水蜜桃实验室

“What? You are Lin Yaoshi?” Xu Fan said with a hint of admiration.

“Genuine and authentic,” Boss Lin laughed heartily, nodding at Xu Fan.

In Xu Fan’s mind, there was a memory of Lin Yaoshi, and this Lin Yaoshi was not an ordinary medicinal herb merchant. He was the cornerstone of the traditional Chinese medicine community in the southern part of Yan Country. It wasn’t an exaggeration to call him the Mount Tai and North Star of the medical field.

He had served the great figures of Dragon City in Yan Country for many years, his medical skills almost miraculous, hailed as a walking living fossil of contemporary traditional Chinese medicine. In his lifetime, he had written countless works and published over a hundred medical papers on traditional Chinese medicine in the internationally renowned medical journal, Willow Leaf Saber.

Furthermore, he was the dean of the traditional Chinese medicine branch at Yan Country Medical College. He had taught hundreds of doctors and PhDs in medicine. Many of his disciples were now deans of municipal hospitals in various cities, and the dean of Zhonghai City Hospital was a student from his seventeenth term. Some of Elder Lin’s first five batches of students were even in charge of health departments in Yan Country.

However, upon learning of Lin Yaoshi’s identity, Xu Fan was not overly excited but instead filled with respect for an elderly man who had dedicated his life to the medical field.

Seeing Xu Fan’s calm and profound demeanor, Elder Lin also secretly admired him. One who is imperturbable in honor or disgrace possesses the demeanor of a great general.

“I wonder if I, Lin Yaoshi, have the honor of making friends with you, young man,” Lin Yaoshi said to Xu Fan with a smile.

If Director Cao of Zhonghai City Hospital saw this scene, he would probably be astonished.

Who was Lin Yaoshi? That was the famous stern-faced dean of Yan Country Medical College in those days. Every student in the College of Traditional Chinese Medicine knew Lin Yaoshi for being strict, serious, rigorous, and unapproachable. His students’ achievements were exceptionally good, but he was also famously strict in discipline, so much so that even PhD students in their thirties hardly dared breathe heavily in his presence.

Who would have thought that Lin Yaoshi, now smilingly suggesting friendship to a young man? If his students saw this, they would probably think something was wrong with his mind.

Hearing Lin Yaoshi’s friendly words, Xu Fan smiled slightly and gave a bow, saying, “Elder Lin is a medical authority in Yan Country, and I, Xu Fan, am honored to make your acquaintance.”

“What a Xu Fan, young and talented, much stronger than those foolish-looking students of mine,” Elder Lin said, stroking his beard in praise of Xu Fan.

“Elder Lin is too kind, I’m just an ordinary person, not as exaggerated as you say,” Xu Fan said with a shrug, speaking generously.

“I wonder, young friend, what use you have for buying so many high-quality medicinal herbs. I consider myself quite knowledgeable about traditional Chinese medicine, so I noticed the herbs you are buying are all top-grade, but they are all extremely potent and ferocious. If not moderated with other mild herbs, I fear they will not only fail to cure the illness but might also cause even greater troubles,” cautioned Lin Yaoshi with earnestness.

These past few days Lin Yaoshi had indeed looked over Xu Fan’s prescriptions, and with his expertise, he found Xu Fan’s selection of herbs to be quite peculiar, completely unable to form a standard prescription. If one were to stew them all together haphazardly, the resulting concoction would definitely be lethally toxic.

Medicinal herbs require a balance of Yin and Yang, with a hierarchy of king, minister, assistant, and envoy; it’s not about using the best for everything. Witnessing Xu Fan’s way of inspecting herbs, Lin Yaoshi knew Xu Fan understood medicine, but the ingredients Xu Fan bought couldn’t form a prescription, which made Boss Lin quite curious.

He knew that some people, in order not to reveal their prescription, would purchase their medicine from at least three or four different pharmacies. Moreover, they would deliberately buy quantities and types that were inconsistent with the actual prescription. This way, they could prevent the pharmacy from reverse-engineering the prescription based on the amount of medicine dispensed.

But as Lin Yaoshi observed Xu Fan, he saw him as an open and honorable person, not one to be secretive and petty. Therefore, Elder Lin was even more puzzled.

“Elder Lin, I’m not buying these medicines to concoct them in the usual way. I use them for alchemy,” Xu Fan said frankly to Lin Yaoshi without any reservation.

“What? You know how to perform alchemy?” A hint of astonishment flashed across Lin Yaoshi’s face.

Alchemy is an art that dates back to ancient times in Yan Country. Different from concocting medicine, alchemy not only requires prescriptions and a pill furnace but also requires the alchemist to have Dan Fire in order to successfully produce elixirs. Otherwise, even if an ordinary person were to use the same prescription, what they would produce would just be a heap of burnt mess.

Because elixirs are produced using Dan Fire, their medicinal properties are much stronger than ordinary medicine. Moreover, the presence of Dan Fire can remove some of the side effects of the medicinal materials, avoiding the issue common in traditional medicine where too many ingredients and adjuvants are used to ensure safety, thus restraining each other and reducing the efficacy of the medicine.

However, the alchemy techniques passed down from ancient times in Yan Country were largely lost during the wars decades ago.

In present-day Yan Country, it was nearly impossible to find true alchemy practitioners, even he, considered the North Star of the traditional medicine community, could not find a master who truly knew alchemy.

There was a time when Elder Lin had thought that the legendary alchemy of Yan Country’s history would become just a story from the past, but today he had unexpectedly encountered Xu Fan, the sole inheritor of Yan Country’s intangible cultural heritage of alchemy skills.

“Are you sure you really know how to perform alchemy?” Elder Lin asked Xu Fan cautiously. It wasn’t that he doubted Xu Fan, but his mind was short-circuiting, unable to believe he had actually encountered someone capable of alchemy.

“It’s just alchemy, why would I need to lie?” Xu Fan replied with a light smile, openly and straightforwardly.

“Young friend, I’ve been searching for someone in Yan Country who knew alchemy for nearly thirty years, and you are the first one I’ve seen that can wield alchemy,” Lin Yaoshi said, grabbing Xu Fan’s hand as if he had encountered a long-lost relative.

“Elder Lin, there’s no need to be excited; I won’t run away,” Xu Fan laughed, easing the surge of emotion from Lin Yaoshi.

“Young friend, could I have the honor of witnessing what real ‘Dan Fire’ looks like? My biggest regret in life, Lin Yaoshi, is that I’ve never seen this legendary ‘Dan Fire.’ Without it, Yan Country no longer has any grandmasters capable of alchemy,” Lin Yaoshi earnestly said to Xu Fan, a profound longing in his eyes.

“Since Elder Lin wishes to see it, then I will show my humble skills,” Xu Fan nodded, extended his palm, and summoned Spiritual Energy to ignite a blue flame on his hand.

This flame was not very large, yet it twisted the surrounding air with its heat.