[You're in a hospital ward.] K reminded him, [Your right hand is still hooked up to an IV.]
...There was no heaven.
Sure enough, he was still a host working 007 with no social insurance or housing fund.
The person responsible for disinfecting the place had probably forgotten to open the windows for ventilation.
The air was full of the acrid smell of free chlorine.
Xin Hexue had thought he knew the state of his own health.
At least, he hadn't thought it was bad enough for him to faint in the bathtub after a handjob.
It was probably because of the drug.
He had also drunk a lot of tea that had gone cold yesterday and soaked in cold water in the bathroom for a long time.
In the past, he wouldn't have touched either of those things.
His tea had to be warm; if it got a little cold, a fresh pot had to be brewed. His bathwater had to be at a comfortably warm, slightly hot temperature.
You Yi had always taken care of those things.
Although that eunuch of the Directorate of Ceremonial, whose merits had already overshadowed his master's when the late emperor was still alive, could be quite annoying at times and was a risk to keep around, Xin Hexue had to admit that You Yi had taken very good care of him.
Otherwise, given all the chronic illnesses Xin Hexue had suffered from in his previous life, coughing up blood whenever the wind blew, he wouldn't have lived an extra two years or shown signs of steady improvement.
Unfortunately, the poison had still taken effect one day and killed him.
Xin Hexue sighed.
He had a few suspects in mind, but since he was already dead and his previous life had faded like passing clouds, thinking about it any further would only waste his energy.
Now that he was awake, the clamor in the ward reached his ears.
This was probably an ordinary ward at West City Second Hospital in the Sixth District.
After all, it was the hospital closest to Xin Hexue's little apartment.
Xin Hexue began to worry whether the little money he had left would be enough to pay for the ambulance and his hospital stay.
His throat was very dry.
Xin Hexue looked up at the IV bag, which was almost empty.
On a bed not far away, a patient's family member pressed the IV call button until it beeped repeatedly, cursing foully all the while.
Xin Hexue's gaze swept over the hallway.
He lowered his eyes and pulled the IV catheter from the back of his hand. The sharp pain made his expressionless face turn pale for a moment.
He pushed himself out of bed and headed out of the ward.
Xin Hexue couldn't quite make sense of the hospital's layout.
He made a circuit of the second floor where he had started but didn't find the hot water room. His only discovery was that hospitals in the Federation offered an almost excessive range of services.
He saw a doctor making rounds, fully equipped like an astronaut, using an electric screwdriver to dismantle a patient's mechanical arm. After the doctor scratched its surface, the situation quickly escalated into a medical dispute. A security guard who looked more like a Transformer came running at the commotion and joined the clanging, real-life Mortal Kombat.
"..."
Xin Hexue took a step back.
He bumped into something hard.
At first, he thought it was some patient's wayward prosthetic limb.
He looked down to see a flat, low cleaning robot repeatedly bumping against his heel. "Hello? I'm blocked."
Xin Hexue silently moved aside
to make room.
No wonder no one had opened the windows after disinfecting.
He watched the cleaning robot, which only reached his calf, roll away.
Xin Hexue made another circuit and found the hot water room on the first floor.
Along the way, Xin Hexue observed that the patients here fell into two categories: those whose bodies had been partially modified with machinery, and those who, like him, more closely resembled humans in their original, natural state.
The second category of patients might also differ from him genetically.
There were two favored directions for human evolution in the current setting: mechanization and genetic modification based on the natural human form.
The leading enterprises in those two fields corresponded to the Xi and Pei families in the plot: the Nüwa Bionic Manufacturing Company, controlled by the Xi Family, and the Shennong Pharmaceutical Company, controlled by the Pei family.
Xin Hexue remembered that, apart from Pei Guangji, the childhood friend with the second-largest role in the script was the Xi Family heir, Xi Zhengqing.
He was also the first person to deceive "Xin Hexue" by pretending to be Pei Guangji and demanding that he fulfill his obligations under the lover contract.
Thinking of those despicable acts in the script, Xin Hexue curled his lips coldly.
It seemed that no matter which direction they evolved in, Alphas in their restless period were no different from uncivilized beasts.
The disposable plastic cup crumpled out of shape between Xin Hexue's fingers, and he tossed it into a trash can.
A large open courtyard had been enclosed on the first floor. Several longan trees stood like canopies, their branches reaching the second-floor windowsills because they were rarely pruned.
In the chaotically developed Sixth District urban area, flowers, grass, and trees were all quite rare. Greenery was a scarce and precious resource, and most of the color visible in the city came from kaleidoscopic neon lights on rainy nights.
The week of continuous rain seemed to have passed, and today was sunny.
Amid the noisy traffic of people on the first floor, countless gazes drifted toward the young man standing in the middle of the courtyard.
He was basking in the sun, his whole body as white as the dazzling foam whipped up by waves in a fairy tale, enough to make people dizzy.
When he moved, people came to their senses and looked away, as though only then realizing he wasn't a painting.
Xin Hexue stretched his back.
The ceaseless rain had made him feel as though he were covered in a layer of long fur laden with moisture, and the sunshine had perked him up again.
As he turned to head back, he came across a strange little boy.
Judging by both the material of his clothes and the expensive bouquet in his hands, he probably wasn't a commoner's child.
The boy pulled a single flower from the bouquet and squatted in a corner, plucking off its petals and letting them drift to the ground one by one.
"She likes me, she likes me not, she likes me, she likes me not..."
He happened to be blocking the corner Xin Hexue had to pass.
Xin Hexue squatted down. He was especially patient with children. "Little guy, can you tell big brother what you're doing?"
The boy, who looked only seven or eight, looked up at him and said, "Xiaomei is sick, and I wanted to bring her flowers, but I'm not sure if she'll like them."
So he was nervously plucking petals, leaving the decision to luck?
Maybe what he wasn't sure Xiaomei would like wasn't the flowers. Children matured earlier these days, after all.
Xin Hexue pointed at the flowers in the boy's arms. "Cosmos flowers have an even number of petals. If you start with 'she likes me not,' there won't be a problem."
The boy froze.
Xin Hexue paused, realizing that what he had said was far too lacking in childlike wonder. "Sorry."
He didn't put much faith in luck. In every event involving chance, Xin Hexue was accustomed to accounting for every controllable variable to the fullest extent.
The boy said nothing. He stripped a flower bare and confirmed that Xin Hexue was right.
He raised his face, looking a little happy. "Thank you, big brother! You can have this candy."
The boy gave Xin Hexue the candy from his pocket.
"Thank you."
Xin Hexue took it and was about to stand when black spots burst across his vision like fireworks.
This is bad, he thought.
As the fireworks burst, Xin Hexue fell.
"Big brother?"
While the boy stood there at a loss, a tall Alpha stepped forward and picked up the slender young man, followed by black-clad bodyguards.
Several of them formed a dark mass.
Pei Guangji, who led them, lowered his gaze and examined the boy, his eyes devoid of emotion. "A child from the Xi Family?"
The boy shrank back and nodded. "Mm..."
Pei Guangji's tone was indifferent. "Go play."
After the adults had gone, the boy suddenly convulsed for a moment, as though he had broken free of some kind of control. His eyes became innocent and puzzled again.
Strange...
His memories were hazy. He only remembered that he had been plucking petals, seen something in the corner as he passed the turn, met a pretty big brother, and then run into Uncle Pei.
What had he seen in the corner, then?
The boy couldn't remember, no matter how hard he tried. He shook his head.
This was the last summer vacation he could spend in the Sixth District. Next semester, he would transfer to a school in the First District and live with his youngest maternal uncle, Xi Zhengqing.
He had to give the flowers to Xiaomei.
Clutching the bouquet nervously, the boy searched for her ward.
Under the sun, his unusually long shadow drifted away.
Before the shadow hid itself again in the darkness around the corner, a sharp black silhouette over two meters tall was cast onto the white wall it passed.
Its carapace was like pitch-black iron armor, its scorpion pincers serrated. Its bony spines dragged across the floor with a sound like glass being scratched, crushing the cosmos petals and squeezing out sticky sap.
At last, it vanished into the darkness.
Low blood sugar was a chance occurrence.
Xin Hexue frowned.
Then could the ten affection points the mission target [Pei Guangji] had inexplicably gained be credited to luck?
The Alpha sitting on the sofa beside the bed noticed the young man's movement.
His skin was pale, making the slightest flutter of his inky eyelashes easy to spot. Pei Guangji looked at him and asked coldly, "Awake?"
Xin Hexue could no longer pretend to sleep.
He opened his eyes and sat up in bed. His first impression was a sense of unfamiliarity caused by the bright, spacious ward.
Spotless.
Comfortable
and cozy
in its decor.
A down-filled sofa stood against the wall beside the bed, a potted green plant sat on the cabinet at the head of the bed, and a holographic projector stood on the long cabinet opposite for the patient's entertainment.
K: [The protagonist gong upgraded you to a high-end ward.]
Xin Hexue said to K with some anticipation, [Did he also pay my earlier fees?]
K: [Yes.]
Given that Pei Guangji had behaved with some humanity so far, Xin Hexue raised his impression score for him by 0.5 points.
Pei Guangji closed the file containing detailed information about the person before him.
His face somber, he handed Xin Hexue a contract.
Pei Guangji had never learned to phrase things tactfully, and his voice was cold. Since the young man had face blindness, he made room for an extra sliver of patience and said, "Let me introduce myself. I'm Pei Guangji."