Desperate people, accept the seed of my soul!

"Application approved."

Zhou Shouzhen brought down his gavel, interrupting the lawyer's protest. "This is necessary to ascertain the facts. The court will adjourn for twenty minutes for the expert panel to conduct an immediate assessment."

In that instant, Li Rui felt a bit of the frustration in his chest dissipate.

The sound suddenly became brighter, like the first ray of sunlight breaking through the curtains in the morning:

"Brother Rui, look! They're scared!"

"The experts are here, so the fake mental illness is just that—fake…it can't be hidden anymore, right?"

Li Rui replied silently.

Yes, it can't be hidden.

Those are experts from the province; they are authorities.

The grip on the brooch in his palm finally loosened slightly.

……

twenty minutes.

For the average person, it's just the time it takes to scroll through a few short videos.

But for Li Rui, every second of those twenty minutes was excruciating.

The first minute later, Su Xiao was still nagging in his ear, "After this is all over, come see me. I'm all alone, and it's a little lonely..."

At the fifteen-minute mark, the voice began to hesitate: "Why...so long? Does it really need to take this long?"

The sound disappeared in the sixteenth minute.

A deathly silence enveloped Li Rui once again.

He has been awakened by this silence for three consecutive nights, a void more terrifying than any nightmare.

Next door, the testing room.

Professors Chen Zupei and He Qing were intently staring at the EEG waveform in front of them.

For the first fifteen minutes, Zhang Ziqian appeared somewhat dazed, but his condition was generally stable under the control of medication.

However, in the sixteenth minute...

It was as if an unseen magic hand had flipped a switch inside Zhang Ziqian's body.

This was not a coincidence, but a pre-set program—the minute-precise discontinuation window for Glowing Pharmaceuticals' "Tranquilizer Type IV".

Zhang Ziqian began to tremble.

It started at the fingertips, then the eyelids, and finally spread to the whole body.

His pupils contracted and dilated violently, and sweat poured out like slurry, instantly soaking his hospital gown.

The waveform on the electroencephalogram (EEG) instantly changed from straight lines to wild spikes, which is irrefutable evidence that the cerebral cortex is undergoing a violent bioelectric storm.

This is not a performance.

This is a real, physiological neurotransmitter imbalance that cannot be disproven even by the most sophisticated instruments.

Drug-induced tremors are indistinguishable from natural disease tremors on instrumental charts.

Chen Zupei took off his glasses and wiped the fog off the lenses with some regret.

He Qing sighed and began to write on the appraisal report.

They are authorities; they believe in science.

But what they didn't know was that science had long since become the perfect tool for escaping punishment in the hands of those in power.

……

"Thump!"

The gavel fell again, signaling the return of the court to session.

Zhou Shouzhen took the sealed appraisal report from the staff and unfolded the paper.

Li Rui saw that Zhou Shouzhen's tense shoulders relaxed the moment he saw the conclusion.

"Based on on-site assessment by the expert panel..."

Zhou Shouzhen's authoritative voice rang out.

"The respondent, Zhang Ziqian, exhibited typical clinical signs of an episodic episode. His electroencephalogram (EEG) was abnormal, accompanied by uncontrollable somatization reactions. The expert panel's opinion: It cannot be ruled out that he was in an episodic state during the period in question, and that he still exhibits a high degree of instability."

It cannot be ruled out.

These four words were like a saw, instantly severing Li Rui's last nerve.

"Brother Rui..."

Su Xiao's voice came from behind her this time, filled with endless grievances and confusion.

"They said 'it can't be ruled out'."

"But that day...you clearly saw it, didn't you?"

"He's smiling."

Li Rui felt as if the sounds of the entire world were fading away, and Zhou Shouzhen's reading became extremely indistinct.

"In summary."

"The applications from the Garrison Command and the Prosecutor's Office to lift the compulsory medical treatment order are rejected. The original compulsory medical treatment decision will continue to be enforced."

The gavel fell.

That hammer blow shattered Lu Wenxuan's tightly clenched fist and shut Zheng Guofeng's painful eyes.

……

The court hearing has ended.

Two bailiffs helped the limp Zhang Ziqian up and carried him toward the side door.

As Zhang Ziqian passed Li Rui's seat, he stumbled slightly.

His head was bowed, and his hospital gown hung loosely on his body, making him look extremely weak.

In that very instant.

No one noticed that Zhang Ziqian's face had turned extremely slightly towards Li Rui.

The amplitude was so small that even the bailiff supporting him would have thought it was just a natural sway of his body due to weakness.

then.

He smiled.

That wasn't a slight upturn of the corners of his mouth, because his facial muscles were still spasming under the influence of the medication.

It was a slight relaxation at the corner of the eye, a gentle lift of the brow, a fleeting glint of light in the eyes that momentarily gathered and then vanished.

That lasted for less than half a second.

The bailiffs didn't see it.

Lu Wenxuan, dejected, didn't see it.

Zhou Shouzhen, who was tidying up the documents, didn't see it.

Only Li Rui saw it.

That was the smile of a hunter standing on the edge of a trap, looking down and counting his prey.

That look seemed to say—

"You see, the rules are my armor. What about you?"

The smile vanished the next second.

Zhang Ziqian reverted to being the patient with the empty eyes, was dragged out of the side door, and disappeared into the shadows.

……

The crowd in the hearing room is dispersing.

Lu Wenxuan was still arguing with Zhou Shouzhen about something, his voice sounding distant and distorted.

Zheng Guofeng stood to the side, his eyes blazing with fury.

Li Rui was like a stone statue abandoned in a corner, oblivious to everything around him.

The world became incredibly quiet at that moment, so quiet that only that last, extremely soft, and close whisper remained in my ear.

"Brother Rui."

"The thing you believed in for so long... turns out it never existed."

Li Rui did not answer.

He slowly pulled his right hand, which had been tightly clenched in his pocket, out and laid it on his knee.

In the center of his palm, the flame-shaped ruby ​​brooch lay quietly.

The bloodstains, dried to a dark brown color, still remained in the gaps of the metal back buckle from four days ago.

That was his blood, and also her brooch.

In that very second, the lifeless object, which had been frozen for four whole days, suddenly began to heat up.

It was a scorching heat that almost set his entire soul ablaze.

The flame shape of the ruby, at a certain moment—

I jumped.

Yi Ming.

One annihilation.

—Like a heartbeat.

Li Rui looked down at it.

His pupils reflected that faint, stubborn cluster of dark red flames.

It's been four days.

This seed was suppressed deep within his chest by "Police Officer Li Rui" for four whole days.

That hard shell is called "discipline," "procedure," and "I choose to believe that the law will give Xiaoxiao justice."

He didn't let it break the ground when he swung his fist in the corridor of the mental hospital.

He didn't let his wife's photo get dirty while wiping it late at night.

He held the brooch so tightly that his palm bled, but he still didn't let it break through the ground.

He thought that as long as he didn't let go, that shell would never break.

until now.

"Click."

That hard shell, called "the last glimmer of hope for the system," after enduring despair—

Finally, the last crack was forced out from the inside.