“The head nurse has spent the most time with you, so she could be the killer. As for the director, I’m just guessing, since he hasn’t shown up at all from start to finish.”
“You’re right. They are indeed more suspicious. But what about Mrs. Sato? Do you think she’s suspicious?”
“She…” Kurokawa hesitated for a moment. “She seems quite kind, and there’s nothing strange about her behavior. I doubt it’s her.”
Su Mo didn’t answer right away. Instead, he glanced at the night outside, thought for a bit, and then said, “You should head back for now. I need to think this over some more.”
After sending Kurokawa off, Su Mo stayed in the room for a while, then quietly slipped out alone.
When he left, he didn’t head straight to the mental hospital. Instead, he took a very long detour. By the time he reappeared, he had changed into a different appearance—the face of a mature woman around thirty years old.
He didn’t try to sneak in. Instead, he knocked directly on the hospital door. The one who opened it wasn’t the head nurse, but a woman in her early thirties.
“Oh my, you’re finally here. Where did you find a man tonight? What took you so long?” The woman glanced at his chest and teased, “Looks like you’ve gotten a bit fuller.”
Su Mo replied in a mock-irritated tone, “If you keep teasing me, be careful—I might go after your man next time.”
The woman’s expression immediately turned serious. “Well then, I’m leaving. Tonight’s shift is all yours. Don’t mess up and get me in trouble.”
Su Mo gave a charming smile. “Of course not!”
As he spoke, he gave her a light pat on the back, which made her complain quite a bit.
Only after she had walked far away did he slowly let out the breath he had been holding, muttering to himself: This person is so twisted. Even as a woman, she still has to take advantage of another woman. Now I have to do the same thing just to keep up the act.
The person he was pretending to be was named Watanabe. On the surface, she was a flirtatious woman who liked to seduce married men. But in reality, she was an undercover agent from Xia Country, following Yan Er’s orders. Before coming to Xiangchuan County, Su Mo had gotten a list of undercover agents from Yan Er, and now it had come in handy.
Her identity was a nurse at Xiangchuan Mental Hospital, and tonight happened to be her turn for the night shift.
Following the description she had given him, Su Mo first went to the office and sat for a while. Then he started checking the rooms one by one to see if any patients were missing.
Everything was going smoothly—until a male nurse walked toward him just as he reached the back garden, a place he wasn’t supposed to be.
“Watanabe, what are you doing here?” The man looked confused.
Su Mo quickly thought on his feet. “I heard some strange noises over here, so I came to check if another patient couldn’t stand being lonely and snuck out here for a rendezvous.”
The man gave him a weird look. “That’s impossib—”
Before he could finish, a series of rather explicit moans drifted out from the garden.
For a moment, the atmosphere was incredibly awkward.
“How about we go take a look together?”
The man hesitated for a moment. “Alright.”
He was curious too.
They reached the edge of the garden just as the couple inside finished their business. Su Mo pretended to be shy and turned away, while the man gave a faint, contemptuous smile, as if to say, Who are you trying to fool?
The two people in the garden weren’t the same pair Su Mo had seen during the day. This couple looked much younger, and their condition seemed less severe—at least they had enough shame to cover themselves the moment Su Mo and the male nurse appeared.
The male nurse treated the patients terribly, cursing at them until their faces turned red with embarrassment. For a moment, Su Mo even thought they seemed completely normal—at least from the outside, there was nothing unusual about them.
The two patients were each taken back to their dorms by Su Mo and the male nurse.
On the way back, the female patient kept trying to strike up a conversation with Su Mo. Noticing this, he took the initiative and asked, “What do you want to say?”
Tears immediately streamed down her face. “Sister, please, I’m begging you. Help me. If I stay here any longer, I’m really going to lose my mind.”
She looked truly pitiful, and Su Mo felt a tug at his heart. But he still acted indifferent. “You think you can leave just because you want to? Don’t dream.”
With that, he turned and walked away, forcing himself to be cold.
In truth, he had just saved that female patient’s life—because the male nurse had originally intended to take her back to her dorm himself. Everyone knew what his real intentions were.
As Su Mo was thinking about other ways to get close to the garden, he noticed someone sneaking out of a dorm at the end of the hallway. Their steps were unsteady, and something seemed off.
Curious, Su Mo followed them—and ended up back in the garden again.
The woman from earlier stumbled into the bushes, deliriously tearing at her clothes.
Not long after, a male patient also staggered over, just as disoriented.
Su Mo seized the moment and shouted, “What do you two think you’re doing here?”
He used the chance to get closer to the garden and noticed that the hidden area in the middle of the flower bed was actually a large piece of spirit stone, covered in complex patterns. With Su Mo’s understanding of formations and runes, he couldn’t make sense of it at all.
Despite Su Mo’s interruption, the two patients ignored him completely. They clung to each other right in front of him, looking utterly desperate.
“Seriously…” Su Mo was at a loss for words.
Of course, he wasn’t going to just stand there and watch. He immediately turned around, but his peripheral vision caught the natural spirit stone bed—it was glowing faintly.
And as the two grew more engrossed, the light became clearer and clearer.
“Watanabe, what are you doing here?” The head nurse’s voice suddenly rang out. “Didn’t I tell you? Don’t come here unless you have a good reason.”
Startled by the sudden voice, Su Mo broke out in a cold sweat. He tried his best to stay calm. “Head nurse, what about them…?”
“Never mind them. These patients have been repressed for a long time. It’s normal for them to have needs. Once they’re done, they’ll go back on their own.”
Su Mo muttered an “oh” and quickly got out of that dangerous place.
Judging by the head nurse’s tone, this seemed like a pretty ordinary occurrence.
Then again, he had already come across three such incidents in a single day…
After getting scolded by the head nurse, Su Mo returned to the duty room and started thinking about the small section of rune patterns he had seen on the spirit stone bed.
Suddenly, a strange feeling exploded inside him.
For some reason, his consciousness started to blur, and his body began to heat up. Su Mo’s face and neck turned burning hot in an instant.
His first thought was that he had been drugged again!
Except this time, he didn’t pass out.
While he still had some control left before the rising desires took over completely, Su Mo kept using yin fire to stimulate his brain, trying to keep himself wide awake.
But it didn’t help much. The burning sensation in his body only grew stronger.
Faintly, he heard a voice calling out to him. His legs began moving on their own, no longer under his control. He felt like a walking corpse, completely detached from his own mind.
Only when he realized where he was heading did it finally click. So… that stone has that kind of effect. No wonder they all go there…
Not far from him, the male nurse from earlier was also stumbling toward the same place, eagerly pulling off his jacket as he walked.