Chapter 113: Born from a Rock, Grown from a Rock
Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
He was kept busy till late into the night.
In the morning of the subsequent day, while he was at his cottage wondering how to complete the system’s a.s.signed mission, w.a.n.g Yao received an unexpected call from Zhou Xiong. w.a.n.g Yao was worried that something had happened to Kang and quickly picked up the phone. To his happy surprise, Zhou Xiong called him to inform him that Kang had slept particularly well during the past few days. In fact, he slept through the entire night. To this, Zhou Xiong called to express his grat.i.tude. Hearing his excited voice, it was easy to imagine Zhou Xiong’s beaming face.
“Glad that the medicine was effective.” At the other end of the phone, w.a.n.g Yao was also smiling.
The phone call ended and w.a.n.g Yao decided to make a trip down to Lianshan County to take a look at Kang. He took Zhou Wukang’s pulse. The improved pulse condition showed that the medication he prescribed was the right one. At this rate, with a little more time for recovery, he was on track to treat Kang’s arm.
“Pretty good; he’s recovering nicely. In no time at all, I can start treatment of his arm,” w.a.n.g Yao told Zhou Xiong upon completing his examination.
“That’s great!”
At noon, w.a.n.g Yao intended to return home, however he received an unexpected invitation from Manager Li. Since he diagnosed Manager Li last time and alerted him of his health issue, this allowed for his timely treatment at the hospital and prevented a potentially painful operation. Manager Li had called him more than once to invite w.a.n.g Yao for a meal but w.a.n.g Yao had always declined. This time, he called again upon hearing that w.a.n.g Yao was in Lianshan County; he insisted on treating him to lunch. w.a.n.g Yao had no choice but to accept his invitation.
The full name of Manager Li was Li Maoshuang. He chose a nondescript looking hotel, but when they entered it, it was, altogether, a different world. The interior was decorated in the style of Jiangnan elegance.
“Today, it’s just the two of us. I’m so grateful to you,” Li Maoshuang said as soon as he saw him.
“You are too formal. How’re you feeling?”
“Much better,” Li Maoshuang replied. “Today, we shall not drink alcohol. Let’s have tea.”
“Okay, let’s have tea then,” w.a.n.g Yao said and smiled.
“This trip to the hospital was a wake-up call for me—if I didn’t do a check-up, I wouldn’t have known. Once I knew, I was shocked. My whole body had all sorts of problems. When I received the health check report, I was thinking the money I’ve earned so far was more than enough to cover it. Now that my body has become like this, even if I had all the money in the world, what good would it be if I’m not around to spend it? From then on, I decided to change myself and hence took the first step to quit smoking and drinking,” said Li Maoshuang.
“I’m glad you have thought about all this,” w.a.n.g Yao said after hearing him.
Numerous people knew they had problems with their health and that they needed to change their habits and lifestyle, but many were unable to do so. The ones who did change themselves had higher likelihoods of improving their health towards a positive direction.
The dishes were served shortly; they were mainly light on taste. Both of them chatted while eating.
“I never knew you had medical skills, did you study medicine?”
“No, this is self-learned,” w.a.n.g Yao replied, smiling.
“Impressive! I admire you!” Li Maoshuang gave a thumbs-up.
The two of them used tea as a replacement for liquor as a social lubricant, and happily chatted away. It helped that Li Maoshuang was also a good conversationalist. Finally, w.a.n.g Yao took his pulse and the conclusion was that there was a marked improvement.
“Well, it’s much better.”
“Is that so? I have been careful these days—not drinking or smoking and I have been eating simpler food, coupled with an apple a day,” Li Maoshuang claimed.
“Continue to persevere. This illness will recover and should not relapse.”
“Not a problem.”
It was a meal where both the host and guest felt right at home.
Having departed with Li Maoshuang, w.a.n.g Yao drove home. Reaching home, he noticed a man—a relative from the village, from his father’s side, having a discussion with his father, w.a.n.g Fenghua.
“Yao is back.”
“Sir,” w.a.n.g Yao greeted.
“The matter is settled. I’ll come look for you another day to talk about this in detail.” The man did not stay long and left.
His voice is uneven, his gait is unstable, his complexion is ashen and he has a body odor. This person is unwell, w.a.n.g Yao looked at his retreating back view and thought.
“Dad, why is he here?”
“To discuss exchanging land with us. His father’s health is not good. He found a Feng Shui master to look for good land, and it happened to be ours,” w.a.n.g Fenghua explained.
“His health is not good; what’s going on?” w.a.n.g Yao queried.
“It seems it’s heart failure. The hospital has already sent a critical illness notification letter.”
w.a.n.g Yao was silent. Life can be so fragile.
“I see that Uncle Fengming’s health doesn’t seem well?” w.a.n.g Yao asked.
“Is it? Maybe he’s tired?” w.a.n.g Fenghua suggested.
“Doesn’t look like it.” w.a.n.g Yao shook his head.
His outward appearance is not due to tiredness; it seems more like it is due to an illness within, and especially with that complexion…
“I hope it’s just overthinking on my part.”
After dinner, w.a.n.g Yao went to Nanshan hill. The hill was quiet; he sat outside his cottage for a long time, gazing at the sky.
“Perhaps I can try to buy some trees tomorrow to try planting them.”
The weather was pleasant the next day with a warm spring breeze.
w.a.n.g Yao drove to the nursery he went to a few times previously. This time, he was prepared to order some trees to plant on Nanshan hill, intending to do a spirit gathering battle array arrangement.
“You want trees, not tree saplings?” The man at the nursery remembered w.a.n.g Yao.
“That’s right.”
“What kind of trees?”
“Eucalyptus, apple, peach, Nanmu—” w.a.n.g Yao rattled off the types of trees.
“Wait.” He was interrupted by that man.
In spite of the fact that these trees grow particularly slow in the North, I am unable to get the Nanmu tree. At most, I can try to get the tree sapling. This is a rare species.”
“In that case, just give me what you have.”
“Okay.” The man named Chen Kun took w.a.n.g Yao’s list.
“These trees—I need them to be at least a year or older. The older, the better, especially the ones that I circled.”
“The price will not be cheap. Heavy machinery is also unable to move up your hill. If the trees are too big, you may have problems planting them as well,” Chen Kun advised. “Anyway, I will see how it goes.”
“Okay.”
“Why do you want to plant these trees on the hill?” Chen Kun’s curiosity was piqued.
“They purify the air, add greenery to the landscape and beautify the environment,” w.a.n.g Yao was smiling when he replied.
Chen Kun gave an “I may be lowly educated, but don’t you bulls.h.i.+t me” look.
In the village where the air was already clean, why would purification of air be needed? Adding greenery to the landscape, beautifying the environment and wanting to plant so many species of trees—he’s never heard of anyone using such precious species of trees to beautify the environment.
“When I have updates, I’ll call you.”
“Okay, please make it fast.”
w.a.n.g Yao left the nursery and made his way back to the hill. When back at the hill, he grabbed a pickaxe and started to dig up pits for the trees.
Arranging the array was painstaking work and required physical hard labor. Only he knew the exact placement, therefore no one else could help him. He planned his route—first to set up the framework of the array which required arbor and slightly bigger mountain rocks. The next step would be to slowly work out the details. This project was a ma.s.sive undertaking.
While w.a.n.g Yao was busy on the hill, he received his family’s phone call asking him to go home, saying they needed him for something.
When he reached home, a middle-aged man was at home talking to his father.
“Third Uncle?” This man was w.a.n.g Yao’s third uncle. Usually, he lived in Lianshan County. Apart from visiting the ancestral tomb annually, he rarely visited w.a.n.g Yao’s home. Therefore, w.a.n.g Yao was surprised he came.
“Your third uncle has something to discuss with you,” said w.a.n.g Fenghua.
“What is it?” w.a.n.g Yao sat down.
Sitting down, his father slowly relayed the situation to w.a.n.g Yao. Around a month ago, his third uncle had done a company periodic health check-up and found that his gallbladder had gallstones. Although not big, the county surgeon advised him to undergo a minimally invasive operation to remove a portion of the gallbladder to prevent future problems. Third Uncle had not felt uncomfortable or visibly unwell, and did not pay heed to this. However, in the past few days, he felt discomfort under his ribs—a slight throbbing pain. He went to the hospital to get checked and found that the gallstone was still there, but it did not grow bigger. The doctor’s suggestion was still the same, but he did not want to undergo surgery. After all, it involved removing part of an organ. It was by accident that he told w.a.n.g Yao’s father over the phone and so he asked him to come to let w.a.n.g Yao see if he could help.
“How big is the gallstone?” w.a.n.g Yao asked.
“There are three of them, the largest is around 11 by 0.3.”
“Do you usually feel anything?”
“Not much. Except that in the past three to five days, I felt some discomfort. When I did an ultrasound, the results were that the gallbladder and liver health were good,” w.a.n.g Yao’s uncle said.
“Okay…” w.a.n.g Yao listened and was speechless.
Advising the patient to undergo surgery was a bit rash, especially since there were no obvious symptoms. The gallbladder was generally in good health and the gallstones had not grown bigger. It was puzzling why the advice was to operate on it. After all, this was an important organ and there would be adverse effects after the operation.
“Let me take your pulse.” w.a.n.g Yao put his fingers on his third uncle’s wrist and concentrated on taking his pulse.
“Third Uncle, normally you drink without limit; your liver is affected and you don’t like to drink water. The body is too heaty and your blood circulation is not smooth.” This was w.a.n.g Yao’s conclusion after feeling the pulse.
The basic requirement for a healthy body was to have smooth blood circulation. When it was smooth, no illness would sprout. When it was clogged, that is where problems crop up.
“Can you treat it?” w.a.n.g Yao’s father asked. This was his own brother after all. Although his brother was the kind of person who did not visit unless there were urgent matters, w.a.n.g Yao’s father was still concerned about this particular brother.
“I’ll try. Third Uncle, stay for dinner.”
“Okay,” replied w.a.n.g Yao’s Third Uncle.
Having diagnosed the problem, w.a.n.g Yao left the house and went up the hill. He recalled having planted a licorice root called Stone flower. It was born from a rock and grew from a rock. This herb could chemically change the stones within the body. The only problem was that after he planted this licorice root, the growth was exceptionally slow. Several days had past and only a small part emerged—a weak stem together with a few green leaves.
“At this rate, it can’t be used in a formula,” w.a.n.g Yao muttered.