Chapter 22: Medicine Sold Out, No Prescriptions Filled for Now!
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That evening, after the clinic had closed for the day, Lu Shiliujiu swung her arms and asked Wei Yuanzhi, “Grandpa Wei, how much do you pay me each day for dispensing medicine?”
“Thirty copper coins!” Wei Yuanzhi snapped.
Lu Shiliujiu frowned. “That little?”
Not to mention the ten taels she owed Grandpa Liu—even repaying the three taels she owed her sister would require her to dispense medicine for a full hundred days.
“Too little? For a child your age, receiving the same wages as an adult is already an exceptional favor!” Wei Yuanzhi rapped his fingers against the table in displeasure.
Lu Shiliujiu knitted her brows tighter and tighter. “Then I’ll help you process the medicinal herbs instead. That earns money faster!”
Hearing her mention herb processing again, Wei Yuanzhi no longer dismissed her out of hand. “You really know how to process medicinal herbs?”
“Teach me once, and I’ll know how to do it!” Lu Shiliujiu declared confidently.
“Processing medicinal herbs is nothing like dispensing medicine from the cabinets. To dispense medicine well, it’s enough to recognize the characters and have a good memory. But knowing exactly how far to process each herb depends on experience. It isn’t something you can understand clearly with just one glance.”
Lu Shiliujiu looked utterly assured. “When you process the herbs, explain the important points to me once, and I’ll understand.”
Wei Yuanzhi frowned at her. “Are you hiding some extraordinary ability?”
“Some other extraordinary ability?” Lu Shiliujiu shook her head. “I just have a good memory.”
Wei Yuanzhi did not believe her. Could someone with nothing but a good memory really learn to use a small balance scale expertly after watching it only a few times?
Yet when he met her hazy gray eyes, he found himself unable to ask anything more.
There was something uncanny about this child!
“Once I’ve finished changing your medicine, follow me and watch,” Wei Yuanzhi said at last, no longer refusing her.
There was no denying that, in the space of half an afternoon, his clinic had done more business than it usually did in an entire day.
After a single night of rumors spreading, everyone in Lean County knew that Spring Revival Hall had a divinely gifted child.
Not only could she read prescriptions and dispense medicine, she did so astonishingly fast—and every dosage she measured was exact. The old physicians of both Spring Revival Hall and Ancient Life Hall had personally verified it.
People were naturally drawn to anything unusual.
The next morning, as soon as the doors of Spring Revival Hall were taken down, a dense crowd had already gathered outside.
“Where’s that child who dispenses medicine?”
“You’re here to have medicine dispensed?” Bai Ji asked, scratching the back of his head.
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“Can’t we take a look even if we’re not here for medicine?” someone complained.
“She’s in the rear courtyard processing herbs. She only comes to the front hall when she’s needed to dispense medicine.”
An old man was immediately helped over by a younger relative. “This old fellow has come for a consultation. When it’s time to prepare my medicine, let that child prodigy of yours do it! I’d like to see what makes her so extraordinary.”
“Very well! I’ll go call her.” Bai Ji did not dare delay and hurried to the rear courtyard.
“Why do you need me to dispense medicine so early in the morning? I haven’t even finished frying these cork-tree bark slivers!” Lu Shiliujiu grumbled.
Bai Ji spread his hands. “What can we do? You’re the living signboard of Spring Revival Hall now. Everyone’s waiting for you to dispense their medicine!”
“Grandpa Wei has to raise my wages!” Lu Shiliujiu complained impatiently as she stirred the cork-tree bark slivers in the medicine pan.
Unable to withstand the pressure from outside, Wei Yuanzhi had also come to the rear courtyard to hurry her along. Hearing this, he readily agreed. “Fine! I’ll pay you one hundred copper coins a day, all right? Hurry to the front and dispense the medicine, or the clinic won’t be able to open today.”
“Deal!”
Her wages had increased several times over. Lu Shiliujiu quickly scooped the now-dried bark slivers from the pan and headed for the front hall without wasting a moment.
“Eh? Why is the child’s face disfigured?”
The moment Lu Shiliujiu appeared, someone voiced a doubt.
“She’s the one, yes, that’s her. Don’t be alarmed by the two blood-colored scars on her face. They look frightening, but she’s truly excellent at dispensing medicine!” Those who had watched the spectacle the previous day hurried to explain.
“You missed the first round of excitement yesterday morning, so of course you don’t know the whole story!” another busybody added.
“What story?”
“That poor child! The scars on her face are nothing compared to the rest. You should have seen her arms—oh, heavens! At a glance, they were covered in layers of bruises and blood-crusted scars. There wasn’t a patch of unbroken skin. It was terrifying!”
“How could that have happened?”
“Ah, the child has had a miserable life! I heard her father had only just died, and her mother was eager to find another husband. She thought the child was in the way, so she beat her nearly to death!”
“Something like that really happened?”
“Of course! You didn’t see it yourselves, but after everyone drove her away, her mother covered her face and ran home.”
The crowd listened to the gossip while watching Lu Shiliujiu dispense medicine, wishing they had a packet of melon seeds to crack open as they watched.
Even the performances on the opera stage were not half as entertaining as the spectacle at Spring Revival Hall!
For three days straight, Lu Shiliujiu was as busy as a mill donkey—dispensing medicine during the day and processing herbs at night. By the fourth day, several drawers in Spring Revival Hall’s medicine cabinet were empty.
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“Master, the amount of medicine we’ve sold these past three days is greater than what we usually sell in three months!” Bai Ji did not know whether he ought to laugh or cry.
The herbs sold by Spring Revival Hall were indeed of good quality and properly prepared. The price of that quality, however, was that Wei Yuanzhi and his apprentice personally processed every single herb themselves. They never bought prepared herbs from elsewhere.
The fact that they had managed to stay open for three consecutive days was entirely due to Lu Shiliujiu’s help with the processing. Given the crowd’s frenzy, Spring Revival Hall would otherwise have had to close on the second day.
Wei Yuanzhi was numb with exhaustion. “I never realized that our little Lean County had so many sick people!”
“What do you mean, our little Lean County has so many sick people? Patients from the entire county and the surrounding areas have all come to your Spring Revival Hall just to see your prodigy!
“Haven’t you noticed? For the past four or five days, the other clinics and apothecaries have been deserted.
“Do you believe that if everyone didn’t know the herbs in your clinic were personally processed by you and your apprentice, someone would have come to your door and caused trouble long ago? You’d never have been able to sell them for more than a few days!”
Zheng Zhongyuan walked in without the slightest hesitation.
“What business brings Physician Zheng here?” Wei Yuanzhi’s expression darkened. Their relationship was hardly close enough for Zheng Zhongyuan to barge casually into his clinic whenever he pleased.
Zheng Zhongyuan chuckled. “You’re still angry because I snatched the balance scale from you last time?”
“Say what you came to say,” Wei Yuanzhi replied coldly.
Zheng Zhongyuan looked around Spring Revival Hall. “Look at this. Your clinic is nearly out of medicine, and you can’t even fill your patients’ prescriptions. Why not lend us that prodigy of yours at Ancient Life Hall for a few days? Don’t worry—we’ll pay handsomely.”
“You shameless old rascal! You’ve actually set your sights on our Spring Revival Hall!”
However pedantic Wei Yuanzhi might be, he knew perfectly well that Lu Shiliujiu was the living signboard of Spring Revival Hall. As long as she remained there, the clinic’s business would only grow. Lending her out would be no different from handing those benefits to someone else.
“Ha! I waited until your clinic had completely run out of herbs before asking to borrow her. That was already the height of benevolence! Don’t think I don’t know that the child is neither your descendant nor your disciple. She’s merely a patient helping out temporarily at Spring Revival Hall.
“What’s wrong with offering her a high wage? Whether she goes or not is her own choice! Go call her out. I want to ask her opinion myself!”
While Wei Yuanzhi and Zheng Zhongyuan were arguing, a vigorous, thin old man appeared at the doorway and asked, “I heard you have a young child who dispenses medicine incredibly quickly?”
“We’re sold out of medicine. No dispensing for now!” Wei Yuanzhi and Zheng Zhongyuan answered in unison, turning their hostility outward.
Afterward, the two old men exchanged a glance, snorted at each other, and hurriedly went their separate ways.
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