Looking at Lian Youming lying rigidly on the ground, Yang Shuang hesitantly reached out her right hand and checked his breathing again. Her pretty face went white, and she nearly burst into tears.
He had actually stopped breathing.
"My brother isn't breathing!"
Everyone else's expression changed at her words. Had they both perished together?
Xie Ruomei's face was deathly pale, but she reacted quickly, pressing Lian Youming's chest again to check for signs of life. Only when she felt his heart still quivering did she hurriedly look toward the old man beside them.
"Grandmaster..."
"All of you, stand farther back. Keep watch and don't let any strangers approach." The old man's gaze sharpened slightly as he gave the quiet instruction.
None of them dared hesitate. They all withdrew into the distance.
Then they saw the old man run a palm along Lian Youming's chest, sweep dark jin across his neck, and pry open his tightly clenched jaw. A clot of bloody filth immediately came out of his mouth.
Seeing that Lian Youming was breathing again, the old man took a wooden box from inside his clothes and used a thin bamboo knife to lift out a twisted, dragon-shaped rootlet. It was a ginseng rootlet.
The moment the ginseng rootlet was cut, a drop of milky-white sap seeped from the cut, trembled on the edge, and fell into Lian Youming's mouth.
There was no telling how many years that old ginseng in the box had grown. The moment its sap entered his mouth, a trace of color visibly returned to Lian Youming's ashen face. Even his chest and abdomen slowly began to rise and fall.
The old man slid the rootlet into his mouth as well, then closed his jaw again.
They waited like that for four or five minutes.
Only