Chapter 123
In a hospital some distance away, a beautiful pregnant woman lying in the delivery room suddenly turned pale, broke out in a cold sweat, clutched her stomach, gasped for breath, and cried out in pain, her amniotic fluid soaking the sheets.
Upon seeing this, the caregiver quickly pressed the call button and ran into the corridor, anxiously shouting, "Nurse! Nurse! Come quick! Bed number 166 is about to give birth!"
In the office building, a handsome and refined man received a call from the hospital. His expression changed drastically. He handed the documents in his hand to his subordinate, and without giving any further instructions, he rushed out of the company, got into his car, and sped off to the hospital.
His face was full of anxiety and worry, yet also tinged with a hint of anticipation and excitement.
Everything in the world is in balance and order. As new life is about to be born, a corresponding existence will have to leave. This ebbs and flows, and the cycle repeats itself.
Xie Xubai felt the repulsive force of the present time and space, which was driving away him, this uninvited guest.
Similarly, his own time and space were also calling out strongly, echoing repeatedly in Xie Xubai's ears like the tides across more than twenty years.
Xie Xubai closed his eyes, following the pull of time, his figure gradually blurred and rose.
Behind him, Pei Yuheng leaned against the window, holding a cup of tea that had gone cold, his head tilted back, still gazing at the sky.
But as the gold-rimmed glasses took effect, his memories of Xie Xubai gradually became blurred, and he vaguely remembered that he had just seen off an important person.
Finally, Pei Yuheng blinked suddenly, paused, looked around, and frowned blankly: "What am I spacing out here for?" He then turned around and sat back in his office chair.
Pei Yuheng's gaze drifted away, but his gold-rimmed glasses remained.
Even from a distance of nearly a hundred meters, Xie Xubai could still feel the gaze cast upon him from below, fixed on him, burning and focused.
Xie Xubai closed his eyes, pinched his trembling fingertips, turned around and stepped into the time tunnel without looking back.
He once again came to the river of history. Above him was a vast sea of stars, their blue-green radiance reflecting and shimmering like silken ribbons, rising and falling.
Golden river water flowed beneath his feet, like thousands of shimmering colors rushing past his calves, splashing against his trouser legs, creating tiny golden waves that then dissipated in mid-air.
The world's many past events are visualized as a black-and-white video being played. Beginning with the past and ending with the future, an endless screen is drawn back, with images constantly switching between the two banks of a torrent.
When Xie Xubai first arrived here, he could barely stand and was almost swept away by the flowing water.
Now his spiritual power has greatly increased, and he is only one opportunity away from becoming a god. He can remain unmoved in the face of the surging torrent of history.
The entrance to the time tunnel closed behind him. Xie Xubai remained silent and stepped forward.
He hadn't taken two steps when golden bubbles suddenly floated out from the screens on both sides and hovered over the place he was about to pass.
Xie Xubai paused, then looked up.
Bubbles enveloping images of the past slowly unfold before him.
...
From the moment he saw the "masses" of the Defense Department at the First Hospital, the man with the gold-rimmed glasses knew that he would be left alone in the past because of Xie Xubai's plea.
Do gold-rimmed glasses want to be left in the past?
Without Xie Xubai, it wouldn't matter where it dazed or slept, but Xie Xubai appeared.
Rather than spending over twenty years soberly in places devoid of youth, it prefers to be close to the skin of a young person's face, appreciating their joys and sorrows in various scenarios, and every detail reflected in their skin texture.
Because Xie Xubai was constantly growing, and at an astonishing speed, before he became a flawless young man, every expression of his was like a constantly changing landscape painting to the man in the gold-rimmed glasses, a sight he could never tire of.
This is a privilege only those with glasses can enjoy. They are afraid of breaking it, so they never mention the wind, thunder, and land in Yan Shuo's consciousness, silently feeling and silently savoring it.
Much later, the man with the gold-rimmed glasses learned that the pleasure one doesn't want to share is called "secret joy" in human vocabulary.
If this feeling of secret joy is born for only one person and dies for only one person, then it represents a more intense and hidden emotion.
--obsessed.
In conclusion, it does not want to be left alone in the past.
On its own, it is a word of sadness, often leaving behind tragedies, such as Romeo and Juliet, Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai. The former lived a solitary life in accordance with the deceased's wishes, while the latter committed suicide together. Humanity also calls the inevitable tragedies "fate," cursing, weeping, and refusing to accept them.
At this moment, the gold-rimmed glasses noticed something amiss—it didn't seem so fiercely opposed to its fate of being left behind. So it consulted the human dictionary and ultimately changed its destiny, defining it as "mission."
Despite being extremely unwilling and feeling pained, I had to do everything I could to complete it.
What Xie Xubai assigned it was a mission.
After Xie Xubai left, the man with the gold-rimmed glasses cautiously spread his influence to every nook and cranny of the hospital, creating confusion.
Such hesitation and indecisiveness do not align with the unrestrained and flamboyant nature of the evil god, but the man with the gold-rimmed glasses has his own considerations.
Although it is powerful enough to affect the entire instance space, that would consume a huge amount of energy. In order to ensure that it can successfully reunite with Xie Xubai, it must learn to save money and conserve its energy like a hibernating bear.
Unfortunately, it's not a bear and doesn't have that kind of luck. Bears can sleep, and when they close their eyes, they wake up to springtime.
Before this, the man with the gold-rimmed glasses, who was an avatar of the evil god, never imagined that he would one day be jealous of such a lowly creature as a bear.
It refused to be worn by Pei Yuheng, so it simply disguised itself as an office decoration, indifferently watching Pei Yuheng.
Pei Yuheng, whose memory was affected, sat back down at his desk and was about to open the medical system when he accidentally clicked on an electronic contract on the desktop.
It was an investment agreement for a certain sweet milk production company.
This sweet milk, beloved by young people, hadn't even officially launched in this era, but more than twenty years later, it had become a well-established brand. Young people drank a bottle almost every day, and even among the myriad of milk drinks available, it wasn't the best-tasting, and its popularity was gradually declining.
Xie Xubai's nostalgia is reflected in these aspects.
Pei Yuheng was lost in thought for a long time. The man in the gold-rimmed glasses also recalled Xie Xubai drinking a boxed beverage. His beautiful thin lips were on the straw, and he was drinking slowly and leisurely, as if he was enjoying this hard-won moment of leisure.
When encountering trouble or feeling frustrated, the young man would subconsciously bite the straw, leaving a faint mark on it.
These childish behaviors are occasionally noticed by the person involved. Looking at the "jagged edges" he created, the young man blinked, calmly put them in his mouth, drank them all in one gulp, straightened the straw with his mental power, threw it into the trash can to "destroy the evidence," and his eyes drifted around intentionally or unintentionally, pretending that no one had seen him.
If the gold-rimmed glasses were to move at this moment, maliciously trying to assert its presence, Xie Xubai would chuckle after a brief moment of stiffness, and lightly flick its frame with his index finger as a silent threat.
By then, Xie Xubai had learned to keep his true feelings hidden under immense pressure, perfectly concealing all his emotions with a calm and composed expression.
People began to fear him, believe in him, and follow him, while those who had been persecuted criticized and slandered him.
He was at the center of the storm, the epicenter of the controversy, and rarely showed a genuine smile in ordinary times. His eyes held a chilling power that made many people hold their breath and break out in a cold sweat.
Then that chuckle came suddenly and unexpectedly, like a dragonfly's thin wings skimming across a still pond, stirring up ripples.
The man with the gold-rimmed glasses thought he was reminiscing or thinking, but he was actually just spacing out.
It wasn't until Pei Yuheng returned to normal and was called to a meeting that it suddenly woke up, turned into a dark shadow and chased after him, then couldn't help but glance back at the shareholding agreement on the computer desktop.
The wall clock ticked away, the minute hand moving slowly, making a soft sound as it passed "12," as if a heavy hammer were striking its chest.
It had only been five minutes since Xie Xubai left, but it already felt the hardship.
.
During the development of the First Hospital, everyone at the hospital, including Dr. Li, unanimously believed that Pei Yuheng, who had disguised himself as Fu Zong, was a despicable person who had taken advantage of the former president's death to rise to power. They had already seen through Fu Zong's true colors during their first confrontation with the Fu Group and were absolutely unwilling to submit easily.
Without Xie Xubai's mediation, the conflict and resentment gradually fermented, eventually being completely intensified by those who were jealous of Pei Yuheng, leading to numerous conflicts and making Pei Yuheng's situation increasingly dangerous.
It was also at this time that the Defense Department of the First Hospital was established.
Unlike the security department, which is responsible for the safety of the entire hospital, the defense department only takes orders from Pei Yuheng and is only responsible for his safety. Initially, only one masked person whose appearance was unknown joined the defense department. Pei Yuheng promoted him to the position of director of the defense department, granting him extremely high authority and placing him on equal footing with the other directors.
This move naturally met with strong opposition from the committee, but soon the voices of opposition disappeared overnight, along with the attacks on Pei Yuheng, both overt and covert.
Those who knew the inside story kept it a secret, filled with extreme fear. Even though there was only one person in the defense department, he became a sword of Damocles, hanging high above everyone's heads, preventing any rash actions from those who might try to harm him.
In the first year after Xie Xubai left, Pei Yuheng, who was struggling to make a living without Xie Xubai's assistance, finally regained his prestige as the dean with the strong support of the Defense Department, and began to implement various preferential policies to help poor patients.
The following year, the preferential policy was fully implemented, and nearly 40 percent of the city's impoverished families enjoyed this subsidy. The reputation of the First Hospital was thus enhanced, and many medical-related institutions vied to contact Pei Yuheng to cooperate with the First Hospital.
In its fourth year, the First Hospital, a rising star, expanded again, recruiting and cultivating medical talent from across the industry. Its medical performance indicators, such as patient volume, surgical success rate, and cure rate in various departments, soared to the top in H City, earning it a place in the People's Daily and praise from several official sources, and its reputation within the industry grew increasingly prominent.
This was Pei Yuheng's busiest period. He was constantly on the go, and his eating and sleeping times had to be precisely controlled down to the minute. He was either on business trips or on his way to meetings, and his mind was filled with official business. He didn't even have time to pay attention to the pressure from the director's team.
During this time, the man with the gold-rimmed glasses remained quietly behind the scenes, helping Pei Yuheng resolve potential dangers, and rarely showed himself.
Although the masked man was rumored to be Pei Yuheng's loyal mad dog, only Pei Yuheng knew that the man with the gold-rimmed glasses was loyal to someone else. As his memory faded, he could only vaguely recall that the man was a helper left behind by a close friend, bound by a contract and willing to obey his orders.
He couldn't even remember Xie Xubai's face clearly, so how could he possibly confide in the man with the gold-rimmed glasses? It was only after a long time that Pei Yuheng was surprised to suddenly realize that there was someone else next to the man with the gold-rimmed glasses.
The same height and build, the same cold eyes, and the same ruthless style of doing things—they were individuals split off from each other in proportion to the glasses.
In the fourth year that Xie Xubai arranged for him to protect Pei Yuheng, the man with gold-rimmed glasses finally couldn't help but split off a part of himself.
The sudden recruitment of new members into the Defense Department led outsiders to believe that Pei Yuheng intended to vigorously expand his power and consolidate his position. Alternatively, they speculated that he was preparing to suppress dissenting voices and massacre the entire hospital.
Little did they know that most of the time, the two identical members of the defense department were simply whispering to each other on a shared brainwave channel.
"How much longer?"
"Nineteen years, ten months, twenty-seven days, twenty-one hours, and thirty-three minutes."
"Does it really take that long?"
"Not before."
"Just one kiss would be a waste."
"Um."
"We'll get it back when we meet."
"Um."
I miss him.
"Um."
Six years later, Pei Yuheng, who was working, suddenly received a call from a stranger. Hearing a familiar female voice on the phone, he subconsciously called out "Senior Sister," arranged his hospital affairs, and hurriedly rushed to keep the appointment.
In the height of summer, cicadas chirped incessantly, the sky was cloudless, and the scorching sun baked the earth.
Pei Yuheng, now back to his original form, suddenly stopped and, across the street, saw a child crouching under the shade of a tree, knees drawn up to his chest. The child was tiny, with snow-white skin, like an ice sculpture, seemingly about to crumble in the wind.
Pei Yuheng's heart trembled for no reason. He ran to the child as fast as he could, but as he got closer, he seemed to feel a sense of trepidation, and his steps slowed down.
The child seemed to be delirious from the heat, staring blankly at the distorted asphalt road surface, never looking up.
Pei Yuheng finally couldn't help but call out to him. The child suddenly looked up at the sound, his eyes as clear and bright as obsidian. He looked at Pei Yuheng in front of him with a dazed expression and finally couldn't help but ask, "Uncle Pei, are you my father?"
At that moment, a deafening roar echoed in Pei Yuheng's mind, and hazy memories of the past flashed before his eyes like images. It was as if a dam had been opened, and a flood poured in, shattering his seemingly hardened heart. He couldn't help but pick up the child tightly and hold him close to his chest, his voice trembling: "...Yes, I've come to pick you up, Ah Bai."
Five years later, Pei Yuheng met Xie Yuchun again. The once vibrant woman was now afflicted with a serious illness and had become emaciated, but her back remained as straight as a poplar tree, and her heroic spirit was as strong as ever.
The aura emanating from her was faintly intimidating.
Pei Yuheng's strength was also different from before, and he could vaguely recall fragments of several reincarnations. In those reincarnations, he successfully adopted Xie Xubai, but due to the constraints of his identity as a dungeon boss, his thinking became increasingly distorted, and his temperament became stubborn, cruel, and violent, which in turn became a burden to Xie Xubai.
“All the adoption procedures have been completed, but this time I want to arrange for Ah Bai to stay in a private welfare home in another city. I have full control of that welfare home, and it is staffed entirely by my people, so I guarantee that Ah Bai will not be harmed in any way.”
"I'll come to pick up Ah Bai then... If the rules restrict it... or if there are any errors in my memory... we must be careful..."
The adults' secret conversation, filled with heavy thoughts, drifted away on the wind, blocked by an invisible barrier in mid-air, and not a single word escaped.
After finishing her meal, Xiao Xubai received an extra box of sweetened milk, which made her extremely happy.
He excitedly opened the package, took out a box, and was about to drink when a large hand covered with calluses suddenly reached out from the shadows of the trees beside him, inserted a straw for him, and held it to his lips.
The man bent down, his face fierce and menacing, his eyes bloodshot, and uttered a single, forceful word: "Drink."
Xiao Xubai was startled and instinctively turned around to call for his mother and Uncle Pei, but before he could, he caught a glimpse of the masked man's eyes and stopped in his tracks.
Amidst fear and doubt, Xiao Xubai suddenly made a bold move that even he found daring: he reached out and took the sweet milk offered by the masked man, put it in his mouth and took a big gulp, as if to bolster his courage, and asked in his childish voice, "Uncle, are you alright?"
Gold-rimmed glasses: "..."
"Don't cry." Xiao Xubai reached out her hand, meeting the masked man's red eyes and unwavering gaze, and awkwardly wiped away the other's wet eyes. "Don't cry, okay?"
Unexpectedly, the man in front of him suddenly squatted down and pulled him into his arms with even greater force than Pei Yuheng. His voice was hoarse and filled with gritted teeth as he accused him, word by word: "I... am... not... good."
God's life was too long, long enough to witness firsthand the transformation of oceans into mulberry fields and the instantaneous annihilation of prosperous empires.
Even though the gold-rimmed glasses had only recently separated from Yan Shuo, it inherited the original's indifference to time, thinking that more than twenty years was just a long time in the grand scheme of things, but in reality, it was only a short span of time.
Until it personally stepped into this history.
In the first year, the man in gold-rimmed glasses lingered on Xie Xubai's farewell kiss, replaying in his mind the process of their first meeting and their eventual close friendship over and over again.
The following year, the gold-rimmed glasses still clearly remembered every smile of Xie Xubai, including the way he looked when he was angry and distressed as a young man. It made images that only it could see and watched them repeatedly in its mind with pleasure.
In the third year, the man with the gold-rimmed glasses silently watched the young man's smile in the image, and suddenly reached out to touch the other's cheek, only to grasp a wisp of cold air as expected.
In the fourth year, the "rules of the game" took hold, and few people in the hospital remembered the deputy director, including his past achievements. Pei Yuheng's impression of Xie Xubai also became increasingly vague.
The gold-rimmed glasses needed to deceive Pei Yuheng's perception, so they couldn't awaken his memories. They walked through the hospital again and again in the places Xie Xubai had once frequented, finally stopping at the gate, standing silently until the sun set, and finally splitting into another version of themselves.
...
For six whole years, the gold-rimmed glasses counted down the seconds, remembering every ebb and flow of the tide, every sunrise and sunset. It imagined the days when Xie Xubai was by its side, seeing the hospital flourish and more people receive treatment, and how the young man would smile with relief and joy. But when it turned around, all it found was the cold, icy air around it.
No one will tell it that the flowers are in full bloom anymore, no one will gently stroke its glasses frame anymore, and no one will smile and say, "Want to go take a look together? The scenery is beautiful," when the moonlight is bright and the sun is shining.
The man with the gold-rimmed glasses hugged Xiao Xubai tightly, his voice almost hoarse: "Six years, how come you're still so small?"
It will be a full eighteen years before it can see him again. How will it endure that?
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