Professor Tang is none other than Tang Wangshan, and Pang Feng's assessment of him is quite on point. This old fellow is a classic case of the frog in the well, merely a worm outside of Southern Chu, but in Southern Chu, he is a true dragon.
In the Southern Chu medical community, Tang Wangshan is unquestionably the top elder. Among the heavyweights present today, the director of the First People's Hospital, Chen Xirong, is his son-in-law, and the director of the provincial Boya Hospital, Peng Cao, is his disciple. Well-known experts and professors throughout the provincial Chinese medicine system are either his disciples or his grand-disciples.
That is Tang Wangshan's position in Southern Chu! It is also because he has long occupied such a position in Southern Chu that he has become somewhat self-inflated, leading to his development of a character that looks down on everything and believes himself to be the best in the world.
