As a general, Wu Qi wore the same clothes and ate the same food as the lowest of his soldiers. When one soldier had an abscess, Wu Qi sucked out the pus himself. The soldier’s mother heard of it and wept. Someone asked her why. Her son was a common soldier, and the general himself had sucked his wound.
“It is not that,” she said. “Years ago, Lord Wu sucked his father’s wound. His father never turned back in battle and died at the hands of the enemy. Now Lord Wu has sucked my son’s wound. I do not know where he will die.” (Records of the Grand Historian)