The hall for the lunch banquet was set up in the property management area. Nearly 100 guests had already taken a seat when Tang Xiu"s group came in. The staff directly took them to the table at the very center where w.a.n.g Xuegang had been waiting for a long time. The latter then immediately got up and smilingly said, "Boss Tang, Miss Zhang, please take a seat."
Zhang Xinyue took a seat gracefully, but Tang Xiu didn"t immediately sit down. He had faintly smelled a familiar scent when he had just entered the hall, but he couldn"t remember what it was immediately. He took a glance around and found that the nearly 100 guests were having a merry time, yet he couldn"t help but crease his brows deeply.
He hadn"t yet discovered the source of the scent, but it somehow made him faintly vigilant inside, as if his sixth sense found something amiss, causing him to feel the looming danger.
"Something wrong, Boss Tang?"
With a surprised yet strange expression, w.a.n.g Xuegang looked at Tang Xiu with inquiry and suspicious eyes.
Tang Xiu was silent for a short while before he slowly took a seat. Then he shook his head and said, "It"s nothing; I just smelled a familiar scent."
w.a.n.g Xuegang couldn"t help but laugh and said after taking a seat, "Mr. Tang feels a kind of familiar feeling with something here; that means that you have taken a liking to my place. If so, I"ll reserve several villas of my Golden Goblet Emperor Gauze villa complex. You can pick the one you like as a present for your support in coming here."
"Nevermind it, but thanks for your good intention, Mr. w.a.n.g." Tang Xiu shook his head. "If anything, I can only stay in this place for a short time, so I have no time to occupy it even if I have a villa here."
w.a.n.g Xuegang smilingly nodded and no longer continued the topic.
A short while after, Zhang Xinya, who sat next to Tang Xiu, was invited to the temporary stage. She sang three songs for all the guests. Her voice was very beautiful, and even though her singing technique was slightly different from her older sister, Zhang Xinya, n.o.body could tell since there were no skilled musicians among the audience.
As the singing session ended, other extra singers came on stage and Zhang Xinyue returned to Tang Xiu"s side and sat down again. However, there was something different in the looks of her eyes, as she whispered when no one noticed them, "What happened, Tang Xiu? I can tell that you were somewhat distracted when you came here."
"Did you smell a particular scent?" asked Tang Xiu with a frown.
…A scent or fragrance?
"You also said to Mr. w.a.n.g that you smelled a familiar scent a while ago," said Zhang Xinyue. "But I didn"t smell any. If anything, it"s maybe because the cold dish was just delivered, so you probably smelled it because your sense of smell is too sharp?"
"That"s absolutely not it." Tang Xiu shook his head and said, "There was the scent when we just entered the lunch banquet hall. The scent has a very strong medicinal herb fragrance, and I usually can tell the herbs used in a medicinal herb soup. I don"t know what happened or why I can"t tell what the medicinal herb is, just that there is a very familiar feeling to that scent."
"How come it"s so bizarre?" Zhang Xinyue was surprised.
Tang Xiu was silent for a moment but the vigilance he felt inside was getting stronger. After that moment of silence and exchange of toasts from everyone at the table, and just as he was about to find an excuse to wander around, his expression suddenly changed and his eyes instantly s.h.i.+fted towards the hall entrance.
There were more than a dozen staff there carrying the stews, and the scent was getting stronger as they approached. The scent was even drilling into his nostrils even without inhaling it.
"Do you smell it?" Tang Xiu turned to look at Zhang Xinyue and asked in a low voice.
"What smell?" Zhang Xinyue asked back as he looked at Tang Xiu with a confused face, "What exactly did you smell? Is it the familiar scent you mentioned before? No… why don"t I smell anything?"
Tang Xi"s expression changed and he abruptly got up. He quickly blocked the path of the staff who delivered the dishes, whereas nearly 100 guests in the hall were surprised and turned silent, as he asked, "Can I taste this stew first?"
"Uh, what?" The staff knew Tang Xiu"s ident.i.ty but was at a loss that the famous divine doctor Tang Xiu would make such a bizarre request.
w.a.n.g Xuegang didn"t know what happened but he strode up and came to Tang Xiu"s side to ask, "What"s going on, Mr. Tang?"
"I have to taste this stew first," said Tang Xiu.
"Mr. Tang, even if you"re starving, there"s no need for you to be this ardent, right?" said w.a.n.g Xuegang with a smile. "I"ll send more pots for you if you like this stew later."
Tang Xiu shook his head and opened the ca.s.serole lid. His heart trembled as he instantly smelled the scent of some medicinal herbs from the billowing mist of vapor.
"Black Zen seeds, Carrion Reed, Scorpion Fruit…"
Tang Xiu"s complexion abruptly changed and he exclaimed, "This dish is poisonous!"
"What?"
Everyone in the entire banquet hall was shocked and got up from their seat, whereas disbelief covered w.a.n.g Xuegang"s face after hearing Tang Xiu"s exclamation, and he spoke hastily, "Are you perhaps making a mistake, Mr. Tang? How come this dish is poisonous? I invited all the chefs today from the county town; there"s no way they would poison people!"
Zhang Xinyue quickly ran to Tang Xiu"s side and said, "Don"t talk irresponsibly like that, Tang Xiu! Can you really judge that the stew is poisonous?"
"Yeah! You can"t make a joke about this stuff, Big Brother Tang!" added w.a.n.g Tao who ran over.
Killing intent gleamed inside Tang Xiu"s eyes as he coldly said, "I smelled this familiar scent right as I entered this luncheon hall. I was not sure where the scent came from, but I"ve finally figured it out now. It"s the scent from the stew in front of all of you."
"Black Zen seed is a very poisonous plant that grows in chilling Yin ground. Just a grain of this seed provides enough poison to kill a whale."
"Carrion Reed is a plant that grows on decaying corpses, especially from the heart. To make this Carrion Reed grow, it needs to be watered down with blood every seven days for seven weeks straight."
"The Scorpion Fruit contains a highly potent poison. It is grayish-black in color and somewhat similar in shape to the scorpion. The fruit grows in extremely harsh cold places."
As Tang Xiu explained up to there, he gripped his fist and was silent for more than 10 seconds before continuing, "These three highly toxic substances can be used as materials to concoct a medicinal poison that is enough to kill hundreds of people. But there should be dozens more highly toxic herbs mixed in the stew as well. However, the most terrible thing is not these herbs, but… the blood from the aquatic dragon"s heart."
"Isn"t what you just said way too mysterious, Big Brother Tang?" asked w.a.n.g Tao incredulously. "Let alone saying that those are poisonous plants I"ve never heard of, but that blood of an aquatic dragon"s heart alone is impossible to exist! Where can one even find such an aquatic dragon in this world?"
Tang Xiu shot him an apathetic look and said, "The fact that you"ve never seen nor heard of it doesn"t mean that the aquatic dragon doesn"t exist. I"ve read about this poison in ancient medical records and learned about its name: Drunken Dragon Powder. I can tell you that if even a drop of Drunken Dragon Powder were to be mixed into a bowl of water and poured into dozens of ca.s.serole stews, you will be able to poison everyone here now."
Whizzz…
Everyone"s expression in the luncheon hall suddenly turned very nasty and they watched the ca.s.seroles in the hands of the more than a dozen staffers as though they were looking at horrifying vipers.
"Go and find an animal, whether it"s a cat, dog, chicken, duck or sheep," ordered Tang Xiu with a heavy voice. "HURRY UP!"
"Alright!" A staffer hurriedly ran after hearing the order. Without much effort, he brought a live chicken and sheep.
"Take a spoonful of stew and stuff it into their mouths," said Tang Xiu.
"Alright."
Several staffers quickly gathered and poured a spoonful of soup into the mouths of the chicken and sheep. Then, they loosened them as per Tang Xiu"s order.
Two minutes later, w.a.n.g Tao, who watched the chicken and the sheep asked with a confused face, "Aren"t they just fine?"
w.a.n.g Xuegang also hurriedly asked, "You just used them to test this whether this stew is poisonous, right? They are just fine!"
Tang Xiu didn"t speak at all but kept staring at the chicken and the sheep on the ground. Half a minute later, the chicken that had tried to run away suddenly fell to the floor.
"WHAT? Blood is flowing out from its mouth! Also… look at its eyes, how can they turn bloodshot?" screamed some people in panic.
Instantly, everyone felt a chill run down their whole being. Fear filled their faces as they watched the convulsing chicken that finally died.
After seeing what happened to the chicken, Tang Xiu focused his eyes on the sheep. After a minute pa.s.sed, the animal slowly fell to the floor and died after convulsing.
"A-All… A-all dead!"
Everyone in the room was struck with fear when the chicken was killed by the poison, but they couldn"t help but shudder and subconsciously want to run away after the sheep was pa.s.sed away.
w.a.n.g Xuegang felt like his whole body was falling into a frozen icy-hole as he muttered with a confused look, "Who the h.e.l.l poisoned the stew? Who can be so ruthless to poison everyone here?"
Tang Xiu creased his brows and asked, "Have you offended anyone recently, Mr. w.a.n.g?"
w.a.n.g Xuegang opened his mouth but was at a loss as for how to answer the inquiry. He had a big business. Even if he hadn"t offended anyone recently, he probably had offended many people in the past! For those who were in the business world, and particularly the ones who made their businesses turn into a major ent.i.ty, it was simply impossible to stay pure and never offend anyone.
Tang Xiu was silent for a moment and then slowly said, "Call the police! This is too serious an incident. I"m afraid we"ll be too nervous to have an appet.i.te to eat again if we can"t find the real culprit of this poisoning."
A grateful look could be seen filling w.a.n.g Xuegang"s eyes as he looked at Tang Xiu and said, "I"ll immediately call the police now, Mr. Tang. We are very fortunate to have you among us today, else we all would have…"
He didn"t finish his sentence, yet everyone in the luncheon hall could see it very clearly. They would"ve been poisoned and dead had Tang Xiu not been there today.
He… he was truly everyone"s savior!