Chapter 9 – The Prince Regent (1)

Translator: Lunarise
Editor: Lunarise
Proofreader: Livyuna

Shen Fei’s eyebrows quivered in annoyance, and he clenched his fists. Although his face was impassive, he vehemently disliked being held up in the bathroom by a girl who had seen every inch of his being, including parts that he wouldn’t want anyone to see.

Zhao Xi, unabated, realized that the reason for his decreased intake of food was to reduce his visits to the bathroom.

Although he tried to eat less, he inevitably had to drink an entire bowl of medicine every time. He couldn’t help it. If only Zhao Xi hadn’t noticed, he could have held it in a little longer.

The man had a strong notion of self-esteem.

The more time Zhao Xi spent with Shen Fei, the more she got to understanding more about him. This man, a martial artist to the core—flexible and strong and mobile—had suddenly become paralyzed, perhaps even for the rest of his life. For someone like him, having to rely on even the smallest of things like eating and drinking, must have hurt his pride to no extent, and inevitably, his ego.

Zhao Xi wrapped him in a cloak and, with much difficulty, carried him to the bathroom, seeing as he did not respond. After about five minutes, she took the hopeless man back to his bed.

Shen Fei, in his shame, turned away from Zhao Xi, and gazed out of the window.

She wiped his hand and tucked him inside the blanket. She replaced the flowers in the vase with fresh ones and put it by the bed on the bedside table, thinking perhaps it would make him feel better.

“Do you want to read some books if you’re bored? I have got some here, if you want to look,” Zhao Xi offered cautiously. She rummaged inside the box where she kept all her books. Almost all of them were medical books left behind by her master.

Thinking that not everybody was inclined to read about medicine, she hunted further inside the box to find something else. The box had an assortment of literatures—essays, fairytales, notes—but every one of them related to medicine, though some of them told interesting stories! He can explore the books in the box if he doesn’t like these, thought Zhao Xi, with generous intention.

She put the box and the books she chose, by the bedside table, gave a piece of ginger and ginseng for Shen Fei to chew on and prepared to leave him in peace. She turned to Ping An and told it to guard Shen Fei instead of whiling its time away, promising a treat of honey when she returned.

Zhao Xi didn’t know if Ping An understood a word she said, but she talked with it either way. The bear walked her till the entrance and watched her leave. She had to walk through the tunnel in the cave to reach the outside, and since Ping An was standing there with its enormous physique blocking the light, she almost tripped, not having adjusted to the heavy darkness inside the cave. She threw a rock at Ping An, making the bear return to its place near Shen Fei, and the light finally fell through, illuminating the way through the tunnel in the cave.

The more she walked, the darker it became, but Zhao Xi didn’t find it daunting having adjusted to the dark cavern. Finally, light spilled through as she walked out of the cave and breathed in the fresh air. She wasted no time in rushing back to the village, wondering if anyone had been waiting by her door for medical help. Zhao Xi always took her job seriously, it was a source of pride for her.

As Zhao Xi reached her house, she was greeted by a dismaying sight: somebody had ransacked her home, smashed her things, and they had plundered the medicine she had left in the courtyard to dry. The porcelains were all shattered and lay there, mixed among the dust.

Zhao Xi could see that Aunt Liu’s place had been manhandled in the same way.

“Aunt, what in the world happened here?” she asked in shock.

“A couple of soldiers came to search for something. They raided the entire house like savages, took the valuables and smashed the rest. They show no care for people like us,” Aunt Liu sighed.

“What were they searching for?”

“I don’t know! Those barbarians took everything… everything! I hope they burn in hell,” cursed Aunt Liu.

Aunt Liu was on a rampage now, using words that would have made a seasoned veteran blush to his roots. Zhao Xi walked to her house and started tidying up the place, putting things back together, salvaging whatever could be saved and throwing out the rest. She wondered if she could return to the mountain by evening.

She needed to visit the market, so she rented a bullock cart from an old man who charged thirty coins per day, and headed out to the city.

Something was amiss in the city, the security had been tightened and the number of soldiers patrolling the city had increased. Every single person entering the city was questioned on their identity and their address, even so far as to ask for a guarantor who could verify the information given. It wasn’t any easier for those leaving the city as well, each and everyone had to be searched yet again!

Zhao Xi, being the only healer in the village, was known to everybody. So it wasn’t difficult for her to find a villager to verify her identity and was eventually allowed inside the city, but not without being searched thoroughly.

Zhao Xi sought to sell her aweto*, first and foremost. The aweto was always difficult to find; they grew on the snow mountains, usually on the highest peak where they were more commonly found. She usually waited till the snow melted to hike through the mountains for them, but finding an aweto always depended on one’s luck also, since the animals were very fond of the plant.

(P/R: It’s a Chinese traditional medicinal plant.)

Zhao Xi would sometimes get the aweto from Ping An, who would hike and hunt for these and hoard a handful. Ping An would savour awetos from time to time, while other times it treasured them as though they were its little cubs.

Zhao Xi wasn’t sad on selling these rare awetos, since she could always hike up the mountains to pick some. Besides, she had some of them in storage.

She finally arrived at the crowded drugstore. She could see that it was ill timing because the store was at its peak and all the staff were busy weighing and inspecting the materials. Medicinal materials had to be handled carefully, and this painstaking process could take all day. There was no way that they could finish everything by evening.