When Doctor Qiu saw Jiang Yuqing wearing a full set of protective clothing, he was shocked speechless. Then he scolded her, "Foolish girl, is this a place you should come to?"
Jiang Yuqing smiled and said, "If Master can come here, why can't I come?"
Doctor Qiu was both anxious and angry: "This is not an ordinary illness. This is the plague, the plague, do you understand?"
Jiang Yuqing hugged the old man's arm through the protective clothing and rubbed it: "I know, that's why I wore protective clothing to come in!"
"Humph!"
The old man's hair was messy, and his exposed eyes were full of red lines, apparently he had not rested well for many days.
Jiang Yuqing followed the old man back to where he lived, secretly waved a few cleaning spells, then took out a set of protective clothing for the old man to put on before asking, "Master, what is the situation here?"
The old man said, "I've been here for half a month. On the day I arrived, I immediately separated those who were sick from those who were not and put them in isolation. But still, people die every day."
"The patients have chills, high fevers, severe chest pains, coughing up a lot of pink foam, and even blood."
"The master has tried many methods and can only keep it under control. There is no radical cure."
Jiang Yuqing frowned, "The symptoms are so similar to bubonic plague?"
Doctor Qiu's eyes lit up, "Does my precious apprentice know about this disease?"
Jiang Yuqing said, "I've heard of it, but I still need to see the patients in person to confirm."
Doctor Qiu immediately said, "Come on, I'll take you there!" Before the master and disciple had taken two steps out the door, several fat rats darted out from under their feet, giving the unprepared Jiang Yuqing a fright.
Doctor Qiu said, "There are strangely many rats in this village, and they are not afraid of people. They dare to scurry all over the house in broad daylight.
They grow very big, the biggest being as big as a cat. The villagers catch them, skin them and stew them as rabbit meat to eat!"
"What, eat rats?"
"That's right! Rats are so filthy, how can people eat them indiscriminately? It's not like they are so desperate to survive. Really!" Doctor Qiu complained while saying, "I heard that in the early days of the onset of the disease, only a few days, five or six people in the village died in succession, and the symptoms were all the same.
The local medicine man in the village realized that this might be some kind of plague and immediately reported it up. Then the government sent people to seal off the place completely.
Only allowing in, not out! Even the carrier pigeons you sent with letters were shot down by them. It made this old man so angry!"
Doctor Qiu took Jiang Yuqing to the isolation point and happened to see two young men with their noses and mouths covered carrying out the corpse of an old patient.
The entire ancestral hall was filled with crying and miserable wailing.
Jiang Yuqing frowned, and immediately cast several cleaning spells.
After examining the condition of the patients, Jiang Yuqing said solemnly, "It is confirmed to be bubonic plague!
This is a virulent infectious disease caused by rats. Without effective treatment measures, the mortality rate is extremely high."
She paused and said to Doctor Qiu, "There are large numbers of bacteria and viruses on the rats' bodies. The villagers actually caught them to eat as meat! It would be strange if they didn't get infected!"
The master and disciple did not avoid the villagers around them. An infected woman said, "But Miss, we've eaten so many before without incident!"
Jiang Yuqing glared at her, "That was because you were lucky. Heaven could forgive you once or twice, but could it forgive you every time?"
The woman immediately dared not speak. This young girl wore strange clothes and had an even more powerful aura.
"Does my good apprentice have any good solutions? We can't just stand by and watch so many people die!"
Although Doctor Qiu usually looks arrogant, he has an extremely kind and soft heart, at least towards the poor common people, he harbors a compassionate heart.
Jiang Yuqing said, "There is. Use streptomycin, combined with other drug treatments." Doctor Qiu knew about this drug, a kind of antibiotic similar to penicillin.
Having found the source of the disease and having an effective medicine, the master and disciple immediately formulated a series of treatment plans.
One, prohibit eating rats, and organize the still healthy villagers to make every effort to exterminate the rats. The killed rats must all be incinerated and then sprayed with lime for deep burial.
Two, disinfect the whole village, especially clothes and items that patients have touched, must be boiled in hot water and then dried in the sun.
Three, the corpses of the deceased villagers must be cremated without exception and the ashes deeply buried. The villagers could easily comply with the first two points, but strongly resisted the third point.
"No, we can't burn them!"
"That's right, isn't that destroying their bodies?"
"If we really burn them, how will they reincarnate in the next life?" The villagers clamored in confusion.
In their traditional thinking, when people die they should be laid to rest in the ground. Cremation was undoubtedly destroying the body, which leads to not resting in peace. This was absolutely unacceptable.
No matter how well Jiang Yuqing persuaded them, they refused to listen. Having exhausted her patience, she had no choice but to jump onto a table and shout loudly with spiritual power, "Please get your brains working, alright?
What does this have anything to do with us? My master and I can completely ignore this! And who are we doing this for?
This is a virulent infectious disease. As long as there is the slightest bit of virus left alive, there is possibility of recurrence. Then all our efforts would be wasted. Your whole village will be wiped out!
You all worry about reincarnation in your next life, but can't even get through this life. I beg you to let go of that ignorance, and think of this for the sake of your descendants."
After a collective silence of a few seconds, the villagers finally compromised with tears.
Even the corpses that were previously buried in the open field on the edge of the village were also dug up and cremated for deep burial, then sprayed thoroughly with whitewash lime for disinfection.
There were cries throughout the whole process. It was heartbreaking.
Jiang Yuqing looked up to hold back her tears. Her heart felt terribly blocked up. But this was unavoidable. She had to do this.
Otherwise, either all the villagers here would perish, or the villagers would break out of the fence in despair. Then the entire Yuci, or even the entire Sizhou would suffer calamity.
After that, the master and disciple tirelessly made medicine and treated the villagers every day, only resting for short periods of time in rotation.
In this way, after seven days, the death toll in the isolation zone finally dropped to zero.
The villagers were overjoyed and cried. Doctor Qiu and his apprentice also breathed a sigh of relief.
Jiang Yuqing passed on the news from inside through the fence. The guarding officers outside, while relieved, were also happy for the people inside.
Everyone had parents and relatives. No one wanted to see such a tragedy happen.
This news was quickly reported to the Yuci county magistrate. Upon hearing this good news, the Yuci County magistrate secretly breathed a sigh of relief as well.
To be honest, listening to orders from above to surround these few hundred villagers and leave them to live or perish, his heart had been frying the whole time.
Therefore, for any requests from the people inside, he tried his best to promise them, at least medicines and the like were never lacking.
Now, hearing this good news, his heart finally felt a little better.
After another ten days, when Jiang Yuqing announced that the last patient had also recovered, cheers erupted throughout the village instantly.
After cheering, immense grief welled up in their hearts again. Out of the 576 people in the village, less than half were still alive now. Several families had been completely wiped out.
Jiang Yuqing stood on a table again and explained to them the importance of the food chain with the most direct words. "Through so many days of understanding, I have also roughly deduced the origin of your village’s disaster.
Your village used to like to eat snakes and ate all the snakes around. But you forgot that snakes are the natural predators of rats.
Without the restraint of their natural enemy, the rats bred rapidly.
They gnawed on crops, ate up grain. With nothing to eat, you ate them. This is the root cause of the disaster!
I hope everyone can learn from this lesson and never do self-destructive things again!"
A man said, "Little divine healer, we will remember."
"That's right, we will never do it again!"
Jiang Yuqing said, "Go home, everyone, do what you should. In a while, I will tell the officers outside to remove the fence, then you can go out."
"Thank you, little divine healer!"
Upon hearing that the villagers had recovered and the blockade could be lifted, the officers guarding the village immediately cheered. The anxiety they held for days could finally be laid down.
However, they did not have the authority to release people on their own, and only said, "We little ones do not have the authority. We need to report what is happening here to the Yuci County Magistrate. Please ask the miracle doctor to patiently wait a little longer!"
Jiang Yuqing then passed a small golden seal to them through the cracks under the door: "Take this to the Yuci County Magistrate first, and he will understand when he sees it."
The small head was shocked when he received the gold seal and did not dare to neglect his duty. He personally went to the county government.
Although he did not know many words, he also knew that a gold seal was not something ordinary people could own.
Let's talk about when the Yuci County Magistrate received the small seal and took a look, he was so scared that he sat on the chair for a long time and could not get up.
Later, he hurriedly called for a carriage and horse, and rushed to the sealed village in a panic.
When he arrived, he immediately ordered the fence opened, and personally led the way in.
At that time, Jiang Yuqing was sorting out the remaining medicinal materials with Doctor Qiu.
As soon as the county magistrate saw her, he immediately knelt down: "The subordinate official pays respect to the Princess Protector, and also Doctor Qiu!"
Jiang Yuqing did not speak, she just looked at him. The county magistrate felt uneasy, cold sweat kept flowing, and his clothes were soon wet. Only then did Jiang Yuqing say, "Do you know your mistake?"
The Yuci County Magistrate said, "This subordinate official deserves death!"
Jiang Yuqing said, "You really deserve death. For the sake of your future, you colluded with your superiors. For such a big matter, you dared to conceal it and did not report it.
If it were not for my master happening to pass by here, I'm afraid the hundreds of villagers would have died out.
Even more serious, if any of them who was infected escaped, the entire Yuci and even the entire Sizhou would become a human hell.
By that time, executing your whole clan would not be enough to pay for it.
Luckily, you still have some conscience left, and have not completely erased your humanity. I shall not evaluate your merits and demerits, just go to the court yourself to confess your crimes!"
"There!" The county magistrate went down with a livid face.
Only then did the villagers realize that their benefactors were the famous miracle doctor Doctor Qiu and Princess Protector.
So they knelt down and kowtowed. Jiang Yuqing quickly helped everyone up and said, "Everyone, stop kneeling. Let's go dismantle the fence together." Opening up the fence was a new life for the whole village.
After everything settled down, the villagers built tombstones at the burial places for the ashes of their deceased relatives. And they built a separate tombstone for the county magistrate who first reported the disease and died of it.
Doctor Qiu and his apprentice also offered incense sticks at the tombstone of this whistleblower. According to Doctor Qiu, until the moment he died, he was still thinking about saving the villagers.
He was a hero, and lived up to the title of doctor!
After this, Doctor Qiu and his apprentice were going to set off on their journey back to the capital. Jiang Yuqing did not choose to fly. She accompanied Doctor Qiu and walked back slowly, enjoying the mountains and rivers along the way.
