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

With Aji's help, the clinic is doing much better.

This kid learns quickly. In just over ten days, he could prepare and dry medicine and write ordinary prescriptions without Yang Hu having to watch over him.

When patients come in, the doctor first asks about their general condition, the severity and urgency of their symptoms, and then escorts them to the examination table.

For common headaches and fevers, Yang Hu would glance at the ailment, instruct Aji to get the medicine according to the prescription, and that would be the end of it.

With the freed-up time, Yang Hu watched a few more important ones.

A batch had just been sent off at noon that day.

Three people came in from outside.

The first man carried a small baby wrapped in a dirty cloth, his steps hurried and heavy. Behind him was a woman, her eyes blinded from crying, her hands twisting at her clothes.

"Dr. Yang," the man stammered, "please take a look at my child..."

Yang Hu placed the baby he was holding on the examination table.

A little boy, maybe seven or eight years old, had a flushed face, his head drooping, looking listless. The right half of his body, from shoulder to chest, was wrapped in a dirty cloth.

Yang Hu reached out his hand, preparing to untie the cloth.

As soon as the cloth was opened, a foul odor wafted out.

Aji, standing nearby, couldn't help but pinch his nose. But instead of pulling back, he moved closer and glared at him.

Beneath the cloth lay a large area of ​​burn wounds. The burns stretched from the shoulder all the way to the chest, red, swollen, and festering, covered with a layer of blackish substance oozing pus.

Yang Hu frowned.

"How many days has this injury been there?"

The man rubbed his hands, trembling, and said, "It's been a few days. The kid was greedy and went to the stove to steal some food. He overturned a spoon and a big pot... and scalded this part."

Have you seen a doctor?

"I've found it! That Dr. Liu from the west of the city applied some stove core soil and some soy sauce, saying it would draw out the fire poison. But the more he applied it, the worse it got. He's had a fever these past two days and is just listless... Dr. Liu said the wound has penetrated deep inside, and he can't save this arm. If the fever doesn't break, he's going to die..."

She couldn't speak, covered her face, and her shoulders trembled intermittently.

The child who brought the child looked at Yang Hu's youth and hesitated before speaking:

"Dr. Yang... even the renowned physician Liu in the city, who has practiced for decades, has given up on treating this kind of injury. Do you think... there's any hope?"

Yang Hu did not rush to answer.

He bent down and examined the wound closely.

Burns themselves are not life-threatening. What is fatal is the dirty stuff covering the outside – the stove core soil, sauce, densely covering the rotten flesh, making it airtight and trapping pus and putrefaction inside.

It's only been a day, and it's already this bad.

The so-called "removal of fire poison" that Liu Lang mentioned involved pressing the child into the fire pit.

"It's quite serious." Yang Hu straightened up and turned to look at the woman. "But it's not hopeless."

He paused again and glanced at the woman.

"Oh no, I shouldn't have put this stuff on the wound."

"What?" The woman was bewildered. "Using the soil from the center of the stove to remove fire poison, that's an old trick, everyone says it's the same..."

"Old methods aren't always right," Yang Hu said. "If the wound is already open, and you cover it up with dirt or soy sauce, the stench inside won't be able to escape, and it will just get worse."

He rolled up his sleeves.

"Hot water, bring plenty of hot water! Clean soft cloth, scissors, and my raw meat medicine bottle."

Aji agreed and got up to get busy.

The woman became frightened again: "Dr. Yang, what's wrong?"

"First, soak and wash away the smeared, filthy stuff little by little," Yang Hu said. "Then clean out the rotten, decaying flesh. Only when the healthy flesh underneath is exposed can it grow back."

A bystander, watching the commotion, shouted, "Why did you wash and cut off the scab? That's just reopening the wound and making it hurt again!"

Yang Hu ignored him.

Warm water was brought in, and he took a soft cloth, soaked it, and gently applied it to the hard, crusty scab, softening it little by little before slowly peeling it off.

Aji helped him, handing him soft cloths and changing hot water; his hands were much better than a few days ago.

When he used scissors to clean the rotten flesh, he didn't flinch; his eyes were fixed on it, as if he was thinking about every cut.

"Master," he said, "you're not picky about these blisters?"

"I can't pick it out," he said, his hands moving non-stop. "Keep it there to protect the good flesh underneath. If I pick it open, it'll be easier for dirt to get in."

He silently remembered it, and his hand steadied even more as he handed over the soft cloth.

The child was delirious with fever and would whimper whenever touched. The woman stood to the side, clutching the hem of her clothes, not daring to breathe.

Yang Hu's hands were very steady. He peeled away the filthy, mushy stuff, cut away the rotten flesh, revealing the tender flesh that was still alive underneath. He didn't poke the few blisters, but carefully left them to protect the wound below.

After cleaning, apply medicine to treat the wound and raw flesh, take a clean cloth, and loosely wrap it around the wound, leaving room for air to breathe.

He wrote out a prescription: "Twice a day for medicine. Make sure to give him this herbal decoction to treat the fever. Don't put anything on his skin for the next few days."

The rest is up to fate.

Yang Hu arranged for him and the child to stay at an inn near the clinic, and watched over him as he changed his dressings for two days.

He had a fever the night before.

By noon the next day, the swelling had mostly subsided, the wound was no longer oozing foul-smelling pus, the redness and swelling had also decreased, and new flesh was faintly growing inside.

Early on the third day, the child opened his eyes and cried out that he was hungry.

The woman knelt down with a thud and kowtowed repeatedly, crying, "Miracle doctor! You are a living bodhisattva to our family!"

He grabbed the woman and stopped her from kowtowing any further.

The news spread throughout the entire western part of the city in just a few days. The child who had been saved by Liu the physician in the western part of the city by applying soy sauce and sawing off his arm, recovered from his fever and gained weight in just a few days under the care of Doctor Yang.

The doctor, Liu, was immediately embarrassed.

In the teahouse, someone said, "That Dr. Liu, he's been a doctor for decades, and he doesn't even know whether you can put something on a burn or not?"

Another person said, "Dr. Yang! He washes it clean, reduces the inflammation, applies medicine, and it's healed in a few days. That's a true miracle doctor!"

An old man nearby said, "That's right! My son scalded his foot last year and got a whole pile of stove dust on his bottom. It festered for half a month and scabbed over like this. But seeing Dr. Yang fixed it all up."

The man ran a small food stall; he didn't have much money to begin with.

Yang Hu only took the money for his medicine, waived the diagnosis fee, and even gave him a few sheets of medicine to change into.

"Children's skin is delicate, so it's best to minimize scarring," he advised. "Applying medication will further reduce the number of marks."

The family left, expressing their deepest gratitude...

After closing the clinic in the evening, the family gathered around to eat dinner.

Lu Yan helped him refill his tea.

"Young master, you've been busy for nothing these past few days," she said. "There's been no money coming in from your consultations."

"It's my own son," he said, "the kid suffered so much."

"As long as he gets one less scar, that's fine," Yang Hu said, holding his tea. "Then one less scar is good enough."

Lu Yan pursed her lips and didn't say anything more.

Qin Ying sat to one side and, by the light, slowly applied lubricant to the knife.

Hearing them say that they had made a wasted trip and hadn't earned much money from the consultation, she didn't stop working, but just said something.

"Spending time, money, and effort on your business"—this isn't how you make money in a shop.

But when she spoke, she didn't seem to genuinely dislike it.

Yang Hu smiled and nodded, without replying.

This doll has delicate skin. If we can reduce his scars a little, then we won't. It's okay to spend a little time and money.

For a traditional Chinese medicine doctor, it's not just about the consultation fee.

As night fell, Lu Yan neatly arranged her medicine cabinet, which had been a mess during the day. After tidying it up, she turned to look at Yang Hu, who was lying there studying a small knife.

During this period, he worked from morning till night every day, and his eyes were almost bloodshot from exhaustion.

She didn't say anything more, and quietly took a coat and put it on him.

It's evening now, and it's chilly up ahead.

Aji didn't go to sleep either. He was tidying up the examination table, putting all the wound cleaning supplies neatly in place. Finally, he went to the medicine cabinet, picked up a pair of medicines he didn't recognize today, and smelled and examined them under the light.

Looking at the two adults and the child, Yang Hu felt much less tired.

With the help of these people, this clinic will be able to cure more patients in the future.

However, he didn't notice that the groups of people loitering at the alley entrance had changed several times.

The hand in the west of the city has not yet given up.