Chapter Summaries

Su Ziyang treated Han Jinkai's wife's swollen finger with realgar and mung bean powder, then gave Han Jinkai Navel-Warming Ointment for a friend's child with chronic diarrhea. Han Jinkai invited Su Ziyang to lecture at a medical college, and after seeing his guests off, Su Ziyang treated patients through the morning.

• Su Ziyang prepared an egg with realgar and mung bean powder and had Han Jinkai's wife soak her finger in it.
• Han Jinkai asked Su Ziyang for a simple treatment for a friend's child with recurring diarrhea, and Su Ziyang gave him Navel-Warming Ointment and explained how to use it.
• Su Ziyang explained the ointment's ingredients and preparation to Han Jinkai.
• Han Jinkai invited Su Ziyang to lecture at a medical college, and Su Ziyang agreed.
• Han Jinkai's wife found that her finger hurt less, and Su Ziyang told them to continue soaking it at home.
• Su Ziyang saw Han Jinkai and his wife off, then treated a rush of acupuncture patients until the morning ended.

Su Ziyang treated a man with primary glaucoma using a risky single-herb prescription of plantain seed, warning him that his symptoms might worsen. After the patient drank the decoction and rested at the clinic, his companion rushed downstairs to report severe eye and head pain.

• Han Jinkai told Su Ziyang that his wife's finger had nearly returned to normal.
• A man with primary glaucoma asked Su Ziyang for Chinese medicine because he feared undergoing the hospital's recommended surgery.
• Su Ziyang prescribed 60 grams of plantain seed and warned the patient that he might develop worse pain, a headache, increased urination, and diarrhea.
• Su Ziyang decocted the plantain seed and had the patient drink it before resting upstairs at the clinic.
• After the patient took the medicine, his companion reported that his eyes and head hurt terribly, and Su Ziyang went upstairs to check on him.

Su Ziyang treated a man whose head and eye pain eased after taking medicine, then prepared to help a needle-shy young Daoist with a severe headache. The chapter ended with Daoist Master Xiao Yang bringing him a container of thick white radish juice for Su Ziyang to use instead of acupuncture.

• Su Ziyang guided the man through diarrhea and frequent urination, then explained how his symptoms and eyesight would improve as he took the prescribed medicine.
• The man left with his companion and later confirmed that Su Ziyang's predictions had come true when he presented him with a silk banner.
• Daoist Master Xiao Yang brought a young Daoist to Su Ziyang for treatment of a severe headache.
• Su Ziyang prepared to use acupuncture, but the young Daoist grew pale and begged to take a painkiller instead because he feared needles.
• Su Ziyang asked Daoist Master Xiao Yang to bring white radish juice, and she returned with a container made from two large radishes.

Su Ziyang treated a young monk’s one-sided headache with white radish juice, then prescribed a decoction. He diagnosed another man’s wandering, severe headaches as wind exposure after falling asleep outdoors drunk and prescribed medicine.

• Su Ziyang dripped white radish juice into the young monk’s nostril, and the monk’s headache stopped temporarily.
• At Daoist Master Xiao Yang’s urging, Su Ziyang prescribed the young monk Migraine-Dispelling Decoction and told him to take a dose when it was ready.
• A man arrived describing bouts of severe headaches that moved from place to place, and Su Ziyang examined his pulse and tongue.
• Su Ziyang inferred that the man had fallen asleep outdoors after drinking and developed wind exposure, then prescribed Chuanxiong, Asarum, and Dahurian angelica root for seven doses.

Su Ziyang treated four burly men for headaches after they slept in a garage while avoiding their wives, and their visit turned into a lively complaint session about marriage. He learned about a local shelter for men beaten by their wives and asked the men for advice on married life.

• A former patient returned with four friends who had developed headaches after drinking and sleeping in a garage, and Su Ziyang began prescribing medicine for them.
• The men received angry calls from their wives, then joked with Su Ziyang and traded stories about their wives scolding or hitting them.
• The men told Su Ziyang about a local shelter that housed men who had been beaten by their wives for up to ten days.
• Su Ziyang asked the men for marriage advice, and they urged him to coax his wife, share the effort, and avoid laughing when he was being hit.

Su Ziyang met Liu Xiaozhe, a wealthy playboy whose wife had bruised his eye, and heard how she challenged him to a drinking contest to curb his nights out. Liu Xiaozhe agreed, confident that his shy, virtuous wife could not outdrink him.

• Xie Dong brought his friend Liu Xiaozhe to Su Ziyang’s consulting room for treatment.
• Liu Xiaozhe told Su Ziyang that after marrying the woman he loved, he returned to his old habit of staying out drinking and neglecting his family.
• When Liu Xiaozhe’s son developed a fever, his wife calmly took them to the hospital and waited until the child recovered.
• Liu Xiaozhe’s wife proposed a drinking contest, promising not to object to his nights out if he could outdrink her, but requiring him to stay home if he lost.
• Liu Xiaozhe accepted, assuming his shy and obedient wife would be easy to beat.

Liu Xiaozhe recounted how Yaya had repeatedly disciplined him after he tested her patience, and how her latest blow left his vision blurred. Su Ziyang treated his eye and proposed a scheme to help Liu Xiaozhe win Yaya’s forgiveness.

• Liu Xiaozhe challenged Yaya to drink, but she outdrank him and made him behave for a while.
• After Liu Xiaozhe resumed staying out, Yaya dragged him from a restaurant, and he passed out after she kicked him and broke three of his ribs when he tried to hit her.
• Liu Xiaozhe learned Yaya had been an armed police instructor and scout, and he later met Xie Dong at a shelter for male victims of domestic abuse.
• Yaya hit Liu Xiaozhe with a thermos after discovering he had cheated while she was pregnant, and he developed a dark shadow over his eye.
• Su Ziyang examined and disinfected Liu Xiaozhe’s injury, then offered to write a certificate so Liu Xiaozhe could claim it was serious and ask Yaya to forgive him.

Su Ziyang treated Liu Xiaozhe's bruised eye and taught him massage techniques to help his wife, Yaya, recover from old injuries. At a group dinner, Fairy Li impressed a restaurant's head chef by identifying how to improve his nine-turn large intestine, and he rewarded the group with complimentary dishes.

• Su Ziyang treated Liu Xiaozhe's eye with hibiscus leaves and vinegar paste, and Liu Xiaozhe's vision recovered a few days later.
• Liu Xiaozhe asked Su Ziyang to teach him massage techniques for Yaya's shoulder and thoracic spine injuries, and Su Ziyang also gave him medicinal wine.
• Liu Xiaozhe's massage and Su Ziyang's wine improved Yaya's lingering injuries, so she brought her family to thank Su Ziyang with a necklace for Fairy Li.
• Liu Xiaozhe, Yaya, their son, Su Ziyang, Fairy Li, and Xie Dong ate at a Shandong cuisine restaurant, where Fairy Li said the nine-turn large intestine was overcooked.
• The head chef returned with an improved dish after Fairy Li's advice and offered the group more complimentary food.

Yaya asked Su Ziyang to treat her mother’s cataract without surgery, and he prescribed an internal medicine and promised eye drops. After a busy day at the clinic, Su Ziyang prepared the eye drops in Daoist Jin’s courtyard and headed home after Fairy Li called him.

• Yaya asked Su Ziyang whether he could treat her mother’s cataract with medicine instead of surgery, and he agreed to prepare pills for her.
• Liu Xiaozhe gave Su Ziyang the information needed for the prescription, and Su Ziyang prescribed the Opacity-Polishing Pill and offered to make eye drops as well.
• After seeing patients, Su Ziyang wrote the eye-drop prescription and bought the ingredients before preparing the medicine in Daoist Jin’s courtyard.
• Su Ziyang ground and filtered the ingredients for several hours, then sealed the finished eye drops in a bottle.
• Fairy Li called Su Ziyang late at night and told him she had bought him clothes and was waiting for him at home.

Su Ziyang received Liu Xiaozhe’s gifts and then examined a boy whose furious mother accused him of pretending not to know his numbers. The boy called a 6 a nine and a 9 a six, leaving Su Ziyang and his mother speechless as she threatened to beat him.

• Fairy Li urged Su Ziyang to shower and try on the new clothes she had bought him, then went to bed while he practiced and meditated.
• Su Ziyang gave Liu Xiaozhe the finished eye drops and accepted the food and drinks Liu Xiaozhe brought him.
• A woman brought her silent, thin son Xiaobao to Su Ziyang and angrily tried to hit him, so Su Ziyang intervened and examined the boy.
• The woman wrote a 6, and Xiaobao called it a nine; when she wrote a 9, he called it a six.
• Su Ziyang and Xiaobao’s mother reacted in disbelief, and she cursed and threatened to beat the boy.

Su Ziyang discovered that Xiaobao was not pretending to avoid school: after eating wood ear mushrooms and vomiting, the boy had begun seeing characters upside down. Su Ziyang identified the condition as Inversion of the Liver Lobes and started writing a prescription, leaving Xiaobao’s treatment about to begin.

• Su Ziyang stopped Xiaobao’s mother from hitting him and asked whether someone at school was bullying him or he disliked studying.
• Su Ziyang tested Xiaobao with letters and characters, finding that he read upside-down characters as if they were upright.
• Xiaobao told his mother that the problem began after he ate wood ear mushrooms and vomited, and she apologized for not believing him.
• Su Ziyang identified Xiaobao’s illness as Inversion of the Liver Lobes and explained that medicinal decoctions could cure it.
• Xiaobao’s mother agreed to the treatment, and Su Ziyang began writing a prescription.

Su Ziyang treated a boy whose liver lobes had become inverted by using a carefully modified Vomiting Method, and the boy recovered after vomiting dark green matter. After teaching the boy’s mother how to care for him, Su Ziyang recorded the treatment and recalled seeing a village doctor use induced vomiting to save a pesticide-poisoned woman.

• Su Ziyang prescribed the boy a modified vomiting decoction and insisted that he take it under supervision at the clinic.
• The boy drank the decoction and vomited dark green matter for about ten minutes.
• Su Ziyang confirmed the boy had recovered when he correctly identified the characters his mother wrote.
• The boy’s mother apologized to him, and Su Ziyang advised a light diet and taught her pediatric massage techniques.
• Su Ziyang recorded how he had modified Melon Pedicel Powder with tonifying medicines to protect the boy’s weak body.
• Su Ziyang remembered a village doctor inducing a pesticide-poisoned woman to vomit with liquid from a dry latrine, which had saved her life.

Su Ziyang relieved Sister Liu’s toothache with a pressure technique and taught her how to repeat it herself. Later, he treated a bald older man’s recurring toothache with a tailored herbal prescription, further increasing his reputation.

• Sister Liu came to Su Ziyang with a swollen cheek and severe tooth pain, and he stopped it by pinching her earlobe and Hegu acupoint.
• Su Ziyang taught Sister Liu how to use her mouth and one hand to apply the same technique, and she went downstairs relieved.
• Sister Liu shared the method with people nearby, bringing Su Ziyang many more patients whose toothaches returned after the pain initially stopped.
• Su Ziyang explained how different teeth corresponded to meridians and prescribed the Immortal Prescription for Treating Teeth with an added herb for the bald older man’s stomach fire.
• After three doses, the bald older man’s toothache did not return, and Su Ziyang’s reputation grew.

Su Ziyang learned tooth-strengthening methods from Daoist Jin and used them to help his patients, further increasing his local reputation. A mysterious visitor then gave him a toothache remedy and vanished, leaving Su Ziyang to wonder whether an immortal had appeared.

• Daoist Jin taught Su Ziyang to clench his teeth while urinating and tap them together after meals to strengthen them.
• Su Ziyang passed the methods on to his toothache patients, and his reputation grew enough that wellness centers invited him to lecture.
• Su Ziyang refused to teach cultivation techniques because he did not know the requested exercises and could not share Mr. Mengfei's teachings.
• A courteous stranger visited Su Ziyang and offered a remedy of raw atractylodes and drynaria, claiming it could stop tooth pain within a minute.
• The stranger vanished as Su Ziyang bowed, then identified himself as Shenqu Langzhongling and said he came from the internet.

Su Ziyang treated children with tooth decay using an ancient medicinal rinse and removed a badly decayed baby tooth. Later, a call from Mr. Mengfei about seeing Daoist Jin off frightened Su Ziyang, but Fairy Li reassured him as he waited to learn more.

• Su Ziyang explained tooth decay to a child's mother and prescribed a medicinal mouth rinse, warning her to keep the child from swallowing it.
• Another mother brought in a child whose tooth had decayed to the root, and Su Ziyang said it should be removed.
• Su Ziyang used medicine from Master Yang Tianzheng to remove the remaining root and told the child how to care for his new tooth.
• While Su Ziyang and Fairy Li ate together, Mr. Mengfei called and said he was returning to see Lao Jin off.
• Su Ziyang panicked, but Mr. Mengfei scolded him and said he would explain when he arrived the next day, while Fairy Li reassured Su Ziyang that Daoist Jin would be fine.

Su Ziyang visited Daoist Jin after learning that his master planned to leave for the mountains to cultivate, and Daoist Jin entrusted him with the courtyard and urged him to honor his lessons. When Daoist Jin departed, Su Ziyang kowtowed to him and promised to care for his patients and pass on his skills.

• Su Ziyang and Fairy Li went to Daoist Jin's courtyard, where they watched him practice Baguazhang and saw that his internal force had grown stronger.
• Daoist Jin told Su Ziyang he was going into the mountains to cultivate after an expert's advice helped his stagnant cultivation advance.
• Daoist Jin gave Su Ziyang the courtyard papers, keys, and medicine list, and asked him to keep practicing martial arts, improve his medical skills, and marry Fairy Li.
• Daoist Jin refused to let Su Ziyang see him off at the station, but Su Ziyang stopped him at the courtyard gate and kowtowed three times.
• Daoist Jin patted Su Ziyang's shoulder and told him to care for his patients and pass down the skills he had taught him.

After Daoist Jin left, Su Ziyang struggled with his absence before treating a man whose tinnitus had left him deaf in one ear. Su Ziyang made an ear medicine that restored the man's hearing, and the man returned with a silk banner to thank him.

• Su Ziyang stored Daoist Jin's belongings in the courtyard and asked Fairy Li whether Daoist Jin would return after succeeding in his cultivation.
• A week later, a new doctor took over Daoist Jin's consultation room, and Su Ziyang felt less uneasy.
• Su Ziyang examined a man whose tinnitus had worsened into deafness despite extensive prior treatment, but found no clear cause in his pulse or tongue.
• Su Ziyang made an ear medicine from herbs, rosin, and beeswax, then showed the man how to place it in his deaf ear each day.
• A week later, the man told Su Ziyang that he could hear again after using the medicine for three days and gave him a silk banner.

Su Ziyang agreed to lecture at a wellness center and prepared an introductory course on traditional Chinese medicine. At his first lecture, he greeted the audience and asked them about the origins of traditional Chinese medicine.

• Lu Junnan visited Su Ziyang again to invite him to lecture, and Su Ziyang agreed to work with the wellness center.
• Su Ziyang and Lu Junnan settled the lecture topics, schedule, location, fee, and benefits.
• Su Ziyang prepared his slides with help from Fairy Li, who made the PowerPoint more polished.
• Su Ziyang arrived at the wellness center and began his lecture on how to quickly get started learning traditional Chinese medicine.
• Su Ziyang asked the audience who knew the origin of traditional Chinese medicine.

Su Ziyang began his first lesson on traditional Chinese medicine by rejecting its association with superstition and explaining its practical, clinical foundations. He left the audience with guidelines for studying it and standards for judging its theories.

• An audience member called traditional Chinese medicine the art of Qihuang and described the Yellow Emperor as an immortal.
• Su Ziyang wrote “Start with the right understanding; reject feudal superstition!” on the blackboard and defined traditional Chinese medicine as a system developed through clinical practice.
• Su Ziyang addressed four misconceptions, explaining that traditional Chinese medicine was not mysticism or unscientific, could treat acute conditions, and was not opposed to Western medicine.
• Su Ziyang told the audience to respect tradition without blindly following it, separate medicine from superstition, and use modern knowledge to understand traditional theories.
• Su Ziyang opened his presentation and said students should establish clear boundaries and judge theories by clinical effectiveness and logical consistency.

Su Ziyang taught that Yin and Yang and the Five Elements were classification tools and models for understanding the body, grounded in Qi Monism rather than superstition. He explained health and illness as states of balance or imbalance and left the audience discussing how those ideas applied to symptoms.

• Su Ziyang began his lesson by presenting Yin and Yang and the Five Elements as foundational models for describing the body's functions and internal relationships.
• Su Ziyang explained Qi Monism and described Yin and Yang as opposing categories used to classify bodily states.
• Su Ziyang asked the audience what health meant, then defined it as a stable balance of Yin and Yang and gave everyday examples.
• A middle-aged woman told Su Ziyang that her palms and soles were always hot, and he attributed the symptom to Yin-Yang imbalance.
• Su Ziyang described illness as excessive or deficient Yin or Yang and said treatment aimed to restore balance, while stressing that Yin and Yang were relative classifications rather than physical substances.