Living leisurely in Tang Dynasty

Chapter 37

Would Li Yuanying be cowardly? Of course not. He got Gao Yang to sit down and started lecturing her on all sorts of things like you’re not sitting properly, you’ve been running so the pulse will not be accurate, and so on. Gao Yang sat up upright and waited for the time limit imposed before stretching out her arm again.

After Yuanying’s psychological tactics, Gao Yang’s doubts disappeared by half and she waited for his diagnosis.

Yuanying pressed on Gao Yang’s pulse point and after careful observation, he concluded that her body was perfectly fine. But merely sharing his conclusion will not allow him to show off his ability, so he deliberately put on a serious face and took her pulse repeatedly.

If Yuanying were to say that she was ill, Gao Yang wouldn’t believe him. So he acted hesitant to speak and Gao Yang felt anxiousness creep into her heart. She asked uneasily: “What’s wrong?”

Li Yuanying said solemnly: “You have eaten too much, your wrists is too fat, so I can’t tell accurately!”

Gao Yang: “…”

Gao Yang got up to hit Li Yuanying but the boy reacted faster and ran away! The two children chased each other around the corridor and when they could no longer run, they shook hands and made peace. The running was loud and the Emperor heard it from his office on the other side.

“That brat makes trouble wherever he goes.” (Li Er)

Wei Zheng and the rest of the ministers did not answer to his statement. The boy is indeed a jerk, but why not think about who allows him to grow up that way?! When you left the palace for the hot springs, why did you bring him along with you? Doesn’t this subtly imply that you enjoy his troublesome antics?

Gao Yang’s pulse was fine so Yuanying ignored her. He instead turns to the other children to practice. Li Zhi didn’t have any major problems but he was a little restless, couldn’t sleep well and his body was a little weak. Li Yuanying hasn’t learned how to treat illness and so he told Li Zhi his conclusion and requested that he figure out the treatment himself. This is just a simple ailment, it shouldn’t require medicine, just pay attention to your diet!

Li Zhi realized that Li Yuanying said something that made sense and so he noted down his suggestion with slight suspicion.

Li Yuanying checked Chengyang’s pulse. All good.

When it was Sizi’s turn, Li Yuanying put on a stunned expression and paused for a moment to think before checking her pulse again. Seeing Sizi looking at him nervously, he said with a smile: “Sizi has also gained weight recently. Uncle needs to try reading your pulse again!”

Sizi was good-tempered and didn’t get angry when someone called her fat. She touch her face with her hands and asked Yuanying happily: “Have I really grown fat? Father said that he likes me to eat more. To grow a bit more chubby.”

Only then did Yuanying realize that Sizi was rather thin. She was one year older than Hengshan but looked exactly like her sister. He carried Sizi up to gauge her weight and nodded firmly: “Yes, you’ve put on weight!”

Sizi hugged him and smiled happily.

He then put her down before checking her pulse seriously: “Sizi is fine.”

Sizi happily repeated the result: “I’m fine!”

Finally it was Hengshan’s turn. She obediently stretched out her little hand for diagnosis.

The pulse of Hengshan is also stable, nothing unusual.

After this activity, the children continued with a storytelling session.  After that, the other children went back for lunch while Li Yuanying went to look for Sun Simiao again.

Seeing that the young boy has returned to him yet again,  Sun Simiao was worried that he would again say that he has finished reading all the books. However, seeing the boy looking  a little off he asked: “What’s wrong?”

“Sizi was born slightly weak. She has been fine these past few years but gets sick easily in autumn. When I diagnose her just now, I found that she has a sunken pulse that is undetectable when pressed lightly. You needed to press much harder to get a reading. I’m afraid that it’s a sign that shouldn’t be taken lightly”

Seeing that the doctor was listening intently, he continued sharing his daily observations. Sizi’s body is weaker than others; her digestion is not very good and she’s prone to sweating in summer and coughing in autumn and winter.

The weather has been quite erratic recently. It’s still warm when I fell asleep but is freezing in the middle of the night. I’m afraid Sizi might have caught a cold. Even if it’s not obvious now, I think we should pay attention to it. After all, isn’t prevention better than cure?!

As Li Yuanying is only a beginner, he didn’t dare to jump to a conclusion. So he has decided to comfort Sizi before quietly coming here to Sun Simiao for confirmation.

Listening to Li Yuanying in all seriousness, Sun Simiao nodded: “You can’t tell what’s going on with just the pulse. You need to also incorporate further investigation and inquiries. You should only judge after looking at all aspects.

Although Sizi was a young child, she was still a princess from the Li family. Sun Simiao being an external doctor can’t just randomly visit her for diagnosis. And if Li Yuanying were to run to His Majesty with a random and dubious pulse reading saying that “I have been studying pulse reading for one day and feel that there’s something wrong with Sizi so please quickly treat her”, I’m afraid the Emperor will just kick him out!

Sun Simiao considered the options and asked Li Yuanying to stay around. He found some patients and simultaneously treated them while teaching Yuanying how to combine all the results to draw a conclusion.

Since this is concerning Sizi, Yuanying quickly agreed and rolled up his sleeves to act as an apprentice. He followed his teacher and learn all about the method of seeing, hearing, asking, and feeling.

Among all the diagnostic methods, the most difficult was pulse reading. Since Li Yuanying was able to learn this easily, the rest is naturally not too difficult. What he lacks is clinical practice.

There were only so many people in this vacation palace and so the number of patients quickly dwindled. Li Yuanying waited and saw that they have no more patients and so he boldly proposed to Sun Simiao to treat the common people outside the palace instead.

The word Free Clinic was introduced to the boy by Sun Simiao. The old doctor said that to gain exposure to unique and difficult diseases when he was a young doctor with no credibility yet, he would set up a booth on the street to offer free medical services as an opportunity to be in touch with a larger number of patients.

He imagined a lively scene. Li Yuanying likes liveliness the most and when he heard that he can play this way, he was eager to try it!

“It’s getting late today. Let’s go tomorrow. If you want to start a free clinic, you’ll have to prepare medicines. Some medicines may not be commonly found in ordinary medicine halls on such short notice” (Sun Simiao)

Li Yuanying heard this and immediately committed that all expenses for any medicine will be borne by him. After all, he can’t always expect the old doctor to contribute in both effort and cost.

Thinking about his upcoming free clinic adventure, Li Yuanying didn’t even go home for dinner. He followed Sun Simiao for staff dinner at the Imperial physician’s office. Concurrently, he also got the doctors to sell him a small medicine box.  He then followed Sun Simiao around packing medicines. Whatever medicine Sun Simiao took, Li Yuan took a little too, acting like a copycat.

Sun Simiao has trained many disciples but this is the first time he has encountered such a dynamic person. Li Yuanying is literally following him around everywhere.

As the royal family gathered to have dinner, the Emperor counted the “little radish heads” (referring to the children) and found that one was missing. Upon probing, he found out that Li Yuanying has somehow managed to run away again to look for Sun Simiao. In addition, the kid has been acting like a copycat, following exactly what the doctor has been doing. He even decided to have dinner with him.

Li Er thought back about what he said to his younger brother earlier about him never studying medicine before. Did his casual mention cause the boy to go and study medicine with Sun Simiao? Even if that idiot starts to learn now, how long will it take before he shows results?

“If that’s the case, we won’t wait for him, let him do whatever he likes.”

Sizi enthusiastically told her father about their afternoon activity: “Young uncle is so amazing! He has learned how to read pulse!”

Gao Yang hummed: “Please! He’s obviously pretending!”

His Majesty agreed with Gao Yang. After having dinner with his family, he took his ministers to the hot spring to discuss government affairs.

It was only after the moon has rose high up in the sky that the Emperor finally release his trusted men home for rest. He then walked back under the moonlight.

Halfway through the journey, Li Er remembered his horrible yet caring little brother. It’s a rare thing for him to volunteer to study on his own. Li Er then decided to award him with a set of colored glass cups that the boy had been eyeing for a long time.

Actually, the cups were not a favorite of Li Er. He has just been frequently using it whenever Li Yuanying is around to make him jealous. For example, this trip to Li mountain.

Although colored glass was expensive, it can be purchased at a high price. But this particular set has a special texture. The whole body is crystal clear making it incredibly beautiful. Li Yuanying fell in love with it at first glance but His Majesty has refused to give it to him. Because of this, his younger brother severed ties with him for days (later this feud ended because the young boy wanted to eat money cannot buy lychee sent from the South).

Li Yuanying played by Sun Simiao’s side until the palace gate was about to be locked and came running home. Hearing that Li Er has gifted the set of colored glass cups to him, he was taken aback. He concluded that his older brother must be plotting something against him.

What’s that saying? One who offers unsolicited hospitality must be harboring evil intentions!

He carefully opened the box containing the glass cups and found that they were indeed the exact ones that he has always wanted.

He was a little puzzled as to why His Majesty was being so kind all of a sudden. He couldn’t think of any reason even after much pondering. Since there’s no conclusion, he decided to not think about it at all and just toy with his new present before reading more medical books from doctor Sun.

Early the next morning, after breakfast, Li Yuanying ran to meet Sun Simiao in high spirits. Hearing that Sun Simiao was going to teach Li Yuanying on-site, the other imperial physicians were surprised.

With doubts and envy, all the imperial physicians sent their apprentices to follow Sun Simiao hoping that they will learn something from him. Otherwise, it would be a complete waste to just tell the Prince of Teng!

Sun Simiao didn’t mind people helping with errands so he let them help with carrying the supplies. He sees the intentions of the imperial physicians clearly but he firmly believes that these apprentices will soon find out that Li Yuanying, who has only started two days ago, learns much faster than them!

There were various counties with dense populations beneath Li Mountains. This is the first time Li Yuanying is visiting and he looked around with great interest. It was only when Sun Simiao called him to enter the medicine hall that Li Yuanying obediently followed.

Sun Simiao shared his intention of setting up a free clinic and borrowed pen and paper from the pharmacy to write “free clinic for one day” and posted it outside. He then requested that his apprentices bang the Gong to attract attention.

Since there aren’t many lively events in this town, the people were attracted by the noise and gathered around.

Hearing that there was an old genius doctor who was providing free medical consultation, they were suspicious. It’s only when they poke their heads into the room and saw Sun Simiao with a youthful appearance, ruddy complexion, and high spirits that their doubts begin to disappear.

Upon further probing, the crowd found out that it was  Sun Simiao and were even more convinced. Some lined up on the spot and those who were not sick quickly ran back to inform those in need in their neighborhood.

As news of Sun Simiao’s free clinic spread, people whether sick or otherwise rushed to town. They either wanted to take the opportunity to cure their stubborn illness or simply to see what old doctor Sun looked like!

Seeing this commotion, Li Yuanying’s eyes widened.

Wow, this is really fun!

Sure enough, I came to the right place!