What she meant by ‘near the water’ was actually a hut, close to a hot spring in the middle of the mountain, limited by a window. Under the moonlight, spirals of hot steam shone rising into the air.
“Brother Lu, take off his clothes, I want to clean his wounds.” Mrs. Shen turned to Jinxia, “Go get a bucket of spring water.”
Jinxia agreed and walked out as fast as she could.
The beggar uncle helped Lu Yi open his clothes. Without suspecting it, Lu Ting discovered two letters in Lu Yi’s pocket that fell out: they were the official government letters. He hurriedly covered them with his robe, wrapped them together, and took a secret and unnoticed glance at Mrs. Shen.
Mrs. Shen turned to look at him.
“This… That…” He stuttered.
“Brother Lu, what are you doing on the ground?” Mrs. Shen said softly, “Get up, hurry, and then go outside and get a few more lanterns. It’s not bright enough here.”
“Alright.”
He presumed she hadn’t noticed. Feeling lucky, the beggar uncle quickly hid the letters under the pile of clothes and went outside to take the lanterns.
After watching him leave, Mrs. Shen glanced at the bundle of clothes, yet she didn’t bother touching them to investigate. She turned to look at Lu Yi, then she was lost in her thoughts.
Outside the house, next to the hot springs, the mist hit the surface of her face. Jinxia took a scoop of water, then looked down at the spring water. The colour of the water was rusty there, therefore she switched to a different place to scoop the liquid. Under the water, there was a shadow that seemed to be swimming and twisting. She was taken aback, then courageously walked closer to see, and finally realized there were little snakes in the water; they were no thicker than a human finger, swimming following the waves, looking lively and nimble.
That place was a paradise for snakes. Jinxia sighed deeply, trying her best not to disturb the little snakes. One scoop after another, she carefully tried to fill the bucket with clean water and brought it to Mrs. Shen.
“Mrs. Shen, the water has been extracted.” She said respectfully.
Mrs. Shen nodded her head and rolled up her sleeves. She scooped the water from the bucket and then washed her hands. After doing so, she took out her hand and shook it a little. Then she said, “Throw this water away, and get a new one.”
“I will do it right away.” Jinxia didn’t say anything else, took the water bucket, and then came back with a new full bucket of water.
Mrs. Shen once again washed her hands, then ordered, “Go get another bucket.”
Jinxia followed her order and went to fetch another bucket of water. She watched as Mrs. Shen washed her hands one more time.
After washing her hands meticulously, Mrs. Shen took the clean cloth next to her and wiped them dry. She then said for the umpteenth time, “Go get another bucket.”
“Alright!” Jinxia didn’t say anything else. She only ran in a hurry to fill the bucket with water.
Watching as she disappeared, Mrs. Shen smiled, turned to the beggar uncle and said, “Even though she is still young, either she has a lot of patience or her love for him is very deep.”
The beggar uncle laughed, “You can keep torturing her, it’s okay, she is very tough.”
Mrs. Shen lifted her head and looked at him. Her face darkened, “Am I a cruel person in Brother Lu’s eyes?”
“No, no, of course not.” The beggar uncle said with a laugh, “I mean, what you do must be right! If you ask me, I will do the same as her.”
Mrs. Shen stared at him for a moment, then said, “What if I ask you to take off your clothes?”
“…….” The beggar uncle raised his hands and covered his chest, his face looked panicked, “This is… not good, it’s not proper… No, more importantly, my body is weak, I can easily catch colds.”
While they were talking, Jinxia had returned to bring the bucket of water inside. Even though the air was cold, because of the spring mist, and her running back and forth several times, sweat was all over her face. She put down the bucket, then looked worried at Lu Yi. At this moment, his upper body was naked. Lying on the bamboo bed, with his eyes still closed, he should have been unconscious.
“Mrs. Shen, the water is here.” Jinxia said with a laugh, using her sleeve to wipe the sweat on her face.
This time Mrs. Shen had no intention to wash her hands. She looked at Jinxia: “I made you run back and forth, surely in your heart, you must be secretly angry with me?”
“How could that be!” Jinxia widened her eyes and denied it, “Am I such an ignorant person? You’re a smart person for being able to avoid the outside world. You must have your own ways of doing things, let alone I’m just bringing a few buckets of water for you to wash your hands… Even if you want to wash your feet, take a shower, change your clothes seven or eight times, in my heart I can’t respect you enough. How can I complain?”
Her whole face looked sincere and serious.
Mrs. Shen, who seemed uncomfortable, chuckled a little, turned to the beggar uncle and said to him, “I haven’t been out of the house for a long time. It seems like the outside world is not the same anymore.”
The beggar uncle said right away, “No, she’s like this. Even if you go out it’s rare to see someone like her.”
Mrs. Shen leaned over and took out a roll of cloth wrapped in the wooden cabinet, spread it out on the table, and under the candlelight, a whole row of silver equipment was shining brightly: tweezers, silver scissors, silver tongs, and even a silver saw…
“Brother Lu, you help me go to the forest and catch a snake.” Mrs. Shen handed him the basket that was sitting beside her while giving orders.
The beggar uncle agreed, took the basket and went out.
Mrs. Shen carried the water bucket inside the room, took out a clean handkerchief, dipped it in water, then wiped the wounds on Lu Yi’s back clean.
The hot spring water was no ordinary water: when it hit the wound, the skin around it turned red. Jinxia saw Lu Yi’s eyebrows tightened, sure that he had to be in so much pain!
The wound was cleaned several times, until the skin around it was red and bled repeatedly. Only then did Mrs. Shen use a small silver knife with a very sharp blade, cutting the wound open, then taking a thin layer of flesh from the wound.
In an instant, blood flowed out like a river.
Jinxia looked at Lu Yi on the side. Her heart kept shrinking even more, seeing Lu Yi’s hands clenched tightly into a fist in a half-conscious state, the pain had to be unbearable. She couldn’t help but reach out to hold his hand. Lu Yi unexpectedly grabbed her hand in a tight grip.
Mrs. Shen carefully put the cut flesh into a silver tray. At that time, the beggar uncle came in with the snake he caught, opening the lid of the basket to invite the little green snake to crawl out.
With the smell of blood as bait, the small green snake shifted its body and slithered towards the silver tray. After circling it several times, in the end, it bit the piece of flesh and swallowed it into its stomach.
Seeing the snake eating it, Mrs. Shen let out a sigh of relief, after which she watched the changes in the snake with extreme attention.
After the green snake swallowed Lu Yi’s flesh into its stomach, its original bright green colour, which had made its smooth body shine, started to fade into a gray tone, from head to tail.
The bright green snake had now turned into a gray snake, but the tip of its tail had remained green and was twisting in the air, which seemed a bit interesting.
“Alright, send him back.” Mrs. Shen returned the little snake in the basket. Her eyes were filled with affection, “In a few days, the poison will dissolve by itself and it will return to its original colour.”
Jinxia couldn’t help but ask, “You mean, this snake can eliminate the poison? He can be saved?”
Mrs. Shen replied, “Logically he should be, but how can he be compared to my snake? Whether he can be saved or whether he can live are two different things. What can be saved may not be able to live, it all depends on his fate.”
Jinxia held Lu Yi’s hand tightly, she nodded and looked at Mrs. Shen, “He will live, he has such a fate.”
Mrs. Shen looked at her for a moment and said, “There are some things that I need to explain to you first. As you have seen earlier, when the snake was faced with poison, its colouring was removed. When a human wants to treat this poison, his skin must be peeled off from all over his body, if he can’t stand it and eventually give up, he will die. At that time, don’t blame me.”
“I will not, I will not let him give up and die, let alone blaming you. You were just trying to cure him.”
Mrs. Shen nodded. From her pocket she took out a small flute and pressed it close to her mouth; a strange melody came out of it: strange because the tone was similar to a melody but it was not melodic, inconsistently high and low…
In her heart, Jinxia thought that people with high skills were indeed not the same as common people. She hesitantly looked at the beggar uncle, and was about to ask him about this unpleasant song, whether she should have applauded or not, but all of a sudden ‘hish, hish’ sounds were heard from outside the window. The sounds made the hair on Jinxia’s head stand up, also considering that these ‘hish, hish’ appeared familiar to Jinxia, giving her goosebumps on her neck.
As soon as the sound of the flute stopped, before Jinxia had the time to let out a sigh of relief, a giant python slithered trying to enter from the window: its entire body was dark red, at night time, its eyes were like burning coals, brightly lit.
“The Goddess of Taohualin Forest!” she shouted these words in her mind, lowering her head on instinct, and subconsciously holding Lu Yi’s hand tighter.
The red python turned its head a few times. Mrs. Shen walked slowly forward, stroking its cold and slippery body, sighed and said, “Since this early spring, there haven’t been any complaints, you’ve been good, haven’t you?”
The red python seemed to be nodding its head.
‘What a thick-skinned snake! He blocked us in the Taohualin Forest a few days ago, and almost fed us to his kids and grandkids. You should be ashamed to say that you were good!’ Jinxia criticized him in her mind.
After stroking it a few times, Mrs. Shen took out a small bronze box, she opened the lid of the box and pushed it in front of the python.
While Jinxia was still amazed, in a single movement the python bit the box, using all its might to chew it, making people worry that this bronze could be chewed until it became flat. Meanwhile, the ‘hish, hish’ sounds that came out of his throat were also a sign that the python was in great pain.
Mrs. Shen approached and seemed very hurt to see this. She waited a while until the python lost all his strength, then she gently placed it in her arms before taking the box off.
Then came the sound of a liquid flowing into the empty bronze box.
Now Jinxia understood, it seemed that Mrs. Shen was collecting snake venom. She wondered whether that python had been nurtured by the woman since it was little for him to be this obedient. The extraction of snake venom was very painful, but it seemed like it did it voluntarily.
Mrs. Shen placed the box to the side, calming the python with gentleness, then she let it go. The giant python retreated from the window, it did not go straight into the forest but slithered into the hot springs.
Collecting snake venoms was not easy, especially using it as poison. Those snake venoms were highly expensive on the black market, Jinxia knew that. At this time, she saw Mrs. Shen taking out a small porcelain bottle from the cupboard, then, from the inside of the bottle, she extracted two long, big sized pills. One of the pills was crushed and mixed with a drop of snake venom, then smeared on Lu Yi’s wound.
The other one was melted with warm water and given to Jinxia in a bowl…
“If he looks pale, or his breath seems rushed, feed him this.” Mrs. Shen gave orders.
Jinxia carefully held the bowl, then gave a worried and attentive look at Lu Yi’s face.
What she meant by ‘near the water’ was actually a hut, close to a hot spring in the middle of the mountain, limited by a window. Under the moonlight, spirals of hot steam shone rising into the air.
“Brother Lu, take off his clothes, I want to clean his wounds.” Mrs. Shen turned to Jinxia, “Go get a bucket of spring water.”
Jinxia agreed and walked out as fast as she could.
The beggar uncle helped Lu Yi open his clothes. Without suspecting it, Lu Ting discovered two letters in Lu Yi’s pocket that fell out: they were the official government letters. He hurriedly covered them with his robe, wrapped them together, and took a secret and unnoticed glance at Mrs. Shen.
Mrs. Shen turned to look at him.
“This… That…” He stuttered.
“Brother Lu, what are you doing on the ground?” Mrs. Shen said softly, “Get up, hurry, and then go outside and get a few more lanterns. It’s not bright enough here.”
“Alright.”
He presumed she hadn’t noticed. Feeling lucky, the beggar uncle quickly hid the letters under the pile of clothes and went outside to take the lanterns.
After watching him leave, Mrs. Shen glanced at the bundle of clothes, yet she didn’t bother touching them to investigate. She turned to look at Lu Yi, then she was lost in her thoughts.
Outside the house, next to the hot springs, the mist hit the surface of her face. Jinxia took a scoop of water, then looked down at the spring water. The colour of the water was rusty there, therefore she switched to a different place to scoop the liquid. Under the water, there was a shadow that seemed to be swimming and twisting. She was taken aback, then courageously walked closer to see, and finally realized there were little snakes in the water; they were no thicker than a human finger, swimming following the waves, looking lively and nimble.
That place was a paradise for snakes. Jinxia sighed deeply, trying her best not to disturb the little snakes. One scoop after another, she carefully tried to fill the bucket with clean water and brought it to Mrs. Shen.
“Mrs. Shen, the water has been extracted.” She said respectfully.
Mrs. Shen nodded her head and rolled up her sleeves. She scooped the water from the bucket and then washed her hands. After doing so, she took out her hand and shook it a little. Then she said, “Throw this water away, and get a new one.”
“I will do it right away.” Jinxia didn’t say anything else, took the water bucket, and then came back with a new full bucket of water.
Mrs. Shen once again washed her hands, then ordered, “Go get another bucket.”
Jinxia followed her order and went to fetch another bucket of water. She watched as Mrs. Shen washed her hands one more time.
After washing her hands meticulously, Mrs. Shen took the clean cloth next to her and wiped them dry. She then said for the umpteenth time, “Go get another bucket.”
“Alright!” Jinxia didn’t say anything else. She only ran in a hurry to fill the bucket with water.
Watching as she disappeared, Mrs. Shen smiled, turned to the beggar uncle and said, “Even though she is still young, either she has a lot of patience or her love for him is very deep.”
The beggar uncle laughed, “You can keep torturing her, it’s okay, she is very tough.”
Mrs. Shen lifted her head and looked at him. Her face darkened, “Am I a cruel person in Brother Lu’s eyes?”
“No, no, of course not.” The beggar uncle said with a laugh, “I mean, what you do must be right! If you ask me, I will do the same as her.”
Mrs. Shen stared at him for a moment, then said, “What if I ask you to take off your clothes?”
“…….” The beggar uncle raised his hands and covered his chest, his face looked panicked, “This is… not good, it’s not proper… No, more importantly, my body is weak, I can easily catch colds.”
While they were talking, Jinxia had returned to bring the bucket of water inside. Even though the air was cold, because of the spring mist, and her running back and forth several times, sweat was all over her face. She put down the bucket, then looked worried at Lu Yi. At this moment, his upper body was naked. Lying on the bamboo bed, with his eyes still closed, he should have been unconscious.
“Mrs. Shen, the water is here.” Jinxia said with a laugh, using her sleeve to wipe the sweat on her face.
This time Mrs. Shen had no intention to wash her hands. She looked at Jinxia: “I made you run back and forth, surely in your heart, you must be secretly angry with me?”
“How could that be!” Jinxia widened her eyes and denied it, “Am I such an ignorant person? You’re a smart person for being able to avoid the outside world. You must have your own ways of doing things, let alone I’m just bringing a few buckets of water for you to wash your hands… Even if you want to wash your feet, take a shower, change your clothes seven or eight times, in my heart I can’t respect you enough. How can I complain?”
Her whole face looked sincere and serious.
Mrs. Shen, who seemed uncomfortable, chuckled a little, turned to the beggar uncle and said to him, “I haven’t been out of the house for a long time. It seems like the outside world is not the same anymore.”
The beggar uncle said right away, “No, she’s like this. Even if you go out it’s rare to see someone like her.”
Mrs. Shen leaned over and took out a roll of cloth wrapped in the wooden cabinet, spread it out on the table, and under the candlelight, a whole row of silver equipment was shining brightly: tweezers, silver scissors, silver tongs, and even a silver saw…
“Brother Lu, you help me go to the forest and catch a snake.” Mrs. Shen handed him the basket that was sitting beside her while giving orders.
The beggar uncle agreed, took the basket and went out.
Mrs. Shen carried the water bucket inside the room, took out a clean handkerchief, dipped it in water, then wiped the wounds on Lu Yi’s back clean.
The hot spring water was no ordinary water: when it hit the wound, the skin around it turned red. Jinxia saw Lu Yi’s eyebrows tightened, sure that he had to be in so much pain!
The wound was cleaned several times, until the skin around it was red and bled repeatedly. Only then did Mrs. Shen use a small silver knife with a very sharp blade, cutting the wound open, then taking a thin layer of flesh from the wound.
In an instant, blood flowed out like a river.
Jinxia looked at Lu Yi on the side. Her heart kept shrinking even more, seeing Lu Yi’s hands clenched tightly into a fist in a half-conscious state, the pain had to be unbearable. She couldn’t help but reach out to hold his hand. Lu Yi unexpectedly grabbed her hand in a tight grip.
Mrs. Shen carefully put the cut flesh into a silver tray. At that time, the beggar uncle came in with the snake he caught, opening the lid of the basket to invite the little green snake to crawl out.
With the smell of blood as bait, the small green snake shifted its body and slithered towards the silver tray. After circling it several times, in the end, it bit the piece of flesh and swallowed it into its stomach.
Seeing the snake eating it, Mrs. Shen let out a sigh of relief, after which she watched the changes in the snake with extreme attention.
After the green snake swallowed Lu Yi’s flesh into its stomach, its original bright green colour, which had made its smooth body shine, started to fade into a gray tone, from head to tail.
The bright green snake had now turned into a gray snake, but the tip of its tail had remained green and was twisting in the air, which seemed a bit interesting.
“Alright, send him back.” Mrs. Shen returned the little snake in the basket. Her eyes were filled with affection, “In a few days, the poison will dissolve by itself and it will return to its original colour.”
Jinxia couldn’t help but ask, “You mean, this snake can eliminate the poison? He can be saved?”
Mrs. Shen replied, “Logically he should be, but how can he be compared to my snake? Whether he can be saved or whether he can live are two different things. What can be saved may not be able to live, it all depends on his fate.”
Jinxia held Lu Yi’s hand tightly, she nodded and looked at Mrs. Shen, “He will live, he has such a fate.”
Mrs. Shen looked at her for a moment and said, “There are some things that I need to explain to you first. As you have seen earlier, when the snake was faced with poison, its colouring was removed. When a human wants to treat this poison, his skin must be peeled off from all over his body, if he can’t stand it and eventually give up, he will die. At that time, don’t blame me.”
“I will not, I will not let him give up and die, let alone blaming you. You were just trying to cure him.”
Mrs. Shen nodded. From her pocket she took out a small flute and pressed it close to her mouth; a strange melody came out of it: strange because the tone was similar to a melody but it was not melodic, inconsistently high and low…
In her heart, Jinxia thought that people with high skills were indeed not the same as common people. She hesitantly looked at the beggar uncle, and was about to ask him about this unpleasant song, whether she should have applauded or not, but all of a sudden ‘hish, hish’ sounds were heard from outside the window. The sounds made the hair on Jinxia’s head stand up, also considering that these ‘hish, hish’ appeared familiar to Jinxia, giving her goosebumps on her neck.
As soon as the sound of the flute stopped, before Jinxia had the time to let out a sigh of relief, a giant python slithered trying to enter from the window: its entire body was dark red, at night time, its eyes were like burning coals, brightly lit.
“The Goddess of Taohualin Forest!” she shouted these words in her mind, lowering her head on instinct, and subconsciously holding Lu Yi’s hand tighter.
The red python turned its head a few times. Mrs. Shen walked slowly forward, stroking its cold and slippery body, sighed and said, “Since this early spring, there haven’t been any complaints, you’ve been good, haven’t you?”
The red python seemed to be nodding its head.
‘What a thick-skinned snake! He blocked us in the Taohualin Forest a few days ago, and almost fed us to his kids and grandkids. You should be ashamed to say that you were good!’ Jinxia criticized him in her mind.
After stroking it a few times, Mrs. Shen took out a small bronze box, she opened the lid of the box and pushed it in front of the python.
While Jinxia was still amazed, in a single movement the python bit the box, using all its might to chew it, making people worry that this bronze could be chewed until it became flat. Meanwhile, the ‘hish, hish’ sounds that came out of his throat were also a sign that the python was in great pain.
Mrs. Shen approached and seemed very hurt to see this. She waited a while until the python lost all his strength, then she gently placed it in her arms before taking the box off.
Then came the sound of a liquid flowing into the empty bronze box.
Now Jinxia understood, it seemed that Mrs. Shen was collecting snake venom. She wondered whether that python had been nurtured by the woman since it was little for him to be this obedient. The extraction of snake venom was very painful, but it seemed like it did it voluntarily.
Mrs. Shen placed the box to the side, calming the python with gentleness, then she let it go. The giant python retreated from the window, it did not go straight into the forest but slithered into the hot springs.
Collecting snake venoms was not easy, especially using it as poison. Those snake venoms were highly expensive on the black market, Jinxia knew that. At this time, she saw Mrs. Shen taking out a small porcelain bottle from the cupboard, then, from the inside of the bottle, she extracted two long, big sized pills. One of the pills was crushed and mixed with a drop of snake venom, then smeared on Lu Yi’s wound.
The other one was melted with warm water and given to Jinxia in a bowl…
“If he looks pale, or his breath seems rushed, feed him this.” Mrs. Shen gave orders.
Jinxia carefully held the bowl, then gave a worried and attentive look at Lu Yi’s face.
