After passing through Sha Qing County, continuing southeast leads to Sha Ping County. South of Sha Ping County is Zeng Ping. By this time, it was already November, and the first snow of the year had started falling in Su Prefecture.
When Father and Daughter Jiang arrived at the Zeng Cheng County government building in the wind and snow, Lu Pingzhang heard his subordinate's report and was overjoyed. He hurried out and said, "This official pays respects to Sir!"
Jiang Wenyuan helped his uncle up and said, "Let's go inside to talk!"
"Good!"
Once in the warm inner study, after dismissing the attendants, their conversation immediately became lively.
Dumpling smiled and threw herself into Lu Pingzhang's arms, "Uncle!"
"Oh, my darling niece, your uncle has missed you so!" Lu Pingzhang bent down and happily held his precious niece in his arms, "It's so cold out, yet you're wandering around with your father. You must be frozen stiff!"
Dumpling shook her head, "It is a bit cold, but I'm fine and dandy, I won't freeze!"
As an immortal cultivator, not to mention her body had become as strong as steel and bone, she at least no longer feared common illnesses and was as hale and hearty as a young calf.
Jiang Wenyuan took his daughter and proceeded to take off her shoes and placed her on the heated brick bed.
He also took off his shoes, sat cross-legged, and drank a cup of hot tea, finally feeling comfortable.
He then took the hot towel handed over by an attendant and wiped his face, "When did you arrive, uncle? Have you been to the government building?"
Lu Pingzhang said, "I've been here for half a month. I went to the government building to report and was told by the staff that you were not there. So I could only go to the rear residence to visit Sister Wen, eat a meal, then come back.
You're really ruthless. It's so cold out, yet you went touring the countryside yourself and even brought your precious daughter. Do not let any harm come to her from the cold.
At that time, not only Sister Wen, even I, her uncle, would be anxious with you."
Jiang Wenyuan's aunt, Madam Chen, heard that her brother-in-law had come with her niece and hurried over from the rear residence.
She was delighted to hold Jiang Yuqing. Having not seen her for over half a year, the little girl had grown taller and was becoming a young lady.
Jiang Yuqing was also very affectionate with her aunt, snuggling closely. Afterwards, Madam Chen took her to the rear residence herself to arrange food, leaving the men in the study at the front residence to chat.
"I was fully prepared to be your staff originally. Who would have thought you'd give me an official position instead. To tell the truth, I never imagined there would come a day I could be a county magistrate."
Jiang Wenyuan said, "The original magistrate of Zeng Ping was incompetent, and I happened to discover him, so I took the opportunity to dispose of him. There's a saying that a new official fires three shots upon taking office. My first shot was fired at him.
Su Prefecture is bitterly cold. There are few who are truly willing to work here. Most are those with no foundation in the court and had no choice but to come to accumulate seniority.
Yet these people are useless, but have inflated egos, it's better to have you, uncle, at least you're someone who can get things done properly.
To tell the truth, I only mentioned it casually to His Majesty, yet he actually approved your appointment. As your brother-in-law, I'm very happy about this. At least in Su Prefecture, I don't have to fight alone anymore."
Upon hearing Jiang Wenyuan's outrageous rationale, Lu Pingzhang was truly exasperated. Half jokingly, he said, "I thought after you became successful, you decided to give your uncle a hand. So it turns out you brought me here to be your beast of burden!"
"Ah, elder uncle, I did not say that! Would not dare, would not dare!"
The conversation then moved on to next year's plans to trial new grain crops and build irrigation canals.
Water infrastructure was the top priority. Without adequate water sources, everything else was just empty talk.
He urged him to properly settle all these miscellaneous affairs first so they could go all out next year.
When Lu Pingzhang heard this, his eyes instantly lit up. He knew that by following his brother-in-law, there would be benefits. Indeed, there was already anticipation from the very start.
Lu Pingzhang's two sons did not come along from their hometown. With fewer people and all family, there was no separation between men and women for meals. The four of them sat at one table, chatting while they ate.
After the meal, Jiang Wenyuan continued discussing affairs with Lu Pingzhang in the front study while Jiang Yuqing was tenderly held by Madam Chen and comfortably napped in the rear residence.
Father and daughter stayed overnight at the county government building. The next day, they set off again in the wind and snow.
South of Zeng Ping was Lian Qi County. Due to the heavy wind and snow, the roads were extremely difficult to traverse.
By the time the entourage reached near nightfall, they still had not seen Lian Qi County City and had no choice but to lodge nearby for the night at a rural estate.
During dinner, as usual, Jiang Wenyuan engaged the owner in small talk while eating steamed buns, chatting about anything and everything.
Jiang Yuqing had affectionately coined her father's behavior as "steamed bun diplomacy".
In the middle of the night, father and daughter were awakened by clamors from outside. Jiang Wenyuan reached out and patted his daughter's back, tucking in her quilt, "Sleep well, I'll go take a look."
"What's going on?" Jiang Wenyuan pushed open the door to see a soybean oil lamp lit in the main hall. The owner's entire family was in the room, appearing anxious.
The middle-aged man said, "Sorry for disturbing the honored guests. My youngest son has a fever and our family has no way of dealing with it. The elders are discussing using mud packs to try to reduce the child's fever."
Jiang Wenyuan said, "My daughter is a doctor. Although still young, her medical skills are decent. If you can trust her, I'll have her take a look at the child."
The family was overjoyed. Who cared how old she was at this time, as long as she was a doctor, it was better than their plan of using urine soaked mud to wrap the child's body.
Jiang Wenyuan promptly returned to the room and shook his daughter awake, "Darling, their child has a fever. Can you take a look?"
Upon hearing this, Jiang Yuqing immediately sat up, shaking off her drowsiness. She rubbed her eyes and readily responded, "Sure!"
While swiftly getting dressed, she asked her father to retrieve the medicine box from the carriage.
In fact, all medical equipment and medicines were within her Spirit Realm. That medicine box was just for appearances.
The child with the fever was the main family's youngest grandson, the middle-aged man's son.
Just over six months old. As the mother's milk was insufficient, the child was extremely frail and seemed to be just three to four months old.
After examination, Jiang Yuqing discovered the child merely had a fever due to catching a cold. She took his temperature, 39.3 degrees, quite severely hot.
She then took out a pre-opened children's fever patch from the medicine box (actually her Spirit Realm), peeled off the packaging, and stuck it on the child's forehead.
Next, she fed the child baby ibuprofen oral solution. At the same time, she instructed the family to use warm water to wipe the child's armpits, neck, groin, palms and soles to physically reduce the temperature.
With this three-pronged approach, in less than half a hour, the child broke out in a full sweat and the fever completely receded. The delighted family loudly acclaimed her a young genius doctor.
Jiang Yuqing told them to promptly change the child into clean clothes and carry him to bed.
As the weather was cold, they had to be vigilant in keeping such a young child warm. She also taught them some emergency methods for dealing with child fevers.
If they felt the fever was not too severe, they could use the physical cooling method she taught, using warm water to wipe blood vessel dense areas.
If the fever was very high, they could also wipe the body with liquor. Best would be to bring the child to see a doctor. Naturally, the family agreed wholeheartedly to all her suggestions.
The next morning, the owner carefully brought in half a bowl of egg drop soup.
This was the most precious gift the family could offer to thank Jiang Yuqing for saving their child last night.
Jiang Yuqing only symbolically scooped a small spoonful, giving the rest to the family's other children. Before leaving, she left a silver ingot on the heated brick bed.
Hopefully this bit of money could bring some small help to this struggling family.
Outside, the wind and snow had stopped, and the sunshine shone on the long row of icicles hanging from the eaves. It no longer seemed so cold.
Jiang Yuqing followed her father back on the road. Soon, they entered Lian Qi County City. Due to the heavy snow, the streets of the dilapidated county city were very deserted, with barely a few souls about.
As usual, Jiang Wenyuan paid a surprise inspection visit to the Lian Qi County government building.
By the time he arrived, it was already past noon. Inside the government building was only a single clerk lazily holding the fort. Jiang Wenyuan entered and revealed his identity, scaring the clerk to near pissing himself.
He asked, "Where is the magistrate?"
The clerk shuddered and stuttered, "Still...still not awake!"
Jiang Wenyuan uttered an "Oh", barely hiding his sarcasm as he smiled, "It appears that your superior was extremely busy last night. It's already this late yet he still hasn't gotten out of bed.
Very well, I shall sit here and wait for him. No need to call for him, keep me company while we wait!"
Speaking, he sat down beside himself and took out a book to read. He kept reading until halfway through the afternoon when the county magistrate Qi Youlai finally walked out from the back hall, yawning and stretching lazily.
Seeing a strange young man sitting steadily in his own public court reading a book on his own, he couldn't help but be stunned.
Just as he was about to ask "Who are you?" he saw the pale-faced teacher waving desperately at him.
Qi Youlai suddenly realized one possibility, and cold sweat immediately came down his forehead. He quickly and carefully walked up to Jiang Wenyuan and bowed in greeting, tentatively asking, "May I ask if you are Mr. Jiang?"
It was a good while before Jiang Wenyuan closed his book and said, "It's rare that you actually recognize this official. It seems your subordinates are trained well. At least the skill of reading subtle expressions, you do quite slickly."
Liu Youlai was so frightened that he immediately knelt on the ground, "Sir is here, I am remiss in not welcoming you from afar, please forgive me!"
Jiang Wenyuan gave a cold snort, "Don't overdo it. I cannot bear such courtesy.
Mr. Liu works hard governing Lianqi, so hard that he is tired to the point he cannot get up in the morning. If he came to welcome me again, wouldn't I be at fault!"
Jiang Wenyuan's words were both mocking and hitting. They scraped Liu Youlai's face red.
In recent days, he had been on guard against the new prefect coming down for a surprise inspection, and had made preparations early.
Who would have thought that after many days no shadow of him was seen, plus the wind and snow these two days, he thought he wouldn't come.
So last night he had fooled around late with his third concubine, and couldn't get out of bed this morning.
Who would have expected that by a fluke the prefect would catch him red-handed.
Who knew that this gentleman braved such heavy wind and snow to come, was he not afraid of the cold?
Now things were completely messed up, he would certainly be punished.
Jiang Wenyuan temporarily held back his anger and carefully examined the yamen's accounts, documents, decrees, and some case files he had handled. Although not outstanding, there were no major mistakes.
The common people's evaluation of him was neither good nor bad. To put it bluntly, this was just a person muddling along to retirement.
Jiang Wenyuan severely admonished him, scolding him until he cowered like a quail, and recorded a major demerit against him.
He clearly stated that next time, he needn't remain an official and could go home to raise children instead.
Only then did he start talking business, ordering him to surely make preparations to experiment with new grain varieties after the new year. Liu Youlai obeyed deferentially.
