Hospital 444
Chapter 474 - 2: Li Zhixiao (1)

Chapter 474: Chapter 2: Li Zhixiao (1)

Li Zhixiao always woke up so early.

For a long time, he had been sticking to sleeping at ten o’clock and getting up at six.

This sleep routine had been maintained until now.

Many people around him used to say that seeing him with a thermos cup, and if it contained goji berry tea, then he really resembled a retired old man who focused on his health. In fact, that was true. Aside from work, his only entertainment was running on the treadmill and lifting dumbbells in the gym. His daily life was extremely regular, and many people said his days passed like those of a veteran cadre. However, the biggest benefit was that his health check-up reports at work were always the best among everyone else’s—others always had issues, however minor or severe, like high blood lipids, fatty liver, hypertension, and so on.

Many people also admired his self-discipline. His self-discipline was so strong that many found it hard to believe.

After waking up early, he went to the treadmill, set the speed, and began to run.

After working up a sweat, it was time for a shower and cooking breakfast, drinking milk, and then going off to work.

Each day was as regular as this, uneventful.

This was Li Zhixiao’s daily routine. Such a routine had been continuing for a long time.

Tomorrow would be a special day for him.

And it just so happened to be the weekend.

On this day each year, he would usually take a day off. Then, he would see no one, and do a fixed thing.

While running, he would play music.

He had always liked symphonies since he was young and had never been interested in pop music, let alone downloaded it to his phone.

But...

What he was playing now wasn’t just pop music; it was a new song by an internet broadcaster.

If someone familiar with Li Zhixiao saw this, they would definitely be surprised. Li Zhixiao, who was just like a veteran cadre, was actually listening to such pop music! In their view, Li Zhixiao would listen to classical music played by musicians in suits, the kind that belonged in elaborate hallways.

Li Zhixiao set a fixed time and speed for his daily run and would adjust it according to his physical condition and the season. As long as it was part of his pre-determined fitness plan, he would complete it well, unless hindered by forces such as illness. This allowed him to maintain his body fat percentage consistently below 15%. Even if he felt fatigued, he would push himself to continue. Of course, his fitness plan was always consulted with a coach at the gym in advance, to ensure it wouldn’t cause any injury to his muscles.

After exercising and sweating profusely, he felt very refreshed. Then, Li Zhixiao went to take a shower, changed clothes, and started making breakfast.

While cooking breakfast, he also turned on the TV to watch the morning news. This was another one of his daily morning habits—he would make breakfast while listening to the news, and he never browsed the news on his phone.

This was what his colleagues found most unbelievable. In this era, most people had grown accustomed to using smartphones for checking the time, reading the news, watching shows, playing games, making payments, booking plane and train tickets, purchasing movie tickets... a smartphone could satisfy most of peoples’ needs concerning clothing, food, shelter, and transport. But Li Zhixiao was different; he had no dependency on his phone at all. Even if his phone was off for a whole day, it would not affect his life, and even now, with the widespread adoption of mobile payments, he still carried sufficient cash on him.

He usually watched only news and documentaries on TV and would watch some movies but never followed TV series. However, his favorite pastime was reading books; he would never download e-books on his phone but always chose to buy physical books, even though his bookshelf was filled with various books. This was also why everyone considered Li Zhixiao quite old-fashioned, not at all like a post-80s, but rather someone from the 60s or 70s.

At that moment, he was also listening to the news report coming from the TV behind him. The TV was reporting on a social news item.

"According to our station’s report, a murder case occurred recently in K City. A woman was found dead in a hotel on the outskirts of K City... The police investigation found that when the woman checked in, she was accompanied by a man who appeared to be unconscious. The whereabouts of this man are currently unknown, our station will..."

Hearing this, Li Zhixiao stopped what he was doing and turned to look at the TV.

"K City, huh?"

He had an aunt who had married into K City, so he had some recollection of it.

After making breakfast, he sat at the table to continue eating while watching the morning news.

After finishing his meal, he stood in front of the mirror to straighten his clothes, then he was ready to leave.

With his briefcase in hand, he took a look around the room and said, "Mang Ge, I’m leaving first."

His home was quite close to his workplace; it didn’t take long to get there.

Li Zhixiao’s profession was an employee at a property management company.

When he arrived at the office, he was the first one there, as usual.

But just as he settled at his desk, his colleague Zheng Yan arrived.

"Morning, Zhixiao."

"Morning."

Just as Li Zhixiao started his computer, Zheng Yan sat beside him and said, "Tomorrow is... that day, right?"

"Yes. Unless there’s something particularly important at work, try not to call me."

"Unshakable, huh..."

"There won’t be any changes, unless there’s a situation that requires me to work overtime."

"You could also consider, remarrying, right? After all, it’s been so many years since your wife passed away."

At these words, Li Zhixiao’s hand, just placed on the mouse, also trembled.

"I, I don’t have this thought at the moment. Although my parents have always wanted me to remarry."

"Sigh, it’s been so many years... Back then, you had just gotten married..."

"It was our second wedding anniversary. Mang Ge had even forgotten that day was our anniversary. I thought it would be better this way, to give her a surprise, so I drove her out..."

"Sigh, who would have expected that to happen."

"Tomorrow is our wedding anniversary, as well as her death anniversary."

That was when we met a drunk driver.

Even though he was clearly inebriated beyond his senses, he still recklessly drove on. The car crashed into us head-on.

Despite having fastened our seatbelts and the deployment of the airbags, the vehicle was hit and flipped over. Both of us passed out on the spot, and that driver actually fled the scene of the accident.

In the end, Li Zhixiao miraculously survived, but his wife Mang Ge passed away.

This left Li Zhixiao living in remorse day and night, thinking that if it hadn’t been for him driving his wife out, if he had noticed the problem with that car earlier and avoided it...

"It’s all my fault."

Li Zhixiao always lived in guilt and regret.

Back then, his wife Mang Ge always urged him to exercise more and reduce his body fat percentage.

She loved listening to pop music, even spending money to tip Internet streamers, while he complained about his wife’s reckless spending.

But now, everything was gone.

And Zheng Yan knew that a large part of Li Zhixiao’s self-blame stemmed from his late wife Lu Mange’s parents.

Li Zhixiao came from a rural background and later succeeded in getting into university, where he met Lu Mange at the university swimming pool. As soon as they reached the legal age for marriage, they quickly registered their marriage. Since Lu Mange came from a much wealthier family, her parents and friends around them didn’t like him. After Lu Mange’s death, he inherited her property. Although the driver who killed her was soon brought to justice and a protracted civil lawsuit ensued, to Lu Mange’s parents, Li Zhixiao was the murderer who took their daughter’s life.

"In fact, they even suspected that I orchestrated Mange’s death since there were no surveillance cameras in that area of the accident. But when the police arrested the driver, I was finally cleared of suspicion."

"How could it have been orchestrated by you... you were in the car too."

"Yeah, but her parents still think I had some tricks up my sleeve. Even her close friends started to think so."

Tomorrow is Saturday.

He will go to her grave.

It’s very likely that he’ll encounter Mang Ge’s parents and her friend Lin Lu.

...

The day quickly passed by just like that.

He went to bed at ten o’clock, as always.

Perhaps because of the specialness of the next day, it took him about two hours to fall asleep.

The next morning.

He rubbed his eyes and looked beside him.

Then, he gasped in shock.

Because, lying beside him, was a woman.

And this woman, wearing headphones and watching a TV drama on her phone, was even wearing Mang Ge’s pajamas!

A thief???

He immediately jumped up, staring at the woman in horror.

"You... you... you..."

Pointing at the woman, he said with a voice full of horror, "Who are you???"

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