Schedule Update
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"Okay," Ren said. "I'll set up my things now."
Lu Changcheng looked at him. "You have everything in your inventory. Don't you need construction work first? Permits? A contractor? Anything?"
"Nope." Ren looked up at the vaulted ceiling. "Let me surprise you."
He closed his eyes.
System.
Yes.
Place the clinic here.
A pause.
There may be alterations due to the spatial properties of this floor being different from standard placement environments. Is that acceptable?
Sure. Just do it.
Installation beginning.
Nothing happened for three seconds.
Then the floor shook.
Not violently. A deep, structural vibration, the kind that travels through the soles of your feet and up your spine before your brain finishes registering it. The inventory in Ren's mind began draining at speed, instruments, equipment, furniture, storage, all of it pulling out simultaneously in a way he had never felt before.
Then the building started growing.
It came up from the floor, which should not have been possible given that there was a floor. It came up anyway. Obsidian black, smooth and modern, clean architectural lines rising into the high-ceilinged space as if they had always been there. Two stories, glass and dark stone, clinical and precise, not out of place in a premium private hospital.
For about fifteen seconds it looked completely normal.
Then the veins appeared.
Green and red, thick as fingers, growing across the outer walls in branching patterns that pulsed faintly, alive, spreading from somewhere underneath the foundation and climbing toward the upper floors with the unhurried confidence of something that had always been there and was only now becoming visible.
Lu Changcheng took one step back.
Ren stared.
What the— He looked at the walls. What the fuck is that. What the fuck is on my clinic.
Aesthetic enhancement. Biomechanical vascular detailing. It creates a more authentic clinical atmosphere.
That is not what aesthetics means you absolute idiot. Take it off.
It is load-bearing.
It is not load-bearing it is a fucking VEIN.
Several veins. Collectively load-bearing.
Ren pressed two fingers to the side of the mask where his temple would be.
Then the sign appeared above the entrance.
CLINIC OF THE FATHER OF ABOMINATION
WE WILL MAKE SURE YOU BECOME AN ABOMINATION MONSTER (as long as you're not already dead lol)
Ren stared at it for a long moment.
"What," Lu Changcheng said, very quietly.
Ren walked to the entrance, grabbed the sign with both hands, and pulled. It did not come off. He pulled harder. It remained entirely attached to the building, serene and confident in its placement.
System.
Yes.
What the actual fuck is wrong with you.
The name reflects your primary ability set and your most significant ongoing project. It is accurate.
My clinic is not called Clinic of the Father of Abomination.
It is currently.
Change it right now.
To what.
To literally anything else. Anything. I do not care. Something that does not make me sound like a cult leader.
I have several suggestions.
Option 1: The Eldritch Mending House of Unspeakable Mercy
Option 2: Doctor Nox's Flesh Reconstruction and Screaming Emporium
Option 3: Where Patients Go In and Something Comes Out
Those are not suggestions; those are a hate crime against me personally.
They are creative options. I spent time on these.
You did not spend time on these, you generated them in a millisecond and you know exactly what you're doing.
I spent an emotional time on them.
"Who are you talking to," Lu Changcheng said.
"Nobody," Ren said. "Give me a moment."
Lu Changcheng looked at the clinic. Looked at the veins. Looked at Ren standing very still with two fingers pressed to his temple. He had met many hunters with unusual abilities over the course of his career. Some of them had internal voices, manifestations, spiritual entities. He had learned not to ask for details unless the details were strictly necessary.
He folded his hands behind his back and waited.
What is the slogan.
"As long as you're not dead, we'll make sure you become an abomination monster."
That is the worst fucking slogan in the entire history of medicine.
It is honest.
A slogan is not supposed to be a THREAT. It is supposed to make people feel safe. That is the entire point of a slogan.
lol ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I swear to every cosmic entity I have ever met that I will find a way to delete you.
You say that every time. It has never happened. It will not happen. I am load-bearing.
You said the veins were load-bearing.
Multiple things can be load-bearing. This is basic structural theory.
Fuck your father and mother.
You need me.
Still fuck your whole family tree.
Ren looked at the sign. Looked at the veins. Looked at the slogan.
"Brother Lu," he said.
"Yes," Lu Changcheng said, from a position that was now somewhat further back than before.
"How much of this is visible from the lift."
"All of it."
Ren exhaled slowly through the mask.
Fine. New name. Final answer. No options, no suggestions, no creative input from you whatsoever. The name is Clinic of the Ruin Gospel.
...Acceptable.
And the slogan. I am writing it. Do not touch it.
I will handle the slogan.
I just said I am writing it.
You will make it boring.
Good. That is the goal. Boring and non-threatening and medically appropriate.
"As long as you're not dead, I can make sure you will live on."
...That's actually fine. Did you come up with that just now.
Yes.
Why couldn't you do that from the beginning.
I could. I chose not to.
I hate you so much.
I know. I find it endearing.
Don't be smug about it.
I am always smug about it. That is a permanent state. It is also load-bearing.
The sign changed. The veins stayed. Ren looked at them for a long moment, decided that this was the battle he was going to lose today, and turned around.
CLINIC OF THE RUIN GOSPEL
As long as you're not dead, I can make sure you will live on.
Lu Changcheng was standing in the middle of the floor looking at the building. He had seen many things in his life. He was adding this to the list.
"So," Ren said, "the easy version of having a horror power is yours, hm."
"My inner demon was a muscle-obsessed smoke entity," Lu Changcheng said. "But at least it did not try to name my guild after it."
"It absolutely would have," Ren said. "It would have called it the Guild of Maximum Gains."
Lu Changcheng looked at him.
"It had sparkles," Ren said. "It would have had a sign."
A pause. Lu Changcheng looked at the clinic, then at the veins on the walls, then at the sign. He pulled out his phone and sat down on the couch.
"What are you doing," Ren said.
"Drafting the patient contract."
"Right now."
"Before anyone walks in and sees the veins without preparation." He opened a document app. "Sit down. I need your input."
Ren sat.
Lu Changcheng typed for a moment, reading aloud as he went. "Clause one. The patient acknowledges that the treating physician, referred to herein as the Doctor, operates using medical techniques that are classified, unconventional, and in some cases not yet recognized by any existing medical institution or governing body."
"That's fine."
"Clause two. The patient acknowledges that the treatment environment may include visual elements of an unusual or unsettling nature, including but not limited to pulsing organic structures, red mist, ambient sounds of unclear origin, and instruments that do not correspond to any known surgical catalogue."
"Also fine."
"Clause three." Lu Changcheng paused. "The patient acknowledges that the Doctor's hands may, at certain points during the procedure, be replaced by or supplemented with appendages of an eldritch nature, and that this is intentional and not a cause for alarm."
Ren stared at him. "Eldritch nature."
"Would you prefer I write tentacles."
"I would prefer you write nothing about my hands at all."
"I am trying to prevent a lawsuit." Lu Changcheng typed. "Clause three revised. The patient acknowledges that the Doctor's surgical methodology may differ visually from standard practice and agrees not to terminate the procedure on the basis of aesthetic objection."
"Better."
"Clause four. The patient agrees not to scream during the procedure unless the Doctor has explicitly indicated that screaming is acceptable at that stage. Unnecessary screaming disrupts the Doctor's concentration and may negatively affect the outcome."
Ren was quiet.
"Is that accurate," Lu Changcheng said.
"...Yes."
"I thought so." He kept typing. "Clause five. The patient agrees that all information regarding the treatment, the Doctor's identity, the clinic's location, the clinic's appearance, the nature of the instruments used, and any transformation that may occur as a result of the procedure is strictly confidential and may not be disclosed to any third party, government body, hunter bureau, military institution, foreign national, journalist, family member, close friend, or pet."
"Pet."
"I am being thorough."
"Why would someone tell their pet."
"People are unpredictable when they are frightened." Lu Changcheng did not look up from his phone. "Clause six. The patient acknowledges that in the event of unexpected side effects, including but not limited to temporary grey skin, involuntary enhancement of physical ability, altered eye coloration, or the emergence of a third eye, the Doctor bears no liability provided the patient was informed that the procedure carried a transformation risk."
Ren pointed at him. "That clause is extremely specific."
"I have context."
"You have too much context."
"I have exactly the right amount of context." Lu Changcheng scrolled back through the document. "Clause seven. The patient agrees that the slogan displayed at the clinic entrance, specifically the phrase as long as you're not dead, I can make sure you will live on, constitutes the full extent of the Doctor's written guarantee and that no verbal promises made before, during, or immediately after a procedure supersede this guarantee."
"Did you just put the slogan in the contract."
"For legal clarity."
"That is insane."
"That is airtight." Lu Changcheng saved the document. "I'll have Lucy format it properly and add the guild seal. Every patient signs before they enter."
Ren looked at the document on Lu's phone from across the couch. Seven clauses. A confidentiality section that covered pets. A clause about screaming etiquette. The slogan in writing.
"You wrote that in four minutes," Ren said.
"I have been a guild master for twenty years," Lu Changcheng said. "I have written many contracts under unusual circumstances. This is not even in the top five for strangeness."
"What's number one."
"A contract preventing a Mythical-rank hunter from using his ability to remove gravity from a specific three-kilometer radius around the capital on weekdays."
A pause.
"I'll send this to Lucy," Lu Changcheng said, and stood up.
"Clinic of the Ruin Gospel," he said, looking at the sign one more time.
"Yes."
"With veins on it."
"They're apparently load-bearing."
Lu Changcheng looked at him. "Load-bearing veins."
"That's what I was told."
"By who."
"It's complicated."
Lu Changcheng had watched Ren spend the last four minutes standing in front of his own clinic, pulling at a sign that refused to move, going completely still at intervals, making the expression behind the mask that suggested someone was losing an argument, and then muttering "load-bearing" under his breath twice. He had processed all of this. He had decided not to ask.
Lu Changcheng nodded slowly. "I see." He turned toward the lift. "I'm going to go back to my floor and have a quiet moment."
"Understandable."
"And Ren."
"Yeah."
"When my hunters come in for treatment." He paused. "Warn them again."
"I'll put it in the intake form."
"Good." He pressed the lift button. "At least the slogan is reasonable."
"The first draft was not."
"I assumed." The lift opened. "Welcome to the Dao Guild, Doctor."
The doors closed.
Ren turned back to his clinic.
The veins pulsed once, gently, in a way that could almost have been a greeting.
Stop that, he thought.
No.