Enforcer Manual
Chapter 706 - 704: Born as a Human_1

Chapter 706: Chapter 704: Born as a Human_1

"Dr. Lucy, if you haven’t lied to me and all this is just a hallucination of my imagination, then in that case, you won’t get hurt either, right?"

As he spoke, Orman raised his right hand, which had been modified into a pistol, and aimed at the center of Lucy’s forehead. He seemed completely oblivious to the approaching Law Enforcers, and blind to the members of the heavily armed response team who had leapt from the armored floating car and were about to rush into the ground floor of the hospital.

"Wait a second, Orman."

"I can’t wait any longer, they’re pushing me!"

Orman raised his voice, he pressed the trigger without hesitation, "Dr. Lucy, you weren’t wrong, the sight of a person’s head blowing up is just so relieving! Oh, right, this is all just a dream, I’m not here, you’re not here, and I’ll wake up after a little while..."

"Bang—!"

The response team members who burst into the first floor answered Orman with more gunfire. They adhered to their usual approach, riddling his body with bullets until there wasn’t a single intact part left.

And at that moment, Lucy’s thoughts seemed to halt.

She was about to die.

The response team was one step too late, she clearly heard the gunfire and the flames spurting from Orman’s pistol.

The muzzle was already aimed at her head, and in the next moment, her head might burst open like Orman’s boss’s had.

But...

Was she going to die so simply at the hands of a patient?

"Time is moving again, get out of the way!"

The voice that reached her ears pulled her back to reality, and whether it was a delusion or not, Lucy thought she saw Hog perform a teleportation move, instantly appearing at her side from a few steps away, and forcefully shoved her aside.

The bullet that was meant for her head struck one of the response team members, only creating a tiny insignificant spark on his armor.

Lucy found herself sitting on the floor in a mess, while Hog had already adopted a serious expression. He turned to face the members of the response team, and said in a deep voice, "You’re too slow!"

If it wasn’t for his timely activation of the Standin ability, her new friend, whom she had just gotten to know, might have been in danger.

The members of the response team clearly recognized Hog and didn’t dare to retort when scolded by him.

They hadn’t expected the head of the Foster Family to appear here, and what was more astonishing was that in the moment the criminal fired, he had physically shoved a psychiatrist out of harm’s way. Considering that Orman’s modified prosthetic pistol was fitted with explosive bullets, Hog could have been injured as well.

This was not the senator they knew.

In such a crisis, they would have preferred someone by their side to serve as their human shield to block every shrapnel for them.

Could it be...

This psychiatrist was Hog’s mistress?

But looking at their ages, they should be about forty years apart.

The members of the response team all shared this thought almost simultaneously, but then they realized that this age difference was very common in The First Region. For the senators, keeping a mistress was not an unusual affair, and they heard plenty of gossip about the senators every day at the office.

"Go do your jobs."

Hog gave them orders, bent down to help Lucy up, and supported her, who was still in a dazed state, onto the elevator.

Lucy’s office was designed in the style of an apartment, with the entire room decorated in warm tones, and the living room had been converted into a small library, with the first bookshelf filled with books on psychology.

She lived here usually, using the living room for work, and would just go to the bedroom to rest after work.

She slumped onto the sofa, still unable to recover from the recent events.

This was where she usually chatted with her patients. Before, Orman had also sat next to her, sharing with her the unfair treatment he faced at work, and the last time she saw Orman was just before the elevator door closed, when he lay in a pool of blood, being treated like trash by the response team members and placed into a body bag.

The criminal died on the scene.

His name might make it to The First Region’s entertainment-style evening news, becoming the subject of the host’s ridicule.

She didn’t hold any resentment towards Orman; he was just somebody crushed by his work, a pitiful person, and people as pitiful as him were commonplace in The First Region.

"I didn’t realize being a psychiatrist was such a dangerous job. Have you often encountered this kind of situation before?"

Hog asked curiously. This was the first time he was observing someone else’s life through his own eyes. In the past, his understanding of other professions was limited to work reports or data provided during meetings. For senators, the rest of the world’s people were just cold numbers.

It was hard to empathize with numbers, so even the death reports involving crime, disease, and accidents failed to stir much emotional disturbance in his heart.

But this time, he thought of his new friend, Lucy.

If she had died at the hands of that mentally ill patient, she would have merely been an additional number in the crime reports, unable to even nudge the percentage of deaths. That felt utterly... insignificant.

For the first time in his life, Hog felt a sense of heaviness because of those cold numbers.

"No, this is the first time."

Previously, the most serious patients generally chose the path of self-destruction. They hardly ever dragged others down with them like Orman did during an episode, sending Lucy into deep self-blame. She thought the advice she had given him had only aided in his breakdown, "I thought he had recovered."

She remembered the last time they met, Mr. Orman was in very good spirits.

His entire mindset had changed, no longer obsessed with his boss’s harsh criticism or the displeasures at work; he began to envision his future life. He talked about holding out for just two more years, after which he could take his savings and return to his hometown for a slower-paced life.

He could buy a big house, bring his family over to live with him. Recently, he had been researching artificial intelligence and even asked her for advice.

At that time, Orman was full of hope for his future.

It seemed that with Mr. Hog’s intervention, they received notification from the Law Enforcers department quite quickly.

The whole affair didn’t sound very complicated.

It was merely because the company was in a downturn recently and needed to lay off a batch of employees. Orman was put on the list because he had taken leave to see a psychologist before, but later Orman discovered it was all an excuse. New employees quickly took over his position, and when he tried to confront his superiors, he was beaten up by the security and left on the street.

In a rage, Orman made a trip to the prosthetic hospital and had his hand turned into a gun. He blew his boss’s head off with a shot as the latter was leaving the building.

"This is a habitual method of the company."

Hog commented. He knew the company too well. They didn’t need many reasons to lay off someone. When they felt you were no longer of value to the company, they would find multiple legal and proper ways to dismiss you.

Situations like this were happening all the time, and Orman was perhaps the most special case among them.

Because others would only accept their fate and leave The First Region with their tails between their legs.

"Unemployment led to a severe exacerbation of his condition. Not long ago, he had just finished paying off the debt he owed for Prosthesis Modification..."

Dr. Lucy murmured to herself.

She understood Orman’s actions but couldn’t understand the nonsensical words he uttered when pressing the trigger—saying someone was urging him.

Who was urging him?

And why urge him?

While auditory hallucinations are a very common symptom for the mentally ill, Lucy still faintly felt that something was amiss. She couldn’t help but suspect that perhaps someone had said something to Orman that led to the dramatic deterioration of his condition.

After losing his job, Orman never contacted her again, and by the time he reappeared, his condition had deteriorated to the point where he was holding a gun to her head.

But then, Lucy discovered something even more important.

"Thank you, Mr. Hog. If it wasn’t for you, I might be dead."

Theoretically, she approached Hog for his mental illness treatment, but she never expected that she would ultimately be saved by Hog.

She felt sure Jock wouldn’t believe what had just happened on the first floor.

Facing an armed criminal, Hog risked getting shot himself and at the very last moment, pushed her out of harm’s way.

Perhaps this was also a symptom of his condition, which made Hog appear gentle and empathetic.

"Don’t mention it. Standins should help each other."

Hog said, "And even if I weren’t there, your Standin would have helped you dodge the bullets in a moment of crisis. Someone said that the Standin is the embodiment of human spiritual power—so it will surely protect you."

"...Someone? Do you have other companions too?"

Lucy felt she had caught an important piece of information.

"He prefers not to show his face."

"I understand."

Lucy nodded thoughtfully, realizing that like Orman’s experiences, Hog’s firm belief in his identity as a Standin messenger was likely also the result of someone else’s guidance, and the events that had just unfolded made her see this concept in a different light.

She still couldn’t explain how Hog, several steps away from her, managed to push her out of the way faster than a bullet.

Unless...

Hog could actually do what he said, stopping the entire world’s time for 2 seconds.

"You’d better get some rest, we’ll be in touch later."

Hog, noticing Lucy’s poor mental state, took the initiative and said, "You have my contact. I should be staying in The First Region recently, so let’s keep in touch."

............................

After anxiously waiting, Jock finally received a call from Lucy.

"How’s the diagnosis? When can he return to normal at the earliest? It’s fine to use more medication appropriately, but we have to make sure he stays lucid for next week’s meeting."

The moment the call connected, Jock’s rapid-fire tone came through.

"Mr. Jock."

Lucy patiently waited for Jock to finish speaking, gave him a few seconds to calm down, and then spoke, "After meeting with Mr. Hog, I’ve changed my mind."

As she spoke, she stood in front of the window, gazing at the familiar nightscape of The First Region.

Night had fallen, and the city was brightly lit. She saw that on the opposite side of this building, there were countless people like Orman.

And after the encounter that night, she had developed a strong interest in Hog.

"Perhaps, Standins really do exist."

When she voiced this thought, both ends of the call fell into a long silence.

Jock pondered for a while, as if sorting out his words.

But after a dozen seconds, he couldn’t hold back anymore.

"Lucy, are you sick, too?"

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