Chapter 186: Hypnosis

2022-05-20

I couldn’t help but retort, “And what about you? Hiding away in this place—doesn’t that mean you’re scared of something too? Honestly, if you wanted to leave, nothing’s stopping you. But it seems like you actually enjoy being here. Or maybe, you’re just terrified of being around too many people. You only like facing one person at a time. Whenever the crowd grows, you start feeling that anxiety creeping in.”

The old man looked at me kindly and even cocked an eyebrow, as if he wanted me to keep going.

Naturally, I didn’t let this chance slip by. So I continued, “You like being alone. You’ve got social anxiety, which is why you always create spaces where you’re in control. Before anyone even asks something, you love to reveal their secrets first. You’ve been holed up here studying psychology and social sciences, probably because of this very reason.”

He stayed silent, but I wasn’t about to give up the upper hand. I pressed on, “So that’s why you ended up here. You think you’re in control, pulling all the strings, but honestly, it’s just fear keeping you locked away. Am I right?”

For a moment, no one said a word.

Long, heavy silence lingered in the room until finally he spoke. “You’re young, but you’ve clearly read a lot of psychology books. From this brief conversation, you’ve managed to say a lot about me—and I’ll admit, most of it is true. You’ve got a sharp eye.”

“But so what?” The old man pinned me with his stare. “Sure, I’ve got my issues. But at least I can face them head-on. I know my flaws and my strengths, which is why I chose a place like this. Do you get it? This is how I confront myself.”

He paused, then shifted his tone, brow lowering like a thundercloud, his voice gaining weight. “But you’re different. You can’t see yourself clearly. Maybe, deep down, you sort of know—but you won’t look yourself in the eye. Ask yourself, is this really the life you want?”

Out of nowhere, it felt like something slammed into my chest, right at the hardest and softest place in my heart. For a split second I was dizzy with a bone-deep exhaustion.

The old man absently picked up a pen and began drawing circles on the paper in front of him.

As he drew, he spoke, “You don’t trust anyone, yet pretend to be close to everyone. You’re scared of loneliness, but even more afraid of getting too close. Because you know—when you get too close, what comes next is always the split.”

“So why can’t you just admit it?” He slid the pen and a blank piece of paper toward me. “We’re the same, you know. Don’t go crazy with socializing just because you’re lonely. We’re meant to enjoy solitude. What’s so bad about being alone? So you get abandoned—so what? We should fight back.”

“Draw me a house, and a tree,” he said.

I quickly drew a tree, then after a heartbeat, added the house right in the middle of it. The result looked like a tree bursting through the roof, stretching into the sky.

He glanced at my drawing, then nodded. “You’re the tree, but you’re still stuck inside the house. Deep down, you’re aching to break free. Haven’t you noticed?”

“You’re not made to live boxed in,” he went on, dropping his voice to a low rumble. “You know what I mean, right? Put on that cloak, and you’ll never set yourself loose. Life only gives you a hundred years, if you’re lucky. Some drift through all hundred, doing nothing. Others make history in just two or three decades. Even if it means being remembered for all the wrong reasons, better that than being forgotten.”

“Now, what did you want to ask me?” He straightened up and looked at me, seriousness etched on his face.

I hesitated, then pulled out my phone and showed him the English letters on the screen. “This. We suspect the killer also has mental problems—a warped mind. We combed the internet for these sentences, but found nothing. Which means the killer probably made them up. Since you’re into psychology too, can you tell what kind of mentality he has?”

The old man kept spinning his pen as he glanced at the phone, muttering under his breath while reading through the sentences.

When he finished, he looked at me. “Don’t you think your translation is all wrong? Who translated this into Chinese, anyway?”

“Doesn’t matter who translated it,” I replied. “What I want to know is, what’s the mindset behind these words?”

He paused for a moment, then said, “It’s simple—you can’t see it? It’s right there. He left so many clues because he wants to prove he exists. It’s just like scratching your name on a tourist spot. People do it to feel like they matter. If someone dies and you can’t find any trace of the killer, it’s as if he never existed in the first place.”

Suddenly, the old man leaned in across the table, a strange intensity in his eyes. “I’ve already told you, the more someone lacks, the more they want to display. He craves to exist. When he was young, that killer must have been invisible. Never got noticed, never mattered. Think about it—who is this killer, really?”

As he spoke, a strange emotion welled up inside me. My head buzzed and a fierce headache flared behind my temples. I pressed a hand to the side of my head, trying to ease the pain.

“Abandoned since childhood, no one ever loved him,” a faint voice drifted to my ears, broken and far-off. “He’s never fit in with this world. Never been accepted. Everything he sees is fake. His friends, the ones he likes, and the ones who like him—they’re all illusions.”

“This world is a lie, so you have to shatter it—find a place of your own. Remember, your keyword is…”

Then, suddenly, alarms blared outside. I didn’t know what was happening.

The haze lifted in an instant. The old man was no longer seated across from me—he was now standing right in front of me, still clutching that pen in his fist.

That’s when I finally registered the furious pounding behind me. The door was locked from the inside, but I swore I hadn’t done that. When had it been locked? I turned and saw the old man glaring at me, face dark and eyes brimming with something sinister.

He looked nothing like the person he had been just moments before.

He rushed at me, gripping the pen tight, but his frame was no match for someone in their twenties—even if I’m on the skinny side, dealing with him wasn’t too hard.

The old man clawed desperately at my collar, muttering, “Did you hear me? You’re an orphan. You want to die. You don’t want to live. Do you remember that?”

His twisted expression made him look like an ogre—the veins bulging on his scarlet face as if he’d dumped every last shred of strength into the attack. Then, suddenly, he let go, mumbling under his breath, “No, no—that’s not right. That’s not me, is it? But so what—still not right. What’s going on?”

Lost in muttering, he started pacing, barely seeming to notice me.

I hurried to unlock the door and darted outside.

A few people stood there, peering at me like I’d just survived a brush with death.

“What just happened in there?” I asked, glancing between them.

The head nurse was visibly shaken. “I told you not to go in, but you insisted. You nearly ended up like all the others who’ve been in there before. You know, I’ve never seen him act like that. Maybe you’re something special, or maybe those others were just quietly hypnotized…”

I was baffled.

Guan Zengbin spoke up. “You scared the hell out of us. We were chatting out here when you suddenly came over and locked the door from the inside. You wouldn’t answer no matter how we called. All we could see was that old man standing in front of you, murmuring something.”

My brow furrowed as it truly sank in how dangerous things had been. I remembered those times the old man spun his pen at his fingertips—not some mindless fidget, but a deliberate trigger. Each spin reinforced the same idea.

At the same time, he was guiding me with his words, drawing me deeper into his world. I’d been hypnotized, and without those alarms shattering the mood, I might have fallen completely under. What chilled me most was that I’d nearly heard the old man’s last words—the most crucial step of hypnosis: the keyword.

Just like Team Leader Shao said, if you never hear your keyword, hypnosis may never take hold in your life. But once you hear it, you’re at their mercy. These words are never ordinary—they’re things you’d never say in a million years, usually only a few syllables long.

If that old man managed to plant a keyword in me, he could hypnotize me anytime, anywhere. And I had no idea what kind of suggestions he left me with.

The head nurse shook her head. “Thank goodness someone hit the alarm when they did, or you probably wouldn’t be standing here right now. You might’ve ended up institutionalized, or worse. I keep telling everyone—these are psychiatric patients! Never talk to them like they’re normal. The only person who can talk to a psychiatric patient is someone just as disturbed.”

“So, who pressed the alarm?” The head nurse glanced at the group. “I need to thank them properly.”

But no one spoke. They all looked at each other in confusion.

An eerie, heavy silence settled over us.

“If none of us did it…” Gu Chen finally said, “Then the hallway was empty.”

“Could it be…?”