Should he drink this soup?
Zhou Ze frowned slightly, then put down the bowl, looking at Wang Ke and his wife.
Wang Ke's wife pulled up a chair and sat down, rubbing her heel as she complained:
"Honey, my heel still hurts."
"That's what you get for being so careless. It's a miracle nothing's broken."
Wang Ke examined his wife's heel carefully, smiled, and said:
"You should go back to the room and rest. Try to stay off it for a while. It must be hard on you to keep walking on tiptoe, especially in those high heels."
"Fine, fine. I'm only trying to make myself look good for you, so you'll be happy to see me at home."
The woman rolled her eyes at her husband, then smiled slightly at Zhou Ze. "You guys talk, I'm going upstairs."
After the woman left, Wang Ke pointed to the bowl Zhou Ze had put down and reminded him:
"The soup's getting cold."
Zhou Ze took out a cigarette, lit it, and started smoking as if he were in his own home.
After a while, Zhou Ze asked:
"What's this all about?"
"Just a whim." Wang Ke shook his head, then pointed to the pot of meat soup. "You thought there was human meat in this soup, didn't you?"
Zhou Ze didn't say anything.
Wang Ke also took out a cigarette and lit it on the gas stove.
"It's psychological suggestion. Everyone encounters this kind of thing to some extent every day. Like when you leave home, and some auntie tells her kid to lock the door after someone leaves, otherwise the house will get robbed.
You'll subconsciously start wondering if you locked the door, then keep thinking and agonizing about it, and finally run back to check whether you closed it or not.
That's a common and simple example. A slightly more advanced one involves repeated psychological suggestions to gradually influence someone's behavior and consciousness until the desired effect is achieved.
For example, you think I'm actually cooking human meat soup in my own kitchen and you don't dare to drink it."
Wang Ke shrugged.
"Sounds absurd, right? Yes, it's absurd, but you believed it. That's the most absurd part, and yet it's the most normal thing in the world."
Zhou Ze asked, "Is this part of the therapy?"
Wang Ke shook his head. "No, it's not a disease. We psychologists rarely call psychological problems 'diseases.' This is your own mental block.
Like why you think I'd cook human meat. This kind of psychological suggestion has been going on for a long time, like my wife who always likes to get her hair done but comes back with pretty much the same style.
What makes you think I'd have a motive to kill her?
I've been cuckolded. She's been seeing another man, giving me a lovely green hat."
"Lovely…"
"Okay, forget the word 'lovely' for now, but you can't deny that's the biggest reason you mistakenly believe I'm cooking my own wife.
Because you think I've known about this for a while. I have known for a while, and you naturally think I'd be angry. Well, I am angry.
After that, you think I have a motive to kill her and eat her flesh, as a way to vent my anger.
Of course, there are also some supporting suggestions, such as my identity and the fact that my greatest hobby is cooking a big pot of meat soup at home that I can't even finish myself, simply to satisfy a childhood desire for meat when I was in the orphanage.
This contrast makes it hard for you to accept, so your brain naturally starts to form its own line of reasoning, a line of reasoning that you think makes sense.
In other words, what we often call 'truth' that you perceive, just like many online rubberneckers, a very simple event can often be hyped and fermented by some schemers, and it is based on this reason.
Everyone has a Shakespeare and a Sherlock Holmes inside them."
Wang Ke picked up a piece of meat with his chopsticks, dipped it in the sauce, and put it in his mouth, chewing it with his eyes closed.
"Really not going to eat any? It's very tasty. I remember you used to fight with me for meat at the orphanage."
"You always gave me your chicken leg in the end," Zhou Ze said.
"Haha, that's because you were younger than me, and because you called me 'Brother'." Wang Ke waved his hand dismissively. "Actually, I really loved to eat meat back then, but I never got enough.
Now that I have the means, I can eat as much meat as I want, but every time I excitedly throw myself into cooking a big pot, I get full after eating so little.
My body isn't as good as it used to be, and I'm not the young man I used to be. Plus, my living conditions have gradually improved since I started working.
Now, I actually think it tasted the best when I watched you eat my chicken leg at the orphanage."
Wang Ke took another piece of meat, put it in his mouth, and sighed after eating it.
Zhou Ze exhaled a smoke ring and didn't say anything, just leaning against the kitchen wall, watching the rolling white smoke, watching the vicissitudes and sighs of this middle-aged man.
"Let's talk about your problem. Actually, the problem still lies with you. To be honest, weren't you most comfortable when you were a doctor?
No matter what problems you encountered at work, no matter how much infighting there was, no matter how much exclusion and suppression,
it was always right to treat and save people when a patient was brought before you.
It was in line with your job, and in line with the moral ethics of human society.
The saying 'a doctor's heart is like a parent' allows you to ignore the patient's identity, ignore the patient's personality, ignore what the patient has done in the past, whether they are a good person or a bad person, whether they are rich or poor.
As long as they are brought before you, the only thing you must do is to heal them.
But now, you're encountering a dilemma. In some choices, you need to consider more situations, and you need to grasp the scale yourself, which makes you very uncomfortable and troubled.
You want to be yourself wholeheartedly, like a character in a Wuxia novel, carefree and unrestrained, but you have to be bound by the present.
In fact, this is the norm for most people, A-Ze. In the past, you actually lived too much for yourself. You and I both grew up in the orphanage. We both experienced childhood misfortune and suffered the pressure and inferiority of lacking a family in our youth.
In fact, we both have more or less psychological problems. This is the seed that is now blooming and bearing fruit in you.
You say your conscience is gone, but it's actually there. You're instinctively rejecting it, instinctively disgusted by it, but you can't bear to part with it.
So your subconscious created this situation. Your conscience has been eaten by you, so you can perfectly ignore it."
"How do I solve it?" Zhou Ze asked.
"Unless a psychology master who can completely override you in consciousness appears and break the shackles in your heart in one fell swoop, allowing you to be hypnotized without resistance.
Otherwise, you can only slowly wear it down yourself, perhaps you will wear it down, or it will wear you down."
Wang Ke took another sip of the soup. It must have been very delicious, as a look of satisfaction appeared on his face. "My level isn't good enough, or rather, I have some solutions for the psychological problems of ordinary people, but you're not an ordinary person."
Zhou Ze nodded. "So, everything can only take its course?"
"You don't have to resist it, you can accept it, and even treat it as a person, as your other side." Wang Ke tried to give his own solution. "What I'm saying is a bit abstract, it's best if you can understand, and it doesn't matter if you can't, letting nature take its course is also okay."
After putting down the bowl and chopsticks, Wang Ke and Zhou Ze went to the living room, where Wang Ke brewed another pot of tea.
The local news of Tong City was being broadcast on TV. Coincidentally, a face that Zhou Ze found somewhat familiar appeared in the news. It was an honest face, and he was crying and roaring.
However, the news had already been broadcast for the most part, and this was already the finale.
Seeing Zhou Ze watching the news, Wang Ke explained, "This matter has been hyped up quite a bit recently. His son has leukemia and wants to find his second daughter, whom he sent away in the past. After mobilizing the media, he finally found her.
But the second daughter and her adoptive parents refused to donate, so he and his wife went to their door to block them, cursing their daughter for being ungrateful at the entrance of their residential complex, and then went to their second daughter's high school to put up big-character posters, listing their second daughter's crimes and forcing her to come out and donate."
"Oh."
Zhou Ze picked up the tea and took a sip.
"There are all kinds of strange things these days," Wang Ke said with emotion.
Zhou Ze looked at Wang Ke and said, "Actually, there were before, but there wasn't such an advanced information network."
"Are you implying something?"
"No."
"Don't look down on your brother." Wang Ke suddenly said seriously.
Zhou Ze shook his head.
"Everyone has their own difficulties, and your brother doesn't want to, but I can see past them."
"I'm leaving. Thank you for today's diagnosis."
"You're welcome. I've said it before, I won't look for you again in the future, but you can come to me anytime if you need anything."
Under Wang Ke's farewell, Zhou Ze walked out of his house and looked back at the balcony on the second floor. The little loli wasn't there.
Yes,
the little loli couldn't be there. She should have already gone to Rong City with the Faceless Woman and a group of ghost messengers.
He hailed a taxi, got in, and the driver turned around. "Where to, buddy?"
"Take me to the most haunted place you know."
Zhou Ze felt that he should take the initiative to go out and do something, get some business.
"Yo, are you a writer, brother? Going out to find inspiration?"
"Something like that."
"Alright, I actually know a place."
The driver patted his chest and guaranteed to find a good place for Zhou Ze, a place that had been very strange recently and that ordinary people didn't dare to pass by at night.
Then,
the driver dropped Zhou Ze off in front of the Late Night Bookstore.
That damned crow appeared again, flying slowly through the air with a "caw caw." It seemed to be very good at flying out when it was most needed.
A breeze blew, causing fallen leaves to swirl at Zhou Ze's feet, making a rustling sound.
Zhou Ze looked back at the taxi that had already driven away,
and suddenly felt that he should talk to Xu Qinglang about moving.
...
Pushing open the bedroom door, Wang Ke entered the bedroom. His wife was lying on the bed playing with her phone. Seeing her husband coming, she changed into a graceful pose.
"He's gone?"
"Yeah, he's gone." Wang Ke sat down on the edge of the bed with a smile, reaching out and touching his wife's cheek.
"I'm getting old, and too much lean meat gets stuck in my teeth."
As he spoke,
Wang Ke reached out his finger and picked out some meat fibers from between his teeth.
"Don't lose weight."