Jing Shu shook her phone and sent the recorded clip to Zhou Bapi. When the time came, even if President Tie tried to backpedal, he would not be able to.
President Tie nodded with a sunny smile, showing no hint of regret. "Silly girl probably does not realize it. Even if she solves a few cases, if Wu City loses overall there will be no vice chair position left. The whole association might be downsized."
As for how to throw blame, he already had a draft speech in his head:"The culprit was Zhou Baqi's stubbornness. He ignored advice and brought in a girl who knew nothing. The little miss had a big temper and boasted in public, then suffered a crushing defeat. Not only did she lose face for Wu City, but she also caused heavy losses to association."
The group swept down from the third floor to the first. The lobby was roaring with noise, packed with Medicinal Herb Association members consolidated from other branches and with the Ta City challengers.
She had not noticed when she arrived, but now she saw the central testing racks had been cleared away for a boxing-style platform. Herbs were arranged on the stage, each with its own diagnostic device behind it.
President Tie hustled her up onto the platform and barked the opening line: "Make way. Make way. Wu City's genius is here. Ta City, you are done. Let the genius onto the ring."
Jing Shu: "..."
She bit back the urge to plant a boot in his ribs. If it weren't for the convenience of doing so, she would never wade into this mud.
The already noisy hall grew louder. She cursed inwardly. If this bit of showboating failed, she could throw her face in the trash. President Tie's little abacus beads were clicking fast.
She stepped onto the spotlighted ring. An old man with a big black mole at one corner of his mouth narrowed his eyes. This was the Ta City lead, Cheng Qingzi. He figured Tie had dragged up a scapegoat, and confidence warmed his chest.
"Comrade genius from Wu City," Cheng Qingzi said pleasantly, "you have two options. First, state the remediation method and get our unanimous assent. Second, remove the disease from the plants by hand."
Jing Shu shifted her gaze to the three remaining specimens. Great. She didn't recognize two of them at all. The third she happened to know. What luck.
Truthfully, whether she knew them or not made little difference.
"Well?" Cheng Qingzi drawled. "Which first? The delicate Tianqi, the dying 'snakeberry', or the Paris polyphylla that refuses to sprout?"
She knew Tianqi by reputation. But Paris polyphylla… was that not the name of a villain in a game? It was also an herb?
Her eyes flicked. Inside the Rubik's Cube Space she pulled up the reference packs she had downloaded before Earth's Dark Days, while smiling on the outside. "Before we begin, just to confirm: today's challenge is to diagnose and treat medicinal plants and resolve cultivation problems, correct?"
Cheng Qingzi nodded.
"Then if you present a plant that is not a medicinal herb and try to muddy the waters, that should count as one point for us, yes?"
The crowd stirred.
"Has to. That would be fraud."
"Of course it counts, otherwise it is cheating."
A man rushed up, jabbing a finger at her. "If you don't understand, keep quiet. There are only a few herbs up here. Anyone can tell at a glance. You think everyone before you was blind, and only you can see?"
Cheng Qingzi frowned and waved him down. "Which one are you claiming is not a herb?"
"That one," she said. "That is clearly a rosehip, not snakeberry. Snakeberry is toxic. The fruit is solid and inedible. Rosehip is hollow and edible. See? It is wilted, but still edible."
She plucked a fruit, popped it in her mouth, and chewed. As a kid she had once eaten real snakeberry as if it were a snack. The aftermath was unforgettable: stomach pump and enema, double-barreled. She had never again confused snakeberry with rosehip.
The hall exploded.
"Damn it, no wonder nothing worked no matter what we tried. It was never snakeberry."
"They look identical. Ta City said what it was and we took it as gospel. I didn't even think to question it."
The old man shot a glare at the trembling fellow in the corner, then checked for himself. He crushed a fruit. The center was hollow.
"Idiot," Cheng Qingzi snarled, flinging the rosehip aside. "I told you to bring tough medicinal cases, not to pad the numbers with fakes." Compared with snakeberry's medicinal profile, a rosehip didn't count here, even if the two were dead ringers.
The man shrank into the shadows. He clearly knew.
"One point to Wu City," Cheng Qingzi said, breathing hard, the hairs on his mole bristling.
She turned with a sunny look. "President Tie, does my point count?"
He managed an awkward but civil smile. "It counts. It counts."
"Looks like she has some weight."
"Of course. President Tie has bragged about her plenty. Spotting that at a glance takes real grounding."
President Tie's heart twisted in pain.
Whatever the case, she had clawed a point back for Wu City and face had been saved a little.
Jing Shu moved to the second case: the Paris polyphylla that refused to sprout. She frowned. Her reading had just reminded her that Paris polyphylla is notoriously difficult to cultivate. The technology was not fully cracked. Soil, elevation, a dozen factors demanded precision.
Propagation required division. In crude terms, you cut a piece off the plant body, disinfect, and set it to root, and it regrows. There were countless reasons for failure.
If they expected her to identify and test each factor… cough. She didn't have that kind of lab time, nor the full technique. Division standards for rhizome segment length and thickness were exacting, and the cut needed a wood-ash dressing. She had never grown it herself.
Ta City's masters had set this one to stump Wu City by forcing them to produce a full method on paper. It was like having a poisoner brew a toxin with ninety-nine steps and then demanding the antidote. Who could do that on cue?
Cheng Qingzi put away his condescension and smiled. "Little master, how will you handle this non-sprouting Paris polyphylla? Will you state a method, conduct a hands-on trial, or review the solutions proposed earlier?"
No sprout meant no growth, which meant no medicinal harvest.
She shook her head.
Then she reached out with both hands and, crack, snapped the precious Paris polyphylla.
A collective gasp. Cheng Qingzi's jaw dropped. Heaven help him, what had he just seen?
She casually stuck the segment into fresh soil, touched it with a secret smear of Spirit Spring, and said, "Done. It will sprout within two days. Please don't imitate this lost technique at random. You will not be able to learn it."