Eldritch Horror Theatre

”Excuse the intrusion.”

It was a flawless infiltration, yet the result was far from ideal.

Clearly, the Old Man standing there had spotted the uninvited guest right away.

The gleaming sickle in his hand was proof enough.

Even faced with a scene like this, Fu Qian didn’t miss a beat, offering a smiling greeting while sizing the man up.

Sure enough, it was the old doctor from his very first day on the job—the one who had kindly asked how his body felt before opening the IV line to send him straight to the afterlife.

Time had marched on, yet not a thing had changed on the man’s face.

Even when he looked stern, those drooping eyelids gave him a somewhat sleazy air.

As for the weapon in his hand, it left an even deeper impression.

A blade absurdly long for its grip, an edge that sent a chill down the spine at a glance, and the casual way he held it as if about to cut grass—all of it carried a heavy sense of menace.In short, weapon in hand, the man was plainly none too welcoming toward intruders.

He didn’t even respond to Fu Qian’s greeting, offering only a gaze so indifferent it seemed stripped of humanity—why was that?

It was one thing for children to end up meeting without recognizing each other, but surely a man of his advanced years couldn’t have such a terrible memory?

Fu Qian naturally took no offense. Politeness was his own choice, and demanding the same in return would be far too harsh—wait a second, was it because he currently looked completely unrecognizable?

Even as he sighed over it, Fu Qian didn’t forget to reflect on himself, and he quickly realized where the problem lay.

Because he had come over from Shangjing this time, he had been wearing the Bookstore Owner’s face the whole way.

Out of sheer habit, he had kept it on ever since, even changing his accent to match.

Under the circumstances, it was only fair that the man didn’t recognize him.

”Sorry, I came in a bit of a hurry and forgot to wash my face.”

Ready to correct a mistake the moment he saw it, Fu Qian didn’t wait for the old doctor to ask. He took the initiative to explain where he had come from and wiped a hand across his face.

Putting on a new face was as simple as that.

It was nothing more than a cat-like swipe of a paw, yet the effect was astonishing.

Not only did it restore the face he had worn on his first day of work, it even smoothed his vocal cords back to normal.

”So it’s you—”

This time, the reaction didn’t disappoint. The old doctor let out an ”oh,” a flicker of emotion crossing his face.

Clearly, he hadn’t forgotten his old acquaintance either.

”What a surprise. You’re a rare repeat customer.”

Rather than wondering how Fu Qian had gotten here, he started by sighing over how hard it was to keep the business running.

”It’s actually a surprise for me too. I came here with someone else—though from the sound of it, not many people come to you for treatment?”

At the mention of business, Fu Qian instantly perked right up.

On one hand, he sincerely made it clear he wasn’t here for a follow-up visit; on the other, he casually rubbed salt in the wound.

”Very few indeed, so please come in.”

The old doctor’s reaction was flat, yet his logic was overbearing.

Drawing back the weapon in his hand, he stepped back two paces to make way, acting as if he were going to force Fu Qian to patronize his business.

”Then I won’t stand on ceremony.”

Fu Qian didn’t hold back either. He even recalled which hand he had used for the IV drip last time and went so far as to take off Annalise’s Lies.

It really was deserted.

Stepping into the still-rickety wooden cabin, Fu Qian felt memories of the past rush back all at once.

The low cabinet, the sickbeds, the IV stand, and the clutter taking up most of the space—it was almost the exact same scene as his last visit.

In fact—could that IV tube be the very same one he had used last time?

Glancing around the room, Fu Qian’s gaze quickly settled on one of the sickbeds.

Hanging beside it was a long IV tube, with a wine-red liquid visibly flowing through it.

To say nothing of the bottle above it, which looked as though it were smeared with human grease.

Everything carried such a strong sense of deja vu that Fu Qian could almost feel the sharp pain of the needle being yanked from the back of his hand.

Every single thing seemed untouched since he had finished that mission and left.

That was understandable enough, of course. After all, there couldn’t be that many people ”traveling to a foreign land” in search of medical treatment.

On first listen, one understands not the tune’s true meaning—looking back now, had that phrasing in the mission briefing been a hint all along?

Throughout his career, he had lost count of how many times he had been called an outsider.

So the Warehouse had already set the tone right from the very beginning?

He could only say its emotional stability was impressive. Even after getting tricked like that, it had still dutifully swallowed its tears and walked through the whole procedure without cutting a single corner on the mission content.

Come to think of it, there still seemed to be no clear explanation for why all the administrators he met appeared to be outsiders—

”Has your body still been hurting lately?”

While Fu Qian was lost in thought, the old doctor had clearly noticed his gaze.

Offering words of concern, he reached back to make sure the door was shut tight.

All in all, he looked like a man who had finally gotten a customer through the door and was afraid they might run off.

”This was prepared for you back then, yet you flatly refused to use it.”

Not even waiting for Fu Qian to answer, the old doctor walked over to the sickbed first and picked up a long needle, his voice full of regret.

’He actually has the nerve to say that? So he really just left it sitting here all this time?’

’Now I’m really curious—if I weren’t a repeat customer, was he planning to jab that needle straight into someone else?’

As his gaze fell on the equipment—which looked fit for giving an IV to cattle—Fu Qian confirmed his guess in a flash and silently scoffed.

Poor business was one thing, but cutting costs to this extent was downright immoral.

In fact, that would even explain the grime on the outside of the thing—who was to say that needle hadn’t been jabbed into other patients’ hands before his own?

For all he knew, this ancestral set of equipment was the only one the Clinic had, and whoever walked through the door got hooked up to it.

Still, Fu Qian wasn’t one to nitpick and lightly dismiss the heritage of this old Clinic.

The main issue was that he had tried this thing more than once back then, and the moment a single drop of the liquid in the tube entered his bloodstream, the mission failed on the spot.

Judging from his later experience, the Warehouse never set those predetermined death conditions in missions at random.

Which made the reason behind such a ruling rather intriguing to ponder.

”Actually, I kept forgetting to ask—what kind of medicine did you use on me back then? The allergic reaction was pretty severe.”

Fortunately, he didn’t need to spend much effort pondering it when the person in charge of the treatment plan was standing right in front of him.

Giving a slight nod as if genuinely weighing the need for another IV drip, Fu Qian began confirming the medical risks with him.

”How could that be! Unlike the others, I went out and looked for this medicine specifically.”

Unsurprisingly, the old doctor looked quite astonished, flatly refusing to admit there was anything wrong with his treatment plan.

”So the other medicines were just picked up at random?”

Fu Qian frowned at those words, not letting him off the hook so easily.

”No, everything else.”

Astonishingly, an even more outrageous answer was waiting.

The old doctor pointed around the room, especially at the IV tube in his hand, his tone certain.

”I picked them all up by the sea.”