Chapter 3: Mei Xi (Part 3) Fever [Edit]
Inside the hall, there was deathly silence. The strong, bitter smell of herbs hung heavily in the air, mixed with the slight smell of blood and sweat, making it suffocating.
Outside the window, the sky darkened completely. The cold wind howled through the cracks in the rocks, making a whimpering sound, adding a bit of desolation.
Lin Jiaojiao curled up on the cold hard couch. The thin animal skin mattress could not withstand the chill of the stone slabs.
The wound on her right shoulder felt like it was being pierced repeatedly by countless red-hot steel needles. Every slight movement brought a tearing pain, causing her whole body to tremble uncontrollably.
Cold sweat had already soaked through her inner clothes, sticking wetly to her body and bringing a biting chill. Her long black hair was spread out on the pillow in a messy manner, and a few strands of hair wet with cold sweat stuck to her pale and almost transparent cheeks, making her look even more like fragile glass.
"Ugh..." A suppressed groan of pain escaped from between her tightly clenched lips. Her teeth sank deeply into her lower lip, tasting a hint of rusty sweetness. Her consciousness floated in the severe pain and coldness, and her vision went black.
The medicine left by Zhao did not seem to work immediately, or perhaps this body had already been overdrawn to the limit by fear and pain. Lin Jiaojiao knew that she might have a fever.
Her brows were furrowed, and her long eyelashes trembled violently like the wings of a frightened butterfly, casting thick fan-shaped shadows under her eyes. Every tremor touched people's hearts.
"My Lady Concubine...My Lady Concubine, what's wrong with you?" Chun knelt beside the couch, her voice filled with tears. With trembling hands, she repeatedly wiped the cold sweat that kept oozing from her forehead with a fine linen cloth soaked in warm water.
She looked at Lin Jiaojiao's face, which was as pale as paper and bloodless. Her thrilling appearance was slightly distorted by the severe pain. Her lips were bitten and bloodless, leaving deep teeth marks, but it still did not damage her amazing beauty. Instead, it added a heartbreaking sense of fragility.
Looking at the corners of her lips twitching slightly due to the severe pain, and looking at the crystal tears mixed with cold sweat rolling down under her tightly closed eyelashes, my heart was broken.
"Cold... so cold..." Lin Jiaojiao's voice was as weak as a whisper. Her body curled up tighter, and her thin shoulders trembled helplessly in the darkness.
The chill that penetrated deep into her bones seemed to drain away the last bit of warmth from her. The flames danced on her face, outlining a delicate yet fragile outline, like a candle that was about to go out in the cold night.
Chun hurriedly covered her with all the thin blankets, animal skins, and even her own coat, and ran to the small fire pit in the corner of the hall, desperately adding the few remaining pieces of dry firewood.
The faint flame jumped, trying to dispel the darkness and a tiny bit of warmth in the small space, but it was like a drop in the bucket for the entire cold side hall.
In the light of the fire, half of Lin Jiaojiao's face was in shadow, and the other half was dyed with a warm orange halo. The interweaving of pale and warm colors formed a thrilling contrast.
"Water..." Lin Jiaojiao's cracked lips moved, and her lips were slightly chapped due to lack of water, but they still had a sickly, pitiful softness.
Chun quickly brought a ceramic bowl and carefully fed her a few sips of warm water.
The cold liquid slid down her burning throat, bringing a brief moistness, but it was unable to warm her cold limbs. A few drops of water slid down the corners of her lips and dripped along her graceful jawline, gleaming faintly in the firelight.
Time passed slowly in painful torment, the night grew darker, and the cold wind grew stronger.
Lin Jiaojiao's consciousness gradually became blurred, and a wave of high fever began to sweep over her. The pain in the wound seemed to turn into a burning flame, spreading from her shoulder to her whole body. There was soreness in the joints between her bones. She began to mutter unconsciously, and the broken syllables were mixed with fear and pain.
"No...no...the wine...stinks..."
"Go away...Bear...Paw..."
"System...help me...it hurts..."
[Warning! Host's core vital signs are abnormal! Body temperature: 39.8°C (continuously rising)! Risk of wound infection: high! Energy reserves: critical! Physiological stress response: peak!]
The system's alarm sounded sharply in the sea of consciousness, with an unprecedented rapid and chaotic electrical noise. An ice-blue shadow flashed wildly deep in the center of the eyebrows, and the data link points spun like a storm.
Chun listened to Lin Jiaojiao's painful mumblings and looked at her reddened cheeks. The sickly blush added a strange, thrilling brilliance to her pale features. She was as anxious as an ant on a hot pan. She stood up suddenly, as if she had made up her mind. "My Lady! Please hold on! I will go and ask Doctor Zhao for help!"
"Don't... don't go..." Lin Jiaojiao used up her last bit of strength and grabbed Chun's wrist fiercely, her fingertips were icy cold, "It's... dangerous outside... Your Majesty..." Her voice was intermittent and full of worry.
She opened her eyes, and her eyes, misted with water due to the high fever, were like dusty stars, reflecting the flickering firelight, with a kind of pleading on the verge of breaking, so beautiful that it was breathtaking.
"But Princess! You..." Chun's tears fell like beads from a broken string, falling on the back of Lin Jiaojiao's hot hand.
Just then—
Tap, tap, tap.
An extremely light, yet unusually clear knock on the door rang out in the deadly cold night.
Haru froze, looking towards the door like a frightened rabbit.
Lin Jiaojiao also opened her eyes with difficulty, and in her blurred vision, she could only see thick darkness outside the crack of the door.
"Who... who is outside?" Chun's voice was shaking and filled with tears.
There was silence outside the door for a moment, and then a low and gentle voice sounded: "It's me, Zhao."
Chun almost crawled to the door and opened the heavy door tremblingly.
The cold wind blew in with fine snow particles. Zhao stood quietly at the door.
He didn't hold an umbrella, and a thin layer of snow fell on his dark gauze robe, staining his hair and shoulders with white.
He was carrying a small wicker box in his hand, and his face looked a little tired in the dim light, but his calm eyes still carried a reassuring power when he saw her.
However, when his eyes fell on the curled up figure on the couch, a trace of shock that was difficult to conceal clearly flashed across his calm eyes.
Lin Jiaojiao's appearance at this moment is enough to move even the most hard-hearted person.
She lay on her side on the couch, her long black hair spread out like seaweed, making her face look even smaller and paler. The high fever made her cheeks abnormally flushed, like two sad and beautiful peach blossoms blooming in the snow.
The hair soaked with cold sweat was messily stuck to the smooth forehead and delicate neck. The long eyelashes were wet with tears, covering them heavily like butterfly wings, casting thick shadows under the eyes.
Her lips were bitten, red and swollen, slightly open, and she was breathing rapidly, each breath carrying a broken pain. The firelight danced on her face, outlining the thrilling and fragile lines. That beauty, under the shadow of illness and death, was magnified to the extreme, with a heart-wrenching, destructive attraction.
Zhao's gaze lingered on her face for a moment, and that moment of absent-mindedness almost broke the doctor's usual calmness and composure. He quickly lowered his eyelashes to hide the surging emotions in his eyes, but his voice remained steady: "I heard that the concubine's injury has worsened, so I came to see it." He stepped into the hall, bringing in a gust of cold air, but also dispelled the desperate silence in the hall.
He gently closed the door with his backhand, blocking out most of the wind and snow, and Chun hurriedly led him to the bed.
Zhao didn't say much. He put down the wicker box and carefully checked Lin Jiaojiao's condition in the dim light from the fire pit.
He first tested her forehead with the back of his hand. The scorching temperature made him frown even tighter. Then, he carefully untied the bandage that Chun had bandaged before, revealing the wound on her shoulder.
The redness and swelling around the wound were more obvious than before, and the edges were even faintly dark purple, emitting an ominous heat, and a faint fishy smell with a smell of corruption permeated the air.
"The wound has been contaminated, causing heat and poison." Zhao's voice was low and solemn. He quickly opened the rattan box and took out a new medicine jar. "We need to clean the wound again to dissipate the poison. Otherwise... my life is in danger."
Chun was so frightened that his face turned pale and tears kept falling. He was so scared that he didn't know what to do.
Zhao's movements were unusually calm. He first washed his hands carefully with water from the deep well, then took out a small, sharp flint knife from the rattan box. He looked at Chun and said, "Hold the concubine down and don't let her move."
Chun hurried forward and used all his strength to hold down Lin Jiaojiao's uninjured left shoulder.
The severe pain made Lin Jiaojiao regain consciousness for a brief moment. When she saw the stone knife in Zhao's hand shining with a cold luster, her pupils suddenly contracted and a huge fear instantly gripped her.
"No...don't..." She struggled instinctively, her voice filled with tears and desperate pleas, "It hurts...it hurts so much...don't cut me..." Tears fell like pearls with a broken string, rolling down from the corners of her tightly closed eyes, sliding across her burning red cheeks, and dripping onto the pillow, leaving dark marks of water. Her panic and helplessness, like a dying swan, was so beautiful and poignant that it struck people's hearts.
[Fatal threat detected! External interference source (Zhao) has abnormal behavior pattern! Judgment: Physical damage! Forced evasion activated! Energy core: Overloaded - Warning! Insufficient energy!]
The system's alarm sounded so sharp that it was piercing.
Zhao's movements did not pause because of her fear and struggle. His eyes were focused, and his wrist was steady without a tremor. But upon closer inspection, the knuckles of his hand holding the stone knife were slightly white due to the force. He was about to cut -
"Burn...burn it..." In extreme fear and confusion, Lin Jiaojiao shouted out a few broken syllables hoarsely with all her strength, as if grabbing the last straw of life.
She did not propose "disinfection" completely consciously, but, driven subconsciously by the remnants of modern knowledge, she had an instinctive resistance and fear of the cold stone that was about to cut her flesh, thinking that "burning" might relieve the pain or "kill bad things."
Her eyes were dazed, and she stared at the stone knife with great fear and a hint of almost desperate pleading.
Zhao paused, his sharp gaze fixed on Lin Jiaojiao's pupils, which had dilated with fear. She yelled "hot"? What did that mean? Was she afraid of the cold? Or...?
In this critical moment of hesitation.
"Ah--!" Lin Jiaojiao let out a shrill scream in advance because of the imagined severe pain, and her body suddenly arched up. This was not the real pain of being cut, but a violent spasm caused by fear.
Zhao was so frightened by her sudden scream and violent reaction that his wrist trembled slightly. He immediately realized that he could not wait any longer. If he delayed any further, she might completely collapse out of fear and even hurt herself.
He no longer hesitated, his eyes fixed, his wrist steady as before, and the sharp flint knife accurately cut across the most red and swollen part of the edge of the wound.
"Ah——!" This time, it was real, heart-wrenching pain.
Lin Jiaojiao's body twitched violently as if she had been electrocuted, and her vision was instantly swallowed by darkness. Her beautiful face was instantly distorted by the severe pain, and sweat slid down from her forehead and temples like a stream, soaking more hair and sticking to her snow-white neck and collarbone, flickering a fragile and desperate luster in the firelight.
Zhao's movements were as fast as lightning. He lightly picked up the tip of the knife and squeezed out a few drops of dark red and black blood. Then he quickly wiped and pressed it with a clean linen cloth that had been prepared long ago and soaked in some spicy herbal juice. The linen cloth had a strong pungent smell and brought a burning pain when it came into contact with the wound, but it also instantly suppressed some of the dirty blood from flowing out.
After the severe pain, an indescribable feeling mixed with spicy and cool, accompanied by a sharp sting, came from the wound.
Lin Jiaojiao was gasping for breath, her whole body soaked in cold sweat, as if she had just been pulled out of the water. Her eyes were dazed, and she was left with only the exhaustion and confusion of surviving a disaster.
She collapsed limply on the couch, her long hair disheveled, tear marks crisscrossing her face, her lips slightly parted, and she was breathing rapidly. The exhaustion that followed her extreme fragility was accompanied by a breathtaking, lazy beauty.
Zhao quickly applied a thick layer of new ointment that exuded a strong and bitter scent on the wound. The ointment had a strange cool feeling that instantly suppressed the burning sensation of the wound. He carefully bandaged it again with clean linen. His movements were still steady, but fine beads of sweat had seeped out of his forehead and his breathing was a little rapid.
Obviously, Lin Jiaojiao's violent reaction and the cry of "hot" just now also put him under tremendous psychological pressure.
Only after doing all this did he breathe a sigh of relief.
He looked at Lin Jiaojiao, who was lying on the couch with a blank look in her eyes, as if all her strength had been drained away.
The firelight danced on her face, and the distortion caused by severe pain faded away, leaving only an almost transparent fragility and purity.
Long eyelashes covered her eyelids like butterfly wings, the traces of tears had not yet dried, the tip of her nose was still slightly red, and her lips were tightly pursed, but no longer trembling with pain. This quiet beauty with traces of tears, after surviving a disaster, was like a lily covered with dew after a storm, so pure that it was breathtaking.
He looked at her for a moment, and complex emotions surged in her calm eyes.
He recalled her unconscious "burn it," and doubts welled up in his mind. What did that mean? Was it gibberish? Or... some kind of hint about treating wounds that he didn't know about? The thought flashed through his mind, but it left a mark on him.
In the end, he just sighed softly, his voice so soft that it was almost drowned out by the wind: "Take good care of it." After that, he picked up the wicker box, turned and walked towards the door, and his figure quickly disappeared in the howling wind and snow outside the door.
Chun carefully fed the prepared medicine powder to Lin Jiaojiao. The effect of the medicine gradually dissipated, the sharp pain subsided, and only deep fatigue remained. Her consciousness sank into darkness. Before she completely lost consciousness, she seemed to hear the cold system prompt sound in her mind, with a hint of strange fatigue and confusion.
Silence returned to the hall, leaving only the crackling sound of burning firewood in the fire pit and the howling wind and snow outside the window.
Chun stayed beside the couch, watching Lin Jiaojiao's breathing gradually become steady and her face fall into deep sleep.
As she slept, all her panic and pain faded away, leaving only a purity and tranquility that was almost divine. The firelight gently outlined her perfect profile, and her long eyelashes cast thick shadows under her eyes, like a sleeping elf. That beauty, after experiencing the brush with death, precipitated a thrilling tranquil power.
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