C27 The Psychiatric Hospital

The wedding massacre shocked the nation. The incident was sealed under top secrecy. Six police officers and the groom were killed inside the hotel; another twenty officers died outside, thirty more wounded. Guests were traumatized for life.

Ethan was sent to a psychiatric hospital. Secretary Ma and Director Ding were moved to intensive care. Dana’s face was permanently scarred—a burning mark that fueled her hatred of crime.

Three months later, the survivors returned to work, but none could forget the horror. Dana threw herself into police work, turning X City’s crime rate upside down. The gang that had attacked the wedding vanished without a trace.

And Ethan? He remained locked in the mental hospital.

Inside the hospital, Ethan wore a thin patient uniform and wandered the wards, kneeling to everyone he saw and begging for money. If anyone refused, he beat them. Both patients and staff feared him. He was the tyrant of the ward.

One day, after attacking a group of patients, Ethan was subdued by twenty staff members wielding electric batons. They tied him up like a rice dumpling and threw him into solitary confinement—a high-risk room for the most dangerous patients.

Two other insane men were locked inside with him.

“What’s this thing?” one asked.

“It’s a rice dumpling!” the other laughed.

They punched Ethan for fun.

Suddenly, Ethan’s body erupted with a surge of electric current. The two men convulsed, foaming at the mouth.

Ethan broke free from his bonds.

He knelt down. The two patients knelt with him.

Ethan kowtowed. They kowtowed too.

Confused, Ethan stood up. They stood up.

Ethan punched them unconscious, stripped them, and tied them up. Then he knelt again, holding out his hand for money.

The men had nothing.

Enraged, Ethan slapped them until they screamed. Then he began to sing at the top of his lungs:

“I’m a little bird, I can’t fly high…”

His terrible voice mixed with their screams, turning the ward into a slaughterhouse.

Staff flooded in and filled the room with anesthesia gas. Ethan collapsed.

The hospital held an emergency meeting.

“This patient is destroying our facility! We can’t treat him!” the director shouted.

“Then send him away!” a nurse cried.

“We can’t. He’s a special case, sent by high-level officials. Our only option is to lock him with the old monster on the mountain.”

The old monster was a legendary patient who had driven the previous hospital director insane. He’d been isolated for fifty years in a stone house deep in the hills.

The staff agreed immediately.

Ethan woke up in a cold, stone room. Iron bars covered the windows. Dust and spiderwebs hung everywhere. The place felt like a tomb.

“Hello? Where am I?”

A voice echoed back, but it wasn’t his own.

“Who’s there? Show yourself!”

Ethan’s voice trembled. For the first time in his life, he was truly afraid.

Then he broke down crying. All the pain, shame, and powerlessness burst out of him.

He cried for his broken childhood, his wasted youth, his chaotic adventures, and for Dana—her beautiful face cut open before his eyes.

It was the greatest shame a man could suffer.

Suddenly, wild laughter exploded through the room.

An old Taoist priest appeared out of nowhere. His clothes were tattered, his hair matted, half his beard black and half white.

“Why are you crying?” he snapped.

“I’m sad,” Ethan mumbled.

“I laugh because I’m happy. You cry because you’re weak. Stop crying—or I’ll kill you!”

Ethan cried louder.

The Taoist roared with laughter. The walls shook. Dust rained from the ceiling.

Ethan’s cries grew louder, matching the Taoist’s laughter. Animals fled the mountain in terror.

Finally, Ethan cried himself out.

He stared at the old man. “Who are you?”

“I’m Li Kun. A Tiger Clan warrior. They used to call me the Tiger Taoist.”

Ethan’s eyes widened.

“Tiger Clan? But… the Tiger Clan is gone.”

The old man’s face twisted with grief.

“I know. I’m the last one.”

He sat down and began to tell his story.

Long ago, Tiger Clan rules allowed only one child per family to survive. Brothers had to kill each other.

Li Kun had an older brother—perfect, talented, loved by all. Everyone assumed Li Kun would die.

On the day they were to fight, the brother smiled and said:

“You’re young. You haven’t lived. I’ve already had five more years of life. You go on.”

He pulled out a knife and pressed it to his own throat.

“I don’t want to kill you,” the brother said.

Li Kun panicked. He’d already poisoned the wine.

“You tricked me!” Li Kun screamed.

The brother smiled weakly.

“I knew. I drank it anyway. Live on. For both of us.”

He cut his own throat.

Li Kun was forced to eat his brother’s flesh to absorb his power—a Tiger Clan ritual.

From that day, Li Kun became unbeatable.

He hunted for the Dragon Pearl—a sacred relic that gave the Dragon Clan ultimate power. He grew famous, matched only by the Dragon Taoist. Together they were called: Dragon Soars, Tiger Leaps.

But the war broke them.

Li Kun lost his mind and was locked away for fifty years.

Ethan listened silently.

“So you’re not crazy,” Ethan said.

“I’m wounded. Same thing.”

The old man looked deep into Ethan’s eyes.

“You carry Dragon Clan power… but you also know the Tiger Dance. How?”

Ethan told him everything: the war, the female empire, Li Yizhu, the betrayal, the wedding massacre.

He told him about kneeling in the dirt, begging for mercy, losing Dana.

The Tiger Taoist nodded slowly.

“You didn’t go crazy. You surrendered. You thought it was the only way to save lives.”

Ethan flinched.

“I was weak.”

“No. You chose life over pride. That takes more courage than fighting.”

The old man stood up.

“The man who can accept humiliation is the man who can change the world. You’re not broken. You’re waking up.”

He placed a hand on Ethan’s shoulder.

Power exploded inside Ethan’s body—Dragon power, Tiger power, the crab pearl, all merging at last.

His mind cleared.

The act was over.

The madman was gone.

Ethan Zhao had returned.

Outside, the hospital staff heard a deep, calm voice.

“I’m leaving.”

The door to the stone room creaked open.

Ethan walked out, his eyes clear, his posture straight.

No longer a beggar.

No longer a fool.

A warrior.

The staff stepped back in terror.

Ethan looked up at the sky.

“Tian Kui,” he whispered. “You made me kneel. Now I’m coming for you.”

The hunt had begun.