Jun Jiuling

Liu’er once again stood outside the door. Although Young Miss had said that she was to prevent other people from eavesdropping, she was not happy this time.

The Fang Family people were really immature. They immediately ran back crying every time they were offended.

Fang Jinxiu was like this, that cripple was like this, and right now, even that aged Lady Fang was like this.

{Perhaps in a moment, Old Lady Fang would be insulted by Young Miss and run out crying to find someone to tell to}, thought Liu’er taking satisfaction in other’s misfortune.

Young Miss was from an elegant and scholarly family, so how could she be too harsh in her insults against Old Lady Fang, who was from a merchant family and acted like a man, showing her face in public and conducting business?

So she wasn’t happy. Young Miss should have let her stay so she could help.

Ever since she had been at Young Miss’ side, she had fought and retreated with Young Miss. Ever since they had come to Yangcheng, she had been boldly leading the troops. But right now, it seemed that Young Miss didn’t need her.

Was a servant not needed by Young Miss a good servant?

Liu’er felt like she had suffered and was sad. She glared even harder at the servants standing around the courtyard.

The room was still lacking any noise. It was like there was no one there.

Old Lady Fang looked at Miss Jun and set down her teacup.

“You spoke correctly. Chengyu was poisoned, and we personally fed it to him,” she said calmly. “Moreover, he has been eating the poison until today so that he will die when he is fifteen years old, one year from now.”

Miss Jun did not smile smugly or scoff at their sin. Instead, she nodded.

“When he was five years old, he fell ill,” she said. “The servants said that, although he was weak, he was not born with the illness. When he was five years old, you gave him some medicine. The medicine cured his illness, but claimed his life.”

She paused here.

“Chengyu is your only bloodline heir. If he fell sick, you would have definitely let only the closest people to you take care of him. Any medicine or treatment that he needed must have been something selected very carefully to make sure that it was absolutely safe.”

So that’s why she had said to Lady Fang that you must have fed the poison to Chengyu yourself.

What they wanted her to say wasn’t this. Old Lady Fang’s lips trembled. She wanted to directly interrogate Miss Jun and learn what were her intentions.

“It was a toxin,” Lady Fang couldn’t help but say.

Miss Jun shook her head.

“That toxin must also be a good medicine,” she said. “Otherwise it wouldn’t have fooled you.”

“Yes,” said Old Lady Fang calmly. “The medicine was compatible with Chengyu’s illness.”

“After the medicine was compatible with Chengyu’s illness, it turned into a new kind of illness. The drug was capable of corroding his blood vessels. In order to prevent the vessels from severing, you had to eat the medicine again. If you didn’t eat it, then the illness would immediately flare up,” said Miss Jun after some consideration.

If he didn’t eat the drug, he would die immediately. But if he ate it, he would die slowly. Although in the end he would die either way, nobody wants to die immediately. Despite knowing the final outcome, he had no choice but to keep ingesting it, holding onto a hope that wasn’t really a hope.

A hope that had no future was harder to bear than utter despair.

Miss Jun looked at Old Lady Fang and Lady Fang with a face full of sympathy.

“This is not tormenting Little Cousin. This torments you,” she said.

Lady Fang raised a hand to cover her tears. For a mother to feed her son a toxin, mouthful by mouthful, was an incredibly bitter feeling. She had never dared to tell her son.

“When I was pregnant with him, I almost miscarried. I didn’t think that after he was born, I would have to personally feed him poison.” She choked up. “His original sickness was not that dire. I wanted him to live, but in the end I claimed his life.”

“Aunt, why do you think this way?” asked Miss Jun. “This was obviously someone else doing ill to you. You cannot blame yourself.”

“If I had been more careful, why would I have let Chengyu eat the toxin?” asked Lady Fang, her emotions stirring.

“There are a thousand days to do evil, but you cannot keep guard against thieves for a thousand days[1].” Miss Jun’s voice grew softer, but remained firm. “Since other people wanted to harm you, if it wasn’t killing him, it would be something else you didn’t guard against.”

When she said this, she paused, a trace of sorrow flashing in her eyes.

“What’s more, the person who wanted to harm you was probably someone you didn’t have any defense against to begin with.”

Lady Fang stifled her sobs. Old Lady Fang inhaled sharply and looked at Miss Jun.

“We acknowledge that what you have said is true. Could you tell us who told you this?” she asked coldly.

Miss Jun looked at her and smiled.

“Grandmother, you misunderstood,” she said. “No one told me; it was I who saw it myself.”

Old Lady Fang watched her apathetically.

“I didn’t know you were born with eyes that could see the past,” she said with a sneer.

“I don’t have eyes that can see the past,” said Miss Jun with a smile. “Grandmother, you forgot that for generations, my family has been doctors.”

Old Lady Fang went blank.

It was true that the Jun Family was a medical family, but what did that have to do with Miss Jun.

“My father had studied when he was young, and when he became an official, he did not give it up. My grandfather and father taught me,” said Miss Jun.

Because they had almost no contact with the Jun Family, Old Lady Fang didn’t really know anything about Miss Jun when she was young. But could a bit of teaching really produce such a talent?

“You saw Chengyu yesterday, and by looking at him and taking his pulse, you knew all this?” asked Lady Fang, shooting Miss Jun a glance. “I never knew that your Jun Family had such divine medical skills.”

Miss Jun nodded,

“Yes,” she said. “Our Jun Family has outstanding medical skills. Otherwise, how would my grandfather be able to cure Old Master Ning to the point that he would not even spare his grandson?”

She had exaggerated.

Old Lady Fang’s voice was hoarse.

“This isn’t something that we necessarily needed to keep a secret.” Her solemn face paid no heed to Miss Jun’s boasting. “Only, we still don’t know who the enemy is, so in order to not beat the grass to startle the snake, we always had to act like we didn’t know. We said that Chengyu was born with the sickness.”

Until now, they still didn’t know who the enemy was. Miss Jun looked at Old Lady Fang with pity.

Old Lady Fang did not see it.

“However, this isn’t some unspeakable secret,” she said. “Since the situation is already like this, it doesn’t matter if you make a public announcement. So don’t think you can use this to threaten us. Perish the thought.”

Miss Jun smiled.

“Grandmother,” she said. “You are mistaken. Have you forgotten? I told Little Cousin that he was poisoned, but I also said something else.”

Old Lady Fang went slightly blank, her ears echoing with the events of the garden that the little servant boy had described to her.

{“Miss Jun had said a few things to Young Master, and then said ‘I will go back and think about this; I will probably be able to find a way to detoxify it.’”}

This sentence?

“You, what do you mean by this?” Old Lady Fang couldn’t help but ask.

It couldn’t be what she was thinking.

“I went back to think over it, and I thought of a way to resolve Little Cousin’s poison,” she said.

“That’s impossible,” Lady Fang blurted out. “How can you do it?”

“Jun Zhenzhen, there’s no point in playing such deceitful tricks. We have watched over Chengyu’s illness for many years and searched high and low for famed doctors. Not one said that they could cure him,” said Old Lady Fang flatly. She paused. “Except that Divine Doctor Zhang might be able to try.”

Could it be that your Jun Family is as amazing as Divine Doctor Zhang?

Although Old Lady Fang did not say it, the tone of her last sentence implied it.

Her voice fell, and she saw Miss Jun go blank for a moment.

“Divine Doctor Zhang,” she repeated.

“Do you know know of Divine Doctor Zhang?” asked Old Lady Fang, with a bit of ridicule. “He is not like your Jun Family, which has only you saying your medical skills are mysterious. His preeminent medical skills are spoken of by everyone under the heavens.”

Of course she knew Divine Doctor Zhang. As Divine Doctor Zhang’s only disciple, she had followed him for six years. She knew better than anyone else of Divine Doctor Zhang’s medical skills.

[1] Thousand days to do evil, but you cannot keep guard against thieves for a thousand days: humans are fallible. It is easy to become neglectful.