I’m Nannan, and I’ve spent ten years tending a medicine cabinet.
Yesterday, I was still fretting over the old stock piled up in the storeroom. Then I woke up as a young apothecary about to be thrown out of Jishitang in the Great Zhou Dynasty.
The previous owner of this body made a terrible mistake, and someone is about to die because of it. The shopkeeper is hopping mad with worry, and the apprentices are trembling with fear. I only glance at the dark, grimy medicine cabinet, completely unfazed. I’ve faced worse than this last month, when I dealt with a scoundrel trying to scam us for money.
Ten years of experience have taught me one thing: no matter the dynasty, even the tiniest error in medicine can lead to disastrous consequences.
I grab the old weighing scale, with no time to waste on explanations. As I clear out the moldy herbs, I make a mental list: the shop’s stock needs a complete inventory, the doctor’s prescriptions need to be recorded, and those common folk who care only about a medicine’s reputation and know nothing about its quality need a proper explanation.
Prince Xiao has stomach discomfort? Stop giving him those useless tonics. It’s indigestion. He needs remedies to aid digestion, along with my own method of eating smaller meals more often.
The Noble Consort can’t sleep at night? I’ll prepare a formula to calm her mind and nourish her heart, and explain how to manage her health.
In the Great Zhou Dynasty, I, Nannan, don’t rely on some miraculous ancestral prescription. I use the experience in my eyes and the skill in my hands, built over ten years, to turn this nearly bankrupt shop into the most trusted store on the street.
