Mary Sue Chapter 54: The gentle doctor and his cold-loving stray (Part 5)

Translated by J.

Editor: Addis

 

Dugu’s icy constitution was often inconvenient and reduced his overall standard of living. Growing up, Dugu never even had a hot meal or a hot bath. When you think about it, it was very sad indeed. So once Dugu’s wounds had fully healed, Doctor Xuanyuan decided to treat his remaining condition.

“Give me your wrist.” The doctor coaxed, “I’ll check your pulse.”

Dugu hesitated before rolling up his sleeve and giving his hand to the doctor. Xuanyuan held onto the tip of his fingers and pinched them provocatively. But before Dugu could sense anything was amiss, Xuanyuan quickly put on a serious expression, then rested his hand on Dugu’s wrist to properly check his pulse.

The small kitten apprehensively held out its little paw, but was met with a pinch on its soft, fleshy little paw pads while the vet acted like nothing had happened!

Xuanyuan became deep in thought, then after a while, withdrew his hand from Dugu’s wrist and turned to scribble in his prescription pad with an intense focus. He explained while he wrote, “You were born with a low body temperature from your mother’s womb. Then due to prolonged exposure to depressive moods, your asthenia had reduced your body’s ability to expel the cold, leading to kidney deficiency, poor blood circulation and erectile dysfunction. This repeating vicious cycle caused your condition to worsen over the years… I recall my professor speaking of a similar case once, where the patient was treated with herbal medicine to improve blood flow. Although the patient’s condition was not as severe as yours, but I can try increasing your dosage to compensate.”

It sounded just like a bunch of righteous nonsense…

But due to Doctor Xuanyuan’s special character design, there were no illnesses in this world that he could not cure.

Dugu was quite confused on the inside, but only calmly revealed a humph.

“I’ll procure the medicine today.” Xuanyuan smiled, “You need to start taking it from tomorrow, okay?”

Dugu nodded while looking like he was lost in thought. After a hesitant pause, he awkwardly uttered, “You did a lot for me these past few days.”

Xuanyuan broke into a kind and amicable grin, “You’re welcome.”

Dugu asked, “How do you want me to repay you?”

The tip of Xuanyuan’s brows shot up, he retorted with the hint of a wicked smile on his lips, “How do you think I want to be repaid?”

“Understood. Leave it with me.” A knowing spark flickered in Dugu’s pitch-black pupils, “Who do you want me to kill?”

He had completely misunderstood the doctor’s intentions.

There was a twitch in the corner of Xuanyuan’s mouth as he chuckled, “I don’t want you to kill anyone.”

Dugu looked puzzled.

“Nevermind.” Xuanyuan shrugged in good humour, “We can talk about this later. Improving your health comes first.”

The grateful little kitten bravely expressed that it could catch mice for the vet, but the vet indicated that he had no mice in his home…

The vet really just wanted to rub the kitten’s soft little belly!

But this was beyond Dugu’s comprehension. So, he went back to the Assassins’ Guild that night.

The Assassins’ Guild was still under lockdown and surrounded by Huangfu X’s bodyguards, who had the look of determination as if they would wait until the end of the world just to recapture Dugu…

Since Dugu’s wounds had fully healed and he was well fed by the doctor these past few days, his body was in peak condition. He easily sneaked past the bodyguards’ surveillance, then entered the guild’s treasure vault. He retrieved a small amount of treasure that was accumulated by the past guild masters, not fetching more only because it would have been too heavy to carry.

It was past midnight when Xuanyuan was woken up from a deep slumber by a familiar chill. He looked up to see a dark shadow standing over his bed, watching him with a cold, piercing gaze while carrying a large bundle on his back.

Dugu untied the bundle and released its contents onto Xuanyuan’s bed. Gold, silver, gems and jade rained down over the bed, clattering like wind chimes hanging from the eaves of a veranda. Under the moonlight, the treasure formed a small glittering creek, flowing from the bed down to the floor.

Xuanyuan sat up with bleary eyes. When he realised what was happening, he arched his brow in amusement as he asked, “What’s all this?”

Dugu turned his face marginally to the side and awkwardly looked down at the floor. He coldly replied, “A thank you gift.”

Dugu felt his face inexplicably burning up again. So, before Xuanyuan could open his mouth, Dugu nimbly jumped out of the bedroom window like a gust of wind…

After escaping from Xuanyuan’s bedroom, Dugu ran swiftly along the ledge around the building’s exterior, then pivoting against the window sill with one hand, hopped inside his bedroom window. Even the way he ran back to his own room was highly original, not letting down the assassin’s character design at all.

Xuanyuan helplessly cracked up laughing as he held his forehead with his hand. Then collecting the treasures into a mound, he placed them into an empty storage box. Xuanyuan decided to hold onto the treasure for safekeeping, then return them to Dugu at a later date.

The grateful little kitten wanted to show its gratitude toward the vet, so it caught a few birds in the wild and lined them up in a row at the vet’s door. The bashful kitten then ran away as soon as the vet opened his door! Thus, the vet picked up all the dead birds, wanting to turn them into a snack for the little kitten later.

The next morning, Dugu was roused by the intense smell of traditional herbal medicine. He opened his eyes and sat up from the stiff, frozen bed, which looked no different from a large block of ice. Following the smell of medicine to the kitchen, he found Xuanyuan sitting on a small stool, fanning a small traditional clay stove in front of him. His tall figure was slightly hunched over the stove due to the height of his stool, but his attractiveness was in no way diminished. Firm, slender forearms extended from Xuanyuan’s rolled-up sleeves, while an unbuttoned collar revealed his collarbone and a small patch of muscle on his chest that was dampened by steam and perspiration, making him look another kind of sexy.

“Almost done, it’ll be ready in a minute.” As he heard footsteps approaching, Xuanyuan turned his head to reveal a smile, then explained before Dugu could ask, “The medicine will be more potent if I brew it using traditional methods.”

Dugu froze where he stood, as if he had not been listening to Xuanyuan at all. He just stared unblinkingly at the backside of the hunched figure. But on his cold, marble-statuesque face, a pair of eyes shone so brightly as if they had come alive.

With a hint of deviousness, Xuanyuan deliberately asked, “Is there a problem?”

“No…hmph.” Dugu awkwardly turned his gaze away before sitting down next to the table.

Once the medicine was ready, Xuanyuan filled a bowl and passed it over to Dugu, “I’m not too sure about the dosage. Here, try it for a few days and let’s see how it goes.”

Dugu took the bowl and looked down at the light brown liquid inside.

Xuanyuan thoughtfully asked, “Do you mind the bitter taste?”

Dugu sneered, “That’s impossible.”

Xuanyuan opened a jar of candy from the table and placed a large handful in front of Dugu, “I got you some candy specifically to help with the medicine’s bitter taste.”

Dugu stiffened his neck as he retorted, “No thanks, the taste doesn’t bother me.” Then gulped down the contents of the bowl in one go.

Xuanyuan took the bowl back to the sink, once he had scrubbed it clean, he turned around and saw that Dugu had disappeared. Out of the large handful of candy on the table, two were missing.

A smile appeared on Xuanyuan’s lips.

That’s right, there were fourteen pieces of candy on the table earlier, now there were only twelve. The doctor recalled this with such clarity because he had counted the number of candy when he grabbed them out of the jar…

Dugu did not expect Xuanyuan to be so tiresome, that his act of stealing a couple of candy to sweeten his medicine would be noticed.

The small kitten refused the milk placed in front of it by the vet as it coldly indicated that it was now a grownup cat and no longer wanted milk. However, as soon as the vet turned his back, the kitten hastily slurped down half the bowl then ran away with a milk moustache still on its mouth!

I bet the silly vet won’t notice, meow!

From that day onwards, candy slowly went missing from the jar every day…

But Xuanyuan did not speak of it. He just replaced the missing candy behind Dugu’s back, so the jar always retained the same amount of candy. The two of them had a tacit understanding.

As for the medicine’s potency…

It could only be said that the medicine was definitely worthy of the top-ranking doctor’s reputation. After drinking the medicine three times a day, seven days in a row, Dugu found that the chill emitted by his body was weakening. A specific observation being water no longer froze no matter how long he held it in his hands, it would just remain in the form of an icy slush. This meant that Dugu’s temperature had risen from below zero to zero degrees celsius.

The character design for icy special effects had lost to the character design for curing all diseases. Dugu’s hypothermia was forcibly cured, which was indeed good news worthy of congratulations.

Since the doctor had not observed any side effects, he decided to increase the dosage so that Dugu could be cured sooner.

So, he fed Dugu three large bowls of medicine with increased dosage that day.

To counter Dugu’s stubborn hypothermia, the ingredients used in the brew were ones that generated body heat and were included in fairly large quantities. If a normal, healthy person took the medicine, even a small sip would make them overheat and their blood boil…

Thus, Dugu tossed and turned in his bed that night, not able to fall asleep at all.

After drinking the large bowls of medicine that morning and noon, Dugu only felt a warmth that he had not experienced before, as if the ice that had been frozen solid in his body were melted by the medicine and expelled through every pore in his skin. Apart from a warm, cozy feeling, there were no signs of discomfort. However, the large bowl of medicine he drank before bed was another matter altogether. It was unclear whether it was due to the extra-large dosage, but it seemed he was overheating. Every drop of medicine had turned into small balls of fire, burning Dugu from the inside, making him restless and painting a crimson colour over his originally pasty complexion.

After tossing and turning for an hour, Dugu was shocked to find himself covered in a layer of sweat. Sweating was not new to him, but what really startled Dugu was that his sweat had not turned into ice. Not only were there no signs of stopping, it seemed to be getting worse, and his heart was pounding to a frenzied beat.

Is it because the dose is too big…? Gritting his teeth, Dugu climbed up from his bed, then moved towards the doctor’s bedroom while pressing a hand on his frantic heart.

Xuanyuan was once again roused from his slumber by Dugu. When Xuanyuan opened his eyes, he found Dugu in a daze in the faint moonlight, panting with rapid breaths, while a crimson flush rose on his face. At that, the doctor’s heart skipped a beat.

“What’s the matter?” Xuanyuan sat up.

“I feel hot and my heart is beating too fast…” Dugu swallowed and licked his parched lips, then impatiently yanked down the collar on his pyjamas, revealing a large patch of pale chest muscles that were covered in a pinkish complexion. He grabbed Xuanyuan’s hand and pressed it to his heart, then asked in a hoarse voice, “Here, can you feel it?”

When Xuanyuan’s palm touched Dugu’s scorching muscles, his brain seemed to have exploded with a loud boom.

The dazed little kitten finally rolled over by its own accord and revealed its soft little belly to the vet!