No matter who it was, he must be someone with superb medical skills to have written a prescription like the one he saw the other day. Like master, like apprentice. Although the little girl was still a beginner, he knew that she must have an affinity for medicine.
Curious about the little girl, Gan Songbo agreed to Jing Yunzhao's request without hesitation.
Though the herb market in Huaningxian was considered small, it had a wide range of herb seeds and herb seedlings. It took them a half an hour drive before they finally arrived at the herb market. It was located in a rather remote area, and they were greeted by the scent of fresh herbs as soon as they got down from the car.
The herb market was located under a bridge, facing a long river. Besides herbs, there were also various types of flowers and birds sold there.
Physician Gan certainly knew his way around the market. He took Jing Yunzhao to their destination through the path with the most beautiful view, but did not stop anywhere until they arrived at their destination.
"This shop has been selling herbs for generations. They sell their own herbal decoctions too, but business has been bad recently so they only make them if someone orders it specifically. They also sell flowers and all sorts of plants… The shop might look messy but I guarantee that they have things that other shops don't," Gan Songbo smiled and said.
Jing Yunzhao looked around the shop. Although it looked like an old shop compared to the other shops in the market, all the items in the table outside the shop were neatly arranged. More importantly, the shop owner seemed to have a good understanding of the properties of each herb and had arranged those that could interact with each other on separate tables. It became clear that the shop owner cared more about medicinal properties than neatness judging by the way he arranged his herbs.
And with that realization, Jing Yunzhao was certain that Physician Gan had brought her to a proper herb shop.
"What are you looking for this time, Uncle Gan?" The shop owner came forward to greet Physician Gan and asked smilingly.
Jing Yunzhao's eyes widened. She had expected the owner to be an old man judging by the way he arranged his herbs, but the owner was a young man who seemed to be around thirty.
"I brought a young friend here this time. She is the one buying today," Gan Songbo explained.
The shop owner's eyes lit up and he looked at Jing Yunzhao curiously.
He saw a girl who had skin as white as snow. Her long black hair was tied up high in a ponytail, revealing her smooth forehead that gave off the impression of someone who was clean and energetic. She was tall, pretty, and elegant despite being a bit underweight.
"I need some common herb seeds like cnidium monnieri, sophora roots, rhubarb, arisaema pulvis and siler root. My master likes planting his own herbs but I don't really need a lot of them, so can I pick them myself?" Jing Yunzhao asked calmly.
She had no choice but to hide the fact that she was the one planting them. After all, the house that the Qiao Family was staying in did not come with empty land for gardening.
Qiao Weimin had invested in a factory when he was young. He was a partner in the business and though he wasn't handsomely paid, he managed to be idle almost all of the time and still get a decent sum of money each year.
Being on her own now, it was always better to have a mysterious master that diverted the attention away from her. She hadn't forgotten what her ancestor warned her about keeping her magical space a secret so it didn't become a fatal disaster.
The shop owner was from the Lu Family. He quickly welcomed Jing Yunzhao into the shop when he heard what she said.
In the shop were rows and rows of sacks of different seeds. Each sack had a label on the front specifying the name of the herb seeds.
Being springtime, most of the herbs were in their sowing season and Jing Yunzhao got to stock up on seeds without worrying about shortages.
The way Jing Yunzhao picked her seeds made her seem like someone who was obsessed with medical skills, and it made Physician Gan grow even fonder of her.
It was just too bad that Jing Yunzhao already had a master, Physician Gan thought to himself in jealousy.
The common herb seeds cost below two hundred, sometimes even as cheap as one hundred per kilogram. Jing Yunzhao tried to buy less of the expensive ones so that she could buy a wider range of herb seeds. She had a limited budget so she could only buy around twenty types of herb seeds even after trying to budget.
Both Physician Gan and the shop owner couldn't help but smile when they saw Jing Yunzhao looking at the seeds that she couldn't buy longingly.
Having her own principles, she refused Physician Gan's kind gesture of buying her those seeds. She might not have enough money for all the seeds now, but she was confident that she could get enough to buy all of them on her own one day.
While finding a proper herb shop that sold herb seeds was tricky, finding a shop that sold herbs was relatively easy. In fact, the biggest traditional Chinese medicine clinic in this town was known for collecting herbs, and the seeds that she just bought would soon be harvested into herbs that she could sell at a good price.
Jing Yunzhao felt relieved after resolving her main concern. She parted with Physician Gan and went straight to school after sending the seeds into her secret space. She remembered Ms. Kim promising her that the school authority would lodge a police report regarding the gangsters who were bugging her earlier, and there should be already a reply from the police by now.
The atmosphere in the school was completely different after the exam season. The tension had subsided, though people still looked at her strangely whenever she walked past.
"Your father came to the school and made a big fuss, Jing Yunzhao! He was yelling about taking you home so you could reflect on yourself since you don't know how to behave," said one of the students mockingly.
Although he wasn't her biological father, Qiao Weimin was still considered Jing Yunzhao's guardian and people believed it must have been something that Jing Yunzhao had done to trigger it.
Jing Yunzhao was not only smart but also beautiful, and that was enough to stir up jealousy in the school. Jing Yunzhao also used to be a quiet girl who always had her head stuck in her book, making others think she was insecure and thus an easy target for bullying.
Jing Yunzhao stopped walking and turned around to ask icily, "What did you say?"
Her demeanor was so cold that it frightened the students who heard her.
"I was just telling the truth, your father really did make a scene at the front gate of the school a few minutes ago. He was yelling that you were shameless to be sleeping with those gangsters at such a young age, and actually it was a lot worse than what I just said…" The student mumbled, intimidated by Jing Yunzhao's attitude.
The student really was telling the truth; Qiao Weimin had wanted to barge into the school without registering with the security guard and was stopped before he could enter.
Being stopped by the security guard had not calmed Qiao Weimin down and he even started insulting Ms. Kim, saying that 'a fish rots from the head down' and that Ms. Kim shouldn't be teaching anymore if she doesn't know how to.
The commotion quickly drew the principal and Ms. Kim's attention and they had quickly taken Qiao Weimin to the office about a minute ago. Jing Yunzhao was certain she could make it in time to meet them before her school withdrawal procedure was completed if she went to the office immediately.
Jing Yunzhao clenched her fists, her features twisting in anger. It was the first time she had shown such an expression in front of her schoolmates. She had always been a famous student in the school. With her outstanding results, rumors about her had been everywhere although only half a semester had passed.
In fact, the rumors started as early as Jing Yunzhao's first day at school. For some reason, someone said that Jing Yunzhao had cheated in her exams to become the top student, and some even accused her of stealing. There were even rumors about her misbehaving and flirting with boys back in secondary school.
With all those negative rumors circling, everyone began to avoid Jing Yunzhao.
Then again, Jing Yunzhao never did care about the others. She had always been on her own and had managed not to offend anyone at all. In fact, she usually kept quiet and never said anything when anyone insulted her.
But today, she had reacted very differently.