94: The number one scholar is really your son?! You can't play like this.

On this day, Beijiang City was shrouded in continuous dark clouds, looking as gloomy as if a torrential rain could fall at any moment.

People hurried back and forth on the streets.

Perhaps due to the low air pressure, no trace of joy could be seen on anyone's face, as gloominess enveloped them all.

Beijiang City First Hospital.

A car pulled to a stop.

Jiang Yuan and Li Mengzhu, who had changed into everyday attire, stepped out of the car.

"This is the First Hospital."

"Let's go."

The two of them walked toward the hospital.

By the roadside, a single-ponytail girl in a school uniform walked out of a bakery holding a newly bought piece of bread, and inadvertently caught a glimpse of Jiang Yuan's back, pausing slightly in surprise.

"Why does his back look a bit like that guy I met in the dungeon..."

Pei Jia recalled that handsome youth she had only met once, originally thinking he was just an ordinary examinee, but never expecting him to be so unimaginably powerful. He had defied all expectations all the way through, ultimately becoming a household-name national top scorer.

As the two figures walked into the hospital, Pei Jia withdrew her gaze.

"He is from Nanjing No. 1 Middle School, so it probably shouldn't be him. They just look a bit alike..."

If it really was him.

Then she would certainly need to express her gratitude properly.

It was both to thank him for the Topaz Honey he gave, and to thank him for protecting her younger sister in the Final Land...

According to her sister, the reason the few of them survived that catastrophe was entirely due to his presence.

"I wonder which university he will apply to," Pei Jia thought to herself.

She and her sister had already decided to go to Divine Martial University.

Although her own score was not quite enough, considering the preferential treatment given to a Genius, the admissions teacher from Divine Martial University still agreed to admit her as well.

If she applied to the same one as him, perhaps there would still be a chance to meet in the future.

...

Inside the hospital, shrouded by an invisible formation barrier, it was packed to capacity at this moment.

Even the corridors were filled with hospital beds.

Nurses hurried about, their faces filled with exhaustion.

Some young nurses had even gone without rest for three days and three nights straight, relying solely on stamina-restoring potions to sustain themselves.

Looking at the scene before him, Jiang Yuan couldn't help feeling a wave of emotion.

No wonder Mom always said she was so busy; she really was too busy to even catch a break.

"Are there really this many sick people in Beijiang City?" Jiang Yuan asked Li Mengzhu.

Li Mengzhu furrowed her brow tightly. "This is also my first time seeing so many patients."

"Although there have been a few explosions recently, the injured were all lightly wounded and should have recovered quickly."

"It seems a bit abnormal," Jiang Yuan said.

Li Mengzhu nodded. "I'll have someone investigate it thoroughly later."

A man shouted angrily, "Why is it still not my turn? I've been waiting for three hours!"

"Yeah, yeah, why do we have to wait so long?"

"Hurry up and process my hospital admission!"

Patients clashed and shouted with nurses and doctors.

The air was oppressive, and an indescribable sense of irritability slowly fermented, intensifying by the minute.

Jiang Yuan brushed past a running child in the corridor.

He suddenly stopped and turned his head to look.

Li Mengzhu asked, "What's wrong?"

The thought that had flashed through Jiang Yuan's mind suddenly vanished again, and no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't recall it.

He shook his head.

"It's nothing."

...

Inside the nurses' station:

"I... I can't take it anymore."

Nurse Mo Jie slumped limply into her chair.

Tao Chunru poured a potion into her mouth, wiped the sweat from her forehead, and regained a bit of energy.

"Hang in there a little longer. Once this wave of wounded gets past the critical period, we should be able to rest for a bit."

"No way, no way. If this continues, I feel like I'll drop dead on the spot. No matter how much overtime pay there is, you need your life to spend it," Mo Jie said in resignation.

Another nurse was also filled with puzzlement. "This is truly strange."

"How can so many people fall ill collectively, all with unknown causes and particularly severe symptoms..."

"It seems to have started about a week ago. More and more people have been coming to the hospital lately, and even professional Martial Artists have started showing up recently. Logically speaking, they rarely ever get sick."

"Could some kind of plague be spreading?" Mo Jie guessed.

"But Dr. Zhao has already run tests. He's a physician with a rare class who specializes in analyzing illnesses. Since even he says it's not a plague, then it probably isn't," Tao Chunru said with a bitter smile.

"Then could it be poison?"

"I don't think that's possible either. Toxicology tests would definitely pick it up, but right now, the illnesses the patients have are all ordinary symptoms..."

"But according to the latest checkups, aren't their hearts and other organs aging rapidly? Even casting Healing spells on them doesn't have much effect, and Purification is useless either."

"How annoying."

"Little Jiang, Patient No. 749's injuries are worsening."

"Head Nurse, I'll go right away."

The young nurse said, dragging her fatigued body to push open the door of the nurses' station, and saw a doctor standing at the doorway, behind whom stood a somewhat familiar black-haired youth and a long-haired older sister-type woman with sharp eyes and a fierce Aura.

The young nurse: "Dr... Dr. Zhao? Is there something you need?"

Dr. Zhao said, "Little Jiang, this is Captain Li from the Patrol Division. She wants to find Nurse Tao for something. Is she in?"

"The Patrol Division...?" The young nurse looked at Li Mengzhu in some surprise. "She's in, yes..."

She turned her head and shouted into the nurses' station, "Sister Tao, someone is looking for you."

The door opened.

Catching sight of Tao Chunru's figure.

Jiang Yuan called out with a bright smile:

"Mom."

Tao Chunru was stunned when she saw Jiang Yuan, and said, "Brother Yuan? Why are you here? Didn't I send you a message saying I was busy with something today and wouldn't be able to go back?"

"I..."

Before Jiang Yuan could finish his words,

a loud clatter came from inside the nurses' station as the tray held by a nurse dropped, shattering the healing potions into pieces.

She looked at Jiang Yuan with an expression of utter disbelief,

"The... The national number one?!"

"Isn't he that national number one Martial Dao top scorer?!"

"What?!"

Several nurses, including Mo Jie, sprang up abruptly from their chairs.

"He, he is..."

The young nurse also stared at Jiang Yuan dumbfounded, finally understanding the source of that familiar feeling.

It came precisely from the photos on the internet.

The black-haired youth before her was none other than the national top scorer who had sparked heated discussions online!

Mo Jie was so shocked that her eyeballs were practically about to pop out, her dazed and bewildered gaze darting back and forth between Jiang Yuan and Tao Chunru.

"Xiao... Xiao Tao? What did he just call you? Mom?"

"That's right, this is my son, Jiang Yuan," Tao Chunru introduced with a proud tone.

All the nurses gasped sharply, as if struck by lightning.

Mo Jie directly short-circuited, her brain turning completely blank.

Previously, she had even relied on her son Awakening a D-grade Awakening to mock Tao Chunru a few times, saying Tao Chunru's son couldn't compare to her own. Even though her son hadn't gotten into a martial arts university, with his talent he could at least be a security guard in the future. She had even offered to help Tao Chunru find a job for her son, and had even made fun of Tao Chunru because her son shared the same name as the Genius ranked first in points. To think that really was your son?!

Why didn't you say so earlier?!

We're all colleagues, isn't being on par with each other pretty good?

How is it that in the blink of an eye, your son suddenly turned into the national top scorer?

That was the top scorer, ah, the top scorer!

A peerless Prodigy who could only appear once a year!

For an ordinary family like yours, wouldn't getting into a tier-3 martial arts university have been enough? How on earth could you produce a top scorer?!

You can't just play like this...