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

The snow fell for half the night.

Early the next morning, the charcoal carrier, along with his teenage child, stumbled and crawled into the clinic.

The child was about 10 years old. Half of his neck was swollen, his face was burning red, and he was gurgling in his throat, struggling to breathe.

"Dr. Yang, please save my child!" The man's voice was hoarse. "My throat has been hurting for the past two days. At first, it was okay; I could drink a few sips of soup. But since last night, I haven't been able to drink anything at all. I can't even swallow a drop of saliva, and I have a high fever! The doctor from the city came and said that a malignant sore has grown in my throat, blocking my throat, and that I'm going to die. He told me... told me to prepare for my funeral!"

After the man carrying the charcoal finished speaking, tears fell onto the child's flushed cheeks.

Yang Hu took the child from him, placed him under the light, and pried open his mouth, making the child open it wide.

I found a thin bamboo strip, pressed it gently against my tongue, and looked at it in the light.

I feel more confident now.

It wasn't some malignant sore that grew on the throat. It was just that the sides of the throat had swollen and suppurated, and the heat and toxins were blocking the throat, which is why the patient couldn't swallow water, causing the neck to swell and the fever to look like that. In ancient times, people called it "tons." If it developed rapidly and suppurated, it was very dangerous. But as long as the pus was drained and the heat and toxins were dissipated, the throat would be cleared, and the fever would naturally subside.

"It's not a malignant sore," Yang Hu said. "It's two swollen tonsils on his throat that have become infected and are blocking his throat. Once the pus is released and the fire poison is eliminated, there is hope."

"Pus...pus?" The man was stunned. "Stab a knife down the baby's throat?"

"They're stabbing a needle into the throat," Yang Hu said. "If we don't let the pus out, it will swell up bigger and bigger, blocking the throat completely, and we won't even be able to breathe. We'll really lose our lives then."

Yang Hu found the thinnest needle and a small knife, dipped them in strong liquor, and then had Lu Rou hold an oil lamp, making sure she held it steadily. He pressed his tongue down with one hand, took the needle with the other, and with a slight twitch of his wrist, inserted the needle into the swollen, shiny abscess.

A stream of yellowish-white liquid gushed from his throat, followed by a foul, fishy stench that filled his nostrils.

"A knife is stabbed into a perfectly healthy throat. Isn't this like going to the doctor only to die?" A group of people stood there, looking terrified.

"If the pus doesn't come out and stays in his throat, it'll be dangerous," Yang Hu said in a low voice as he picked at the pus. "See, now that the pus is out, his throat is open, isn't it?"

Sure enough, the pus and blood gushed out together, and the child's previously blocked throat immediately opened up, and the loud, gurgling breathing became much smoother.

But Yang Hu was not at ease at all.

He leaned closer and, by the light of the lamp, examined the two nipples closely. He then carefully pried open the one that hadn't fully burst, until he saw that there was no more yellow or white stuff in the throat. He stood up, rinsed the boy's mouth with water, and then took some throat-clearing medicine powder, blowing it onto the area where the pus had just drained. He prescribed a formula to clear heat, detoxify, reduce swelling, and soothe the throat, quickly decocted it, and fed it to him little by little.

Among those doctors who had issued verdicts saying "choking, no hope," there happened to be one who had been dragged over to watch the spectacle. He watched helplessly as the young doctor slowly released the blocked throat, needle by needle. The man's mouth was wide open, unable to close for a long time, and his face flushed red and then turned pale as he quietly slipped out of the crowd.

Then, Aji, who was helping out, was also drawn to the scene. When he came back to look, he couldn't help but ask, "Master, your throat is swollen, how come you can relax so easily?"

"Look at this stove door!"

Yang Hu said, "When firewood is burning, smoke and fire need to escape through the stove door. But if both sides are blocked by ash, it will swell up into a lump, narrowing the fire door. The smoke and fire can't pass through, and the whole stove will turn red and very hot! The throat is like that blocked stove door. When the breasts swell and fester, they block the door, causing blood and qi to stagnate inside, making it swollen and hot. When we drain the pus and clear the fire, the door becomes wider, air flows out, and the swelling and heat disappear."

Aji was a little confused, but he wrote down every single word.

Since following his master, he has memorized more and more prescriptions, recognized more and more medicinal herbs, and seen more and more craftsmanship every day.

I watched the entire procedure for draining pus today, word for word.

By noon, the swelling on half of the child's neck had gradually subsided, the fever had gone down, and the child had woken up. After swallowing a few times, the excruciating pain had lessened considerably, and the child was even able to swallow a bowl of porridge.

"It's time to drink... Dad, I can have some porridge now..."

The child, with a hoarse voice, was somewhat timid.

The coal carrier knelt down with a thud and kowtowed repeatedly to Yang Hu, saying that the child was his only son whom he had picked up on the road, and that if it weren't for Doctor Yang, he would have no descendants.

Several people nearby, also waiting for their turn to see a doctor, wiped away their tears and chattered about how, in these days, a poor family's child is like facing a life-or-death situation from a single illness, and how fortunate they were to have a miracle doctor in the east of the city who was willing to treat patients.

Yang Hu then earnestly warned that the roots of the moths had not yet been completely removed, and that he should pay special attention to keeping warm and avoiding catching fire, otherwise it would be very dangerous if it got infected.

The father and son made a living by carrying charcoal and doing manual labor. They had no connections. Apart from accepting a sum of money for medicine, Yang Hu did not charge them a penny for draining pus or acupuncture.

When the doctors who had been sentenced to "chokehold and be prepared for the worst" heard about it, they didn't dare to go out for quite some time.

Those families whose children had sore throats from a fever were terrified by the doctors who said they were beyond saving. Now that they knew Yang's clinic in the east of the city could remove a person from a choked throat with just a needle, they rushed over with their children. Suddenly, the clinic was filled with parents carrying their babies, their eyes filled with hope.

By the afternoon, after seeing the person off, the charcoal brazier in the backyard was already burning bright red.

Lu Yan poured Yang Hu another cup of hot tea, her eyes crinkling into crescents: "One needle saved another little baby whose throat was blocked!"

"We'll clear the blockage wherever the illness is." Yang Hu warmed his hands with hot tea. "Other doctors are afraid of the swelling in the throat. When they hear about this child, they don't dare to use needles anymore, saying there's no hope. But as long as we see clearly that it's pus, we can release it, and the child will suffer less. If the pus isn't released, it can really be fatal."

"When you're doing this, young master, either don't move too far, or be a little ruthless." Lu Yan helped him straighten his clothes, her eyes full of warmth: "If it were any other doctor inserting a needle into his throat, their hands would have been shaking long ago."

Lu Rou was tidying up the needles and knives she had just used, while Liu Ye had just rushed back from outside through the snow, still feeling the chill. She leaned close to Yang Hu's ear and hurriedly told him some things.

Yang Hu slowly stopped holding the teacup.

Although the room was warm, his eyebrows furrowed even more.

My already tense nerves tightened even more.

The open wounds and the reduced fever in the east of the city are all part of the doctor's duty and the foundation of this hospital's existence. However, the hand in the city, with the evidence of the burned cars and the box of ironclad evidence from last night, seems to have suddenly gone mad. It has searched the entire city thoroughly, causing unrest among the people.

We were disturbed by that fire!