Doctor Le quickly removed the bandages on Chu Junyi's body and turned to throw them into the basin filled with bloodstains beside. Then he raised his hand to signal his apprentice beside him.
The apprentice immediately handed over a scalpel.
Doctor Le seemed to be shocked by Chu Junyi's wound too. His hand holding the scalpel trembled slightly, and he almost didn't know where to start.
Li Xinyue stared round - eyed nervously and almost rushed forward to Doctor Le.
Fortunately, Doctor Le had already buried his head in scraping the rotten flesh, cleaned the wound again, and then began to stitch it up.
Only then did Li Xinyue calm down and sit there patiently. But her heart was still in turmoil, because the man hadn't woken up yet, and it was even hard to say whether he would wake up.
She didn't dare to think too deeply.
As time passed bit by bit, the tense and anxious atmosphere made the already stuffy room even hotter.
The strong smell of blood and medicine slowly spread in the room.
Under the curtain, Doctor Le's bent and busy figure was faintly visible. The long needle and thread in his hand were getting shorter at a visible speed.
Li Xinyue felt weak all over when she saw this. Sewing such a long thread into the flesh stitch by stitch must be extremely painful, and it wasn't just once, because it would hurt again when the stitches were removed.
Chu Junyi, Chu Junyi, what on earth have you been through?
Who did this to you?
"Scissors, scissors!"
The apprentice immediately handed over the scissors.
Doctor Le cut off the redundant thread ends, wiped the sweat off his forehead, massaged his aching old waist, took off the blood - stained gloves made of sheep intestine, and threw them into the copper basin for bloodstains on one side.
The apprentice beside him quickly cleaned the tools and put them away.
After simply tidying themselves up to avoid being impolite, the two of them walked over and bowed to Li Xinyue with their hands down.
Li Xinyue waived the courtesy directly.
Doctor Le instructed, "All the explosion wounds on His Highness the Consort's back have been treated, but he is still not out of danger.
Next, he may have a high fever. Only if he can get through it can we truly say he is out of trouble.
Your Highness needs to send someone to watch over him day and night without leaving for a single step.
I will come for a follow - up diagnosis early tomorrow morning."
Li Xinyue frowned worriedly. At this moment, she couldn't say a single word. She could only raise her eyes, nod slightly to Doctor Le, and then look at the hibiscus couch faintly visible under the curtain. Her heart was tightly clenched.
Doctor Le and his apprentice turned around and took their leave.
After the maid came in to carry away the basin of blood water, she also left.
Only Li Xinyue and the unconscious Chu Junyi were left in the room.
Li Xinyue propped her chin with one hand and was thinking distractedly about other things.
The purpose of the Emperor's imperial examination was to select scholars from poor families and break the monopoly of the aristocratic families.
And Chu Junyi was the tool the Emperor used to break the power of the aristocratic families.
She had fallen in love with a tool, which meant she had to be prepared to lose this tool at any time.
Moreover, this was just the beginning. The more their interests were touched, the more violent the counter - attacks from the aristocratic families would be.
Alas!
It was a wise decision not to fall in love with him at the beginning, but it was a pity that she didn't stick to it in the end.
Now...
Now she could still protect herself, but suddenly she didn't want to.
The words she said in the Fu family in the south of the Yangtze River, "Princess Yuanyang is willing to take care of Lord Chu" were originally meant for Fu Chengyuan, but now she was willing to take these words as a promise to Chu Junyi.
As long as she was alive, these words would always count.
As night was falling, the strong wind before the rain blew open the window that hadn't been closed tightly.
Li Xinyue came back to her senses, closed the window, and then carefully lifted the bed curtain. She sat by the couch and watched for a while.
At this moment, Chu Junyi was still unconscious. He was lying motionless on the couch, covered with a thin blanket. The treated wound was gently hidden under the blanket, only showing a little trace of the stitches.
Just this little bit made Li Xinyue's scalp tingle. Not to mention the large wound hidden under the blanket. She couldn't even imagine how terrible it would be.
But she still lifted a corner of the blanket. Her nervous and uneasy side - glance fell on it, only to find that the wound was wrapped in gauze, covering the terrifying traces.
Li Xinyue then covered him with the blanket again.
Then she thought it might be bad for the wound.
So she lifted the blanket again.
But then she thought he might catch a cold.
Right, she had a piece of sheer fabric.
Li Xinyue decided to get the sheer fabric to cover him.
Just as she was about to turn around, her wrist was suddenly grabbed. She raised her eyes in surprise. The big hand on her wrist carefully moved down, as if afraid that she would pull her hand back. It always stayed within the controllable range. After it touched her hand...
Someone slowly exhaled.
Then her hand was tightly clasped with the big hand finger by finger.
"Where is Your Highness going?"
Chu Junyi struggled to prop up half of his body, raised his head high, and stared at Li Xinyue without blinking.
Li Xinyue's heart was beating fast. She steadied herself and then turned back to him and said, "I'm going to get you some clothes."
She subconsciously moved her wrist, indicating for him to let go.
Chu Junyi didn't want to.
Li Xinyue let out a tired sigh. She kicked a footstool over with her leg, sat down in front of him, and then called someone to bring the medicine.
Chu Junyi wanted Li Xinyue to feed him. Before she could agree, the sensible little maid ran away in a hurry.
So Li Xinyue had to do the job of taking care of others herself.
Forget it. Why argue with a patient?
At this moment, there was something on Chu Junyi's mind. He didn't know whether he should say it or not. Originally, he didn't want to, but since he was in such a state, if he didn't say it, she would probably ask.
So he decided to say it.
"I arrested a royal relative who committed a capital crime the other day."
"Who tried to hurt you?" Li Xinyue and he asked almost at the same time.
The two of them looked at each other face to face, and there was an indescribable emotion in their eyes.
After a pause, Chu Junyi answered her question first.
"The Luo family secretly raised outlaws as their minions and used them many times to assassinate their political enemies. Over the years, there have been traces of the outlaws raised by the Luo family in several old cases."
"The Luo family? Luo Changling, the head of the Luo family, is just a fifth - rank official. If the evidence is conclusive, the Supreme Court of Judicature would have dealt with them long ago. Why wait for you?"
"So, the Luo family is just a minion of another big family. Now that the matter has been exposed, the Luo family is just a pawn to be discarded."
"No wonder," Li Xinyue said as she lowered her head to scoop up a spoonful of medicine and brought it to his mouth.
Chu Junyi grabbed her wrist and looked up at her seriously and solemnly. "I arrested a royal relative who committed a capital crime the other day.
This person previously rode a horse wildly and killed someone by dragging. He also gathered a crowd to fight, seriously injured several girls, bribed officials, and falsely accused those girls of making improper advances on him. He claimed he was acting in self - defense.
When I caught him, he broke into a civilian's house and forced himself on a civilian girl.
Does Your Highness want to know who this person is?"
Chu Junyi frowned tightly, stared at Li Xinyue with a solemn look in his eyes, and because of his extreme nervousness, he squeezed her hand a little harder.
Li Xinyue was startled by him. Then she thought that no royal relative was easy to deal with. Judging from his question, this royal relative was probably a close relative of hers, which meant he had a very high status, the case was extremely difficult, and the danger was very high.
She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, forcing herself to calm down. Then she asked, "Who?"
"The only son of the Eldest Princess, the Prince of An, Wei Jinchen. Your Highness's cousin."