Entomologist in Sichuan Tang Clan Chapter 121

#123. Addiction 3

“Choya, wait here with Seol. Mom and Dad have somewhere to go for a bit. Someone said they were sick, so Mom and I will go and take care of them, okay?”

“Yeah, let’s go stay with your aunt. You had a fun few days with your aunt, didn’t you? Dad, go. Let’s go.”

-Tsurut!

He told Cho to wait a moment and followed the soldier, Zhuge Hu, to the reception hall where the regular guests of the Murim Alliance stayed.

We were given a private house behind the Maengjujeon Hall because we had one of the five elders, Shintu, a guest, Seol, and me, who had even established a public office. However, Ji-ryong, the nephew of the elder Jegal Hou, seemed to have been given lodging in the reception hall where visitors to the Murim Alliance usually stayed.

‘Oryongsambong, nothing special.’

Around the reception hall, the warriors of the Murim Alliance were already spread out and surrounding the area. Judging from the commotion at the entrance to the Murim Alliance and the surrounding area, it seemed like they were completely controlling entry and exit.

It’s probably an emergency situation since it’s the poisoning incident of the nephew of the Murim Alliance military leader.

Passing the warriors who were guarding fiercely, I followed the long corridor of the reception hall and the rows of one-room-like rooms on both sides until I arrived at a room.

There, the Kwonryong, Geomryong, and Gungbong that we had met earlier were loitering around with worried expressions on their faces.

“Sir!”

“Yeah, did anything happen while I was away?”

“Yes, Ji-ryong is being looked after by the Yin Bong, the members of the council, and the people of the Jegal family.”

When I opened the door and went inside, there were already a dozen or so people in the small room, and next to Ji-ryong, who was lying on the bed, a woman named Eumbong was holding onto the collar of Ji-ryong’s clothes, who was blankly looking up at the sky with swollen eyes.

As our group entered the room, the crowd split in half like the Red Sea.

Through the gap, the phoenix spotted us and jumped up, shouting.

“Do, Dok-hwa! Please! Cheonrang, please Cheonrang···.”

Lang is a nickname used between lovers.

Perhaps Eumbong and Jiryong were lovers.

Now, she looks incredibly pitiful and sad, but after breaking up and listening to Hwa-eun’s explanation, she was a terrifying woman who would scream or play instruments to kill people by bursting their eardrums or blood vessels.

Eumbong ran out as if he couldn’t see the adult Jegalhou and grabbed Hwaeun’s hand and dragged her.

“Okay, calm down.”

Earlier, her face was definitely a bit whiter and her mouth was red as if she had eaten a mouse, but it seemed to be makeup.

Hwa-eun pulled her wrist out of Eumbong’s grasp and headed towards Jegal Yongcheon’s bed.

He asked me to follow him.

“The little dragon is close too.”

“Me too?”

“Yes, because the little dragon also knows a lot about poison.”

I wondered if there was any reason for him to call me, but after hearing the story that followed, it seemed like he was right.

Well, I’m an expert on biological toxicity, but that’s true.

He nodded and stood in front of Hwa-eun and Jegal Yong-cheon’s bed.

‘Let’s see what kind of addiction this is all of a sudden.’

And then he looked at the lying Zhuge Yongquan.

When I first met him, I thought he was too shy, but other than that, he didn’t seem to have anything strange about him on the outside, even though he was addicted.

Hwa-eun looked at the man standing near Jegal Yong-cheon’s bed, laying out something that looked like a pillow, and asked.

“It looks like the blood vessels and blood vessels have been blocked, slowly causing the blood to become cloudy. Are you saying that it’s a symptom of poisoning? Are you sure?”

The exterior looked so normal that even Hwa-eun seemed suspicious.

If it were addiction, there would have to be external symptoms such as rapid breathing, fever, bleeding, or physical abnormalities, but Ji-ryong showed no such external symptoms at all.

Then the man nodded and said.

“Yes, at first I thought it was some kind of disease, but it didn’t seem to be a disease, and there was a doctor who knew about poison, so I asked him to take a look, and he said it seemed to be poison···.”

As the man looked the other way, another man who had been looking at him stepped forward and threw a ball at Hwa-eun.

“I’m Won-gyu. Do you remember me? Miss.”

“Won-gyu? Oh, so you’re one of the members of the family that was sent at the request of the Murim Alliance a few years ago?”

“Yes, that’s right, miss.”

A man bowing his head to Hwa-eun’s words.

The man was probably a member of our Sacheondang family, and was dispatched there at the request of the Murim Alliance.

There are quite a few poisoning incidents in the martial arts world, so he was probably on a dispatch mission.

Hwa-eun nodded and asked the man named Won-gyu.

“How were your symptoms?”

I was suspicious until now, but since he was my family, I felt like there was no way he could be wrong.

“Fortunately, it doesn’t seem to be a fatal amount, but the blood clot has been fixed for now. Before releasing the blood clot, severe convulsions and slurred speech were confirmed.”

“Slurred speech and convulsions… Have you confirmed what kind of poison it is?”

“I’m sorry. My level of self-discipline is not that high···.”

If your level of poison is high, you can immediately check the level of poison you have taken in, but if your level is low, you cannot check it.

“Then I guess I’ll have to check the symptoms again. First, I’ll take your pulse.”

Hwa-eun’s hand went towards Ji-ryong’s wrist, who was lying down with sleepy eyes, and after a while, Hwa-eun nodded with a serious expression after finishing checking.

“It is definitely poison.”

Then, cries of murder and anger burst out.

“Hey, that’s right! Could it be the Blood Cult guys!?”

“Who dares to attack our Yongcheon!”

“How dare you poison the young master of the Zhuge family!”

Hwa-eun’s words broke through the murderous atmosphere.

“I want to see the symptoms, but can you please open the blocked blood vessels and blood vessels?”

Then, the military man Zhuge Hu shouted in surprise.

“Then won’t the poison spread and cause death!?”

The story is that if you block the spread of poison, the poison will spread and you will die if you open the blood vessels.

Hwa-eun shook her head at that question.

“If what I think is right, the poison won’t spread.”

“It doesn’t spread?”

Hwa-eun nodded her head at his question, and Zhuge Hu, who had been thinking for a moment, came forward and spoke.

“So be it.”

“Yes, I understand.”

As Zhuge Hu nodded, other men nearby stepped forward.

A group of sturdy men came out and surrounded Ji-ryong.

And when one of their hands touched several parts of the dragon’s body, a surprising sight was revealed.

At first, it started with the eyes of the dragon who was dazed, coming to life.

“Whoa, why are you so sensitive!? My, my body···.”

What I heard from Ji-ryong’s mouth was a dull tone of voice, completely different from the confident voice he had when they first met, and clearly full of fear.

As if his mouth was frozen, Ji-ryong could not speak properly.

What was more surprising was that the corners of Ji-ryong’s eyes and mouth trembled violently, and eventually his entire body began to tremble.

The dragon shook violently, as if it were the last gasp of an animal dying after being hit by an arrow.

Perhaps the people surrounding it were preparing to capture the body of this dragon.

As the dragon’s trembling grew more intense, the sturdy men around him grabbed hold of the dragon’s limbs.

“Khuuuk. Momi, Momi···.”

“Hey, Cheonrang! Sob···.”

At the serious look on Ji-ryong’s face, Eumbong bursts into tears, burying his face in Ji-ryong’s chest among the men.

As her loud sobs burst out, Hwa-eun directed the people towards her.

“You’ve seen enough. Let’s check the blood pressure again. Check the blood transfusion.”

“All right!”

Soon, Ji-ryong regained his senses and fell into a deep sleep.

Hwa-eun looked down at Ji-ryong and asked.

“Has Ji-ryong been having frequent headaches, having trouble remembering things, or suddenly getting angry lately?”

Then, Zhuge Hu clutched his chin and fell into deep thought.

“well···.”

Since it was his nephew’s business, he wouldn’t have known such trivial things, and what crazy person would get angry at their uncle?

I thought the question was a bit off topic so I looked at the candle, and the candle flinched when our eyes met.

She looked around and spoke in a cautious voice.

“I know, I was close to you, but there were times when you had a headache and had trouble remembering things. You forgot things you promised me, and I was upset a few times recently.”

Hwa-eun nodded at the answer and spoke to Zhuge Liang.

“I’m sure. Then, this is not an addiction today.”

“You’re not addicted today!?”

“Yes, it was a very slow addiction over a long period of time.”

“What!?”

The atmosphere became even colder than before at Hwa-eun’s words.

The military leader of the Murim Alliance, Zhuge Hu, asked in a cold voice.

“Yeah, how long does it feel like?”

“At least half a year.”

“···.”

At the words “half a year,” the murderous intent that Zhuge Hu had suppressed spread to all directions.

This means that they planned and prepared to poison him slowly, and just like with Young-young, they couldn’t have done something like this without someone around them.

And then, as if the scent was bothering her, she crawled out of his arms and looked at Jegal Hou.

-Tsrrrr.

The feeling flowing out of Hyang-i is, Dad, what is this? Ask? Should I ask?

As I was stroking Hyang-i’s head and trying to calm him down, Hwa-eun spoke as if she was trying to calm Jegal-hu down instead of me.

“Please calm down. It may not have been intended by someone, sir.”

“What? It wasn’t intentional?”

“Yes, sir. The one who poisoned Ji-ryong was Hong.”

“Hong (汞)?”

Hong, the word I heard when learning about poison in Tangga.

‘If it’s Hong, then it must have been mercury, right? Oh! Then since you said you were poisoned for quite some time, then it must have been mercury poisoning?’

Hong’s words helped me understand Ji-ryong’s symptoms, and why Hwa-eun had been addicted for a long time and why it wasn’t intentional.

Ji-ryong’s symptoms seem to be similar to Minamata disease caused by chronic mercury poisoning.

Even though I am an expert in biological toxicity, I have experience in broadcasting some of the poisons we encounter in our daily lives, so when I think back to the content I studied about mercury poisoning, the symptoms of Minamata disease include neurological symptoms such as lip tremors, speech impediments, and general behavioral disorders.

It matched Ji-ryong’s symptoms exactly.

And it was understandable that the harm might not have been intentional, since in those backward times mercury was used as a medicine.

It is said that the elixir of immortality that Qin Shi Huang took also contained a large amount of mercury.

It is said that they also drank liquid mercury as medicine.

However, liquid mercury is not easily absorbed by the body, so it does not cause poisoning unless taken for a long period of time. This is a characteristic of mercury.

Mercury is used in many places in our daily lives, the most representative being the thermometer.

There are more cases than you might think of children biting the tip of a thermometer and ingesting mercury and being taken to the hospital, but mercury is not poisonous to that degree.

So, if the dragon was poisoned, it was obvious that it was because he had been wearing mercury or something.

“Have you been taking any medicine mixed with red pepper or taking anything like Yeongdan?”

At this question, both Zhuge Hu and Yin Feng shook their heads.

“No, not that I know of.”

“As far as I know, there isn’t any.”

“That’s strange. It feels like I’ve been taking it for quite a long time···.”

The ending feels a bit like a labyrinth.

I thought back to what I had memorized when I was learning about toxicology in the Gomgomi Dangga class.

‘You clearly said that Hong(汞) is made by burning red sand(朱砂), right? You said that it produces poisonous gas, so you have to be very careful? You said that inhaling the smoke can cause acute poisoning that stops your breathing, so it can’t be that poisonous…

Wait a minute, where have I heard that injection before? Where did I hear it?’

The word injection came to mind when I was thinking carefully about what I had learned.

I remembered what happened at Namgungga.

“A water palace is something that a woman puts on her body to prove that she is pure. If you raise a lizard in a jar and feed it vermilion, its body will turn red. You crush that in a mortar and put it on the woman’s body.

If you are a pure white person, the blood will never be washed away even if you wash it with water.

That was the very food that was abusing the lizard.

‘It’s turning red? Huh!? No, really!?’

When I heard that it turns red when you eat it, the image of red lips flashed through my mind.

He asked Hwa-eun with a startled expression.

“Hwa-eun, Ho, by the way, I learned at school that the ingredient for Hong is Ju-sa. If I take Ju-sa, will I become addicted to Hong?”

Then Hwa-eun smiled with a very special expression.

Hwa-eun nodded and answered.

“As expected of Soryong. That’s right. Soryong. I didn’t even teach you that much, but our Soryong is the one who wakes up two things when you teach him one.

“Since the injection is an ingredient of Hong, it also makes you addicted to Hong.”

He looked at Ji-ryong, who was lying down asleep, after hearing Hwa-eun’s answer.

Then, a burst of laughter breaks out.

“under···.”

‘Ah···. Youth···.’

This is why lipstick must be non-toxic.

I was really at a loss as to how to explain this.