“My hand… My hand is ruined! That woman is a lunatic! She deliberately hurt me!”
The piercing screams in the medical unit’s emergency room were loud enough to shake the ceiling.
Shen Xue lay on the hospital bed, her entire right arm wrapped tightly in gauze. Even so, yellowish fluid was still seeping through the bandages. The few drops of liquid hadn’t killed her, but their corrosive properties were devastating. The flesh on the back of her hand had been thoroughly eaten away. Even after it healed, it would leave behind gruesome scars.
Several young nurses stood nearby with their necks hunched, not daring to utter a word.
Captain Liu stood beside the bed, his expression so sour it looked as though he had swallowed a fly.
“Enough! What are you screaming for?”
Captain Liu finally lost his patience. He slammed the medical chart in his hand onto the table.
“You went to the laboratory to cause trouble, then tried to snatch chemicals that were in the middle of a reaction! Even calling this a workplace injury would be a stretch! And you still have the nerve to blame someone else?”
“Captain! Are you taking that country girl’s side?”
Shen Xue stared at him in disbelief, her eyes wide. Tears had ruined the makeup on her face.
“I’m a properly trained military doctor! What is she? She poisoned me! I’m going to report her! I’ll have my father call the division headquarters!”
“Go ahead! Make the call!”
Captain Liu sneered.
“If you’re not afraid of completely humiliating your father, then by all means, call him. Illegally possessing prohibited drugs, causing trouble in the laboratory, and damaging military supplies. Any one of those charges would be enough to send you before a military tribunal. When that happens, you won’t just lose your position as a doctor. You’ll have that uniform stripped right off your back!”
Shen Xue’s sobbing stopped abruptly.
She opened her mouth like a chicken being strangled, but for a long moment, no sound came out.
At last, fear overwhelmed her anger.
She knew Captain Liu was telling the truth. Since Gu Ci had already ordered her to get lost, he certainly wouldn’t show her any leniency. If she continued making a scene and her own misdeeds came to light, she would truly be finished.
“Th-Then… what about my hand?” Shen Xue stared at her heavily bandaged hand, despair filling her eyes.
“Let it heal.”
Captain Liu sighed and turned toward the door.
“Once you’ve recovered, return to your hometown. Those are the regimental commander’s orders. No one can change them.”
After leaving the ward, Captain Liu wiped the sweat from his forehead.
He glanced at the closed laboratory door at the end of the corridor, a hint of reverence flashing in his eyes.
That woman named Jiang Ning was ruthless when she wanted to be.
Who would believe it was an accident?
The precision of that splash. The coldness in her eyes. This was clearly a warning to everyone else by making an example of one person.
From now on, she was someone nobody should dare to provoke.
…
Dusk settled over the compound.
The jeep pulled up outside the residential quarters.
Gu Ci sat in the driver’s seat, his fingers tapping rhythmically against the steering wheel. He looked at the woman in the passenger seat, who was cradling a small bottle of dark brown liquid.
Jiang Ning had her eyes closed. Her face was even paler than it had been that morning.
Preparing such a potent medicine had taken an enormous mental toll. She had also spent hours working in an environment filled with low concentrations of toxic substances. Her constitution had never been particularly strong, and now she was running on her last reserves of energy.
“We’re here,” Gu Ci said.
Jiang Ning opened her eyes. Her gaze was perfectly clear.
“Get out.”
She pushed open the car door, carefully shielding the glass bottle in her arms.
She had spent the entire day extracting the substance inside, nearly blowing up the laboratory in the process. It was a compound of tropane alkaloids derived from datura—the powerful medicine she had prepared specifically for Gu Ci.
Inside the house, Black Panther heard them and came running over, wagging its tail.
Jiang Ning paid no attention to the dog. She walked straight to the table and set down the glass bottle.
“A bowl,” she said tersely.
Gu Ci turned and went into the kitchen, returning with a coarse porcelain bowl.
“Fill it halfway.”
Jiang Ning pointed toward the thermos.
“Warm water.”
Gu Ci did as instructed.
Jiang Ning pulled the stopper from the glass bottle.
An indescribable odor immediately filled the room. It smelled like burnt rubber mixed with rotting flowers and weeds, accompanied by a cloying sweetness that made one’s head spin.
Gu Ci frowned.
“Is that medicine?”
“Poison.”
Jiang Ning picked up a dropper and carefully drew up three drops of the liquid, letting them fall into the warm water.
The brown liquid spread through the water like a cloud of ink that refused to disperse.
“Datura, raw aconite, and a tiny amount of toad venom.” Jiang Ning swirled the bowl. “Each ingredient could kill a cow on its own. But combined, they become an explosive charge designed to clear the blood stagnation in your brain.”
She pushed the bowl toward Gu Ci.
“Do you dare drink it?”
Under the lamplight, the murky liquid glimmered with an eerie sheen.
Gu Ci stared at the bowl.
As a battle-hardened special forces soldier, he had an instinctive sense for danger. Whatever was in that bowl was certainly no harmless remedy. Drinking it would leave him in agony, if it didn’t kill him outright.
But he understood his own condition even better.
His headaches were becoming more frequent, and his vision had begun to blur at night. If he didn’t receive treatment soon, he would spend the rest of his life as a cripple.
A cripple.
That was a fate he found even harder to accept than death.
“What would I be afraid of?”
Gu Ci picked up the bowl.
“Let me warn you before you drink it.”
Jiang Ning leaned back against the chair, crossing her arms. Her gaze was as calm as if she were observing a laboratory mouse.
“This medicine is extremely potent. Within five minutes of drinking it, you’ll feel as though your brain is exploding with pain. Then you’ll start hallucinating, and your limbs will become numb and paralyzed. That state will last for about two hours.”
She paused, the corner of her mouth curling into a wicked smile.
“If you feel like killing someone during that time, you’d better not be holding a knife. You might end up stabbing yourself instead.”
Gu Ci snorted.
“You talk too much.”
He tipped his head back and swallowed the entire bowl of bitter, foul-smelling medicine in one gulp.
His Adam’s apple bobbed.
The bowl was empty.
Clack!
He slammed it down on the table.
“How does it taste?” Jiang Ning asked.
“Like shit.”
Gu Ci wiped the corner of his mouth and offered his honest assessment.
Jiang Ning wasn’t offended. Instead, she nodded.
“Good medicine tastes bitter. Go lie down. Better yet, tie yourself up.”
Gu Ci ignored her, rose to his feet, and strode into the inner room.
He didn’t need to be tied up.
His willpower was the strongest restraint there was.
Jiang Ning watched him go, a faint flicker passing through her eyes.
She hadn’t lied. The medicine really was effective, but it was also genuinely dangerous. It was a modified version of a traditional formula she had studied in her previous life, designed specifically to treat lingering brain injuries caused by old head trauma.
What she hadn’t told Gu Ci was that the medicine had another side effect.
While it was taking effect, a person’s psychological defenses would drop to their lowest point. Whatever they feared most or desired most deep down would be magnified beyond all reason.
That was her real purpose.
She wanted to see what lay hidden in the deepest recesses of this mad dog’s heart.
Five minutes later, a muffled groan came from the inner room.
It was followed by the sound of something heavy crashing against the wall.
Thud!
Jiang Ning got up and pushed open the door.
Gu Ci was curled up on the bed, clutching his head with both hands. His entire body was taut like a drawn bow. The veins on his face bulged, sweat poured down him, and his teeth ground together with a harsh, grating sound.
“Pain…”
He forced the word through clenched teeth.
This was no longer the dull ache he had suffered before. It felt as though countless red-hot needles were stirring inside his brain. Every nerve was being forcibly stretched, snapped, and then pieced back together.
“Endure it.”
Jiang Ning walked to the bedside and looked down at him.
“The medicine is breaking through the blood stagnation. The more it hurts, the better the effect.”
Gu Ci couldn’t hear her.
Everything before his eyes had turned blood-red.
The hallucinations had begun.
He saw flames. Endless flames stretching across the sky.
It was the jungle along the border.
“Platoon leader! Go! Don’t worry about me!”
“Blow it up! Destroy the bridge!”
The screams of his comrades, the thunderous roar of explosions, and the horrific sounds of bodies being torn apart surged toward him like a tidal wave.
“No… Don’t die…”
Gu Ci reached out, groping frantically at empty air.
“Grab my hand… Don’t let go…”
His gaze was unfocused, his pupils trembling violently.
This was his deepest nightmare.
During a retreat mission, the bridge had collapsed. His old squad leader had sacrificed himself to protect Gu Ci, detonating a grenade and taking the enemy with him. Gu Ci could only watch helplessly, powerless to save him.
“It’s all my fault…”
Gu Ci rolled off the bed and dropped to his knees. He slammed his head against the floor.
“I should have died… It should have been me…”
Bang! Bang!
His forehead struck the concrete floor, and blood immediately began to seep from the wound.
Jiang Ning frowned.
At this rate, he would suffer a concussion before the blood stagnation had a chance to clear.
She rushed over, grabbed Gu Ci by the collar, and tried to pull him upright.
“Gu Ci! Wake up! It’s a hallucination!”
But Gu Ci’s strength was astonishing. He suddenly swung his arm and flung Jiang Ning away.
She crashed into the wardrobe and sucked in a sharp breath from the pain.
This mad dog is ridiculously strong.
Gu Ci continued pounding his head against the floor. His eyes had gone completely vacant, and he kept murmuring the names of his fallen comrades, as though he were truly trapped in that hellish battlefield.
Jiang Ning rubbed her shoulder, her expression turning cold.
She couldn’t let him keep destroying himself.
She pulled out her acupuncture kit and selected the longest silver needle.
“Sorry in advance.”
Waiting for the right moment, she lunged forward and climbed onto Gu Ci’s back. With one arm around his neck to restrain him, she gripped the needle in her other hand and drove it firmly into the Baihui acupoint at the crown of his head.
“Keep still!”
The needle penetrated about three millimeters.
Gu Ci’s body convulsed violently, as though he had been struck by lightning.
His movements stopped.
That frenzied urge to destroy himself had been forcibly interrupted by the needle.
But he was still trapped in his hallucination.
Instead of banging his head against the wall, he rolled onto his back and suddenly wrapped his arms around Jiang Ning.
He held her tightly.
As though she were the last lifeline keeping him from drowning—or the comrade he had failed to hold on to in his nightmare.
“Don’t go…”
His voice trembled, filled with a vulnerability and desperation she had never heard from him before.
“Don’t leave me behind… Please…”
Hot tears fell onto Jiang Ning’s neck.
She froze.
She had seen Gu Ci kill.
She had seen him cold and indifferent.
She had seen him lose his temper.
But she had never seen him cry.
This mad dog, who never bowed his head to anyone, was now as fragile as an abandoned child.
Jiang Ning’s hand, still holding the silver needle, stopped in midair.
She had originally intended to administer another needle to make him fall asleep.
But as she listened to his muffled sobs and felt his arms locked tightly around her waist, as though he were terrified she might disappear, she suddenly found herself unable to do it.
“I’m not leaving.”
Jiang Ning sighed.
She put away the silver needle and gently patted his back, which was drenched in cold sweat.
“No one’s abandoning you. I’m here.”
In that moment, there was no scheming and no bargaining.
There were only two souls, each struggling in their own personal hell, briefly finding solace in one another.