Chapter 41 - Except for the small loyal dog, everyone is stressing me out.

At midnight, Doctor Lu knocked on the door, I was still half awake but Ye Tan had already gotten up to answer. I heard the Doctor say that the life of that seriously injured man was hanging on by a thread and he needed a few precious medicinal ingredients to extend his life, they weren’t some sort of panacea and could be obtained with some money, but Yangxi was not a large city and he feared there usually weren’t many medicine shops in town, and he couldn’t afford to waste time travelling to the surrounding large region.

I was a bit worried, and Doctor Lu spoke again: “Perhaps some of Yangxi’s rich families have some stocked.”

Of the rich families here I only know Yang Qingzhou, and I believed our friendship could maybe probably be considered pretty good, so I should be able to borrow some medicinal ingredients from him and make up for it in the future. I hurriedly got Doctor Lu to write out the prescription and dragged Ye Tan to go to Yang Lake.

Before we left, I stole a quick glance at Ye Lan’s room. The lights were on but nobody was speaking, so I didn’t know if they had been up all night or not.

We stole a boat to cross to the island in the centre of the lake, but the main doors of the Yang Lake Residence were locked. We knocked on the door and asked the young servants on night duty to report that we wanted to go in, and a short time later we were welcomed inside the manor.

As we came in, Yang Qingzhou had hurriedly gotten up, he was wearing a broad gown tied by a loose belt, and there was still some drowsiness in his eyes, but he wasn’t angry for having been disturbed in the middle of the night and he still smiled and apologised for his lack of manners, his self-cultivation was indeed excellent. However, a few discontented mutters came from Yang Su inside his room, perhaps complaining that we were being too noisy.

Yang Qingzhou lowered his voice and said: “My younger brother is irritable when woken up, let us talk in another place.”

We had just gone out into the courtyard when I told him in full detail how other people came to steal the sword, how we accidentally injured a man and now he was in imminent danger, and how we needed his help.

Yang Qingzhou bowed his head and looked at the prescription, but he didn’t reply how I expected, and instead asked: “Must you save him?”

I was confused: “Why do you say such a thing?”

Yang Qingzhou smoothed out the fabric on his lapel, and slowly said: “These scoundrels have repeatedly invaded your territory, putting Young Master Jun in danger with their sinister motives, it could be said that his death would not be worth caring about. This inside information is unknown, and the thugs that came were not good, so why would Young Master Jun personally come pay me a visit this late at night and offer to owe me a favour?”

His words confused me, and I didn’t understand what he said, so I asked: “You don’t want to?”

“Since Young Master Jun opened his mouth, I’ve had no reason to refuse.” He turned the conversation around, “It’s just that I can’t understand why Young Master Jun must do this.”

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1 Means trash, since it sounds like 垃圾 lājī which is literally trash/garbage. Top.