Trial Medicine

Half an hour later.

Chen Luo looked at the Scabby Dog kicking its legs on the ground and felt that something was off.

"Could the dosage be wrong?"

Chen Luo could not make heads or tails of it. He had only forced a small mouthful into the Scabby Dog, yet it had turned out like this. It had been lying on the ground kicking its legs, and he did not even know whether it was about to die. If he could not figure this out, then when Third Uncle returned later, he really would not be able to explain himself.

"Big Flower, wake up! Extra chicken legs!"

Chen Luo tried calling out twice, but unfortunately, Big Flower seemed like it had been disconnected. It only lay stiffly on the ground, its legs twitching.

Having lost his patience, Chen Luo grabbed the Scabby Dog by the scruff and slapped it twice, left and right.

Those two slaps had definitely been hard. Normally, the Scabby Dog would have tucked its tail and howled miserably, but today it gave no reaction at all and continued twitching its legs.

"Let's find two chickens to try next."

Chen Luo was unwilling to give up.

He had finally caught sight of hope for turning his life around. He could not abandon it over such a minor setback.

Pouring it directly into his own stomach was definitely out of the question. He was afraid of dying.

He turned and went to the Backyard. Chen Luo found two chickens in the kitchen. Third Uncle had told him to buy them when he returned earlier; they had originally been meant for dinner that night, but he could not worry about that now.

He picked up the two chickens and poured the medicine broth from the Pottery Pot into the Rooster's mouth.

Cluck-cluck-cluck!

After swallowing the medicine broth, the two chickens became lively, flapping their Wings like mad. Chen Luo had to use a great deal of strength to pin them down. Yet even with him pressing them to the ground, they did not stop for a moment, desperately beating their Wings as if they had lost all sense of pain.

"What's going on this time?!"

Chen Luo could not get a read on it either.

Looking at the Scabby Dog still convulsing nearby and the two chickens pinned beneath his hands, he could not determine the medicine's effects for the moment.

A quarter of an hour passed.

The leg-twitching Scabby Dog recovered and suddenly sprang up from the ground. Its bewildered dog eyes looked around, having completely forgotten what had just happened. The two chickens Chen Luo was holding down had also lost much of their vigor, their flapping Wings becoming sporadic.

After struggling with them for ages, Chen Luo released his hands and dropped onto the ground on his backside.

The Medicinal Qi in the Pottery Pot beside him had almost completely dissipated. Its contents had begun to Solidify, turning into a black, ointment-like paste.

"I still need to test it!"

Gritting his teeth, Chen Luo prepared to continue testing the medicine.

He needed enough samples before he could probe out the medicine's actual method of use. The Prescription that Jianghu Wanderer had left behind in his mind had to be useful; otherwise, the man would not have remembered it even after death.

Taking the Solidified medicinal paste, Chen Luo locked the door and headed up On the Mountain behind the house.

After going up the mountain, Chen Luo quickly caught a Wild Hare.

Back when they were poor, his Dad, Old Man Chen, had raised him through hunting. Hunting wild game was no difficult task for a poor family like theirs. Chen Luo had lived in this world for more than ten years, and he had basically learned all the skills his Dad knew.

Holding the Wild Hare by its ears, Chen Luo grabbed a Small Piece of medicinal paste and forcibly stuffed it into its mouth.

One minute.

Two minutes.

Not until ten minutes later did the Wild Hare hanging from Chen Luo's hand suddenly begin struggling, its hind legs kicking wildly in every direction. A strange force leaked from the rabbit's body. Root Tendril-like patterns appeared in its red eyes, making it look especially ferocious. Several bulges of muscle also rose beneath its skin, while root-like blood vessels protruded across its body, creating a terrifying sight.

Bang!

Kicked in the chest by a rabbit leg, Chen Luo felt his chest tighten and nearly failed to catch his breath.

The Wild Hare in his grasp struggled more and more violently. In the end, it completely broke free of Chen Luo's restraint. Like it had Mad Cow Disease, the crazed rabbit slammed its head into the tree stump ahead.

With a bang.

Brain Burst.

The Wild Hare smashed its own rabbit head to pieces On the Spot. The force was so great that it even knocked a dent into the dead tree before it.

Such tremendous strength?

Chen Luo was startled as well. He quickly stepped forward and examined the hole the rabbit had made.

A hole seven or eight centimeters deep had actually been smashed into the bark of the Old Bark Tree. Rabbit blood and brain matter were mixed inside, a particularly grisly sight.

"The medicine works!"

Chen Luo grew excited.

All that remained was finding the right way to use it.

Afterward, Chen Luo caught several more Small Animals on the mountain—snakes, hedgehogs, foxes. He did not stop experimenting until all the medicinal paste in his hand had been consumed.

Through the "sacrifices" of so many animals, Chen Luo roughly reached a conclusion.

The medicinal paste was effective.

There was no doubt about that. Different animals experienced different effects after swallowing it.

The wild animals On the Mountain clearly showed better results.

After a full day of fussing about, Chen Luo was exhausted by the time he returned home.

Third Uncle came home drunk after finishing his little drinks.

Corpse Collectors like them were very busy whenever there was work, but idle for most of the rest of the time. Third Uncle was also an old bachelor. Once he got paid, naturally he went out to drink with Pretty Girls. He had spent his whole life working in the city without saving a single coin; that alone showed just how carefree Third Uncle's usual life was.

"Who the hell is cooking cow dung in my house?!"

The instant he pushed open the door, Third Uncle was hit by the stench inside the house.

He vomited heavily by the doorway and took a long while to recover.

Having recovered, Chen Laosan immediately reached back to find the bamboo stick he usually kept hidden. When Chen Luo had first settled in the city, Chen Laosan had used that stick more than a few times to teach his nephew a lesson. He had gone out drinking today, and only his nephew was at home. There was no need to think about who the culprit was.

The Scabby Dog, which had also recovered beside him, came over with the bamboo stick in its mouth.

That foolish dog had kicked its legs in the courtyard for half the day, yet by nightfall it had somehow recovered. This gave Chen Luo a successful case for his experiments. At the moment, he was brewing a new batch of medicine inside, preparing for another round of tests.

"Third Uncle? Why are you back!"

Chen Luo was dumbfounded when he heard the noise.

As he remembered it, on the first day after getting paid, Third Uncle never came home for the night. The Pretty Girls in Widow's Alley would not let him return either. Who knew what had gotten into him today? The old man had actually come back early.

"You little bastard, three days without a beating and you're climbing onto the roof to tear off tiles! If I hadn't come back tonight, were you planning to dig up the ancient cesspit next door and boil that too?"

Seeing the Earthen Pot in Chen Luo's hands, Chen Laosan's anger surged. He raised the stick and stepped forward to teach him a lesson.

"Third Uncle, don't! These are all medicine!!"

How could Chen Luo let Chen Laosan truly Take Action? He lifted one arm and held Chen Laosan in place. Already dead drunk and having vomited all over the doorway, Chen Laosan was no match for Chen Luo. He was restrained in an instant, while the Scabby Dog behind them anxiously spun in circles.

It was still counting on its old master to avenge it!

"Medicine?"

The moment he heard it was medicine, Chen Laosan sobered up considerably.

"Has the poison acted up?"

Chen Laosan no longer had any mind to be angry and immediately asked nervously.

The Old Chen Family had passed down through a single line for three generations. This generation had only Chen Luo as its lone heir. If anything happened to Chen Luo, how could Chen Laosan ever face Eldest Brother?

"No."

Chen Luo hurriedly explained what he had done to Third Uncle.

He skipped over the crucial detail of seeing a Dead Man's obsession, saying only that he had obtained an ancient formula by chance and wanted to give it a try.

"You want to practice martial arts?"

Chen Laosan's brows furrowed slightly as he looked at his nephew.

Wanting to learn martial arts was not strange. Chen Laosan had entertained similar thoughts when he was young and had even taken a master to learn a few moves of Basic Martial Arts. But those were only for strengthening the body and made little difference from ordinary people.

True Martial Dao was different from Basic Martial Arts.

Powerful martial artists possessed unfathomable, godlike abilities. They could move mountains and overturn seas, like Land Immortals.

Though Chen Laosan had never Come Into Contact With such people, he had heard the brothers from the yamen boasting while drinking. They said the Martial Dao could reach the divine, and at its peak, one could become a god.

That was precisely why the Martial Dao was sealed off so tightly.

For ordinary people, whether the Imperial Court or Jianghu Wanderers, they did not live in the same world as them. What those people pursued were the Heavenly Materials and Earthly Treasures of Mythological Legends, while what ordinary people pursued was firewood, rice, oil, and salt.

"I do!"

Chen Luo hurriedly nodded.

It would have been one thing if he had no hope before, but now that an opportunity was laid out before him, it would be inexcusable to keep acting like a turtle shrinking its head into its shell.

Chen Laosan silently took out a jug of wine from the cabinet beside him and poured himself a cup.

Chen Luo stood by and watched.

He did not say anything.

He knew Third Uncle was thinking.

Unlike his Parents in the countryside, Third Uncle had been a Corpse Collector for so many years and knew some people. If he wanted to learn martial arts, he had to use Third Uncle's connections. Making use of family ties within reasonable limits was the rational thing for a normal person to do.

As for taking the medicine—

He had not yet figured out the medicinal properties of the Prescription in his hands, nor did he know its actual effects. He did not dare swallow it recklessly.

If his luck was bad and he went mad like the Wild Hare, smashing himself to death, that would be a terrible loss.

"You little bastard, all you know is how to cause trouble for me!"

Third Uncle drained the last of his wine, cursed under his breath, then shut the door and went back to his room to sleep.

Chen Luo, meanwhile, Sighed in Relief.

He knew Third Uncle had agreed.

Please keep reading, please add it to your collection.

Whether I can survive depends on all of you.