Chapter 53: Li Si

"Kraft, Kraft, are you there?"

Li Si held a stack of medical records and knocked on the professor's room, which had been usurped by an intruder. His knuckles struck the thick solid cedar wood, producing a dull echo.

An unclear echo came from the other end of the corridor, as if another door were being visited simultaneously, an invisible visitor walking with him. The academy's architectural style was taken from churches, with buildings featuring long corridors and halls, interspersed with winding spiral passages and staircases, also inheriting the effect of vast echoes.

Saint Simon's Church kept its lamps and candles burning day and night, with sacred songs and sutras never ceasing to reach the ears, naturally echoing layer upon layer, extraordinarily holy. But moved to the academy, it seemed too large for its purpose; whenever dawn or night fell and people were scarce, the echo's near and far variations seemed like someone following, yet turning around revealed only emptiness, instead creating the opposite atmosphere.

Li Si disliked this atmosphere; it always reminded him of ghost stories floating in his subconscious, especially when leaving alone after midnight dissections, momentarily losing focus and taking a wrong turn, the echo behind him could make him drop all the tools in his hands.

Except for necessary lectures, most of his time was spent in the outside clinic; unless dissecting with Karlman, he was unwilling to linger in the academy. If Lu Xiusi hadn't failed to appear for two consecutive days, he wouldn't have come personally in the evening to find him.

There was no response from behind the door; he hesitated for a while. He knew Kraft was very busy; sometimes he might have fallen asleep at the desk. If that were truly the case, he had arrived at an inopportune time.

Just as Li Si was hesitating, the door suddenly opened from the inside. A brown-haired head poked out from behind the door; it was actually Lu Xiusi.

"Lecturer Li Si?" Lu Xiusi stepped aside, letting Li Si enter the room, then closed the door behind him. "Please come in; you've arrived just in time."

Li Si placed the medical records on the desk. The table was covered with manuscripts that hadn't been cleared, and the person who should have been sitting in the chair was not here. He turned to ask about Kraft's whereabouts, but saw Lu Xiusi bolt the door, his expression carrying a hint of nervousness, asking the question he wanted to ask.

"Have you seen Lecturer Kraft?"

"What?" Li Si was puzzled. If anyone in the academy should know the answer to this question, it was definitely Lu Xiusi himself, not him, a lecturer who had long been wandering outside.

He had come today to hand over medical records filled out in detail according to the new format; he hadn't expected to be interrupted the moment he entered, caught off guard by this incomprehensible question.

Combining the conversation from two days ago, he still vaguely guessed what might have happened. "You actually went to the Salt Tide District?"

"Yes, we confirmed that one well in the Salt Tide District was contaminated, but we are unsure of the cause."

"And then? Don't tell me Kraft went missing inside." The biggest possibility Li Si could think of was this, but if so, there was no need to close the door separately to tell him. Based on his long experience communicating with patients, this meant the key hadn't been found.

The manuscripts on the desk were still unorganized, a half-page left unfinished waiting to be continued, as if that person would push the door open any moment to continue working at the desk.

"No, of course not; Kraft came out together with us. We originally agreed to go again before noon today, but it's already evening..." Lu Xiusi unconsciously rubbed the leather of the bird-beak mask in his hand, pacing back and forth in the room.

Something was wrong; this description didn't match the signs of unease and nervousness at all. Li Si pulled a chair over and sat down, adopting the posture of a therapist; he was certain this boy had only told half the story, and the half he hid was not simple.

Kraft had always been a rigorous person and generally wouldn't stand someone up, but missing an appointment once and being so anxious, making the matter sound so simple—who was he trying to fool?

He pulled another chair over, letting Lu Xiusi sit, pressing his shoulders down, and took the bird-beak mask that was about to be rubbed to pieces. In his mind, he wondered what was going on; there was content to be hidden from others, even from himself.

"Lu Xiusi, have I done something wrong? Making you distrust me so much." Li Si stared into Lu Xiusi's eyes, locking gazes with him, as if forcing a patient hiding a history of promiscuity to speak the truth.

"Of course not." Lu Xiusi quickly denied it, averting his gaze; this guilty action couldn't escape Li Si's eyes.

"Alright, with you like this, I can't help you. If Kraft just missed an appointment for half a day, I suggest you wait until tomorrow. After all, who doesn't have an emergency?"

Forcing Lu Xiusi to speak out using his status as a lecturer was impossible; Li Si knew this very well. Apply some pressure, then express unwillingness to participate, and Lu Xiusi's inner unease and desire to express would make him actively seek someone to share the burden.

Li Si didn't stand up; leaning back in the chair, he watched Lu Xiusi's conflicted face. "If there's nothing else, I'll head back first. When you see Kraft, remember to remind him that I brought the rewritten medical records."

Lu Xiusi interlaced his fingers, twisting them almost into a knot, and squeezed a few words out of his mouth. "We made some strange discoveries."

"Hmm?"

"He couldn't have not come. We discovered it might be a problem with a well, causing the surrounding residents to wake up later and later." After opening up and pouring out his thoughts, Lu Xiusi looked a bit more relaxed; keeping this matter bottled up alone was truly uncomfortable.

"What exactly is the problem? The baker I encountered here wouldn't go to the Salt Tide District to draw water."

Li Si had a bad feeling; his case had become a small hole through which Kraft had glimpsed something extraordinary, and it looked like a big disaster.

"Kraft insisted there was a connection; he... his behavior was a bit strange." Lu Xiusi found a template in the words Kraft had used to describe Karlman, fitting it onto Kraft himself perfectly.

A connection? Li Si's heart sank. Both were increased sleep time and difficulty waking up; if there was a connection, he immediately recalled Lu Xiusi's earliest hypothesis, which was also the hypothesis Kraft and he had initially supported the least.

Lu Xiusi didn't know that his few words had already almost leaked the secret completely; he was still thinking about how to avoid mentioning the Black Liquid as much as possible.

He saw Li Si frown, and a direct, core-attacking question burst forth. "Is it Clarity? Why would it be Clarity?"

Lu Xiusi's face changed drastically; panic-stricken, he finally realized that once he spoke, he couldn't hide it from Li Si at all.

Seeing his reaction, Li Si knew he had guessed correctly. He looked at the large stack of medical record papers on the table, sucked in a cold breath, and thought of the many surgeries he had performed using Clarity; if all those cases were stacked up, it might be at least three times the amount here.

"I don't know; he just stayed by that well for a while, then suddenly insisted it was Clarity, and also..." Lu Xiusi hesitated, wanting to speak but stopping. He actually agreed with Kraft that the professor's words and deeds were bizarre, but now thinking about it, Kraft's behavior was also very abnormal.

"And what else?" Li Si couldn't sit still; disregarding maintaining his image as an outsider, he leaned forward, pressing toward Lu Xiusi.

"You know Kraft has a sword, right? He suddenly swung backward with a sword, as if fighting something, but there was nothing there except a wooden board."

"Hysteria?"

"Probably? He was very clear-headed at the time, and his logic was also very clear." Recalling it, Lu Xiusi vaguely sensed a certain coincidence: rational, clear-headed, yet behaving strangely.

Ambiguous words turned the logic of the whole matter into a pool of muddy water, as if Kraft had gone mad by the well in the Salt Tide District, thinking someone would pour Clarity potion into the well.

"Lu Xiusi, do you know what you are saying? You are implying to me that Kraft is mentally unstable, and that the Clarity potion, which we strictly control, ended up in a well in the Salt Tide District?"

The large stack of medical records was still piled on the table; turning around, such an incident happened. Li Si felt like a clown performing a comedy for the audience. "Besides the three of us, who else could possibly touch Clarity?"

Lu Xiusi's gaze dodged again; he leaned back, increasing the distance, and denied it more firmly than before. "No."

Seeing him like this, Li Si wanted nothing more than to go up and punch him. As a doctor, he hated most when someone asked for help yet concealed the truth; in the years running his own clinic outside, he had honed the ability to read people's expressions.

Saying "no," yet not daring to look at him—that meant "yes," didn't it? Li Si gave up trying to dig out more confidence from Lu Xiusi and turned to analyze the relationships within it himself.

Ostensibly, only three people had contact with the Clarity potion: Kraft, Lu Xiusi, and himself. According to his deduction, it was absolutely impossible. Not only Lu Xiusi, but Kraft also had something to hide from him.

The initial explanation for the Clarity potion was that it was a family secret medicine; however, Kraft casually changed his tune, admitting there was more than one dose, yet didn't admit it was his own achievement. It seemed the earliest source didn't come from Kraft's hands.

So there exists a fourth person, or even more, whom both Kraft and Lu Xiusi know, likely well-acquainted.

This was interesting; Kraft was new here, his interpersonal relationships were not complex, and the overlap with Lu Xiusi's interpersonal relationships was even smaller.

Li Si felt he was approaching the truth; he loved this process of peeling back the layers like drawing silk from a cocoon, just like inferring the cause of illness through fragmented symptoms during a consultation.

First, rule out other lecturers; among the lecturers, the one closest to these two was only himself. Students in the academy were possible, but unlikely, because this person was someone Lu Xiusi still tried hard to exclude even under sudden circumstances, and quite decisively.

The only person Li Si knew who met all the conditions was Professor Karlman, who had already left.

The water here is very deep.

Li Si stood up, using a cough covering his mouth to hide his expression, but his gaze remained fixed on Lu Xiusi, ensuring he didn't notice Li Si had made a discovery.

"Do you know where Kraft lives?"

Lu Xiusi was not entirely wrong; Kraft's disappearance was abnormal.

Rather than continuing to waste time with Lu Xiusi here, it was better to go find Kraft and see what he had discovered. He believed Kraft would give him an answer; even if he couldn't find him, that would be an answer in itself.

"Uh, I remember a house provided by the tutor, but I went to look. The neighbors said no one has ever lived there." Lu Xiusi was dazed; this was his first time going outside the academy to find Kraft, and he had come up empty.

"Then let's go ask. I don't believe no one sees which direction Kraft comes from to enter the academy every day." Li Si pulled Lu Xiusi up. Outside the window, the setting sun was sinking. "Let's go; it's getting late."