Chapter 601: A New Visitor

I gave the name Xia Chi after careful consideration. I had met Chen Jiuge in the Deep Dream Layer, where I told him my name was Xia Chi. Since it was highly likely he was participating in this live broadcast as well, I stuck with the name to keep the lie intact.

Looking at my outstretched hand, the man didn't seem to think much of it and casually shook it.

"Yin-Yang Has an Order!" At the Ghost Art Fourth Layer, my control over Yin energy had reached a microscopic level. I let the Yin energy hidden in my palm and between my fingers seep into the man's body.

I did this covertly. Generally speaking, unless someone was extremely familiar with ghost arts, they couldn't possibly detect my little trick.

The Yin energy condensed into fine needles and pierced the man's acupoints without meeting the resistance I expected.

'Is this man just an ordinary person?' His meridians contained neither Yin energy nor true qi, and many of them were completely blocked. There was no trace of cultivation.

'Why would an ordinary person lie? Is he really not a live show streamer?' In my impression, every live show streamer was an extremely dangerous, terrifying existence. After all, to survive so many live broadcasts, they had to have some real skills to rely on. An ordinary person couldn't possibly survive that long.

As the Yin energy entered his body, the man pretending to be Wang Shi showed absolutely no reaction. I had already prepared to deliver a killing blow, but seeing this, the murderous intent in my heart slowly dissipated.

'This guy must have an ulterior motive for staying in Jianghu Hospital late at night. Experiencing life and looking for inspiration are just excuses, but that doesn't mean he's a live show streamer.' I let go of his hand, maintaining my smile, and stepped back to keep a safe distance from him.

"Why are you standing so far away? Does my face scare you?" The Writer pointed at his face, his uneven eyes—one large, one small—blinking a few times. He seemed used to being alienated. "I got sick when I was a kid. A tumor grew in my head and pressed against my nerves. The first surgery failed, and they didn't get it all out. When it relapsed, it worsened, eventually growing to the size of a chicken egg. My entire face deformed because of it."

"A brain tumor?" I had just seen this term on the walls of the Sarcoma Center, so I was merely parroting it.

"Yeah. Fortunately, the second surgery was a success, and they removed the tumor completely. But my face couldn't be changed back." The Writer's lips curled outward in an ugly smile. I wanted to comfort him, but the words died in my throat.

The atmosphere grew heavy. The Writer waved a hand. "Let's not talk about it. It's all in the past."

He tilted his head back and downed a can of beer before continuing. "I got here earlier than you and have pretty much explored the place. How should I put it? Abandoned hospitals—if you can avoid coming into places like this, it's best not to. There are lots of ways to make money. There's no need to throw your life away for it."

After he downed the beer in a single breath, a subtle shift occurred in the Writer's mood.

My eyes lit up, and I followed his lead. "Is it dangerous here? Did you find something terrifying?"

"I haven't found anything terrifying, but I just have this constant bad premonition." The Writer leaned against his tent. "Let me put it this way. I've been to other abandoned hospitals looking for inspiration before. Once, I went to Huadu Xiaotangshan Hospital. I don't know if you remember when SARS ravaged the country in the early 2000s. To control the outbreak, Huadu spent seven days and seven nights building the Xiaotangshan emergency treatment hospital specifically to isolate SARS patients. Once the outbreak was brought under control, Xiaotangshan Hospital was abandoned. All the doctors and staff evacuated, and that plot of land has never been repurposed."

"I've heard of the SARS epidemic. Xiaotangshan Hospital is the environmental template for many domestic escape room games. What are you trying to prove with this example?" I stared at the Writer. Ever since I realized he was lying and hiding his true identity, I had to mull over every word he said.

"It's simple. Xiaotangshan Hospital was abandoned to prevent the spread of a highly dangerous epidemic virus. But have you ever wondered why Jianghu Cancer Research Hospital was abandoned? Cancer isn't contagious." The Writer looked mysterious, successfully piquing my curiosity.

"You've been staying here for a day and a night already. Have you discovered anything?"

"Would I still be scared if I had? You don't get it. It's exactly because of the unknown that people feel excited and terrified. Right now, I'm in a very hyperactive state." As the Writer spoke, he cracked open another can of beer and raised it toward me a few times, as if hinting at something. "Aren't you going to have some?"

"No thanks, my alcohol tolerance is terrible. I easily act crazy when I'm drunk." Shaking my head, I waved a hand in refusal. "But you must have gained something from staying here for a day and a night, right? Can you share it with me? After all, I still have to go out and live stream later."

"Jianghu Cancer Research Hospital is huge. I've been here all day, and I've only just managed to look around the Cancer Rehabilitation Center." The Writer took a sip of beer and counted on his fingers. "There are three main buildings inside the hospital. The tallest is the Outpatient Building, which is where the two of us met. The building I'm staying in is the Cancer Rehabilitation Center. As for the building located deepest inside, its doors and windows are completely sealed and boarded up with wooden planks. I have no idea what it was used for."

"The doors and windows are sealed and boarded up?" The structure of that final inpatient building sounded somewhat similar to the Henshan Psychiatric Hospital I had visited a long time ago. Back then, I had expended quite a bit of effort just to escape that place. "Is that all? Is there anything else to watch out for?"

I was slightly suspicious. The Writer was definitely hiding something. He had arrived here a full day and night before me, so he had likely figured out the layout of the area long ago.

"Did you go to that water tank in the Outpatient Building's Sarcoma Center during the day? Do you know what's inside it?"

"I didn't pay attention." The Writer casually tossed his empty beer can into the corner.

"Then in this past day and night, have you run into anyone else?" I asked my final question. "When I got here, there was a private car parked outside. Judging by the driver's license inside, you aren't the owner. If my guess is right, that person should also be in the hospital right now."

"There's someone else in the hospital?" The Writer's voice shifted, sounding extremely surprised. "No way. I've been wandering around for so long, and you're the first person I've seen."

His expression was natural, and I couldn't tell whether he was lying or not.

"Do I have any reason to lie to you? Aside from you and me, there are other people in this hospital, and I suspect there's more than one." I watched the Writer, wanting to find more flaws in his expression.

"Why would they come to the hospital? This place has been abandoned for over twenty years. Could there be treasure hidden here?" He started laughing at his own words. "Sorry, I've written too many novels. Just treat it as me rambling and don't take it to heart."

The two of us chatted for quite a while longer. Neither of us had any intention of leaving the room. I was considering whether I should take this opportunity to finish him off directly, and the Writer likely harbored similar thoughts.

Both of us harbored our own dark motives as we shared the room. It wasn't until twelve-thirty, when a new flash of light appeared inside the hospital, that our attention finally shifted away from each other.

"Someone else came in!"

In the silent, dark hospital, a beam of light swept across the ward window. It seemed like someone outside had accidentally flashed a flashlight.

The Writer and I turned off the emergency lamp and lifted a corner of the curtain. We happened to spot a young man in his early twenties, carrying a backpack and shining a flashlight, walking into the Cancer Rehabilitation Center.

'It's not Gu Bei? How come there's another newcomer? Could he be the kidnapper who took the baby?' The Writer and I exchanged a glance and tacitly crept toward the door. Hiding at the corner of the second floor, we secretly sized up this reckless young man waving his flashlight around.

After entering the Cancer Rehabilitation Center, he kept muttering something under his breath. A few yellow paper Dao Talismans hung from his clothes, and his legs trembled. As he walked, he shined his flashlight at the door signs of the various departments, seemingly searching for something.

'He doesn't have a phone on him, nor is he wearing a Brooch. This foolish kid is so scared he can't even walk straight. He doesn't look like a live show streamer either, does he?' I stared at the young man still wandering blindly through the lobby, then glanced back at the Writer. Both of these people gave me a very strange feeling. Neither of them seemed like live show streamers, yet they had both inexplicably appeared in a live show streamer's hunting game.