Li Yifeng had seen him treat Murong Feiyan with his own eyes. Now that he claimed to know nothing about medicine, Li merely took it as modesty and chuckled. "You're too modest, Young Master Hu." His expression plainly said, Who the hell are you trying to fool? I saw it myself.
"I've never understood what modesty means, not since I was little," Hu Xiaotian said. "Mr. Li, you strike me as an honest elder, so I won't hide anything from you. First, I've never had a teacher. Second, I've never studied medicine."
"I was right beside you when you treated Chief Constable Murong's injury," Li Yifeng said. You insist on making me expose you, boy. You're far too slippery.
"This is rather embarrassing to explain," Hu Xiaotian said. "But if I don't, you'll surely think I'm lying, Mr. Li. I'll tell you the truth, but you absolutely must keep it secret."
Seeing how solemn he looked, Li Yifeng felt both curious and suspicious. He nodded. "Please, go ahead, young master. I'll certainly keep your secret."
Hu Xiaotian deliberately glanced around before moving a little closer to Li Yifeng and lowering his voice. "The truth is, I don't know anything about medicine. The reason I can set broken bones and remove the arrow from Chief Constable Murong's body is that I'm familiar with the structure of the human body."
"How could you be familiar with it if you've never studied medicine?" Li Yifeng asked.
Hu Xiaotian sighed. "There's something wrong with me!"
Li Yifeng froze for a moment. He had hardly ever met anyone who described himself that way. He blinked, his face full of bewilderment. Something wrong with him? What sort of thing?
"Since childhood, I've had a secret hobby," Hu Xiaotian said. "I like taking a knife and dismembering small animals. At first, it was little animals like chickens, ducks, cats, and dogs. Later, I moved on to larger livestock-pigs, horses, cattle, and sheep. And after that..." He deliberately paused, smiling with a sinister chill. "Do you understand what dismembering means?"
Of course Li Yifeng understood. By this point, he was already getting the creeps. "You mean... Cook Ding Butchers an Ox..."
"More or less, but it's still different," Hu Xiaotian said. "Cook Ding only took apart an ox's bones, joints, and muscles. I don't leave out the internal organs or the vessels either. I call it dissection!" His gaze grew ardent, and he looked intensely excited.
Li Yifeng, however, felt a chill despite the warmth. "I... see..."
"Not just that. Later on, dissecting pigs, horses, cattle, and sheep no longer satisfied me, so I turned my interests to..." Hu Xiaotian fixed his eyes on Li Yifeng.
Li Yifeng felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He knew what Hu Xiaotian was implying. "You mean dismembering..." His voice trembled. The word "people" reached his lips, but in the end, he held it back. To him, this was already something horrifying enough to shock the world. He didn't want to believe it, yet Hu Xiaotian sounded so convincing that it seemed entirely possible.
Hu Xiaotian nodded. "You guessed it."
Li Yifeng felt his stomach churn like an overturned sea, something surging upward inside him. With considerable effort, he forced the nausea back down. "But the law of the land forbids that."
"Of course I know," Hu Xiaotian said. "So naturally, living ones are out of the question. Instead, I spend a fortune buying dead ones, take them back to a secret location, and dissect them bit by bit, studying them bit by bit."
At this, Li Yifeng almost saw the fellow waving a little knife as he dissected a corpse, blood dripping everywhere, a sight too ghastly to bear. Suddenly, an uncontrollable wave of nausea rose within him. Clapping a hand over his mouth, he rushed toward the rear courtyard with astonishing speed.
Before long, Hu Xiaotian heard the fellow retching in agony. He had really done a number on Li Yifeng this time; the man would probably vomit up even his bile. A discipline regarded as a natural science in the past was treated in this era like some savage beast from the primordial wilderness-absurd beyond belief and utterly terrifying. No wonder people in the past had suffered scorn, or even sacrificed their lives, for studying anatomy. Hu Xiaotian's story contained both truth and lies. Here, he had never performed a single dissection experiment. Without feeding Li Yifeng something potent, how could he make the old fellow abandon the idea of having him treat Prince Jin? Now that Li knew he had such a perverse hobby, he would probably keep a respectful distance whenever they met again. Hu Xiaotian realized that managing his image was important. This conversation had instantly repackaged him from a skilled, compassionate physician into a perverse, bloodthirsty dismemberment fiend.
Murong Feiyan arrived at Easy Origin Hall precisely at noon. Hu Xiaotian's surgery had been timely and expertly performed, Li Yifeng's Golden Wound-Healing Medicine was highly effective, and Murong Feiyan herself had an excellent constitution. As a result, she recovered quickly. When she appeared before Hu Xiaotian again, she had already regained her former spirited bearing.
Still, Murong Feiyan gave Hu Xiaotian no friendly look when she saw him. Whenever she caught sight of that grinning, flippant face, she felt he was up to no good. How could anyone look like that? He was clearly quite handsome, yet whichever way she looked at him, his face was full of wickedness. From every angle, he looked like a scoundrel.
Hu Xiaotian chuckled. "You're here, Chief Constable Murong. I've been waiting ages for you."
"Sorry to have kept you waiting, Young Master Hu," Murong Feiyan said. "I was handling some official business just now, so I'm late."
"You're truly dedicated, Chief Constable Murong," Hu Xiaotian said. "Even with a work-related injury, you insist on staying on the front line. A minor wound won't take you out of the line of fire, indeed."
Murong Feiyan had already grown accustomed to his peculiar way of speaking. Hu Xiaotian really did hide his abilities well. She had always thought him an ignorant, unskilled wastrel, never expecting that he actually knew something about medicine. In fact, his medical skills were quite impressive. Throughout the Capital City, few people could successfully remove a Fang-Barbed Arrow. Hu Xiaotian had not only extracted it successfully but had also treated the wounds on both sides beautifully, leaving almost no scars.
Just then, Murong Feiyan also heard the vomiting from the rear courtyard. Looking over, she saw Li Yifeng bracing one hand against a veranda pillar, bent over and vomiting without pause. She frowned. "Is Mr. Li ill?"
"Seriously ill!" Hu Xiaotian said, secretly amused. All he had done was tell a story about dissecting human bodies, yet he had frightened Li Yifeng into this state.
Murong Feiyan had come in her Official Uniform today. She possessed an androgynous air rarely seen in this era, spirited and striking, with a thoroughly capable appearance. That quality made her decidedly unconventional.
"Sit!" Hu Xiaotian said.
Murong Feiyan sat in the Grand Tutor Chair beside him and placed her sword on the Long Table. Because she was a constable, even her sitting posture leaned toward the masculine. She sat there without ceremony, her legs spread wide, completely unlike an ordinary woman. All the women Hu Xiaotian had seen lately kept their legs pressed tightly together, without so much as a gap. Someone like Murong Feiyan was a rare sight indeed.
Murong Feiyan realized that the fellow's gaze kept straying between her legs. Although her outer robe covered her, and she knew he could see nothing, she still reacted instinctively, suddenly clamping her legs shut and pressing them together.
Hu Xiaotian had just taken a sip of tea. Finding Murong Feiyan's movement terribly comical, he couldn't hold back his laughter. He choked on the tea, turned aside, and sprayed it onto the floor.
Murong Feiyan's pretty face flushed crimson, and she silently cursed the shameless fellow. Look at nothing improper! What are you staring there for? Just as she was about to flare up, she saw Li Yifeng walk in, pale and utterly drained. Hu Xiaotian had put him through quite an ordeal. On seeing Murong Feiyan, he barely managed to cup his hands in greeting.
"Are you all right, Mr. Li?" Hu Xiaotian asked with a smile.
Li Yifeng nodded.
Hu Xiaotian opened the Brocade Box. At the sight of those surgical instruments, Li Yifeng inexplicably pictured the fellow wielding his tools to dismember a human body again. His cheeks bulged. Hastily covering his mouth with both hands, he turned and ran toward the rear courtyard once more.
Hu Xiaotian sighed. "Seriously ill!"
Now Murong Feiyan believed he was ill too. "Mr. Li has skilled hands and a compassionate heart," she said softly. "He cares so deeply for his patients. He's truly been working too hard."
"Life isn't easy for anyone," Hu Xiaotian said. I was the one who saved you. I'm the one with skilled hands and a compassionate heart, all right?
Murong Feiyan gave him a displeased glance. "Not necessarily. There are always people in this world who reap without sowing, draw salaries while occupying their posts like corpses, squander without restraint, and know nothing of the suffering of ordinary people."
Hu Xiaotian naturally knew she was talking about him. The smile abruptly vanished from his face. "Take off your clothes!"
Before you continue