Soul Patch

Chapter 183 is not organ trafficking.

"Who ordered the flowers?" Liu Qingqing asked, puzzled.

"The florist said it was a mysterious man who had placed an annual order, and that a bouquet would be delivered every day."

As Wenjie spoke, he looked towards the entrance of the residential area, where the ambulance had already driven out: "Let's go, let's follow it and see."

Liu Qingqing watched the ambulance drive away, then hurried to catch up with Wenjie and tugged at his shirt: "Let's take a taxi!"

Wenjie walked briskly forward, and upon hearing Liu Qingqing's words, he said without turning his head, "If we take a taxi, we can only get one room tonight, so..."

As he spoke, he turned to look at Liu Qingqing. He thought that Liu Qingqing would scold him for being a hooligan after hearing what he said, but when he turned around, he saw that Liu Qingqing's face was flushed and she was standing there without any intention of blaming him.

Liu Qingqing seemed to sense that Wenjie was looking at her. She slightly raised her eyes and said coyly in a very innocent way, "Then you can only sleep in the corridor."

After saying that, Liu Qingqing raised her hand and waved at a passing taxi.

But the taxi was carrying passengers, so it only slowed down slightly, the driver glanced at her, and then resumed its speed.

She dejectedly lowered her hand and stood by the roadside, glancing in both directions every now and then.

Whenever a taxi comes into view, she waves her arms vigorously.

After driving past three or four taxis carrying passengers, she finally found an empty one.

The driver of the car turned around and drove towards them, pressed the "vacant" sign, and beckoned Wenjie and the others to get in.

The driver glanced at Liu Qingqing's long, straight legs with their graceful lines.

This made Liu Qingqing act aloof, and she rolled her eyes at the back of the driver's head.

"Where are you two going?" The driver locked the car and saw that the long-legged woman kept fanning herself as soon as she got in. He closed the car window and turned on the air conditioner.

"Go to the emergency room of M City Central Hospital," Wenjie said briefly.

When he was staring at the ambulance, the words "M City" flashed through his mind when he saw the hospital logo printed on the vehicle.

This actually happened in City M twenty years ago.

The last mission failed in a short time, and I didn't even have time to ask the system where it had taken them.

I remember that Zhang Zhipeng only mentioned the time, not the location. So the system defaulted to rewinding the timeline by twenty years, while keeping the location unchanged.

After a moment's thought, Wenjie realized that Zhang Zhipeng, being the patch carrier himself, must be aware of the system's rules. Since he didn't mention the location for correcting his life's trajectory, he must have felt it was unnecessary to say so.

The taxi sped through the middle of the road. The driver, a very outgoing person, noticed Liu Qingqing was captivated by the scenery outside the window in the rearview mirror, chuckled twice, and said:

"What, is this your first time in M ​​City? Let me tell you, M City has developed incredibly fast in the last two years. Look at these buildings, they're all newly built. They say this area is going to be developed into the South City Business District. And over there, they're going to build a wetland park..."

After listening to the driver's introduction, Wenjie and Liu Qingqing exchanged glances, and Liu Qingqing showed a slightly embarrassed smile.

Without a doubt, Liu Qingqing was comparing the scene before her with M City twenty years later, and then thought it was all so outdated and incredibly backward.

It's hard to imagine that the South City business district was a pile of ruins twenty years ago.

But the driver said he was proud of it and kept recommending this and that to them, almost like a free tour guide for tourists from out of town.

Wenjie wasn't in the mood to compare those numbers. He glanced at the numbers flashing on the meter and asked, "Is it still far?"

Liu Qingqing didn't catch the subtext in Wenjie's voice, mainly because she didn't know how much Wenjie's watch was worth. She just assumed that Wenjie was afraid of losing the person, so he wanted to get there quickly, preferably before the ambulance arrived at the hospital.

"Almost there! About five more minutes."

Wenjie estimated that in another minute or two, he would exceed the starting price and be charged according to distance. If the starting price was six yuan, he estimated that it would cost nine or ten yuan to get there.

Then they had forty yuan left, and they didn't know what the prices were at the guesthouses here. Back in their rural hometowns at that time, they could probably find a simple little hotel for 15 or 20 yuan.

Soon Wenjie saw the M City Central Hospital building, and Liu Qingqing's gaze naturally followed the hospital.

Her view of the hospital was unobstructed from her seat. She turned and whispered in Wenjie's ear, "The ambulance is parked over there."

"Um"

Wenjie seemed to have remembered something else. After responding to Liu Qingqing, he asked in a low voice, "Is Zhang Zhipeng injured?"

Liu Qingqing was taken aback by the question. Her eyes darted around, and she remained silent for a second or two, clearly trying hard to recall.

Then she answered firmly, "No, you're worried about..."

"Hmm," Wenjie nodded.

He did have this suspicion: the Li family, desperate to save Li Shiman, might have been involved in the sale of human organs.

Even if a matching organ is found, as long as the family can afford it, they might spend a lot of money to buy and transplant the organ for their beloved daughter. Sometimes, they will do anything to save a life.

However, Liu Qingqing's answer clearly denied this.

Wenjie recalled the innocent and bewildered look in Zhang Zhipeng's eyes when he said he didn't know what Li Shiman had done to him, as if he were facing an unknown world.

It seems it wasn't about human organ trafficking, otherwise Zhang Zhipeng could have simply lifted his coat and shown them his wounds.

If it's not about organs, then what is it?

With this question in mind, Wenjie and Liu Qingqing arrived at the M City Central Hospital. Before getting out of the car, Wenjie paid the taxi fare of 9 yuan.

Liu Qingqing looked at the colorful bills in Wenjie's hand and insisted on snatching them to take a look.

"It's been so long since I've seen the fourth set of RMB banknotes!" Liu Qingqing exclaimed excitedly. "My dad loves collecting things like ancient coins, stamps, and we even have some old versions of RMB banknotes. We're only one five-yuan note away from completing the third set."

“Don’t tell me there’s no fourth set of RMB banknotes!” Wenjie understood the implication in Liu Qingqing’s words and retorted first.

"That's what I mean. My family has the fourth set of RMB banknotes, but not the new ones like the ones you have. Give me these banknotes, and I'll take them home to my dad. He'll definitely be happy."

"Don't even think about it!" Wenjie coldly rejected Liu Qingqing.

He thought to himself: Dream on! They're giving you money, and this isn't even enough to cover your expenses!

"Hurry up, or we'll lose you." Wenjie waved to Liu Qingqing, who reluctantly handed back the eleven yuan the driver had given Wenjie in change.

He muttered to himself: "How stingy! This is supposed to be Young Master Wen, but he can't even spare a few dollars."

It seems this man is a real miser, not willing to spend a penny!

The two made their way to the emergency room, where they saw Li Shiman's mother—the lady holding lilies—waiting outside the emergency room in the corridor.

She looked even more haggard than when I had seen her downstairs; her eyes were red, and there were still tear stains on her face. She clutched the bouquet of lilies tightly in her hands, which seemed to represent more than just flowers—the flowers that symbolized her emotional support.

Holding this bouquet of flowers tightly is like holding my daughter's life tightly.

Just then, something beeped, like a pager or something similar.

Many people may not be familiar with pagers. They were a product introduced to the Chinese market from abroad, but they were actually a failed business. By the time they were introduced to China, they had already been largely phased out in foreign markets.

This device has a very simple function: it can display the number of incoming calls on its small screen and also receive short messages.

But don't think this thing is similar to a mobile phone; in fact, they are completely different. The PHS phone is miles ahead of it.

These messages are all manually entered, meaning that the industry is supported by tens of thousands of operators who manually input the information into the computer, and then the computer processes it before it is displayed on the pager.

Just then, the woman's pager rang. She took out the tiny black box from her pocket and looked at the caller ID.

She stared blankly at the screen for a moment, and the man beside her pulled her into his arms and asked her in a low voice.

The man was about 180 centimeters tall, with handsome features and piercing eyes.

Her eyes were slightly red from anxiety and worry, and her right eye was bloodshot, as if she hadn't slept well last night.

His forehead and demeanor resembled those of Charmaine Sheh, so it seems this must be Charmaine Sheh's father.

Li Shiman's mother's tears, which had just dried, welled up again. She looked at the man beside her with teary eyes and couldn't stop crying.

The man glanced down the corridor, then put his arm around the woman's shoulder and walked toward the other side of the operating room.

Wenjie winked at Liu Qingqing, who understood and followed him, pretending to be passing by as she walked past the operating room door and headed in the direction of the two people.

Wenjie stepped back down the corridor and stared intently at the hospital map on the wall of the lobby.

After a while, seeing that Liu Qingqing hadn't returned, Wenjie felt a little strange and walked over there.

But after turning the corner from the operating room, they saw Li Shiman's father and mother talking at the window, but Liu Qingqing was nowhere to be seen.

He seemed to realize something and suppressed the urge to ask. He walked straight past the two people and heard them mention two words: "Gong Po".

Jiong Po?

It sounds like a person's name.

Would anyone have such a strange name?

As Wenjie pondered this, he walked past the two without stopping.

Seeing Wenjie approaching, the two of them tacitly shut their mouths.

After Wenjie had walked away, the man said to the woman, "This man is with that woman. I saw him downstairs; he followed the ambulance."

The woman's face was filled with sorrow. At this moment, she could not pay attention to any other information except for the method to save her daughter. She said indifferently, "I know. Just now, the two of them were standing in the corridor looking this way."

Seeing the woman's distraught state, the man pulled her into a tight embrace, rested his chin on her shoulder, and whispered in her ear, "Don't worry, everything will be alright."

Upon hearing this, the woman burst into tears, grasping the man's hand tightly.

A desperate person will cling tightly to any straw that appears before them as a lifeline.

Perhaps it was at that moment that they decided to take a gamble and fight with all their might.

Wenjie walked past the two people and searched the hospital corridor thoroughly, looking through the storage rooms, restrooms, trash cans, and cleaning staff restrooms where people might be hiding.

I looked everywhere, but I couldn't find any trace of Liu Qingqing.

That's strange. In such a short time and at such a close distance, if Liu Qingqing were in danger, Wenjie couldn't possibly not have heard her plea for help.

Li Shiman's parents were chatting by the window, looking completely calm and collected. It didn't seem like they had knocked Liu Qingqing unconscious, hidden her away, and then come back to stand here pretending to chat.

After pondering for a moment, Wenjie returned to the restroom entrance, his gaze lingering on the sign next to the women's restroom depicting a woman with long hair and a short skirt.

He angrily shouted inside, "Liu Qingqing!"

"Liu Qingqing!"

On the third call, a response finally came from inside: "Here!"

Wenjie felt a tightness in his chest. After Liu Qingqing walked out of the bathroom with measured steps, Wenjie glared at her and said, "Couldn't you have told me you were going to the bathroom beforehand?"

"My stomach suddenly hurts! How could I tell you in advance? Oh dear, it's probably the ice cream you bought that's the problem; my stomach hurts after I ate it!"

Liu Qingqing looked at Wenjie with a resentful expression, her eyes seeming to convey something.

Wenjie swallowed back the words he had intended to use to demand an explanation; it seemed things weren't so simple.

He gave Liu Qingqing a cold look and said, "I really doubt how you completed the quests in the game before."

"Hehe, just like you see, I went to the toilet... and the game mission is complete!" Liu Qingqing said sarcastically.

“I think so too!” Wenjie said through gritted teeth.

"Let's go!"

Liu Qingqing crossed her arms and asked, "Where are we going? Shouldn't we be eating now? Or we can find a place to settle down first, and then eat!"

"..." Wenjie

Liu Qingqing followed Wen Jie out of the hospital. After they had walked a distance from the hospital, Wen Jie looked around warily and asked, "What just happened?"

"We're being watched! Before I even got close to them, I saw them looking at me suspiciously, and then they all fell silent!"

“I noticed that too. I was worried they had kidnapped you. What are your basic skills like? To be honest, that fight you staged using Captain Wu seemed to be pre-planned. I couldn’t tell your skill level.” Wenjie finished speaking and gave Liu Qingqing a meaningful look.

"...Uh, this? Didn't I just say that? I went to the bathroom, and the mission system completed the mission..." Liu Qingqing's eyes darted around.

"..." Wenjie was speechless for a moment.

He glanced out of the corner of his eye toward a window on the second floor and saw two figures standing there, looking in his and Liu Qingqing's direction.

Li Shiman's parents are still observing them.

He called out to Liu Qingqing, "Let's go, I'm hungry, let's go eat."

Liu Qingqing greeted him with a smile, took Wenjie's arm, and asked, "I'm hungry too. What are we having for dinner?"

After Wenjie's arm was linked with Liu Qingqing's, his arm stiffened slightly, but he didn't pull away. Instead, he kept the arm in that position: "It seems you can only choose between eating and sleeping. I guess you'll choose to eat!"

(End of this chapter)