Chapter 132
Refining Skin Whitening Pills
'You were fooled.' That three simple words made Chen Jiadi's face blushed into hot red. Ten thousand yuan isn't anything significant to him, it's just that he couldn't accept that he had been deceived.
"Those students from Chinese medical school in the same team with Chen Jiadi, please stand up," Guo Huai instructed. He then asked with a smile, "Can any of you tell how did they counterfeit this thirteen years old ginseng?"
"Mr. Owner, I was beside him when Senior Chen bought the ginseng, and I did notice the ginseng. Although I have no idea how they faked it, I do have a rough idea of the price of a thirteen years old wild ginseng. It's impossible to buy such wild ginseng for just ten thousand yuan," Wu Zhan said with a smile.
"Everyone come over here and take a good look at it. Let's see if any of you could tell how they forged this," Zhou Tianyang said smilingly.
"It's a one-year-old cultivated ginseng," said He Mo. She took a step forward and continued, "Its upper section is made by gluing together multiple pieces of one-year-old cultivated ginseng"
Guo Huai nodded lightly after he heard the explanation. Zhou Tianyang then grabbed that ginseng and gave it a soft pinch. The upper half of the ginseng snapped into a dozen or more pieces. That made Chan Jiadi's face glow even hotter.
"I will go find them!" Chen Jiadi shouted, ready to run out the door.
"Jiadi, come back. There's no point going back there. Since you've already bought it, just take it as a lesson. Ten thousand yuan isn't that expensive for a lesson," Zhou Tianyang said with a smile. "Alright I should start cooking now," Zhou Tianyang said and then proceeded to take some Chinese medicinal herbs and walked into the kitchen.
"Today is the first day and I feel quite disappointed," Guo Huai said as he looked at the eighteen students. "I feel disappointed not because Chen Jiadi bought a counterfeit ginseng, but because around half of all the things in these bags can't be used. In the first bag, Ephedra. Second bag, Cinnamon. Third bag, Basil leaves, Fifth bag, Nepeta. Seventh bag, ……..."
As Guo Huai named the things, all the students slowly had their heads lowered. Bag number four, six, nine, thirteen, and eighteen were not mentioned by Guo Huai. Those who bought them at first were secretly delighted, but what Guo Huai said next will make these five students wished they could bury themselves into the ground.
"The remaining five bags have good and bad equally mixed. If you want to use them you must first separate out the all the good ones from the bad. Otherwise, if you use these to treat a patient, the person might die," Guo Huai said gently.
"I hope that all of you will remember one thing, that is, you guys are no longer students in Wucheng University Chinese medical school or Western medical school. You are personnel of the Clinic of No Treatment, a doctor in this clinic. And you will be the among the finest doctors in the whole of China, and carry the hope and pride of Chinese medicine," Guo Huai said loudly. "And you three groups, there are Chinese medical students in your groups, and so there are many mistakes that your group could easily avoid. But you choose to fight against your own teammates. That is not something that I want to see. Today after the dinner, I will teach you all how to identify these medicinal ingredients. And tomorrow, we will return to the Chinese medicinal market, and find those merchants, those who treated you like cash cows, you will make them so shocked they can't recognize their own mothers!"
Guo Huai's words of motivation made the eighteen students to be fired up. Nearly half an hour later, waves of appetizing fragrance came through the kitchen. Guo Huai walked into a cabin in the clinic, and subsequently, he placed the 65kg Tai Sui into a big pond in that cabin.
"It seems like I gotta ask Da Zhu to come over in a few days. Witch's blood essence, Haha. If I were to cultivate this Tai Sui with Witch's blood essence, perhaps even the Heavenly Palace doesn't have this. I can then refine some medicinal pills that could be used in the human world," Guo Huai muttered to himself.
Guo Huai walked out of the cabin and his gaze landed on Jade. Actually, Jade's body also has Witch's blood essence. But when Jade gave him a smile, he'd give up on that idea. It was as though Jade had guessed what he was in his mind, and so she revealed the tip of her dagger on her sleeves. If Guo Huai were to be so daring to ask her to do it, he would surely be stabbed.
"Let's eat. After the dinner, we will separate these Chinese medicinal herbs, and fill the usable ones into the medicine cabinet. I will think of a way to dispose of those unusable ones," Guo Huai said smilingly. The dinner wasn't as splendid as what they had for lunch. And because of the issue about the medicinal herbs they purchased, the students weren't in a very good mood. However, for Guo Huai and Zhou Tianyang, they happily drank some wine and enjoyed it very much.
"Cheer up people. Today is only the first day. And there are a lot of days ahead. Come, move those Chinese medicinal herbs you purchased into the room," Guo Huai instructed the students after they had finished eating dinner. After moving those bags of Chinese medicinal herbs into the room, Guo Huai began to explain to them about those which they had bought."
"Commonly used Chinese medicinal herbs come in all kinds of shapes and sizes. They are many and varied, which will make it challenging to differentiate the true and the bogus, the good and the bad, to a certain extent.
It's unrealistic to send each and every item to be tested with modern detection methods and lab experiments, nor could we send all the medicines to the drug-testing lab for identification. All that we can utilize are traditional ways such as with sight, touch, sniff, taste, soaking in water, burn with fire, and etc, as preliminary means to examine the medicinal herbs," Guo Huai said with a smile as he held up some of the Chinese medicinal herbs.
"Other than those traditional ways of evaluation, there are many other ways to evaluate a Chinese medicinal herb. Also, for different Chinese medicinal herb, different methods of evaluation need to be used. For example, Saffrons, you can pluck one of the flowers and put it into water. The water should turn yellow, and the flower should not fade of color. For Ash tree bark, after steeping it, the water should glimmer with dark blue. For bear gall powder, it will spin on the surface of the water and then sink downwards with yellow lines formed," Guo Huai explained smilingly.
The lecture went on from seven to nine o'clock in the evening. At first, the students were somewhat reserved, but soon into the lecture their attitude turned open, and won't hesitate to ask if they have any questions. Guo Huai would mostly let those from Chinese medical school to discuss and answer those general questions. He Mo's knowledge in Chinese medicine made every student there felt incredibly amazed.
"Those ginseng available commercially can be classified into multiple categories. There are Red ginseng, sun-dried ginseng, wild ginseng, cultivated ginseng, and etc. There are more than ten types of commonly employed counterfeit techniques, which make them rather difficult to be distinguished. Its most prominent features are …." He Mo explained softly as she held up a ginseng.
Guo Huai nodded as he was very satisfied with her detailed explanation. He thought that this apprentice of his was pretty good and that he ought to refine some Skin Whitening Pills before the clinic opens for business. Those medicinal pills will be used to treat He Mo's face.
After the students had returned to the guesthouse for sleep, Guo Huai went to the cabin which he stored the Tai Sui. Using his flying sword, he sliced off a small piece of Tai Sui about the size of a palm.
"Sigh, it's so strenuous without a medicinal cauldron. There were many had successfully levitated heavenwards back then, and they couldn't have brought their cauldron with them. Hmm, I gotta take some time to get my hands on a few of those medicinal cauldrons. Otherwise, the success rate of refining medicinal pills like this is way too low," Guo Huai muttered to himself. He walked into the drugstore connected to the clinic and took some Chinese medicinal herbs he needed. Skin Whitening Pills has a better effect than those which he had let Murong Weiwei consumed. It's also easier to refine than Pill of Youth. Perhaps this pill will be very useful for firing the opening shot for his Clinic of No Treatment.
After thinking for some time, a faint smile suddenly appeared on the corner of Guo Huai's mouth. Those Chinese medicinal herbs on the table suddenly floated in midair. Using the True Fire, after an hour's time and eight failed trial, eighteen white coloured pills could be seen floating in the air. He finally succeeded.