The purple-tipped brush on the desk hung in mid-air, ink dripping onto the corner of the official document, spreading into a blot.
Gu Moran grabbed the large seal from the sandalwood box and pressed it heavily into the cinnabar mud.
"Smack!"
The crimson seal of Prince Yi rested at the end of the letter requesting battle.
" Uncle Fu." Gu Moran tossed the pen onto the pen rest, looked up at the old steward standing by the door, and said, "Send the best deliverymen, 800 li express, send it to the capital as quickly as possible."
Uncle Fu bowed and accepted the sealed document, held it to his chest with both hands, and walked briskly out of the warm pavilion.
A series of rapid footsteps came from the courtyard.
Tuoba Mang abruptly threw off the heavy felt curtain, his broad shoulders damp with the outside air, and gruffly clasped his hands in greeting.
"Your Highness, the two hundred-man teams at the workshop outside the city have been captured. The furnaces are already lit, and they're pouring molten iron into the molds right now!"
"Take all the remaining refined saltpeter from the warehouse over there." Gu Moran walked to the Great Yan Map hanging on the wall and tapped his finger on the narrow official road between Anyang and Dengzhou.
" The Subduing Fire Thunder doesn't need to be aesthetically pleasing; the fuse must be soaked in oil, and the casing must be cast from rough iron. I need to see two thousand boxes packed within ten days."
"Your subordinate obeys! Anyone who dares to slack off or doze off, I'll whip them until their skin is stained!"
Tuoba Mang grinned in agreement, then turned and strode into the night fog.
The back room of the pharmacy.
The charcoal in the brazier was burning white, and the aroma of medicine mixed with the smell of blood, making it somewhat pungent.
Shen Ling'er held a delicate silver scraper in her hand, scraping the dried, dark brown blood powder little by little from the edge of the bloodstained rough sheepskin into a small white porcelain dish.
She kept her head down, and the two silver hairpins in her hair swayed gently with her movements.
A slender silver needle sat on the side of the table.
Shen Ling'er put down the scraper, picked up the silver needle with bamboo tweezers, heated the needle tip in the boiling medicinal tea beside her, and then inserted it into the dish of blood powder.
The moment the needle tip touched the powder, its originally shiny silver color quickly turned into a deep black. With a very soft, crisp sound, the first half of the silver needle broke in two and fell onto the blue brick floor.
Shen Ling'er pursed her lips tightly, her eyelids twitching violently.
How so?
Gu Moran stepped into the pharmacy and stopped beside her.
"This is an evil poison from overseas, which specifically devours a person's essence, blood, and marrow."
Shen Ling'er picked up the broken needle and placed it on the porcelain plate, her voice somewhat muffled.
"The first few times this medicine is taken, it has tremendous power, but once the poison takes root in the heart, it will gnaw at the flesh and bones every day."
To completely remove it, you'd have to use my grandfather's Nine-Turn Yang-Restoring Needle to protect all the major acupoints on the body, and then use strong medicine to scrape out the toxins.
Otherwise, if the medication is forcibly stopped, the patient will surely die within seven days from a ruptured heart.
Gu Moran looked down at the blackened broken needle, his gaze darkening.
" Elder Shen is in the capital and has to take care of the Emperor; he's too far away to help in this urgent situation."
"You want to save your imperial brother?"
"It's not a matter of whether he wants to or not, it's just that he can't die now, otherwise, the chaos in the Great Yan will be even greater."
At that very moment.
Suddenly, footsteps sounded at the door.
Meng Jiuning stood outside the threshold, carrying a basin of freshly boiled water. Her moon-white skirt was brushed against the door frame, and her fingertips rested on the edge of the copper basin, causing the hot water inside to ripple in several circles.
She stepped over the threshold, placed the copper basin steadily on the medicine-washing table, and looked up at Gu Moran with her clear eyes.
"How about I give it a try?"
"In the royal family of Dali, there is a secret recipe called 'Withered Wood Meets Spring Powder '."
The pharmacy fell silent instantly; even the crackling of the charcoal fire seemed exceptionally clear.
Shen Ling'er suddenly turned around and looked her up and down.
" Withered Wood Meets Spring? That's a potent and deadly medicine made from the gallbladder of a five-step snake and the seven-leaf aconite. Drinking it can completely seal off the blood vessels in your body for three days."
Although toxins can be forcibly expelled from the body, the body's meridians also...
" Sister Shen is right."
Meng Jiuning's face remained expressionless, her hands, which were tucked into her sleeves, were slightly clenched.
"Those who take this medicine will never be able to wield a knife or engage in combat again, and they will be unable to lift even heavy objects. Moreover... they will lose at least ten years of their lifespan."
Shen Ling'er gasped.
To lose all his martial arts skills and shorten his lifespan by ten years was worse than death for a proud and arrogant prince.
Gu Moran stood still, his gaze fixed on Meng Jiuning's face.
He watched her for three breaths, his face showing no emotion, only uttering three words through gritted teeth. "You stay and boil it."
After saying that, he turned and walked towards the long corridor outside, casually pulled out a blank sheet of Xuan paper, picked up the charcoal pencil hanging on the corridor pillar, and quickly wrote a line of words.
"I have already requested permission to go to war. In order to gain Qi and Lu, I will lie and say that your poisoning was a scheme by Japanese people posing as doctors from the Central Plains, in order to avoid suspicion of colluding with the Japanese."
The antidote is here...
To die, or to be crippled.
"Your Majesty, please choose for yourself."
The handwriting is sharp and concise, without any unnecessary strokes.
It was the third watch of the night in the study of the Prince's mansion's inner quarters.
The heat inside the bronze hand warmer gradually dissipated.
The door was gently pushed open, carrying with it an intense, almost overwhelming, bitter smell of herbs.
Meng Jiuning held a black lacquered wooden tray in her hands, on which lay a round pill completely sealed with white beeswax and a cup of tea.
She changed out of the formal Dali royal robes she wore during the day and into an extremely light and soft long dress with cloud and water patterns.
A three-finger-wide blue brocade belt cinched her waist, making her already slender waist appear even thinner. The neckline was slightly open, revealing her long, delicate neck and a small patch of pale collarbone.
"Your Highness, the medicine has been sealed, and the wax coating has been applied in three layers."
Meng Jiuning walked to the large desk and put down the wooden tray.
Gu Moran was sitting on a large rosewood chair, flipping through the treasury records of Jiannan Circuit. Upon hearing this, he raised his hand and sealed the note he had just written.
"Someone come here!"
The guards outside immediately slipped inside, wrapped the wax pellets and note in oilcloth, tied it to their chests, clasped their hands in a fist salute, and silently retreated into the night.
Only the two of them remained in the room.
Meng Jiuning picked up the teacup, walked slowly to Gu Moran's side, and said in a low voice, "Your Highness must be tired after half a night. Have some tea to soothe your throat."
I don't know if it was because the skirt was too long, or because the ground was a bit slippery.
As she walked to Gu Moran's knees, her right ankle twisted slightly in an extremely natural way.
"Ah..."
A soft gasp escaped her lips.
The porcelain bowl in her hand almost slipped from her grasp, and Meng Jiuning, like a willow branch broken by the wind, softly fell into Gu Moran's broad embrace.
Gu Moran reached out with his left hand in mid-air and precisely caught the flying porcelain bowl, without spilling a single drop of the warm water inside.
At the same time, his right arm swung forward to catch Meng Jiuning's falling body, his hand directly gripping her slender waist.
A warm, fragrant, and soft body embraces you.
The thin, soft gauze could not block the burning heat beneath. The woman's unique camellia fragrance, mixed with the slight bitterness of herbs, wafted straight to Gu Moran's nose.
Meng Jiuning Ning nestled against his chest, her hands instinctively resting on his shoulders, stray strands of hair clinging to her glistening cheeks with sweat.
His chest heaved violently, and his exhaled hot breath sprayed all over Gu Moran's neck.
"Your Highness... please forgive me."
Meng Jiuning's voice was as soft as a mosquito's buzz, with a slight tremor at the end.
"I spent two hours tending the simmering fire in the pharmacy, and it took a lot of mental and physical exertion. My legs were weak, and I couldn't stand up straight..."
This explanation is perfectly reasonable and there is not a single fault with it.