky white, smooth ointment. He couldn't tell what it was, so he asked Zhao Liangxu, "What kind of ointment is this? Is it for removing scars? Is it as good as the Songyu glue that we gave you?"
As Zhao Liangxu recovered from her illness over the past few days, her health and spirits gradually returned. Seeing Anhe carefully studying the ointment, almost to the point of smelling it, she had the idea to tease Anhe.
"Qiu Cheng's ointment is certainly effective; I use it every day. However, it doesn't have the same effect as Songyu glue, but Eunuch An's Songyu glue is also excellent."
Anhe's fingers were beautiful, long and slender like jade, clearly well-maintained with hand cream. He rested his ring and middle fingers on the small box, his thumbs supporting them below, and rotated his wrist to examine Qiu Cheng's "useful ointment," yet he still couldn't resist comparing: "Use this every day? Do you use the pine resin glue every day too?"
Although Zhao Liangxu's new house was warm, it hadn't been used for a long time and wasn't as luxuriously heated as Anhe's house with its underfloor heating. Therefore, Zhao Liangxu didn't wear anything too thin inside.
In addition, she had been sick and weak these past few days, so she had to keep her body covered up. Naturally, something as trivial as applying scar removal cream had to be put on hold for the time being. Zhao Liangxu honestly replied, "I haven't used it these past few days."
Anhe snatched the small box into her hand and clutched it tightly, feeling unhappy: "Why not use it?"
"I don't want to move while I'm sick, so how about...?"
Zhao Liangxu gently rested her hand on her chin as if in thought, and earnestly suggested, "How about Eunuch An applies it for me?"
-----------------------
Author's Note: Xiao Anzi, you may step aside now. I know you're worried about Zhao Liangxu.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
