Chapter 124

Chapter 124

“True. Isn’t that a little too much of a coincidence?”

Nan Mu knew about this as well. If they followed his line of reasoning, then yes, the coincidence factor was a little too high.

In fact, even setting Su Yu and Zhaodi aside, Gu Zhishu and Wen Miao alone already made the whole thing coincidental enough.

There was no question about Gu Zhishu and Jia Lingyuan. That connection was set in stone.

As for Wen Miao and Xu Lei, while it was only his speculation that Xu Lei had attacked Wen Miao for the sake of his wife, Meng Ran, the fact that Xu Lei had attacked Wen Miao was indisputable.

Wen Miao and Gu Zhishu’s relationship, plus the fact that Xu Lei and Jia Lingyuan were both from Wisdom Biotech Company-if they called all that coincidence, didn’t it feel far too convenient?

Wen Miao looked at the two of them, each arguing their own point. After listening for a long while, she finally raised a hand with a headache. “Stop, stop, stop. Can you two stop arguing for a second? Can I ask a question first?”

Once both of them had turned to look at her, Wen Miao asked, “Do you remember the question we discussed before? About how they knew that my organs, Gu Zhishu’s organs, and the others’ organs would definitely be compatible with theirs?”

Wen Miao sat up straight and looked at Nan Mu. “Didn’t you tell me before that tissue typing for organ transplants doesn’t just require blood type matching, but also the HLA human leukocyte antigen system, PRA panel reactive antibody, and a complement-dependent cytotoxicity crossmatch test? They would definitely have to run those tests first to determine compatibility. It’s not like they could grab someone first and only then worry about whether the match worked, right?”

Wen Xin nodded. “Right. So before that, didn’t they trick Gu Zhishu, Su Yu, and the others into getting physical exams in all kinds of ways?”

For Gu Zhishu, it had been the pre-college entrance exam physical.

For Su Yu, it had been his pre-employment physical.

As for Zhaodi, someone had been texting her nonstop, telling her to get a free physical exam.

“No, no, no.” Wen Miao quickly denied it, then pulled all the side dishes on the table over to use as props.

“You’re mixing something up. There’s a problem with the order of these physical exams.”

She picked up a condiment jar and placed it in the middle of the table. “Let’s say this is one of the steps we already know about: getting the organ donor to go in for a follow-up exam, then misleading them into thinking they have some serious illness and need surgery. Right?”

Only after both men across from her nodded did she continue, “Then before that, don’t they first have to confirm who can be their organ donor?”

Wen Xin looked puzzled. “Right. So wasn’t Gu Zhishu’s school physical the process they used to confirm Gu Zhishu?”

“No.” Nan Mu suddenly realized something. “That’s not it.”

He abruptly remembered going to the Gu Family with Qiu Ziyu, and how Gu Zhishu’s father had described the circumstances under which Gu Zhishu’s illness had been discovered.

“Back when Gu Zhishu had his physical at school, the doctor who examined him already told him to go to the hospital for a follow-up exam when he had time.”

Wen Xin asked, “How do you know that so clearly? You know Gu Zhishu?”

Wen Xin found it strange. Hadn’t Wen Miao said Nan Mu was just kindly helping with the investigation? When had he ever met Gu Zhishu?

Nan Mu froze for a moment, but Wen Miao reacted quickly and immediately added, “I told him. Before… when Gu Zhishu and I met, he mentioned it to me.”

She wasn’t lying about the second half.

Gu Zhishu had indeed told her how his illness had been discovered. She simply hadn’t discussed that part with Nan Mu, because Nan Mu knew far more about Gu Zhishu’s case than she did.

Only then did Wen Xin say, “Oh,” and bring his thoughts back to Gu Zhishu. “Then that doesn’t add up! I thought Gu Zhishu was matched because they drew his blood at school… But if what you’re saying is true, then the other side must have identified Gu Zhishu before the school physical!”

Wen Miao nodded and placed a dish of side vegetables in front of the condiment jar. “This is the school physical. This is when they made contact with Gu Zhishu and induced him to go to the hospital for a follow-up exam.”

Then she placed another dish in front of that one. “This unknown step here is when they confirmed Gu Zhishu was the target they had chosen.”
Nan Mu added, “Thinking about it that way, Zhaodi’s situation is actually similar to Gu Zhishu’s. The place she worked had very few employees and wasn’t properly regulated, so there was no pre-employment physical.”

He pressed a finger against the spice jar. “So in order to get her to the point where she would undergo surgery, they kept steering Zhaodi toward a free physical exam.”

“In other words…” Wen Xin suddenly felt a chill run down his back. “They knew from the very beginning who their matches were? How could they possibly do that?”

All three of them fell silent at once. The web behind Wisdom Biotechnology might be far deeper and more unfathomable than they had imagined.

===

“I have an idea.” Wen Miao was the first to break the heavy silence. “We’ve talked a lot just now, but much of it is still speculation. Since Nan Mu guessed that Xu Lei targeted me because of Meng Ran, why don’t we verify it?”

Nan Mu frowned. “How?”

“Draw blood and run compatibility tests. Blood type matching, the HLA human leukocyte antigen system, PRA panel reactive antibody, the complement-dependent cytotoxicity crossmatch test… do all of them. If both she and I are compatible, then that’ll prove the direction of your guess was definitely right.”

“It’s a good method, but how are we supposed to get it? Meng Ran’s blood won’t be that easy to obtain.”

It wasn’t as if they could set up a fake physical too, right? Forget how alert the other party might be-even if she were an idiot, they’d still have to organize an entire physical exam, find people to act the parts, and produce fake reports…

No matter how they looked at it, it sounded complicated. And the more they thought about it, the more obvious it became that Wisdom Biotechnology was no simple operation. After all, they hadn’t pulled this off just once.

“Didn’t they say Meng Ran is sick? If she’s sick, then she must have gone to the hospital for an examination. City A’s medical system is fully networked now. There’s one person who might be able to help.”

Wen Xin asked curiously, “Who?”

“Yu Jingtong.” Knowing Wen Xin didn’t know her, Wen Miao smiled. “Gu Zhishu’s pen pal.”

===

There were too many people around the school, and Nan Mu was worried they might run into someone they knew, so he only walked the two of them to the other side of the street before stopping.

Wen Miao took two steps toward the school, then couldn’t help looking back at Nan Mu, standing alone beneath the streetlight.

She pressed her lips together, then suddenly left Wen Xin behind and jogged back by herself.

Nan Mu smiled as he looked at her. “What’s wrong? Forget something?”

Wen Miao shook her head and looked up at him.

Their gazes met at just the right moment. She couldn’t tell whether the streetlight was simply too gentle tonight, but something ambiguous seemed to seep into the air, fermenting beyond her control and tangling the strings of her heart.

“I wanted to ask you something.” Wen Miao clenched her fists. “If you came to investigate Gu Zhishu’s case, why didn’t you come on the twenty-seventh? You knew that during those first two days, your past self was still at the school, and you couldn’t go straight into Wisdom Biotechnology… So why did you come on the twenty-fourth? You should have known that would waste three days of your time.”

Nan Mu froze slightly, as if he hadn’t expected her to ask such a question.

Why? Nan Mu looked at Wen Miao in front of him without saying a word. Then he suddenly raised his hand and gently touched the top of her head.

The moonlight was soft as down, hanging in the dusk like a sky lantern. His fingertips brushed against her hair, warm enough to burn, and Wen Miao heard his low, husky voice. “Do you really not know?”

Do you really not know?

Wen Miao’s heart seemed to skip a beat, then began pounding like a drum. The thoughts she had once desperately pressed into the depths of her heart rose with surprise and joy, bobbing inside her like a buoy dipping in and out of a lake.

Suppressing the turmoil within her, she hesitated, testing the words carefully. “Did you come for me?”

“Yes. I came for you.”

His voice was firm, without the slightest hesitation. She even saw her own reflection in those eyes, deep and calm as lake water.

In the surrounding stillness, time seemed to gain both pause and eternity.