Chapter One: The Madman-Delegado, eu realmente matei alguém, por que vocês não acreditam em mim!(Dinastia Shang)

The weather was somewhat cold and gloomy.

The air was tinged with the earthy scent that follows rain.

The first autumn rain seemed to have carried away the restless heat.

Inside a small psychological clinic, Lu Yuan absently caressed the teacup in his hand, gazing out the window in a daze. Wisps of white steam curled up from the cup, and the friction of his fingers produced a faint, creaking sound.

“Business is tough these days,” he sighed.

He set down the cup and flipped through the clinic’s patient records. The last visitor had come exactly three months ago.

“If there are no more patients, this place might as well close,” he muttered, taking a sip of his tea.

Ugh.

Terrible.

He shook his head helplessly. He much preferred coffee, but buying coffee required money. Tea leaves, on the other hand, were free—after all, the old security guard at the door was long past the age for coffee; from him, you could only cadge tea, never coffee.

“This doesn’t make sense!”

“With all the pressure people are under these days, who doesn’t have some kind of mental issue?”

“All those people always complaining about depression—where have they gone?”

“Is it that everyone can afford high-end psychologists and snubs a small clinic like mine? They say the economy’s bad, but it seems I’m the only one struggling.”

It was five o’clock in the afternoon.

As expected, today was yet another empty day.

Lu Yuan tidied up his desk, ready to close shop early. The clinic was not only his workplace, but also where he slept at night.

Knock...

A sudden rapping on the door interrupted him.

His hands paused mid-motion. He glanced at the door. “A patient?”

“Coming!” He strode over in a few quick steps and opened the door.

No rain was falling outside, but the person standing at the entrance was drenched through and through, bundled up in a heavy down jacket meant for winter. Sensing Lu Yuan’s gaze, the visitor spoke in a timid, trembling voice: “Excuse me, is this Lu’s Psychological Clinic?”

Lu Yuan was surprised, but asked nothing more, only mustering a professional smile. “Yes, that’s right. Please, come in.”

The visitor shrank back, tucking his entire face into the collar of his down jacket. “I… I’m here to see a doctor.”

“Take off your coat,” Lu Yuan suggested gently. “It may be autumn, but it’s warm enough inside—no need to keep it on.”

The visitor hesitated a few seconds before removing his hat and mask, though he still refused to shed the down jacket. Only then did Lu Yuan finally see his face.

This was a man in his forties or fifties, his bloodshot eyes brimming with fear and panic. His hair, streaked with gray, was hopelessly tangled and emitted a faint odor. His lips were trembling ceaselessly.

Lu Yuan poured him a cup of hot tea and handed it over. “Have you encountered some kind of problem?”

His voice was gentle and soft.

The man drank the tea, and some of the panic faded from his eyes. He seemed desperate for someone to confide in; upon hearing Lu Yuan’s question, his emotions surged. “I… I… I’ve run into something supernatural.”

Hmm.

Diagnosis complete.

Definitely a mental issue.

Lu Yuan showed no hint of surprise. “Can you tell me exactly what happened?”

“A week ago, one night, I was at home resting. Around eight o’clock, someone rang my doorbell. I thought it was one of my patients and didn’t think much of it, so I went to open the door.” The man’s eyes grew distant as he recalled the memory, but sitting across from him, Lu Yuan felt something was off.

“Hold on,” Lu Yuan interjected. “Your patient? May I ask what your profession is?”

“…Oh, I’m a psychologist.”

Lu Yuan: ?

A colleague?

A psychologist coming to a psychological clinic as a patient…

Lu Yuan’s expression turned odd, but he gestured for the man to continue.

“After I opened the door, I saw a woman standing there, soaked to the bone. I know all my patients well, and I was certain I’d never treated this woman before.”

“She was wrapped in a thick coat, wearing sunglasses and a mask. At first, I thought she’d come to the wrong place, but then she called me by name.”

“She looked so pitiful that I let her in.”

The man finished his tea and smacked his lips as if still thirsty, but Lu Yuan made no move to pour him more. So the man helped himself, refilling his cup from the teapot on the table.

“Once she sat down, she told me, terrified, that she’d encountered something unclean.”

“There’s something living inside her, she said. At night, it starts fighting her for control of her body. At first, nothing happened, but recently, there’s been trouble. Several times, she woke up in strange places, her hands covered in blood.”

As he spoke, the man began to tremble, as if recalling some horrific scene.

The smile on Lu Yuan’s face faltered.

Soaked through.

Heavy coat.

Sunglasses.

Mask.

…

Wasn’t that exactly how this man looked right now?

Lu Yuan stood up and walked to the cabinet behind him. “Do you smoke?”

“Occasionally,” the man replied, a flash of longing in his eyes.

With his back to the man, Lu Yuan took out a pack of cigarettes from the cabinet, slipping a small stun gun into his pocket as well. “I don’t smoke myself. These are for patients. See if you like them.”

The man’s hands trembled as he tore open the seal, lit a cigarette, and took a deep drag.

Lu Yuan sat back down across from him, studying him closely: pale and haggard, distinct marks on the bridge of his nose and temples, as if he’d worn glasses for a long time. His clothes were stained with dust and mud, yet the quality was unmistakably expensive.

A fellow psychologist.

But clearly, this man was far wealthier.

Lu Yuan didn’t rush him.

After a long silence, the man coughed a few times. As he lit another cigarette, he picked up the story where he’d left off. “My first thought was that this woman had dissociative identity disorder. She wasn’t my patient, but as a doctor, I still gave her a simple psychological assessment.”

The wealthy always spoke with such confidence.

If it were Lu Yuan, he’d have insisted on a deposit before starting any treatment.

“I put her under deep hypnosis, hoping to help her sleep and planned to observe her overnight to see if she’d sleepwalk.”

“At first, nothing was unusual. But at ten o’clock, as I was getting ready for bed, the woman suddenly woke up and stared at me, unblinking.”

The man paused.

His bloodshot eyes flickered with a strange red light.

Seeing this, Lu Yuan frowned slightly.

The white smoke from the cigarette mingled with the steam from the tea, obscuring much of the man’s face and expression. A chill crept into Lu Yuan’s heart. The man was staring at him with the same intensity he’d just described, like he was reenacting the woman’s actions.

“She pulled a knife from her coat and lunged at me.”

“She was unbelievably strong—I couldn’t control her at all!”

“We struggled. The knife slashed my neck, and blood spurted everywhere. I couldn’t speak; when I tried, my mouth filled with blood. All I could do was clutch my wounded throat and try to escape.”

“But she came at me again, stabbing me over and over.”

…

The man’s voice suddenly grew eerily calm.

Now it was Lu Yuan’s turn to panic.

“You must be joking, sir. If that really happened, you’d be dead,” Lu Yuan said with a forced laugh.

Suddenly, the man grinned wickedly, pulled a blood-stained knife from his coat, and twisted his neck. Around his throat, just above the collar, was a line of fine stitches, as if his head had been sewn onto his neck.

“That’s right! I should be dead! So why am I still alive?”

…