Chapter 1089: Ning Chengs secre (1/2)

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What distracted Han Yunxi was none other than Ning Cheng’s hand! If she hadn’t pulled on it today, she would never notice it had a problem. Perturbed, she didn’t want to make any preposterous guesses but stopped to ask, “Gu Beiyue, come have a look. What’s wrong with Ning Cheng’s hand?”

“Hand? What is it?” Gu Beiyue asked curiously.

Ning Cheng’s wounds were mostly concentrated on his body, not his limbs. The new and old scars were mostly whip injuries besides the stab wound Jun Yixie had inflicted on his shoulder. The explosion just then had injured Gu Beiyue, but not Ning Cheng.

“It seems…” Han Yunxi didn’t know how to say it. “Well, it just looks wrong somehow, you have a look.”

“The palm?” Gu Beiyue changed places to take Ning Cheng’s hand. He was about to examine it when Han Yunxi cut in.

“No, it’s the place between his arm and shoulder, the bones and muscles there.”

Gu Beiyue released Ning Cheng’s hand to examine the location, then cried in alarm, “It’s been heavily injured in the past--at least five years prior. It didn’t heal correctly and greatly damaged the muscles. It must have been a severe tear through the tissue that caused necrosis. Moreover, his upper arm...is a prosthetic limb.”

Now even Long Feiye was looking over. Gu Beiyue had to be the best physician in the world. Although he was stunned by Ning Cheng’s arm, he didn’t express it, but only spoke in low tones so that only Long Feiye on the side could hear. The rest of the group didn’t hear a thing.

After all, these were Ning Cheng’s private affairs.

“His hand is disabled?” Long Feiye was very surprised.

A severe injury to the shoulder that healed incorrectly, plus a fake upper arm, meant that Ning Cheng couldn’t use much strength in this arm at all. Daily tasks wouldn’t be an issue, but martial arts and the battlefield would render this arm useless. Ning Cheng was none other than the leader of an entire clan and its commanding general. He was meant to kill in the field! Leaving aside everything else, he could only kill by holding a sword in one hnd and the reins in another! How could a useless arm like his bear the shock of a horse if it spooked?

Han Yunxi and Long Feiye had never heard of General Ning Cheng’s arm being crippled, much less his upper arm being a fake. Just how had Ning Cheng hid this from the Tianning army and Di Clan over the past few years? If he wasn’t unconscious today, who would expect this after taking his left hand?

Now Han Yunxi couldn’t help but think back to all her interactions with Ning Cheng. She couldn’t recall anything out of place, but she’d never paid attention to his hand either! She only witnessed him swordfighting with both hands, but who would expect he only had the strength of one arm?

“Is it curable?” Han Yunxi asked.

Gu Beiyue examiend it carefully before he said with a helpless air, “Princess, it’s too late...even a miracle pill would only yield average results. Even if we did heal him, there wouldn’t be a point.” So speaking, he gestured to Ning Cheng’s upper arm and explained, “This whole section is a prosthetic. If this subordinate guessed right, Ning Cheng must have been severely injured in the past. All the bones in his upper arm would’ve been crushed to pieces to have him replace it like this.”

Han Yunxi understood. They couldn’t give him a replacement upper arm. Even modern marrow transplants were incapable of growing an entire bone. Thus, Ning Cheng was doomed to have no strength in his left hand. Faced with this reality, she and Gu Beiyue fell silent. Since Ning Cheng had hidden this fact--and so exceptionally well---they were better off playing ignorant than exposing his secret.

This was both a matter of privacy and self-dignity.

“I don’t know a thing!” Han Yunxi muttered before taking her needles to look for acupoints.

Naturally, Long Feiye understood too. Gu Beiyue set down Ning Cheng’s hand and had no more curiosity to inspect the other, either. However, he never checked Ning Cheng’s left palm. If he did, he could have found that it was useless too, because a tiny acupuncture needle was hidden beneath the skin, the softest, most unbridled part of Ning Cheng’s hidden heart.

Han Yunxi focused her attentions on the acupoints and carefully inserted needles. Long Feiye stood by as an assistant, following her instructions. In the past, this was Gu Beiyue’s job! Who would have thought it’d fall to Long Feiye’s hands one day?

Noting that Han Yunxi didn’t make any big movements, Gu Beiyue silently crouched by her side to start treating her shoulder wound. She glanced over as soon as he touched her.

“Princess, please don’t worry. This subordinate won’t disrupt you,” he smiled.

What a familiar scene! In the past, Han Yunxi had been whipped by Great General Mu at his estate before sporting the wounds to treat Mu Qingwu. Gu Beiyue had been by her side then and treated her injuries while she tended to her patient. Back then, Han Yunxi was stunned by Gu Beiyue’s skills because he hadn’t disturbed her a bit. Moreover, his treatment didn’t even hurt.

Years later and much had changed. Gu Beiyue was no longer the imperial physician of the past, but his smile was the same as ever. She grinned back and resumed her treatment. Gu Beiyue’s faint smile and familiar movements didn’t affect Han Yunxi’s movements at all. It had been a long, long time since he’d seen her focused, professional side so up close. Even though he was no longer than imperial physician and she no Qin Wangfei, he still saw her as a marvel, fascinating enough to stir his heart.

Her brows were creased in the same old way.

However, Gu Beiyue quickled reined in his thoughts of the past and glanced at Long Feiye, who happened to looking over.