Chapter 993: Who Would Have Thought? (Happy Birthday, Zhu Moyan)

After glancing at her, a few veteran soldiers said: "No money, no treatment!"

Pan Yun looked regretful: "I saw you're soldiers, you've been wounded defending the country, and I couldn't bear to see you suffer from rheumatism rekindling old injuries, so I…"

"Go away, go away, a turtle chanting sutras—I won't listen! No money, no treatment—even if you drop dead right now, I won't treat you!"

"Heh, I don't believe in this nonsense! I won't take your money—I'll cure you anyway! Will you let me treat you or not?!"

The veteran soldiers lifted their eyelids, sizing her up with skeptical expressions: "Where did this fool come from? Are you really not charging, or just tricking us first then billing later?"

One said: "Don't believe her—why would cakes fall from the sky? I think she's a fraud."

The veteran who had just stood up sat back down.

Pan Yun snapped her fingers, and a stool slid out from under one veteran's buttocks, instantly relocating behind Pan Yun.

Pan Yun straightened her robe and sat down.

The veteran who lost his stool grunted, rolled up his sleeves, ready to fight, but someone grabbed him: "Don't be impulsive, don't be impulsive!"

Pan Yun looked up, scanning the veteran who'd lost his stool, then said: "Do you wake up every morning with a dry mouth, sore lower back, weak knees, and occasional dizziness and blurred vision at noon? Every winter and spring, your old wounds itch and burn, turning red and swollen?"

The veteran blurted out: "How do you know?"

Pan Yun confidently stroked her chin, mimicking her senior brother's mannerism as she swayed her head: "Heaven's secrets cannot be revealed—but tell me, am I right or not?"

His comrades all stared at the veteran, eyes sharp.

The veteran choked for a moment, then nodded: "Yes, but…"

"If you agree, then you agree!" Pan Yun slapped her thigh. "Will you let me treat you? No charge!"

One veteran squinted and asked: "No charge for diagnosis, or no charge for medicine too?"

Pan Yun: "Both!"

The veteran: "What about acupuncture or other treatments—do those cost money?"

Pan Yun: "No."

"If you can't cure us today, what about follow-up diagnosis, medicine, and acupuncture fees?"

Pan Yun's face darkened: "I'm here—I won't charge. If I'm not here, you can't even ask for it."

The veterans finally shifted their stools closer to Pan Yun: "Come on, come on, treat us!"

Pan Yun hummed twice, felt their pulses, then immediately pulled out her needle case and pierced them all like hedgehogs.

Soon after the needles went in, each felt a warm current rise within them; the persistent itching and numbness in their old wounds faded considerably, easing their tension.

As she treated them, Pan Yun said: "You're weighed down by worries, your hearts are closed—even with medicine, your wounds won't heal. You should learn to let go."

The veterans sat still as she pricked them, chuckling: "Little Daoist Priest, how old are you to lecture us on letting go? Wait till you're our age—you'll see, life's problems don't vanish just because you decide to let go."

Pan Yun: "Then talk to someone. Speak it out—your mind will ease, and your body will benefit."

"Wrong again," the veteran said. "Military matters are all classified—how can we tell outsiders? That's a capital offense."

Pan Yun rolled her eyes: "Please. I just passed by—through a door, I heard you cursing the thousand-household commander, saying he's withholding your monthly grain, you're about to drink northwest wind. If that's classified, then the whole city's drowning in secrets."

The veteran burst into laughter: "You're a funny little Daoist Priest—trying to pry into our military secrets?"

Pan Yun pressed his shoulder, warning: "Don't move—if you shift the needles, you'll die screaming."

The veteran froze. Another veteran chuckled: "Little Daoist Priest, if you want to ask something, just ask outright—no need to beat around the bush. You're right—we don't have any secrets in our thousand-household unit."

Pan Yun's eyes flickered. After finishing the acupuncture, she squatted before them and smiled: "I do have a question for you. Where are the convicts exiled to Chaozhou by the imperial court and assigned to the military stationed?"

"Why do you ask?"

"My father offended the corrupt eunuch Wang Zhen during the Zhengtong era and was exiled to Chaozhou. I was too young then to help. Now I've grown up and came to find him. I went to the county office—they ignored me. I went to the hundred-household office—they ignored me too. So I came here, to the thousand-household office."

The veterans relaxed, laughing: "That's easy—I'll check for you later. I thought it was something big. Tell me your father's name and the year he was exiled, and I'll look it up. Come back tomorrow."

Pan Yun agreed at once, chatted with them a while longer, then removed the needles. The veterans felt their bodies noticeably lighter.

Pan Yun left them two bottles of medicine and took her leave, agreeing to meet again tomorrow.

As soon as Pan Yun turned away, she left the city directly, chose a direction, and flew on her pot to Xian Long Bay.

Chaozhou grows rice; now all the paddy fields have been harvested, and even the cut stalks have sprouted new green shoots.

At this moment, on the eastern side of Xian Long Bay—belonging to Feng Ban Cheng—many children and teenagers were working, dressed in short jackets and shorts, barefoot or wearing straw sandals, cutting the new green shoots, barely a palm's length tall.

If they eat two meals a day, this would be breakfast time.

Sure enough, they gathered their harvest and headed home.

Pan Yun followed them for a long time, finally finding a clustered village in a mountain hollow.

She glanced at the banner hanging at the village entrance and knew they were military households.

Pan Yun slipped silently into the village, passing behind a kitchen.

The kitchen was a half-room built of wood; through the gaps, she saw a boy washing rice stalks, chopping them, and tossing them into a pot. The porridge inside was already cooked—coarse husks still clinging, thin and watery—but once the stalks went in, the vegetable porridge thickened quickly.

Pan Yun clenched her back molars.

Old Zhu once took great pride—he fed a million soldiers without costing the state a single grain of rice.

His garrison farming policy consumed one-tenth of the nation's farmland; he established strict garrison regulations: on the frontier, three-tenths guarded the walls, seven-tenths farmed;

in the interior, two-tenths guarded, eight-tenths farmed.

Soldiers guarding the walls had no land taxes or labor duties; military households who farmed each had land to till—not only enough to eat, but enough to support the wall-guarding soldiers too.

These military households were the recruitment pool; to ensure their strength, he gave them fertile land so they could eat well and grow robust bodies;

he required them to train regularly during off-seasons, so when war broke out, they could adapt instantly to the battlefield;

he established military academies so their children could learn to read, study military texts, and practice martial arts from childhood—to cultivate future generals…

He did all this—yet he never imagined that just seventy years after his death, his military household seedlings couldn't even get enough to eat, were yellow and emaciated, let alone join the army or face the frontlines—any random person could knock them down. (End of chapter)