The girl was stunned.
"Who am I?"
Huo Guining laughed.
"Why are you asking me about myself now?"
The girl changed the subject: "What happened to your dad? Why does he need you to save him?"
Huo Guining fell silent.
After a while, she said: "Nothing's happened to him, but I'm afraid something will."
After all, that was the ending written in the book.
The Huo family going bankrupt, and Huo Xiaozheng ultimately meeting an accidental death.
Although Huo Xiaozheng had loved the wrong person, he didn't deserve to die.
Even though she had only interacted with Huo Xiaozheng for just over a month, he wasn't an utterly despicable person.
Moreover, she quite liked this father.
If she could choose her birth, she'd be quite willing to choose Huo Xiaozheng as her father.
The girl asked curiously: "Why are you worried something will happen to him?"
Huo Guining replied matter-of-factly: "Because he's always entangled with Jiang Suyuan and Qin Zhiyi."
She relaxed and rolled over on the grass, hearing the babbling of the stream nearby, its tinkling sounds mingling with birdsong, making one feel particularly at ease.
The girl asked: "What does Huo Xiaozheng potentially getting into trouble have to do with Jiang Suyuan and Qin Zhiyi? Are you worried they'll harm your father?"
Huo Guining became somewhat wary: "What's wrong with you? You're not like yourself. How come you don't know anything?"
The girl's tone was a bit hurt: "I haven't been feeling well lately, so..."
Huo Guining thought of her own body and suddenly felt guilty: "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to, but..."
The scene at the Qin house suddenly played out before her eyes. In the blink of an eye, the blue sky, white clouds, and grass all vanished.
A fleeting image of Qin Zhiyi and Jiang Suyuan speaking harshly to her flashed by, replaced by a scene of ruins after a fire.
In the vast garden, a great fire raged.
No leaves, no flowers, no fruits.
Only charred branches remained, standing lonely in place, waiting for the wildfire to spread.
The girl stood barefoot on the ruins, a solitary figure in the distance.
Seeing Huo Guining look over, she shook her head and turned away.
The fire had not yet died down, and thick smoke choked the air, making Huo Guining cough uncontrollably.
"Cough, cough, cough..."
The ruins before her eyes gradually disappeared, and the world plunged into darkness.
"Beep, beep, beep, beep"
A series of urgent alert sounds rang out.
The nurse immediately came forward to check: "Tachycardia!"
The doctor came over with a stethoscope: "How's the blood pressure?"
"Blood pressure is fine."
"Give her the medication."
Shortly after administering the drug, the heart monitor showed that the heart rate had returned to normal.
The doctor exhaled and waved to the people nearby: "It's alright now."
In the VIP ward, Shen Shiyan stood by the bed and nodded to his colleague upon hearing this.
The medical staff left the room.
Shen Shiyan turned to look at Huo Xiaozheng, who was planting himself on a stool by the bed: "How do you feel about it?"
Huo Xiaozheng looked as if his anger hadn't fully subsided. He coldly glanced at the other person in the room: "I don't feel good about it."
Xie Lingluo stepped out from the shadows: "This method was indeed a bit risky."
Shen Shiyan agreed: "It was risky, but it seems to have worked."
Huo Xiaozheng didn't argue.
After Ningning was admitted to the ICU, her vital signs gradually stabilized.
However, three days had passed, and she still showed no signs of regaining consciousness.
On the few occasions when she hazily opened her eyes, her consciousness remained foggy.
She didn't know where she was, and her responses to conversations were incoherent.
Seeing that this situation couldn't continue, Shen Shiyan contacted Xie Lingluo, hoping to find a breakthrough from her side.
Considering that Ningning's vital signs were now stable, and she occasionally woke up, able to vaguely understand part of what others were saying,
Xie Lingluo suggested starting hypnotherapy directly.
Huo Xiaozheng asked: "Will it be dangerous?"
What was it that Xie Lingluo had said at the time?
"Of course there are risks, but at worst, it's better than Ningning just lying here indefinitely, between life and death."
Huo Xiaozheng didn't immediately agree.
He looked at Ningning on the bed, her once rosy lips now colorless, and the little weight she had managed to gain had all been lost in these three days.
Her breathing was shallow and slow, lying there, unaware of the passage of time.
The news of Ningning's hospitalization couldn't be kept from Old Master Huo.
When he heard that Ningning's incident had occurred at the Qin house, the elderly Old Master Huo, without anyone's support, angrily stormed over and berated Old Mr. Qin viciously.
While Huo Xiaozheng was at the hospital, Xi Chuan handled company matters.
Occasionally, when decisions couldn't be made, Old Master Huo would step in directly.
His way of doing things was identical to Huo Xiaozheng's, if not more extreme.
In the past, he had looked down on his son for relentlessly pursuing the Jiang family because of Qin Zhiyi.
Now, he was acting even more outrageously than Huo Xiaozheng.
"Cut off all cooperation with the Jiang and Qin families. Spread the word that as long as the Huo family exists, the Jiang and Qin families will have no place to stand in South City."
Xi Chuan wiped his sweat, thinking that just as Mr. Huo had recovered, the old man had now fallen ill.
Huo Xiaozheng didn't care about this.
By the fourth day, Ningning's condition showed no improvement.
In fact, the instances of her hazily regaining consciousness became less frequent.
Huo Xiaozheng: "Would it be better to send Ningning to a hospital abroad?"
Shen Shiyan: "It might be. But in Ningning's current condition, she can't endure a long flight."
"Let's try it," Shen Shiyan urged. "I promise you, with me here, Ningning's condition won't get any worse than it is now."
Huo Xiaozheng looked at Shen Shiyan: "What can you use to promise me?"
Shen Shiyan was stunned.
Not because of Huo Xiaozheng's unreasonable questioning, but because this was the first time he had seen an expression resembling pleading on Huo Xiaozheng's face.
The day Huo Xiaozheng was rejected by Qin Zhiyi, he found Shen Shiyan, and the two of them dug out Old Master Huo's aged wine in the underground cellar of the Huo family's old mansion.
Even at that time, Huo Xiaozheng had controlled himself, only allowing himself one more glass than usual.
At the end, it was still Huo Xiaozheng who sent Shen Shiyan home.
In Shen Shiyan's heart, Huo Xiaozheng had always been the epitome of rationality.
He believed in human triumph over nature more than any vain prayers or hopes.
But at this moment, for his daughter, he had surrendered.
Shen Shiyan's nose tingled a bit, and he cleared his constricted throat.
Trying to sound casual but with a firm tone, he said: "I promise you with my 'reputation' and 'ability' as a genius doctor who chose pediatrics and has practiced medicine until now."
Huo Xiaozheng compromised.
Since that snowy night when he personally helped Ningning up, this day's compromise was inevitable.
At this point, he thought: Even if it fails, it doesn't matter. There will be many, many people who will accompany his daughter in death. It doesn't matter.
