A live stream that dramatically transformed a depressed schoolgirl shocked netizens across the count

Bai Weiwei removed her hand from the playing card.

The rattan chair leg brushed against the ground and retreated half a foot.

The night breeze blowing in from outside the bamboo fence carried away some of the stuffiness.

A hunched figure stood outside the door.

"Grandma Katsura?"

The wooden staff tapped the stone steps, producing a dull thud.

"Avi still recognizes me."

The old man's voice had a rough, gritty quality.

Bai Weiwei stepped across the courtyard and pulled down the door latch.

"How did you get here?"

"Songhe Village is more than 30 miles away from here, and the last bus has already stopped running."

The bamboo door was pushed open.

Grandma Gui carried a worn-out blue cloth bundle, her wooden cane crossing the threshold, her shoes bringing in a few grains of mud.

"Your grandmother asked me to bring some things."

"The bus down the mountain broke down halfway, and by the time the driver finished repairing it, the bus to Xizhou had already left."

Bai Weiwei supported the old man's elbow.

"You should give me a call, and I'll arrange a car to pick you up."

"My phone is dead and won't turn on."

Grandma Gui patted the cloth bag tied around her waist.

"Your legs are still strong enough to work, there's no need to torment you young people."

Su Niannian bent down, put the spatula on the corner of the table, and casually pulled over a wide-backed rattan chair.

"Grandma, please sit down."

"Would you like some hot tea or something to eat?"

"There's still fish soup in the pot; I'll go add some firewood to heat it up for you."

"No need for that, just have some water first."

Bai Weiwei took the heavy bundle and helped the person to the charcoal stove.

Chen Lang leaned back in his chair, flipping the spade card between two fingers.

He glanced at the bits of grass stuck to the old man's trouser leg, then lowered his gaze and stopped at the heel of his shoe.

Slender grass seeds got stuck in the gaps in the shoe upper, with the grass awns sticking out.

Large patches of needlegrass grow on the high slopes of the northern foothills, but you won't pick up any of its seeds while walking on the road.

The old lady followed the mountain path as she came down.

Su Niannian picked up the copper kettle, poured the tea into the rough pottery cup, and slowed her speech.

"You walked this far through the mountains all by yourself?"

"I hitched a ride on a mushroom-selling tricycle for the first half, but for the second half I walked the whole way."

Grandma Gui held the rough earthenware cup in both hands, lowered her head and took two sips.

The heat hit her cheeks, and she lifted her eyelids, her gaze passing over the rising steam to land on the table.

Gu Qingshang's phone screen was lit up.

A medical record photo from ten years ago is displayed on the screen.

The three characters "Cheng Shouzhuo" in the lower right corner gleamed in a cold light.

Grandma Gui's back slumped off the chair, and the rough pottery cup rested against her palm.

"Are you looking for Cheng Shou-chou?"

All movement around the stone table ceased.

Bai Weiwei placed the bundle next to the rattan chair and rested her hand on the back of the chair.

"Grandma, do you recognize him?"

I overheard you talking for a few minutes outside the door.

Grandma Gui put down her teacup.

"You mentioned the medical records and the old doctor from Cangshan."

"This sounds confusing to me, so I'll ask first."

Gu Qingshang dragged the phone back, leaving the screen constantly lit.

My grandfather is very ill.

"Ten years ago, he received some assisted treatment, and the name Cheng Shou-chou was recorded in his discharge record."

Gu Qingshang put two fingers together, zoomed in on the photo on the screen, and cropped out the date and signature.

"I want to find the person who prescribed the medicine back then and verify the specific treatment process."

"The elderly person's illness cannot wait too long."

She swallowed all the pressure from the Gu family's collateral branches, the marriage contract, and the Swiss transit route, without uttering a single word.

Grandma Gui lowered her head and smoothed out the wrinkles on the blue cloth bundle with her calloused hands.

The chirping of insects from the grass outside the courtyard seeped in through the gaps in the bamboo fence.

The charcoal fire burned brightly, and the water in the copper kettle rattled against the lid.

Bai Weiwei reached out and lifted the copper kettle, causing half of the steam to dissipate.

After a moment, Granny Gui untied the knot in the bundle.

Several newly dyed headscarves were placed on top, and spice packets and oil paper packets were pulled out from below.

She lifted the interlayer, reached her fingers between the two layers of blue cloth, and pulled out a folded old piece of paper.

The paper has deep creases and tears along the edges.

The names of the medicinal herbs are arranged vertically from right to left, with several water stains in the middle.

"My husband had a serious illness ten years ago. He always had phlegm stuck in his lungs, and he had difficulty breathing at night."

Grandma Gui held the paper but didn't hand it over.

"I've been continuously receiving the medication prescribed by the hospital."

"Later, the villagers took him to the forest ranger station to find a doctor, and this prescription was left behind at that time."

Gu Qingshang stood up.

The rattan chair slid backward across the muddy ground with a dull thud.

She gripped the edge of the table with both hands, her breath caught, and her gaze was fixed on the end of the prescription.

Half a red seal was stamped on the end of the paper.

The upper half of the characters was blurred by water, leaving only the outlines of the two characters "守拙" clearly visible.

Gu Qingshang opened his phone's camera and pointed the lens at the prescription.

Her hand hovered in mid-air as she pressed the shutter button, pausing for two seconds before finally pressing it down.

"Grandma, may I take a picture?"

"Go ahead and take the picture, just don't damage the original paper."

Shen Qingci had already opened the original medical record image in the group.

She enlarged the two photos side by side to the same size and pulled over the hardcover notebook that Ye Xingyu had spread out on the table.

"These two have the same finishing stroke habit."

The pen drew three sets of drug names on the paper.

"The last stroke of the character '术' in Bai Zhu's name is elongated to the right."

"The character '半' in '半夏' has two horizontal strokes that are not at the same height."

"The dosage column contains three qian (a traditional Chinese unit of weight), and the characters for 'three' and 'qian' are written continuously without any break in the strokes."

Gu Qingshang swiped the screen to bring up another page of the medical record.

Shen Qingci continued to circle the next line.

"There are also customs regarding the order of medicinal herbs."

"First list the main medicines, then proceed to the auxiliary treatments."

"The dosage for each line is precisely placed at the end, without ever being placed in a separate column."

She looked up at Gu Qingshang.

"The probability that they came from the same person is extremely high."

"Seals can only serve as supplementary evidence; the handwriting and overall structure of the writing are more convincing."

Gu Qingshang gripped the phone frame tightly, pressing his thumb hard against the metal edge.

"After we get back, we'll need to have a specialist do the analysis."

"right."

Shen Qingci capped the pen and pushed the notebook back into place.

"At this stage, we can only classify it as a highly reliable clue."

The floating live-streaming ball on the corner of the table was flashing blue light.

The light screen had already covered half of the table.

[Half a seal of simplicity and honesty—is this the real connection?]

[Please zoom in on that prescription; I'd like to help look it up!]

[Does any local fisherman know the exact location of the North Slope Forest Protection Station?]

Chen Lang raised his arm, grabbed the live broadcast ball with his large hand, and flicked it outwards.

The camera pans to the weathered courtyard wall.

"Investigating clues is fine, but checking the elderly person's household registration is not."

"The housing administrators are doing their job by obscuring names, addresses, and medical information from the live stream cache."

"Turn off the permission to capture images of the prescription."

Privacy masking is now complete.

Permission to capture relevant footage has been disabled.

The old prescription image on the screen was covered with mosaic, leaving only half a red seal and a few edges of writing.

Chen Lang leaned back, tilting his chin toward the light screen.

"Tonight, whoever dares to find out my mother-in-law's address will receive a free account ban from the platform."

"Yesterday, the group of online trolls from Chenhai PR just tried it out, and the feedback was great. It's a lifetime luxury package."

The scrolling comments were stuck for a second.

[Understood, understood. We will absolutely not investigate the elderly; we will only wait for the anchor to release publicly available clues.]

[Even the investors who benefited from Lang Ge's freebies had to say it was great.]

[The entire management team is on duty; anyone who dares to disclose private information will be immediately removed.]

Grandma Gui turned to the side and looked at the floating ball against the wall.

"Is this thing always on?"

Bai Weiwei squatted down beside Granny Gui.

"There are hundreds of thousands of people watching us online. If you don't want to show your face, I'll have Chen Lang shut it down immediately."

"Your face looks so old, what's there to be ashamed of?"

Grandma Gui waved her hand.

"Don't spread this prescription around. This medicine is for my old man to treat his lung disease. Outsiders don't understand it and will get sick if they take it randomly."

Gu Qingshang nodded in agreement.

"The prescription will never be made public."

She sat back in the wicker chair, her fingers moving rapidly to lock the medical record pages into an encrypted folder.

"What was the doctor's name?"

"Where exactly do you live?"

"Nobody knows his full name; the villagers usually just call him Mr. Cheng."

Grandma Gui folded the old paper along the creases.

"He stayed at an abandoned forest ranger station on the northern slope, and always carried a wooden medicine box with him when he went out, relying on himself to go up the mountain to dig up medicinal herbs."

He only charges one or two yuan for the medicine when treating patients; if anyone offers more, he will refuse to accept it.

"Years ago, someone asked him if he could stop taking the medication prescribed by the hospital, and he immediately berated that person."

"He said all he knows is how to treat it, and that he should have all the necessary medical tests done at the hospital and take the prescribed Western medicines as usual."

"He won't treat anyone who risks their life to try his remedies."

Su Niannian crossed her arms and raised her eyebrows.

"This sounds much more reliable than those charlatans on the internet who spout nonsense."

Gu Qingshang tapped his fingers on the screen, recording the entire conversation into his memo.

How long did he stay at the forest ranger station?

"About half a year."

"Did you mention to anyone where you were going next before you left?"

Grandma Gui shook her head.

He left in a great hurry.

"The brazier outside the forest ranger station burned paper for half the night; it was all scraps and prescriptions that had been written down and discarded."

He left behind several large boxes of unused medicinal herbs, which he entrusted to the Yunxiu Cooperative for safekeeping.

"Instruct them to distribute the medicine to the poor people in the village who can't afford it."

Gu Qingshang stopped typing.

"Yunxiu Cooperative?"

Bai Weiwei wrinkled her nose as she recalled.

"I've heard Grandma mention before that there was indeed a cooperative specializing in growing medicinal herbs on the northern slopes in the past, but it was deregistered a few years ago."

Ye Xingyu turned to a new page in her notebook.

She carefully added the name below the three characters "Cheng Shouzhuo".

"As long as there is a deregistration record, it can be found in the business registration information and public archives."

"The original leaders, the list of members, and the trends of medicinal herb transactions over the years will always leave traces."

"Most of the paper archives from ten years ago are incomplete."

Gu Qingshang stared at the notebook.

"Tomorrow morning, let's check the basic business registration information and the information published by the village and town authorities, and gather as much information as we can."

The search for the person started with a name and led to a deregistered cooperative, but the connection was temporarily stalled.

Grandma Gui pulled the blue cloth bundle back to her knees.

"I haven't finished speaking."

She deftly opened the oil paper package that Grandma Bai had asked her to carry.

The top was filled with several small bags of herbal seeds for sacrificial purposes.

A piece of cardboard the size of a palm was placed at the bottom.

Grandma Gui pinched the corner of the paper and pulled it out.

It was an old group photo, the edges worn and yellowed.

The wooden house of the forest ranger station stands on a hillside, with a few local villagers standing scattered in front of it.

Grandma Gui, who is ten years younger, is holding her husband's arm.

On the far right of the photo, a man carrying an old medicine box is turning and walking down the steps.

The camera didn't capture a full view of her face, only showing half of her profile.

Gu Qingshang pulled up an old group photo of the medical team attached to his grandfather's medical records.

She placed the two photos side by side on the table.

The same nose bridge, the same jawline.

Even their habit of pressing the medicine box strap down their collar is identical.

Gu Qingshang's throat tightened, and he picked up the cardboard photo and flipped it over.

There was a line of text written in bold on the back of the photo.

Zhou Henian, the person in charge of inspecting medicinal herbs at Yunxiu Cooperative.

"Who is this person?"

Gu Qingshang pressed for more information.

Grandma Gui picked up her wooden cane and touched the name on the back of the photo with the tip of the cane.

"The key to the forest ranger station's gate used to hang on his waist."

"The room full of medicinal herbs that Mr. Cheng left behind before he left also ended up in his hands."

Bai Weiwei leaned forward.

"Is Grandpa Zhou still living in Songhe Village?"

Grandma Gui picked up the cooled tea and swallowed it in one gulp.

"He's been traveling around a lot these past few years and rarely comes back to the village."

She put down the ceramic cup and glanced at the people around the table.

"However, he has always personally lit the first incense stick at the beginning of the three-spirit ceremony."

"As long as Zhou Henian has a breath left, he must return to Songhe Village first thing the day after tomorrow."