Chapter 44: The Doctor
“Ah!” Ruan Yi cried out in terror.
The study door was pulled open with force, making a loud noise.
Ruan Ying’s bloodshot eyes locked onto her daughter, whose face had turned pale from fright.
“Xiao Yi! Who let you out! You can’t come out! Go back! Be a good girl!”
Her voice was sharp, bordering on shrill.
Ruan Yi instinctively stepped back in fear until a pair of firm arms shielded her into a warm embrace.
Seeing her daughter’s frightened appearance, Ruan Ying reacted even more violently, lunging forward to grab her shoulders.
Ruan Yi closed her eyes in a shiver, but the expected touch of pain did not arrive.
As the needle precisely pierced the side of Ruan Ying’s neck, the agitated figure suddenly froze. All sound caught in her throat as she went limp.
The person skillfully supported Ruan Ying’s weakened body and settled her onto the sofa.
Ruan Yi slowly opened her eyes, her lashes trembling. Her mother’s loss of control had vanished. Before her was a tall silhouette with a head of white hair—it must be the doctor Fu Jingchen had called.
The man wearing a surgical mask turned around.
Most of his face was covered by the mask, leaving only a pair of gray-blue eyes visible. The corners of his eyes tilted upward slightly, and his brow bone was high and nearly sharp.
The man’s pupils vibrated violently. Even through the mask, the sound of him swallowing as his Adam’s apple rolled was clearly audible. The hand hanging at his side was clenched into a tight fist.
He stared fixedly at Ruan Yi’s small face, which was pale and pitiable from fear.
Ruan Yi noticed the other party’s gaze, and her brows furrowed slightly. She suddenly felt a strong sense of discomfort, even finding it hard to breathe.
Ruan Yi looked at the man and tried to identify him, but she was certain she hadn’t met him before.
A warm touch came to her cheek as a pair of large hands gently turned her head, bringing her face back.
“Sister, don’t look at others. Look at me,” Gu Zhi complained with a hint of grievance.
Before she could comfort her brother, she was interrupted by a decisive question.
“What is President Ruan’s current condition?” Fu Jingchen asked, looking at the white-haired man.
The man’s gaze finally moved away from Ruan Yi.
“From the looks of it, it’s an acute manic episode superimposed with anxiety neurosis.”
His voice was indifferent and low, with an unexpectedly pleasant tone.
“There should have been a strong stressor before the loss of control. If a psychiatric illness occurs without a trigger, blood tests are required. The possibility of incorrect medication cannot be ruled out.”
Listening to the back-and-forth between the two, Ruan Yi understood that this doctor was definitely not Fu Jingchen’s subordinate.
The tone of their conversation sounded more like familiar friends.
Before he finished speaking, the white-haired man’s eyes suddenly looked at Ruan Yi, his depths carrying an indefinable dark tide.
“Are you the patient’s daughter?”
Ruan Yi immediately snapped out of her thoughts and responded quickly.
“Yes, I am her daughter.”
“If it’s convenient, could we exchange contact information? I can be reached for follow-up blood tests and consultations on the condition.”
As the man spoke, he fished out his phone and handed it to Ruan Yi.
Ruan Yi took the phone but froze for a moment when she saw the screen.
The interface wasn’t the familiar dialing keypad but a page for adding a friend on a messaging app.
Do doctors nowadays communicate with patients via WeChat?
Ruan Yi hesitated for a few seconds but still entered her number. After searching for the account, she pressed the send button.
Focused on the phone screen, the girl didn’t notice that the atmosphere around her had turned a bit strange.
Of the two men beside her, one had a deep frown, while the other’s jaw was tense as he pressed even closer to Ruan Yi. The surrounding air pressure seemed to drop significantly.
“Let the patient rest quietly. If there’s another episode before the check-up, have her take this. it can act as a temporary sedative. Contact me if anything happens.”
The man’s long fingers tapped on the medicine box, and then he handed the prescription instructions to Ruan Yi. His movements were swift and professional.
Even though the other party’s tone was normal and his conduct was appropriate, for some reason, when those eyes stared at her…
She felt very strange. The accidental touch of their fingertips when he handed over the phone also caused a sense of discomfort to rise in Ruan Yi’s heart.
Perhaps she was judging a book by its cover, thinking that only an old chief physician with a receding hairline would count as professional.
But the other party clearly didn’t have any other intentions.
Ruan Yi and Gu Zhi gently settled Ruan Ying back into bed. When she tucked in the corners of the quilt, Ruan Ying’s expression was tranquil, showing no sign of the loss of control from earlier.
The fact that her mother was being drugged was now out in the open.
Does this mean the plot has been changed?
Although she didn’t know the specific reason, she had discovered her mother’s worsening condition early.
If she sought medical treatment now, the ending where the condition deteriorated extremely would no longer happen. There was a change—everything was changing!
Ruan Yi’s eyes instantly clouded with mist. The fear and worry that had been suppressed by the world’s settings for so long broke through the dam at this moment.
Ruan Yi dove into Gu Zhi’s arms, her cheek pressed tightly against his chest. Her voice carried a sob of joy.
“Ah Zhi, Mom will get better. Everything will get better, right?”
Gu Zhi’s entire body stiffened, but then his long arms wrapped around her slender waist, his palms pressing against the girl’s soft skin.
His finger pads gently rubbed the soft baby hairs at the back of her neck, sliding from behind her ear to the sensitive earlobe. His movements were as gentle as if he were comforting a startled small animal.
He lowered his head, his deep voice revealing a trace of imperceptible hoarseness.
“Yes. As long as Sister wants it, it will happen.”
In a remote suburban villa.
The man’s leather shoes tapped against the marble steps, every step echoing in the empty basement.
His silver-white hair glinted with a metallic luster under the basement lights.
Large anatomical diagrams hung on the basement walls, surrounded by countless glass display cases. The pungent smell of formalin permeated everywhere.
Deformed fetuses, mutated organs, and limb specimens soaked in transparent liquid glowed with a faint luminescence under blue lights.
The man’s fingertips slid across the phone screen, the corner of his mouth curling into a morbid arc.
In the dialogue box, just looking at the message sent by the girl allowed him to imagine her sweet voice and cute appearance.
[Hello, Doctor. I’m the daughter of the patient from earlier. You can just call me Ruan Yi.]
The man’s tongue pressed lightly against the roof of his mouth, a low chuckle escaping his throat. His gray-blue eyes swirled with an almost eerie frenzy.
He had seen countless exquisite faces—cold, delicate, fragile—but they were all like faded specimens, dull and soulless.
[Until I saw her.]
She possessed a soul-snatching allure more intoxicating than the most perfect nerve specimen on a dissection table.
“Found you…”
Her scent was different from everyone else’s.
The man stared at the phone screen, his eyes flashing with an extremely dangerous predatory lust in the dim light.
The girl’s photo on her social media feed was magnified infinitely under his fingertips.
The madness swirling in his pupils almost broke through his reason.
“My Muse, my work of art.”
“Destined to become the most flawless masterpiece under my scalpel.”
This was also the first time he had a reaction.
[So this is what it feels like. It actually aches from the hardness.]
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