Thunderous Methods, a Bodhisattva's Heart

Riverside City was sealed off the very day the goddess constable arrived.

Duan Yun was not too flustered. He quietly waited for the storm to pass.

He had not planned to leave so early anyway. The faster he ran now, the more easily he would invite suspicion.

If someone could still find him after he had erased the traces so thoroughly, then running any farther would probably be useless. He might as well conserve his strength.

Besides, he had done nothing wrong. Why should he run?

He had destroyed the Black Bear Gang so he would not have to keep hiding from place to place. He had killed the county magistrate to prevent unreasonable fees. If the goddess constables insisted on arresting him because of that, he would not mind capturing them and locking them in the cellar, moving them with feeling and enlightening them with reason.

As for whether he was a match for those goddess constables, Duan Yun was not entirely sure.

He could not help analyzing the matter. The experts of the Black Bear Gang and the magistrate's estate had all been no match for him. They had not even forced out his Grasp Sparrow's Tail. That meant this goddess constable from the Clear Qi Bureau probably would not be either.

Well, even if the two sisters joined forces, they would not be.

That at least gave him room to imprison them and reason with them.

Of course, Duan Yun did not want that to happen.

Imprisoning goddess constables would make him seem like some demon lord from The Fallen Goddess Constable. He was a gynecologist with the heart of a healer.

Since no one came to collect protection fees anymore, Duan Yun opened the pharmacy for business.

He did not have much money left. Earning a little was better than earning nothing.

He was somewhat annoyed. Back then, he had been so focused on wiping out the protection fees that he had forgotten to pick up some money from the Black Bear Gang's corpses.

Now that the goddess constables had arrived, it was even less convenient for him to go scavenging. Besides, the money had surely been picked clean by others already.

According to the gossip he had heard, after he had slaughtered the Black Bear Gang until it was scattered to the four winds, the few idiots left behind had fought among themselves over the division of the spoils. After that, the gang was finished.

Looking at his somewhat cramped and deserted pharmacy, Duan Yun once again felt that he had been a rather unsuccessful gynecologist.

He did not even have two regular customers.

His father had died too suddenly, and he was too young to inspire trust. On top of that, gynecology was already an obscure field, so it was understandable that he had little business.

Thinking of the effects of the Jade Sword Stance and breathing exercises, Duan Yun began considering whether he should treat kidney deficiency on the side.

That would probably have a larger customer base.

As dusk drew near, Duan Yun rose to close the door. Yet when it was only halfway shut, someone hurried into the shop.

"Doctor Duan, my young master asks you to come save a life!"

Duan Yun recognized the servant. He was from the Zhao Family in the west of the city.

The Zhao Family's young master and young madam were among his few regular clients.

Before the Zhao Family's young madam had married, her mother had greatly admired Duan Yun's father's medical skills. As a result, she had held a favorable impression of the Duan family pharmacy ever since childhood.

Later, after marrying Young Master Zhao and becoming the young madam, she had become pregnant. She had not minded in the slightest that Little Doctor Duan, Old Doctor Duan's son, was still inexperienced, and had asked him to treat her several times.

The day Duan Yun had been kicked was the day he had suffered his misfortune while buying vegetables after treating this young madam.

Thinking back on it, most of the respect he had received as a gynecologist had come from Young Master Zhao and his wife.

It could be said that they were the most precious and important clients of his medical career.

Duan Yun hurriedly asked, "What happened?"

"My mistress can't give birth. Even the midwife has no solution. Young Master heard that you once mentioned a method of cutting open the belly to deliver a child, so he sent me to invite you!"

The servant was frantic and looked close to tears, which showed that the situation was bad.

Duan Yun had learned the method of delivering a child by cutting open the abdomen. Yet even his father, Old Doctor Gu, who had passed down the method, had never once cut open a woman's belly to take out a child in his entire life. If he wanted to boast about it, he had to boast about some ancestor or another from generations ago.

But the current Duan Yun wanted to give it a try.

Opening the abdomen, stopping the bleeding, and stitching the wound were all technical work. They might once have been enormous challenges for him, but now he had practiced swordsmanship and killed people.

Moreover, he had long used the medical knowledge from his previous life to verify this inherited surgical method, and believed there would not be much problem with it.

"Doctor Duan, please hurry! If we're any later, Mistress will be gone!" The servant was already speaking through tears.

Duan Yun hesitated no longer. He hurriedly slung his medical case over his back, grabbed two knives, and said, "Lead the way."

The servant immediately ran outside, with Duan Yun following behind. But as they ran, Duan Yun ended up carrying the servant along as he ran.

For a moment, the servant felt as though he were riding the wind and cleaving the waves. The fierce wind blew until his eyes blurred.

Little Doctor Duan could run this fast?

It did not take long before they reached the Zhao Family residence.

"Doctor Duan is here! Doctor Duan is here!" the servant called as he jogged inside.

At that moment, a young man in green robes rushed out to greet them, his face full of anxiety. "Doctor Duan, my wife—"

Duan Yun said, "Let me see her condition first."

Young Master Zhao hurriedly led him toward a nearby room.

Inside, maids and a midwife stood beside the bed, their faces drenched in sweat. On the bed lay a young woman who was nearly unconscious.

Duan Yun examined her and knew that her labor strength was absolutely insufficient. The only option was to cut open her abdomen.

Still, he was somewhat nervous.

This was his first time, after all.

Beside him, Young Master Zhao saw that his wife was already at death's door and anxiously asked, "Doctor Duan, what should we do?"

Seeing that the doctor Young Master Zhao had invited was so young, the midwife hurriedly said, "Don't act recklessly! Otherwise, neither the mother nor the child can be saved!"

Duan Yun said gravely, "If we keep dragging this out, neither of them will be saved. Her abdomen must be opened."

"What? Open her abdomen?" The midwife stared in shock.

She had delivered babies in the city for so many years, yet she had never heard of any decent person using such a method.

"I need to see Madam!" the midwife said agitatedly.

"Shut up."

After saying that, Duan Yun turned to Young Master Zhao. "Young Master Zhao, I cannot guarantee that this will succeed. You decide whether to do it."

Young Master Zhao wiped the sweat from his forehead. Gritting his teeth, he said, "Do it!"

"Then stay here. Have the servants prepare hot water, scissors, needles, and thread." Duan Yun gave his orders.

Facing the young madam, who was already barely clinging to life, he knew he could delay no longer.

The blade was heated over the flames, gleaming with a cold light.

Just as when he practiced swordsmanship, once Duan Yun began, he entered a state where nothing else could distract him.

The icy blade pressed against the woman's swollen belly in an instant, then sliced.

Duan Yun's hand was steady—astonishingly steady. The knife in his hand was swift, like a white colt flashing past a crack in the wall.

The moment a cut roughly six inches long appeared, Duan Yun's hand had already reached inside.

Inside the room, the midwife and Young Master Zhao did not dare breathe. The maids had long since been frightened into trembling at the side and did not dare look again.

Outside the room, the old madam was pacing frantically.

She always felt that the doctor her son had invited was not very reliable.

He was too young.

Even the experienced midwife she had hired could do nothing. What trick could this doctor, whose feathers had not even fully grown, possibly have?

But suddenly, an infant's cry rang out. The pacing old woman froze stiffly in place.

The baby had been delivered?

Delivered?

With a deft motion, Duan Yun cut the umbilical cord. He was immersed in the feeling of flowing clouds and running water.

He held the infant, who had just been slapped into crying, in one arm while stitching the young madam's wound one-handed.

Then he said to the stunned midwife beside him, "Take the child."

The midwife had barely taken the baby when Duan Yun was already tying off the stitches.

After this practical experience, Duan Yun understood that some scenes in martial arts novels were not fabricated nonsense. For example, after a swift sword move sealed someone's throat, it would take a brief moment before the victim reacted, and only then would a faint line of blood appear across their throat.

As long as the blade was fast and sharp enough, the incision would be very narrow, and the person might not even feel much pain at the time.

After stitching up the incision, Duan Yun began washing his hands.

Listening to the infant's cries and the comparatively steady breathing coming from the woman beside him, he felt that he had been a qualified obstetrician today.

No, not qualified. Excellent!

Seeing the stitches tied into a butterfly bow on his wife's belly, Young Master Zhao suddenly began to cry.

He cried tears of joy.

He and Duan Yun were not close. Previously, it had always been his wife's idea to have Little Doctor Duan treat her.

This time had also been his wife's wish before she fell unconscious.

In truth, this had been a gamble. It was not easy to stake the lives of his wife and child on a young doctor. It required bearing tremendous pressure.

Thankfully, they had gambled correctly!

Little Doctor Duan truly was a good doctor worthy of trust!

"Madam needs quiet rest. Feed her well, and make sure she does not catch a chill. I will come to remove the stitches in five days." Duan Yun spoke gently as he took her pulse.

He could feel the family's joy.

He was quite happy as well.

This was probably the most fulfilling day of his medical career thus far.

That sense of accomplishment reached its peak when he received the fifty taels of silver as his consultation fee.

Seeing that Duan Yun seemed pleased after receiving the payment, the servant also grinned foolishly.

Today had truly been a false alarm. He had thought that his mistress and little young master were really going to die.

In truth, many things in life were less beautiful than the words "a false alarm."

Duan Yun patted the servant on the shoulder, offered Young Master Zhao his congratulations, and left.

A fine rain drifted through the sky as Duan Yun walked down the road with light steps.

He suddenly realized that saving people made him quite happy—perhaps even happier than killing people had made him a few days ago.

A saying from his previous life, spoken by someone he did not know, surfaced in his mind: "Use thunderous methods to reveal a bodhisattva's heart."

His methods were not thunderous enough, nor was his heart compassionate enough to be called a bodhisattva's, but he had still relied on his own strength to do what he wanted.

All these changes had begun with that manual he had bought for one qian of silver.

Without the Jade Sword True Canon, he would probably still be a timid gynecologist barely scraping by.

Thinking of the concise and apt annotations in the manual, Duan Yun felt a trace of warmth.

Clearly, the senior who had written those annotations possessed a bodhisattva's heart and wanted the manual to be passed down, thereby changing more people's lives.

He was one of those who had benefited.

Duan Yun had already made up his mind. In the future, he would do the same.

He would spread the Jade Sword True Canon far and wide—and it would be the Jade Sword True Canon refined by his own sword-dao genius, with no small measure of power.

When that time came, there would surely be many good people in the world like him.

Then evil would be stopped, and goodness would be promoted.

As Duan Yun walked home, the outline of a plan gradually took shape in his heart: "A healer's benevolent heart, spread martial arts across the world."