The Yu Brother’s Case Book - S2: Book 4: Chapter 10

The next time he woke, all kinds of distinctive jabs of pain followed after he regained consciousness.

“Oh, you’ll feel some discomfort, but you’ll just have to endure it a bit.”

He turned his head and, as expected, saw his evil friend that others would often want to strangle out of annoyance.

The air was filled with the faint smell of disinfectant. There was an extremely spotless, white ceiling. He then turned his head back as he finally realised where he was. While he had already known he was in the hospital from the last time he had awoken, it seemed that his location had changed again – it was different from before.

“This is a special single ward. The two suspects are on the run, so it was coordinated with the hospital to have you moved here. You know that the special care isn’t cheap, right? Don’t you feel that having a friend like me is such a valuable thing now?” Yan Si shut the book his hands as soon as noticed the other person awake, then immediately dragged a chair over. While helping to check over his friend’s condition, he took the chance to reiterate his steadfast loyalty as a friend.

After a faint pain from his head, Li Zi Hong’s mind cleared completely. “Right now…”

“Have you remembered what happened?” Seeing Li Zi Hong try to sit up, Yan Si pressed him back down and easily reached out to adjust the IV drip. “The last time you opened your eyes was around twelve hours ago. It seems like a resilient guy like you can just push through.”

Li Zi Hong closed his eyes and took in a deep breath before re-opening. The previous dull pain and haziness in his head was already significantly better, and he recalled the questions from before. “I still don’t remember…” He had no memory of anything that had happened since he got injured. Although he had the faint impression of having been placed somewhere and being moved around, he had no clue about any detailed circumstances. All critical points drew only a blank.

“Then do you remember you having an older brother that has been wandering about destitute and estranged for many years? Maybe your dad created the demon while out and he might have accidentally let it slip once when you were really young, so you’ve been searching for this blood-related brother this entire time?”

“There’s nothing of that sort.” Li Zi Hong shot a cold look at the guy next to him. He had actually witnessed what “intruding during a moment of weakness” meant – the representative example of randomly intruding while he was in a weakened [state] was right here.

“Hmph, but the guy that forcibly hid you all over the place calls himself your older brother. He even collected a ton of photos and clippings of you like a zealous fan. You should check to see if your trash cans have any traces of having been flipped through.” Yan Si brought over a cotton swab and a cup of water to sincerely play the role of a nurse as he said, “You have an impression of Zheng Zhong Hui though, don’t you? You two talked and laughed together for three days; it was all caught on the surveillance cameras.

“Mn, I remember.” After waiting for a wave of dizziness to pass, Li Zi Hong said, “Met him before…bumped into him on the road during the first few days I went back…he seemed to be looking for a job after getting released from prison, and we chatted about some things…”

“What day did you bump into him?”

“The day I returned from Officer Yu’s home.”

That was the day they finished solving puzzles…late at night? How could there be so many coincidences past midnight? Yan Si inwardly cursed at the damned stalker that must have planned when to jump out. He wondered if the person had acted out a fake car accident while at it too.

“Saw him in the convenience store next to the street when I was waiting for a traffic light…he greeted me because I looked a bit familiar, and I finally remembered…After exchanging a few sentences, we arranged to meet up a few days later. I wanted to help understand his current situation, as well as introduce him to some jobs…”

“Ahh, got it.” This wasn’t the first time. Yan Si knew that his former roommate had definitely helped guide several people to restart their studies and careers, not limiting himself by the scope of his own work’s responsibilities. Li Zi Hong would always help or refer people that sought aid or those he encountered while investigating cases. Quite a few were doing pretty well now, even opening businesses; not long ago, he had even seen someone get married and specially send a wedding invitation to his former roommate. If they had met through a chance encounter in this manner, then it was no wonder that this guy had socialized with that stalker for so many days. Moreover, the stalker had definitely known that this guy paid more attention to matters like these to use such a topic to hook him in.

“Is Mr. Zheng alright?”

“What the hell are you worrying for? That stalker is still plenty energetic, to the point where he can even break handcuffs. You’re better off taking care of yourself first.”

Li Zi Hong felt a bit more at ease upon hearing this answer. Then he began to feel his head start spinning a bit again, though he tried his best to stay awake. “The current situation? Everything?”

“I swear, could you not be such a workaholic?” Yan Si helped pull the blanket up in exasperation and eyed the clock. “Found you, seized Zheng Zhong Hui, then found that he seemed to be involved in some case. Earlier Tong came and talked some about it. It seems our student that was ganged up on was once again enabled by a spiritual force; they’re about to unlock your unusual world password and bizarre past. There’s also something like a hidden treasure of bones…As an additional note, their pile of paper shreds was confirmed to contain human blood, with bloody fingerprints and stuff. Boss seems to have connected it together with your case and has started pursuing it that way…”

Just as he was about to finish his simplified explanation, he finally realised that a certain prosecutor had stopped making any noise. When Yan Si glanced down, he found that the other person had long since fallen asleep, therefore wasting his time and breath to speak.

Yan Si reopened his book and let out a snort as he continued muttering to himself, “The only thing worthwhile of that stalker brother of yours is that he left behind some evidence. Moreover, you must’ve fought back pretty intensely that day. Once Jiu Shen-xiǎodì finishes analyzing the bunch of flesh and skin on you guys to confirm who it belongs to as evidence, the time for revenge will be just around the corner. Plus, based on the wounds and other marks you both have on your bodies, in addition to the fact other minor things that were retrieved from that alley, Jiu Shen-xiǎodì and I have also slightly reconstructed the location where you were found. It seems like you and your brother were ambushed in the alley. Based on the clues from the wounds, the amount of force, and the height, you should have been blocked off by two people. Aside from a metal bat and bricks or sticks they randomly picked up from the roadside, they should have also had weapons that made it difficult for you guys to retaliate, right? Or else there’s no reason you two would be injured so severely and escape.”

Ah, but I only truly confirmed this conclusion after seeing that old man barge in. There was no reason for two young and strong fellows to be casually knocked down. There must have been some additional kind of weapon that had made it impossible for his former roommate to have suffered that blow on his head.

“A gun, probably.”

One of them had a gun and had even shot at his former roommate a few days later.

Yan Si rubbed his chin as he contemplated this.

“Ah Liu and the others are still inspecting the scene of the fire. It really did burn everything clean away. But there are always things that cannot be burned.”

They would undoubtedly piece together the truth.

***

“Is it alright for Dong Feng to be in there?”

Yu Yin watched Dong Feng chat and laugh with the suspect inside the interrogation room. He seriously could not figure out how the situation had changed so much in a single day.

But why is Dong Feng wearing a cap inside the room? Even hiding all his hair underneath the cap…no idea what that’s about.

“He’s rebuilding bridges.” After returning from the hospital, Yu Tong had likewise been surprised by this situation. When he asked his brother, this was the response.

“Is this safe?” Yu Yin was somewhat uneasy as he stared at the bandages around Dong Feng’s neck.

“Your uncle is nearby, so there shouldn’t be any issues.” Of course, they could not let the child freely stay with a suspect that had violent tendencies. Yu Xia sat in the corner monitoring their every single action. Since there was a moving, lethal weapon inside, Yu Tong was not particularly concerned about safety. He turned to focus on other progress. “Tell me everything about the ghost story first.”

“Including the parts about the ghosts appearing?”

“Yes.” Yu Tong smiled faintly at his child. “Is there something you cannot talk about?”

“N-no.”

As Yu Yin started to tell about the details related to the ghost story, inside the interrogation room, Zheng Zhong Hui was starting to let down his previous guard.

Their conversation had been established not long ago.

Yu Xia crossed his arms as he remained alert.

Just as Dong Feng had said he would, he had taken the cap and a blank sketchbook with him into the room.

At first, he had really just quietly sat off to the side drawing in the book.

The originally very emotionally unstable Zheng Zhong Hui had worn an intensely guarded expression, as if about to attack at any given moment. However, after a while, his gaze suddenly locked onto the sketchbook and he gradually calmed down.

One hour, then two hours, slowly passed.

The first to break the silence was Zheng Zhong Hui. While staring at the flipped open sketchbook and the new human sketch starting to appear on the blank page, he suddenly said, “…I’ve never seen what he looked like in senior high.”

“I haven’t either. This is my back-projected guess based on his bone structure and muscle growth,” Dong Feng calmly replied to the other person’s words while continuing to draw. “However, I think it should be at least 80% or more alike. Once one knows the principles of growing transformation, it’s not a problem at all. Naturally, the accuracy still cannot compare to an actual photo.”

“Do you have his photo?” Zheng Zhong Hui looked completely engrossed now.

“I don’t have one right now. I’ll ask Senior to give some to me later, will that work? I don’t think Senior will be petty.”

“Yeah.”

“Then it’s an agreement.”

Yu Xia eyed Dong Feng, who had just made an agreement with the other party, but did not interrupt them.

Zheng Zhong Hui kept his eyes on the sketchbook as he began to ask more questions.

“I haven’t seen him in middle school either, can you draw it?”

“I can.”

“…Actually, elementary too.”

There was a very long silence afterwards. Dong Feng placed the book flat on the table to let the person next to him see it more clearly, then continued to draw various sketches without stopping.

Once he had filled the fourth blank page with drawings, he pushed the book towards Zheng Zhong Hui, somewhat alarming the tall suspect at first. However, the man that had clearly already held back for a long time only hesitated for a brief moment before immediately grabbing the book to carefully flip through and study the drawings.

“Let me first apologise to you. I didn’t mean what I said before. Your younger brother is in the hospital right now. He’s very safe, with people protecting him. Those two cannot get near him.”

“You didn’t know, it’s fine. It’s alright as long as I know.” Completely opposite from his former violent temperament, Zheng Zhong Hui rubbed his hurting nose and face before carefully wiping his hands clean and flipping through the pages again. “He’s not…It’s fine, just don’t make him mad again…he will kill you, so it’s okay now…”

Dong Feng glanced at Yu Xia. He did not immediately ask about the meaning of the last part of the sentence, instead changing the topic back to the sketchbook. “You and your brother were never together before he went to university?”

“No, I couldn’t find him. But I bumped into him one day.” Zheng Zhong Hui seemed to be reminiscing as he placed the book down on the table and pushed it back towards Dong Feng. “They took him away, but I still found him. He had already grown so much, but I recognised him at first glance, and then later confirmed again it was him. I figured he had forgotten about what had happened, just like I had at the time. So I was afraid of him being found before everything had come to an end. He seemed to be living very well, so it’s the right thing for him to not remember.”

Dong Feng continued sketching on the blank pages as he contemplated. Then he said, “I think so too. Oh right, I’m his junior from school. Although I don’t know too much about Senior’s school life, if you’re interested in anything and want to ask, I can respond if it’s within my scope of knowledge.”

“Really?”

Dong Feng noticed the purple and red swollen face give off an excited air and nodded. “Based on just the clippings and asked questions, you probably already know his work situation. And things like the fact that my Senior secretly loves playing games, video games and such…”

“Yeah, yeah. He used to really like playing them when he was little too. But back then there weren’t video games. We would play other things in the mountains.”

“When the matter comes to an end, you guys might be able to chat about it. My senior quite enjoys being in the mountains too.”

“Ah…”

Seeing the two of them really continue chatting line after line like this, Yu Xia did not participate and simply listened to the information in their conversation while checking the other news he had received.

Jiu Shen was still tracking the other fingerprints and bloodstains on those papers. The bizarre part was that the age of the bloodstains was extremely old, to the extent where Jiu Shen immediately cried out in anguish when he first discovered this and had shouted out that this was completely unscientific. However, with tears in his eyes, he had still put [the papers] together for analysis and was currently waiting to see if he could find a third person.

The others were still investigating matters related to Yang Cai Qian with the other students that year.

“Huh? Is that true?”

Yu Xia raised his head to look at the cap-wearing Dong Feng, who had voiced this in slight astonishment.

“Yeah, before an extension was built, my little brother loved going over there, calling it a secret base or whatever. I wonder if he still remembers.” Zheng Zhong Hui paused, his posture starting to relax as he even reached out to accept the glass of water Dong Feng passed over. “Do you have one?”

“I do, I liked closets when I was very small.” Dong Feng eyed the other person and said, “The top part.”

“You had three-compartment closets? We did too, my dad built them himself.”

“Can you build them as well?”

“Yeah, I used to help often, and I learned it later too.”

“So you haven’t lost your memories, have you.”

Zheng Zhong Hui narrowed his eyes. The originally warm expression suddenly turned cold. He opened and closed his mouth several times before finally spitting out words in an extremely low voice, identical to the one that Dong Feng had heard during that moment in the darkness. “Do you want to know? They always believed I had already forgotten. Those people, that woman, those men—they thought we forgot everything, those murderers, those ghosts.

“We remembered everything on the fourth day.”

***

“How was it? Did he say anything?”

When Yu Xia carried Dong Feng out of the interrogation room, they just happened to bump into Yu Yin and Yu who had charged over again.

“Where’s your dad?” Without answering, Yu Xia tossed the person at his nephew as he asked this.

“There seems to have been a bunch of reporters that ran in. Dad and some others are holding them off. Li-dàgē’s matter was spread.” Yu Yin shrugged. He had seen this kind of scenario quite often; in any case, it was better to let others handle it. The only thing worth rejoicing about was that the news had been leaked after Li Zi Hong had already been found. Otherwise, it would have been a lot worse.

Yu Xia nodded to indicate his understanding as he glanced at his cellphone. He had received a text from Jiu Shen to go over. “Tell me what your dad asked about.”

Yu Yin followed Yu Xia walk towards the other side as he obediently finished telling everything about the ghost hauntings.

After the elevator doors opened, they soon saw Jiu Shen circling the workroom with jars of evidence, clearly not wanting to enter.

“What are you doing?” Yu Xia furrowed his brows, having no idea what shenanigans the other was up to now. He looked into the workroom but did not see anything inside.

“Slightly affected…figured there were more people outside…and there might be more yang.” Jiu Shen took a few deep breaths as he shot an anguished look at Yu Yin. He had seriously had enough of having to use these unscientific methods for analysis every time; it was terrible for his mental state. Why can’t I just peacefully use my normal ways and have a normal work lifestyle?!

Receiving the grieved gaze for the umpteenth time, Yu Yin coughed. “Jiu Shen-gē, it’s very clean inside right now. There’s nothing there – it’s super clean.”

“Really? But I just had a graduated cylinder blow up with nothing inside it.” Jiu Shen had no idea how he could say this so calmly. In that scene when the graduated cylinder had exploded, he had practically crawled out of there on all fours. Ah Liu hadn’t returned yet and Jiu Shen had no idea what to do, so he had just stared at his work piled inside. Although he knew that every one of them was very urgent, and the machines had all been beeping too, he could not persuade himself to step inside no matter what.

Yu Yin looked in again and really did not see anything. He just could not say if nothing had visited before.

“Didn’t you request for a bunch of useless stuff? What’s there to be scared of?!” Yu Xia reprimanded then directly pushed the door open to walk int without a care. On the way, he turned off the machines that were constantly making noise. He then saw many chains of “useless” things hanging from the nearby shelf, and there were even one more string than what he had previously known about.

“Doesn’t seem to be working.” Jiu Shen fearfully followed in.

“No, it might be.” Yu Yin fiddled with a string of protection amulets. Following his action, the small bags made a faint noise, and rice or already shattered charms dropped out from some with bottom seams that had unknowingly ripped at some point.

Jiu Shen sucked in a sharp breath and took a step back.

“Results.” Yu Xia somewhat impatiently grabbed the person that wanted to flee, dragging him away from the protective amulets.

Perhaps because there were more people now, Jiu Shen did not feel as frightened as before. Thus, after some deep breaths, he pulled out a folder from nearby. “In short, there’s another one. If you exclude the two girls from the beginning, I ran deoxy—DNA on the other three. One of them matched up to have a parent-child relationship with someone from our database. Liu Guo Dong, fifty-three years old, already divorced; he was caught having an affair with someone else’s wife four years ago, and there were records from that time. However, it was later reconciled. The one relation is his son. So I checked and discovered that he originally had one son around twenty years old named Liu Jian Ting, who went missing seven years ago outside school. Whereabouts are currently still unknown.”

Yu Xia took the folder, which had two photos included – one each of Liu Guo Dong and Liu Jian Ting. The father and son had very similar appearances.

“Ah, I’ve seen this person before.” Yu Yin, Yu and Dong Feng had all circled around to see the photos too. Yu Yin immediately recognised the older one. “At the hospital. When I woke up, I saw him next to me. I thought he was some patient!”

“Mm, and then there’s still one issue.” Jiu Shen pulled out another set of analytical results and handed it over. “One of the matches with the weapons and the skin, blood, etc. samples brought back from the alley where Prosecutor Li and his companion were attacked matched with Liu Guo Dong, confirming that he’s the attacker.”

“Then you’ll definitely be very unhappy when you hear this news, Boss.”

Yu Xia turned his head to see Xiao Wu who had appeared at the door at some point. “Speak.”

Xiao Wu, who had been busy to death outside, handed over the paper bag he was holding. “We contacted Yang Cai Qian’s old classmates from that year. I asked them if they remembered anything related to hiking. One of the female classmates recalled that Yang Cai Qian had attended off-campus voluntary activities while in university, going out with several friends at random times. They would sometimes go hiking. Since they were quite friendly with Yang Cai Qian that year, they would often chat with her. Yang Cai Qian had once complained about a newbie in the group during their final hiking trip. There were around five people total at the time, with the youngest being Hu Xin Lei, who was not yet twenty. She later died from an accidental fall not long after, so the friends still remembered her. In addition, the oldest in the group was Liu Dong Guo, at twenty-four. The head of the group was called Lin Bo Yuan, and there was another person called Wang Qiang Ming…Wang Qiang Ming also reported his son having gone missing eight years ago. This photo is of his old face.”

From the paper bag, he pulled out an everyday photo of the father and son from back then. Yu Xia was not surprised in the least to see that it was the person that had pretended to be the landlord.

“After Yang Cai Qian returned from that last trip, she never went hiking again. Naturally, nothing like the hauntings in that ghost story happened either. But she turned into a very quiet person.” Xiao Wu shrugged. “Although time was tight, we tried contacting other classmates too…we found one of Hu Xin Lei’s senior high school classmates, but since it’s been so long and the two had not interacted much back then, the classmate only remembered that Hu Xin Lei had not entered university after graduating. She worked at a clothing store instead. However, the classmate did tell us of an interesting matter…she had heard that Hu Xin Lei had at some point mysteriously turned ostentatious out of nowhere, spending large amounts of money to treat many of their classmates to meals. She fell to her death soon after. That’s pretty much everything.”

Yu Xia nodded with narrowed eyes. He had a general guess of what had happened.

“What about Lin Bo Yuan?” Dong Feng asked after some thought.

“Lin Bo Yuan opened his own shop after graduating from university and married a woman who died from a car accident at twenty-eight. The opposite party had done a drunk hit-and-run, but they were immediately captured. Their family found that he had already written a will that said if something ever happened to him, to donate half his savings to welfare or something like that…In any case, Lin Bo Yuan remarried, and the two don’t have any children.” Xiao Wu had asked around about these things too. He took a deep breath and accepted the tea that Jiu Shen poured for him. “The five main characters have all been found. The ghost story is fake, the people are real.”

“Understood. Xiao Wu, do you have a strong fortune?” Yu Xia planned some things out in his head as he prepared to leave.

“Eh? Huh? I-I think it counts as strong?” Xiao Wu was somewhat taken aback by the sudden change in topic.

“Then you stay here to continue investigating. You can only leave once you’ve found new clues.”

After saying this, Yu Xia tossed him forwards and ran out in a flurry, with a line of children following behind him.

The dumbstruck Xiao Wu stared blankly at his boss stalking off alone before belatedly remembering to shout—

“Boss! I can’t, Boss! My girlfriend wanted to invite me to eat a late-night meal, ahhhhh—!”

***

Not—me—

That’s—not—me—

As he hazily began to regain consciousness, he faintly spotted a small figure at the corner of the bed, its red eyes glaring resentfully at him.

You’re not me!

When his eyes shot open, the first thing he saw was the bright sky outside the window.

The room was very quiet. There was only the soft whirring of various machines running. A light fragrance like some kind of cake wafted over from the side.

“While Jiu Shen-xiǎodì kindly dropped off visiting gifts, he forgot that you cannot eat it for the time being, so I helped you take care of it.”

Li Zi Hong shot a cold look at a certain forensic investigator eating a cake on a chair next to him. “You owe me one after I’m released.”

“Is there really a need? Hasn’t our friendship long since reached the point where your things are mine, and my things are yours?” Yan Si chewed on a whole chestnut as he magnanimously replied, “Speaking of our friendship that is as deep as an ocean trench, giving you an entire table’s worth wouldn’t be a problem after you’re recovered enough to leave the hospital. This shop’s cakes are pretty delicious, full of plump chestnuts and chestnut paste. It’s not too sweet nor does it have the cream you dislike. Jiu Shen-xiǎodì is really quite thoughtful. Even when he’s at the verge of dying from overwork, he still made the special trip here to buy a visiting gift.”

“Progress?” Li Zi Hong pressed his still dully aching head as he glanced at the table next to him. The clock indicated that it was past nine in the morning; another day had passed.

“Boss locked onto those two guys and is chasing after them. Seriously though, I think you should save your energy instead of trying to remember. When it’s time to remember, you will. We’ve already caught them anyways. With the yin and yang realms working together, the breakthrough point can always be found.” Yan Si swallowed his last bite of cake, then bent over to help adjust the bed higher so that the restless patient could sit up a bit. “The only reason you didn’t die this time was because you were lucky. But nobody knows what the aftereffects will be. You’re not like the student that was ganged up on, who doesn’t get injured in any critical areas and can quickly go back to jumping around energetically. Although the student that was ganged up on always has a bloody appearance that makes it seem severe, he actually gets mostly flesh wounds, and his quick replenishing of blood makes him no different from a cockroach. Don’t forget that your recovery ability isn’t as good as his. You were always like this since university. This is the difference between a psychic and an average person.”

“…” Li Zi Hong originally had still been trying to recall his memories. However, this blow made anything he seemed to have been on the cusp of remembering immediately vanish.

“That time your face got cut in university didn’t leave a scar only because I kept a close watch on it for nearly two months!”

“…”

“Which wasn’t the case for that large scar you got from slipping on the mountains in senior high.”

“What happened in senior high has nothing to do with you. Besides, I didn’t slip back then, it was a member…” Li Zi Hong sensed that he was starting to waste his energy on trivial matters. He shot the other person a sideways glance, not at all certain whether having such a friend stay by his side was helping or worsening his recuperation. “Cellphone.”

“Your cellphone said it isn’t home.”

“Just tell me directly then. If you want Ah Si to help, you’ll probably have to wait for another ten minutes.” Yu Xia opened the door and walked in, having just happened to overhear the deadlock inside the room. “Once you’re done saying the important parts, you should quickly go back to sleep. There’s no need to talk about the suspects; we already know who attacked. We’ve reconstructed the event in the alley too. The building set afire had most of its traces burned cleanly away, but Ah Liu found a bullet. Zheng Zhong Hui Is currently detained at the station; my brother is keeping a close eye on him.”

“He gave me something.” Li ZI Hong paused to close his eyes and waited for the dizziness to pass before continuing, “But I don’t remember what. While in the ceiling, he put something inside my pocket…”

“Jiu Shen inspected the clothing you were changed out of and did not discover any objects.” Yu Xia contemplated this for a few seconds as he walked over to level the bed. “It likely fell when Ah Yin pulled you down. I’ll have people go over and search again. The scene of the fire is currently still sealed off, so it shouldn’t have gone missing.” It just might have been burned away. However, he did not voice this sentence.

Li Zi Hong nodded and said, “I met him in university…during a self-improvement activity, in the mountains, an accidental encounter. He seemed to have gotten injured from a fall, but after confirming he was alright, I left…I don’t know him well, nor do I share any blood relationship with him.”

“Got it.” Having previously gotten a rough understanding of the situation already, Yu Xia was currently more concerned about what happened before that, the beginning of this strange chain of events. “Last question: when he first sought you out, did you think he was a good person?”

“…I can only confirm that he did not have any hostility towards me.”

“Alright, you two continue staying here and don’t run around. I’ve ordered people to stand guard outside. Be careful.” After stating these words, Yu Xia left in a rush, having only come in a spare moment of time to check on the situation.

Once the door closed, Yan Si turned back to push his friend that was about to fall back asleep. “Why don’t I know about you encountering a weirdo during your self-improvement activity?”

Li Zi Hong opened his eyes to give the other person an exasperated look. “I only recently found out that during this self-improvement activity, you had coincidentally been sent to the ER because of our junior.” When he had returned [from the activity] back then, this roommate had simply welcomed him by asking for a local souvenir, then ran away without asking anyways. It just so happened that the other had not asked more about this particular activity. Thinking back, it was must have because his roommate had held a guilty conscience.

Yan Si coughed and shrugged. “This just proves that we really are roommates with an amazing connection. Even major events end up happening at practically the same time.”

Li Zi Hong couldn’t be bothered to continue bickering about this type of thing, and he was already feeling very tired. He turned his body away to go straight to sleep.

Yan Si watched his friend fall back asleep. He stretched out his joints and leaned back in his chair to continue waiting.

Truthfully, he had not taken more vacation to sit here idly. And in reality, Jiu Shen-xiǎodì had not gone through the effort to visit the hospital with a gift while on the verge of dying from overwork.

The air in the ward gradually turned cold once again.

Even though he could not see it, he could still sense something in the room. The electronic machines started to exhibit unusual activity. Sudden ripples appeared in the IV drip and an unusual odour came from the air vent.

He could not see it, but he knew it was there.

The protective amulet hanging at the head of the bed was constantly being tugged by something. The allegedly very famous red cloth bag already had many loose threads from being pulled. However, it continued to firmly stay place.

Yan Si flipped open the book that he had placed down nearby and remained unruffled as he continued to waste his time here with the other person.

“Hurry up and get lost.”