The Lost Tomb : Sea Of Sands

Introduction (Part 2)

One night nine years ago, intern Liang Wan was conducting routine rounds on the sixth floor of the inpatient department of the First Affiliated Hospital of Peking University.

She had actually already completed her rounds at this time, but the reason why she was still hanging around was because there was a special patient on this floor.

The patient's surname was Zhang, and she had noticed him when he was first admitted to the hospital.

This was because almost all of his drugs and treatments were taken care of by special personnel, and there were people who took care of him on weekdays. But these people were very different in temperament and were also very mysterious.

A general patient's family members usually had a few common reactions: either they were depressed because the illness was too severe, or they were extremely optimistic and tried not to think about the future. But no matter what kind of reaction, their main concern was the patient's condition.

The patient surnamed Zhang was suspected of having brain damage that led to memory impairment, and it was easy to see that all those who visited him had old injuries. But she found that these people, including the patient himself, were very calm about the illness, and no matter how much it was discussed, they maintained a cautious and conservative attitude.

Liang Wan was able to touch patient Zhang's arm while giving him a routine examination. Although his muscles weren't very exaggerated, the density of the fibers was beyond comprehension.

Even the muscles of athletes were unlikely to have such high fiber density, which meant that this person was seemingly normal, but extremely strong. This kind of muscle wasn't something that could be trained by ordinary means. Her mentor told her that this could almost be called muscles of will, which could only be formed through a long period of highly unified movement of both body and consciousness.

The patient was someone with excellent physical skills and concentration. Even when he was deep asleep, he would immediately wake up and be alert whenever someone approached him.

What Liang Wan found strangest of all was that this person had two fingers that were extremely long. If they weren't intentionally shaped that way from an early age, such a thing would be impossible.

The patient was silent, and his eyes were dazed and listless due to the memory impairment. Beyond her initial curiosity, Liang Wan seemed to have some strange feelings for him. After her rounds every day, she always liked to go to his room and take a final look at him.

The same was true on this day. The fat man that usually took care of the patient wasn't there, and the patient was lying down. She didn't know if he was asleep as she entered the ward, reflexively looked at his nameplate, and then stepped forward to check his pupils.

At this time, she suddenly heard patient Zhang say a word.

He had a strange sleeping habit— unlike ordinary people who would sleep for a long time, his sleep was scattered. He would often fall asleep when people weren't paying attention to him, and although this kind of sleep enabled him to rest as much as possible during periods of high concentration, it was also especially harmful to the human brain. As a result, the doctor gave him a sedative after he was hospitalized.

Later, the doctor found that the sedative wasn't particularly effective, and so a mixed drug was used. As the effectiveness of this new drug gradually became apparent, it became his main treatment plan.

After this, the patient began to sleep for a long time and started talking in his sleep, which the doctor believed was a sign of his memory beginning to recover.

But his dreams were generally meaningless, vague, and most of them couldn't even be interpreted.

This was the only sentence that intern Liang Wan heard very clearly.

It sounded very strange at first, and she lowered her head as she pondered over it. At that time, the patient repeated the sentence and it was also very clear.

Liang Wan didn't think much about it at that time, but because the sentence itself was so strange, she immediately remembered it and left the ward.

This incident happened very quietly one night nine years ago. No one knew how missing this one sentence would make it so difficult to solve the mystery of this entire event that was increasingly shrouded in fog. As a result, the key information of a core secret was missed by all the relevant people that year.

People's growth often happens when they're not aware of it. I don't want to be like this, but sometimes my own decisions surprise me. I'm not as shrewd as I should be when facing others, even though they shrewdly speculate all about me. It's not you that changes, but the you in the eyes of others.

——Wu Xie