Chinese Medicine: Starting with Daily Intelligence-Chapter 122: The Red-Hot Mao Dudu

That evening, Li Xu and Gu Xiaoya met at a quiet private restaurant in Feng City.

Gu Xiaoya wore a light blue dress, her hair casually pulled back into a ponytail. She looked much more relaxed than usual.

"Congratulations on finally getting rid of that scumbag," Li Xu said with a smile, raising his teacup.

Gu Xiaoya’s eyes curved into crescents as she raised her teacup and gently clinked it against his. "Thanks! You have no idea, the day the hospital announced their decision, I felt so light. It was like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders."

"I can tell. You’re in a much better place now." Li Xu placed a piece of steamed fish on her plate. "What are your plans for the future?"

"I’m just going to focus on work for now." Gu Xiaoya propped her chin on her hand. "I’m not thinking about romance at the moment. I just want to concentrate on my career. Oh, and speaking of careers, your Mao Duddu Eye Drops are really blowing up lately!"

Li Xu asked, "Oh? What have you heard?"

"Heard about it? I’m seeing it firsthand!" Gu Xiaoya said excitedly. "I work in the ophthalmology department, and now whenever I see patients with dry eye or eye strain, I recommend they try Mao Duddu. And do you know how good the feedback has been? One patient who’d been using imported eye drops for a long time came back just to thank me after trying Mao Duddu. They said it was much more soothing than those big-name brands!"

Li Xu was a little surprised himself. "I didn’t expect it to go so smoothly."

Even a great product could get lost in the crowd these days.

He had been worried the initial launch wouldn’t go well.

"Tell me about it!" Gu Xiaoya pulled out her phone and scrolled through some chat histories. "I even asked a few friends who work at pharmacies. They said Mao Duddu is selling incredibly well and a lot of stores are already sold out. This product of yours is going to be huge!"

That caught Li Xu’s attention.

He had been so busy with the Aconite recently that he hadn’t paid much attention to the eye drops’ sales figures.

"I have you to thank for making the initial connections," Li Xu said sincerely. "If you hadn’t helped me apply for the patent and get the word out, this product would probably still be sitting on a lab shelf."

Gu Xiaoya winked playfully. "Words alone aren’t enough. How about... you give me a massage sometime? The clinic has been so busy lately, and my shoulders are killing me."

Li Xu chuckled. "Alright. Don’t rush off after we eat. I’ll give you a proper massage."

After dinner, Li Xu gave Gu Xiaoya a massage right there in their private room.

It felt so good she almost cried out.

Half an hour later, after seeing Gu Xiaoya off, he returned to his clinic.

Li Xu was just about to make a call to ask about the eye drops when his phone rang.

It was Ding Kaifang.

"Dr. Li! Great news!" Ding Kaifang’s voice was buzzing with excitement on the other end of the line.

He was the head of a major conglomerate,

but his previous ventures had all been in fields like real estate, tourism, and hospitality.

The pharmaceutical company he’d acquired had been losing money hand over fist.

Now, with a true blockbuster product on his hands, he felt a renewed entrepreneurial passion. "Mao Duddu Eye Drops have exploded! We sold over a thousand bottles in a single week! Many pharmacies are already reordering!"

Li Xu walked over to the apothecary cabinet in his clinic, phone in hand. "I just heard from Dr. Gu. I had no idea sales were this good."

"I didn’t expect it either. It seems the market for eye drops is bigger than we imagined, and people are desperate for a quality product!"

Ding Kaifang continued excitedly, "At this rate, breaking five thousand bottles this month will be no problem! Dr. Li, do we have enough raw materials? We need to ramp up production immediately!"

Li Xu frowned slightly.

His personal supply of the mutated foxtail grass extract was nearly gone.

There was another patch of the wild plants on a cliff near Bailingyu Village, deep in the Qinling Mountains, but the supply was limited.

"The raw material is definitely a problem..." Li Xu said, thinking. "Mao Duddu Eye Drops are made from a Chinese herbal extract, and the main ingredient is extremely rare. I can only provide one more batch this year, and it won’t be ready for at least a month."

"I see..." Ding Kaifang mused for a moment. "In that case, I’ll have the sales department slow things down. We can’t afford to sell out too quickly."

After hanging up, Li Xu sat back down on his stool.

He mulled over how to expand the cultivation of the mutated foxtail grass.

Previously, he had been more focused on finding superior strains.

But his recent experience with the Aconite had made him realize that the quality of medicinal herbs was inextricably linked to their growing environment.

The exact same strain could have vastly different medicinal properties depending on the soil and climate.

"Perhaps..." Li Xu muttered to himself, "I should try planting a batch of ordinary foxtail grass near Bailingyu Village..."

Once the idea took root, he couldn’t shake it.

Foxtail grass was an annual plant. It was summer now, so if he planted the seeds soon, they would be fully grown in a month or two.

He didn’t even need them to produce seeds.

They just needed to reach maturity.

It was a common strain, after all.

The seeds were easy to come by.

He wanted to test a theory: could ordinary foxtail grass, when planted there, grow into the mutated variety?

If it worked, he would have an endless supply of raw materials for the eye drops.

’It’s been over a month... I should go check on things.’

Li Xu decided he would take some ordinary foxtail grass seeds and plant them there in a few days.

...

「Meanwhile.」

Liu Haibo, the Feng City sales agent for Baixing Eye Medicine Group, frowned as he scanned the sales report in his hands. His finger tapped repeatedly on the column for "Bright Eye Drops."

The data clearly showed that in the past week, orders from major pharmacies across Feng City had plummeted by forty percent. This was highly unusual.

"What’s going on?" he muttered, grabbing his suit jacket and heading for the door. "I need to go see for myself."

Half an hour later, Liu Haibo parked in front of Kangning Pharmacy. He frowned as he looked through the car window and saw the store was bustling with customers.

As the sales agent for Baixing Eye Medicine Group in Feng City, he was familiar with every pharmacy’s sales patterns. Tuesday mornings were supposed to be slow.

He unbuckled his seatbelt, straightened the collar of his shirt with its "Baixing Eye Medicine" logo, and pushed his way inside, carrying a sample case.

Inside the pharmacy, five or six customers were crowded around the counter where the owner, Zhang Zhigang, was busy ringing up a middle-aged woman.

"Looks like business is booming, Boss Zhang," Liu Haibo said, waiting until the crowd thinned before approaching the counter.

"Oh, Manager Liu!" Zhang Zhigang looked up, his face breaking into a smile. "Perfect timing. I was just about to call you. I need to place a restock order."

With that, he handed a prepared order form to Liu Haibo.

Liu Haibo’s heart sank as he took the form and glanced at it.

It was all for generic medications.

There was no mention of Bright Eye Drops.

’What’s going on?’

Usually, Zhang Zhigang ordered 200 bottles of Bright Eye Drops at the start of every month. But last week, he’d only ordered fifty, and now he wasn’t reordering any at all. ’Could it be...?’

"Place is really buzzing, Boss Zhang," Liu Haibo said, setting down his sample case with a casual air. "How are the Bright Eye Drops selling? Need a restock?"

Zhang Zhigang’s smile faltered for a second before he became even more enthusiastic. "Come, come, have a seat and drink some tea. Xiao Zhang, pour Manager Liu a glass of water!"

He shouted toward the back room, then lowered his voice. "Manager Liu, we’ve been working together for years, so I’ll be straight with you. I’ve recently started stocking another kind of eye drop..."