Chapter 103

Chapter 103

Qiao Yu had no time to argue with the Pen Spirit. He tapped the mouse again with his index finger and brought up the second page.

Name: Tongyan Wuji

Age: 23

Gender: Male

Cause of illness: Coronary heart disease.

Surgery fee: 3 million (pending payment)

Banquet: – (does not meet banquet standards; cold treatment after surgery)

Corneas: 1 million (pending completion)

Heart: – (failed)

Director Zhou: -200,000

Material fees: -6,500 yuan

Estimated value after discharge: 50 million+

Total: – yuan

At first, Qiao Yu had assumed this place was a black-hearted institution that performed cosmetic surgery on patients to build its reputation while also profiting from the black-market trade of human organs.

But now he realized… things didn’t seem to be that simple. The waters behind this were probably much deeper.

Besides, cosmetic surgery alone couldn’t pull the wool over everyone’s eyes.

There was almost no room to maneuver with something like that.

Never mind finding someone with the exact same build and height. Even if they did, making them look perfectly identical through surgery, and getting that person to agree to be a “stand-in,” were both practically impossible.

“Huh? What’s this?”

Qiao Yu followed the direction of the Pen Spirit’s finger and said impatiently, “A stapler. You don’t even know that?”

The Pen Spirit caught the disdain in his tone and immediately bristled. “Thank you very much, but as a poor young maiden ravaged by the old society, am I supposed to know what that is?”

Young maiden…

Qiao Yu rolled his eyes inwardly. Just as he was about to fire back with some sarcasm, the snapped thread in his mind suddenly reconnected and pulled taut. He muttered to himself, “Could it be… cloning?”

Seeing this semi-illiterate Pen Spirit abruptly reminded Qiao Yu of “Lu Shanshan” in Ward 601. He remembered that on his first day here, he had seen her for the first time after she was pushed out of the operating room. Back then, he’d thought her eyes looked extremely “simple and clear,” as if she were filled with curiosity toward the whole world.

And her hair-or rather, the lack of it. Even her arms had no hair…

But hadn’t cloning technology been explicitly banned by countries all over the world?

And supposedly, the success rate was still less than two percent…

Qiao Yu suddenly thought of the bag of trash he had taken to the back courtyard when he was working as a cleaner.

That bag filled with unidentified human tissue…

At that thought, he looked around the empty desk. Without much hope, he pulled open the drawer under the computer desk. Sure enough, as expected, there was nothing inside.

Just as he turned to leave, the Pen Spirit suddenly grabbed his wrist and pointed at the computer screen. “Qiao Yu, it changed. The words on the screen changed by themselves.”

Hearing that, he bent down and looked where the Pen Spirit was pointing. The streamer with the ID Tongyan Wuji now had Xu Jingqi written in the name field.

The three words “pending completion” after the 1 million for corneas had disappeared as well.

He frowned, quickly pulled up the streamer list, and when he saw the grayed-out ID on it, he lifted his foot and headed straight for the door.

“Where are you going?” the Pen Spirit instinctively stood up to follow.

“To take a look outside the operating room.”

Qiao Yu hurried to the entrance of the operating room, just in time to run into the head nurse pushing a patient out.

The person lying on the bed looked almost exactly like the patient in Bed 612.

He wore a blue cap on his head, and his eyes were as clean and clear as a newborn’s, curiously taking in the world around him.

Those eyes looked toward the rising sun outside the window, seemingly filled to the brim with joy.

Looking at that faintly smiling face, Qiao Yu, who hadn’t felt cold in a very long time, actually began to tremble faintly.

He slowly closed his eyes, turned around, and left.

Behind him came the Pen Spirit’s exasperated shout. “Where are you going now?”

“Back to sleep.”

Pen Spirit: ??

So he really had just run over to take one look?

She was honestly speechless…

Then she watched that heartless little brat walk into Ward 614.

What, did the hospital not even have employee dorms anymore? Did he have to go all that way to find some wild man?

While the Pen Spirit fumed helplessly over there, Qiao Yu entered the room, walked to the hospital bed, and righteously lifted Shang Yan’s blanket before lying down inside.

Luckily, neither of them was fat, so they could just barely fit.

Shang Yan looked at Qiao Yu, who had shut his eyes and was burrowing his face into his chest, then raised an eyebrow. “Are you throwing yourself into my arms?”
Qiao Yu didn’t even open his eyes. He burrowed his head against Shang Yan’s neck, where a faint, clean sweetness lingered. “Because you’re a feast for the eyes.”

Whether Qiao Yu could see him or not, Shang Yan nodded in understanding. “I know. You just want my body, right? Come on, bite me.”

Qiao Yu lazily half-opened his eyes. “…”

Then he lowered his head, opened his mouth, and blew a breath against Shang Yan’s neck. “Do you know what that means?”

Shang Yan truly couldn’t keep up with his train of thought. “What does it mean?”

“My long-lost secret technique-Zombie Breath. If you don’t shut up, you’ll turn into a zombie any second now!”

Shang Yan: “…”

Childish!

With no one nagging in his ear anymore, Qiao Yu soon sank into a deep sleep…

Cold. Sitting inside that rundown brick-and-tile house was truly cold.

Qiao Yu tried his best to tuck his arms into his thin, unlined shirt, his gaze drifting to the broken old window on the wall.

The window had been nailed shut, and outside it, planks as wide as an arm had been sealed across it. A faint dampness seeped through the gaps between the boards.

Rain fell endlessly outside, sliding down from the roof like a blurred curtain drawn before his eyes.

Qiao Yu really hated rainy days, because several of his worst childhood memories had all happened on gray, rainy days.

Like now…

A middle-aged woman in a black jacket walked in. She pointed at the three young boys in the room, then ordered the men behind her-men with tattoos on their arms and vicious-looking faces-“Bring these three out.”

The next second, a large hand seized Qiao Yu by his filthy collar and dragged him and the other two numb-faced boys out the door like dead dogs.

This was the seventeenth day after he had escaped the orphanage. He had thought that once he left that hellhole, he would be reborn. He never expected that he had merely fled a tiger’s den only to fall into a wolf’s lair.

“Did you learn what I taught you yesterday?”

As soon as the words fell, Qiao Yu caught sight of the boy beside him trembling out of the corner of his eye.

He hid the disgust in his eyes and copied them, giving a small shiver.

The woman seemed to enjoy the sight of others fearing her. She picked up a beer from the side and took a sip, then lifted her chin at the men behind her.

One of them turned around and hauled over three security doors, each still set in its frame.

“Since you’ve joined the organization, you’d better do your job properly. We don’t keep freeloaders here.” As the woman spoke, she took out a cigarette, lit it, and inhaled. The smoke she exhaled rose slowly, covering that hypocritical face of hers.

The young boy beside Qiao Yu widened his eyes in terror and pitifully took the piece of wire. He poked it into the keyhole and fumbled around a few times.

Whether he was naturally stupid or so frightened that he underperformed, the thin wire snapped with a sharp crack and jammed inside the lock.

Seeing this, the woman displeasedly threw her half-smoked cigarette at him. “Are you useless?”

The boy crouched down in fear and dodged it.

Qiao Yu gave him a cold glance and cursed inwardly, idiot.

Sure enough, after missing, the woman grew even angrier. She pulled a stick from the corner and began whipping the boy beside him, blow after blow. The whoosh of the wooden stick cutting through the air rang endlessly by his ears, frightening the other boy until his eyes turned red.

During that time, Qiao Yu lowered his head, picked up the wire that had been thrown onto the ground, and pressed his lips together as he stared at the purplish-blue bruises crisscrossing his wrists.

In just a few short seconds, he cast aside morality and conscience.

He raised his hand, jabbed the thin wire into the keyhole, and imitated the way the “seniors” had done it, fiddling twice. With a click, the door opened successfully.

The middle-aged woman turned back and looked at him in surprise. Then she tossed away the stick in her hand, her face full of approval. “Not bad. You can have a chicken drumstick tonight.”

As she spoke, she walked over to Qiao Yu and slapped his bony shoulder hard. Her voice softened considerably. “Work hard. Once you successfully finish a job, I’ll move you to the big house in the back…”

The woman was very strong. After several slaps, his brows furrowed deeply, and he had to use all his strength to keep his swaying body from falling over.

The damp rain had soaked through the only thin shirt he had to keep out the cold. This time, he really was trembling.

But the woman thought he was afraid and burst into roaring laughter. In his blurred memories, that twisted face somehow became clear once more…