Eldritch Horror Theatre

"What? They wouldn't even open the door? They even said they didn't need it?"

Inside the Clinic's office, Doctor Kelly's voice pitched up again after Fu Qian gave a brief rundown of the situation.

"That bastard."

She spat the curse a moment later, her tone thick with equal parts anger and sorrow.

She obviously wasn't talking about Toshima Shiki, but about her good friend Nancy.

"I'm coming with you!"

Her outburst over, she stood up with surprising decisiveness and motioned for Fu Qian to bring the sedatives.

"It's a bit of a distance. Do you have a car?"

Fu Qian had no objections, but he did point out the logistical hurdle.

Kelly answered as if it were the most natural thing in the world, pulling a car key from her pocket.

She really isn't leaving a scrap behind—taking over both the house and the car!

Keeping his musings to himself, Fu Qian didn't stand on ceremony. He followed her outside and got into Nancy's car.

Kelly seemed intimately familiar with the area. Driving as swift as wind and lightning, they reached the home of their first patient, Toshima Shiki, much faster than Fu Qian had managed on his own.

"You again? What do you want now?"

Toshima Keiji called out the moment Fu Qian knocked, questioning them from behind the door with even greater wariness than before.

"That's right, it's me. Considering the severity of your condition, the doctor has come in person to treat you."

Fu Qian made a gesture of introduction, and Kelly stepped forward.

"Your condition is very serious. We need to use medication to manage it."

Unfortunately, it seemed the psychiatrist's bedside manner was even blunter than his own.

"What medication? I'm not sick."

Toshima Shiki gave the exact same answer, looking at them as if they had teamed up just to scam him.

"Do you know who I am?"

Kelly suddenly asked.

"Aren't you a doctor from the Clinic?"

Toshima Shiki answered naturally.

"So if you aren't sick, how did you know that?"

Kelly followed up.

...

The question clearly dealt a critical blow to his logic. Toshima Shiki froze, his thoughts short-circuiting until his expression began to twist.

"I just know."

It took him a long time to regain his composure, but when he finally did, he spoke with stubborn confidence.

"If you don't have anything else to say, I'm closing the door."

He was a man of his word, and he immediately started pushing the door shut.

"Toshima Shiki, can you still hear the voices?"

Kelly remained entirely unfazed. She simply asked her third question.

...

The door stopped moving. Toshima Shiki stared dead at Kelly, his expression twisting twice as hard as before.

"If not, what do you have stuffed in your ears?"

Kelly pressed her advantage relentlessly, refusing to give him an inch.

Sharp eyes. She's recovering pretty well lately!

Fu Qian silently praised her. Toshima Shiki clearly had some kind of cotton-like wadding stuffed in both of his ears—something Fu Qian had noticed during his last visit.

Without the patient's medical files at the time, he had merely noted it as odd without connecting the dots.

"That has nothing to do with you..."

"It does, because you're going to accept what I brought you."

Seeing Toshima Shiki's defenses crumbling piece by piece, Kelly triumphantly grabbed a paper bag and held it out to him.

"If you want me to accept it—"

Unfortunately, even against such an aggressive onslaught, Toshima Shiki somehow withstood the pressure and refused to take the bag.

"Then bring me ten jin of candles. Otherwise, it's not happening."

As expected, the exact same answer!

Seeing Kelly freeze mid-motion, Fu Qian sighed inwardly.

"Ten jin of candles?"

Hearing the demand, Kelly repeated the words through gritted teeth.

"Are you joking? Where am I supposed to get that many for you?"

"What do you mean, where?"

Toshima Shiki shot back instantly. Speaking clearly and rapidly, he rattled off three different locations—including a convenience store, a chain supermarket, and an address that distinctly belonged to a private residence.

So he really is too afraid to go outside, just like Nancy?

He knows exactly where to find them, but he absolutely refuses to go get them himself.

Fu Qian shook his head as he listened.

"Are you sure?"

Kelly was clearly skeptical, but her only answer was the swift, decisive slam of Brother Shiki's door.

"His condition is even worse than I thought."

Kelly looked helplessly at Fu Qian. Given the circumstances, she couldn't hide her deep concern.

"Did you remember those addresses he just listed?"

That tiny amount of data was a piece of cake. Fu Qian nodded.

"So we're going to go find candles?"

"He's too stubborn. Forcing the issue will only backfire, so let's play along with his logic and guide him step by step for now."

Kelly made a prompt decision.

"The silver lining is that he refuses to leave his house, so we don't have to worry about him causing trouble outside."

"No problem."

Fu Qian voiced no objections.

"Then let's hit those places in the order he gave us."

...

As it turned out, in this day and age, neither convenience stores nor supermarkets stocked many candles.

Half an hour later, as Fu Qian carried their entire haul over to Kelly, she looked at the pile with clear skepticism.

"Is this enough?"

"Not even close. It's less than half."

Fu Qian casually hefted the bags and gave his assessment.

That is way too far off the mark!

"There's still the last place."

Kelly gritted her teeth and sped off toward the final address.

A few minutes later, Fu Qian pushed open the unlatched door. Despite the empty room that greeted them, he quickly struck gold.

"These are all...?"

Kelly stared in shock at the pile of colorful, oddly shaped candles Fu Qian dumped onto the table.

"The melting point might be a bit on the low side, but I doubt Brother Shiki will mind."

"As for the quantity, this is more than enough."

Too lazy to explain further, Fu Qian just shoved the pile together with the rest.

Rather than dwell on such trivial details, he was far more concerned with another question: how did Toshima Shiki know?

Guessing a convenience store was one thing, but this apartment wasn't exactly easy to find. Did Toshima Shiki somehow know about the resident's bizarre fetish?

No matter how you looked at it, the whole thing screamed bizarre.

...

"We found what you wanted."

Kelly didn't overthink it. Now that they had the items, she drove them back to Toshima Shiki's place as swift as wind and lightning, pounding on the door until she summoned him out again.

Toshima Shiki was visibly thrilled to see the bulging bag set down before him. Without another word, he threw the door wide open.

"You want me to take the medicine inside that?"

Excitedly taking the heavy bag of candles, he was suddenly in excellent spirits. Not only did he ignore the bizarre mix of candle shapes, but he even pointed proactively at the paper bag Kelly was offering.

"Yes..."

Stunned by the sudden 180 in his attitude, Kelly just blinked before finally nodding.

"Alright... then I'll accept it."

True to his word, Toshima Shiki reached out to take the bag of sedatives.

"But I won't drink this stuff until later."

Unfortunately, as he spoke, his hand grasped empty air.

Fu Qian had snatched the paper bag full of sedatives away a split second earlier.

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