Practicing Medicine Among the Common Folk

The warm spring sun spilled entirely over the Tang Dynasty palace. Glazed tiles refracted dazzling light, while wind chimes under the upturned eaves swayed gently in the breeze, producing clear and melodious sounds as if recounting the palace's long history. Lin Yue stood in the courtyard, gazing beyond the palace walls into the distance, her mind already wandering to the vast world outside. These days, news of the common people's lack of medical care and difficult lives had constantly reached her ears, and a seed of wanting to leave the palace to provide free medical treatment for the people had quietly taken root and sprouted in her heart.

Li Yi walked to her side with steady steps. Following her gaze into the distance, he seemed to see through her mind at a glance and softly said, "Yue'er, if you want to practice medicine among the common folk, I will fully support you." Lin Yue turned her head, her eyes instantly filled with surprise and gratitude. She tightly held Li Yi's hand and said sincerely, "Yi, I want to help those suffering people and relieve their pain with my medical skills." Li Yi nodded slightly, his eyes full of affection and determination: "I will make proper arrangements. You just go with peace of mind."

After several days of preparation, Lin Yue bid a deep farewell to Li Yi, took several medical women from the Imperial Hospital, and set foot on the road out of the palace. Along the way, the spring scenery unfolded like a gorgeous scroll before her eyes. Tender green buds playfully poked their heads out from the branches, curiously looking at the world; colorful wildflowers bloomed freely, competing in beauty, and the rich fragrance of flowers filled the air, making people feel relaxed and happy. But Lin Yue had no intention of admiring the picturesque scenery. Her heart was full of the common people she was about to meet and their sufferings. The carriage moved slowly along the winding road, and the wheels rolled, raising clouds of dust.

When they arrived at a small town, they noticed an unusual oppressive atmosphere hanging over it. The streets were deserted, and the few passers-by looked hurried and flustered, their faces full of fear and unease. Lin Yue's heart tightened, and she quickly asked an old man passing by about the situation. The old man sighed deeply, his eyes full of grief and helplessness: "Girl, there is a plague in this place. Many people are sick in bed, and the doctors are at a loss. Everyone doesn't know what to do."

Upon hearing this, Lin Yue did not hesitate and immediately decided to go deep into the epidemic area to carry out treatment. She took the medical women and hurried to the temporarily built patient resettlement site. As soon as she stepped in, a pungent smell of medicine and the patients' painful groans hit her. In the resettlement site, simple beds were lined up one after another, and the patients lay on them weakly, their faces as pale as paper, their eyes full of fear and despair, as if swallowed by darkness with no dawn of hope in sight. Lin Yue quickly composed herself and immediately threw herself into the intense work. She shuttled between the beds, carefully feeling the pulse and diagnosing each patient, her eyes focused and determined, not missing any subtle symptom.

She came to the bed of a young man. The man had his eyes closed, a flushed face, and rapid breathing. The high fever made his consciousness slightly blurred. Lin Yue gently held his wrist, feeling his chaotic pulse, and frowned slightly. While softly asking the anxious family members beside the man about the situation before and after his illness, she quickly thought in her mind about the possible diseases and corresponding treatment methods. Based on the man's symptoms and the family's description, Lin Yue initially judged that after being infected with the plague, he had intense heat evil and poor qi and blood circulation in his body. Lin Yue quickly made a decision. She asked the medical women to prepare acupuncture tools, washed her hands, and picked up the silver needles. She skillfully found the acupoints and slowly inserted the silver needles into the man's skin, each needle accurate and steady. During the acupuncture, Lin Yue was fully concentrated, her eyes tightly fixed on the man's reaction, while softly comforting him and his family: "Don't worry. Acupuncture can help him dredge the meridians and relieve the 

symptoms. He will get better soon." As the silver needles were inserted, the man's breathing gradually became steady, and his furrowed brows slowly relaxed.

Next, Lin Yue prescribed a prescription for clearing heat and cooling blood, detoxifying and expelling evil for the man. She personally went to the place where the medicine was boiled, watched the medical women put the medicinal materials into the pot one by one, and patiently instructed them to master the heat and boiling time. While waiting for the decoction to be boiled, Lin Yue did not stop and went to the next patient.

It was a thin old woman lying in bed, constantly coughing, each cough seeming to use up all her strength, and there was blood in the sputum she coughed up. The old woman's eyes were full of helplessness and despair. She tightly pulled Lin Yue's hand and said weakly: "Girl, my old bones are probably going to fail..." Lin Yue gently patted the old woman's hand and said tenderly: "Grandma, don't lose heart. We will definitely cure you."

After a careful examination of the old woman, Lin Yue found that her condition was more complex. She was not only infected with the plague but also had severely damaged lungs due to physical weakness. Lin Yue decided to treat her with a combination of traditional Chinese and Western medicine. She first asked the medical women to feed the old woman some herbal medicine with the effect of moistening the lungs and relieving cough, then took out some modern anti-inflammatory drugs from her medicine chest, crushed them, and fed them to the old woman. At the same time, she also massaged the old woman to enhance her body's resistance by stimulating acupoints.

During the treatment, Lin Yue constantly paid attention to the old woman's condition changes and adjusted the treatment plan in a timely manner according to her symptoms. She would come to the old woman's bed early every day, ask about her feelings, and examine her body. Under Lin Yue's careful care, the old woman's cough gradually reduced, the blood in her sputum no longer appeared, and her face gradually regained some color.

However, the rescue work was full of difficulties from the beginning. The first challenge was the shortage of medicinal materials. The existing medicinal materials were far from meeting the needs of many patients, and each portion of medicinal materials was extremely precious. Moreover, due to the raging epidemic and people's panic, many common people were skeptical of the arrival of the medical women, fearing that they would also bring the epidemic and unwilling to cooperate with the treatment.

Lin Yue patiently soothed the emotions of the patients and their families, comforting them in a gentle voice, while struggling to find a solution to the shortage of medicinal materials. She suddenly remembered that in the palace, Li Yi had mentioned the materials stored by the court, which might solve the urgent problem. So she immediately spread out the paper, picked up the pen, and wrote an urgent letter, detailing the severe situation here, and sent someone to rush it to the palace on horseback.

After receiving the letter in the palace, Li Yi's face instantly became serious. He knew the severity of the epidemic and did not dare to delay for a moment. He quickly entered the palace to meet the emperor. In the court, Li Yi earnestly and detailedly reported the situation in the epidemic area. After hearing this, the emperor was worried, frowned, and immediately ordered to allocate a large number of medicinal materials and supplies from the court's reserves to the epidemic area. Li Yi personally supervised the allocation and transportation of supplies, checking every link in detail. He carefully inspected the quality of each batch of medicinal materials, distinguishing the authenticity and efficacy of the medicinal materials one by one; at the same time, he also carefully selected some elite soldiers to escort the supplies to the epidemic area to ensure the safety of the journey. Under his careful arrangement, the supplies soon set off for the epidemic 

area.

During the wait for the supplies, Lin Yue did not slack off at all. She led the medical women to use the local existing herbal medicines to try to prepare some simple and effective prescriptions. They shuttled through the mountains and forests every day, carefully identifying each herbal medicine, carefully collecting them, and not missing any possibly useful herbal medicine. After returning to the resettlement site, they immediately started processing the herbal medicines, and the strong aroma of herbal medicine filled the resettlement site, which was the smell of hope.

With their efforts, the conditions of some mild patients were gradually controlled. Their faces gradually regained some color, and their weak bodies were slowly recovering. But the condition of severe patients was still not optimistic. They had persistent high fever, difficulty breathing, and were critically ill, each breath like a life-and-death struggle with death. Lin Yue stayed by their side day and night, constantly adjusting the treatment plan and trying various methods. Even if there was only a glimmer of hope, she would never give up. Lin Yue stood in the center of the temporary resettlement site, surrounded by the smell of medicine and the patients' painful groans, but at the moment, what worried her most was the suspicious and resistant gazes of some of the common people.

She looked at a mother tightly holding her child, her eyes full of vigilance, and felt mixed emotions in her heart. "I understand their fear," Lin Yue silently sighed in her heart. "This terrible plague has made them lose too much. How can they easily believe in us who suddenly appeared?" She remembered when she first arrived in the epidemic area and explained her purpose to an old man, but the old man kept waving his hands, his turbid eyes full of guard: "Don't come near. Who knows if you will bring more disasters." At that moment, Lin Yue felt as if she had been hit hard in the heart, but it also strengthened her determination to gain everyone's trust.

"I must do something to make them see our sincerity." Lin Yue clenched her fists, her nails almost digging into her palms. She recalled that when she first arrived in the Tang Dynasty, she had also faced countless unknowns and difficulties, and didn't she also gradually win trust step by step? She thought of those people struggling in pain. Every minute and second of delay might bring them closer to death. "Don't give up," she encouraged herself in her heart. "Even if there is only a glimmer of hope, I must make them understand that we are here to help them."

So Lin Yue led the medical women to take the initiative to take on the cleaning work of the resettlement site, from morning to night, without complaint. She personally changed the medicine and fed the medicine to the patients, every action gentle and focused, her eyes full of concern. Once, a grumpy uncle, because of pain and fear, knocked over the medicine bowl and loudly scolded them. Lin Yue was not angry at all. She just silently squatted down, cleaned up the debris, and said softly: "Uncle, I know you are in pain. When you feel better, we will take the medicine again, okay?" At that moment, she saw a flash of guilt in the uncle's eyes, and a glimmer of hope arose in her heart.

At night, Lin Yue sat alone in the corner of the resettlement site, tiredly rubbing her temples. She looked at the stars in the sky, her thoughts floating to Li Yi in the distance. "If you were here, you would definitely encourage me," she whispered. "But I can't back down. The people here need me." Thinking of this, Lin Yue took a deep breath, stood up, and her eyes regained their firm light, ready to meet the challenges of a new day and continue to move those suspicious people with her actions.

Lin Yue found that the young mother holding the baby was getting more and more seriously ill. The mother was too sick to breastfeed the baby, and because of the mother's illness, the baby's cry was getting weaker and weaker. What should she do? Looking at the mother and child, Lin 

Yue was full of distress. She not only carefully treated the mother but also personally took care of the baby, searching everywhere for fresh goat's milk and feeding it to the baby mouthful by mouthful. Under Lin Yue's careful care, the mother's condition gradually improved, and the baby also regained vitality and began to show innocent smiles. The mother took Lin Yue's hand, tears streaming down her face, full of gratitude: "Girl, you saved the lives of our mother and child. We will never forget your great kindness!"

Just when everyone was extremely anxious, the supplies allocated by Li Yi finally arrived at the epidemic area. Looking at the car full of medicinal materials and supplies, Lin Yue's eyes filled with tears, and her heart was full of gratitude. She immediately organized the medical women to distribute the medicinal materials and boil decoctions for the patients according to different diseases.

With the use of sufficient medicinal materials, more and more patients began to recover. Smiles reappeared on their faces, and the fear in their eyes was gradually replaced by hope. In order to prevent the epidemic from breaking out again, Lin Yue also popularized epidemic prevention knowledge to the common people. She patiently explained how to maintain personal hygiene, how to ventilate, and how to enhance their own resistance. The common people gathered around her, listened carefully, nodded from time to time, and firmly remembered these knowledge in their hearts.

With the efforts of Lin Yue and the medical women, the epidemic was completely controlled. The small town regained its former vitality and vitality. The streets became lively again. Children laughed and played in the streets, and their silver-like laughter echoed in the streets and alleys; the hawking sounds of vendors rose one after another, full of the hustle and bustle of life.

Looking at all this, Lin Yue was full of relief in her heart. She knew that her efforts had not been in vain. And this experience also made her more deeply understand the responsibility and mission of being a doctor.

When Lin Yue took the medical women back to the palace, Li Yi was already waiting at the palace gate. From a distance, he saw Lin Yue, quickened his steps to meet her, and seeing Lin Yue's slightly tired but smiling face, he distressedly hugged her into his arms: "Yue'er, you have worked hard." Leaning against him, Lin Yue softly said: "It's all worth it to help the common people tide over the difficulties."

This experience of practicing medicine among the common folk not only greatly improved Lin Yue's medical skills but also deepened her relationship with Li Yi. They knew that no matter what difficulties they encountered in the future, as long as they worked together, they would definitely be able to protect the common people of the Tang Dynasty and this land. In the following days, Lin Yue continued to study medical skills and train new talents in the Imperial Hospital; Li Yi offered strategies for the country's prosperity and stability in the court. Their story spread in the palace and among the common people, inspiring countless people.