Chapter 396: You're Just Lazy

Lin Feng brought Old He into the study.

Seeing the large quantity of Yongle Encyclopedias placed on the bookshelves of the study, Old He's eyes widened.

He went to the Guo Jia Museum, but he didn't see so many Yongle Encyclopedias there.

Soon, his gaze stopped at the shelf holding the medical volumes.

"Quick, bring the towel over!"

Old He shouted.

Guo Yanqiu was much smarter at this time.

She took a wet towel from the maid's hands.

After wiping his hands and waiting for the moisture to dry, Old He then pulled out a Yongle Encyclopedia.

He then sat at the desk, took out his glasses from his pocket, and began to look through it.

"Great! Excellent!"

"So that's how it is! That's how it is!"

"Excellent!"

"Originally, originally the prescription we've been using has always been wrong!"

Old He became completely absorbed in the book, occasionally letting out exclamations.

Outside the study, in the courtyard.

Lin Feng lay on the recliner, holding a small teapot in his hand.

He occasionally sipped some cool tea, feeling very refreshed.

Guo Yanqiu, fearing to disturb Old He's reading, ran over to Lin Feng's place.

She brought a stool and sat beside Lin Feng.

"Brother-in-law..."

Guo Yanqiu called out.

Lin Feng glanced at Guo Yanqiu's long legs in blue jeans and said lightly, "What's the matter?"

Guo Yanqiu grabbed Lin Feng's arm and shook it, saying, "Can I borrow a few Yongle Encyclopedias to take back and read? The medical volume sections."

Lin Feng shook his head, "Definitely not! Do you believe that if you take it and someone finds out, it will disappear by tomorrow morning? If you want to read it, come to my brother-in-law's study."

Guo Yanqiu frowned and nodded.

She hadn't thought of that.

She knew the Yongle Encyclopedia was precious.

"Also..."

Lin Feng reminded, "There's also a confidentiality issue here; I can let trustworthy people see these books."

"For example, your teacher He Chang, this old man is worthy of respect; your choice of teacher is still good!"

"If the contents of these books were directly spread out, letting others see them, especially the people of Han Guo and Little Japan... to put it bluntly,"

"Their Traditional Chinese Medicine environment over there is much better than ours here!"

"By then, if they develop a complete TCM system, our losses would be too great..."

Guo Yanqiu said, "You're worrying too much; my teacher said that Traditional Chinese Medicine is what it is because of its close relationship with this land, and most of the medicinal herbs used in TCM can only be produced here."

Lin Feng tapped Guo Yanqiu's head, frowning, and said, "That's because they haven't learned to the root; truly understanding TCM, one would realize that all things can be used as medicine."

"For example, a blade of grass by the roadside, if you observe its growth pattern, you might discover that this grass, stepped on countless times by passersby and self-healing countless times, when used as medicine, can let a person's wound heal quickly."

"You see, eating durian causes internal heat, but its shell can reduce heat."

"Eating too many lychees causes internal heat, right?"

"Boiling lychee shells to drink water can, however, dispel that heat."

"You study both Chinese and Western medicine; use Western medicine to explain to me, what is the principle behind this?"

"..."

Guo Yanqiu didn't know how to answer for a moment.

Lin Feng then said, "Western medicine only analyzes the components of these things, such as what nutrients, what rare substances, etc."

"Then it attributes the efficacy to those components."

"The ginseng and cordyceps used by our ancestors to treat illness have been questioned, even denied, from a nutritional perspective by them."

"This involves the principle of mutual generation and restriction; in my view, only water can contain fire—don't you think that's the principle?"

Guo Yanqiu nodded.

Then she said, "Brother-in-law, please keep talking; I want to listen."

"What shall we talk about?"

"Listen to you criticize the examples where nutrition science questions Traditional Chinese Medicine!"

"Let me think..."

Lin Feng thought for a moment, then laughed and said, "I've got one! An expert online, from a nutrition angle, said that a woman who has given birth and is observing the postpartum confinement, drinking old hen stew, the soup's nutrition isn't as much as the meat, right?"

Guo Yanqiu nodded.

Lin Feng laughed and said, "An old hen raised for years lays eggs just like giving birth; laying eggs for many years... is like roadside grass being trampled yet stubbornly growing; from a production perspective, the old hen's body carries a kind of energy that helps women recover their bodies quickly after childbirth."

"Our ancestors discovered thousands of years ago that the old hen greatly nourishes women observing postpartum confinement; of course, adding some medicinal herbs makes the effect even better."

"Moreover!"

"Many people say that the Cantonese people's soup-making is wasteful, with no nutrition in the soup."

"Are they doing it for the nutrition in the soup?"

"Wrong! They are consuming the qi in the soup."

In ancient times, that place was filled with miasma, the environment harsh, with insufficient qi circulating in the body to resist the miasma?

But why drink the soup instead of eating it directly?

The ancients said, "The highest good is like water." Water carries all things, it is the mother of life. These energies are all blended into the soup...

Brother-in-law, you should also study Chinese medicine! I feel your talent is better than mine.

Guo Yanwen widened her eyes, looking at Lin Feng with admiration.

She felt Lin Feng's words made a lot of sense.

I don't want to, I'm too tired, no time—let you professionals handle these professional matters!

Lin Feng shook his head.

Guo Yanqiu pouted and said: "I summed it up in one word: lazy, brother-in-law you are lazy! I want to use a few diligent little bees to brew soup for you, to drive away your laziness!"

Lin Feng shook his head and said: "If you give me laziness‑driving little bees, it won't work. Because diligent little bees are all workers, I am the boss, workers and bosses are natural opposites; according to the principle of mutual generation and restriction, bee soup is useless for me."

In arguing, ten Guo Yanqius still aren't a match for Lin Feng.

Even in her own professional field, Guo Yanqiu can't outtalk Lin Feng.

She was also scolded, and could only retreat.

She returned to the study, picked up the Yongle Encyclopedia that records medicine, and began to read.

The ancients recorded medicine in Classical Chinese; if we were to describe it in vernacular, a few dozen words could expand into tens of thousands of words for modern readers.

Guo Yanqiu suddenly realized that to study Chinese medicine well, she also needed to systematically learn Classical Chinese.

But compared to studying medicine, understanding the text is much simpler.

Old He sat in the study all day.

Only when evening approached and the sky was about to darken did he come to his senses.

Then he discovered Lin Feng was taking his pulse.

Old He looked astonished and said: "Mr. Lin, what are you doing?"

Lin Feng calmly said: "I'll check your qi and blood to see how long you can live, whether you're suitable to cooperate with me to promote Chinese medicine."

Old He gave a wry smile and said: "I'm just over seventy, no bad habits, I can probably last another ten or so years!"

Lin Feng withdrew his hand, nodded and said: "Old He, your qi and blood are not depleted—excellent! If you have any problems, please come often."

By the way, please look after my niece; don't hesitate to instruct her, scold her if she disobeys, punish her if she makes a mistake.

Old He glanced at Guo Yanqiu and said with a smile: "Mr. Lin, you've misunderstood; I, He Chang, am not the kind who would starve to death for my teacher."

I only wish today's young people would calm down and diligently study the medicine passed down from our ancestors—what a pity!

Old He sighed.

Chinese medicine is easy to learn but hard to master; young people also need to make a living, it's impossible to survive on a meager salary while studying for ten or twenty years, right?

With that time spent learning Western medicine, after a few years one can perform surgeries, with salaries starting at hundreds of thousands.

Lin Feng naturally understood the helplessness hidden in He Chang's sigh.

He had wanted to promise something to He Chang, but after thinking it over, he decided against it.

Because one Old He is not enough.

After a while, when more 'big fish' have been caught, we'll talk about it now.