Yan Feifan and Wang Chuan drove to No. 427, Binhe South Road, and found a decently upscale Chinese restaurant.
A waiter led Wang Chuan directly into a private room.
As for Yan Feifan, he was guided to a secluded two-person table in the main dining hall.
"Mr. Yan, our Shredded Three Delicacies, Crab Roe Tofu, and Smoked Fish are quite good!"
Worried and with little appetite, Yan Feifan listened to the waiter’s enthusiastic recommendations and said casually, "Alright, I’ll have those three. Add any vegetable dish and a soup to go with them."
"Of course, Mr. Yan. Please wait a moment!"
While waiting for his food, a bored Yan Feifan noticed that of the fifteen tables in the main hall, only six were sparsely occupied.
The fullest table only had five people.
It was after seven o’clock on a Friday night, which should have been the busiest time for dinner service.
’With business this slow,’ Yan Feifan thought, ’the food here can’t be that good.’
Then another thought occurred to him. If this was a secret base for a certain government department, then it all made sense.
’This place doesn’t need to turn a profit. In fact, if business were too good or the restaurant became too famous, it would interfere with its primary function...’
Yan Feifan let his mind wander for about ten minutes before the waitress brought over the three dishes she had recommended. She also brought Shiitake with Bok Choy, Mouth-Watering Chicken, a meatball soup, and two bowls of rice.
Furthermore, a long-haired girl in her twenties, about 1.7 meters tall and fairly pretty, walked right up and sat down across from him.
Yan Feifan watched as the girl smiled at him, then unceremoniously picked up her chopsticks and started eating.
After his initial surprise, Yan Feifan couldn’t help but ask, "Who... who are you? Do we know each other?"
The girl swallowed the food in her mouth, took a couple of sips of the meatball soup, and straightened her posture.
"Hello, Mr. Yan. I’m Li Yun."
The girl introduced herself, then continued, "The General asked me to come and eat with you, so you wouldn’t feel awkward eating alone."
"Also, the General said that from now on, I’ll be your direct point of contact."
"After all, the General has many matters to attend to and sometimes isn’t available to communicate with you directly."
"Mr. Yan, I’ll be on call for you twenty-four hours a day."
Yan Feifan gave a soft "oh," realizing the pot-bellied General had just pawned him off on this low-ranking soldier.
He scoffed inwardly and said, "I’m just a doctor. I won’t be bothering you unless it’s for something serious."
Yan Feifan added, "And frankly, I have no desire to get any more entangled with you people."
With that, he picked up his chopsticks and started eating as well.
As soon as he took a bite, Yan Feifan couldn’t help but nod lightly.
The dishes were actually quite good, comparable to the work of a five-star chef.
This made him curious, and he couldn’t resist asking, "The food is excellent. Why are there so few customers?"
"Are the prices too high?"
Li Yun smiled faintly. "Mr. Yan, these dishes were personally prepared by the head chef."
"What ordinary customers eat is usually made by the other cooks."
Yan Feifan understood.
It was a restaurant with two different standards, one for insiders and one for outsiders—just like the exclusive dining room for hospital leadership located above the main cafeteria. It was all about preferential treatment.
The delicious food eased much of Yan Feifan’s worry about Wang Chuan, greatly improving his appetite.
After finishing two bowls of rice, he got a third.
By this time, Li Yun was already full.
She watched Yan Feifan with great interest as he continued to eat.
"Mr. Yan, I know you’re known as a genius doctor and that your medical skills are incredible."
"I’d like to ask, Mr. Yan, do you know of a way to make someone develop a mental illness without them realizing it?"
Li Yun added, "The kind where a hospital wouldn’t be able to detect any foul play, and which wouldn’t cause significant damage after being cured?"
Yan Feifan asked for confirmation, "You mean inducing a mental illness in someone through artificial means?"
Li Yun nodded in confirmation.
Yan Feifan asked tentatively, "You must have access to powerful hallucinogens, right?"
Li Yun smiled and answered evasively, "It can’t be detectable as man-made, the symptoms of the mental illness must be obvious, and it needs to be long-lasting."
"Most importantly, after treatment, the damage to the person must be minimal, or at least controllable."
Li Yun met Yan Feifan’s gaze and asked, "Mr. Yan, do you know of such a perfect, untraceable method?"
"I’m a doctor. I only save people, I don’t harm them," Yan Feifan said, his tone cold.
Li Yun paid no mind to his cold attitude. Instead, her face lit up with excitement as she asked, "Mr. Yan, you can do it, can’t you?"
Yan Feifan ignored her and went back to eating his meal.
Li Yun hesitated for a moment, then said slowly, "Mr. Yan, I’m not asking this question because I want you to harm someone."
"Let me put it this way: we have a target of interest."
Li Yun elaborated, "He was originally a very healthy individual, with no family history of hereditary mental illness."
"But in recent months, this guy has started experiencing hallucinations and mental confusion."
"His hallucinations are making him violent."
"As time goes on, his hallucinations and violent symptoms are becoming more and more pronounced."
"More than one psychiatric expert has diagnosed him with schizophrenia. However, antipsychotic drug treatments have had very little effect on him."
"We’ve also ruled out the possibility that he’s faking it."
"We strongly suspect that his psychosis was induced by someone using drugs or other methods."
"But we can’t figure out how it was done."
"Mr. Yan, can you help us solve this puzzle?"
Yan Feifan said lightly, "Have you ever considered that he might have just developed schizophrenia naturally, like catching a cold or a fever?"
Li Yun retorted, "Then why have targeted antipsychotic treatments had no effect on him at all?"
"If treatment were always effective," Yan Feifan said sarcastically, "then there wouldn’t be so many psychiatric patients locked up in asylums all over the country."
Li Yun said a bit sheepishly, "Mr. Yan, this individual’s status is somewhat... special. We need to confirm whether he truly has an incurable case of schizophrenia."
Yan Feifan nodded with a hint of understanding. "Psychiatric disorders aren’t my specialty."
"How about this: you can send me the guy’s detailed medical records, and I’ll try to analyze them."
Li Yun shook her head. "Mr. Yan, he’s not in our custody. We only have a general understanding of his condition."