Chapter 649
Chapter 649
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>Translator: Ryuma
>Chapter: 649
>Chapter Title: Discharge from Hospital
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Kangning Hospital's disturbance passed quickly.
Qian Fu had been locked up, and after that, Li Huowang never found any more needles in his food for a while.
This indirectly proved that the needles in his meals before had indeed been placed by him.
Eating, taking medicine, watching TV, group therapy, talk therapy, yard time, sleeping—these were practically all the options in a mental hospital.
Just like that, two months flew by. Aside from the boredom, everything was perfectly normal.
During this time, both his mother and Yang Na came to visit him. When they learned he truly hadn't had another episode, they were overjoyed.
One morning, Li Huowang sat in his ward, quietly waiting for the instant noodles in the bucket to soften.
A mental hospital naturally wouldn't provide bucket noodles like braised beef flavor. He'd just mentioned it in passing during Yang Na's last visit.
By her second visit, she'd brought him a whole case.
Just as Li Huowang waited three minutes and lifted the lid, a familiar face appeared at the door.
"Yi Donglai, you've finally come."
"I have a lot on my plate. I'm just your former attending physician, not your personal nanny."
"Besides, I keep in touch with Junior Brother Wu regularly. I'm fully up to speed on your condition."
"You seem to be recovering pretty well." Yi Donglai sat on the edge of the bed, watching Li Huowang eat the noodles with a folding fork.
"Not bad. It's been three months now. I've gotten used to pretty much everything I need to." Li Huowang took a sip of the broth.
"On the phone before, you sounded pretty urgent. What about now? Not so much?"
At these words, Li Huowang swallowed his mouthful of noodles and thought seriously for a moment before replying hesitantly,
"Well, as time goes on, those memories are starting to blur. I'm not even sure anymore if they were delusions or things that actually happened."
They were things he'd clearly done, yet in the real world, they hadn't happened at all. The only possibility seemed to be that the problem lay with him.
But Li Huowang knew he wasn't sick at all.
Hearing this, Yi Donglai nodded approvingly.
"Since starting the new meds, has that kind of thing happened again?"
"No." Li Huowang kept eating his noodles.
Since it had only happened once, Li Huowang decided to observe a bit more. If it never happened again, he wouldn't pursue it further—just chalk it up to a bizarre dream.
At that moment, Wu Cheng walked in from outside. He leaned in to whisper something in Yi Donglai's ear, and the two stepped out into the hallway for a hushed conversation.
They talked for a full half hour outside, even making a few phone calls during that time.
When Yi Donglai returned to the ward, he held a tablet in his hand.
"Come on, Huowang. I've got some questions here—mind doing them for me?"
"Questions?" Li Huowang took the tablet and saw the multiple-choice items on the screen.
"I always insist that others act according to my wishes and get furious when they go against my will."
Yes?
No?
"I'm always uneasy about letting others handle things and prefer to do them myself."
Yes?
No?
"I'm frequently tormented by thoughts that barge into my mind without reason."
Yes?
No?
Looking at the questions, Li Huowang glanced up at Yi Donglai, his voice tinged with excitement as he asked,
"Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory? Or SCL-90? You're testing me on this—does it mean if all the scales come back normal, I can get discharged?"
Yi Donglai looked at Li Huowang with some surprise.
"You know quite a bit about this stuff, huh? Just do it first. This is only the first test."
Energized by this, Li Huowang focused intensely and completed the questions, his fingers even trembling slightly.
He was finally getting out!
Li Huowang filled them out meticulously. Next came a barrage of tests—he was even hooked up to machines to check for abnormal brain activity.
After all the hassle, they told him to go back to his ward and wait.
The wait was pure agony. Li Huowang finally understood what "every day feels like a year" really meant.
Finally, when he saw Wu Cheng walk in and unlock the handcuffs on his wrists, Li Huowang's eyes welled up with tears of excitement.
He was really getting discharged.
But as soon as the cuffs came off, a black device like an electronic watch was locked onto his left ankle.
"What's this?" Li Huowang's elation dipped a bit.
"After all the trouble you caused, we're just putting you on electronic monitoring for a year. You're getting off easy."
"To monitor my location around the clock?"
"Not just monitor—restrict. It's connected online the whole time. Once you're out, you can't come within five hundred meters of any school—kindergarten, elementary, middle, or high school."
"If you're in the area for five seconds, it'll alert the nearest station right away. Even if the doctors say you're not sick, it won't matter." Yi Donglai explained the device's restrictions to Li Huowang.
"And don't think about removing it. Damage it or if it stops detecting your pulse, it'll set off alarms."
"Once you're home, don't wander off. Strictly speaking, you're not fully free yet—you need two months of home treatment to stabilize."
Li Huowang nodded in understanding. It seemed his past actions had led to these extra precautions.
Even after discharge, there were still all these restrictions.
But as long as he could leave as a normal person, even with more limits, it didn't matter. At least he was getting out.
"Li Huowang, remember to take your meds on time after discharge. Don't stop anything else, but especially not the meds. Come on, your parents are waiting at the front hall."
"Yang Na didn't come?"
"For regular patients, we only notify immediate family. Hurry up—they're here."
With Yi Donglai and Wu Cheng escorting him, Li Huowang shed his blue-and-white hospital gown and changed into regular clothes.
The moment Li Huowang appeared before Sun Xiaoqin in civilian attire for the first time, she burst into tears of joy.
Beside her, Li Jiancheng held their things, trying to keep composed, but his shaking hands betrayed his emotions.
As the teary Sun Xiaoqin turned to kneel before Yi Donglai, everyone rushed to stop her.
"Sister Sun, don't—calm down, get up first. This is just my job."
After the chaos settled, Li Huowang finally walked out of the hospital.
The instant he stepped outside, Li Huowang looked up at the white clouds in the sky. He'd never found them so beautiful before, nor the air so fresh.