Soul Patch

Chapter 263 Going through the back door

Wenjie went through a lot of trouble to obtain the blood sample.

He specifically chose Sunshine Health Checkup Center, which has a cooperative relationship with Huahai International, and booked a VIP health checkup package for his family of three, along with their nanny An Ran.

An Ran's impression of physical examinations was still that they involved queuing up for blood tests, wasting money and causing a lot of trouble.

Every year, the housekeeping company requires them to renew their health certificates, and it is only at this time that An Ran will take a day off and arrive early at the physical examination area of ​​a top-tier hospital to queue up.

When Wenjie mentioned that he had booked a physical examination for his parents and suggested that she get one too, she hesitated for a moment. Then, remembering that her health certificate was expiring this year and she'd have to get a checkup sooner or later anyway, she decided to go with them.

So she nodded blankly.

Unexpectedly, the Sunshine Health Checkup Center was so impressive, with a brightly lit examination area.

The receptionists, all dressed in matching dark blue suits, greeted An Ran politely and warmly. If An Ran hadn't been holding a patient guidebook, she would have mistaken the beautiful women in front of her for flight attendants from some airline.

Several people carrying patient guidance manuals darted past her, all heading towards the blood collection room.

This puzzled her a bit. "Don't we... need to queue up?"
The triage nurse, with a professional smile on her face, led them through the women's examination area.

Uncle Wen and Aunt Wen followed the triage nurse calmly, which made An Ran even more suspicious.

Wenjie glanced at An Ran and saw her looking around nervously. His gaze lingered on her for a moment.

Soon, the nurse arrived at a half-open door, stepped back half a step, and pushed the door open, gesturing for the patient to enter.

An Ran glanced at the solid wood door and saw a metal sign hanging on it: VIP waiting area.

She murmured the words on the sign, and Wenjie and the other two had already entered the room.

An Ran hurriedly followed her inside. "Wow!" she thought to herself, "Wow, there's a place like this in the hospital."

Poverty truly limited her imagination.

This is a room with extremely exquisite soft furnishings. Several sets of fabric sofas, tatami coffee tables and matching small bookshelves are seemingly casually placed, and green plants are scattered throughout.

There is a door at regular intervals along the walls of this room. Between the doors, there is either a full-length mirror or an oil painting.

This is……

An Ran looked over there, about to ask a question, when one of the doors opened and a nurse walked out, saying into the walkie-talkie, "You can draw blood now!"

The triage nurse settled them down next to the sofa, took away their triage booklets, and handed them in.

Oh, An Ran understands now, they really don't need to queue.

This VIP waiting area connects to each department, and the guiding nurses will coordinate the order of their examinations based on the availability of patients in each examination room.

Once a department is available, simply hand in the examination guide, and they can proceed with the examination.

If there are many people queuing for physical examinations outside and all the departments are full, they can sit on the sofa, flip through magazines, and watch TV.

Seeing An Ran's expression shift from initial confusion to sudden understanding, and finally a hint of resentment, Wenjie sat down next to her: "What's wrong? Did the blood draw hurt?"

An Ran pouted, "Last time during my physical exam, I had to hold my urine while waiting for the ultrasound, and I waited for ages. There was clearly no one in the examination room, but they wouldn't let me in for the exam! Now I understand, they're giving others special treatment through back channels."

Wenjie paused for a moment after hearing this, then burst into laughter.

To be honest, the phrase "going through the back door" is quite apt here.

His gaze shifted slightly from An Ran's angry little face and settled on her arm, which was pressing against the medical cotton swab.

This medical examination institution has been cooperating with Huahai International for many years, and their employees have their annual medical examinations done here. It can be said that Huahai International is a regular major client of theirs.

He obtained Dr. Han's business card, who was in charge of liaising with Huahai, from Manager Zheng in the administration department. He also contacted Dr. Han beforehand to have a copy of the blood sample kept for him.

Dr. Han was very understanding; he simply asked how many people were undergoing the physical examination and how many blood samples needed to be retained.
When he heard that in addition to the Wen family of three, there was also a young woman, he curled his lips into a wicked smile: "I understand, I understand, we can do that test here too..."

Dr. Han leaned closer to the phone receiver and lowered his voice, saying, "And it's confidential!"

Wenjie sensed something was off about the tone of the conversation and explained, "Don't misunderstand, that's my housekeeper..."

"Ha ha……"

Originally, Wenjie didn't think there was anything wrong with what he said, but when he heard the other person's greasy laughter on the phone, he seemed to smell the scent of a clichéd soap opera.

"..."

He had nothing going on with the nanny, and it wasn't the kind of examination Dr. Han was thinking of... But how do you explain this?

The more you explain, the more confusing it becomes; the more you try to explain, the worse it gets.

Fortunately, he didn't say anything more, but simply scheduled a time for the medical examination.

At this moment, watching the simple and honest An Ran huffing and puffing about getting in through connections, he thought that An Ran was quite naive.

Unlike the kind of person who would poison someone.

……

After leaving the medical examination center, Wenjie asked the driver, Xiao Wang, to take his parents and An Ran home first.

My parents went for their medical check-up on an empty stomach in the morning, and the nurse brought them a light meal only after the fasting tests were finished.

The simple meals at the health check center weren't to my parents' liking. They only ate eggs and drank some milk, giving the rest of the food to Anran.

After arriving home, my parents, who had been busy all morning, were quite tired and went straight to their bedroom to rest.

Wenjie ran to the storage room and rummaged through it, finally finding two keys in a black box.

It was the key to the house in the south of the city, and the key to the old house in the countryside.

That's wonderful! My mother is indeed good at organizing and storing things; she has kept all the important items in the house very well.

He put the keys in his pocket and got into the Land Rover parked at the door.

Taking advantage of the moment the car started moving, Xiao Wang turned around and smiled, "Wen... Brother Wen, didn't you get any sleep? Shall we go straight to Huahai?"

"No, go to Jinxiuyuan Residential Area. It's the one at the southeast corner of the intersection of Jiangxin Road and Huainan Street."

When Wenjie recited the address, he did so fluently.

He had lived there for several years and was very familiar with that address and everything around it.

"Okay!" Xiao Wang replied and slowly drove the car out of Hanlin Villa.

The Land Rover drove south along Binhe Road, and Wenjie leaned against the car window, closing his eyes.

Xiao Wang assumed he was taking a nap and quietly turned off the car music.

Wenjie was wide awake.

He activated the system and stared blankly at the constantly jumping progress bar.

Without any network connection or system tasks, the system interface resembles an old-fashioned computer, with lines of white text scrolling across a black screen:

Welcome to the Soul Patch System

No online tasks are currently available.

[Do you want to go to my profile page?]

【Yes】

[Personal Homepage Items: 3] [Basic Abilities: Thinking: 3, IQ: 4, EQ: 3, Skills: 3]

Two of the props were his own, and the other was given to him by Old Luo, or more precisely, to Andy.

He didn't have time to look at it while performing the online task.

He then went into his inventory and looked at the item that Old Luo had left for Andy: +1 Health.

He stared at the line that said his health had increased by one, and remained silent for a moment.

No one knows better than him how valuable those things are in the system tasks.

He now has only two items left: an escape tool and a mission exemption.

The basic skills remain unchanged; the reward skills are still increased by 30% when you achieve a perfect score on the system test.

In other words, during the last online mission, he used up one identity exchange but received nothing.

The system is so stingy!
He looked at his personal profile screen again and again.

No ports or hidden functions were found.

How do you enable that safe mode?
In safe mode, the system slowly unveiled a corner of its mystery, but before he could even study it, the system returned to normal.

"Young Master Wen, Brother Wen... Brother Wen..." Xiao Wang was still not used to calling him brother.

Wenjie opened his eyes and looked around. The car had already stopped in front of Building 16 of Jinxiuyuan Community.

It turned out that Xiao Wang knew their previous address, and he was slightly surprised: "You've been here before?"

"Yes, I've come here twice before with President Wen."

Xiao Wang got out of the car and ran over to open the car door for Wenjie.

Wenjie opened the car door first, met Xiao Wang's smiling eyes, and asked, "When?"

Xiao Wang's eyes darted around, and he hesitated before saying, "Uh... let me think, it should be last month, yes, I came here once last month."

I think I came here two or three months ago, yes, yes, it's been two or three months.

What is Father here for?
Wenjie strode out of the car and asked, seemingly casually, "Did he say what he came for?"

"Oh, no..." Xiao Wang scratched his head and guessed, "Maybe he's looking for something, just like Brother Wen did this time."

Looking for something?
Wenjie gave Xiao Wang a strange look.

That look made Xiao Wang pause slightly, muttering to himself, "Am I wrong? People usually come to old houses looking for things... Oh, or maybe they're looking for memories..."

remember?

Wenjie pondered Xiao Wang's words, thought for a moment, and then instructed, "Wait for me in the car."

He then turned around and went upstairs alone.

The stairwells, corridors, elevators... everything in Jinxiuyuan Community is still the same as he remembers, except that after so many years, the walls have become more mottled, and the corridors piled with clutter seem more cramped.

The elevator was plastered with small advertisements: moving companies, housekeeping, hourly workers, air conditioner relocation, plumbing...

Following his memory, Wenjie arrived at room 1601 and inserted the key into the keyhole.

With a slight twist of his wrist, the key turned twice in the lock, and he continued to twist it half a turn in the same direction. The door creaked open.

The key was pulled out, and with a click, the lock turned half a turn, and the sliding door popped out.

Wenjie entered the room, closed the door behind him, and locked it with a sliding doorknob.

The door can be opened by turning the handle from the inside, but it cannot be opened from the outside.

As soon as he opened the door, a damp smell hit him. Dust floated in the air, rushing straight into his nose... He instinctively raised his hand to shield his nose.

He took two slow steps, then stopped and looked around.

It wasn't as old as he had imagined, and the dust on the ground wasn't excessively accumulated.

It was obvious that her father cleaned the room every time he came; there was only a layer of dust on it.

He stepped inside. It was a spacious two-bedroom apartment of 120 square meters, with a bright and airy layout, and good ventilation from north to south. Although it wasn't as spacious as the villa he currently lived in, it still had a regular layout, excellent natural light, and was quite comfortable to live in.

He walked through the living room and turned right, where his bedroom was.

The master bedroom across the street was previously occupied by my parents. It faces due south and has a large balcony attached to it.

On sunny mornings, sunlight streams in from the master bedroom, casting long shadows that extend to the bedroom doorway.

As soon as he opened the door, he saw his father or mother standing against the light in the porch, calling out to him, "Wenjie, have you finished your homework? Are you trying to sneak out and be lazy?"

Whenever this happens, he would slink away and close the door, continuing to tinker with his gadgets in the room.

Back then, I was obsessed with science fiction novels. My mother wouldn't let me touch my phone, so I would find physical books and download audiobooks to listen to.

As he pondered this, he stood at the door of his bedroom and looked towards the master bedroom.

It was afternoon, the best time for natural light had passed, and the brightest sunlight had moved out of the room, making the master bedroom appear somewhat dim.

When they were being whipped by their parents, they were only focused on rebelling...

Looking back, the best time for learning was gone forever due to those youthful rebellions!
He withdrew his gaze listlessly and strolled into his bedroom.

The clothes, belongings, and valuables in the room were all moved out, leaving only a few pieces of furniture.

After purchasing the villa, the decoration and renovation were tailor-made, with integrated furniture and appliance design, and the entire kitchen and bathroom were completed in one go.

The furniture here wouldn't fit over there, so we just left it in the old house.

Wenjie walked to his desk, pulled out his computer chair, and sat down.

Xiao Wang is right; sometimes, coming to an old house is about reminiscing.

As he looked at this familiar room and its familiar furnishings, his mind was filled with memories of when he lived here...

Reaching out to touch the desk, my gaze swept across it. The desk was covered with stickers of movie stills from films like Avatar, District B13, and The Myth, and there was also an Avatar-themed mousepad on it.

He glanced at the few stills from the drama "The Myth" for a moment, and one of them, a shot of Kim Hee-sun looking back and smiling, made his teeth ache.

Junior high school is a time when girls are just beginning to experience romantic feelings and are feeling confused about their adolescence. Why would someone put up a picture of Hee-sun from a drama on their desk?
Do you think she's pretty?
Or do you simply like the movie "The Myth"?

Or perhaps you like the theme song of that movie, "Beautiful Myth"?
Wenjie rubbed his chin, lost in thought.

After a while, he casually opened the drawer on the right side of the desk and looked inside.

Besides the odds and ends, there was also a rather thick-looking notebook.

His eyes lit up; it was his notebook from back then.

Could it be the one we're looking for?
He quickly picked up the notebook and started flipping through it.

His attention was completely absorbed by the notebook, and he didn't notice that the door had been quietly pried open.

A dark figure reached out and unlocked the door, tiptoed in, and widened the crack in the door. The slender figure outside also slipped in.

(End of this chapter)