Chapter Summaries

Jin Shanyao planned to earn money by gathering medicinal herbs with Meng Anzhi, while Meng Anci, Zhao Zhiyuan, and Shiyan competed fiercely in their studies. After struggling with a policy essay about flood prevention, Meng Anci got help from Lu Chi and finished it late at night.

• Jin Shanyao questioned Meng Anzhi on her medical studies and told her they would gather herbs on White Head Mountain the next day.
• Meng Anci arrived early at the Enlightenment Academy, where Zhao Zhiyuan and Shiyan also pushed themselves to study harder than one another.
• Master Zhao gave the pupils a classical-text examination, and he was pleased by Meng Anci's correct answers and Shiyan's progress.
• Shiyan challenged Meng Anci to a wager about the prefectural examination, but Meng Anci refused to bet.
• Meng Anci brought home a flood-prevention policy essay and struggled to understand Lu Chi's waterways map.
• Lu Chi explained four approaches to managing floods, and Meng Anci completed his hundred-character essay after nightfall.

Jin Shanyao returned to White Head Mountain with Lu Chi, Qing He, Qing Yang, and Meng Anzhi, using her Spiritual Power to find and harvest valuable herbs. She left the mountain with two wild ginseng plants and began directing the others to dig up more herbs for transplanting to Lush Mountain.

• Jin Shanyao arrived at White Head Mountain and ordered Qing He and Qing Yang to dig up motherwort and Solomon's seal.
• Jin Shanyao found a seventy-year-old wild ginseng plant, which led her to a nearby hundred-year-old one, and she and Meng Anzhi dug them up with their roots and soil intact.
• Jin Shanyao asked the plants whether they would go with her to Lush Mountain, then transplanted the willing ones and left the others where they were.
• Lu Chi watched Jin Shanyao locate herbs across the mountain and wondered who had taught her such skills.
• Jin Shanyao ordered Lu Chi and Meng Anzhi to harvest astragalus, Baikal skullcap, poria, and violet herb while leaving some plants behind.

Jin Shanyao took Meng Anci and Meng Anzhi to Qingzhou Prefecture for Meng Anci’s prefectural exam, bringing along medicinal herbs to sell. After reaching the city, she reassured Meng Anci about the exam and planned to visit the examination compound and local clinics.

• Jin Shanyao made Lu Chi and the old ox help gather herbs, stopping the ox from ramming Lu Chi’s tree while they worked.
• Jin Shanyao, Meng Anci, and Meng Anzhi set out for Qingzhou Prefecture with a cart full of herbs as Meng Anci prepared for his exam.
• At the Drunken Immortal Pavilion, Jin Shanyao arranged for the herbs to be stored and guarded by Dahuang and Xiaoli.
• Jin Shanyao took the children to see the examination compound and planned to visit medical clinics to sell the herbs.
• When Meng Anci became nervous, Jin Shanyao told him to do his best and leave what he could not control to heaven’s will.

Jin Shanyao sold premium herbs and deer antler velvet to the Hall of Saving the World, then accompanied Meng Anci to the prefectural examination. Meng Anci entered the examination compound as Jin Shanyao and Meng Anzhi waited outside.

• Jin Shanyao persuaded the shopkeeper at the Hall of Saving the World to buy her premium herbs and deer antler velvet at negotiated prices.
• The shopkeeper sent his assistant to follow Jin Shanyao and learn where she was staying so he could secure the goods.
• Meng Anci studied through the night despite Jin Shanyao urging him to rest.
• Jin Shanyao reassured Meng Anci outside the crowded examination compound, and he entered with his book basket as the gates opened.
• Su Wenqian spotted Jin Shanyao but decided to greet her after the three-day examination, and the compound gates closed behind the students.

Meng Anci began the prefectural examination while Jin Shanyao struggled to set up her fortune-telling stall outside the compound. After the constable revealed that Lord Su was mysteriously falling asleep, he asked Meng Anzhi to examine him, and Jin Shanyao agreed to meet him at the yamen after the examination.

• Meng Anci entered his examination cell and watched Shiyan realize that the cell’s board could be lifted rather than squeezed past.
• The examiner checked the candidates’ credentials and handed out the papers, while Su Wenqian inspected Meng Anci’s and Zhao Zhiyuan’s answers.
• Jin Shanyao argued with the constable until he allowed her to set up her stall, but the constable’s presence scared off her potential customers.
• The constable explained that Lord Su had been falling into unnaturally deep sleep despite seeing physicians, and asked Meng Anzhi to take his pulse.
• Jin Shanyao agreed to meet the constable at the yamen after the examination, then smacked him for loudly advertising her fortune-telling services.

Jin Shanyao sold medicinal herbs to Zhou Kang and went to the prefectural yamen to treat Su Wenqian. There she confronted Zhang Banxian, who had tried to harm her before, and left him terrified after warning him to stop cheating people.

• Jin Shanyao met Meng Anci after his exam, then sold sacks of excellent astragalus root to Zhou Kang and signed a contract for future herbs.
• Jin Shanyao earned nothing from fortune-telling during the remaining days of the prefectural examination and decided to take the children home before the results were posted.
• Jin Shanyao brought the children to the prefectural yamen to treat Su Wenqian and was welcomed by Madam Su.
• Jin Shanyao spotted Zhang Banxian in the inner residence and immobilized him when he tried to flee.
• Jin Shanyao reminded Zhang Banxian of his past attacks, then released him and warned him to stop swindling people; the steward dragged him away.

Jin Shanyao discovered that Su Wenqian’s worsening sleepiness came from a stolen Divine Soul and charged the Su family to save him. After pulling the evil Qi from his body, she found and returned his Divine Soul, though the chapter ended before she confirmed the full result.

• Madam Su brought Jin Shanyao and the children to see Su Wenqian, whose sleepiness had grown worse for a month and a half.
• Meng Anzhi diagnosed Su Wenqian’s weak, slow pulse, and Jin Shanyao revealed that someone had stolen his Divine Soul.
• Old Madam Su fainted, then begged Jin Shanyao to save her son and agreed to pay three thousand taels.
• Jin Shanyao pulled the black Qi from Su Wenqian, easing his symptoms, but said his Divine Soul was still missing.
• Jin Shanyao followed the black Qi to an altar, retrieved Su Wenqian’s Divine Soul, and watched it return to his body.

Xuanxin survived the remnant Spiritual Power in Su Wenqian’s memorial tablet and vowed to track it down. Meanwhile, Jin Shanyao sold talismans to Old Madam Su, who nearly made her a sworn sister, before the Su household finally sent Jin and the two children away.

• Xuanxin was immobilized when the Spiritual Power from Su Wenqian’s tablet entered his body, then survived and resolved to find and drain that power.
• Jin Shanyao sold Old Madam Su talismans, and the two women grew so close that they decided to become sworn sisters.
• Su Wenqian objected to the match, and Jin Shanyao mistakenly called him Old Madam Su’s grandson, leaving the household awkwardly correcting her.
• Madam Su tried to send Jin Shanyao away, but Old Madam Su invited her to stay and then accepted her departure after Jin promised to visit again.
• Old Madam Su saw Jin Shanyao, Meng Anzhi, and Meng Anci out, and Madam Su shut the door behind them.

Jin Shanyao split the money from selling herbs and planned to plant medicinal crops with Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci. After the group returned safely from Qingzhou Prefecture, she told her household that the Hall of Saving the World had bought their herbs at a good price, while a schemer had begun targeting her.

• Jin Shanyao reassured Meng Anci that her talismans were real, and Meng Anzhi encouraged him to trust her.
• Jin Shanyao praised Meng Anzhi’s prescription, then fell asleep with the children as her merit grew.
• Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci rode home in a dangerously fast ox cart and both vomited after arriving.
• Qing He told Jin Shanyao that Qin Baitang had repeatedly asked about the cart’s cargo and their herbs.
• Jin Shanyao said the Hall of Saving the World bought their herbs for two and a half times the county-town price, and explained that she had already investigated the prefectural city’s medical halls.

Jin Shanyao sent Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci to hire workers to plant trees and scatter seeds on Lush Mountain, but they failed and struggled to understand her advice about hiring. As they tried a new approach, a sinister figure noticed the Spiritual Power surrounding Meng Anci.

• Jin Shanyao gave Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci a hundred taels and instructed them to keep careful records while hiring workers for Lush Mountain.
• Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci set pay rates and advertised the work, but townspeople refused because the barren mountain would be difficult to work on for too little pay.
• After failing to hire anyone and losing money on a secondhand gong, the children told Jin Shanyao what happened, and she advised them to consider workers’ incentives and their competition.
• Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci spent the night thinking over Jin Shanyao’s advice and came up with a plan.
• Meng Anci spoke with old men playing chess and accidentally revealed that Jin Shanyao believed Lush Mountain would provide for the family, then anxiously warned them not to go there.
• A sinister figure watched Meng Anci and recognized the Spiritual Power surrounding him as what they had been searching for.

Jin Shanyao’s purchase of Lush Mountain sparked rumors of an ancient tomb after Meng Anci and Meng Anzhi planted copper coins to lure people there. Jin Shanyao tried to dispel the rumors, but the crowd still lined up for work planting trees, and the children took charge of hiring.

• People in Willow and Poplar County speculated that Jin Shanyao had bought Lush Mountain because it contained a tomb, and rumors identified the supposed occupant as Mu Wan'er.
• Jin Shanyao confronted Meng Anci and Meng Anzhi, who admitted that they had spread the copper coins to make people curious about the mountain.
• Meng Anzhi explained that Jin Shanyao’s public denial would make the rumors harder to dispel, and Meng Anci pleaded with her to stop pinching him.
• The next morning, a crowd carrying hoes and shovels gathered outside the shop, hoping to work on Lush Mountain and keep any copper coins they found.
• Jin Shanyao denied that Lush Mountain had a tomb or coins, then left Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci to register workers.
• Meng Anci set the pay at twenty copper coins per worker and announced that the family would hire a hundred people to dig holes and plant trees.

Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci kept the workers on Lush Mountain by planting fake copper-coin discoveries, but Jin Shanyao later doubled their wages and gave them medicine. She praised the children’s clever plan while telling them they had used it in the wrong place, leaving them unsure what she meant.

• Meng Anci proposed scattering and burying copper coins to keep the workers digging on Lush Mountain, and Lu Chi carried out the plan despite his objections.
• The workers found copper coins and a jar full of them, and continued digging even after realizing their employers had planted the money.
• Jin Shanyao settled the workers’ wages, doubled their pay, and distributed her medicine after noticing their injured hands.
• Meng Anci and Meng Anzhi watched the workers leave and worried about Jin Shanyao’s displeasure.
• Jin Shanyao took the children up the mountain, praised their resourcefulness, and told them their method had been used in the wrong place.

Jin Shanyao taught Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci not to exploit poor workers, then used her Spiritual Power to bring water and new growth to Lush Mountain, alerting the predatory Xuanxin. Later, Meng Anci failed the child scholar exam and grieved, while Meng Anzhi kept following him around to read.

• Jin Shanyao explained that taking money from wealthy people was different from exploiting poor workers, and warned the children that their trick would damage Anzhi Hall's reputation.
• Jin Shanyao opened a subterranean river beneath Lush Mountain, nourishing its plants and causing an earthquake that Xuanxin sensed.
• Jin Shanyao reassured Qing He that the earthquake would not happen again, and heavy rain helped Lush Mountain grow lush enough to yield wild mushrooms by early August.
• Meng Anci checked the child scholar results and discovered that he had failed, then cried all the way home as Jin Shanyao comforted him.
• Meng Anzhi followed Meng Anci from room to room to read, eventually angering him into threatening to disown his kin.

After Meng Anci failed the county exam, his family helped him recover and he returned to studying with renewed patience. Meanwhile, Jin Shanyao accepted a house call from a suspicious elderly man and ended up sealed inside an iron box by Xuanxin.

• Meng Anci felt miserable after failing to challenge Meng Anzhi, but Jin Shanyao and Meng Anzhi teased and encouraged him over lunch.
• Meng Anci decided to study steadily, learned Zhao Zhiyuan had passed and left for the prefectural city, and found a fellow unsuccessful student in Shiyan.
• On a rainy evening, an elderly man asked Jin Shanyao to treat his fallen mistress, and she demanded a hundred taels before going with him.
• Xuanxin lured Jin Shanyao into a windowless carriage, revealed its iron walls, and shut her inside the iron box.

Jin Shanyao escaped Xuanxin’s burning iron box and overwhelmed him when he attacked her with a formation. She forced him to confess his crimes and his ties to the prefectural deputy, then mocked his belief that he could become prefectural deputy by stealing Divine Souls.

• Xuanxin trapped Jin Shanyao in a talisman-covered iron box and tried to roast her, but she escaped and stood untouched by the rain.
• Xuanxin summoned the Karmic Slaughter Formation, but Jin Shanyao stopped its ghosts and chains, slapped him through the formation, and crushed his Law Power.
• Jin Shanyao asked whether Xuanxin’s master knew he had come after her, and Xuanxin revealed that he had acted against his master’s wishes.
• Jin Shanyao confronted Xuanxin about teaching Concubine Liu of the Zhao Residence to use children’s heart blood in her rouge, and Xuanxin admitted it.
• Xuanxin confessed that he had helped the prefectural deputy steal scholars’ Divine Souls and said Su Wenqian had caught him before the deputy rescued him and kept him at Jade Terrace House.
• Xuanxin blamed Jin Shanyao for ruining his plan to become prefectural deputy, and she told him the position required passing an examination.

Jin Shanyao killed Xuanxin and discovered that doing so earned her merit instead of heavenly punishment. After returning to Anzhi Hall and reassuring her worried household, she took them mushroom-picking and asked Lu Chi to deliver a letter to Su Wenqian.

• Jin Shanyao crushed Xuanxin's heart and soul, carrying out what she called Heaven's justice, while Zhang Banxian later found the body and realized Xuanxin was dead.
• Jin Shanyao returned to Anzhi Hall, where Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci checked that lightning had not struck her; she discovered that her merit had increased.
• Jin Shanyao played with the children in the rain, then let Meng Anci sleep with them after he said Meng Anzhi had apologized by giving him meat.
• The next day, Jin Shanyao took her household to White Head Mountain to gather mushrooms and medicinal herbs.
• Jin Shanyao asked Lu Chi to arrange delivery of a letter to Su Wenqian, and Lu Chi asked whether she had any white fruit to sell his aunt.

Jin Shanyao tried to fertilize Lush Mountain, but the manure scorched the plants, so she set out with Qing Yang to seek advice from her family’s farming experts. Meanwhile, Lu Chi confirmed his men had dealt with Lu Mingche’s tails and planned to remain until the mountain’s autumn harvest.

• Qing He told Jin Shanyao that Su Wenqian had arrested Vice Magistrate Wang and seized his property after uncovering his crimes.
• Jin Shanyao spread manure on Lush Mountain, and the grass and moss cried out as their roots and stems burned.
• Jin Shanyao suspected the fertilizer had been poisoned, but Qing Yang argued that the night-soil collector would not have allowed anyone to tamper with his valuable manure.
• Qing Yang offered to ask her father and second uncle, experienced farmers, how to prevent fertilizer from scorching plants, and Jin Shanyao went with her to invite them.
• After Jin Shanyao left, Lu Chi ordered his hidden guards to tidy the vegetable leaves and learned from Feng Zhi that Lu Mingche’s tails had been dealt with.
• Lu Chi decided to stay until Lush Mountain’s autumn harvest and planned to take mountain and sea delicacies back for his aunt.

Jin Shanyao visited Qing Yang’s family to ask them for help with the manure pile at Lush Mountain, but her attempt at a respectful greeting was mistaken for a funeral bow. Qing Yang’s father explained how to compost the manure, and the journey left Jin Shanyao hearing how poverty and famine had once driven Qing Yang and Qing He’s parents to give the girls away so they could survive.

• Jin Shanyao bowed deeply to Qing Yang’s family, and Qing Yang whispered that the gesture was used to pay respects to the dead.
• Qing Yang explained that the family’s help was needed because a manure pile had been rotting at the foot of Lush Mountain.
• Qing Yang’s father said raw fertilizer could burn plants’ roots and agreed to inspect the manure pile at Lush Mountain.
• Qing He’s mother and Qing Yang’s mother told Jin Shanyao about the flood, hunger, and hardships that had forced them to give the girls away.
• Qing Yang’s mother thanked Jin Shanyao for caring for the girls, while the men on the cart listened with tears in their eyes.

Jin Shanyao arranged for Qing Yang's father to teach the family how to compost and joined the work at Lush Mountain. After Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci complained about the smell, she explained why people in charge needed to understand practical work, leaving them to accept the lesson.

• Jin Shanyao reflected on her growing bond with Qing Yang and Qing He after hearing about their family's hardship.
• At Lush Mountain, Qing Yang's father offered to compost the manure and teach the family, while Jin Shanyao insisted on paying him for his knowledge.
• Jin Shanyao arranged a composting lesson for the whole family the next morning and hauled Meng Anci out of bed to attend.
• Qing Yang's father showed everyone how to dig a pit and layer rotten vegetables, manure, and water to make compost.
• Meng Anzhi and Meng Anci told Jin Shanyao they disliked composting and wanted to focus on their own ambitions, so she explained why they needed practical knowledge to lead others.

Madam Shi came to Jin Shanyao for help after her husband Shi Chang'an disappeared while searching for a missing jade Buddha. Jin Shanyao learned that the escort job and both the cargo and Shi Chang'an had gone missing, leaving her to decide how to help.

• Jin Shanyao returned from Lush Mountain and found Madam Shi waiting outside her gate.
• Jin Shanyao mistook Madam Shi's tears for a request to find a mistress or illegitimate child and quoted her prices.
• Madam Shi explained that Shi Chang'an had gone missing three months earlier while searching for a half-meter-tall jade Buddha lost by the Shi Household Escort Agency.
• Madam Shi said the other escorts returned without Shi Chang'an, and Jin Shanyao realized both the jade Buddha and the man were missing.