Chapter 1016

Then, he realized he was like a discarded puppet, leaning against the cold wall, sitting on the hard floor.

Why am I here? Hiss——

A sharp pain surged from all his limbs and bones, rushing straight to his brain.

That feeling was very uncomfortable, as if every bone had been smashed and ground, every inch of muscle had been finely minced, and his internal organs had been beaten all over with a wooden mallet.

Adam suspected he had been drinking, which was why he forgot what he had done before, and why he was in so much pain all over.

Under the pain, his right hand clenched into a fist until his knuckles hurt from excessive force, and only then did he slowly loosen it.

Adam took a breath, feeling a bit lost in his heart. He didn't remember drinking, and there was no smell of alcohol on him.

But no matter the situation, just sitting on the floor like this definitely wouldn't work. Go home first to rest, take a warm bath……

Thinking this, Adam supported the ground with his left hand to stand up, but immediately felt something strange, and his heart skipped a beat—two fingers had lost sensation.

Perhaps the situation was worse, but Adam didn't want to think about it further.

For a violinist, losing sensation in two fingers meant he might not be able to perform on stage for a short time and needed treatment.

If he lost two fingers……

Adam already had the answer in his heart, but he didn't want to accept such reality. Before seeing it with his own eyes, he hoped it was just an illusion, a misjudgment of his body.

He slowly lowered his head, his eyes turning bit by bit, moving toward the hand that was trembling constantly due to pain.

The next moment, his pupils shook.

He saw the stumps that used to be two fingers, poking baldly on his palm, the other parts nowhere to be found.

"Ah! Ah——ah——"

"My hand!"

He held them, curled his body forward, knelt on the ground, knocked his head against the ground, and cried out in despair.

The screaming echoed in this building for a long time, with no response.

I don't know how long it took, but Adam finally accepted the status quo, realizing that no matter how much he cried and howled, he couldn't twist reality and make the two lost fingers return.

He sat back slowly. His condition was not good to begin with, his whole body hurt, and after such an emotional fluctuation, fatigue surged like a tide, trying to cover his mouth and nose, making him suffocate.

Why did it become like this? Adam asked himself.

He had stayed away from disputes all his life and never made enemies. According to common sense, there shouldn't be anyone with such great malice toward him, wanting to destroy his career path for the second half of his life in this way.

Jealousy?

That shouldn't be it either.

He was not far from old age; would anyone be jealous of an old guy over fifty?

Right, where is my violin?

After a while, Adam raised his right hand, supported his forehead, and began to scrape every clue in his skull.

The last scene he could remember was that he was passionately performing Shostakovich's work.

That performance was wonderful, without a single stutter, the violin sound didn't have a single mistake, and the audience below was intoxicated by the orchestra's performance.

Everything was perfect, until the moment the memory suddenly broke, and the subsequent memory became a blank.

Only the unfinished movement fragment played back repeatedly in his mind, as if stuck and rewinding like a cassette, like an earworm that couldn't be driven away.

He couldn't let himself escape from it.

He felt like a cassette repeater.

The memories behind, no matter how he thought, how he tried, how he attempted, didn't show any signs of loosening.

It was as if someone had specifically selected them and then cut them out.

Damn it……

Adam took a deep breath, trying to adjust his posture, but his left hand still didn't listen to him. He could only wipe the tears from the corners of his eyes with the hand that was still intact.

His current state had nothing to do with "upper class," but was very similar to the trash on the street—his shirt was gone, and his arms and chest were stained with gray dirt.

And, he could no longer perform.

Just like this, Adam curled up in place, immersed in small, frustrated, and confused emotions, and spent a long time.

After a long time, Adam decided to pull himself together. He should leave here.

He looked up at the corridor and found that the sunlight was projecting a dark red light through the window on the classroom door in the distance.

It was dusk, or the sun was about to rise.

Adam carefully examined the surrounding environment and found that he was in a school, with bulletin boards, lockers, and colorful murals decorating it. The entire corridor was desolate and quiet.

He had guest-starred as a music teacher in one or two schools before, but he had no impression of this one.

With some discomfort, Adam checked his bad hand.

The finger stumps were rough and irregular, covered with scar tissue and scabs, without any trace of stitching.

Obviously, these fingers were not removed under fine operation, but were cut off or bitten off in a very rough way.

And such a discovery left him extremely confused—because no matter what, he couldn't recall the details at the time.

What's even stranger is that although he maintained clear thinking, whenever he concentrated and tried to delve into that lost memory, there was always something in the void forcing him back.

It seemed to be filled with a fierce, red heat.

"……"

Adam turned his attention to the wound.

Although the finger wound looked quite bad, it had already begun to heal.

But…… from the finger breaking to stopping the bleeding, and then to the wound basically healing…… how long would that take?

How long had he been lost?

What happened at that time?

What happened during this period?

Why did he lose his memory, and why did he suddenly regain consciousness at this time?

Messy thoughts swirled in Adam's heart, lingering for a long time, leaving him confused, lost, and puzzled.

"What on earth happened……"

While thinking, he supported the wall and stood up, walking forward along the corridor.

At this moment, a crisp telephone ring suddenly sounded, which was particularly clear in this empty teaching building, with echoes continuing.

Adam looked up and looked toward the place far from the classroom, where a teacher's office door was left ajar.

The ringing was coming from there. ===== CHAPTER 1018 =====