I stood in a corner of the airport, silently watching the sky. An airplane flew overhead, disappearing into the clouds. I knew it was Lin Han’s flight; she was returning to Xi'an today.
Yu Xiaoluo walked over, handing me a cup of coffee. "Since you're so reluctant to let her go, why didn't you follow her? Lin Han is a great girl."
"Some mad dogs are clinging to me. If I don't take care of them, how can I have freedom in love?"
"That makes sense!"
I looked at Yu Xiaoluo, her face etched with weariness. She was still the same workaholic. If I weren't heading back to my family home in Beijing today, I wouldn't have had the heart to disturb her.
"Did you call your parents?"
"I did."
"What reason did you give?"
"I said I was held by people from a pyramid scheme."
Yu Xiaoluo burst into laughter. Watching this straightforward Beijing girl, I said with a sigh, "I'm sorry, sis! I came to Beijing for your wedding, but I never expected to ruin it."
The wedding banquet had long been booked, but because I went missing during that period, Luo Bo and Yu Xiaoluo focused all their efforts on finding me, and the wedding couldn't proceed as scheduled. I felt guilty about it.
"What are you talking about? Marriage doesn't necessarily require a wedding ceremony. By the way, we checked the Dongyang Psychiatric Hospital in Daxing District. It's legal and compliant."
"Legal and compliant?"
Hearing this, my face contorted.
"What couldn't you find? That private psychiatric hospital was established by Duan Shan in the early 1980s. It was originally called Dongyang Pet Clinic."
My scalp tingled. A clinic for pets had become a mental health facility. Was that considered a career change?
"This is..."
Duan Shan was a doctor who graduated from a health school in the 1970s. He was tired of working within the system. After the reform and opening up, like everyone else, he chose to venture out and opened a pet hospital in Daxing District, Beijing. In those days, pets weren't valued as they are now. The greatest fortune for a pet was to be able to eat its fill. Who would send their pets to a hospital? Duan Shan's novel idea didn't bring him revenue.
However, because Duan Shan was a neurologist, slowly, some people began to seek his medical advice under the guise of taking their pets for treatment.
After providing psychological counseling to these individuals, Duan Shan accumulated some funds, and in 1988, he opened his first mental health clinic. What was most unacceptable was that the following year, Duan Shan was diagnosed with a severe mental illness. His son, Duan Dongyang, who was studying abroad and also a psychologist, took over the clinic.
Duan Dongyang is 42 years old this year. His father sent him to study in the United States at the age of 18. In 1988, when Duan Shan established the mental health clinic, Duan Dongyang joined as an intern. By 1989, Duan Dongyang had become the chief physician of Dongyang Mental Health Clinic. By then, Duan Shan had already become one of the patients. It is said that Duan Dongyang was the one who truly founded the mental health clinic, and Duan Shan had fallen ill in 1988 but kept it secret.
In 1990, Duan Dongyang went to the United States to participate in an important experiment with his mentor. This is when it was revealed that Duan Shan, the legendary neighborhood psychologist, had been suffering from a severe mental illness the previous year. Although Dongyang Mental Health Clinic never closed, Duan Dongyang rarely returned to China. He followed his mentor until his mentor's death. In 1995, he opened a mental health clinic in the United States and became a renowned psychologist.
Recently, Duan Dongyang returned to Beijing, mainly for a wedding in April. When the police went to investigate him, he explained to them that being a psychologist was a common profession abroad, and a psychologist with hypnosis qualifications could not make someone kill another person, not even with drugs.
Hearing Yu Xiaoluo's explanation, I sneered, "This Duan Dongyang is truly extraordinary, pushing all blame onto others."
"Yes!"
"Then we won't investigate him."
"Last year, the leadership consulted Professor Wang Ren. Professor Wang Ren reasonably explained that hypnosis cannot control someone to kill. This concept doesn't exist anywhere in the world. Because of Professor Wang Ren's authority, the leadership ordered us to cease our investigation into Dongyang Mental Health Clinic."
I sighed, frustrated that there was no way to implicate Duan Dongyang.
"Is that it?"
"How could it be? The other day, when Luo Bo was in danger, I went to find Cao Qian and discovered she was preparing for her wedding. The groom is Duan Dongyang. I can sense a connection between Duan Dongyang and 'Logical Paradox,' but I can't find any proof."
Yu Xiaoluo looked troubled; she had been investigating this matter recently.
"What did Group Leader Wang say?"
"He said to investigate. He'll take responsibility if anything goes wrong. We didn't investigate Dongyang Mental Health Clinic, but the place where you were held. We traced the car you drove through the highway exit cameras."
I listened with some excitement. "Did you find that mental hospital? Is Li Xiaodong still there?"
"We didn't find it. By the time we got there, it had already been leveled and was being developed into a tourist site. They said they had never heard of any high walls and electric fences there."
Hearing this, I couldn't help but laugh in anger. "So, everything I said was because I was mentally unstable and talking nonsense?"
"Theoretically, yes. By the way, we found Li Xiaodong, the person you were looking for."
"Where is he?"
"At the Criminal Investigation Bureau. He's still being interrogated. Li Xiaodong said he was detained by a pyramid scheme organization."
"Isn't he talking nonsense?"
"We investigated based on what he said, and there is indeed a pyramid scheme organization that has detained quite a few people."
Hearing this, I sighed repeatedly. "This Duan Dongyang is truly not an ordinary person. In the end, I've been made out to be mentally ill. Only I am talking nonsense, while everyone else's statements have a basis."
Yu Xiaoluo nodded. That was the reality now.
"Sis, do you believe me?"
Upon hearing my question, Yu Xiaoluo slapped me casually, not even bothering to answer. She continued, "We can only start with Duan Dongyang now. His mentor is no ordinary person. He proposed the theory of left-brain and right-brain division of labor and conducted brain-cutting experiments on chimpanzees in 1961. Later, he proposed the chilling theory of split-brain individuals."
"Split-brain? What's that?"
Starting in the 1940s, scientists cut the corpus callosum in epileptic patients whose seizures were unresponsive to medication. This stopped the epileptic seizures, but it also severed communication between the two hemispheres of the brain, rendering them unable to interact or cooperate in actions, thus creating so-called "split-brain" individuals.
When scientists gave commands to the left brain of split-brain patients to raise their hands or bend their knees, the right side of the body obeyed, while the left side of the body did not respond. When the split-brain patients were blindfolded, if their left side was touched, they could not identify the touched area.
Scientists pieced together a picture by combining the left half of a young woman's photo with the right half of a child's photo. Then, they had the split-brain patient focus on the center of the composite image, with the left half of the photo in their left visual field and the right half in their right visual field. When asked what they saw, the patient's left hand pointed to the woman's photo, but their mouth said they saw the child's photo. Here, the left and right sides of the body acted independently, and thought became divided, as if two entirely different minds existed within one person. Based on this, scientists concluded that split-brain individuals possessed two consciousnesses and were two people.
I listened, stunned. I forgot to get into the car when we reached it, and instead asked Yu Xiaoluo, "Are these experiments legal?"
"Of course! However, Duan Dongyang is probably not limited to this. I heard he has secret laboratories in several countries overseas."
"Where does he get the money, just by being a psychologist?"
"We can't find that out. Duan Dongyang is not Chinese. He obtained a green card in 2000 and renounced his citizenship."
"He's also a traitor."
Yu Xiaoluo smiled. "Let's talk in the car."
She started the car, and we drove away from the airport. Yu Xiaoluo said as she drove, "Luo Bo consulted Professor Dong, a neurologist hired by Chang Dachun. Both your right brain and Lin Han's right brain have suffered varying degrees of drug-induced damage."
"Right brain?"
"Theoretically, the left brain is responsible for logic and the five senses, while the right brain is responsible for emotions and creativity. If the right brain is severely damaged, a person will lose their emotions. Similarly, a person with only a left brain will have greatly enhanced logical abilities and possibly partial memory loss. Also, intuition, dreams, subconsciousness, and sixth sense are all handled by the right brain."
I frowned. "If there's no intuition or subconsciousness, then the brain's defense mechanism that Professor Wang Ren talked about wouldn't exist. With damage to the right brain, as long as one knows simple hypnosis, they can control people to kill."
Yu Xiaoluo chuckled at my words. "I don't believe it, but that's what Luo Bo said. Your minds are too imaginative."
I remained silent. Not everyone could understand such ideas. It was true that Professor Wang Ren was an authority on psychological crime within the current police system, but his expertise did not reach the level of Duan Dongyang's mentor.
At that level, it should be Nobel Prize caliber. Their imaginative ideas could lead humanity in new directions.
I speculated that Duan Dongyang could use some method, possibly drugs, to damage a person's right brain, thereby transforming a normal person into a single-minded split-brain individual. Such a person would have stronger logical abilities, be susceptible to hypnosis, but would have lost their emotions.
Yu Xiaoluo, seeing my silence, smiled and said, "Luo Bo asked me to ask you, how do you plan to deal with Duan Dongyang?"
"Me?"
"The Criminal Investigation Bureau can't help this time, but we don't want scum like Duan Dongyang to continue harming people. So, Luo Bo and I have decided to be your pawns and send him to prison during his wedding."
I didn't agree, smiling. "Stop joking. Why would you, good police officers, be pawns?"
"You're going to go at it alone?"
"Aren't there enemies we can use?"
As I spoke, I glanced out the window. The scenery had changed from high-rise buildings to traditional and elegant streets, with courtyards!
"We've arrived, haven't we?"
"Yes!"
I had always known that Yu Xiaoluo had spent a lot of money to buy a siheyuan two years ago.
So, I wasn't surprised when we arrived. But when I pushed open the door and saw the lush plants and picturesque scenery, and then the four characters above the main hall, I was utterly stunned.
The plaque above the main hall read: Wende Xiaoyuan.