Since he wanted to play the role of miracle doctor and catch the rich man who held multiple sets of JoyStation consoles, Liam needed to confirm something first.
Whether he actually was a "miracle doctor" or not.
If he couldn't cure the incurable disease of the rich man's true love, then he'd have to change tactics. Iterate new methods. Optimize the plan. In other words, if fishing didn't work, he'd have to find a way to rob.
Liam wasn't willing to rob openly. It would cost too much to his reputation. So try to fish first.
Since it was a temporary hotel, there was no need to worry about the license signal being leaked. Liam directly swiped the black Hunter License and entered the Hunter website to get the required information.
It had to be said, this card is convenient. Even Battera, one of the world's richest men—Liam had the authority to easily access a considerable amount of information not shown in online encyclopedias. Liam guessed this confidential information was probably contributed by other Hunters who didn't know each other. Or there might be guys like Intelligence Hunters, Privacy Hunters, or Hacker Hunters. Maybe some were keen on doing exactly this.
Soon, Battera's extremely wealthy and dense asset structure and huge business empire were like a spider web of interpersonal relationships. From shareholders, consultants, lawyers, security teams, to the cleaning lady of all the properties under his name—the list was clearly visible in front of Liam and Shizuku.
This was information that was relatively easy to obtain with a Hunter License. But if the scope narrowed down to Battera's personal privacy, it wasn't that simple.
Needed to pay more.
Liam and Shizuku had hundreds of millions on their cards. They could afford whatever they wanted. Didn't take much effort to get the information they really wanted.
Certain accounts that seemed to have little to do with Battera. Medical records of countless transfers. Different hospitals. Different expert doctors. There were many professional Hunters among the recipients—Liam didn't know Dog Sister of the Twelve Zodiacs, "Disease Hunter Cheadle," wasn't among them—but the common denominator was the patient. These accounts all gave money to the same patient for treatment.
This true love was the only weakness of Battera, a wealthy and powerful tycoon. It was reasonable for Battera to try his best to hide his relationship with her and her current situation.
As for the patient's private information—last name, where they were currently recuperating—these were all very expensive. A waste of money. Liam felt it was unnecessary. He didn't want to visit the doctor for consultation.
Just get a description of the condition.
Medical experts at several facilities concluded that the patient is in a persistent state where only basic physical systems and reflexes function; all conscious thought and active movement are gone.
Commonly known as vegetative state.
The brain was too sophisticated and mysterious. Once something went wrong, even the medical level of the Hunter world, including professional Hunters, would be unable to do anything. To put it more mysteriously, in this world where Nen abilities that reflected the soul existed, the human brain, consciousness, and other fields would only become more difficult, unpredictable, and hard to study.
Liam also used the convenience of his Hunter License to check how many similar vegetative patients were hospitalized in nearby hospitals. What were their addresses. What were their ward numbers.
These ordinary patients, neither rich nor noble, were admitted to ordinary hospitals in this small town. With a Hunter License to clear the way, Liam got the most detailed and accurate information without spending a penny. These ordinary people had almost no secrets in front of this card. Or it could be said they had no value at all.
"No wonder all the smart people in the world want to be professional Hunters." Liam took out the Hunter License from the card reader and rotated the corner of the card on his fingertips. "Infinite privileges and infinite obligations. Who can not love this?"
"If you're a Nen user, you should know the Hunter Association is the organization with the most in-depth research on Nen and the longest history. Should join it. Walk the path together." He sighed. "Just like this."
Shizuku asked, "So, we're going to find them tomorrow?" She pointed to the data on nearby vegetative patients that Liam had collected and tabulated on the screen.
"No, go now." Liam jumped up, opened the window, and looked up at the dim starry sky. "The night is dark and windy, eerie and quiet—perfect for our work!"
Shizuku did everything efficiently. Raised her hand and materialized Blinky, sucking in the belongings of the two people in the room like a gust of wind sweeping fallen leaves. She followed Liam and jumped out the window, falling from the third floor to the ground. The two of them disappeared into the night ahead.
Late at night in the inpatient department of the hospital, the quiet corridors were lit with lights. Doors of some wards were ajar. In some rooms, sobbing or mumbling of accompanying relatives could be heard vaguely, but most soon fell into silence.
The nurse on duty at the nursing station yawned, stood up, put her hands in her pockets, and walked around outside each ward.
She glanced in at the door of the corner ward. The thin, frail fourteen-year-old boy unconscious on the bed only moved slightly. The gray-haired woman napping next to him immediately woke up. After nervously checking the boy, she turned her back to the door. As if muttering something to herself, she lay down to rest again.
The nurse sighed and left.
What she didn't realize was that after she walked away, two ghostly people opened the door of the ward behind her openly and stepped in.
Even before entering the ward, the taller one raised his head and looked around the corners of the corridor ceiling, seemingly looking for the location of the hospital's surveillance cameras.
The lights in the ward suddenly turned on. The mother who'd just fallen asleep suddenly woke again. When she opened her eyes, she thought it was a nurse coming. But she saw two strange figures, one tall and one small, standing beside her son's bed.
Two strangers. A man and a woman. The man was very tall—1.9 meters—and the woman looked petite in comparison. But what frightened the mother was that they were both wearing masks with strange symbols on the four corners, as if they were looking at her son who'd been sleeping in the hospital bed all year round.
She was about to scream—
"Shh! Don't make noise." The tall masked man raised his hand. His voice was a little muffled through the mask. He stretched his hand toward the young man who seemed to be sleeping soundly on the hospital bed. "It's very critical now. You don't want anything to happen to him, right?"
The woman's eyes only dimmed as the masked black-haired woman next to the man appeared beside her. A hand that looked like it belonged to a weak girl pressed on her shoulder. As if a mountain was pressing down, the woman sat down again without resistance. She whispered in horror, "Nooo, take me…. Don't hurt him."
Liam didn't explain. He glanced at the fourteen-year-old vegetative boy on the hospital bed. Reached out and pressed on the side of his neck, leaving a rose gold pattern of a five-pointed star.
The woman watched nervously. But in the blink of an eye, the tall figure of the masked man standing in front of the hospital bed with fingers against her son suddenly disappeared in the night by the window, as if blending into darkness.
The girl's hand on her shoulder and the invisible pressure no longer existed.
The woman looked around in horror. Apart from her bedridden son and herself, there was only the sound of dripping instruments in the empty ward, as if the masked man and woman who'd just appeared were an illusion.
"Nurse..." The woman subconsciously pressed the call button on the bedside.
She looked down. Her son, who'd been sleeping on the hospital bed for an unknown length of time, had opened his eyes at some point.
With the help of a cautiously extended hand, his son sat up from the bed.
He turned to look at the night outside the window. Thought to himself: Success!
He turned to look at the woman beside the bed who was so excited she was speechless and helpless. He smiled slightly. Stretched out his finger on the pentagram on the side of his neck. Lightly scratched it with nails.
The rose gold pentagram mark shattered.
There was confusion in the son's eyes. He quickly focused and saw clearly the haggard-looking woman supporting him. He was surprised. "Mom, what's wrong with you?"
"Ward 302, something happened..." The nurse hurried into the ward. The corridor outside seemed noisy. The nurse looked at the mother and son crying in the ward in surprise. "Is your son awake?"
From the nurse's mouth, the mother and son learned that something strange happened in the hospital tonight.
Not only did her son, who'd been in a vegetative state for a long time, come back to life in this ward—many patients in other wards also recovered one after another. Patients recovering after emergency surgery found their surgical wounds suddenly disappeared. Patients who'd broken bones and were bound with casts had their bones completely healed. Spent most of the night screaming in the ward to break the annoying plaster.
"The most incredible thing is that the patient who just had five toes amputated yesterday—her toes actually grew back!"
The inpatient department became lively at night. Almost boiling. News of the bizarre situation rapidly passed among patients, family members, and medical staff.
In ward 302, the woman carefully feeding hot soup to her son looked at the ward. A figure hurriedly passed by outside. She thought silently: They must have done it!
It must be the miracle granted by the mysterious man and woman wearing masks.
The woman didn't know how to thank them. Didn't know whether she should publicize their merits to others. Could only look at her son's doubtful eyes with tears. In her heart, she silently remembered the figures of the man and woman and the symbols on their masks that she didn't recognize.
"What's the writing on their masks?"
"Maybe it's just a pattern."
A bunch of white coats gathered in the hospital's monitoring room. In the surveillance video that had been pulled up, men and women wearing masks shuttled from ward to ward like ghosts. They'd go from one ward to another in a minute at most. This speed—let alone using some kind of miracle to cure diseases and save people—even shopping for clothes wasn't this efficient.
The chief doctor zoomed in on the paused surveillance picture, showing the man looking up at the surveillance camera before entering Ward 302.
If these doctors and nurses could recognize the symbols, they'd see there was a character written on each of the four corners of his mask. Foreign-looking. Mystical.
The mask with symbols was swayed like a fan in the night. From the top corner of the building opposite the inpatient department, Liam looked at the brightly lit and lively inpatient department building in the night.
Next to him, Shizuku, who was wearing a matching mask, asked, "What was the result?"
"Success. He didn't turn back into a vegetative state again." Liam said happily.
"This healing ability is really amazing." Shizuku commented.
"Indeed. I've reached godhood." Liam was convinced.
Putting the Star Mark on the side of the neck of the vegetative boy in Ward 302, Liam had used the first-person perspective control method to possess him.
Liam still hadn't understood Star Mark's mysterious and unreasonable healing ability, but—the priority of possession control must be very high, or even the highest level, in Star Mark's Manipulation hierarchy. So Liam had guessed in advance that as long as he could possess the vegetative boy and open his eyes, it would prove Star Mark's healing ability. In order to make this body meet the conditions for him to open his eyes, it had already cured and repaired the unknown issue in the depths of the original vegetative boy's brain.
That is to say, even if he released the possession control and the Star Mark, what would be left behind should be a completely healthy body and an awakened brain.
Since my Star Mark ability can indeed cure vegetative state, what else is there to say?
Battera, you'd better watch more news.
"Why are you looking at me?" Liam noticed Shizuku's gaze next to him.
Shizuku behind the mask asked curiously, "Are you trying to compensate? In the past few days, you've been absorbing death energy at the top of several hospitals and emergency centers. You know you could have saved those people. So today, you treated many people in the hospital so you can gain peace of mind?"
Liam was greatly surprised when he heard this. "If you say that..." He muttered. "I really haven't thought about it carefully, but what you said makes sense!"
"Perhaps that's true!" He laughed. "What do I call this—the principle of conservation of conscience of the miracle doctor?"
Shizuku thought for a while. "This seems to be called hypocrisy. Or, being a hypocrite?"
Liam reached out with his big hand. Grabbed Shizuku's mask and pulled it out a little. After letting go, the mask flicked on Shizuku's face. "I should say, this makes me have a little conscience, but not much."
"Oh." Shizuku held onto the crooked mask.
"Let's go back to sleep. Waiting to read the newspaper tomorrow..." Liam jumped up.
"Then what?" Shizuku followed.
"Then? Then we catch a ride and head to the next town!"
In the night, the two of them quickly touched the outer wall of the building like Spider-Man.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Writing takes time, coffee, and a lot of love.If you'd like to support my work, join me at [email protected]/GoldenGaruda
You'll get early access to over 50 chapters, selection on new series, and the satisfaction of knowing your support directly fuels more stories.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~