Chapter 37
Si Chen took the key from the cook’s chest.
It was chaos in the cafeteria.
The patient dolls were stacked on top of each other, tearing and biting at the staff dolls underneath. They didn’t care if their limbs were broken so long as they were able to vent their inner hatred.
Tufts of cotton were flying all over the cafeteria. Broken buttons and strips of cloth littered the floor.
Xiao Zhou raised his trident, looking like he too wanted to join the battle. But lacking legs, he had no choice but to stay in Si Chen’s pocket, cheering on his fellow patient dolls, howling from time to time to boost the dolls’ morale.
A rag doll was stabbed in the chest with a table knife during the fierce battle.
One strong worker doll threw it off the battlefield.
The rag doll fell by Si Chen’s feet with a clatter.
Si Chen picked it up and squeezed it. The patient doll was soft and let out a “squeak” sound. It had no audio easter egg.
He handed the doll to Xiao Zhou.
Half of the patient doll’s scalp had been torn off. Dirty cotton wadding was leaking out; there was no way to stuff it back in.
Xiao Zhou’s expression was a little sad. “This is, Hua Hua.”
Hua Hua was a fellow patient and his friend. Her family had some money and hearing that the recovery rate of the House of the Mind Rehabilitation Center was 100% and also that it was located not far away, they sent her here.
Hua Hua had autism. With this world’s level of medical technology, it was a condition that could not be remedied. But her parents were desperate and after a cursory inspection, dazed and confused, they signed the contract.
On the doll’s face was a smile stitched crookedly with needlework.
As the cook was terminated, the stewed meat turned back into clumps of dirty cotton wool and the wriggling maggots died and lay still.
Si Chen endured his nausea and poured the rice into the bucket for swill.
Yu Lian’s sanity gradually returned and cold sweat broke out all over his body. “I was…almost done for there. That was a close call.”
That stewed pork rice made by the ghost chef had aroused the most primitive desire in his heart.
At that moment, Yu Lian truly was driven to madness by the hunger. He thought he would starve to death if he couldn’t eat.
In order to make this stewed pork rice, the ghost chef had sharpened his kitchen skills for many decades. He had perfected his recipe, experimenting with dozens of ingredients in the broth alone. He thought it was foolproof. He never expected to encounter someone like Si Chen with his sense of smell and taste all out of whack. What a miscalculation.
Si Chen untied the iron chain off Yu Lian. He rewound the iron chain and held it in his hand again.
Having used it a few times, the red color on the iron chain had faded and the detectable energy value had dropped a lot.
Si Chen understood that one more use and this iron chain would lose its supernatural properties and become an ordinary iron product.
Yu Lian moved his muscles and bones. He then retracted back his arms and legs.
He looked at the thing in Si Chen’s hand. “What does that key open?”
We’re sorry for MTLers or people who like using reading mode, but our translations keep getting stolen by aggregators so we’re going to bring back the copy protection. If you need to MTL please retype the gibberish parts.
The key looked special. Its handle was made into the shape of a heart and the shaft was covered with raised balls and spikes.
Ktf ilaaif wfgwjc gfqilfv, “Ktlgv oibbg, vbbg.”
Cmmbgvlcu ab atf wjq ja atf fcagjcmf bo atf tjii, atf rfmbcv oibbg tfiv atf qtjgwjms jcv atf qjalfcar’ kjgvr. Ktf atlgv oibbg kjr atf boolmf jcv bqfgjalbc gbbw.
Pc atf mjofafglj, atf yjaaif yfakffc atf vbiir bc ybat rlvfr fcvfv klatbea j mbcmierlbc.
When the last trace of the dish’s aroma dissipated, the patient dolls and staff dolls, like mobile phones that had run out of battery, automatically stopped moving, falling over in all directions.
Si Chen took away the chef’s butcher’s knife. He then remembered a key question, “Why did you become dolls?”
Xiao Zhou replied, “I do not, know.”
When he woke up, he had already turned into a cotton doll in the bathtub.
Aside from cotton dolls, there were also dolls made from ceramic, cloth, clay, plastic…all kinds of materials, every material one could expect.
They left the cafeteria. The phone on the second floor was still ringing.
The two took the elevator to the second floor. The phone on this floor was just next to the tea room opposite the elevator.
Si Chen picked up the receiver from off the phone atop the coffee table.
For a long while, Doctor remained silent over the other end.
Through the speaker, only his shallow breathing could be heard.
The excessively short breaths gave the impression that he was a little out of breath.
The rehab center had no surveillance. This was done purposefully to prevent someone from secretly gathering any video evidence. Doctor wouldn’t allow anyone to have such solid evidence against him.
But when the call to the phone on the second floor connected, Doctor knew that the cook had been defeated, failing to live up to his expectations.
Si Chen raised his eyebrows. “Scared?”
Doctor sneered, “You don’t even have a clue what you’ve gotten yourself into. Leave the rehabilitation center now and I can pretend that nothing happened.”
Si Chen narrowed his eyes. “It may be nighttime but dreaming like this is inappropriate.”
Doctor forcefully hung up the phone.
There were no lights on the second floor. Fortunately, there was moonlight coming in through the bars. Ordinary people would probably be night blind but Si Chen and Yu Lian were both Evolutionaries, so they were still able to see.
Si Chen held the butcher’s knife in his hand while Yu Lian held the kitchen knife.
The evil aura emanating from the knives dissipated some of the fear caused by the oppressive environment.
The second floor was where the patients were usually housed. At first glance, the long corridor seemed to have no end.
The doorknob to the wards had been deformed by the fire.
The entire corridor was silent save for the two’s quiet footsteps.
Si Chen wanted to take the elevator to the third floor but unfortunately the button of the elevator was broken and the “3F” button could not be pressed at all.
“Let’s find the stairs.”
Si Chen turned on the lamp that he had taken from the grandmother’s food cart and walked down the corridor. All the doors lining either sides of the corridor were closed.
When he came to the end of the corridor, the power of the lamp in his hand was almost exhausted and the light it emitted became dimmer and dimmer.
Yu Lian frowned. He touched the wall in front of him. “There’s no way ahead.”
Along the way, except for the closed doors, they saw nothing else; no other passageways.
Si Chen thought for a moment and approached the door closest to him.
On the door panel, the room number was written: 2001.
He leaned his head close to the door panel without touching it and listened carefully. It was quiet inside.
Goosebumps popped up on Yu Lian’s arms. “Ge, you really shouldn’t be doing that. According to the horror movie routine, there’d be a ghost sticking to the other side of the door and listening to you as well. If it’s a time travel – space dislocation – horror cruise ship, that person on the other side might be another you.”
Si Chen thought it was nothing at first but after hearing that from Yu Lian, he felt a chill go down his back.
He was slightly annoyed, “Tell me, were you hired by Doctor to provide the ambiance?”
Yu Lian knew that he’d said something wrong so he obediently kept his mouth shut.
Si Chen activated the scanning mode of his prosthetic eye.
By the time this instance is over, not only the light in his hand but also his prosthetic eye would be out of power.
In energy saving mode, this prosthetic eye could last for two months; but once other functions are activated, the stored energy simply wouldn’t be enough.
The prosthetic eye is too small and there were a lot of parts that needed to be installed, leaving little space for the battery.
However, as soon as the energy scanning mode was turned on, Si Chen’s heart skipped a beat.
There were energy fluctuations across the entire second floor, more than one.
Almost every few meters, there would be a cloud of energy, like a locked room, quietly waiting to be opened.
The sources of these scanned energy readings were lying quietly on the beds. They had vaguely human outlines.
Si Chen originally wanted to turn around and leave but felt something was wrong.
The poses of these “ghosts” were too consistent.
Looking at the outlines, there are clearly males and females… It didn’t make sense for so many psionic High-Dimensional Creatures to all have the same characteristics.
He switched over to user search mode.
This mode could scan Machine Core product users in the nearby area.
Before, Si Chen had used this function to find Yu Lian who was hiding on the residential building’s 22nd floor.
On the second floor, numerous blue dots instantly lit up.
Si Chen was momentarily taken aback. He put his hand on the doorknob, turned it and opened the door to the ward.
There were six beds in this ward.
There were three beds are on opposite sides of the room. The quilt of one of the hospital beds was raised, clearly someone was there.
Si Chen, not holding much hope, reached for a light switch by the door.
Sure enough, at the critical moment, the lights wouldn’t turn on.
He held the lamp up and approached the occupied bed.
Yu Lian followed behind him, carefully closing the door of the ward.
The dim light illuminated the scene in the ward.
It was a bald man. He had his eyes closed. He was tied to the bed with bandages and an IV was inserted into his forehead. Bright red blood mixed with pink and white bits slowly flowed through the infusion tube.
In the hospital, when young children need infusions but the blood vessels in the arms are too thin; nurses will choose this method of insertion.
The other end of the transparent infusion tube was not connected to a hanging bag but to a transparent glass box.
Inside the box was an unformed doll.
This doll had no color. It appeared like a hand-made gray model that the creator hadn’t yet had time to color. Though the contours of the face and its features have emerged.
The man lying on the bed looked familiar. His left arm from the elbow down was the cylindrical barrel of a gun,
The patient’s face was covered with a white cloth.
Si Chen carefully lifted the white cloth to reveal the patient’s face.
Yu Lian saw the patient’s facial features clearly under the dim light. He almost couldn’t hold back the exclamation that jumped to his throat.
The person lying on the bed was his teammate who had entered the Space Fold with him.
“It’s my teammate! The one that said he got a call from his mother when the Space Fold started and then ran away!”
His teammate’s vital signs were very weak; his chest didn’t even rise and fall.
He was wearing a hospital gown and was lying so still that he appeared dead.
The doll in the box has no energy fluctuations yet but Si Chen could already feel an ominous aura.
He whispered, “Take off this infusion needle first.”
This infusion tube was siphoning the patient into the glass box.
However, before the two of them had time to act, the sound of high heels clacking against the floor suddenly came from outside.
The sound was coming closer and was suddenly running, extremely hurried.
In Si Chen’s pocket, Xiao Zhou’s expression changed instantly. “Quick, hide, hide well! It’s, the nurse!”
Oh man, every episode is a little more anxiety and fear. Even Si Chen is chilling. I wonder what kind of appearance the Nurse has, could it be a doll?
Thanks for the chapter 🌹
One nurse ghost coming up… Thanks for the update ❤️🤣❤️💉👀👀👀
Maybe nurse looks same like from beginning
Thank your for your translation 💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛💛
It’s supposed to be an easy instance but all of these guys got caught 😭