Chapter 2825: Suspected Dou Shengnan
The experts carefully examined Miss Zeng's body, confirming that she was fully awake and had not sustained any serious physical injuries. They were astonished and also curious about how Xu Huo had managed it. From the perspective of those outside the ward, he had simply sat there the entire time, not even moving when Miss Zeng fell off the bed!
After satisfying their curiosity about Miss Zeng, the experts turned their attention to Xu Huo, gathering around him to ask about the treatment process, the issues to be mindful of during treatment, and his control over spiritual power. Of course, they were even more eager for him to write down all his treatment insights, as this could provide ideas for treating similar patients.
Xu Huo had no time for them now. He asked the people in the room, "Can Miss Zeng speak now?"
Although Miss Zeng was weak, she had replenished herself with nutrient supplements after waking up, so speaking was not a problem.
The ward door was closed again, shutting out the experts, while Tang Xu remained inside.
Miss Zeng knew what Xu Huo wanted to ask and took the initiative to say, "Actually, I'm not very clear about how it happened."
"At that time, I had just returned from an instance. I was tired and a bit injured. It seemed I accidentally bumped into someone. The moment we met face to face, I lost consciousness. While unconscious, someone must have invaded my spiritual world."
"I'm not very strong in spiritual evolution. Even when I use spiritual power, I don't dare to easily expose my core spiritual world. But the other party was too strong. I didn't last long before my consciousness fell into chaos."
Xu Huo described Dou Shengnan's appearance, as well as the faces he had seen in the spiritual world. "Have you seen them?"
"I haven't seen any of them." Miss Zeng knew of Dou Shengnan, but she confirmed she had no memory of her. As for those faces, during her chaotic state, she felt the pull of multiple forces, as if those faces were alive. They frequently emitted sharp spiritual power, constantly disrupting her self-repair. The longer it went on, the more blurred and confused her autonomous consciousness became.
She hadn't felt much during the previous treatments. In fact, she felt that those therapists were just chaotic spiritual forces suddenly appearing in her spiritual world, making it impossible to distinguish truth from falsehood.
"You were sent to the hospital by a patrol robot. The place where you collapsed was right where you exited the game. I've checked the surveillance footage there repeatedly, and there's no problem. You lost consciousness as soon as you came out. You were taken to the hospital in less than ten minutes." After hearing this, Tang Xu found it strange and even suspected she had been ensnared in the instance, leaving her mind unclear when she came out.
Miss Zeng glanced at him. "My mind was very clear when I exited the game. I hadn't fought with any spiritual evolvers before that."
"Also, the time you mentioned differs by half a day from when I actually returned from the instance. Someone must have tampered with it."
"That's even stranger." Tang Xu was puzzled. "If they weren't trying to kill her, why go to such lengths to attack her spiritual world?"
Xu Huo was thoughtful. If Miss Zeng's memory was correct, it was very likely that someone had used her as practice.
Throwing something like an "anchor" into her spiritual world without killing her—this was more like training.
But what was strange was that multiple spiritual forces were mixed into her spiritual world. Were there really that many spiritual evolvers in District 003 who could leave "anchors" in someone else's spiritual world?
Among the similar evolvers he had encountered, very few even knew the concept of an "anchor," let alone the fact that Dou Shengnan's face had appeared in Miss Zeng's spiritual world—this wasn't an illusion he saw; it should be something Miss Zeng had seen before, but her spiritual power wasn't strong enough, so she wasn't aware of it.
But if it was Dou Shengnan, it seemed unlikely.
From his last encounter with Dou Shengnan, he roughly knew that her spiritual power was so strong mostly because of the props in her eyes. Although she had tried to leave an "anchor" in his spiritual world, she hadn't succeeded. Of course, the spiritual power she left behind had also been removed by him.
The black world in Miss Zeng's spiritual world was somewhat similar to Dou Shengnan's. This time, it seemed the "anchor" had been left smoothly, allowing it to completely influence Miss Zeng's autonomous consciousness, while also being closer to the characteristic of an anchor being "no longer controllable once detached from the body."
But this didn't mean it was successful. If it were a true "anchor," Miss Zeng should have been living normally without any awareness, or she might have noticed but remained unaffected, like when the childhood personality stole spiritual power from Dou Shengnan's spiritual world.
He had already learned through Pu Yu that there were no spiritual evolvers in District 003 who met this standard, let alone three at once.
If what happened to Miss Zeng was really related to Dou Shengnan, then after their last encounter, Dou Shengnan had likely evolved again, or she had found another auxiliary prop similar to the Goddess Vine Seed.
Due to the damage to his props, Xu Huo couldn't determine whether Dou Shengnan had died after that. Logically, as a wanted criminal, the moment she used a ticket, she would have been thrown into a high-risk random instance. Having missed instances for years, and facing a high-risk instance targeting A-level players, the difficulty was unimaginable. If she could still survive that, she was impressive.
Of course, that wasn't the most important thing. The most important thing was that Dou Shengnan might be in District 003, and she had evolved again.
After leaving the hospital, Xu Huo contacted Pu Yu and asked her to help find Dou Shengnan's whereabouts, while also providing his search scope.
First, the area near where Miss Zeng exited the instance. It couldn't be ruled out that the two had met by chance, though the possibility was small, but this was the easier part to investigate.
Second, institutions or organizations that knew about Miss Zeng's condition, especially if there were evolvers who had suddenly disappeared or suddenly fallen ill like her.
Finally, public and private institutions that treated spiritual evolvers. Dou Shengnan had suffered consecutive heavy blows and might not have fully recovered. Moreover, the spiritual power in Miss Zeng's spiritual world was unstable, which also indicated the interferer's state to some extent.
Pu Yu readily agreed. As the newly appointed boss, many people were willing to establish friendships with her.
She had barely spread the word when, within half a day, someone from the local government of Flowing Gold City informed her that three months ago, there had been an attack in Flowing Gold City. The target was a well-known private treatment hospital, and several doctors had died. Although the government hadn't found any results from the investigation, some sharp-eyed people had noticed that a player recovering from illness had moved into the wealthy area east of Flowing Gold City, and screams could occasionally be heard coming from there.
Whether it was Dou Shengnan, the local government didn't know and was too lazy to investigate, but they were certain it was a spiritual evolver in an unstable state.