998 A Base of Herbs

"So, you are only doing this to preserve the ecosystem here?" a good-looking young woman among the outsiders asked.

"Preserve the ecosystem?" Miao Xihe asked. "Well, I guess you could say that. I'd like very much to keep this place as it is, and I'm not referring to just nature. I'm also referring to our culture and daily living. I do not wish to see too big of a change in those parts. If changes were to take root, getting back to how things were would be difficult."

"I reckon there are a lot of rumors regarding our village circulating outside, and there are also a lot of misunderstandings."

"There are indeed a lot of rumors, and most of them are anything but good things," the leader, who was tall and stout, replied.

"I can understand why," Miao Xihe said.

"Chief Miao, there are also those from the village who still want to see the outside world," the leader of the outsiders said.

The outsiders had talked to a few villagers after coming in. There were indeed people among them who expressed their desire to see what was outside, especially those who were younger.

"Well, you people did bring things from outside when you came, and curiosity is part of human nature," Miao Xihe said. "I can understand that much."

After the conversation, the outsiders present had gained new insight regarding the head of the old village. While the man was conservative, his motives did not seem to be how it was rumored outside. They posted their thoughts on the internet. Shortly after, responses were claiming that they had been bought over and knew nothing about what was actually happening.

"Those people probably have never been here before and are just speculating things out of thin air," the young man, who was their leader, said while pointing at the posts.

"There are people throwing mud at this place and Chief Miao on purpose," the young woman in the group said. "He must have gotten on someone's bad side."

"What we know is but the tip of the iceberg," the leader said. "While we've talked with Chief Miao, we hardly know much about him. What he said might not be the truth, and hell, the words might not even be his actual thoughts."

"Yeah, that much is true."

"Just think about it," the leader of the group said. "The village was so isolated and so many strange things happened to the first batch of outsiders who came here, yet he said nothing about that to us and did not bother explaining what happened. I reckon most of those happenings had to do with him. Anyway, we're just posting our thoughts and opinions. These people on the internet can say whatever they want about it. There is no need for us to argue."

"Yeah, you're right, but still, that place really is beautiful, especially that lake during sunset. Boy, that is just nothing short of fantastical!"

"People do like beautiful places."

In the village somewhere in Lianshan County, thousands of miles away…

"Can you see if something could be done about this disease of mine?" a middle-aged man asked.

Wang Yao was there to treat a disease, which was something rather common—baldness.

"I could treat this, but there are habits you would need to kick," he said.

There were a great many reasons why people became bald, including emotional problems, stimulation from medication, and imbalance in nutritional intake. The man before Wang Yao was bald because his Yin and Yang balance were skewed. It caused problems with blood circulation. Those problems were reflected in his thinning hair, which was gradually making him bald.

"What habits would you be referring to?" he immediately asked, hoping there was truly a cure.

"I take it that you like eating meat," Wang Yao said.

"Yes."

"Reduce your intake of oily foods as much as possible from here on out," Wang Yao said. "Keep a clean and light diet, and kick the habit of smoking and drinking."

"Well, umm, what does smoking have to do with baldness?" the man asked in shock.

"Heh heh, a butterfly fanning its wings in one corner can end up causing hurricanes in another corner of the world," Wang Yao said. "It is the butterfly effect, so to speak. Smoking is no good for the body to begin with. Kicking the habit will do you a lot of good and no harm."

"Alright, alright, I'll quit," the man promised.

"I'll give you some medicine for your case," Wang Yao said.

He thought for a bit and wrote down a prescription. It was to mainly adjust the balance of Yin and Yang, reinforce Yin elements, and stabilize his mind.

Wang Yao had an easier way of treating his condition, which was to spray some diluted muscle growing powder on his head. That would have probably made a considerable amount of hair start growing within a few days. However, the ingredients for making that medicine were simply too precious. Using them to treat such a condition was a terrible waste.

"Well, Dr. Wang, how long will it take for the meds to work?" the man asked.

"If you pay close attention to your daily life and do what I told you, you'll see results after a month of finishing the medicine," Wang Yao replied.

"That's good to hear," the man replied.

Few people sought medicine from doctors to treat baldness.

Not long after the man left, someone else from the village rushed into the clinic.

"Yao, look into this for me!" A man in his 40s pressed against his reddened right shoulder, which was swollen from burns.

"Were you scalded by hot water?" Wang Yao asked.

"Yeah, I knocked over a flask by accident, and there was newly boiled water in it," the middle-aged man said. "It really hurts. I feel like my entire arm is on fire."

"Hold on."

Wang Yao went to get a small scoop of muscle growing power. He diluted it using cooled water before applying it to the patient's shoulder.

The man felt his shoulder immediately start cooling. The burning pain in his arm had considerably dissipated.

"What kind of medicine is it, Yao?" the man asked with a shocked expression. "This is amazing!"

"Herbs," Wang Yao replied with a smile. It was a medicine made using magic herbs, as well as a prescription provided by the system. It was only natural for it to have such a surreal effect.

"Alright, you're done." after applying the paste, Wang Yao bandaged the wound.

"Are you done already?" The man was startled.

"Yeah, just be careful, and don't touch the wound," Wang Yao said. "I'll reapply the medicine for you tomorrow afternoon."

"Will do. Thanks a lot." The man paid the fees and left.

I should probably try making something more common.

When he treated that patient, some problems came to Wang Yao's mind. He called Zheng Weijun.

"A medicine for burns is definitely a commonly used one. Right, sure. Yeah, I'll have someone get to it." After hanging up, Zheng Weijun immediately started addressing the problem Wang Yao had told him about over the phone.

They had talked about commonly used medicines, especially the type that needed to have very large quantities in the market.

It was a way to spread medicine all over the world.

Reputation and word of mouth were gained if the medicine worked well. Adding new medicines and marketing to a solidly built reputation opened up new markets for them. There was no better way to quickly build a reputation through word of mouth than to use commonly used medicines as breakthroughs.

Zheng Weijun went to the clinic that afternoon.

"Master, here are the stats I got my people to gather," he said.

"Cardiovascular type, huh?" Wang Yao scanned the list. He found those types of medicines to be in great demand, so much so that they seemed to be second only to the ones used for treating fevers and colds.

"Yes, according to the latest statistics, these diseases are the number one killer among all diseases, and it seems that more and more young people are being afflicted by such diseases," Zheng Weijun said. "Our country has a large population, which makes the number of people afflicted with illnesses like high blood pressure, hyperlipidemia, myocardial infarction, and so on to be higher than usual. If you take some time to visit hospitals, you'll find the places are filled with people battling these illnesses." He had been in the pharmaceutical business for a long time, and he had frequently been in contact with people in the hospitals. That allowed him to get to know what was going on in those places in detail.

"Does that mean medicines addressing such illnesses would sell like hotcakes?" Wang Yao asked.

"Do you mean those that have to do with cardiovascular types of illnesses?"

"Yeah," Wang Yao said.

"They would definitely sell like hot cakes," Zheng Weijun matter-of-factly replied.

Medicines had to be effective to rack up great sales. In that particular area, Wang Yao had absolute faith in the young man standing before him. He almost seemed to have blind faith in him.

The Primordial Spirit Soup worked exceptionally well, and sales had practically exploded. Demand for the medicine was far higher than what they were able to supply. Many places intended to sell the medicines at higher prices. There seemed to be some scalpers out to make a quick buck.

The Heat Clearing Powder was also put into mass production, and the first batch was already delivered. Responses from people who had purchased it were coming in that the medicines worked well. Test runs of the Antidote Pill had also been a success. Preparations were underway to get the medicine into mass production. From the looks of things, it was only a matter of time before the company began seeing huge sales profits.

"I'll figure out the formulas needed," Wang Yao said. "What you need to do now is secure the procurement of herbs. We'll need our own wild-herb base."

"That was also something I have been thinking about lately," Zheng Weijun said. "I have contacted a few large medical companies down south. They would be responsible for providing us with the best raw materials. That was the first step to ensure production numbers. I have also been looking into one such base for cultivating wild herbs, which is located in Wannan."

"Wannan, huh? That's quite a distance from here," Wang Yao muttered.

That place was thousands of miles away from Lianshan County, so it was quite far away. Then again, there were a good number of mountains there, which were suitable for cultivating some breeds of wild herbs.