Truth and Falsehood

“Dr. Hua, Wang Qiyao is vomiting blood!

“Director Hua, the second-floor conference room wants you in a meeting.

“Dr. Hua, the patient in Bed 9 has suddenly developed an irregular heartbeat. It’s already up to 180, and her blood pressure..."

There was almost never a quiet moment in the Provincial Hospital’s gland differentiation department. Hua Yu first sent Liu Cong to check on Wang Qiyao, asked Yang Cha to go to the meeting for her, and then followed several younger doctors to examine the patient in Bed 9.

Liu Rannran trailed behind them, clutching a stack of files as she hesitated. “For Wang Qiyao’s side, should we let Dr. Liu go?”

Without looking back, Hua Yu said, “Wang Qiyao vomiting blood means her condition has flared up again. Her illness is severe, but it progresses slowly. She should be fine. You go with Dr. Liu.”

When she reached Bed 9, she immediately focused on finding the cause. Liu Rannran didn’t step forward again; instead, she turned and headed to Wang Qiyao’s room.

Wang Qiyao was staying in the special care ward; it was VVIP. The farther she walked, the quieter and cleaner the surroundings became. The young nurses in the special care area were probably not too busy, and each one seemed gentler than the last, with soft, friendly faces.

Just before Wang Qiyao’s room, she heard a man shouting inside.

“Where’s Dr. Hua? Why hasn’t she come?”

Liu Cong was pushing medication into the indwelling needle, her tone calm. “A different patient had an acute episode. She’ll come after she’s finished.”

“You’re not my daughter’s attending physician,” the man yelled at the nurse beside him. “You—go call Dr. Hua over here. My daughter’s had an acute episode too. She’s even vomiting blood, so why hasn’t a doctor come yet?”

“It’s a complication caused by gastric atrophy,” Liu Cong ignored him and gave the young nurse a few instructions with her head lowered. “Go get the test orders, then change the medication.”

The man stormed forward. “Can’t you hear me when I’m talking?”

“Dad,” Wang Qiyao weakly opened her eyes and raised one hand. “Don’t argue with the doctors.”

The man immediately took her hand and comforted her in a low voice. “Dad upset you. It’s fine, I won’t say anything anymore. Does it still hurt? What feels bad?”

Wang Qiyao shook her head. Under her pale hair, her eyes were tired and clouded.

A few days ago, she had still been in decent shape; there were already strands of black hair visible among the white. But in just the past two days, her condition had plunged sharply, her indicators collapsing again. She was only slightly better than when she had first been hospitalized.

Father Wang was so anxious he gritted his teeth. He had shouted countless times in front of Hua Yu and begged countless times, demanding that she cure Wang Qiyao no matter what.

But Hua Yu had never given him a definite answer. She had even advised him to understand the condition better. How could he not understand? His daughter had been sick since childhood; no one understood it better than he did!

What Hua Yu was really saying, between the lines, was that he should prepare himself psychologically; that his daughter’s condition was bad and she could die at any moment!

And now his daughter was vomiting blood, yet Hua Yu was still treating other patients!

Were other people more important than his daughter?!

They had poured so much money into the hospital, bribed their way from the department head all the way to the director, and his wife, despite being buried in work, had even gone out of her way to order and donate a batch of medical equipment. They had tried so hard just to let their daughter live. Yet the hospital had taken their benefits and not done a decent thing in return; anyone who refused to help them was courting death!

At that moment, Hua Yu finally rushed over after finishing with the Bed 9 patient, not even having time to catch her breath.

“How is she?”

Liu Cong nodded at Hua Yu. “A gastric issue. It’s been brought under control.”

Hua Yu lowered her head to check the blood clots in the basin. “Take it for testing and check..."

“Dr. Hua,” Father Wang said darkly, “why is my daughter vomiting blood?”

Hua Yu was interrupted; her brows knit for a moment. Fortunately, Liu Cong knew what she had been about to say, nodded, and noted it down.

Hua Yu looked at Father Wang, then lowered her head to inspect Wang Qiyao. After a moment’s thought, she didn’t give a direct answer. “We still need to wait for the test results.”

“I’ll wait for your damn test results!”

Before the words had even faded, Father Wang swung a fist at Hua Yu.

Hua Yu didn’t see his movement clearly, but her reflexes were sharp, and she stepped hard to the side.

Even so, she didn’t get out of the way completely; his fist scraped past her cheek.

With a loud bang, Father Wang knocked over Wang Qiyao’s breathing machine, yanking the tubing connected to her IV along with it.

The needle slipped out of the flesh, drawing a streak of blood through the air.

The sight of blood only further enraged Father Wang. He raised his fist and lunged again.

Liu Rannran and Liu Cong rushed over, both straining to hold Father Wang back while shouting for Hua Yu to run.

Hua Yu staggered half a step, calmly pressed the nurse call button, and at the same time activated the loudspeaker. “Special Care Room 3; violent medical disturbance. Notify security.”

Three seconds later, hurried footsteps rang out in the corridor.

The security guards stationed in the special care ward burst through the door, and just as the man charged toward Hua Yu again, they slammed him to the ground.

Father Wang’s eyes were bloodshot; filthy curses poured out of his mouth.

“You dare curse my daughter!

“What kind of damn doctor are you? If you can’t save my daughter, I’ll fucking kill you!”

Hua Yu ignored him. She fished out an alcohol swab from the drawer and pressed it to Wang Qiyao’s hand, then secured it with medical tape.

“Liu Cong, help me prop up the breathing machine.”

Liu Cong was still in shock. She looked at Father Wang, then at Hua Yu, completely unprepared for a man who looked so refined and educated to suddenly erupt into such madness.

When Hua Yu called her, she snapped back to herself and, together with a nearby idle security guard, helped lift the breathing machine upright.

Wang Qiyao was dazed and muddle-headed. She couldn’t speak. Seeing her father lashing out at the doctor, her breathing grew increasingly rapid. The next second, her whole body began to tremble.

“Get the respirator on her!” Hua Yu said at once.

Father Wang had still been struggling, but when he heard the movement from Wang Qiyao, his face went pale with terror and he froze stiffly.

“Dr. Hua, the breathing machine seems broken. It won’t turn on!”

Hua Yu paused, then quickly took an oxygen mask and pressed it over Wang Qiyao’s face, while pushing aside Liu Cong’s monitoring equipment.

Liu Rannran hurried to bring another breathing machine over, but even if they moved the nearest one and installed it now, it would still take at least two minutes.

And when Father Wang had been hitting people, Wang Qiyao might already have been in a hypoxic state. With multiple organs failing and her body already aged and declining, could she survive two minutes of suffocation?

Father Wang suddenly wailed, crying out miserably, “Hurry and find a breathing machine! Hurry!”

He struggled to get up, but the security guard forced him down hard.

They dragged him out, while Father Wang clawed desperately toward the bedside. Even the guards were growing furious. “Stop moving! This is all your fault, so stop causing trouble here!”

“If you want your daughter to live, get out here now!”

Just then, with a sharp metallic crack as Hua Yu bent her elbow and struck the breathing machine, the startup tone of “beep beep beep” sounded.

At the crucial moment, the breathing machine finally returned to normal.

After half an hour of chaos, Wang Qiyao’s vital signs stabilized. Hua Yu walked out of the ward and let out a heavy breath; her bangs were completely soaked through.

Yang Cha had been waiting at the door for a while. The meeting Hua Yu had asked her to attend included the director and the heads of several departments. The news of Father Wang’s violent medical disturbance spread quickly; as soon as the meeting ended, she hurried straight over.

“Dr. Hua... are you all right?”

Because Hua Yu knew Wang Qiyao’s condition best, even after being beaten and insulted by the patient’s father, she still had to do everything she could, relying on her professional skill to pull the man’s daughter back from the brink of life and death.

And yet saving the dying and healing the wounded seemed to be a doctor’s duty.

Your grievances and dissatisfaction meant nothing before another person’s life.

Then were doctors’ lives not lives? Who protected their safety?

Yang Cha was so angry her eyes had gone red.

Hua Yu’s mood had not been affected. She pressed once at the silicone gel patch on her cheek and patted Yang Cha’s shoulder. “We’ll talk when we get back.”

Inside the department, Director Li and the department head were waiting for her, along with a crowd of doctors.

“Did you do a checkup?” The department head was very old. Though she usually kept a low profile and was quite smooth and worldly, when one of her people had been put through this, anger now outweighed reason. “What the hell kind of scum are they? Rotten, shameless, black-hearted trash.”

Wang Qiyao was a patient brought in by Director Li, and he had specifically named Hua Yu to take over. Hearing this, Director Li’s face looked awkward. “Yes, we still need to run the tests first. Clean the wound before anything else.”

Back when she had been rushing to care for Wang Qiyao, Hua Yu had only slapped a patch on her cheek and left it at that.

The department head pushed Director Li aside and walked up to Hua Yu to clean her wound.

“No need,” Hua Yu stopped her lightly. “Head, Yang Cha and the others can do it.”

The department head glared at her. Her weathered hand, dry and warm despite being in her fifties, firmly held Hua Yu’s face and turned it aside, while her other hand tore off the silicone gel patch.

“Who told you to stick this thing on without even disinfecting it...” she muttered as she cleaned the wound, but very soon, as the gauze grew increasingly bloodstained, her expression darkened. “This blood... why won’t it stop?”

Hua Yu shook her head. At first she hadn’t paid attention to the wound on her face; only after she noticed blood running down her cheek had she fished out an IV dressing, thinking it would be enough once she stuck it on. But the blood kept flowing. It wasn’t much, but it came in a thin, steady trickle, so she had pressed a cotton pad over the wound and topped it with the silicone gel patch.

Hearing the department head say that, she had a guess. In a calm, even voice, she said, “Head, I’ll press on it myself. I’m going to get my coagulation panel done now.”

—

Yu Tiantian’s factory was located on the border between Q City and F City, in a broad suburban stretch with little oversight; for ten li around, there wasn’t a soul in sight.

Xu Ya Qing was driving Pedro’s car. It was said to be professional-grade, top-tier in shock resistance, fire resistance, and off-road performance alike.

Wei Yin tapped the window, then looked back at the trunk, which supposedly held a fire extinguisher and a lot of other things. Xu Ya Qing claimed that if anything happened, they should just open it up; they’d definitely find good stuff inside.

“Don’t think about it; it’s definitely bulletproof,” Xu Ya Qing said, completely absorbed in the thrill of driving, whipping the car into a series of S-curves. “You don’t know what it feels like if you haven’t driven. This sensation, this engine, this view..."

“Seven kilometers left,” Wei Yin interrupted flatly. “We’re going up the mountain ahead.”

Yu Tiantian’s factory was not only in the suburbs; it was also up on a mountain.

When the two of them arrived, a worker in a yellow-green uniform was waiting at the entrance to greet them.

“Give me the car key,” the worker said. “It needs to be parked in the garage at the back.”

Xu Ya Qing tossed the key in her palm and looked around. “Your entrance is so big. What a waste not to use it for parking.”

The worker hadn’t expected her to say that and froze. “The rules say no parking at the entrance.”

“Then get your boss out here,” Xu Ya Qing said without making things difficult for her. “You go do whatever you were going to do.”

The worker froze again. “The boss asked me to show you around... I can’t go find the boss directly.”

“Then have your higher-up go find her,” Xu Ya Qing said, half-amused. Where had Yu Tiantian dug up such an honest soul? Yu Tiantian really did have a problem; she had called Wei Yin over but wouldn’t appear in person. Xu Ya Qing didn’t make things hard for the worker and urged, “Go on then, like I said. Hurry.”

Wei Yin tugged Xu Ya Qing once and smiled at the worker. “Whoever gave you the order, go find them. We’ll wait at the entrance for Yu Tiantian.”

The worker looked at the two of them, hesitated for a few seconds, then turned and ran off.

“She’s just an employee too,” Wei Yin said. “I should call Yu Tiantian.”

“No,” Xu Ya Qing said, catching Wei Yin’s hand. “Don’t spoil her. She’s the kind who pushes her luck. This is her trying to test how obedient you are; she’s putting on a show of force the moment you arrive. If you go looking for her first, it’ll make you seem like you can be bossed around however she likes.”

Wei Yin tilted her head and thought for two seconds, then nodded decisively. “You’re right.”

Sometimes, as someone who had grown up among businesspeople, Xu Ya Qing’s judgment on people and situations was sharper and more precise than Wei Yin’s.

Xu Ya Qing raised her wrist to check the time. “I’ll give her ten minutes.”

Wei Yin copied her, improving fast. She lifted her head to find a surveillance camera, then walked to the one nearest the entrance and drew out her voice. “Five minutes. When time’s up, we’re leaving.”

Xu Ya Qing laughed as she followed behind, one hand in her pocket. “Fine. Don’t wait here; get in the car. Once five minutes are up, we’re driving off.”

Two minutes later, it was still that same worker. She came jogging over, her face flushed red, panting. “The boss is waiting for you in the third-floor reception room. She’s receiving guests right now. You can go upstairs to see her, or go into the lobby and wait for a bit.”

Xu Ya Qing rolled her eyes. “Fine, we know.”

The worker swallowed, looking at the two of them uneasily.

In her eyes, these two looked exactly like people who had come to make trouble and smash the place up.

Wei Yin found her amusing, while Xu Ya Qing said directly, “Let’s go up. Our time is precious; we can’t be bothered to wait for her to finish making a scene.”

Wei Yin snorted.

As they passed the worker, Wei Yin stopped. “What’s your zodiac sign?”

The worker stared blankly at her. “Rat... the Rat.”

Wei Yin pulled a small red envelope from her coat and said with a smile, “Thanks for the welcome.”

In the elevator, Xu Ya Qing asked in confusion, “Why’d you give her a red envelope?”

“She said she’s sixteen,” Wei Yin said, the smile at the corner of her mouth a little helpless. “So she’s not a child laborer.”

Only then did Xu Ya Qing notice that the grey-clothed worker really did look quite young.

Xu Ya Qing clicked her tongue. “No choice. If she was born in the Year of the Rat and has had her birthday, then she’s already sixteen. But though she looks young, she’s the kind who’s probably old enough to be an adult but didn’t keep going to school, so she looks a little weathered. How did you figure out she’s not an adult yet?”

“She walks like a child,” Wei Yin said. “I did that too when I was fifteen or sixteen.”

“What’s Yu Tiantian hiring a child laborer for?” Xu Ya Qing asked. “Trying to deliberately gross us out?”

Wei Yin shook her head and frowned. “I don’t know. Let’s see.”

Actually, she wasn’t sure how old the child was either; she had deliberately asked about the zodiac sign. If the zodiac sign given had made the person older than sixteen, it would actually have made the lie seem less likely.

But she happened to land right on sixteen.

Still, the fact that Yu Tiantian was hiring child laborers didn’t seem connected to what she was here to investigate. It just felt like child labor, besides being cheap, had no knowledge and no stamina, so its cost-performance ratio was poor. Yu Tiantian was such a shrewd, self-serving person; this didn’t seem like something she’d do.

When they reached the third-floor reception room, someone came to serve tea. Xu Ya Qing looked up and, sure enough, it was that Rat girl again.

“We’ll do it ourselves... hey!”

Xu Ya Qing raised a hand to stop her, but the little worker had already bent over and picked up the coffee, only to spill it all over Xu Ya Qing’s pants.

Xu Ya Qing was silent for two seconds, then said expressionlessly, “You can go.”

The coffee wasn’t scalding, but it was sticky enough to be annoying. Wei Yin took a box of tissues and set it in front of her, trying not to laugh. “There’s a restroom next to us.”

Xu Ya Qing kept her face blank and tried her best to make her expression look less like she had stepped in shit, then got up and limped toward the bathroom door.

The moment the bathroom door shut, the reception room door opened.

Yu Tiantian was standing outside, making a “please” gesture.

Wei Yin said nothing and didn’t look toward the bathroom. She rose naturally and walked out quietly.

“Xu Ya Qing reacts fast. When she comes out and sees I’m gone, she’ll definitely come looking for me,” Wei Yin said mockingly. “And your acting is way too fake.”

Yu Tiantian patted the shoulder of the young girl beside her. “She’s talking about you. Your acting still needs work.”

The young girl was still wearing the work uniform. Standing next to Yu Tiantian only made her look even younger.

Wei Yin stopped walking and looked from the girl to Yu Tiantian.

Yu Tiantian said composedly, “What’s the confusion?”

“You really don’t seem like someone who keeps herself clean,” Wei Yin said evenly.

Yu Tiantian was stunned for a moment, then burst out laughing. “Hahaha, she really is just an ordinary employee. You can go downstairs. Call me again if you need anything.”

The young girl paused for two seconds, then said, “Oh,” and ran off.