Silt in the Tea (Part One)
Something like learning martial arts was not done overnight. Yu Fu only saw the soldier demonstrate it once, and the results were as imagined.
Yao Lan applied medicine to Yu Fu’s arms while making a fuss, “Young miss, you gave me a scare. I thought that you were going crazy and wanted to jump off the table!”
As she said this, she looked at the soldiers to the side, “It has already been hard enough on the young miss to travel here from the capital. You guys actually still let her get hurt. Hmph, I will refuse to provide you with any medicine. Get it for yourselves!”
The medicine that she was speaking of was the medicine that Yu Fu was going to give everyone to prevent illness.
The soldiers wore bitter expressions. They did not think that Yu Fu’s arm would bruise from rolling off of such a low table onto the ground.
This was true. They were sturdy men with thick skin, so it was natural that they would be fine, but Yu Fu was different.
Thinking about it like this, the soldiers were even more adamant in their refusal to continue on in the rain, “Young miss, let’s just forget about it! We only managed to learn this life-saving technique after many years of training in the military. How can you learn it in such a short span of time?”
Yao Lan rubbed some rubbing alcohol on her arm. After applying it, she forcefully rubbed the bruise away, causing Yu Fu to grimace in pain.
Hearing the soldiers’ discouraged tones, she immediately stood up, “I can learn it, and I can make sure Yao Lan learns it too. Go and make the medicine based on my prescription. After it’s been made, everyone needs to drink a bowl. Yao Lan and I will be practicing here until we manage to learn it properly.”
“Young miss…”
The soldiers wanted to say a little more, but Yu Fu looked up, “Go quickly. Do I need to abandon my face?”
Were they planning to continue watching her unseemly falling position?
Everyone obediently retreated.
Yu Fu reached out to Yao Lan, “Yao Lan, come up here. Once we have finished training on this shorter table, we can train on the larger table. We absolutely must learn it by today, so we can set out tomorrow morning!”
Yao Lan looked where she was pointing. The high table in the corner of the yard was even taller than her height.
She wanted to cry but had no tears, “Young miss, you’re killing me…”
With how steep Zhu Mountain was, whenever the Gu family’s army ascended the mountain in the rain to observe the situation, there would always be someone who got injured during the descent. There would even be people who would lose their lives.
With such heavy rain, would they even be able to see the mountain pass?
Gu HuaiJiang decided to withdraw from the outpost on Zhu Mountain, leaving a few people to defend against a surprise attack.
It was clear without even needing to think about it that nobody would launch a surprise attack with such poor weather.
“Head general, it’s raining too heavily. The sandbags can’t block the rain at all. Many tents on the edges have already been washed away by the mud and rain.”
Lao Jin entered the main tent with his thick raincoat. He was standing up perfectly straight, so his appearance was a little strange.
Yan HuaShi cracked a rare joke, “At a glance, I thought that a giant porcupine rolled in, and I was about to pull out my sword.”
“Here, take the big porcupine!”
Lao Jin took off the cloak and cheerfully tossed it at him, thoroughly soaking him. He then looked up at the top, “Head general, that area can no longer be lived on. Fortunately, there were only a few soldiers stationed there, so I made the decision to have relocated to a safe location.”
Gu HuaiJiang said: “Have all of the soldiers whose tents have been collapsed by mudslides brought back. The ones who are also in imminent danger should also be brought back. This rain will continue falling for many more days. Don’t let the soldiers get washed away in the middle of the night.”
Lao Jin removed his raincoat while answering, “Understood. I will tell them in a moment. I will have the row of tents nearest the mountain set up in a different location!”
Yan HuaShi poured him a cup of hot tea, “Look at you. You’re completely soaked. Have some tea and warm up!”
Lao Jin received the cup with a smile but immediately frowned upon lifting the cup’s lid, “Hey, hey, old Yao, you’re too unwelcoming. Why is there silt in this tea?”
“Silt?”
Yan HuaShi received the cup of tea and looked inside. sure enough, there were a few grains of sand, “That’s right. The consecutive days of rain have made the water in the well dirty. When the soldiers were preparing the tea, they probably didn’t notice. Just bear with it. We’ve followed the head general all over for decades. We’ve even drank water that was mostly mud. You’re still worried about this?”
Lao Jin was unreserved, “I don’t mind, but we can’t have head general and the young general drink this, right?”
He picked up the teapot in the tent and took a look. Sure enough, there was a layer of silt at the bottom, “Little Yin, go and get some clean water. The tea is full of sand!”
His son was standing outside the tent. Hearing this command, he immediately entered the tent and received the teapot. Taking a look inside, he turned back around, “Dad, this is already the cleanest water in the camp! The two rivers nearby are so yellow that they’re like mudslides. Not even the wells nearby have remained unaffected. Even the water that the soldiers use to make rice has sand in it. The cleanest water was selected to be brought to the main tent.”
Gu HuaiJiang was in the middle of looking over some documents and did not even bother looking up, “Lao Jin, just leave it be. The water that the soldiers are drinking is even dirtier than this. It’s not like we haven’t needed to drink dirty water before. Don’t trouble the younger generation.”
Lao Jin was stunned but obediently put the teapot back down, “Damn, if it keeps raining like this, will we even be able to eat?”
He did not want to taste sand when he ate!
With a whoosh, Gu ShuBai entered the tent. His usually white clothes were clearly partially soaked, yet he was particularly calm, “Father, it’s bad!”
“The road to Immortals Valley has been blocked by Western Kun. It’s no wonder the number of people that they sent to Zhu Guan was so low. They were all sent to block the path to Immortals Valley!”
Gu HuaiJiang’s hand froze, as he stood up to say: “It’s no wonder there were so few reinforcements. It turns out that they have no intention of fighting us head-on. Western Kun has sent so many disciples to Immortals Valley over the years, and they finally plan to make use of them.”
“What? Western Kun plans to send a group of people to poison us?”
Lao Jin’s eyes twitched. With no time to consider drinking his tea, he thought back to when Gu HuaiJiang had been poisoned by Kunlun Snow and how chaotic things at the camp had become.
At that time, it was fortunate that he had brought Yu Fu from Immortals Valley. That had saved Gu HuaiJiang’s life, but this time, Immortals Valley had already been blockaded. Western Kun did not want to give them a chance to go and ask Immortals Valley for assistance!
Suddenly, a head poked into the tent. It was Yan Zheng, “Young miss Yu Fu said that the Deity of Medicine is able to take on tens of thousands of troops on his own. With a wave of his hand, he can kill a swath of people with poison. If those people from Western Kun were to raise their arms and poison us, what would we do?”
His speech might have been unrefined, but Gu ShuBai thought of Yu Fu’s surface-level martial arts, and even she could take many people’s lives just by throwing her poison needles. What about the people from Western Kun who have been planning this ahead of time?
Lao Jin looked at Yan Zheng then at Gu HuaiJiang and Gu ShuBai, “What should we do about this? The road to Immortals Valley has been blocked. Should we send someone back to the capital to bring young miss Yu Fu?”
Gu HuaiJiang lifted his eyes to glance at him, and the latter immediately fell silent.
He naturally understood that having Yu Fu travel a great distance to the desolate border was not good; moreover, the consecutive days of heavy rain made the roads hard to traverse, but the people of Western Kun planned to use poison. Aside from Yu Fu, who else could do anything about it?
Yan HuaShi said: “Fortunately, it has not stopped raining, and Western Kun’s new general has not yet arrived. Even if they want to poison us, it won’t happen so quickly. During this time, we should place more focus on our defenses. First, we need to protect our food stores and water sources. Second, we need to have the military doctors prepare medicines to deal with the poisons. Didn’t young miss Yu Fu provide us with large quantities of medicine to deal with fevers?”
This was all that they could do today.
The atmosphere inside the tent was a little heavy, and Lao Jin dryly chuckled, “Young general, you are completely soaked. Quickly sit down and drink some tea to warm up!”
It was still the same teapot as earlier on the stove, and Lao Jin had forgotten about the sand inside, directly pouring a cup of tea for Gu ShuBai.
Everyone sat back down, and Gu ShuBai received the cup and sniffed it. His handsome eyebrows slightly furrowed.
Only now did Lao Jin remember that the water inside was dirty, as he smacked himself on the head, “Hold on, the water for that tea is not clean. I’ll go out and get a new pot of water. How can this be stomached?”
He picked up the teapot and started walking out when Gu ShuBai suddenly stopped him, “Hold on, how is this water not clean?”
“There is sand in it, and it smells of mud.”
Lao Jin handed the teapot to him with a look of disgust, and Gu ShuBai sniffed the top of the teapot. He then looked at the cup of tea, and everyone was a little confused.
It was just some dirty water. Why was he looking at it for so long?
He lifted the cup and took a sip before immediately spitting it out and putting the cup back on the table, “There’s something wrong with the water. Carefully smell it. Is it really the smell of mud?”
Everyone picked up their cups from the table. Gu HuaiJiang even took a sip, and Gu ShuBai immediately rushed to stop him.
“Father!”
Gu HuaiJiang was very familiar with the taste of muddy water, and this water did not just taste like it contained mud.
Gu HuaiJiang spat the water back into the cup, “Immediately give the order for the armies to throw away all food and tea made using this water. They are not to use it again.”
“All of the water sources at the camp are to be sealed, and the soldiers are not permitted to use the water to make food!”
“ShuBai, lead the military doctors to inspect the wells and check on the water quality!”
Silt in the Tea (Part One)
Something like learning martial arts was not done overnight. Yu Fu only saw the soldier demonstrate it once, and the results were as imagined.
Yao Lan applied medicine to Yu Fu’s arms while making a fuss, “Young miss, you gave me a scare. I thought that you were going crazy and wanted to jump off the table!”
As she said this, she looked at the soldiers to the side, “It has already been hard enough on the young miss to travel here from the capital. You guys actually still let her get hurt. Hmph, I will refuse to provide you with any medicine. Get it for yourselves!”
The medicine that she was speaking of was the medicine that Yu Fu was going to give everyone to prevent illness.
The soldiers wore bitter expressions. They did not think that Yu Fu’s arm would bruise from rolling off of such a low table onto the ground.
This was true. They were sturdy men with thick skin, so it was natural that they would be fine, but Yu Fu was different.
Thinking about it like this, the soldiers were even more adamant in their refusal to continue on in the rain, “Young miss, let’s just forget about it! We only managed to learn this life-saving technique after many years of training in the military. How can you learn it in such a short span of time?”
Yao Lan rubbed some rubbing alcohol on her arm. After applying it, she forcefully rubbed the bruise away, causing Yu Fu to grimace in pain.
Hearing the soldiers’ discouraged tones, she immediately stood up, “I can learn it, and I can make sure Yao Lan learns it too. Go and make the medicine based on my prescription. After it’s been made, everyone needs to drink a bowl. Yao Lan and I will be practicing here until we manage to learn it properly.”
“Young miss…”
The soldiers wanted to say a little more, but Yu Fu looked up, “Go quickly. Do I need to abandon my face?”
Were they planning to continue watching her unseemly falling position?
Everyone obediently retreated.
Yu Fu reached out to Yao Lan, “Yao Lan, come up here. Once we have finished training on this shorter table, we can train on the larger table. We absolutely must learn it by today, so we can set out tomorrow morning!”
Yao Lan looked where she was pointing. The high table in the corner of the yard was even taller than her height.
She wanted to cry but had no tears, “Young miss, you’re killing me…”
With how steep Zhu Mountain was, whenever the Gu family’s army ascended the mountain in the rain to observe the situation, there would always be someone who got injured during the descent. There would even be people who would lose their lives.
With such heavy rain, would they even be able to see the mountain pass?
Gu HuaiJiang decided to withdraw from the outpost on Zhu Mountain, leaving a few people to defend against a surprise attack.
It was clear without even needing to think about it that nobody would launch a surprise attack with such poor weather.
“Head general, it’s raining too heavily. The sandbags can’t block the rain at all. Many tents on the edges have already been washed away by the mud and rain.”
Lao Jin entered the main tent with his thick raincoat. He was standing up perfectly straight, so his appearance was a little strange.
Yan HuaShi cracked a rare joke, “At a glance, I thought that a giant porcupine rolled in, and I was about to pull out my sword.”
“Here, take the big porcupine!”
Lao Jin took off the cloak and cheerfully tossed it at him, thoroughly soaking him. He then looked up at the top, “Head general, that area can no longer be lived on. Fortunately, there were only a few soldiers stationed there, so I made the decision to have relocated to a safe location.”
Gu HuaiJiang said: “Have all of the soldiers whose tents have been collapsed by mudslides brought back. The ones who are also in imminent danger should also be brought back. This rain will continue falling for many more days. Don’t let the soldiers get washed away in the middle of the night.”
Lao Jin removed his raincoat while answering, “Understood. I will tell them in a moment. I will have the row of tents nearest the mountain set up in a different location!”
Yan HuaShi poured him a cup of hot tea, “Look at you. You’re completely soaked. Have some tea and warm up!”
Lao Jin received the cup with a smile but immediately frowned upon lifting the cup’s lid, “Hey, hey, old Yao, you’re too unwelcoming. Why is there silt in this tea?”
“Silt?”
Yan HuaShi received the cup of tea and looked inside. sure enough, there were a few grains of sand, “That’s right. The consecutive days of rain have made the water in the well dirty. When the soldiers were preparing the tea, they probably didn’t notice. Just bear with it. We’ve followed the head general all over for decades. We’ve even drank water that was mostly mud. You’re still worried about this?”
Lao Jin was unreserved, “I don’t mind, but we can’t have head general and the young general drink this, right?”
He picked up the teapot in the tent and took a look. Sure enough, there was a layer of silt at the bottom, “Little Yin, go and get some clean water. The tea is full of sand!”
His son was standing outside the tent. Hearing this command, he immediately entered the tent and received the teapot. Taking a look inside, he turned back around, “Dad, this is already the cleanest water in the camp! The two rivers nearby are so yellow that they’re like mudslides. Not even the wells nearby have remained unaffected. Even the water that the soldiers use to make rice has sand in it. The cleanest water was selected to be brought to the main tent.”
Gu HuaiJiang was in the middle of looking over some documents and did not even bother looking up, “Lao Jin, just leave it be. The water that the soldiers are drinking is even dirtier than this. It’s not like we haven’t needed to drink dirty water before. Don’t trouble the younger generation.”
Lao Jin was stunned but obediently put the teapot back down, “Damn, if it keeps raining like this, will we even be able to eat?”
He did not want to taste sand when he ate!
With a whoosh, Gu ShuBai entered the tent. His usually white clothes were clearly partially soaked, yet he was particularly calm, “Father, it’s bad!”
“The road to Immortals Valley has been blocked by Western Kun. It’s no wonder the number of people that they sent to Zhu Guan was so low. They were all sent to block the path to Immortals Valley!”
Gu HuaiJiang’s hand froze, as he stood up to say: “It’s no wonder there were so few reinforcements. It turns out that they have no intention of fighting us head-on. Western Kun has sent so many disciples to Immortals Valley over the years, and they finally plan to make use of them.”
“What? Western Kun plans to send a group of people to poison us?”
Lao Jin’s eyes twitched. With no time to consider drinking his tea, he thought back to when Gu HuaiJiang had been poisoned by Kunlun Snow and how chaotic things at the camp had become.
At that time, it was fortunate that he had brought Yu Fu from Immortals Valley. That had saved Gu HuaiJiang’s life, but this time, Immortals Valley had already been blockaded. Western Kun did not want to give them a chance to go and ask Immortals Valley for assistance!
Suddenly, a head poked into the tent. It was Yan Zheng, “Young miss Yu Fu said that the Deity of Medicine is able to take on tens of thousands of troops on his own. With a wave of his hand, he can kill a swath of people with poison. If those people from Western Kun were to raise their arms and poison us, what would we do?”
His speech might have been unrefined, but Gu ShuBai thought of Yu Fu’s surface-level martial arts, and even she could take many people’s lives just by throwing her poison needles. What about the people from Western Kun who have been planning this ahead of time?
Lao Jin looked at Yan Zheng then at Gu HuaiJiang and Gu ShuBai, “What should we do about this? The road to Immortals Valley has been blocked. Should we send someone back to the capital to bring young miss Yu Fu?”
Gu HuaiJiang lifted his eyes to glance at him, and the latter immediately fell silent.
He naturally understood that having Yu Fu travel a great distance to the desolate border was not good; moreover, the consecutive days of heavy rain made the roads hard to traverse, but the people of Western Kun planned to use poison. Aside from Yu Fu, who else could do anything about it?
Yan HuaShi said: “Fortunately, it has not stopped raining, and Western Kun’s new general has not yet arrived. Even if they want to poison us, it won’t happen so quickly. During this time, we should place more focus on our defenses. First, we need to protect our food stores and water sources. Second, we need to have the military doctors prepare medicines to deal with the poisons. Didn’t young miss Yu Fu provide us with large quantities of medicine to deal with fevers?”
This was all that they could do today.
The atmosphere inside the tent was a little heavy, and Lao Jin dryly chuckled, “Young general, you are completely soaked. Quickly sit down and drink some tea to warm up!”
It was still the same teapot as earlier on the stove, and Lao Jin had forgotten about the sand inside, directly pouring a cup of tea for Gu ShuBai.
Everyone sat back down, and Gu ShuBai received the cup and sniffed it. His handsome eyebrows slightly furrowed.
Only now did Lao Jin remember that the water inside was dirty, as he smacked himself on the head, “Hold on, the water for that tea is not clean. I’ll go out and get a new pot of water. How can this be stomached?”
He picked up the teapot and started walking out when Gu ShuBai suddenly stopped him, “Hold on, how is this water not clean?”
“There is sand in it, and it smells of mud.”
Lao Jin handed the teapot to him with a look of disgust, and Gu ShuBai sniffed the top of the teapot. He then looked at the cup of tea, and everyone was a little confused.
It was just some dirty water. Why was he looking at it for so long?
He lifted the cup and took a sip before immediately spitting it out and putting the cup back on the table, “There’s something wrong with the water. Carefully smell it. Is it really the smell of mud?”
Everyone picked up their cups from the table. Gu HuaiJiang even took a sip, and Gu ShuBai immediately rushed to stop him.
“Father!”
Gu HuaiJiang was very familiar with the taste of muddy water, and this water did not just taste like it contained mud.
Gu HuaiJiang spat the water back into the cup, “Immediately give the order for the armies to throw away all food and tea made using this water. They are not to use it again.”
“All of the water sources at the camp are to be sealed, and the soldiers are not permitted to use the water to make food!”
“ShuBai, lead the military doctors to inspect the wells and check on the water quality!”
