"Doctor Hua, quickly examine my mother! What exactly is happening to her?" Shen Banian pleaded, holding down the elder woman while speaking anxiously to the physician.
Dr. Hua, taken aback by the elder's sudden violent reaction, stood by the bedside, momentarily stunned. Hearing Shen Banian's urgent plea, he snapped back to attention. "She may have been poisoned for too long," he explained. "The toxins have become completely integrated with her body. Now that I'm expelling them, her system can't adapt immediately and is experiencing an acute stress response..."
"Hold her down firmly. I will administer another needle to her Yintang acupoint. It will calm her down!"
"Alright, Doctor Hua, hurry!" Shen Bayue urged. "My mother's strength is immense right now; we can barely restrain her!"
"Yes, yes!" Dr. Hua agreed. He retrieved another silver needle and inserted it into the Yintang acupoint between the elder woman's eyebrows.
However, the moment Dr. Hua's needle pierced the Yintang point, the elder did not calm down. Instead, she struggled more fiercely than before, shouting incoherently. "Ah… let me go, let me go…"
"What's going on? Doctor Hua, what's happening?" Shen Banian asked urgently.
"I… I… I…" Dr. Hua was bewildered, having no explanation for the situation.
As the elder's struggles intensified, black blood spurted from her mouth, splattering everywhere, including on Shen Banian and Shen Bayue's clothes. Shen Banian, both anxious and heartbroken for his mother, implored, "Doctor Hua, please think of a solution quickly!"
"Yes, yes…" Dr. Hua responded reflexively. But despite his agreement, he had no idea what to do about the elder's current condition.
Just then, a figure rushed in from outside the door, knocking Dr. Hua aside as he stood by the bedside. Qin Yi swiftly removed the silver needle from the elder's Yintang acupoint and then placed a palm on her forehead. From his palm, streams of Zhenqi—the purest energy cultivated by cultivators, capable of both harming and healing—were channeled into the elder's forehead.
As Qin Yi continuously infused Zhenqi into her body, the elder's violent struggles gradually subsided. Dr. Hua, thrown off balance by Qin Yi, stumbled and fell to the ground. Just as he was about to unleash a torrent of curses, he noticed the elder had calmed down. He swallowed his words and scrambled to his feet.
Seeing their mother no longer struggling, Shen Banian and Shen Bayue tentatively released their grips. To their immense relief, she lay still on the bed. Xue Qiao'er and Luo Dexuan, who had followed them in, remained silent, observing Qin Yi's actions.
Once the elder had completely settled down, Qin Yi withdrew his palm from her forehead. He turned to Shen Banian and Shen Bayue and said, "Your mother isn't suffering from snake venom. She has a poisonous insect inside her body! I must kill it now!"
As soon as he finished speaking, Qin Yi circulated his Zhenqi, his gaze fixed on the elder's eyes, preparing to act again. However, before he could move, the elder sat up abruptly, even jumping off the bed and hiding behind Shen Banian and Shen Bayue. She then looked at Qin Yi with a fearful expression. "Who are you? What do you want to do???"
Having witnessed Qin Yi calming their mother earlier, Shen Banian now harbored some trust in him. He even felt a pang of guilt for his initial attitude toward Qin Yi and for trying to send him away. He quickly explained to his mother, "Mom, he says there's a poisonous insect in your body, and he's trying to treat you…"
Before he could finish, the elder interrupted him. "Nonsense! Who has a poisonous insect in their body? I'm all better now!"
"Mom, you're better?" Shen Bayue asked, looking at her mother with surprise.
"Yes!" The elder pointed at Dr. Hua. "He just gave me acupuncture, and all the poison in my body has been expelled! I feel perfectly fine now, very comfortable all over!"
Dr. Hua, who had been standing there with a shocked and bewildered expression, blinked when he heard the elder's words. Then, his confidence returned. Stroking his beard, he declared, "Indeed. I administered twenty-one needles just now, expelling all the toxins from her body. This black blood is the evidence of the toxins!"
Shen Banian, still half-doubting, asked, "But Doctor Hua, what was that intense reaction my mother had just now?"
"That…" Dr. Hua pondered for a moment before replying, "Your mother has been poisoned for so long. When all the toxins are suddenly expelled, her body's inability to adapt leads to an acute stress response. It's perfectly normal!"
Hearing this, Shen Banian and Shen Bayue looked back at their mother. Aside from a slightly dark complexion and a general weakness, she was clear-headed and standing beside them, seemingly unharmed. They finally believed Dr. Hua. They concluded that their mother's recovery had nothing to do with Qin Yi; it was entirely Dr. Hua's doing. Her violent struggles and spitting black blood were merely normal reactions to the detoxification process initiated by Dr. Hua's acupuncture. Qin Yi's sudden appearance and placing his hand on her forehead, which coincidentally led to her calming down, was just a mere coincidence. In reality, their mother would have recovered on her own after a while. After all, no one else could see Qin Yi channeling Zhenqi into her forehead to suppress the poisonous insect.
Therefore, after the elder and Dr. Hua had spoken, Shen Banian stepped in front of his mother, blocking Qin Yi. "Uh, Qin Yi, my mother is all better now. You don't need to trouble yourself!"
Qin Yi shook his head wordlessly. He found Shen Banian filial but incredibly obtuse. His mother and Dr. Hua had said a few words, and he had completely believed them! His mother wasn't better at all; in fact, her condition had worsened. If Qin Yi wasn't mistaken, she was now completely under the control of the poisonous insect. Her recent words were not her own but were manipulated by the insect, which was controlling her body and consciousness to prevent Qin Yi from acting. Qin Yi was even more speechless at Dr. Hua's utter lack of ethics, lying to steal credit and going along with the elder's false statements.
With a heavy sigh, Qin Yi no longer bothered to speak to Shen Banian. He reached over Shen Banian and directly grabbed at the elder. Due to Dr. Hua's bungled intervention, the elder's condition had worsened considerably. Delay was no longer an option; any further hesitation would lead to her certain death, beyond even his ability to save her.