Chapter 1: Her Name Is Chi Mo, Guan Yizhou's Girlfriend
The light from the shadowless lamp was blindingly white.
Like icy needles, stabbing straight into his retinas.
A hemostat clattered onto the stainless steel tray with a sharp clang.
Gu Ye tried to shout, but his throat felt stuffed with dry cotton.
Not a single syllable came out.
His heart was suddenly seized in the iron grip of an invisible hand.
Pain.
A tearing, wrenching agony shot from his left chest, radiating through his back and down his left arm.
His legs buckled, and his body pitched forward.
His arm caught the instrument cart beside him, sending it toppling.
Surgical scissors, gauze, and saline bottles crashed to the floor in a chaotic clatter.
Gu Ye collapsed onto the cold tile, his vision rapidly narrowing, then fading to black.
The beeping of the defibrillator charging grew distant.
The cardiac monitor flatlined into a piercing, unbroken wail.
"Dr. Gu! Dr. Gu's having a heart attack!"
The circulating nurse's scream pierced through the iron door of the sterile room.
But Gu Ye could barely hear it anymore.
Thick, viscous darkness swallowed him whole.
Whoosh—
Gu Ye sucked in a sharp, ragged breath, like a fish just hauled out of the water.
His chest heaved violently.
He snapped his eyes open.
No blinding shadowless lamp.
No blood-soaked attending surgeon.
Above him hung a dust-covered incandescent bulb.
The filament buzzed with a faint electric hum.
Cold sweat had soaked through his fitted training shirt, the rough fabric clinging to his back with an itchy, prickly sensation.
Gu Ye's hands were trembling.
He yanked open the collar of his camouflage jacket and looked down at his chest.
No burn marks from defibrillator pads.
Just solid muscle, pulsing with each deep breath.
Thump. Thump.
Strong, steady, without a trace of irregularity.
Gu Ye raised his hand.
His fingers were well-defined, the palm covered with a thin layer of calluses.
These were not the hands that had gripped scalpels year after year, pale and wrinkled from constant talcum powder.
Where was this?
Beneath him was a green canvas folding stool.
In front of him, an old desk with paint chipping off the edges.
Against the left wall stood a white metal-and-glass cabinet.
Inside, a sparse arrangement of iodine bottles, two rows of ranitidine, and several rolls of yellowed gauze.
The air carried no heavy stench of blood.
No sharp smell of formalin.
Only a faint trace of medical alcohol, mixed with the musty odor of military canvas.
Gu Ye rubbed his throbbing temples.
A buzzing filled his head.
Two completely different sets of memories slammed into each other.
The wall calendar had been torn to a new page.
September 15, 2008.
His first day assigned to the company as a new recruit.
He had been reborn.
Back to the year he turned twenty.
At this point in time, he was still a top clinical medicine student at the Provincial Medical University.
To compete for the department's only guaranteed graduate school slot, he had let his counselor talk him into applying for a two-year stint as a medic in a grassroots company.
The official line was "tempering himself at the grassroots level."
In reality, it was just padding his resume and biding his time.
In his previous life, on this very day, he had been hunched over this exact chipped desk.
Studying his thick anatomy textbook with desperate intensity.
Racking his brains over a several-thousand-word ideological report.
Gu Ye rubbed his face hard with both hands.
The rough palms left two red streaks across his cheeks.
He remembered how it had all ended last time.
That guaranteed slot—he had clawed his way to it.
After returning to the top-tier hospital, he had worked himself to the bone and become the youngest attending physician in the department.
And then?
Then came the endless, sunless hell.
The black-hearted hospital director, Li Dehai, with his round beer belly and imported cigar.
Blowing smoke rings directly into Gu Ye's face.
"Xiao Gu, you've got the steadiest hands in the department. Take on a few more of these high-difficulty surgeries, will you?"
"Young people should do more work. Suffering is a blessing."
Blessing my ass.
Li Dehai patted him on the shoulder, painted a grand picture, then turned and got into the Audi A6 parked downstairs.
Off to the golf course to schmooze with pharmaceutical reps.
Leaving Gu Ye alone, facing a surgery schedule packed wall-to-wall on the whiteboard.
Day shifts bleeding into night shifts, night shifts bleeding into back-to-back emergency surgeries.
He had lived like a surgical machine plugged into a wall socket.
In the seventy-two hours before his sudden death, he hadn't left the surgical building for three full days.
Running on eight cans of strong coffee.
Stomach acid churning in his gut, burning his esophagus raw.
During the final bypass surgery, he had just finished the last suture when his heart gave out completely.
At the moment he collapsed, he could even hear Li Dehai cursing on the phone in the hallway.
Not cursing that he had died.
Cursing that he had died at this critical moment, delaying the next VIP patient's surgery schedule.
To hell with the guaranteed slot!
To hell with Li Dehai!
To hell with being a surgical prodigy!
Gu Ye slammed his fist onto the chipped desk.
The enamel mug on top jumped, clattering sharply.
In this second life, if he walked that same twisted, soul-crushing road again, he'd be a complete and utter idiot.
What medical pinnacle? What healing the world?
If he was dead, who the hell was he healing?
Gu Ye stood up.
He looked down at the corner of the desk.
There, neatly pressed, lay a half-completed "Medical Graduate School Grassroots Recommendation Form."
In his previous life, he had treated this piece of paper as more precious than his own life.
Wiping it with his sleeve every day, terrified of creasing a corner.
Gu Ye reached out and pinched the edge of the paper.
Riiip—
The recommendation form was torn in half.
Then quarters, then eighths.
He crumpled the pieces into a ball and casually tossed it into the plastic trash bin behind the door.
The paper ball hit the bottom with a soft thud.
Satisfying.
Even his breathing felt smoother.
Gu Ye unzipped the green military duffel bag on the floor.
Inside were several textbooks thick as bricks.
Clinical Surgery. Atlas of Neurosurgical Procedures.
Gu Ye pulled the books out.
He walked to the desk and crouched down.
The front-right leg of this rickety old desk was missing a chunk, making it wobble.
He aligned the two medical tomes and wedged them under the desk leg.
He pressed down on the desktop firmly.
Mm. Steady as a mountain.
Now that was the best use for professional textbooks.
He continued rummaging through the duffel bag.
At the very bottom, his hand closed around a hard, cylindrical object.
A stainless steel thermos.
Printed on the side in red were the words "Serve the People."
His mother had shoved it into his bag at the last minute before he left.
In his previous life, he had thought it was too tacky and left it buried at the bottom of his pack.
Now, it seemed like the ultimate health-preserving treasure.
Gu Ye took the thermos and walked to the washroom outside the infirmary.
He turned on the rusty faucet.
Cold water rinsed over the stainless steel surface.
After washing it clean, he walked to the boiler room at the end of the hallway and filled it to the brim with scalding hot water.
Carrying the cup back to the infirmary.
He rummaged through the drawer beneath the metal cabinet.
His hand found a kraft paper bag.
He opened it. A large bag of Ningxia red goji berries. Leftover stock from the previous company medic.
Gu Ye grabbed a huge handful.
Without the slightest hesitation, he scattered them into the boiling water.
Ripples spread across the surface.
The shriveled red goji berries tumbled in the scalding water, slowly absorbing moisture and plumping up.
The clear water gradually turned a faint yellow.
A light, sweet fragrance wafted into the air.
Gu Ye pulled over the green canvas folding stool.
Placed it by the window.
The sun outside was just right.
Afternoon light streamed through the glass, warm against his skin.
Gu Ye plopped down.
He stretched his legs out, heels propped on the edge of the desk.
His back leaned against the white wall.
Now this was living.
Being a small medic in this border defense company—how comfortable.
No more massive surgeries involving cutting people open and removing organs.
The daily work was just handing out cold medicine and dabbing on mercurochrome.
New recruits scraped their skin during physical training—slap on a band-aid.
Veterans ate too much and got stomachaches—hand over two antacid tablets.
No wind, no rain.
Even the company's five-kilometer armed cross-country run didn't require him, the medic, to run himself ragged.
And the monthly allowance came on time, every month.
After two years of service, he'd take his discharge pay and go back home to open a small clinic.
Nine to five, closing on the dot, absolutely no overtime.
In this life, no one was ever going to get him back on an operating table.
The thermos was a bit hot to hold.
Gu Ye cradled it in both palms.
The heat spread from his palms through his entire body.
This warmth—it felt real.
He looked at the goji berries floating on the surface.
He brought the cup closer to his lips.
He blew gently across the top.
Steam rose against his face, carrying a moist warmth.
Gu Ye opened his mouth, ready to take the first sip of health tea in his new life.
BANG!
A thunderous crash.
The green-painted wooden door was violently kicked open.
The door panel slammed against the wall, sending flakes of plaster raining down.
Gu Ye's hand jerked.
The boiling water in the thermos sloshed, nearly splashing onto his crotch.
A figure like a black iron tower squeezed through the doorway.
It was Niu Dashan, platoon leader and squad leader of the new recruit company.
This man usually trained soldiers with a voice like a booming bell.
But now his face was twisted in pain, his thick black eyebrows knotted into a tight knot.
He hopped on one leg, the other suspended in the air, limping and jumping his way inside.
"Ah fuck, it hurts like hell..."
Niu Dashan hopped on one foot to the desk.
He dropped heavily onto the long wooden bench.
Both hands clutched his right foot, sucking in sharp breaths.
He looked up, sweat pouring down his face, and stared at Gu Ye.
"Gu Ye, stop spacing out!"
Niu Dashan pointed at the combat boot on his right foot.
His voice was laced with agitation.
"Hurry up and look at my foot—it's blistered!"
Gu Ye sighed.
He looked at the red goji berries bobbing up and down in his cup.
Steam curling upward.
That sip of tea, in the end, never made it to his mouth.
He set the thermos down gently on the desk.