Chapter 66: Anxious, the critical moment (2/2)

The empress was about to echo her sentiments, but spotted the emperor’s impatience and gave up the idea. She kept the empress dowager company by sitting next to her. Those who waited felt time was long even if it was one more second. Yet inside the room, the bustling Han Yunxi had long lost track of time. She’d already done various necessary examinations on Long Tianmo to verify that she could use anesthetic medicine immediately after cutting him open. He had to be fully unconscious because 1) taking the medicine would make him feel very uncomfortable, and 2) Long Tianmo might not be able to endure it when she used a knife on him. Of course, the most important thing was that she didn’t want Long Tianmo to see too much.

Her detoxification system had a new type of anesthetic that was very easy to use. Before long, Long Tianmo had thoroughly passed out. Gu Beiyue had just started boiling the medicine, a big pack of poisonous herbs cooked into a small bowl of liquid. It really was poisonous, with a very strange flavor. Even Gu Beiyue, who had grown up around piles of medicine since childhood, couldn’t stand it. Luckily, Long Tianmo had fainted away, or else it’d been a hassle to get him to drink the medicine. After it finished boiling, Gu Beiyue took charge of feeding Long Tianmo himself.

Han Yunxi walked to the medicine pot and was about to get rid of the decoction dregs when she halted in place, hesitating. The smell of these toxic dregs were stronger than she imagined! No matter if she hid it in her medicine pouch or Gu Beiyue’s traveling case, it’d still be possible to sniff it out. It’d be hard to explain things if it was discovered.

What to do?

Han Yunxi glanced back at Gu Beiyue, who was completely focused on Long Tianmo, as a complicated look flickered past her eyes. She shifted her position so that her back was to him, blocking his line of sight. Unknown to Han Yunxi, there was a pair of icy eyes staring at her from the ceiling. Long Feiye could tell instantly that Han Yunxi was acting peculiar. He immediately suspected that there was something wrong inside the medicine pot, but he wasn’t knowledgeable enough to tell what.

Could it be that Han Yunxi was hiding something from Gu Beiyue?

At this moment, Han Yunxi grabbed the dregs out with her hands as if to sniff them. However, while Long Feiye was distracted, the dregs in her hands vanished into thin air. Long Feiye abruptly knitted his brows before shifting over a roof tile to look more clearly. He only saw that the dregs in the pot were long gone, while Han Yunxi turned to open Gu Beiyue’s medicine chest to retrieve bag of medicine.

Where did it go?

Did he see wrongly, or did it really disappear into thin air? He thought it over multiple times, but couldn’t figure it out.

—

Hiding the dregs of the poison in her detox system dimension was the safest place. There was no way to smell it from there. Han Yunxi darted a glance at Gu Beiyue, seeing that he was still feeding Long Tianmo the poison. She expelled a breath and felt much more relaxed, before taking out the pre-prepared ingredients she’d stored in his chest. This mix was exactly the combination she’d haphazardly written up in her prescription. She dumped the entire thing into the medicine pot before filling it halfway with water and boiling it anew. After she finished expelling the poison, this medicine should boil into dregs as well. At that time, she’d have nothing to fear when Emperor Tianhui and Han Congan came for their inspections.

After the entire bowl of poison was ingested, Han Yunxi’s gaze turned solemn. Though she was about to perform a very simple surgery, there was still risk involved. The next step was the most crucial, dangerous one. When the poison entered the stomach, it’d start to dissolve Long Tianmo’s fetus in fetu–or what Han Yunxi preferred to call a ‘thing,’ because it was only something that had life but no human form. Thinking this way reduced her sense of committing a crime against a life.

Han Yunxi calmly lifted Long Tianmo’s robes to expose his swollen stomach. Though Gu Beiyue knew she was a doctor right now, he was still tongue-tied seeing such nimble movements. Again, he admired this woman for not being affectedly bashful like other females. Her behavior was reckless, but her heart was very magnanimous. When she did things, it was clear-cut, decisive, and bold.

“Imperial Physician Gu, before I make the cut you can’t speak to me. No matter what happens, you mustn’t disturb me!” Han Yunxi’s tone was very serious.

It took some time for the poison to dissolve inside, but this period of time determined when Han Yunxi should cut. If she was too early, she’d have no way to dissolve all of the fetus in fetu. Too late, and the poison might pose a risk to his internal organs and create new complications or aftereffects.

Han Yunxi wouldn’t allow any of that, nor could she afford to let it happen. Those three people waiting outside the door weren’t meant to be provoked and there was a Han Congan waiting to seize on her mistakes. This step had to succeed! There was no allowance for failure!

Although Gu Beiyue didn’t understand the profound and subtle details, he knew this step was critical. Otherwise, Han Yunxi wouldn’t have raised her second requirement for Emperor Tianhui back then for peace and quiet.

“All right, don’t be too nervous,” Gu Beiyue said, before turning to walk far away to minimize distractions.

Han Yunxi’s line of sight rested on Long Tianmo’s swollen stomach, her gaze solemn and focus. She immediately activate the detox system’s deep-level scanners to observe the poison in Long Tianmo’s stomach and tracked its displacement throughout the body. Judging by the toxicity of the poison, she could measure the degree of corrosion against the thing inside. Right now, Han Yunxi was completely concentrated, her entire being emanating a severity that brooked no disturbances that kept people away.

Although the detox system’s deep-level scanners could compute things accurately, she still needed to consciously work with the system. Her focus needed to be 100 percent; otherwise, the scanners would generate errors that would affect the timing for her incision.

Gu Beiyue looked at her breathtaking form from a distance. He liked this woman most of all when she was concentrating. And yet, right at this moment…

-o-

[1] imperial mother (母后) – muhou, the variation on mufei; in this case, the mother is an official consort/empress rather than a concubine.