Chapter 205: I Am Not Sick

Yin Huaiyu stayed in the hospital for two weeks, receiving the best medical treatment; his state of mental confusion improved significantly, his whole person gradually relaxed, and he no longer experienced such large emotional fluctuations.

But he still refused to say who had kidnapped him.

He was under constant surveillance by Yin Shuyi's people, and after regaining consciousness, he was required to cooperate with the hospital for examinations, primarily blood draws and routine physical check-ups, thyroid function tests, MRI scans, and finally, he went to the psychology room to undergo a psychological assessment with a doctor.

Inside the warm and quiet consultation room.

The psychologist smiled and broke the silence: "Young Master Yin."

"In the test results, the EEG shows an increase in your slow-wave activity, and your thyroid function is abnormal, which may trigger feelings of depression..."

"I am not sick!" Yin Huaiyu said decisively.

After two weeks of recuperation, his complexion was much ruddier, and those eyes were still as beautiful as before, though invisibly lacking two parts of their former flamboyance: "Doctor, I feel perfectly fine, I am completely capable of controlling my own emotions, I am not sick, and I do not need to undergo any treatment!"

"Can I leave now?"

The psychologist said: "It is clear that you, Young Master Yin, have a high sense of self-efficacy, but the expression 'completely control' is too absolute; emotions occurring in the human body are often very difficult to be absolute."

"Sit down."

He smiled apologetically: "The Head of the Family has given a strict order; please fill out this self-rating symptom scale."

Yin Huaiyu sat down, and the psychologist successfully obtained a rough understanding of what happened from his mouth, although it was very likely adulterated.

The psychologist discovered that when he described it, his emotions were very complex, not merely simple fear or terror.

The doctor took the self-rating symptom scale he had filled out into his hands; this form contained 90 items, covering various aspects such as sensations, emotions, consciousness, behavior, living habits, and interpersonal relationships, and could assess the patient's psychological health status from multiple dimensions.

He focused on questions related to emotional dependency, traumatic stress reactions, and other such dimensions.

Then he discovered that Yin Huaiyu's scores in the areas of emotional identification with and dependency on the perpetrator were abnormally high.

The psychologist asked him: "During the period of your imprisonment, did you have any complex psychological feelings toward the perpetrator, for example, sometimes thinking that he had a side that was good to you?"

Yin Huaiyu felt his question was strange: "He was very good to me."

Ling Wu would care for him, apply medicine for him, feed him water, cook for him...

"I like him."

"..." The psychologist pushed up his glasses, looked away somewhat subtly, and swallowed: "Is there anything else?"

In the subsequent conversation, he clearly felt that Yin Huaiyu's cognition had deviated; he unconsciously made excuses for the perpetrator's behavior, believed that it was his own poor performance that led to those tortures, and had developed a sense of adaptation to the environment created by the perpetrator.

The psychologist: "Under what circumstances would symptoms like anxiety and fear improve during that time?"

Yin Huaiyu did not really want to say.

But after being stared at by the doctor's eyes for a long time, he said: "When he talked to me and fed me water, I felt very happy."

The tendencies reflected by the psychological scale, the special emotions and cognitive biases toward the perpetrator presented in the clinical interview, combined with the severe traumatic experience Yin Huaiyu suffered—these factors mutually corroborated one another.

The psychologist said: "Young Master Yin, your condition is called Hostage Syndrome from a psychological perspective, also known as Stockholm Syndrome."

"This is just the first step of the diagnosis; follow-up will require a customized targeted treatment plan..."

Yin Huaiyu was nailed to his chair by his words.

As if forcibly dragged out of a nightmare, he was instantly drenched in cold sweat; a chill rose from the ground, burrowed into his pant legs, and spread to his entire body, making his lips and teeth feel cold.

That sentence kept echoing in his mind like a curse, with Ling Wu standing in the basement looking at him coldly—"I have the ability to satisfy all four of the above points on you."

Now he was being told that that period of time was all fake.

Was it something he had embellished with a filter?

Yin Huaiyu abruptly interrupted him: "I don't have it!"

He stood up from the chair, slammed his hand on the tabletop, his just-relaxed nerves immediately becoming tense, a solid high wall built in the depths of his heart, and he roared hoarsely: "No! I fucking cannot have Stockholm Syndrome!"

"I have always liked him!"

"Get out! I am not sick!" Yin Huaiyu swept the pen and paper off the table: "Quack doctor!"