On the distant and seemingly unreachable wall, a face of classical elegance peeked over. With an oval face, hair elegantly tied up in a high bun, and a bright vermilion mark at the center of the forehead, he looked like a refined gentleman. Yet, hearing his voice from inside the house, one might mistake him for a playful child. He waved his snow-white sleeve at Liu Yan, saying, "You seem like an honest man. The one drinking tea inside is no good at all. Trust him too much, and you'll be in trouble. I, on the other hand, have a conscience and would never deceive you."
Liu Yan's lips quivered slightly. "You are Shui Duopo..." The graceful figure on the wall smiled at him. "Yes, it's me." Liu Yan's gaze shifted to the carriage in the courtyard. "I heard... you are highly skilled in medicine..." The man on the wall waved his hands dismissively. "Many are far more skilled than I am. I'm just a mediocre doctor at best." Liu Yan lowered his voice. "Whether you're a miracle doctor or a quack, can you save his life? I've come from afar, and if not for the chance encounter with Brother Mo, I wouldn't have found this place. Since fate has brought me here, I beg you to save him."
"Mo Ziru!" The white-robed man on the wall suddenly shouted. "Did you bring him here just to cause me trouble?" Inside the house, Mo Ziru, sipping tea, closed his eyes. "How dare I? This gentleman was looking for you. I merely pitied him for his arduous journey." Shui Duopo snorted. "You deliberately made him climb a broken ladder..." Mo Ziru opened his eyes, his gaze still clear and serene, as if filled with an ethereal aura. "I did no such thing." Shui Duopo shot him a glare before pulling his head back from the wall, as if about to leave. Startled, Liu Yan called out, "Shui Duopo! If you can save his life, we can pay any price—even ten thousand taels of gold or rare treasures. He can afford it."
"Eh..." The refined face reappeared over the wall. "What if I ask for two hundred thousand taels of gold?" Without hesitation, Liu Yan replied, "Done!" Shui Duopo beamed. "What about two million taels?" Firmly, Liu Yan answered, "Done!" Shui Duopo grew even more delighted. "Then what if twenty—" Liu Yan cut in, "Done!" Shui Duopo muttered to himself, "Hah... as if I'm really that greedy. Fine, two million taels it is. But before you pay, you must first fix my ladder." Liu Yan was taken aback—the ladder was clearly in Mo Ziru's courtyard. How could it belong to Shui Duopo? Noticing his confusion, Shui Duopo explained, "That scoundrel Mo borrowed it from me, so of course I gave him a broken one. Who knew he'd use it to trick you?" Liu Yan was baffled once more. These two eccentric neighbors were truly peculiar.
The shattered wood on the ground was in complete disarray. Reassembling the splinters into a functional ladder seemed an impossible task, especially since Liu Yan had no talent for carpentry. He picked up two broken pieces of wood, staring at them for a long while, unsure how to join them. Meanwhile, Shui Duopo sat on the wall, watching with amusement as Liu Yan struggled with the pieces. Before long, Mo Ziru emerged from the house, holding a scroll of parchment in one hand and sipping tea leisurely with the other. He leaned against the doorframe, standing quietly in the courtyard.Liu Yan slowly arranged the shattered wooden pieces on the ground one by one. In that short moment, he had already realized that the two people beside him were equally indifferent. Mo Ziru's expression was aloof, as if he wasn't even looking at him, but like Shui Duopo, he was merely there to watch the show. Liu Yan's mind had always been unclear, but now it was unusually sharp. There wasn't a trace of anger in his heart—his attention was entirely focused on the broken wood in his hands. After a moment of contemplation, he tore a strip of cloth from his tattered sleeve and tied two broken wooden pieces together.
Mo Ziru turned a page of his book, while Shui Duopo retrieved an oilcloth bundle from somewhere and placed it on the wall. A faint blue shadow flitted past, and Mo Ziru, still in his reading posture, was suddenly atop the wall. To any onlooker, it would have seemed like a mere blur—Mo Ziru remained elegantly perched on the wall, reading as before, except the oilcloth bundle was now open, its contents—whether rice balls or a whole chicken—nowhere to be seen. Shui Duopo kicked the empty bundle into Mo Ziru's courtyard and grinned at him. "Tasty?" Mo Ziru's eyes narrowed slightly. "Plain rice." Shui Duopo flicked open the fan in his sleeve with a snap. "Only plain rice cooks itself on the stove." Mo Ziru closed his book and said calmly, "Let's go drinking at the tavern again sometime." Shui Duopo glanced down at Liu Yan, who was still tying the wooden pieces together. "With you? Drinking with you would surely get me lost. Don’t think I don’t know—you’ve lived here for two years and still don’t know the name of the main road in front of the mountain."
By the time they finished speaking, Liu Yan had already repaired the broken wooden ladder. His clothes, already ragged, now lacked sleeves entirely, making him look even more disheveled. Yet his gaze was calm. "Fixed." Shui Duopo gave him a once-over and suddenly asked, "Can you cook?" Liu Yan replied, "A little." Shui Duopo's face lit up. "Can you fry eggs?" Liu Yan frowned. "Fry eggs?" Shui Duopo sighed. "You can’t even fry eggs? How disappointing." Liu Yan's frown deepened, but he finally said, "I can make wolfberry leaf soup." Shui Duopo beamed. "Really?" Liu Yan, torn between amusement and exasperation, pointed at the carriage. "He cooks far better than I do."
A white shadow flashed—Shui Duopo was already standing in Mo Ziru's courtyard, leaning into Tang Lici's carriage to examine him. Liu Yan strained to turn his body and watch Shui Duopo's back. At first, his movements seemed relaxed, but gradually they slowed. After a while, he remained frozen in a bent-over position, motionless for a long time.
Mo Ziru drifted down from the wall, his voice serene and composed. "Well? Is it difficult?"
Shui Duopo slowly withdrew from the carriage and straightened up, staring at the ground. "What is inside his stomach?"
"It's a person's heart," Liu Yan answered flatly. "Our brother's heart."A peculiar expression crossed Shui Duopo's face. "A human heart? He implanted a heart in his abdomen?" Liu Yan nodded. "I don't know exactly where, but that heart is beating." Shui Duopo tapped her forehead with the folding fan hidden in her snow-white sleeve. "There's no space in the abdomen to implant a heart. He must have damaged other organs—where else could something as large as a human heart fit? Moreover, since the heart is beating, it means blood circulation is functioning. But where would there be enough blood in the abdomen to sustain a beating heart?"
Hearing this, Liu Yan couldn't help but feel admiration. For a physician from a thousand years ago to have such an understanding of the human body was truly remarkable. "He said he connected it wherever he could."
Shui Duopo tapped her forehead again with the fan. "That means even though no single blood vessel in the abdomen could support a beating heart, he connected multiple vessels to it, keeping the heart alive. But in doing so, he must have severed most of the abdominal vessels, implanted the foreign heart in between, and then reconnected the vessels to their original organs. With so many vessels tangled together, many of his internal organs must have shifted. And this heart isn't compatible with his own body..."
Liu Yan's mind reeled—was this rejection? Was the reason Tang Lici, who once feared neither injury nor infection, had become so weak due to the rejection from Fang Zhou's transplanted heart? If there was rejection, it would have started from the very beginning. Tang Lici couldn't have been unaware. He had endured years of suffering just to preserve the faintest hope for Fang Zhou—and yet, he—Liu Yan—had buried Fang Zhou. Not only buried him, but let him rot into a pile of decayed flesh.
"The worst part is that his own constitution is so strong that even with his organs in such disarray, he won't die immediately," Shui Duopo said regretfully. "Anyone else would have died years ago. But now, his displaced liver, stomach, and that heart have fused together. The rerouted blood vessels have gradually damaged his liver, which is why he's in pain and has no appetite."
Liu Yan was silent for a moment before speaking slowly. "He can't keep anything down. He vomits everything he eats."
Shui Duopo sighed. "On top of that, the heart in his abdomen seems to have changed. It's growing upward, pressing against his stomach, making him prone to vomiting."
Liu Yan suddenly felt his teeth chattering. "Will he die?"
Shui Duopo looked at him with pity. "He should have died the moment he buried that heart in his abdomen. Deep down, you've known he would die—you just didn't want to admit it. His external injuries don't matter; they'll heal with simple treatment. But most of his organs are already ruined."
Liu Yan's teeth chattered uncontrollably, a deep chill spreading through his body. "You're saying... you're saying he won't die now, not until... not until his organs completely fail?"
Shui Duopo herself shuddered. "Yes... and it will be excruciating."
"Then what if we remove the heart?" Liu Yan asked in a low voice, his palms icy, the cold seeping from his very core."It's impossible now. Many of his organs have fused with that heart. Before they fused, we could have taken the risk, but not anymore." Shui Duopo's expression was full of regret. "I can give him medicine, save him for a while, but the longer he lives... the more pain he will endure—pain beyond what you or I can imagine..."
Liu Yan slowly turned his gaze toward the carriage. There was no movement inside. He didn’t know if Tang Lici had already foreseen this outcome. He recalled a story that had once moved him to tears—on a desolate grassland, a strong mare struggled through a difficult birth and, in her agony, kicked and severed her own exposed intestines. She dragged the broken entrails behind her as she ran in circles across the plains, running endlessly, endlessly...
Sometimes, life resists death in ways so cruel that it makes one realize... how sudden death can truly be a mercy.
OpenNovel