463: Chapter 463 The best way to break the curse is to eliminate the opponent.

The VIP ward area on the top floor of the hospital has always been known for its privacy and quietness.

The corridor is covered with thick carpets, enough to absorb any noise.

However, at this moment, it appeared unusually noisy.

Nurses hurried past pushing instrument carts filled with syringes, medicine bottles, and monitors, bustling to deliver medicine and change IV drips for various wards.

The doors of one ward after another were pushed open from time to time, with doctors walking in and out with solemn expressions, talking in low voices.

Suppressed groans, painful cries, and anxious inquiries from Family members were mixed together, filling the entire floor with an atmosphere of panic.

Fang Cheng, Bailing, and Pan Wendi just walked out of the elevator when Lin Chuqiao immediately greeted them.

"You're finally back."

There was a hint of relief in her voice, and the tense expression on her face relaxed a bit.

"What's the situation?"

Fang Cheng swept his gaze over the chaotic scene before him and asked in a deep voice:

"Whose Family member in the Chen Family had an accident?"

"It's not just one person, it's many."

Lin Chuqiao turned her head slightly and looked at the brightly lit wards on both sides of the corridor.

Hearing this, Fang Cheng was slightly startled and looked in the direction of her gaze.

Through the glass window on the ward door, the scene inside could be vaguely seen.

Some patients lay on the beds, seemingly in a deep sleep, but their brows were tightly knitted, and their faces were full of pain.

Their exposed arms and calves were covered with dense red dots, as if they had been pricked by needles.

Other patients sat at the head of the bed with IV drips hanging on them, letting out a muffled groan from time to time.

Even though they were in severe pain, they didn't dare to change into a more comfortable posture to lie down.

Suddenly, heartbreaking cries came from a ward on the left.

A seven or eight-year-old boy suddenly sat up from the bed, as if having a nightmare, and cried out loudly:

"It hurts so much! It hurts so much! Mom, I don't want to sleep in bed, something is pricking me!"

A graceful and luxurious woman accompanied him by the bedside. With red eyes, she repeatedly and softly pacified the child.

Hearing the sound, the nurse immediately ran in and skillfully injected a tranquilizer into the boy.

Second Young Master Chen Xuan was also in the ward.

He stood by the bedside, placing one hand on the boy's shoulder to comfort him softly, his eyes filled with hard-to-conceal anxiety.

However, his other hand hanging by his side was clenched tightly into a fist, and the veins on the back of his hand were taut.

From the woman's address to Second Young Master Chen Xuan, it could be heard that this boy was none other than the son of the Chen Family's eldest Young Master, Chen Qirong, which meant he was his own biological nephew.

Fang Cheng frowned slightly, withdrew his gaze from the ward, and looked at Lin Chuqiao:

"Did these people also fall victim to Needle Sorcery?"

Lin Chuqiao nodded:

"Not long after you left, the Chen Family members guarding outside the Old Madam's ward began to show symptoms one after another, first complaining of body pain, and collapsing to the ground shortly after."

"The onset of symptoms is very similar to the Old Madam's. Although not as severe as hers, the doctors have checked for a long time and remain helpless."

"They even suspect this is a rare, genetically-related familial cluster infectious disease, and are discussing whether to report it to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention."

Lin Chuqiao paused and added:

"Those collateral relatives were afraid of being implicated and all left on various pretexts. Even that Chen Qiming saw the situation was bad and was the first one to slip away in fright."

Hearing this, Bailing's face turned pale in a flash, and she suddenly thought of a possibility:

"Then... We ate the food made by the Chen Family last night, and drank the water from their house, could we also have been inflicted with sorcery..."

"Very likely, oh!"

Pan Wendi leaned over, deliberately lowering his voice, and spoke in a weird, sarcastic tone:

"The documentary I watched last night said that some sorcerers mix corpse oil with insect eggs and secretly put them in food."

"Once those bugs burrow into your stomach, you won't feel anything at first, but when they act up, they will gnaw away all your internal organs from the inside out..."

"Wendi!"

Lin Chuqiao glared at him fiercely.

Pan Wendi immediately shrugged, made a gesture of "I'll shut up," and tactfully retreated to the side.

"Needle Sorcery is different from ordinary poison sorcery or Gu sorcery."

Seeing Bailing's face pale and her lips trembling, Lin Chuqiao softened her tone to explain:

"Don't listen to his wild scaremongering. Needle Sorcery is different from ordinary poison sorcery and Gu sorcery. To avoid being detected, the practitioner must deliver the Materials for the 'sorcery needles' into the victim's body over a long period and in small doses, and it only erupts through accumulation."

"Even if there really was a problem with what we ate last night, with the physical fitness of us practitioners, that little dosage would have been metabolized long ago, and it couldn't possibly harm us at all."

She paused and slowly swept her gaze across the wards:

"These people from the Chen Family obviously lived in that environment for a long time and unknowingly accumulated the dosage, which is why their symptoms erupted collectively."

Hearing this, Bailing finally breathed a sigh of relief and patted her chest.

Lin Chuqiao turned to look at the thoughtful Fang Cheng and continued:

"So far, a total of nine people have fallen ill. I just checked their identities, and they are all direct members who just came out of the Chen Family's Secret Realm."

"The culprit clearly seized this opportunity to strike at them."

Hearing this, Fang Cheng's eyes flashed:

"The culprit previously targeted individual targets, but now suddenly launched a large-scale action. What is his purpose?"

"I guess he likely learned of our plan to officially act tomorrow, sensed the threat, and therefore struck early to weaken the Chen Family's living force and deprive us of assistance."

Lin Chuqiao gazed intently at Second Young Master Chen Xuan in the ward and then stated her speculation.

"Isn't this guy too ruthless?"

Pan Wendi couldn't help chiming in again:

"Lifting a vicious hand against his own compatriots and relatives, turning everything upside down and making so many people fall victim—even if he eventually becomes the head of the Family, what's the point of facing such a mess?"

"Precisely because he had to cast spells on multiple people simultaneously, his power was dispersed, so the damage caused by the sorcery to each person is limited."

Lin Chuqiao explained while observing the scene inside the ward:

"Look, although those people from the Chen Family are in great pain, there is no fatal danger. The culprit's purpose might simply be to restrict their mobility."

"No, you missed a crucial point."

Fang Cheng pondered for a long time and suddenly spoke:

"If the culprit is Second Young Master Chen Xuan, he is already the actual power holder of the Chen Family now, and the Old Madam, the only person who could check him, has now been hospitalized."

"With Second Young Master Chen Xuan's current status, he could completely mobilize all the power of the Chen Family to deal with us foreign investigators."

Fang Cheng paused, swept his gaze over the three of them, and further analyzed:

"Even if things are exposed tomorrow and the secret is revealed, he has plenty of ways to frame others."

"After all, the Chen Family disciples all take orders from him now, and compared to us outsiders, they are definitely more willing to believe what he says."

"Yet he went the opposite way and sent all his own helpers to the hospital."

Fang Cheng rubbed his chin, his tone full of confusion.

"This operation simply doesn't make sense logically..."

"That's right!"

Bailing also reacted, her eyes instantly lighting up:

"I remember he said before that he would dispatch Chen Family experts to cooperate with us. Doing this now, isn't he cutting off his own arms?"

Second Young Master Chen Xuan, who used to be the number one suspect, seemed to have been cleared of suspicion a bit more in her heart.

"I've been pondering this question too."

Lin Chuqiao rubbed her brow and bit her lower lip gently:

"What Second Young Master Chen Xuan is doing right now simply cannot be explained by common sense, unless... he has completely gone mad."

"Mad?"

Bailing looked at the gentle and refined man in the ward who was still comforting his nephew, unable to connect him with a "madman" no matter what.

The four of them said no more and fell into a brief silence.

No matter how they speculated, they always failed to bypass a core question.

If Second Young Master Chen Xuan was really the culprit, then his behavioral logic was self-contradictory everywhere.

The cries and conversations coming from the ward still drifted into their ears continuously, making the surrounding air seem a bit heavy.

"Let's not talk about this for now."

Lin Chuqiao shook her head, temporarily casting aside her full mind of doubts, and turned her gaze to Fang Cheng:

"What clues did you find when you returned to the Chen Family Manor?"

Fang Cheng gathered his thoughts and then roughly recounted the mysterious corpse-storing building, the coffins and ancestral tablets piled inside, as well as the bizarre divine statue and the old man's corpse in the basement.

After listening, Lin Chuqiao furrowed her brows tightly:

"As far as I know, although aristocratic families emphasize returning fallen leaves to their roots, they would never store the remains of past ancestors in a living residence for a long time."

"After Family members die, they are generally buried in the Legacy Secret Realm. Their bones and Souls will become part of the Secret Realm, which in turn nourishes the Bloodline of the entire Family."

"What the Chen Family is doing is indeed very bizarre and abnormal."

Hearing Lin Chuqiao's analysis, Fang Cheng nodded slightly.

The reason he came back to discuss this with Lin Chuqiao was precisely because he valued her profound knowledge and understanding of these aristocratic Family secrets.

Subsequently, Fang Cheng also stated his own guess:

"I suspect that the purpose of Crow and the Professor coming to Tiannan Province is related to some unspeakable secret of the Chen Family."

"The Chen Family's secret?"

Lin Chuqiao chewed on these words, rapidly searching her mind for various records concerning aristocratic Family Legacy.

"Perhaps the Chen Family's Secret Realm is rather special? Or... that corpse-storing building is specifically built as the entrance to the Secret Realm?"

Despite saying this, she herself had no confidence; her brows remained furrowed, obviously deep in thought for a long time without reaching a definitive conclusion.

Fang Cheng's eyes flickered as he pondered inwardly.

He always felt that the secret hidden by the Chen Family was not as simple as a "special Secret Realm".

The key to unlocking the mystery probably still lay on the eccentric divine statue in the basement and the mysterious old man's corpse.

Just at this moment, the door of the ward not far away was gently pulled open a crack from the inside.

Second Young Master Chen Xuan was bowing his head, talking to the doctor inside about something, looking like he was about to come out.

Fang Cheng's eyes narrowed slightly, and a plan quickly took shape in his mind.

"I'm going to show my cards to Second Young Master Chen Xuan right now and see how he responds."

With that, he lifted his steps and walked towards that ward.

"What?"

Lin Chuqiao was startled upon hearing this and instinctively reached out to grab his arm:

"Fang Cheng, wait..."

Her meaning was very clear.

This was the Chen Family's territory. Directly falling out with the opponent without preparation carried huge risks.

In case Second Young Master Chen Xuan really was the mastermind and still had some undisclosed trump card hidden up his sleeve,

The few of them would likely fall into a passive position on the spot, or even be trapped in Tiannan Province, making it difficult to get away.

Pan Wendi also hurried over and said:

"Isn't this too hasty? If negotiations break down, we haven't even found a retreat path yet."

Bailing clenched the corner of her clothes and added in a low voice:

"Yeah, Big Boss, Second Young Master Chen Xuan might have experts hidden around him. Should we think about this carefully..."

Fang Cheng turned his head, swept his gaze over the two of them, then let it fall on Lin Chuqiao's beautiful eyes full of worry, smiled slightly, and asked in return:

"Don't you trust me?"

This sentence was spoken once again, not loud, but carrying the power to steady people's hearts.

Lin Chuqiao gazed at his calm and bright eyes, stunned for a few seconds, and the hand holding his arm slowly loosened.

The worry in her eyes quickly faded, eventually turning into a gentle, soft smile on the corner of her lips.

Although faint, that smile possessed the absolute trust of "Since you have decided, I will accompany you".

Fang Cheng straightened his expression, then said to his three companions in a deep voice, stating his reasons:

"Haven't you heard a saying? The best way to lift a sorcery is to find the person who cast it and eliminate them..."

While speaking, with a "creak", the ward door was completely pulled open.

Second Young Master Chen Xuan walked out looking exhausted, raised his hand to rub his brow, and swept his gaze casually across the corridor, but paused when he caught sight of Fang Cheng and the others.

Clearly, he hadn't expected the few of them to still be guarding here.

Fang Cheng's gaze also met his calmly, a trace of sharpness hidden in the depths of his eyes.

Originally, he had planned to wait until tomorrow to take action, but the opponent's successive moves and step-by-step pressing posture made him realize that he could no longer wait.

The longer time dragged on, the more thoroughly the enemy would prepare.

Fang Cheng knew very well in his heart.

He was neither Sherlock Holmes nor had any interest in playing cat-and-mouse games with the rats hiding in the dark amidst a fog of mystery.

The current situation was intricate and complicated, making it hard to discern true from false.

His uncle had been missing for days, his life or death unknown; every minute wasted increased the danger by a fraction.

Instead of passively guessing and analyzing here, being led by the nose by the opponent, it was better to directly flip the table!

Using the simplest and most violent way to show cards with all hidden enemies.

See whose trump cards were harder, whose fists were bigger.

Then decide who would take the initiative in this game!

Facing Second Young Master Chen Xuan's puzzled gaze, Fang Cheng took a step forward and said in a clear voice:

"Young Master Chen, our team's reinforcements have arrived, and we have just scouted out the place where the culprit is hiding."

His voice echoed clearly in the corridor.

Hearing this, the remaining few relatives of the Chen Family who hadn't left cast their gazes at Fang Cheng, this "outsider", their faces showing astonishment or confusion.

Second Young Master Chen Xuan's pupils shrank slightly, and he stared closely at Fang Cheng, seeming to want to distinguish the truth or falsehood of this statement from his expression.

"What did you say?"

He asked instinctively, his voice somewhat out of tune.

Fang Cheng didn't answer, only looking into his eyes calmly.

Second Young Master Chen Xuan quickly glanced at the probing gazes cast from around and immediately realized this wasn't the place to talk.

With decisive action, he stepped forward, and as he passed by Fang Cheng, he lowered his voice and said:

"The three of you, please follow me."

Fang Cheng did not refuse, giving Lin Chuqiao and Bailing a look to signal them to follow behind.

The two of them understood tacitly and walked together with Fang Cheng and Second Young Master Chen Xuan toward an empty lounge not far away.

Pan Wendi scratched his head and quickly followed as well.

Because according to Fang Cheng's words, he seemed to be that "reinforcement".

"Bang!"

The door was heavily shut and locked.

Inside the lounge, Second Young Master Chen Xuan let go of his hand and paced back and forth twice, seeming to calm his excited emotions.

He turned around abruptly, his bloodshot eyes staring fixedly at Fang Cheng, lowering his voice and asking word by word:

"Where on earth did you guys go just now?!"

(End of chapter)