The Magnolia Beauty

She instantly recognized him and sprang up, smiling.

"Weizhe!" She cried, hugging him (in a friendly way where Suyin would consider Weizhe like his brother). She could not have welcomed his presence much sooner!

"M-Miss Suyin! Please do not do that, Your Highness would kill me if you were to do that to me." Weizhe was staggered at her abrupt reaction.

Suyin chuckled, "S-Sorry, I got too happy."

Suyin needed to remember about the old traditional ways of what was inappropriate and what was customary according to the time era. Of course, hugs was a common thing back in her days, but here, it would be comparable to something that was embarra.s.sing to do from a woman.

Weizhe then shifted his tone, bowing to the two. "Miss Han Suyin, Your Highness has delivered a piece of important evidence that may be a good use for you." Weizhe delivered her a wooden small box, about the size that would fit a small ring. He glanced at Zhaohui, who did nothing but speculate. Weizhe didn"t care much about his demeanor and was prepared to leave.

"W-Wait!" Suyin called out to Weizhe. He turned to her, "How did you get out of the cell?" Suyin had to give herself a push mentally to finish her sentence, "...Is the Prince doing well?"

Weizhe lit a small smile to comfort her, "There are things that are needed to be done such as this mission."

He flew off back into the distance while Suyin and Zhaohui watched him disappear from the forest.

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*Weizhe"s POV*

In the "Prison cell", Qin Fuhua took a sip of tea at the table. His cell was nothing more than just a guest room of the Shi Zhang, who came by every so often to check up on him. Weizhe flew across the rooftop and swiftly entered the room, bowing to Qin Fuhua.

"Your Highness, I have presented her with the evidence that will help her with the illness. Do you think she can do it?" Weizhe cowered in front of Qin Fuhua. He tenderly put his cup up to drink and hid his smile behind the ceramic material, which threw Weizhe off. Weizhe was astounded by his pleased face.

"I shall wait, just like the Prince!" Weizhe exclaimed in rage.

Unlike Qin Fuhua who was composed enough to wait for Suyin to identify the disease, Weizhe was anxious and restless. But because of his(Qin Fuhua"s) facial expression, this made Weizhe even more eager to see how all of this mess would wrap up!

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*Back to Suyin"s POV*

Suyin held the box that Weizhe had just given her. Just what was the "evidence?" Zhaohui turned to her, giving her a skeptical (but sarcastic) expression, "You"re suspicious of me, but who are you? How do you know so many people with that kind of power?" He inquired.

Suyin shrugged her shoulders, "It"s called bad luck." She responded nonchalantly.

Zhaohui laughed at her reply and headed to one of the trees. "Forget what I said, it"s scaring me enough to know you and the power of people you a.s.sociate with."

He had a secret doork.n.o.b that would open as long as he had the key. Zhaohui then inserts the key into the doork.n.o.b and twisted it open, exposing an entrance from the large tree in front of them.

"Speaking of which." Zhaohui went inside with Suyin following him. He closed the entrance and walked ahead, exposing a small room about the size of a regular-sized bedroom. There were little hand-made things that were arranged in the room and a little small round wooden table right in the middle of the room. A bed made out of bamboo was at the corner of the wall and objects such as a slingshot, a little wooden toy figure, and other similar items were distributed around the room.

"There"s one thing that I found to be ominous ever since the illness began." Zhaohui went straight to the table and sat down, intertwining his hands together. Suyin trailed after him and sat on a chair straight across from him.

"The villagers began feeling ill after they toured this lake nearby here. Although I have tested and examined to see if there were any poison or foul play, the water was perfectly fine to drink."

Suyin pursed her lips, stuck in deep reflection about the situation.

"Anyway, all I can gather is the location of the place has to do something with the sickness," Zhaohui told with a stressed tone.

There was something that had been bugging Suyin about the village, and it wasn"t the people or even the shady Shi Zhang who hindered with her investigation. Suyin was still holding on to the wooden box that Weizhe had given her.

(*Weizhe"s words a couple of minutes ago*)

*"Miss Han Suyin, Your Highness has delivered a piece of important evidence that may be a good use for you." *

She flipped the box open with a doubtful face. A dead mosquito laid in the little box. Zhaohui hurdled in close to Suyin to take a peek at what she was staring at and gave her a strange look.

"That person you were speaking to..." He glimpsed at the box that she held at the palm of her hand, "Miss Suyin, why is there a dead mosquito in there and how is that going to help us?"

Her eyes lit up a sparkle that caused her to stand up.

"Zhaohui! About the lake, show me where it"s at!"

Suyin finally found the solution to the problem now and needed to confirm her theory. If it was correct, this would save the whole village and the Qin Fuhua.

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A still lake surrounded by ma.s.sive trees was as quiet as the sound of the bugs hovering around the field. The pair strolled down the forest path and reached their destination at the side of the lake. Little crackles could be heard from afar, a sign that a tree bark or trunk had fallen off from itself. Suyin could smell the stench of the earthy fragrance of the water from the decomposition of plant substances that had dropped in the lake. There was no ripple or movement of the lake.

If Suyin didn"t know this was a lake, it would have looked like a frozen lake that didn"t budge at any movement.

"Was it always like this?" Suyin asked, taking a glance around the water of the lake.

"From the rumors of the villagers, they have complained about not having enough rain for this past year," Zhaohui replied. "And they failed to catch any more fish since the water seemed "poisoned," there were no more fishes alive here. Many of the fishermen that used to fish here had stopped after catching all of them and feeling sick from coming here." He watched Suyin and followed her to where ever she needed to go.

"Not enough rain?" Suyin could have guessed correctly with the item that Weizhe had given to her. If there wasn"t any water current, the problem with this lake was not the consumption of water, but the flow.

No fishes meant that the culprit behind this illness was the reason why this all started! Suyin nodded her head, after realizing that there was no source of any predator to attack them!

Suyin turned to Zhaohui and stared straight in his eyes, causing him to be surprised at how serious she seemed at the moment. "Zhaohui. I think I have the solution to help the village now." She smirked.

"There was a case back in the hospital---er.." Suyin coughed to change the terms, "Back where I lived. A child was sick with similar symptoms of chicken pox, but it wasn"t chicken pox. He had another disease called, Dengue Fever." Suyin pointed her hands up in the air and gave him the biggest grin he had ever seen from her.

"A still water will cause these mosquito bugs to plant their eggs in the water, and since the fishermen had been fishing all of the fishes, this was the perfect place for them." Suyin then pointed at the water.

"Fishes usually eat the eggs of the mosquito, but since they are all taken out, this was the perfect home for them plus no water movement." Zhaohui then snapped his fingers, now comprehending her theory.

"If that is so, then the real reason why they are all sick would because of the mosquitos!" Zhaohui now grasped what was the problem behind the disease.

"Mhm! The reason why the doctors are suggesting it is chicken pox is that the symptoms are similar, but it appears that they did not investigate thoroughly enough to find out what it really was. Luckily, I had a case similar to this before, so I knew. The medicine that the doctors had prescribed to the villagers harms the illness rather than help it, which explains the critical condition they were in."

Suyin can finally go to the Shi Zhang and finally get the two out of the prison! "We did it Zhaohui--" She whirled around to look at Zhaohui but he was nowhere to be found.

"Zhaohui?" She called. There was no response and the only echo in the area was Suyin"s voice. "So much for supporting me." She grumbled.

She had no more time to spare since it was necessary for her to send the news to Shi Zhang. "Sorry, but I"ll go resolve the problem with the village first, Zhaohui."

Suyin hurried off back to the village, with a figure leaning on top of the large tree, smiling mischievously at Suyin from the ground.

"Young Miss, it seems like only you can save them."

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Jiaoshu village was a beautiful small town that had everything that people could ask for: the agriculture, mountains, and scenery. Suyin could believe this would have come out of a Chinese martial arts movie or something and there would be a shifu standing at the top of clouds circling the mountain. Since it was the afternoon, there weren"t a lot of villagers on her path since they were doing ch.o.r.es such as washing clothes, hunting, or farming on their land.

Suyin made a fist from her hands and marched up to the hill of the Shi Zhang promptly and proudly. Some of the villagers glared at her, letting out a couple of murmurs to the person next to them.

"I heard this female wanted to be a doctor, but watch her hurt us instead." One clearly spoke out loud.

Suyin overheard it and turned her head to glare at the man talking, throwing an I"ll-prove-you-wrong facial expression and continued to walk up the hill.

If Suyin could compare the atmosphere and the people around her, it would be like a thousand of her father and mother(of this time era) at that moment.

Neglecting the thought that she was the center of the attention of the villagers, she stepped right up in front of Shi Zhang"s home.

Qin Fuhua"s soldiers were all there, they seemed to look worn out from all of the babysitting they had to do outside of his house. Suyin boldly knocked on the door, noisy enough for the insiders to hear.

"Who is there?" The door slightly opened enough for the male servant to peek his head out to see who was banging at the door.

Suyin had realized that it was the same male servant who helped them the first time that they came into the Shi Zhang"s home.

Before the male servant could react to close the door, Suyin kicked the door open with her right foot. She knew that they would not let her in, especially after the Shi Zhang"s plan to stop Suyin from finding the cure.

Suyin hustled through Shi Zhang"s home, racing to the main corridors to the Shi Zhang. The male servant tried to stop her but failed to do so because he fell down when Suyin had kicked the door.

"In a hurry, are we?" A voice called out in the main residence as Suyin barged in. She gazed at the Shi Zhang who turned to her with a big smile.

Shi Zhang"s male servant ran in the room, "Shi Zhang! She is here--"

He snorted and shook his head. "A good entertainer, you sure are."

Suyin gave him a perplexed expression but had no time to understand his crazy talk.

The elderly man was leaning on the chair lazily. He rested mainly on the right side of the arm of the chair and had his legs stretched out. If someone didn"t look and walked in front of him, they would clearly trip because his legs would have been in the way.

"I found the solution to prevent this illness from spreading." Suyin spoke, "Not just that, but I know how to cure the people that are sick."

Shi Zhang sat up straight this time, but he was still smiling at her. "Ah, so you found a solution then? That"s great!"

Suyin nodded her head, biting her lips because she didn"t comprehend the Shi Zhang"s mind at all. First, he wanted her to find a cure to the illness. Then, he wanted to stop her. What was with the Shi Zhang?!

"May I have a paper and brush, please?" Suyin inquired.

The Shi Zhang nodded with the servant running off to give her the materials she needed.

By the time that the servant found her the paper and brush, a crowd of the villagers outside of the main residence were invited in to see the turmoil by observing from the Shi Zhang"s windows and outside courtyard. There were noises and giggles about Suyin and how she wanted to help them.

Suyin didn"t care about all the whisper and gossips and scribbled down the problem of the illness and how it all started and then placed resolutions to fix it.

"What is important is for your village to build a foundation of moving, current water from the still water. You can do this man-made by digging enough to connect it to the river or waterfall nearby. This will help the fishes reach the lake and help with the infestation of mosquitos too."

Suyin described the purpose of the lake and how it all started to the beginning of the illness and to the doctor"s medicine that was prescribed as harmful. The Shi Zhang only observed, amused, yet entertained by her dedication.

"There are some herbs that I need, in order to cure everyone who is ill right now," Suyin mumbled to herself, contemplating about the ingredients.

"We can provide that, but the question is, who will be willing to be your first patient? Once I see that your medicine would miraculously work, only then I would believe this whole story." The Shi Zhang challenged, interested in how she would respond to this. The people of Jiao were known to be distrustful of the outsiders.

Since Suyin was also a female, this just made the situation worse for herself. Who would let a female lady help cure one of their own? And how would they know if the medicine would work?

"She will just make a fool out of herself just like the Doctor from the Long Kingdom." A female spoke, swaying her head as she rolled her eyes.

"How would we know she was making this all up?! What if her medicine will poison us instead?!" Another one cried out from the crowd.

Suyin bit her lips. Great. How would this work now? It was harder than she had expected to gain Shi Zhang"s trust. After all, he was the one who believed she would fail in the first place.

"I will allow her to cure my son as my first patient."

A voice p.r.o.nounced out from the crowd.

A lady and a man stood in a pair, as the female elevated her hands. Suyin turned around to see a familiar face staring straight at her.

"Meifeng!" Suyin smiled.

Just as she was going to wave at her, she turned to see her brother, who had a busted lip, cower his head down to hide from her from embarra.s.sment. Suyin glared at him but could tell that the sister did a little beating up to teach him a lesson.