“Little Hui, you don’t need to worry. The doctor said that your sickness is just a small one. You’ll be out of the hospital soon.”
Huang Shujun’s face had a small smile as she babbled at Su Hao, fearing that Su Hao’s mind would have wild thoughts.
“Yeah yeah yeah!” Luo Shengrong quickly nodded his head.
“The doctor also said you got sick mainly because you’ve been overworking yourself these years. So for a short period of time, you can’t study and have to properly rest.”
“Yeah yeah yeah!”
“In order to let you recuperate in peace, the family has all moved to the hospital to stay. During this time when you can’t study, we worried you’d be bored, so we’ll be by your side to talk.”
“Yeah yeah yeah!”
……
Su Hao listened attentively and pretended he didn’t know his own condition. He nodded to his parents and promised he would properly recuperate and wouldn’t think of anything during this time.
Then when he was alone, he looked online for “pancreatic cancer”.
Pancreatic cancer was also known as the “King of Cancer”…
Seeing this, Su Hao suddenly understood. He no longer had a chance. From the perspective of modern medicine, this was a terminal illness, and he probably would not even survive until nine months.
After calming down and thinking about the situation, Su Hao only then discovered that this universe is so mysterious and unpredictable. Isn’t life so mysterious? Humanity’s current understanding of life was still at a very shallow level, unable to cure a majority of illnesses, unable to find the cause.
And his understanding of the human body was even shallower. He had almost no understanding of his body. These years he had been pursuing knowledge with a focus on the natural sciences while ignoring humanity’s roots — life. There wasn’t even a single “Medical” category in his “Cosmic Light”.
Su Hao silently entered the marble room. A new column was added behind the many stacks of categories called “Medical”. After thinking about it, he deleted it and renamed it “Life”.
The endgoal of medicine was life.
Getting sick was a strong signal that the body sent out that the internal organs and cells were no longer able to handle the harm and were seeking help from the outside world. It was life’s first attempt for help.
Then what was life? Flesh, cells, chromosomes, nucleic acids, proteins?
Who could say. All we know is that life is a miracle that came about over hundreds of millions of years.
The meaning of life surpassed just living in humanity’s cognition. Why did it start, why does it end, what purpose is there in life? No one could give a real answer to these questions. Moreover, a normal person would not think about these questions at all.
But Su Hao laid in the hospital bed blankly staring at the column called “Life” and deeply pondered it for the first time.
Did these questions really not have an answer?
A sudden strong desire gushed in Su Hao’s heart to find out.
……
On the second day, Su Hao pretended to be casual and said, “Mom, I want to look at some medical books. Can you get me a laptop?”
“No way!” Huang Shujun didn’t even hesitate and refused. From her perspective, her precious son’s sickness was all because of his obsession with studying and had caused his body to collapse.
At that time, Luo Chaoxin who was nearby raised his hand and said: “Mom, Big Bro wants to read. I also want to read.”
Huang Shujun was infuriated. For the first time, she picked up Luo Chaoxin and spanked him, hitting him one after another: “Reading, reading, read what? Luo Chaoxin, your old lady is saying this, from now on, if you get top 20 in school, this old lady will break your leg. Did you hear me? From now on, go out and play for me. If I see you read or do homework, I’ll give you something to look at.”
Happiness came so suddenly. This was heaven! Luo Chaoxin forgot to even cry about being hit.
Su Hao scratched his head helplessly and turned to his father Luo Shengrong and tried: “Dad, I want to look at some books. Won’t you help me find a computer!”
Luo Shengrong didn’t have a chance to respond before Huang Shengrong yelled: “No way. If I say no, that means no!”
She even glared at Luo Shengrong after she was done speaking.
Luo Shengrong’s softening heart hardened again and angrily said: “That’s right. No way!”
Immediately after, Huang Shujun began to ramble on to Su Hao on why he can’t read and the harms of reading to a person’s health and other nonsense.
As a last resort, he had to change his way of communicating.
Su Hao with a face full of confidence said: “Mom, you don’t have to trick me. I already know. My sickness is terminal isn’t it? I only have nine or so months right?”
Huang Shujuna and Luo Shengrong were stunned. Luo Chaoxin seemed to understand but not really. He copied his parents and had wide eyes.
At this time, Huang Shujun couldn’t help it as tears as large as raindrops fell from her face. Luo Shengrong hurried to hug his wife.
Huang Shujun suddenly thought of something and broke away from Luo Shengrong’s tight embrace, and pointed at him accusingly. She angrily said: “Luo Shengrong! Speak! Were you the idiot that told Little Hui?”
Luo Shengrong jumped in fright and shook his head and waved his hands: “It wasn’t me. It wasn’t me!”
“If not you then who?”
Luo Shengrong rolled his eyes and just happened to see Luo Chaoxin with a weird expression. He pointed at Luo Chaoxin and said: Maybe it was Little Xin who said it!”
Huang Shujun’s burning eyes looked to Luo Chaoxin: “Luo Chaoxin? Was it you that said it?!”
Luo Chaoxin was dumbfounded. Who am I, where am I, what am I doing?
Su Hao had a funny look on his face as he said: “No need to guess. No one told me. I peeked when you were all distracted.”
Huang Shujun stopped and cautiously asked: “Little Hui, you… you’re not sad?”
“Nonsense!” Su Hao said speechlessly, “Of course I’m sad. But how does being sad help? It can’t change the current state of things.”
The hospital ward fell into silence. No one spoke.
Seeing the atmosphere wasn’t right, Huang Shujun’s tears were about to fall again, he hurriedly said: “Mom, I know you’re trying to do what’s best for me, but things have already come to this point. There’s already no way to fix things to the way they were before. In my life’s final hours, I want to live according to my own terms, is that ok? I want to read and study.”
Huang Shujun choked and sobbed: “But. The doctor said as long as you preserved an optimistic and positive attitude towards life, there would be a chance to heal.So don’t put too much pressure on yourself during this time. Listen to mom, okay?”
Su Hao comforted: “Don’t worry. I will fully cooperate with the treatments and I won’t let my body get too tired. I promise I’ll only read for a bit each day.”
Huang Shujun still hesitated so Su Hao added: “Also, mom don’t you remember? Your son is a genius. Let me study this disease myself. Who knows? Maybe I can find a cure.”
Luo Shengrong slammed his fist into his palm and the dark clouds scattered from his face: “That makes sense!”
Su Hao struck the iron while it was hot: “It’s more than just makes sense. As the saying goes, it’s better to help yourself than seek help from others. My life is controlled by me. Believe me, maybe I really will succeed.”
Finally, Huang Shujun was persuaded and agreed to help get Su Hao a laptop and to go to the bookstore to help him buy some books on medical research and life sciences.
The premise was that every day. He could not go for more than four hours. After four hours, he would have to put it away.
But this kind of limitation wasn’t really a limitation to Su Hao. As long as he could get a computer, and sweep the information from those life science and medical knowledge into the marble room, then he could view it at his leisure in the marble room.
After negotiating Su Hao’s situation, Huang Shujun turned her attention to Luo Chaoxin.
“Little Xin, tomorrow mom will bring you to sign up for some extracurriculars. You’ll need to learn art, piano, dance, taekwondo, swimming, ping pong… You absolutely have to train your body, understand?”
Luo Chaoxin fell from heaven to hell.
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