Chapter 38: Reunion with an Old Friend

Perhaps it was just his imagination, but after drinking the concoction, Chang Yu felt as if every inch of his body was brimming with strength. His back no longer ached, his legs no longer hurt, and he walked with vigor. At this moment, even if he were to climb five flights of stairs in one go, he would do so effortlessly, as if he had just swallowed some miraculous elixir.

Seeing Chang Yu obediently down the medicine, a satisfied, approving smile appeared on Katerina’s face. Even the look she gave Chang Yu had softened considerably. Everyone knew, after all, that beside her passion for health and wellness, nothing pleased Katerina more than having others drink the secret concoctions she so carefully prepared.

About ten minutes later, the door to the conference room swung open once more.

A slender, young boy in a blue striped suit entered. He was small and thin, perhaps only about 1.6 meters tall, with a mop of unruly hair that looked like a bird’s nest perched in a tree. Perhaps because of his frail build, the blue pinstriped suit hung loosely from his shoulders, swaying with his every movement like a ragged sack buffeted by the wind.

From the moment the boy stepped into the room, Chang Yu’s scrutinizing gaze never left him. Before coming here, Katerina had already informed Chang Yu that, besides himself, two other new investigators would be joining the organization. If he guessed correctly, this frail-looking youth was likely to be his future colleague and partner.

“Hello, my name is Chang Yu. I’ll be your new colleague from now on,” Chang Yu said, rising and extending his hand in a gesture of goodwill.

He had assumed that this delicate-looking boy would be awkward or uneasy when greeted by a stranger. However, reality often defies expectation.

The instant the boy saw Chang Yu, his eyes lit up with an uncontainable joy and excitement—a look akin to a greedy squirrel spotting its favorite acorn, or a ravenous wolf laying eyes on its coveted prey.

Seeing that expression, Chang Yu was suddenly seized by a sense of foreboding. Something about this situation felt off.

Sure enough, after staring at Chang Yu for a moment, the boy seized his outstretched hand and exclaimed in delight, “Sasuke! Is it really you? My Sasuke!”

Chang Yu was utterly dumbfounded, his expression frozen, the air thick with awkwardness.

Sasuke? What on earth was that supposed to mean?

Before Chang Yu could make sense of it, the boy called out to Katerina, who was also in the room:

“Sakura-chan, I’ve finally found Sasuke!”

“Take care of yourself. I’m taking him back to the Hidden Leaf Village!”

With that, he tried to pull Chang Yu towards the door.

At that moment, time seemed to come to a standstill. Chang Yu stared at the boy in front of him, his mouth agape, searching for even a hint of jest on the youth’s animated face.

Unfortunately, no matter how closely he looked, Chang Yu could not detect the slightest trace of mischief. In other words, this boy was absolutely serious—he wasn’t joking in the least.

“What... what on earth is going on?” Chang Yu looked to Katerina for help, trying to wrench his hand from the boy’s increasingly fervent grip.

He now realized the boy’s handshake was growing uncomfortably firm—his enthusiasm rather excessive.

“Don’t mind him,” Katerina explained, rubbing her forehead helplessly. “He’s a good kid, but he’s a bit of a fantasist.”

She then addressed the boy, “I’ve told you more than once: stop wearing your hospital gown in public.”

“What’s wrong with it? The Hokage himself gave me this ninja outfit—I like it,” the boy replied innocently. “Besides, everyone in the village wears this.”

“But you’re not in the village anymore, so there’s no need to keep wearing it,” Katerina said, exasperated.

“Ninja outfit?” Chang Yu eyed the blue striped suit, finding it increasingly familiar the more he looked at it. He suddenly made a connection—Katerina had just called it a hospital gown. In a flash, the realization struck him.

“Hey, Katerina, this guy didn’t escape from a psychiatric hospital, did he?” Chang Yu asked after a moment, reaching a startling conclusion.

It wasn’t a hard deduction; Chang Yu had already recognized the outfit as one only mental patients wore in hospitals.

Katerina didn’t try to hide the truth. “I forgot to mention,” she explained, “his mental condition is not very stable. He’s been living in a psychiatric hospital for the past ten years.”

Chang Yu nodded, his suspicions confirmed. “Then... why is he here?”

“We discovered his innate powers had awakened. To protect the other patients, we had to transfer him out of the hospital.”

“If I’m not mistaken, he just called me Sasuke.”

“Oh, ‘Sasuke’ is the Japanese pronunciation—he means the character from the anime Naruto.”

“And he called you Sakura because...?”

“That’s another Naruto character—a girl named Sakura.”

“And just now, he said he was going to take me back to the Hidden Leaf Village...”

“I think what he means is taking you back to the psychiatric hospital. He calls it the Hidden Leaf Village.”

“What? He wants to take me to a psychiatric hospital? That’s not happening! And the ninja outfit?”

“Just as you guessed, it’s a hospital gown. He calls the other patients in the hospital his ‘villagers.’”

“Heavens, what a disaster,” Chang Yu groaned, burying his face in his hands, mirroring Katerina’s earlier gesture.

“It really is unfortunate,” Katerina said regretfully, glancing at the boy. “If his powers weren’t so unstable and dangerous to others, we wouldn’t have had to bring him out.”

“So, what should I call him? I mean, how do I address my future colleague, partner—comrade, even?” After a long pause, Chang Yu finally accepted reality and asked Katerina.

“His name is Feng Sanpao. Like you, he’s an orphan,” Katerina replied.

“So, he’s had a hard life, too,” Chang Yu said, looking at Feng Sanpao with newfound empathy. Having learned of the boy’s background, his initial aversion had faded; two people with tragic pasts were bound to feel a kind of kinship.

“Hello, Sanpao! You don’t mind if I call you that, do you?” Chang Yu smiled warmly at the boy.

It was a social trick he’d picked up from Fatty Wang—using the last two syllables of someone’s name right away to foster closeness and goodwill.

Of course, this only worked with three-syllable names. For example, Huo Jianhua—just call him Jianhua. Yu Wenle—call him Wenle. Doesn’t that sound more intimate?

So, when Chang Yu met Feng Sanpao, he naturally chose to call him Sanpao to show friendliness.

“Actually,” the boy said, his smile radiant, “I’d prefer if you called me by another name.”

“Oh? What is it?” Chang Yu was intrigued.

“Please call me Naruto, or—Uzumaki Naruto!” The boy puffed out his chest, grinning to show a mouthful of white teeth.

“All right... Ruto...” Chang Yu resolved to stick to Fatty Wang’s method, come what may.

“You see, aside from his mental issues, he’s also a chronic fantasist,” Katerina added. “He’s convinced he’s one of the characters from Naruto, and he sees everyone else as characters from that anime, too.”

“Well, he must really love that show,” Chang Yu said, his expression suddenly odd. He wrinkled his nose and sniffed. “Say, do you smell something strange?”

“What smell?” Katerina, imitating him, sniffed around.

She lowered her head and smelled her suit. Only her morning perfume lingered—definitely not the source.

Chang Yu pinched his nose. “It’s like... the combined stench of stinky tofu aged for a dozen years and pickled cabbage left to rot for twenty. That kind of smell.”

At that, both Katerina and Feng Sanpao finally caught a whiff of the odor. Just a single breath was enough to make them question their will to live.

“I smell it—it’s truly indescribable,” Feng Sanpao said, holding his nose in agony, gasping for breath like a drowning duck.

“I smell it too—it’s awful!” Katerina’s eyes rolled back from the stench, tears streaming down her cheeks, almost unable to open her eyes.

“It’s strange, but I feel like I’ve encountered this smell before. It’s so pungent, it drills straight up your nose,” Chang Yu said, gagging and feeling a strange sense of déjà vu.

The conference room door swung open, and an odor ten times stronger than before flooded into the room with exaggerated speed.

“Well, I thought I’d arrived early, but you’re all here already,” said the person at the door—the very source of the stench.

“It’s you!” Chang Yu immediately recognized the newcomer.

“Damn, I should’ve known. This smell is unforgettable—once you’ve encountered it, you can never forget!” Chang Yu stared at the man, his composure crumbling.

The man was burly, a veritable muscle-bound giant with prominent features—especially his jutting lips, which made him look uncannily like a gorilla.

Wasn’t he the very same powerhouse Chang Yu had met on the bus the other day?