Chapter 238
Chapter 238
When the people of Wuhe Stockade learned that Shen Qingzhu was also a physician, their impression of him improved even further.
That very day, Shen Qingzhu treated several sick villagers.
This won him an enormous amount of goodwill from the people of Wuhe Stockade.
Jiang Yunsui was not idle either. Admittedly, she was mostly playing, but she was pretty and sweet-spoken. It did not take long for her to become friendly with everyone in the stockade, especially the children.
“You’re all so amazing! Your father can treat illnesses, Little Yunsui. Can you do it too?”
For now, Jiang Yunsui was still pretending to be Shen Qingzhu’s daughter.
That identity also made everyone especially fond of her.
As for why she did not share Shen Qingzhu’s surname, naturally, she had taken her mother’s surname.
The villagers had been somewhat astonished, but Shen Qingzhu had successfully invented the image of a man deeply devoted to his wife.
Jiang Yunsui shook her head. “I don’t know how yet, but I recognize lots of medicinal herbs.”
She was a mushroom herself-a plant spirit-so she learned to recognize other plants much faster than ordinary people.
Shen Qingzhu never avoided her while gathering herbs, and she had learned to identify many of them at his side.
“Only Granny Chunmiao knows medicinal herbs in our stockade. Everyone learned to gather them from her. But she can only treat simple illnesses. She isn’t as capable as your father.”
Jiang Yunsui listened with great interest as they told her stories about the stockade.
In such a remote place, someone who recognized herbs and could treat minor ailments was already extraordinary. To study medicine properly, one had to go to a town or city. Yet medical knowledge was generally passed down within families. Even becoming an apprentice at a clinic required connections.
Granny Chunmiao’s father had been fortunate enough to apprentice at a clinic. He remained an apprentice after more than ten years, but he learned to treat minor illnesses.
When he eventually left the clinic and returned home, he taught what he knew to Granny Chunmiao.
After learning from him, she taught the villagers to identify common herbs they could gather.
Even selling a small quantity each year helped the people of the stockade.
The easiest things to sell, however, were deer antler, tiger bone, and rare medicinal ingredients with many years of growth behind them.
Unfortunately, such things were extremely difficult to find.
“Help! Something terrible happened! A-Ming fell into the water!”
A panicked child suddenly came running over, shouting for help.
“What?!”
Everyone raced toward the river, Jiang Yunsui among them.
The river had given the stockade its name.
The Wu River was broad, and its deepest sections were around five meters deep. In those places, the water looked green-a sign of its depth.
Nearly every child in the stockade could swim, but the adults repeatedly warned them never to enter the places where the water looked green.
“A-Ming’s leg cramped while he was swimming. None of us noticed. By the time we did, he’d already drifted into the green water.”
An older child who was a strong swimmer had gone out and pulled A-Ming ashore.
But when he was brought back, his face was bluish-white, and he was no longer breathing.
The surrounding children went pale. Their minds emptied in terror, leaving them with no idea what to do.
Jiang Yunsui squeezed through the crowd.
“Move aside. Let me do it.”
Instructions for rescuing a drowning victim appeared in her mind.
First, she turned his head to one side. Fortunately, nothing obstructed his mouth. Then she placed one small hand over the other, pressed them against his chest, and began cardiopulmonary resuscitation.
“What is she doing?”
“Little Yunsui is Doctor Shen’s daughter. She must know how to save him.”
“But he’s already stopped breathing. Can he still be saved?”
After pressing for a while, Jiang Yunsui began running out of strength.
She hurriedly circulated Imperial Flowing Essence to restore her energy and fed some to A-Ming as well.
“You, come here. Blow air into his mouth.”
Jiang Yunsui pointed at a boy.
The boy looked bewildered, but he followed her instructions and forced himself through the embarrassment of breathing into A-Ming’s mouth.
With Jiang Yunsui’s continued efforts, A-Ming coughed up a mouthful of water.
His chest began to rise and fall again.
Jiang Yunsui collapsed onto her bottom.
She was exhausted!
Cardiopulmonary resuscitation required strength. She was small and not especially strong, but no one else knew how to perform it, so she could only do it herself.
Fortunately, she was no ordinary child.
Sweat covered her forehead from exertion.
Only then did the adults arrive after hearing the news.
A-Ming’s parents, in particular, wailed and rushed forward to embrace their son as soon as they saw him.
Ji Si had appeared beside Jiang Yunsui at some point. He picked her exhausted body up.
Jiang Yunsui gave him an enormous smile.
“Wasn’t I amazing? I saved someone!”
Now that she had time to think about it, even Jiang Yunsui found the feat incredible.
Her Imperial Flowing Essence could nourish the body, treat external wounds, and ease internal injuries. But it was not very useful for drowning or suffocation caused by something lodged in the throat.
It could not force water or a foreign object out of someone’s body.
Ji Si gave a quiet hum. “You have always been amazing.”
Jiang Yunsui instantly grew terribly proud.
As she rejoiced, a wisp of virtuous merit silently entered her body.
Jiang Yunsui sensed it and became even happier.
The scene remained chaotic. She rubbed her little stomach.
“I’m hungry.”
Ji Si carried her away to find food.
Once her little stomach was full, Jiang Yunsui skipped off to find Shen Qingzhu.
“Shen Qingzhu!”
“I heard you saved someone who drowned?”
They spoke at the same time and stared at each other.
Thinking of the person she had rescued, Jiang Yunsui nodded openly.
“Yes.”
Shen Qingzhu became interested. “How did you do it? They said the child had already stopped breathing. Some even claim you know a resurrection technique.”
Jiang Yunsui shot him a sidelong glance. “If I really knew how to resurrect people, I wouldn’t need to find an antidote for Ji Yan’an.”
Following the instructions in her memories, she described the cardiopulmonary resuscitation procedure in detail.
“It only works for sudden cardiac arrest, suffocation, drowning, and things like that. And it has to be done within four minutes.”
“Four minutes?”
Jiang Yunsui looked at him with wide eyes.
She thought hard and counted on her little fingers.
“I don’t know how to explain.”
She scratched her head. “Counting to sixty is one minute. Four minutes is four sixties.”
Shen Qingzhu understood approximately what she meant.
“Show me how it’s done.”
He truly loved to learn.
Jiang Yunsui looked around and selected someone.
“Si Si, come here.”
“Did you see what I did?”
Ji Si nodded.
“Then show Shen Qingzhu.”
“You have to demonstrate rescue breathing too. You blow air from mouth to mouth.”
Ji Si’s body stiffened.
“No.”
He refused flatly.
“Oh, just find a boy to practice with.”
In the end, under Shen Qingzhu’s insistence and Jiang Yunsui’s expectant gaze, they found another person for the demonstration.
Ji Si performed the chest compressions accurately.
But when it was time for rescue breathing, he copied Jiang Yunsui and pointed at someone else to do it.
The result was that both men spat in disgust for quite some time afterward and even went to rinse their mouths.
Shen Qingzhu looked thoughtful.
“This method could be useful for many acute emergencies.”
Once Shen Qingzhu learned it, Jiang Yunsui washed her hands of the matter.
That afternoon, a crowd came to the house.
This time, they had not come for Shen Qingzhu.
They had come for her.