Chapter 610: Number Five Needle

"Where are you going?" Zhang Heng grabbed me and pointed at Chen Mo, who was lying on the ground. "What about him?"

With a fractured lower leg and covered in blood, Chen Mo's chances of escaping if we ran into danger again in the inpatient building were very low.

"Don't leave me here alone. I won't hold you back. Take me with you," Chen Mo pleaded, trying to stand. His leg couldn't support him, however, and after struggling a couple of times, he collapsed back into the dirt.

Humans are strange creatures. When faced with a conflict of interest, most people's first reaction is to protect their own interests. But when faced with danger, they prefer to distribute the risk, gravitating toward a group.

Instinct made Chen Mo unwilling to act alone in the face of danger. To him, staying behind was equivalent to being abandoned by the pack.

I glanced down at him. The medical student was in a miserable state. His eyes were damp, and the excruciating pain made his words slur slightly.

"How about we take him outside the hospital first?" Zhang Heng couldn't quite stomach leaving him; after all, this was a living, breathing human life.

"No, outside the hospital is dangerous too." I didn't tell them that not long ago, a woman had presumably been attacked by ghosts and had vanished into the dense forest.

"What danger could there be outside?" Zhang Heng said, though he blinked at me twice. Behind Chen Mo's back, he subtly made a gesture telling me to abandon him.

To be honest, I was tempted for a moment. In such a dangerous environment, joining forces with a capable ally was naturally better than dragging a burden along.

"Why don't we let him hide here first? The two of us can go inside to investigate, and once we uncover the truth, we'll come back to get him." Zhang Heng was giving me a way out, hoping I'd follow his lead and agree right then and there to spare everyone the awkwardness.

Abandoning Chen Mo had no downsides for Zhang Heng. He had already abandoned him once before, cementing their grudge, and he knew Chen Mo would never forgive him.

But my perspective was different. I hadn't spent all that effort saving Chen Mo just to send him to his death. I hadn't squeezed all the value out of this medical student yet. "That won't work. Leaving him here is a death sentence."

"Then what do you suggest? This won't work, that won't work," Zhang Heng said, his tone clearly growing impatient.

"We'll bring him with us and find him a better hiding spot."

"Hidden? Brother, think it through. This abandoned hospital is that monster's turf. Who knows how long it's been living here? Stop kidding yourself."

"I know what I'm doing." I snapped off a thick branch and tossed it to Chen Mo to use as a crutch. "I'll count to ten. If you can stand up, we'll take you with us. If you can't, you'll have to figure out a way out on your own."

I wanted to give him a chance. After all, he was the only one among us who studied medicine, and we happened to be in a hospital. This live broadcast might touch upon professional knowledge regarding cancer research, so Chen Mo might prove incredibly useful.

I only made it to three before Chen Mo gritted his teeth and pushed himself up with the branch. The blood vessels on his face bulged, and the veins on his forehead twisted under his skin like little snakes.

"Alright, I'll keep my word. Keep up." I glanced at him and nodded silently. The guy had actually impressed me. This performance also completely ruled out the possibility of him being a live show streamer.

There was a physiological difference between faking pain and experiencing it for real. Most live show streamers were already numb to pain. Even if they tried to fake it, their bodies had grown used to the sensation and wouldn't be able to put on as realistic a display as Chen Mo just did.

"I definitely won't hold you back," Chen Mo said. He hopped on one foot, leaning on the branch, until he reached my side, then solemnly added, "Thank you for saving my life!"

Chen Mo seemed to have misunderstood something, but that didn't hurt me, so I couldn't be bothered to explain. I waved my hand. "Let's go. We'll check out the Writer's tent first."

Having just left the Diagnostic and Treatment Building, entering another similar structure left all three of us on edge, as if that monster might leap out from a corner at any second.

On the second floor of the Cancer Rehabilitation Center, I pushed open the door to the ward and was the first to walk in.

"Preserve the scene. Don't touch anything." As soon as I walked in, I spotted the can of beer sitting on the floor. The Writer had urged me to drink it several times.

"Preserve the scene? Are you a cop?" Zhang Heng didn't say anything, but Chen Mo chimed in. The way he looked at me had changed again, upgrading from simple trust to full-blown reliance.

I ignored Chen Mo and picked up the beer can, inspecting it under the beam of my flashlight. After turning it a few times, I finally found a tiny pinhole on the seam between the upper rim of the aluminum can and its label. "Just as I thought, there's a problem here. Chen Mo, you're a medical student. Have you ever seen a 0.5-millimeter syringe needle?"

"Yes, subcutaneous injections all use a Number Five Needle. The needles used for children have an even smaller diameter of only 0.45 millimeters." When it came to professional knowledge, Chen Mo spoke in great detail to prove his worth.

"What kind of drugs are usually administered via subcutaneous injection?" I popped the can open and took a sniff. It definitely smelled like beer.

"There are plenty. Insulin shots and vaccines all use a Number Five Needle. Oh, right, there's another scenario. When injecting drugs with severe side effects that could harm the internal organs, subcutaneous injections are often used. The liquid medicine is injected directly into the subcutaneous tissue so it isn't carried throughout the body by the bloodstream."

I nodded. Bringing Chen Mo along was useful after all. I set the beer can aside. If conditions allowed, I actually wanted to catch a rat or something to test the drug's effects, but time was too tight. I couldn't afford to delay.

"Close the door and guard the entrance," I told Chen Mo before I began searching the room without worry. This was the second floor of the inpatient building. It wasn't too high off the ground, so even if an accident occurred, I could always jump out the window to escape.

Bottled water, instant noodles, and beer were sitting next to the Writer's tent. After checking all of them, I found that the water and noodles were perfectly fine. Only the beers had issues—half of them had pinholes left in them.

'Who exactly is this guy? Is he a live show streamer or not?' I had met quite a few people since this live broadcast began, and while every one of them seemed strange, none of them felt like a live show streamer. Ironically, Chen Jiuge, whose identity as a live show streamer was already confirmed, had vanished without a trace, and I had no idea where he had run off to.

I opened the tent, and a rather awkward scene presented itself: the Writer's "soulmate" was pressing down on top of the sleeping bag.

Seeing the sudden appearance of a human silhouette inside the tent, Zhang Heng and Chen Mo both took a step back, likely assuming it was a corpse. Having seen it once before, I was much calmer. I reached in, dragged the Writer's "girlfriend" out of the tent, and tossed her aside.

"An inflatable doll?"

"A Silicone Doll."

"You've done research on these things?"

"You talk too much."

I pulled everything out of the Writer's tent. The man really might have been a fan of Wang Shi. The tent itself had very little space, but he still kept a few books inside. A closer look revealed that the pen name on all of them was Corpse Body Human Face.

Other than these items, I found nothing else.

'Why did this guy impersonate Wang Shi? If he isn't a live show streamer, then what is his purpose for living in the hospital deep into the night?' The Writer's ugly face flashed through my mind, and I unconsciously thought of a character from a novel.

Quasimodo, the bell ringer from The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. That tragic, ugly freak was very similar to the Writer.

Equally hideous, equally deformed, and equally hidden away in the corners of the city. In the eyes of normal people, there was usually another word for guys like that—monsters.

"Did you find anything?" Zhang Heng slung an arm over my shoulder. "Brother, we don't have much time left. I have a feeling the curse on the note is going to come true very soon."

"The note was given to you two. What does it have to do with me?" I brushed his hand aside and scanned the ward, feeling like I had overlooked something.

"You saw what was written on the note. That vengeful ghost won't let you off either," Zhang Heng said, half-joking, half-serious.

"It would be great if it really was just a vengeful ghost." I shook my head without explaining. My current situation was terrible. Even ignoring the other hidden live show streamers, the unclean things in this hospital alone kept me running for my life. 'Are ghosts playing with people, or is a person pretending to be a ghost? Or do both exist at the same time?'

I turned my head and happened to catch Chen Mo poking the Writer's "girlfriend" with his branch. The wood pressed against the silicone, but the indentation wasn't particularly obvious.

"Don't move!" I shouted at Chen Mo. He ducked his head a bit sheepishly and hurriedly pulled the branch back.

I couldn't be bothered to scold him and simply crouched in front of the Silicone Doll.

The Writer must have really liked this doll. He even applied light makeup to her face, and her lingerie had clearly been carefully selected.

"Brother, what are you doing?" Zhang Heng stood next to me holding his DV. His nimble fingers moved quickly as he swapped in a fresh battery.

"Move aside." I found a broken piece of white ceramic tile on the floor and drove it right into the doll's jaw.

In the darkness, there wasn't much difference in shape between the doll and a living human. The scene made the other two men wince slightly.

"Just as I thought." The tile pierced the doll's body with ease. I dragged it downward, slicing the doll open right down the middle.

"Riiiip!"

A harsh tearing sound echoed through the ward. The way I looked right now was probably no different from a slasher in a movie.

After slicing it completely open from the jaw down to the belly, the three of us huddled together and looked inside. Tucked away in the doll's stomach were several sealed Injections.

"Chen Mo, can you recognize what kind of medicine this is?"

"There aren't any written labels, so I'm not sure. But I know this is a Number Five Needle, and the dosage is 3.5 milliliters." Chen Mo hesitated for a moment. "Under normal circumstances, the dosage for a Number Five Needle won't exceed 1.5 milliliters to prevent adverse drug reactions. This syringe was custom-made."

Hearing Chen Mo's words confirmed my suspicions. "Of course the dosage is small for human use. But what if this needle isn't meant for a human?"