A divine healer, a general, a young marquis! Who can rival them!

As winter deepens, snow falls one after another.

On the surface, Yang's life seemed peaceful. People lined up for treatment at the clinic in the front yard, stretching all the way to the alley entrance, while four women in the back yard each managed their own stall.

Liu's widow's husband died at the border, leaving behind two children. Now she dries and sorts herbs in the herb garden, earning a few strings of cash a month, and her face has finally regained some color. Yang Hu often says, "Giving someone a way to make a living is more practical than giving them money."

Lu Yan managed the pharmacy, ensuring ample supplies of medicinal herbs for winter, neatly arranged in each compartment. Lu Rou oversaw the accounts; the doctor's reputation had grown, and so had their income. However, Yang Hu always allocated the majority of his earnings—half to the medicinal herb garden, hiring unemployed villagers and widows of fallen soldiers; the other half to help the poor in and around the city. Liu Ye managed the suburban medicinal herb garden meticulously, returning every few days through the snow with a game or two, whispering to Yang Hu while carrying firewood that she had become more familiar with the delivery route outside the city. Qin Ying sat by the window, wiping her worn-out dagger in the snowlight, observing the lively atmosphere in the courtyard, the perpetual coldness in her eyes softening slightly.

This courtyard is a home built up through countless battles and countless medicinal herbs during a chaotic era.

But beneath this peaceful surface lie two unresolved matters.

In the rented house diagonally opposite, the men who claimed to be small business owners kept a close watch on them every single day. The covert investigation of the Zhao family in the west of the city also continued unabated, becoming increasingly in-depth each day.

Yang Hu understood perfectly: Zhao Tongpan, that old fox, couldn't be stopped on the street or monitored, so he switched to a more insidious method to dig out Yang Ji's background from the root.

One afternoon, a middle-aged man with an unfamiliar face came to the clinic.

The man was well-dressed, wearing a fine cloth long gown. He didn't register upon entering, but his eyes didn't seem like those of someone coming to see a doctor. He first strolled around the hall at a leisurely pace, his gaze slowly sweeping over the curtain leading to the back hall, over Lu Rou who was registering, and over the row of medicine cabinets in the corner, as if he were taking stock of the shop for someone.

After walking around for a while, he slowly sat down in front of Dr. Yang and said that he had been feeling "tightness in his chest and couldn't sleep well at night" lately, and asked Dr. Yang to take a look.

Yang Hu took his pulse.

His pulse is steady, even more even than a normal person's. Where does this chest tightness and restless night come from?

I understand now. This person isn't sick.

While Yang Hu took his pulse, the middle-aged man made casual conversation.

"I heard that Dr. Yang has quite a few family members; they are all very fortunate."

"This courtyard has three courtyards and three entrances; it's quite impressive. Where did Doctor Yang make his fortune?"

"The ladies living in the back don't seem to come from ordinary families..."

Lu Rou paused as she kept the accounts.

She had worked as a maid in the Lu family for several years and managed Yang Hu's accounts for more than half a year. She had dealt with all sorts of people and could tell at a glance who was genuinely there for treatment and who had ulterior motives. This person was clearly the latter.

These questions were asked incorrectly.

Who's going to visit the sick person? Instead of asking about the illness, they're asking how many people are in the family? Where is the woman's family from?

She subtly put down the account book, glanced towards the back room, signaling Liu Ye to be careful, and then, taking advantage of the opportunity to pour tea, sidled up to Yang Hu and reached out to block the middle-aged man's gaze from the back room.

If it were an ordinary person asking such questions, Yang Hu wouldn't take it seriously and would just let it go.

But this person seemed rather reliable, and his questions were never about the illness; he was clearly asking questions of the people in the courtyard!

Yang Hu knew what was going on, but his face remained expressionless, as if he hadn't heard the hooks in those questions at all. He slowly packed up the prescriptions, wrote out a calming prescription, and handed it to the middle-aged man.

"Sir, your pulse is very normal; you don't have any serious illness!"

He chuckled. "I guess I've been overthinking things lately. Calm down, go home and get your prescription, and stop thinking so much. You'll fall asleep easily then!"

If that middle-aged man tried to be clever and beat around the bush, Yang Hu would just keep talking about the illness and the prescription, completely ignoring what the other man was saying about what was happening in the courtyard.

Unable to persist any longer, he took the prescription for calming medicine and left, looking rather embarrassed.

Liu Ye came out from the back room and said, "I saw it. That person went out towards the west. It doesn't seem like a family from this part of the city!"

"The Zhao family!" Yang Hu said to Lu Rou, watching the middle-aged man's departing figure, "If we can't keep an eye on them, they can't get out. Let's send someone else in to get information out of them!"

However, he was quite clear-headed; this was most likely because Zhao Yanei was losing his patience. Prefect Zhao wanted to get to the bottom of things, a method the old fox used to employ steadily and surely, not something that could be rushed.

But Zhao Yanei was stingy and full of resentment. He couldn't stand being suppressed by Zhou Ji on the street and the city defense battalion. He planned to secretly find out something so that his father could take action sooner.

The more anxious they are, the more it proves that these women in the courtyard never get a moment's rest!

Lu Rou's face was somewhat pale, and she gripped the account book tightly in her hand.

That evening in the backyard, Yang Hu told Qin Ying what had happened during the day.

Qin Ying sat outside the window, wiping her worn-out dagger. After listening to him finish speaking, she tightened her grip on the dagger.

"They're investigating too thoroughly!" Her voice was low, much lowered as she spoke. "Stalking them, finding out where they came from, and even sending someone in to extract information! Magistrate Zhao is determined to expose everything about us!"

She paused for a moment.

She understands perfectly.

She had seen far too many of those who were dug out bit by bit. She had seen many of them in the army and in the capital. She was not afraid of Zhao Yanei who showed off in the street. What was scary was the father who did evil behind the scenes without leaving a trace!

"My identity can fool ordinary surveillance and inquiries?" she said softly. "But if you dig too deep, there will always be leaks eventually!"

She didn't mention the truly terrifying parts that followed.

Yang Hu knew what she was talking about.

The reason Zhao Tongpan was involved was to vent his anger on Zhao Yanei, while the reason the man hiding in the capital was to portray Qin Ying as someone who died fighting for his country was to save her life.

The two are not closely related, but both are directed at a woman in the courtyard who does plastering.

Qin Ying would be in extreme danger if either of them broke through that thin layer of paper.

"We can't find anything!" Yang Hu said. "No matter how capable he is, he couldn't possibly imagine that someone who died at the border is sitting alive in the courtyard. One of the people in the courtyard is disguised as a medicine boy, and the other has fallen on hard times and become an ordinary citizen. The loopholes are all too tight. As long as we don't reveal any flaws, his path will be blocked."

He grabbed Qin Ying's hand.

"Besides, I'm not just someone who can hide. Once I trace this line all the way to the Prefect's Mansion and expose the hand hiding in the capital, you won't have to keep pretending anymore."

Qin Ying turned around, and for the first time, a hint of warmth appeared in her sharp eyes under the light, but she was completely unaware that this warmth was directed at her.

Qin Ying looked up at Yang Hu, said nothing more, and slowly sheathed the short knife that she had been polishing all night.

It's still snowing outside.

The eyes and ears across the street, the old fox keeping watch from the west of the city, and the cunning man hiding in the capital were all slowly closing in on this courtyard. They all knew that the person in the courtyard was the one who had been hiding the secret all along.