Chapter 36: There is Somebody Among Us!

No matter how long the night is, the dawn shall always rise.

A tinge of purple stained the sky, gradually brightening into fiery orange.

“Come on…”

Lu Yibei clenched her petite fist, looking into the distance expressionlessly. Flames seemed to tumble in her eyes as she stared at the rising sun.

‘After waiting all night, it is time to witness the miracle!’

Squeak!

The roof door of the hospital swung open, and the feeble yet crisp sounds of complaints could be heard.

“For god’s sake, I couldn’t rest all night. When I saw that white-haired… thing, I started seeing it everywhere! Whenever I closed my eyes, I would see that thing too! I’m going to go insane…”

A doctor with dark circles lit his cigarette and took a deep puff. As he approached the edge of the roof, he could see the back of a naked girl sprawled over nothing but air.

Her silky, long hair swayed in the morning breeze. As she turned around, her hair gradually turned a striking red.

On her expressionless face, there seemed to be flames dancing in her scarlet eyes—indifferent, gloomy, yet murderous.

“W-who are you?”

‘Sh*t.’

It was way too embarrassing to be seen like this! Yibei couldn’t believe that the doctor would have the gall to come to the roof when the sun wasn’t even fully up yet.

The doctor’s body stiffened, and his mind buzzed in fear.

The lighter slipped from his hand and fell to the ground with a soft ‘clang!’ The girl was seemingly alert, and she turned around and rushed towards his side.

“No! Don’t come close to me…!”

The doctor started to shout relentlessly as he flailed his arms, but the girl seemed to ignore him.

Come on. You can’t keep shouting like this, Yibei thought frantically. ‘You’re going to attract attention!’

The girl was getting closer and closer, and in the next moment, the doctor could feel his brain short-circuiting. Sweat painted his forehead, and reactions that could only equal a heat stroke began to become apparent on his body. Immediately afterwards, his eyes rolled to the back of his head, and he fell forward.

The sun had reached the horizon of the mountains, and bright, golden light showered upon the girl’s back.

Bathing in the sun, she ran wildly. Her fair skin sizzled under the gentle heat, and under her skin, molten light flowed through her blood vessels. A pale smoke covered her body, shrouding her in the mist; beneath that mist, a silhouette that was getting taller and taller could be seen.

Looking at his familiar hands, Yibei was excited beyond words. Glancing at the unconscious doctor beside him, though, he couldn’t help but feel bad.

‘Wasn’t this the doctor by the porch last night? I sure hope he’s okay…’

He looked downwards and noticed that he was still naked. His gaze fell on the doctor, and an evil thought arose in his head.

In a flash, Yibei stripped off the doctor’s clothes quickly, leaving only his underwear and white coat to cover him before running away.

Later on…

Footsteps could be heard running back up the roof—a hand that emerged from the shadows placed a cloth soaked in cold water on the doctor’s head. Yibei sighed at himself and ran back downstairs.

He left the outpatient department and walked across the garden path towards the inpatient department. The closer he got, the more nervous he became.

‘What if the barrier doesn’t let me in?’

He wasn’t sure if Jiangli’s maid had woken up yet. If she wakes up and finds that he’s missing, would she report it to her mistress?

No matter how you look at it, witch or not, if a patient were to mysteriously disappear, would that not be a cause of suspicion?

He reached the inpatient department and stopped.

After hesitating for a moment, he took a deep breath and stretched his arm forward. His fingertips danced around the boundary of the invisible barrier as if he were testing the waters.

His heart beat faster and faster as his fingers approached the barrier, and his hands trembled uncontrollably.

Just as he was about to touch the barrier, a slightly anxious voice came from behind him.

“Hey! Be careful! Come, let me help you.”

A woman rushed up from behind him and helped him forward, or rather, forced him forward.

Seeing that he was approaching the inpatient building, his pupils shrank, and he murmured, “Not good…”

He could feel something poking his back, and he was stunned. He turned his head and saw a tall and voluptuous nurse with thick limbs and as strong as a bull.

‘Why are you… working as a nurse? If you work in the paediatrics department, I fear you might scare all the children there.’

“Aren’t you a hemiplegic patient? How many times have I told you: don’t run around alone, don’t run around alone? Christ, what if you fall?” The nurse rambled.

‘I’m not a hemiplegic patient… I’m just… trembling! Yes!’

“Actually, I…” He opened his mouth to explain himself but was stunned upon seeing that he was in the lobby of the inpatient department.

‘I-I got in?’ He breathed a conscious sigh of relief. ‘Did the barrier wear out? Or was it because I was restored to my original form?’

The nurse tugged him towards the elevator and sighed, “Right, let’s get you back to your room.”

I… Lu Yibei thought for a bit before replying. “Okay!”

I can never let her know that I’m not a patient, or she might kill me in this elevator, he thought as he glanced at the nurse’s fan-like palm that rested on his shoulder.

After parting from the strong and voluptuous nurse, he walked around the building, looking for his own ward.

Just as he was about to open the door to his room, he heard a conversation in the ward. He froze, and he quickly pressed himself against the door.

“You’re telling me you fell asleep, and when you woke up, he wasn’t here,” Jiangli interrogated.

“Yes. I’m sorry, Miss,” the maid said weakly. “Last night, I felt very sleepy for no reason while watching over him, and when I woke up… Miss! He isn’t in any danger, right?”

He could hear Jiangli sighing, “Don’t worry; I’ve sealed this building with a barrier. Only ordinary people and members of the Night Division can get in.”

His heart skipped a beat as he heard this: he was taken away in his sleep without alerting the maid, and only ordinary people or members of the Night Division could get in the hospital…

Does that mean a member of the Night Division kidnapped him?

There must be a spy among us.

“Let’s go out and look for him. Since he’s injured, he shouldn’t be able to get very far.”

Oh, Lu Yibei thought as he looked at his deep wound that had already healed into a light pink scar. He gritted his teeth before running away.

As he was running, he paused as he saw a first-aid cart by the door of a ward. While the nurse was distracted by the patient she was tending to, he grabbed a pair of scissors and a roll of gauze.

A few minutes later…

In a bathroom in the corner of the hospital, intermittent groans and moans of pain could be heard.

“Ow… mmph…”

A patient suffering from haemorrhoids stood by the door of the toilet where the groans were the loudest. Hearing this, he couldn’t help but show sympathy for that person’s condition.

“I better leave you alone; good luck!”

A moment later…

Lu Yibei’s appearance was pale and was covered with large beads of sweat. He limped forward while leaning on the wall and cursing at himself.

Perhaps it was because he was so elated that he was restored to his original appearance that he forgot that he was injured with a wound that was life-threatening.

If he rushed back to the ward with a wound that had already healed into a scar, they would definitely be suspicious of him.

With such a deep wound, nobody would believe that he would be able to recover overnight.

“Damn it! It hurts!” he cursed.

A few minutes earlier, in the toilet cubicle, he made up his mind to cut himself.

‘Be a man! You have got to take risks!’

After several attempts at poking at his stomach, he painstakingly poked a bleeding hole through his stomach…

…but…

He didn’t realize that the pain would be absolutely unbearable because the scissors were unable to cut through his skin, which made him wince in pain with each attempt.

The moment blood started to leak out, he almost fainted from the pain.

Just as Yibei was cursing himself once again, the voice of the maid could be heard in front of him.

“Hey! What are you doing here all alone?”

He raised his head and said solemnly, “I… wanted to go for morning exercises. I-I always had the habit of doing this.”

“You… were stabbed in the stomach, and you want to do morning exercises?” The maid narrowed her eyes.

“I just wanted to try,” he nodded. “But the wound tore, and the pain was unbearable, so I lifted myself onto this toilet.”

He unbuttoned his shirt, revealing a hastily wrapped gauze around his abdomen, and faint traces of blood stained the gauze.

The maid absolutely could not believe her eyes. After a while, she put a palm to her head and sighed, “For somebody who talks a lot, you’re dumb as hell! There is no way you went to exercise after being stabbed!”

Seeing that the maid believed him, he heaved a sigh of relief.