The night was black as ink, with only a few scattered insect calls outside the window.
The room was unlit. Moonlight filtered through the sheer curtains, spilling a hazy silver glow.
Qin Churan's consciousness slowly surfaced from a chaotic darkness.
She felt as though she had dreamed a very, very long dream, filled with deafening blasts, flames that engulfed everything, and her colleagues' terrified cries...
Her eyelids were as heavy as lead.
It took every ounce of strength she had just to open them a crack.
An unfamiliar ceiling came into view.
A faint, pleasant fragrance of plants lingered in the air, soothing her mind.
Where was she?
A hospital?
She moved her fingers, trying to push herself upright.
The next second, her whole body froze.
Something was wrong!
Given the force of the explosion, she should have been in agony, as though a truck had run her over and shattered every bone in her body.
But now...
Apart from a faint, intermittent stinging in her left eye, she felt no discomfort anywhere in her body!
The sensation was so strange that her heart tightened.
She struggled into a sitting position and only then discovered that her entire head was wrapped in thick layers of gauze, leaving only her eyes, nostrils, and mouth exposed.
She raised a hand to touch it. The bandages felt thick, yet she could feel no pain from any wounds beneath them.
She looked around.
It was a clean, tidy bedroom, simply but warmly furnished, nothing like the hospital wards she knew, filled with the smell of disinfectant.
Her gaze swept across the room and caught a small makeup mirror resting on the bedside table.
Qin Churan's heart stopped.
With a trembling hand, she reached out and picked up the mirror.
It reflected a face wrapped