According to the description given by the captain of the French Navy ironclad Méandre, who first encountered him, this injection called Tian Yi Sheng Shui used only about a teardrop’s worth of dosage to pull one of his sailors back from the hands of death. At the time, the sailor was on the verge of death due to relapsing fever, and even the ship’s doctor believed there was no hope for recovery.

“What utter nonsense, it was clearly Benjamin Franklin who cured his syphilis!” said Boss Young with a look of disdain as he read the newspaper in his hand.

This incident was quite unexpected. After encountering the Méandre, which was returning from Algeria to Brest, at sea, he had originally just wanted to ask for directions and leave. However, upon learning that his yacht was fast and heading to France, the captain immediately asked him to help take a sailor who had contracted relapsing fever en route to Paris. With such a good opportunity, Franklin Young naturally wouldn’t miss it.

He told the French that he had a secret family remedy that could cure this illness instantly. Of course, the French were delighted to hear this. The sailor had little hope left, so they were willing to try anything. Who would have thought that after Franklin Young performed a skin test and injected him with a diluted dose of penicillin, the sailor’s symptoms began to improve significantly in no time.

Immediately, everyone on the Méandre treated him as an honored guest. The captain personally invited him to dinner. While drinking red wine and eating steak, he boasted about the efficacy of penicillin, especially emphasizing that it could also cure stubborn diseases like syphilis and gonorrhea. He knew exactly what kind of people these Frenchmen were.

As a result, after dinner, the captain mysteriously invited him to his own cabin and, with some embarrassment, confided that he happened to be troubled by one of these stubborn diseases.

The rest was simple. After using penicillin to resolve the captain’s embarrassing problem, Franklin Young immediately became someone the captain wanted to curry favor with. Especially after learning that Franklin Young could continuously obtain this miraculous medicine from China, Captain Laville almost wanted to perform a Chinese-style chicken-head-cutting and yellow-paper-burning ceremony with him.

“The Young Brothers, judging by your accent, are you from the capital? May I ask your esteemed father’s name?” Sitting across from him was a man dressed as a zombie, who only smiled faintly at his crude words and then asked with some curiosity.

“Mr. Howard, to be honest, I am actually a Chinese-American. As for the so-called secret family remedy, that was just me fooling these foreigners. In fact, even this ship was invented by myself and a group of like-minded young people, and we’re planning to bring it to Europe to make money.” Franklin Young said with a smile. The skinny man sitting across from him was a celebrity—the famous poet and diplomat William Howard.

“Neither in calligraphy nor swordsmanship do I excel; stroking my temples, my hair turns to silk. My parents rejoiced, friends congratulated, when I was born thirty years ago.” Although Boss Young was not well-educated, he could still remember this poem.

Old Howard had just arrived in Paris with the newly appointed envoys of Britain, France, Italy, and Belgium, Samuel Swift, and would soon head to London to serve as Second Secretary at the Chinese Legation. As a wealthy Chinese globe-trotter, Franklin Young naturally should first report to the Chinese Embassy in Paris. Although Chinese people were still quite rare in Europe at this time, it wasn’t rare enough for the envoy Samuel Swift to personally receive him, so the task fell to William Howard, who served as an adviser.

“Oh, so The Young Brothers is a Chinese-American. May I ask where you lived in America? I myself lived in America for several years and am quite familiar with the Chinese community there,” William Howard said with a smile.

“Uh, please forgive me, Mr. Howard, but my friends don’t like outsiders knowing about them. As you know, anti-Chinese sentiment in America is very serious right now. It’s hard for Chinese like us to survive, and the technologies they possess are easily coveted by foreigners, so we have to be cautious.” Franklin Young quickly replied. He had forgotten that Old Howard had also served as consul general in San Francisco and might know America even better than he did.

William Howard nodded noncommittally. As a bureaucrat of the Qing Empire, if nothing else, his ability to read people was top-notch. Of the ten sentences this oddly dressed fellow spoke, probably nine were lies. But that didn’t matter; in officialdom, someone who only lies nine times out of ten is already considered honest.

Boss Young came to the Chinese Embassy looking for a job. In his own words, he wanted to serve the court—even if he wasn’t paid, as long as he was given a chance to serve the court and the Empress Dowager, he would be deeply grateful.

“Mr. Howard, as you know, we overseas Chinese wander far from home. Our greatest wish is to return home in glory. To be honest, we don’t care about money. What we want now is an official title, so that when we return, we can bring honor to our ancestors.” Franklin Young said earnestly, his sycophantic attitude on full display.

He was in urgent need of a patron. Although the Qing Dynasty wouldn’t last much longer—especially if he kept stirring things up—it still had some prestige for now. At least it still had the strongest fleet in Asia, and the Dingyuan and Zhenyuan had only been in service for a few years, just in time to show off in Japan. The old empire, battered by repeated British and French bombardments, was experiencing a bit of a last gasp, especially after the recent Sino-French War, which had given the French a hard time. So, keeping up appearances was still no problem.