Night Wanderer

Too similar.

The man who used Zong Ying’s credit card at the hospital store, the man in the old family photo, and the person standing before him now—they were identical to an uncanny degree.

This resemblance wasn’t just in the eyes or features, but in their entire presence. It was unsettling.

Sheng Qiushi had never expected to encounter him again, yet here he was, standing less than a meter away.

The harsh white lights of the emergency hall cast a stark glow on Sheng Qiushi’s face, accentuating his shock.

Faced with Qiushi’s probing gaze, Sheng Qingrang, though puzzled, responded cautiously, “I’m a friend of Zong Ying’s,” and attempted to shift the topic. “How is she now? Is she out of danger?”

At the mention of Zong Ying, Sheng Qiushi snapped back to attention but clearly had no intention of dropping the matter. Adjusting his grip on the pen, he said briskly, “Filling out this form requires your information. May I have your name?”

Sheng Qingrang had always been wary of people in this era. Aside from Zong Ying, he never revealed his identity to anyone—including his name.

Meeting Qiushi’s gaze briefly, he glanced at the form in his hands and concluded, “It doesn’t seem like my information is necessary here.”

Sheng Qiushi abruptly closed the medical chart, swiftly masking his expression. “You look familiar. I think I’ve seen you before. I’m Zong Ying’s senior. Nice to meet you—”

He extended a friendly hand, while Sheng Qingrang observed his shifting demeanor and glanced at his name tag before countering, “Was it at the hospital store? Then your memory is impressive, Dr. Sheng.”

Qiushi hadn’t expected the other man to remember as well—nor the unexpected compliment, which nearly threw him off. Still, he pressed on. “That day, you used Zong Ying’s credit card to pay, so I took a closer look.”

By now, Sheng Qingrang had pieced together some clues. One night, an uninvited guest had arrived at Apartment 699 while he was showering, and Zong Ying had received them.

If his deduction was correct, that guest had to be Sheng Qiushi standing before him now.

That night, they had even mentioned Qinghui. The exact words were: “Are you asking about Miss Sheng? She was my grandfather’s adoptive mother.”

So this person was a descendant of the child Qinghui had adopted?

A strange sense of temporal continuity washed over him, but Sheng Qingrang quickly suppressed it and politely shook Qiushi’s outstretched hand.

Qiushi withdrew his hand and lowered his gaze, noticing Sheng Qingrang’s shoes—a pair of size 42 or 43 Derby shoes—the same ones he had seen in Zong Ying’s entryway that night.

Their relationship was intimate enough for this man to leave his shoes at her place. Just who was this unnamed gentleman to Zong Ying?

Just as Qiushi was about to probe further, a nurse approached, urging him again to review the scans. At the same time, Xue Xuanqing arrived in a rush.

Recognizing Sheng Qiushi, she immediately demanded, “What’s the situation? Where’s Zong Ying?”

Qiushi responded with practiced professionalism. “She was brought in time. Personally, I don’t think there’ll be any major issues, but we’ll need to wait for the consultation results to be sure—”

Xuanqing had no patience for his drawn-out explanation. She snatched the medical chart from his hands and scrutinized every word, unwilling to miss a single detail.She held back her anger as she finished reading and handed the medical chart back to him. Turning around, she wished she could find a punching bag to vent her fury, but in the end, she only slammed her palm hard onto the bench by the wall. The impact startled a child sitting at the far end, who burst into loud wails.

Xue Xuanqing’s palm stung red from the force, both painful and furious. For two whole months, she had been kept in the dark. Why should anyone bear an illness alone? How had she even managed to endure it?!

The child’s cries were heart-wrenching. The emergency room buzzed with activity as a parent hurried over to scoop up the child, leaving the bench suddenly empty.

Xue Xuanqing plopped down onto it, staring blankly at the white wall opposite her.

She had likely rushed straight from work, still in her uniform, her short hair looking unwashed for days. Dark circles shadowed her unfocused eyes. After a long moment, she snapped back to reality and instinctively reached into her pocket for a pack of cigarettes.

Just then, a nurse came to hurry Sheng Qiushi again. Once he left, she turned to Xue Xuanqing and warned, "Officer, smoking isn’t allowed here. If you must, go outside."

Xue Xuanqing hastily stuffed the cigarette pack back into her pocket. Looking up, she saw Sheng Qingrang and forced herself to calm down before asking, "How long have you been here?"

"About half an hour," he replied. After a pause, he added, "Does Zong Ying have any relatives we can contact?"

Without hesitation, Xue Xuanqing answered with six words: "Yes, but it’s as good as none."

The Zong family had never cared about how Zong Ying was doing. As for her mother’s relatives, they were too far away to be of any immediate help. For years, there had been only one name in Zong Ying’s emergency contact list—Xue Xuanqing.

Sheng Qingrang abandoned the idea of calling her family.

But then the nurse called out again, "Family of Zong Ying, please come complete some paperwork."

Hearing this, Sheng Qingrang turned, but Xue Xuanqing was already on her feet, heading for the nurse’s station.

From a distance, Sheng Qingrang could only watch as Xue Xuanqing presented her ID, filled out forms, and paid the fees. In this era, he had no identity, no connections, and not enough money—there was pitifully little he could do for Zong Ying.

Once the paperwork was done, Xue Xuanqing stood waiting in the hallway until the nurse told her, "The consultation results won’t be ready this quickly. Don’t stand here—you’re blocking the way." Only then did she turn and walk back to Sheng Qingrang.

"How much longer do we have to wait?" he asked.

"They’ll notify us when it’s time to transfer her to neurosurgery," she said, already walking toward the exit without looking back. Outside, an ambulance wailed toward the entrance, screeching to a halt. Amid shouts of "Make way! Make way!" the bustling emergency entrance cleared a path for the new patient.

Xue Xuanqing and Sheng Qingrang stepped aside. Once the siren faded and order returned, Xue Xuanqing leaned back against the wall, pulling out her cigarettes and lighter. With a flick of her thumb, a flame sparked to life in the dim blue night.

She lit a cigarette, took a deep drag, and exhaled slowly, the smoke curling from her nostrils.

"A few years ago, I brought Zong Ying to the emergency room too," she suddenly said, the smoke thinning in the night air. "Time passes too fast."Sheng Qingrang noticed the subtle shift in her tone and glanced at her, cautiously asking, "May I know what brought you to the emergency room?"

"Because of an accident." Xue Xuanqing tightly furrowed her brows and pressed her lips together, though they trembled slightly despite her efforts. To suppress the unease brought on by the memory, she lowered her head and took another drag from her cigarette.

An accident? Sheng Qingrang suddenly recalled a topic they had discussed on Zong Ying's birthday.

Back then, he had asked her why she was no longer a doctor, and her reply had been, "Some accidents happened."

When he asked what kind of sports she liked, she said, "Rock climbing."

Connecting this with the inscrutable change in Zong Ying's expression when she answered, Sheng Qingrang asked Xue Xuanqing, "Was it an accident during rock climbing?"

Xue Xuanqing looked up at him in surprise. "You know about it?"

Sheng Qingrang shook his head. "No, I was just guessing." He paused briefly before continuing, "Did Miss Zong injure her hand while climbing, making her unable to perform surgeries, so she changed careers?"

Upon hearing this, Xue Xuanqing quickly lowered her head and took several rapid puffs from her cigarette, her movements brimming with anxiety and regret.

She immediately refuted, "No, it wasn’t..." Then, suddenly lifting her head, she struggled to control her emotions before continuing, "That day was Zong Ying’s last climb with the team. She said she wouldn’t climb anymore after this one because rock climbing puts too much strain on the finger joints—it’s hard on the hands.

"Performing surgery demands extreme stability and endurance from the hands, and a neurosurgeon’s hands are especially precious.

"She loved neurosurgery from the bottom of her heart, so this choice might have been necessary."

Xue Xuanqing built up to the story, then lowered her head to take two more drags before continuing, "The weather was beautiful that day, I remember. It had just rained, and the air was especially clear. We chose a standard route—one with a suitable difficulty level, one I’d climbed many times before. I knew every tricky spot."

Her words began to lose some coherence. "Because I was so familiar with it, and everyone was egging me on, I went without protection. But then my calf cramped. Even though there were bolts on the rock face—"

Her face was shrouded in smoke. After a long pause, the smoke dissipated, and her voice grew weak. "Zong Ying saved me, but she injured her hand."

Hearing this, Sheng Qingrang recalled the look on Zong Ying’s face when she had mentioned "some accidents."

Xue Xuanqing let out a long sigh. "The injury was severe, but at the time, she was optimistic about recovery. She worked hard for a long time, and when all the tests came back normal, she took on a surgery. The case was very complex, with high risks—they had prepared multiple contingency plans. But in the end, it still failed. It caused a huge uproar. I don’t know how the patient’s family found out about her previous injury, but they used it to attack her and the hospital, demanding to know why they’d let a doctor like her operate—

"She shut herself away for a month. When I went to see her afterward, there was a stack of books on her desk. She said she was studying for an exam and even told me, 'There’s no road you can’t walk down—if you want to, there’s always a way.'"

As she spoke, Xue Xuanqing lit another cigarette. Sheng Qingrang summarized for her, "So you introduced Zong Ying to this line of work, and she became your colleague.""Right." After finishing her account, Xue Xuanqing's voice grew calmer, though the fingers holding her cigarette still trembled uncontrollably: "She's very intelligent, willing to endure hardship, with excellent comprehension skills. She works steadily and diligently, and in some aspects, she's more professional than we are."

Sheng Qingrang was drawn into memories by her words, but his mind kept returning to images of Zong Ying absorbed in her work. The final frame that surfaced was her lonely profile as she stood on the balcony smoking.

Abruptly, Sheng Qingrang interrupted his thoughts and asked Xue Xuanqing, "When did Miss Zong start smoking?"

Xue Xuanqing flicked the ash from her cigarette lightly and replied, "The first time she was on-site, she encountered a highly decomposed corpse. The smell was overwhelming, and that day she worked continuously for a long time without even changing her clothes. Combined with the exhaustion of shift work, she started smoking. Over the years, she developed a bit of an addiction, but lately, I haven't seen her smoke much—seems like she's trying to quit." At this point, Xue Xuanqing recalled the medical chart she had just reviewed: "Probably quitting because of her illness."

Xue Xuanqing understood Zong Ying's dilemma—on one hand, she longed for the surgery to go smoothly, but on the other, she feared it might fail, hence her need to prepare everything beforehand.

Sheng Qingrang asked, "Could I know about Zong Ying's condition?"

Xue Xuanqing turned around, her voice tinged with exhaustion, almost sighing: "You should ask her yourself."

No sooner had she spoken than her phone rang—a call from the emergency nurse station.

The nurse said, "Neurosurgery is here to take the patient. They're transferring her now. Come over."

Xue Xuanqing hung up and hurried back, with Sheng Qingrang close behind.

After being transferred from the emergency department to the neurosurgery ward, Zong Ying remained asleep.

By the time everything was settled, the wall clock in the ward corridor had already passed midnight, its bright red digits displaying "00:00:05." Outside the hospital room, the city's countless lights gradually dimmed.

The night deepened hour by hour. Around five in the morning, Xue Xuanqing suddenly received a call from work and stepped out of the room. At that moment, Sheng Qingrang, who had been dozing by the bedside, noticed Zong Ying stir slightly. He quickly straightened up and turned on the light.

Zong Ying opened her eyes to the sight of the hospital room ceiling. Shifting her gaze to the right, she saw Sheng Qingrang's face. After a brief moment of disorientation, she pieced it together—she must have been brought to the hospital after losing consciousness, and the one who brought her here was Sheng Qingrang.

Sheng Qingrang asked from above her, "Miss Zong, can you hear me?"

At first, Zong Ying responded through the oxygen mask, but eventually, she lifted her hand and removed it, her voice hoarse: "I can hear you. Please help me sit up."

Sheng Qingrang complied, and Zong Ying glanced toward the door, spotting Xue Xuanqing through the glass pane, standing in the hallway on a phone call. "Xuanqing is here too?"

"Yes," Sheng Qingrang replied, placing a cushion behind her for support. "I called her to come."

Zong Ying raised her wrist to check the time, only to find a loose hospital bracelet dangling there.

Sheng Qingrang handed her a cup of water and, anticipating her need, told her the time: "It's five-thirty now."

She took the cup and drank slowly, in measured sips.

Sheng Qingrang watched her silently until Zong Ying, feeling uneasy under his gaze, asked, "What is it?"

He said, "I'm very worried. I hope you can recover fully, but—""But you don't know the full extent of my condition." Zong Ying took over his words, turning sideways to set down her water glass. "To put it simply—" She pointed to her head. "There's a ticking time bomb buried in here."

"It can be treated, right?"

"Yes, but with certain risks." Zong Ying's voice was hoarse as she admitted frankly, "My case is complicated, so the risks are higher."

That's why she wanted to draft a will beforehand, why she wanted to solve the mystery of Yan Man's sudden death before then.

Sheng Qingrang understood and was about to comfort her when Xue Xuanqing's voice suddenly came from outside the door: "What are you doing here?"

The tone was dripping with hostility. Sheng Qingrang and Zong Ying both looked toward the entrance, where Xue Xuanqing stood facing off against the visitor.

Then Aunt's voice abruptly cut in: "I'm her aunt, why can't I come? I should be asking who you are!"

Xue Xuanqing quickly moved to block her: "Zong Ying is resting right now. If you want to visit, pick a better time, okay?"

"I came because I heard she was unconscious!" Aunt took advantage of Xue Xuanqing's momentary distraction to push open the hospital room door. Seeing Zong Ying sitting up rather than lying down, she sighed in relief. "She's already awake!" Ignoring the attempts to stop her, she strode inside. Spotting Sheng Qingrang, she demanded, "And who are you? Mind moving aside?"

No sooner had Sheng Qingrang stood up than Aunt plopped into the chair, grabbing Zong Ying's hand. "I just heard from the nurses upstairs that you were brought in unconscious. I rushed down in a panic, but you're awake now—thank goodness, thank goodness."

Zong Ying remained silent.

Aunt continued, "Are you still upset about what happened last time? I was wrong then—I shouldn't have said those things to your grandmother."

Her tone was uncharacteristically gentle, her expression even mustering a hint of sincerity. "Are you feeling any better now?"

Still, Zong Ying said nothing.

Sensing Zong Ying's discomfort with the visitor, Sheng Qingrang spoke for her: "She just woke up and needs rest. Perhaps you could come back another time?"

As he finished speaking, hurried footsteps sounded outside. Turning, they saw Sheng Qiushi enter with a nurse.

Sheng Qiushi frowned. "You woke up and didn't even tell anyone?" His gaze flicked over the monitors before landing on Zong Ying, bypassing Aunt. His words carried both warning and reassurance: "The longer we delay, the riskier it gets. We'll finalize the surgical plan as soon as possible. Your case is complex, but stay optimistic—try to relax."

Aunt turned to him anxiously. "Is the surgery dangerous? What are the success rates?"

Sheng Qiushi replied coldly, "Success rates are only reference points for individual cases—they hold no practical meaning." Addressing Zong Ying, he added, "Get some rest." Then, pointing to the IV drip, he instructed the nurse, "Adjust the flow rate for her."

With that, he headed out, pulling Xue Xuanqing aside at the door. "Zong Ying shouldn't have her emotions stirred right now. Aunt has no filter—keep an eye on her."

Xue Xuanqing nodded. "Got it. Go do your work." Returning inside, she saw Zong Ying staring at Aunt and saying firmly, "I don't want to discuss this now. Please leave."