Chapter 37 - 38: Changhe Gang, Nameless Prescription

Chapter 37: Chapter 38: Changhe Gang, Nameless Prescription

After leaving, Su Chen went to the Martial Arts Hall. However, he didn’t see Hong Ming. Hong Ming had gone out on business and probably wouldn’t be back for a while.

When Li Mo learned of the Fang Family caravan’s encounter, he looked Su Chen up and down for a good while, only relaxing after confirming he was unhurt. Then, he insisted on sparring with Su Chen, only to end up utterly demoralized by the outcome.

To Li Mo’s surprise, despite Su Chen not training at the Martial Arts Hall every day, his mastery of the Iron Wire Fist rivaled his own. He couldn’t help but exclaim that Su Chen possessed astonishing talent. Su Chen gave a wry smile but didn’t explain anything. Li Mo didn’t know Su Chen had already broken through. Otherwise, his single exclamation of shock would have undoubtedly turned into two.

After bidding farewell to Li Mo, Su Chen found a restaurant to eat at. Once he had eaten and drunk his fill, he headed home.

As soon as he arrived at his front door, he saw his landlord pasting something on the gate. Before he could walk over for a closer look, the landlord spotted him.

"Su Chen, you’re back just in time. Let me tell you something—move out tomorrow," the landlord said as he looked at Su Chen.

Only then did Su Chen realize that the notice pasted on the gate was an eviction order.

"Mr. Xu, if I remember correctly, I’ve rented this house for less than two months, but I’ve already paid rent for half a year," Su Chen said calmly.

Hearing this, Mr. Xu looked somewhat troubled and replied, "Well, as for the rent, I’m afraid I can’t refund it to you."

"Oh? It was clearly written in black and white. Are you trying to back out of our agreement, Mr. Xu?" Su Chen frowned slightly.

Mr. Xu gave a bitter smile. "Su Chen, it’s not that I don’t want to refund you, but this house has already been bought by the Changhe Gang. They didn’t give me much money for it. Even if I wanted to refund you, I simply can’t!"

"That’s your problem. According to our agreement, if you break the lease early, you need to pay me three times the remaining rent as a penalty," Su Chen stated.

"I... I can’t pay that!" Mr. Xu’s face looked grim as he shook his head.

"If you can’t pay, then I’ll just keep living here!" Su Chen retorted bluntly.

These words made Mr. Xu’s face turn sullen. He looked at Su Chen and said in a deep voice, "Have it your way, then. The people from the Changhe Gang will come to take over the house tomorrow. When you offend them, don’t blame me for not warning you."

Seeing Mr. Xu’s attitude, Su Chen ignored him entirely, walked straight into the house, and shut the door.

Mr. Xu stood at the door for a long time, his face flushing alternately red and pale in anger. He then let out a cold snort and strode away.

He didn’t even have to wait for tomorrow. In the afternoon, people from the Changhe Gang arrived. They were two gang members he had crossed paths with once before. The pair had also brought Mr. Xu along. However, Mr. Xu wasn’t looking too good; he appeared to have been beaten up, his face bruised and swollen.

"Master Su, this old geezer was spouting nonsense and intentionally withholding your rent. We taught him a lesson for you. Here is your refunded rent and the penalty fee—twenty taels in total. Consider the extra as a token of our respect. Please accept it. You can move out whenever you have the time; there’s no rush."

To Su Chen’s surprise, the two men weren’t here to pick a fight, but to apologize. They had even brought Mr. Xu along to apologize with them.

"Alright, I’ll move out within two days!" Su Chen accepted the money, left them with that single sentence, and closed the door.

After the three men left, Su Chen headed out to a property brokerage, planning to look for a new house. During his search, he noticed that housing prices in comparable areas had dropped, and there were more vacant properties than usual. After spending an entire afternoon, Su Chen found a relatively nice courtyard house and rented it for half a year at the cost of five taels of silver.

He signed the contract with the new landlord, and by nightfall, Su Chen had moved into his new home, hauling all his bags and belongings. The new house was in a good location, with many vendors and shops lining the streets, though it was quite far from the Martial Arts Hall.

Moving into the new house didn’t bring Su Chen much joy; rather, he just felt exhausted. He busied himself until late into the night. Only then did he finish washing up and lie down in bed to sleep.

The next day, Su Chen returned the key for his old house to Mr. Xu. On his way back, he dropped by the Martial Arts Hall, but Hong Ming still hadn’t returned. He informed Li Mo about his move, then slipped back home and began to study the secret medical manual in earnest.

In a flash, three days passed.

For these three days, Su Chen had been constantly reading and barely went out. The complexity of the knowledge within the secret medical manual exceeded his expectations. Simply reading through it entirely would take a very long time.

Flipping through casually, Su Chen noticed five or six different handwriting styles in the manual’s notes. This indicated that the manual had been passed down in the Zhu Family for at least five or six generations, so the information it encompassed was naturally vast and convoluted. To truly master it would likely be impossible without decades of dedicated study.

Su Chen knew his own limits. Hoping to match several generations of accumulated knowledge with just a short period of effort was clearly a pipe dream. Thus, his study was targeted. Aside from foundational knowledge, he focused on content related to poisons and Qi Blood. Fortunately, thanks to his prior learning, he could now barely decipher it, taking his first step toward success.

Of course, concocting poisons was still far too difficult for the current Su Chen. In three days, let alone creating deadly toxins, Su Chen had failed numerous times at formulating a simple knockout powder—and that was even with reference material on hand.

However, he didn’t plan on continuing his study of the manual today. Instead, there was an unexpected matter he needed to attend to.

Last night, while studying the manual, he had accidentally discovered a hidden layer between its pages. After extracting the piece of paper hidden inside, he found it was a medical prescription. By comparing the medicinal properties of various herbs, Su Chen confirmed that this prescription was related to Qi Blood.

Upon arriving at this conclusion, Su Chen was extraordinarily pleasantly surprised. Recently, aside from studying poisons, he had placed even more emphasis on Qi Blood. He had hoped that by studying the manual, he might find medicinal ingredients capable of enhancing his Qi Blood. He never expected this prescription for a Nameless Medicine to give him such a massive, delightful surprise.

Therefore, he planned to go to a clinic today to buy the herbs listed on the prescription, test its effects, and see if it worked as he envisioned.

Early in the morning, Su Chen set off. Since he had already memorized the prescription, he went to several different clinics to purchase the herbs separately.

During the purchasing process, Su Chen also verified what he had learned, discovering that some clinics were passing off shoddy herbs as high-quality ones. Infuriated, Su Chen outright refused to buy from those places and switched to others. After wandering all over, he had visited nearly every clinic in the city.

Yet, Su Chen still hadn’t gathered all the necessary ingredients.

"I’m only missing one ingredient—Red Blood Grass. There’s one more clinic ahead, but it’s relatively remote. I don’t know if they’ll have it!" Su Chen muttered, feeling somewhat helpless. Red Blood Grass was simply too hard to find. Many clinics either didn’t stock it or had sold out.

Soon, Su Chen arrived at that clinic. He walked in and asked straight to the point, "Do you have any Red Blood Grass here?"

Hearing this, the clinic apprentice replied, "There’s only one stalk left."

"Alright, give it to me!"

No dramatic incident occurred where a stranger suddenly appeared to contest Su Chen for the last stalk of Red Blood Grass. After paying the silver, Su Chen finally collected the last medicinal ingredient.

Upon returning home, Su Chen began preparing the prescription according to its proportions, a trace of nervousness coloring his expression. He thought, "Hopefully, I can succeed on the first try!"