Forensic Imperial Concubine

Chapter 35 Please Pay The Medical Fee

Denny had the medical bath prepared soon. When the guards carried the bath barrel in, they caught sight of Harper quickly pulling out the needles from Matthew's body. His face turned from dark to ashy from the great amount of blood loss.

"Put him in." Wiping the sweat off her forehead, Harper pulled out a porcelain bottle from the pocket of her waist and rattled out three red pills. Without another word, she tilted Matthew's chin up and made him swallow them all.

There was a smell of blood from the pills that made Denny wrinkle his nose. "What are those?"

"Blood-generating Pills," Harper explained, discontented by the fact that she had to use them already. "His Highness already lost too much blood. It's too slow to make up for the lost blood by taking nourishing food, and this would be a quicker way. Alas! He has eaten as much as three pills at a time."

Looking at the pained look of Harper, Denny couldn't help but choke back a laughter. If any other woman was placed in her position, she'd surely do everything in her power to save Matthew. Harper, however, cared about her pills more than Matthew. Denny shook his head incredulously.

"Can I have one?" Denny asked cautiously. He could tell from the expression on Harper's face that the pills were very rare and hard to come by. Were these pills really that effective? He was curious. All text © NôvelD(r)a'ma.Org.

Unexpectedly, Harper gave him a pill without hesitation. "It's used as a last resort in dealing with excessive amount of blood loss. I used a lot of herbs to make only ten of them." She shot Matthew a look. "His Highness just wasted three."

'Wasted?' Denny hid a smile, and couldn't help but admire the woman in front of him. Only she would think feeding these pills to Matthew would be a waste. If it were any other physician, it would've been their honor to serve the prince.

"What herbs do you need? You can ask His Highness to compensate for your loss once he wakes up," he suggested.

"Of course His Highness will. If I wasn't planning for this, I would've already left," Harper scoffed, looking at Matthew as if she was looking at a treasure chest. She obviously needed money to run her store. Money was hard to come by, so she wasn't going to throw this opportunity out of the window.

When Matthew finally woke up, the first thing he saw was a pair of shiny eyes. The surprise and delight that shone from them really confused him. Was she really that happy to see him wake up?

"Your Highness, you're awake!" Harper sighed in relief.

Matthew blinked, not at all used to her bubbly attitude. He simply replied with a nod of his head and kept silent.

"Your Highness, please don't tell your guard to bring me here like that again. The way he carried me on his shoulder made me throw up," Harper complained pouting her lips.

"Okay," Matthew agreed easily.

Another smile spread over Harper's face. Without another prompt, she quickly handed over a piece of paper. "This is the bill for the treatment I've given you, Your Highness."

Denny almost fell off his chair. The woman actually dared to ask Matthew for the medical fee. 'Do you even know who he is? How dare you demand payments from him!' he thought to himself.

Matthew, however, didn't look at all fazed from her request. Instead, he took the list from her and scanned it closely. The paper was well organized, listing the cost of each item, the amount of medical herbs it contained, and even the total price he owed her at the end of it all.

"300 taels of silver for the treatment fee, together with dozens of precious herbs such as Ganoderma, ginseng and more?" Matthew asked seriously. Money was not a problem for him, but the raw materials she had asked for were not easy to come by.

"Yes, Your Highness. It's not easy to make the Blood-generating Pills, and you've eaten three pills. These are the materials necessary to refill my stock. Though they are rare, I'm sure it's not difficult for you to acquire them," Harper said firmly. She already had enough food and clothes. The only thing she lacked was silver. She had only received a little from her monthly allowance. Although she'd won 10, 000 taels of silver from the gambling house, it was still not enough.

Matthew raised his hand, only for a servant to move towards him.

"Go get her 1, 000 taels of gold and pack whatever herbs she has listed, and give them to her." Matthew didn't even bother to bargain before waving the servant away. Harper couldn't help but feel flattered.

After she returned to her house, she glanced at the 1, 000 taels of gold and the large bag of herbs that she had just acquired. It was as if she was in a dream!

'If I can make money out of this for a few more times, I'd be rich as hell. No wonder so many people would want to be physicians; it's where the money is, ' Harper thought, placing the gold and medicinal herbs away. Matthew wasn't easy to get along with, and now that she got what she wanted, she would need to be more polite to him whenever she saw him.

"Your Highness, how are you feeling?" Denny stretched out his hand, meaning to poke him, but he retreated it at one look at Matthew's face. If he did it, he might just find his arm lying on the floor.

"I won't die." There was no expression on Matthew's face, as if God had sent a robot in the place of a person. His eyes were shut when Harper touched him, but he was conscious. He couldn't help but recall the feeling—it was different from when he was touched by others.

Though others' touch made him feel uncomfortable, there was something from the way Harper's hands wandered around his body that made him feel relaxed.

"What do you think of Harper, Denny?"

"She loves money, and she's incredibly stingy. All she did was talk about money and the herbs. She was even afraid that you wouldn't pay up," Denny scoffed, shaking his head.

"It's good to love money, which makes her a person that I can use," Matthew said slowly, but he didn't think Harper loved money. He had already sent someone to investigate her, and he'd had an idea on what she liked, what she hated, and who else she had met. "Do you know she's good at martial arts?"

"Impossible. I've seen her, and from what I can tell, her strength is subpar." Denny denied it without any hesitation. From how she had behaved, he found it difficult to believe that she'd be good at martial arts.

"The other day, she dressed up as a man and met Hansen in the Spring Restaurant. I saw she launch a sneak attack. She was swift and Hansen didn't find that."

"Do you want somebody to test her?" Denny made a gesture by drawing a straight line over his neck. If Harper was a spy for Charles, then they should kill her.

Matthew shook his head. Charles didn't care for his daughter, and Harper felt the same way. She'd been subjected to many faithful "accidents" orchestrated by her own father. If there was one thing he was certain about, it was that the two weren't in the same boat.

"There's one thing I'm curious about. Harper has been known for her good medical skills and was promoted to an imperial physician. I want to know who taught her the methods of autopsy, given that its technicalities and fundamentals are far from treating patients." He remembered the way Harper did the autopsy. And she could find the murderer who killed the merchant from the Western Regions in such a

short period of time. For a woman who appeared to be arrogant and brainless, she was brilliant enough to have fooled them all!

"I have to investigate her," Denny said. "Women are always known to be good at acting. Moreover, they also have the fair share of killing men due to their abilities to manipulate them."

"Are you saying I'm that easily seduced?" Matthew's voice was as cold as ice. One wrong word, and he'd make sure the place would be splattered by Denny's blood.

"Your Highness, I didn't mean it like that. But you know how irresistible beautiful women can be since the beginning of history. And Harper is indeed a beauty," Denny said with a wicked grin. "She's been known to attract countless men just by revealing her face."

"Has anyone proposed a marriage yet?"

"Of course not. Ever since Prince Kevin's son call off their engagement, no one would dare try–in fear of angering Prince Kevin," Denny answered before lowering his voice to a whisper. "Do you think they're planning to force her to kill herself by ruining her future?"

"Is she willing to sit and wait for her death without doing anything?" As Matthew tapped the table rhythmically with his fingers, he continued, "I'm now managing the three interdependent judicial departments. It's a good excuse."

"A good excuse for what?" Denny asked curiously.

Matthew didn't answer. He only had two years left and needed to speed things up. Despite his current situation, the emperor still feared him and wanted to make things difficult for him. Matthew decided to show his power to hold the emperor in awe.

"I heard that Lady Chloe is pregnant?" Matthew changed the topic. Chloe was from the Shen Clan, but was just the daughter of a concubine.

"Yes, Lady Chloe is pregnant. We have arranged Hailey Chu to take care of Lady Chloe just as you ordered. Hailey has just returned to the Chu Clan mansion, so she must be having a discussion with Charles on what to do next," Barry reported.

"Something happened in the Chu Clan mansion?" Matthew questioned. Harper was not an easy person to deal with. Her family members were not far off. If all of them were together under one roof, something must've gone wrong in the Chu Clan.

"Harper poisoned Felicia and the latter was disfigured. Sue couldn't find the antidote for her, so she asked Hailey for help." Barry updated him of the latest happenings inside the Chu Clan mansion.

"Harper poisoned her sister?"

"Well, it was Sue who wanted to poison Harper. When she found out, she extracted the poison and placed it on Felicia." Though Barry respected Harper, he'd do everything to keep his distance. She was different from many noble ladies he had met. While others would die for their family, Harper would rather kill her family just to keep herself from dying.

"It gave Hailey an excuse to come back home. Harper must've figured out how powerful her enemies are. Hansen is just one of them. She's surely not a person who's willing to be placed at the mercy of others. What is Harper up to lately?" Matthew asked indifferently.

"She recently bought a store in the north of the city. Other than that, she's been staying at home. I don't really know what else she's been up to."

"Bought a store?" Matthew furrowed his eyebrows. What was Harper up to? Was she planning to start a business? Was it a place for her to continue her autopsies? Was it a clinic? There were so many

questions running on Matthew's mind, and they were things he intended to find out.