Hospital 444

Today at five in the afternoon is the final deadline.

For some reason, Yueyin had a very intense feeling of unease.

And this feeling of unease, as time went on, grew stronger and stronger.

"You, come here a moment."

Out of nowhere, the manager called Yueyin over.

"Manager, what’s the matter?"

Upon entering the office, the manager stared at Yueyin and said, "Xiao Jiang..."

"Manager, my last name isn’t Jiang..."

But Yueyin’s voice was too soft, and it seemed the manager did not hear her, continuing to say, "Your internship period is almost up. Have you considered staying with us?"

"Manager?" This made Yueyin overjoyed, naturally she did not correct the last name issue.

"But," the manager stood up, leaned close to Yueyin, and staring at a spot just below her neck, said, "if you want to stay, you need to consider, what kind of ride you’ll take."

"Ah?" Yueyin was bewildered, "I, I live close to the workplace, I can just walk..."

"Xiao Jiang, who’s talking about that? I’m asking you, do you prefer to ride the bus that goes to the kindergarten or the one that doesn’t go to the kindergarten?"

At this point, Yueyin felt a sudden chill in her heart!

"Manager, I, I don’t understand what you mean, um, I still have work, if there’s nothing else, I’ll be leaving first."

The manager showed a disappointed expression and said, "Fine. Since you’ve made your choice, let it be."

After leaving the manager’s office, Yueyin felt nauseated all over.

Clearly, she would definitely not be able to continue her internship here.

Returning to her own desk, she began to feel dizzy.

Looking at the computer in front of her, Yueyin no longer had any desire to work. She truly wanted to just walk away, now, immediately.

Finally, the end of the workday was approaching. And at this moment, less than thirty minutes remained until five, the final deadline.

Just then, she suddenly felt a hand grab her shoulder!

She jumped in fright, turned her head, and saw that it was the manager!

"Manager Xiang," Yueyin’s body curled into a ball, "what, what do you want to do?"

"If you change your mind, tomorrow before the end of work is your last chance," Manager Xiang continued, "Remember that."

Then, the manager turned and walked away.

At this moment, Yueyin felt a wave of cold terror and couldn’t sit still any longer.

She grabbed her bag and rushed out.

Absenteeism be damned; she couldn’t continue this job anyway. At worst, they would dismiss her internship; she could return to school and slowly look for a new internship.

Yueyin dashed out of the company’s main entrance, not even wanting to wait for the elevator, and started running down the stairs directly.

But at that very moment, she heard a voice behind her.

"Hey, where are you going? It’s still working hours!"

Upon hearing this, Yueyin looked up to see Manager Xiang chasing her down from the upper stairs.

Lately, the company was short-staffed, and the boss might notice if an intern just left.

Clearly, he was worried that if his own intern ran off like this without explanation, it would be bad if the boss later asked about it and the incident got out.

"Get lost!"

Yueyin immediately ran downstairs.

"What did you just say to me?"

Suddenly, she heard a scream from above.

Looking up, she saw Manager Xiang slip, his balance gone awry, and he fell down the stairs!

Tumbling down the staircase steps, his head then violently struck the floor!

The sheer horror of this scene scared Yueyin out of her wits.

This, this...

Her mind went blank for a good five or six seconds before she came to her senses: she had to call 120!

Yueyin frantically pulled out her phone to quickly dial 120 when suddenly she discovered something horrifying.

Manager Xiang’s head began to bleed profusely!

And this blood, in front of her, started to slowly form...

Words!

Yes, words!

Yueyin turned on her phone’s flashlight and shone it over, and she could see clearly, it was truly a series of words!

This...

These words were— 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

"Three minutes left."

How could this be possible?

She immediately checked her phone, and the current time was exactly 4:57 PM!

Indeed... there were three minutes left until 5 PM!

In just an instant, more blood flowed out, completely washing away the original text.

But Yueyin had already seen the words clearly just before.

"What, what, what is this?"

She then dialed 120 with trembling fingers.

"Hello, hello, hello... There’s someone injured here... Ah, the address? The address is..."

It took her quite a while to recite the entire address, and then she remained trembling on the spot. That’s when she suddenly remembered... the last warning given by the blood!

Only one minute left!

After that minute, it would be...

Right at that moment, she suddenly heard a ringtone coming from the manager’s phone.

She promptly pulled out his phone and saw the caller ID showing "Son".

She had heard of the manager having a son, and he was exactly... five years old!

So she immediately answered the call.

"Hello, daddy?"

Hearing the voice on the other end of the phone, she quickly said, "Are you Manager Xiang’s son? I, I’m your dad’s subordinate. Your dad has fallen down the stairs and hit his head!"

"Ah, you, you’re lying!"

"I’m telling the truth, he, he has a lot of blood flowing from the back of his head, so much blood!"

"You, you’re talking nonsense, talking complete nonsense! Mom, mom!"

Finally...

She heard the child’s cries from the other end of the phone!

At that moment, the time was exactly 5 PM!

...

It wasn’t until after 10 PM that she left the police station. After all, there were no surveillance cameras in the area where the incident occurred, and considering her abnormal early departure from work, the police questioned her. Of course, she repeated what Manager Xiang had said to her, but this only made her appear to have a clear motive for hurting him. The misunderstanding wasn’t cleared until information came from the hospital that Manager Xiang had woken up.

Because the incident wasn’t exactly honorable, after Manager Xiang clarified the situation for her, it was naturally implied that she should not spread the story around.

However, for Yueyin at this particular moment, something far more terrifying occurred to her.

The balloon... might not be some reality show gimmick after all!

When she got home and looked at the red balloon, her heart plunged into turmoil.

She remembered clearly at the time, the blood definitely had formed those five characters!

Could it be that this balloon was really akin to a wish-granting genie like in Aladdin’s lamp?

She immediately turned on her computer and started searching for clues related to things like "red balloon". But after a long search, she found nothing.

Afterward, she turned back to look at the red balloon.If it really could grant wishes...

When the red balloon returned again, apart from the content about the "price", there was also a wish paper.

She gritted her teeth, looked at the wish paper, then took up a pen, her heart pounding fiercely.

The person who surfaced in her mind was Lan Ying.

When she first met him, they were both high school seniors facing the college entrance exam. After hearing his choice of university, Yueyin buckled down and crammed, and to her surprise, she managed—with a whisker to spare—to cross the minimum admission scoreline for the university she’s attending now, thus allowing her to enter the same university as him.

But she never dared to confess her feelings to him, and just like that, time had reached their senior year of college, just before graduation.

She couldn’t deny that she sensed Lan Ying probably didn’t harbor romantic feelings for her.

Most importantly, she always suspected that her best friend Peipei might also like Lan Ying. Although she claimed to have no interest in football, that was probably just a cover. Yueyin felt that with Peipei’s personality, she might truly dare to confess to him before they graduated.

Could it truly fulfill all wishes?

Even those that seemed to require supernatural powers to come true?

But, to use such supernatural powers to fulfill a wish...

"The price... the price..."

A lipstick worth over ten thousand, the price was making a child cry.

So, what would be the price to pay for a wish like this... for Lan Ying to fall in love with her?

While pondering this question, her hand involuntarily began writing down her wish on the paper.

In the end, she swiftly placed it back into the envelope, tied it to the balloon, and released the balloon outside the window, fearing that another second’s delay would bring about regret.

The red balloon floated higher and higher in the sky until it finally disappeared completely from view...