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

No matter how tightly the military report was hidden, or how firmly the clues in the investigation were held, the barbarian's knife waits for no one.

Before dawn, the barbarians from beyond the pass launched another fierce attack. The battle that day was exceptionally brutal, lasting from daybreak until the sun began to set, and the wounded soldiers' camps were once again filled with people missing limbs.

As the sun began to set, several comrades desperately carried a seriously wounded soldier, stumbling and staggering all the way into the wounded soldiers' camp.

"Dr. Yang! Save Zhou Datou! I'm afraid he can't save his leg!"

Upon hearing the sound, Yang Hu hurriedly went to greet him.

The wounded soldier was a burly man named Zhou Datou, but his face was ashen and he was unconscious. A few days earlier, while defending the city, he had been injured by a rolling log thrown by barbarians. The army doctor had only applied some quick wound medicine. However, over the past few days, the wound had not healed; instead, his entire leg had swelled up, becoming shiny and black, with festering, pus-filled skin that emitted a foul stench that could be smelled from afar.

Yang Hu quickly stepped forward, checked his pulse, and found it to be weak and thready; then he checked his forehead and found it to be frighteningly hot.

"Gangina." Yang Hu frowned deeply. "The rotting flesh in this leg has become infected. The poison is traveling upwards through the blood vessels and is about to reach the heart. If this drags on any longer, the person will die."

The military doctors standing nearby had already been shaking their heads repeatedly.

"This leg is so badly rotten, even a god couldn't bring it back," an old doctor sighed. "The poison has even reached his heart. Let alone this leg, he probably won't survive the night. Doctor Yang, you'd better hurry and leave Zhou Datou a whole corpse."

"Leave him whole?" Yang Hu's eyes suddenly darkened. "His pulse is still there, his heart is still beating, so there's still hope! This leg can't be saved, but if we can saw it off at the knee to sever the poison, he can live!"

Ordinary people, seeing a wounded person with such a rotten leg and poisonous wounds, would assume that death was inevitable and no one would dare to make a move.

The poison growing in the rotten flesh of this gangrene will travel upwards along the blood vessels. As long as the rotten flesh is not removed, the poison will continue to seep into the heart. To save the patient, the leg that has rotted to the root must be cut cleanly from the healthy flesh before the poison attacks the heart, removing the root of the poison as well. Cut off a leg, save a life.

To wield such a large sword in the army is extremely dangerous, but it is Zhou Datou's only way to survive.

There is no room for hesitation.

"Prepare the strongest liquor, my fastest saw and knife, a branding iron, clean cloth, and binding thread! Bring them all!" Yang Hu ordered sternly. "And bring two sturdy wooden sticks for him to bite on."

When the doctors accompanying the army heard that he was going to saw off a person's living leg, they were all terrified and turned pale.

"Saw off a living person's leg?" the old doctor exclaimed. "Is this treatment or execution?! Once it's sawed off, the blood will drain out, and the person will die on the spot!"

"If we don't saw him, he'll die from the poison tonight," Yang Hu said in a deep voice, his eyes filled with a certainty that understood life and death. "The bleeding can be stopped. This sawing is like snatching him back from the jaws of death."

Qin Ying, disguised as a medicine boy, had already prepared strong liquor, a saw, and a branding iron. She then stepped forward to help several of her personal guards, firmly holding down the unconscious Zhou Datou. After that night of fire and the bloody battles of the past few days, her hands remained as steady as a rock.

Yang Hu first carefully disinfected the area above Zhou Datou's knee, where the good flesh met the rotten flesh, with strong liquor. Then, he used a cloth strip to tightly wrap around the area, constricting the blood vessels in the leg.

"Once this bandage is tightened, most of the blood flow is cut off. As for the remaining blood vessels, I'll saw and tie them off as I go." He said in a deep voice as he worked, his eyes showing a certainty that understood life and death. "You have to saw quickly and tie firmly. If you're even a fraction slow, more blood will flow; if you can't tie it off, the person will be gone."

"This strike is even more ruthless than chopping down barbarians on the city wall." Yang Hu gripped the knife tightly, and as he made the strike, he said in a deep voice, his eyes revealing a certainty that understood life and death. "If I don't act this ruthlessly this time, I won't be able to save this life."

He swiftly and steadily brought the knife down.

Everyone in the tent held their breath, not daring to utter a sound, watching helplessly as the gleaming knife sliced ​​through flesh.

The sharp blade sliced ​​through the flesh, the saw rested on the leg bone, and after a few passes, it sawed off the rotten leg at the knee. The black, festering stump fell to the ground, and a stench of decay made onlookers back.

The blood gushing from the cut was quickly tied off one by one by Yang Hu. He tightly bound the thick veins with silk thread; for the small, bleeding cuts, he pressed a red-hot branding iron on them and burned them off with a "sizzle".

The bleeding has stopped.

The wound, which had been gushing blood, finally stopped bleeding.

Yang Hu finally breathed a sigh of relief, cleaned and sutured the wound, applied herbal medicine to promote tissue regeneration and prevent decay, and then carefully bandaged it with a clean cloth.

A critically wounded soldier, on the verge of death from the poison gas, was saved by his swift and skillful methods of amputation, hemostasis, and ligation. The pale complexion gradually regained some color, and the fever on his forehead slowly subsided.

The army doctors who had previously said to "leave the body intact" were stunned when they saw the sawed-off rotten leg and Zhou Datou, who had escaped death and was breathing steadily. They were speechless for a long time.

Having practiced medicine their entire lives, they had never dared to amputate a leg that was completely rotten and poisoned to the core. They were always ready to prepare a coffin, never daring to do so. Who could have imagined that this man with a missing leg could stop the bleeding, eradicate the poison, and be pulled back from the brink of death?

"Dr. Yang's skill is truly amazing." Several people who were originally just watching the commotion quietly came forward to lend a hand.

Yang Hu did not answer. He had no way of explaining this method of amputation to save lives and ligation to stop bleeding to the people of this era. He only knew that this method could save lives.

And what was saved was a life capable of drawing a bow and defending a city.

"A broken leg, but a life saved." Yang Hu tucked Zhou Datou in and said in a deep voice, "Once he recovers, he can still draw a bow and shoot arrows with one leg and defend his city. It's better than losing his life for nothing."

In this bloody battle to defend the isolated city, saving even one soldier meant gaining valuable combat strength. A soldier with a broken leg who could still draw a bow, guarding the city walls, meant one less arrow from the barbarians would fall. Defending the city meant protecting people. As long as the people were alive, the walls would stand.

Zhou Datou slowly woke up, looked down at his missing leg, and then at the young physician standing beside him. The towering man was stunned for a moment, then his eyes suddenly reddened.

"Dr. Yang, my leg is gone just like that."

"My leg is gone, but I'm still alive," Yang Hu said calmly. "Once I recover, I can guard Qing Shi Kou for a few more days."

He wiped his blood-stained hands on the hem of his robe and glanced at the group of wounded soldiers.

The blood that flows on the city walls every day, the broken legs and lost lives, all stem from the hand that hides in the central army, colludes with the barbarians, and cuts off the soldiers' weapons and supplies.

The roll of military reports hidden close to his body, the two signatures on military law and supplies, were gradually drawing closer to the outline of that hand. Only when that hand was pulled out by the roots and its hand reaching out to the barbarians was severed could these soldiers on the city wall no longer have to lose their legs and their lives for its crimes.

Another one was carried in from outside. He rolled up his sleeves and squatted down again. The night was still long.

Living people is his duty, dragging people away is his debt; he has to do both himself.