The sound of shattering porcelain next door made eight-year-old Gu Nian pause with a half-eaten pork dumpling between his chopsticks.
His black-gold eyes darted toward the eastern courtyard wall. Even through the thick brick partition that separated the Third Branch yard from the Hundred-Herb Clinic on Willow-West Street, they could hear heavy boots kicking over wooden medicine racks.
“You ungrateful little shrew!” a rough voice barked from the clinic yard next door. “Second Elder Gu Ba offered you twenty silver taels for your dead father’s Jade-Dew Pill Recipe!
That’s more than this leaky clinic makes in a whole winter!”
“Get out!” Physician Qin Wan’er shouted back, her voice tight with anger and followed by the sharp clang of a brass pestle hitting a wooden shield. “My father spent forty years perfecting the Jade-Dew Formula to treat poor woodcutters and hunters!
If I hand it over to the Second Branch, you’ll dilute the herbs by half and charge six silver taels a bottle!
Even if I die here today, I will never sell my father’s life’s work to Second Elder Gu Ba!”
Crash!
Another row of clay medicine jars smashed onto the flagstones next door. A bitter smell of spilled licorice root and crushed winterberry drifted over the snow-covered wall into the Third Branch yard.
Inside the warm bedroom, Gu Nian set his chopsticks neatly across his bowl and slid off the heated brick bed.
His yellow bunny slippers gave a soft squeak against the warm slate tiles. He looked up at Gu Changsheng, his small hand resting over the glowing [Little Red Flower Sticker] pinned to his yellow smock.
“Dad,” Gu Nian said quietly. “That’s Big Sister Qin next door. Last winter, when my fingers were frostbitten from chopping firewood and nobody in the clan would look at me, she tossed a jar of salve over the wall when the guards weren’t watching.”
Gu Changsheng’s gaze softened as he looked down at his son.
Even when Gu Nian’s Darkening Meter had been hovering near ninety percent, the boy had remembered every person who ever showed him a scrap of kindness.
“She gave my son frostbite salve?” Gu Changsheng stood up from the table and brushed a crumb off his cuffs. “Then those loudmouths next door just made a very expensive mistake.”
Standing by the doorway with his newly straightened six-foot spine, Grandpa Fu immediately picked up his heavy black-iron abacus and gave it a crisp shake.
“Young Master, Physician Qin’s late father was old Doctor Qin, who treated the late Patriarch’s sword wounds twenty years ago,” Grandpa Fu said earnestly. “Since old Doctor Qin passed away three winters back, Miss Wan’er has kept the Hundred-Herb Clinic running all by herself. Second Elder Gu Ba’s rival pill shop on Central Street has been trying to swallow her recipe for months.”
“Hold on a second, Grandpa Fu,” Gu Changsheng said, raising a hand as a warm vibration pulsed inside his inner coat pocket.
He stepped out onto the front porch and pulled out [Dad’s Plot-Spoiler Notebook].
Because Gu Changsheng had stolen both the Three-Hundred-Year Blood-Jade Ginseng and the Warm-Marrow Tomb Jade on the mountain last night—and. Gu Nian had just flattened Deacon Gu Hu’s nose at dawn—the ripples of his interference had triggered a fresh wave of Foreknowledge Decay across Frost-Pine Town.
The parchment pages flipped rapidly in the morning breeze before settling on a newly updated entry etched in dark crimson ink:.
[ DAD’S PLOT-SPOILER NOTEBOOK — FOREKNOWLEDGE DECAY ALERT! ]
* Plot Node : The Hundred-Herb Clinic Tragedy (Qin Wan’er)
* Decay Shift : Accelerated by 4 Days! (Happening in 10 Minutes!)
* Cause of Shift : Chosen One Lin Fan lost the Blood-Jade Ginseng,.
paid a 20-silver graveyard fine at dawn, and.
desperately needs the [Jade-Dew Pill Recipe] to.
regain Second Elder Gu Ba’s backing!
* Original & Mutated Script :.
1. Second Branch thugs smash the Hundred-Herb Clinic to terrify.
24-year-old medical genius Qin Wan’er (Rank 1 Peak, suffering.
from a 3-year Cold-Furnace Alchemy Backlash).
2. Ten minutes later, Chosen One Lin Fan arrives in clean white.
robes pretending to be a chivalrous savior who condemns Gu Ba.
and offers a fake promissory note to clear her clinic’s debt.
3. While Qin Wan’er turns to fetch a pulse-pillow, Lin Fan slips.
colorless [Seven-Step Heart-Rot Powder] into her teacup!
4. Once her lung meridians freeze and rot, Lin Fan pretends only.
his “ancient master” can cure her—forcing Qin Wan’er to hand.
over the Jade-Dew Pill Recipe and work as his unpaid alchemy.
servant until she dies of exhaustion at age twenty-six!
Gu Changsheng read the crimson lines from top to bottom. When he finished, he snapped the notebook shut with a cold laugh.
“What a classic routine,” Gu Changsheng muttered, shaking his head in disgust. “First the uncle sends thugs to smash her shop, and ten minutes later the nephew walks in wearing white silk to play the good cop with a packet of slow poison in his sleeve.”
He walked to the eastern courtyard wall and rested one hand on the grey bricks.
Listening closely, he heard the three Second Branch debt-collectors cursing as they kicked the clinic’s wooden sign one last time and stomped away down the street, shouting that she had until noon to reconsider.
Inside the clinic next door, the heavy wooden bar slid across the latch. Then came a muffled, rattling cough, followed by the quiet sound of a broom sweeping broken porcelain across stone tiles.
“She held off three Second Branch thugs on her own,” Gu Changsheng noted, glancing back toward the warm kitchen. “But inhaling cold winter air while angry is already irritating her old furnace injury. And in eight minutes, Frost-Pine Town’s favorite white-robed hypocrite is going to walk through her front door.”
Gu Nian trotted out onto the porch in his yellow bunny slippers, his small brows knitted tight.
“Dad, are we going over to hit them with the belt?” Gu Nian asked eagerly, patting his small hip where he wished he had a belt of his own. “I can kick their shins while you whip their faces!”
“Walking in and whipping a man before he takes the poison out of his sleeve only lets him cry that he’s innocent,” Gu Changsheng said. Tapping the tip of his son’s nose with a grin. “If you want to pull up a poisonous weed, you wait until he reaches for the teacup in front of the whole street—and you bring the right medicine for the doctor first.”
Gu Changsheng turned and walked back into the warm kitchen.
Over on the cutting board sat the remaining half of the real Three-Hundred-Year Blood-Jade Ginseng root from last night’s harvest, still glowing with a rich ruby luster. Beside it sat a basket of aged mountain ginger, a jar of wild comb honey, and a clay pot of spring water bubbling gently over the dragon-stove.
Gu Changsheng opened the three-slot interface of [Dad’s Care-Package Upgrade Box] in his mind.
Right now, after unlocking Gu Nian’s permanent tenfold Redeemed Kid Bonus, his account held a comfortable 510 DP, with +450 DP/day rolling in every twenty-four hours.
Into Slot 1, he placed [Three Slices of Three-Hundred-Year Blood-Jade Ginseng].
Into Slot 2, he loaded [Two Pounds of Aged Fire-Ginger Root & Red Jujubes].
Into Slot 3, he poured [One Jar of Wild Cliff-Bee Comb Honey & Mountain Spring Water].
“System, fuse a batch of flaw-free medicinal broth tailored to cure a three-year Cold-Furnace Alchemy Backlash,” Gu Changsheng commanded silently. “Cost: one hundred Dad Points.”
[ DAD’S CARE-PACKAGE UPGRADE BOX — MEDICINAL CULINARY FUSION! ]
* Input 1 : [Three-Hundred-Year Blood-Jade Ginseng Slices (x3)]
* Input 2 : [Aged Mountain Fire-Ginger & Red Winter Jujubes]
* Input 3 : [Wild Cliff-Bee Comb Honey & Boiled Spring Water]
* Cost : 100 DP (Remaining Balance: 410 DP)
[ DING! 100% FLAW-FREE UPGRADE COMPLETE! ]
* Output : [Rank 1 Perfection: Fused Honey-Ginger Detox Soup]
* Effect : 100% Zero-Erosion Pure Yang Culinary Medicine!
Instantly dissolves three-year Cold-Furnace Frost Clots.
in the lung and heart meridians, purges residual toxins,.
and nourishes an alchemist’s innate fire root!
Hummm!
A soft golden light flashed inside the covered clay pot on the stove.
When Gu Changsheng lifted the lid by half an inch, a rich, sweet aroma of caramelized honey, warm ginger, and three-hundred-year ginseng wafted through the kitchen. Unlike ordinary bitter decoctions that smelled like boiled mud and tree bark, this golden broth smelled like a royal pastry shop on a snowy morning.
Merely breathing in a wisp of the rising steam made Grandpa Fu’s single eye widen in amazement.
“Good heavens, Young Master,” Grandpa Fu breathed, taking a deep sniff as his newly healed back warmed all over again. “What kind of immortal tonic is this? Just smelling the steam makes the qi in my lungs feel twenty years younger!”
“It’s neighborly ginger soup,” Gu Changsheng said, ladling the glowing amber broth into a thick, double-walled porcelain thermos jar and tucking it into a woven bamboo basket lined with cotton quilting.
He placed two clean porcelain bowls, a silver spoon, and a freshly washed white handkerchief inside the basket, then handed the bamboo handle to eight-year-old Gu Nian.
“Can you carry this without spilling a drop, Nian’er?” Gu Changsheng asked.
Gu Nian took the warm bamboo basket with both hands and puffed out his chest, making the [Little Red Flower Sticker] on his yellow smock catch the morning light.
“This basket doesn’t even weigh five pounds, Dad,” Gu Nian said seriously. “I have eight hundred pounds of strength in my arms now. Even if a wild boar bumps into me, I won’t spill a single drop of Big Sister Qin’s soup.”
“Good boy,” Gu Changsheng said, ruffling his son’s hair before checking the buckle of the [Seven-Wolves Disciplinary Belt] at his waist. “Remember the plan. When we get next door, don’t rush in while our ‘righteous young hero’ is still making his speech.
Wait until he pulls the little gray paper packet out of his left sleeve.”
Gu Nian’s black-gold eyes gleamed with mischievous understanding.
“And when he tips the powder into the cup,” the boy whispered, “I yell really loud so everyone on Willow-West Street hears!”
“Loud enough that the folks at the end of the alley drop their turnips,” Gu Changsheng confirmed with an approving nod. “Let’s go, Grandpa Fu, Nian’er. It’s time to pay a morning call on our neighbor.”
They stepped out of the Third Branch gate into the crisp morning sunshine of Willow-West Street.
Because it was just past six-thirty in the morning, the cobblestone street outside was already bustling with life. Blacksmith Zhao was firing up his coal forge across the lane, Widow Zhang was haggling over winter cabbages at a wooden handcart. Dozens of townsfolk in thick padded coats were carrying baskets toward the morning market.
Twenty paces down the street stood the weathered wooden storefront of the Hundred-Herb Clinic.
Its carved sign hung crookedly from one iron hinge where the Second Branch thugs had struck it with a club minutes earlier. Several cracked clay pots lay scattered in the slush by the doorstep.
Just as Gu Changsheng, Gu Nian, and Grandpa Fu paused beside a steamed-bun stall across from the clinic’s open front window. A slender figure in a freshly pressed white silk robe came hurrying around the corner from the direction of the town magistrate’s office.
It was Lin Fan.
After spending half the night tied to a carrying pole in the magistrate’s cold-water shed. Lin Fan had only been bailed out twenty minutes ago when Second Elder Gu Ba’s steward paid the twenty-silver sanitation fine. He had washed himself three times in ice water, drowned his collar in cheap lilac perfume to cover the lingering smell of the graveyard ditch.
Wrapped a neat white silk bandage around his forehead to hide the bramble scratches on his brow.
Even so, his complexion was pale and hollow, and his footsteps carried a stiff, bow-legged waddle from last night’s tenfold croton purge.
Inside the black iron ring on his thumb, Master Yao Chen let out a long, disgusted sigh.
Boy, my spiritual sense can see three hundred yards down this street, the old Pill Sovereign grumbled inside Lin Fan’s mind. That girl inside the clinic has a clean alchemist’s fire-root, even if her lungs were injured by a cold furnace. Must you use a filthy gutter trick like Seven-Step Heart-Rot Powder on a fellow physician?
Lin Fan paused outside the clinic steps and adjusted his white sleeves. When no one was looking, his eyes flashed with vicious resentment.
Shut up, old man, Lin Fan thought coldly back at the ring. If you hadn’t woken up too late on the mountain last night, I wouldn’t have lost the Blood-Jade Ginseng or been dragged through the streets by night-watchmen! Right now, my uncle Gu Ba is threatening to cut off my resources completely unless I bring him the Jade-Dew Pill Recipe before noon!
Lin Fan’s fingers slipped inside his left cuff and touched the small, flat packet of gray oil-paper hidden against his wrist.
Once the Seven-Step Heart-Rot Powder enters Qin Wan’er’s stomach, her lung meridians will lock up in three breaths, Lin Fan calculated, a cruel smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth. Then you’ll give me a half-dose stabilizing pill, and she’ll have to kneel at my feet and hand over her father’s recipe just to stay alive!
Taking a deep breath, Lin Fan wiped every trace of malice off his face.
In the blink of an eye, his expression transformed into the warm, gentle, heartbroken smile of a righteous young gentleman who couldn’t bear to see a single sparrow suffer in the snow.
Lifting the hem of his white robe, Lin Fan stepped across the broken clay pots and walked into the Hundred-Herb Clinic.
Across the street beside the steamed-bun stall, Gu Changsheng cracked a roasted melon seed between his teeth and nudged Gu Nian’s shoulder.
“Showtime, son,” Gu Changsheng said softly. “Keep your eyes on his left sleeve.”