Song Shuyi was so busy his face was pale. His mice became even more excited after being injected with the inhibitor.

They had been squeaking all afternoon. Now, the senior brother had to miserably check the document with him.

Around twelve o'clock, Li Aimin made a WeChat call. When he heard they still needed another thirty to forty-five minutes, he gave them both a solid scolding.

After the scolding, Cen Zeng put his phone away and continued to stare at the screen.

The PhD student, who had been experimenting all day, started to sigh.

"Can we just slack off?" Song Shuyi asked.

This junior brother was quite quick and competent, and could be considered smart, but he just spoke too little.

Cen Zeng thought for a moment and said, "If you want to hear an encore of Director Li's verbal abuse."

He finally said something, and it was this kind of deadpan humor.

"Forget it." Song Shuyi resignedly leaned over to look at the computer, pointing out some issues with formatting and sentence structure. Then, his alarm suddenly blared.

"Fuck." The senior brother almost screamed, "Don't wake up those ancestors in the Mouse Room again."

He turned off his phone and let out a deep sigh.

"Do you have something to do?" Cen Zeng asked.

"It's nothing. Today was supposed to be my anniversary with my girlfriend. I wanted to call her right on the dot." Song Shuyi sighed again, a short one. "It's fine, I'll finish checking this with you first."

"Why don't you make the call first? If anyone's going to get yelled at, it'll mainly be me anyway."

"It's okay. She studies law, she'll understand."

It was twelve-forty when they sent it to Director Li.

Song Shuyi was slumped over the table, looking even more sensitive to the inhibitor than his mice.

He said, "When will these days ever end?"

On the other side, Cen Zeng took out his phone. A few hours ago, Cheng Shuo had sent him a class schedule. It was marked with classes that were mandatory to attend, classes he would usually skip, and classes he never went to.

"The two mandatory ones are taught by two old guys who aren't easy to fool. The ones I usually skip are mainly because they're too boring and the final review points are accurate. As for the ones I never go to... take a guess."

After a few glances, the person slumped over on the other side sat up, "A message from your girlfriend?"

"Not my girlfriend."

"Someone you're seeing?"

"Not that either."

"Then what are you smiling at?" Song Shuyi leaned closer. "Hey, hey, hey, you're so handsome, you don't have a partner?"

"No."

"You look like that and you're single? Your standards must be too high, huh?"

"No time."

"You can always squeeze in some time! You should date now, otherwise, when you start your clinicals, life will be even more impossible."

Song Shuyi grabbed his hair as if trying to pull his soul out of this terrible place. "It's like this with my girlfriend and me: when I'm free, she's preparing for the Bar Exam. When she's free, I'm in the laboratory hypnotizing mice, or busy in the Emergency Department for twelve hours, not even having time for a meal box."

"You two sound very much in love."

Song Shuyi paused almost imperceptibly, then smiled. "We are very much in love. We never fight, because we don't even see each other once a month."

He then shook his head and said, "You should go first. I still have to check on that group of ancestors."

"Thank you for your hard work, Senior Brother."

"Don't be so polite. This is nothing yet, the days of suffering are still long." He waved to his junior brother. "See you tomorrow."

After Cen Zeng left, Song Shuyi slumped over the table. Tears he couldn't hold back fell, two drops. He silently covered his face. In the dead of the silent night, his sobs sounded like the rising tide.

He waited until another vibrating alarm he had just set went off, and then finally made the call.

"Happy anniversary," he said.

"So... are we still... breaking up?" he asked.

"I know, I'm too busy, I—"

He couldn't make another sound.

The room was silent. His arm, propping him up on the desk, slowly slid down, and the phone fell back onto the tabletop.

Not long after, another call came in. Director Li would naturally scold Cen Zeng about the document, but when it came to the experiment, he was the one who got yelled at.

He wiped his eyes and coughed once, making sure he didn't sound like he'd been crying, before pressing answer.

The moon was bright and the stars were few; the autumn night was as silent as the boundless universe. Cen Zeng walked into the dorm. Wu Yin was playing a game, yelling, "Penta kill, penta kill, fuck, who stole my kill?"

Hearing the door open, he pulled off his headphones and said, "You're back?"

Cen Zeng nodded. "You play. I'm going to take a shower and do some homework."

"Okay, we can compare notes in a bit."

After finishing the PowerPoint and the accumulated homework, Wu Yin had also finally finished his King's Promotion Match. They checked their answers. Cen Zeng explained a few of Wu Yin's wrong questions. They said goodnight to each other and went to bed.

At three in the morning, Cen Zeng sent a message to Cheng Shuo, saying that Monday noon was fine. Then he set an alarm for eight-thirty and resolved to sleep.

At four o'clock, the sound of long, steady breathing came from Wu Yin's bed. Cen Zeng climbed down and stared at himself in the mirror.

'I have to buy melatonin tomorrow. If I can't, I'll take some of my mother's medicine.'

Just then, a new message appeared on his phone, from Cheng Shuo: "Replying so late, huh? The School of Medicine's reputation for crushing people is well-deserved."

In his insomnia, a mixture of exhaustion and wakefulness, Cen Zeng typed: "You're not asleep either."

"I'm playing games..." Cheng Shuo replied. "Wanna join the great PhD Sect?"

"No time."

"Tomorrow's Sunday, are you going to the laboratory?"

Cen Zeng sent a question mark.

"Just a guess." Cheng Shuo replied. "I really didn't follow you to the hospital."

"Yes."

"Then when will you be done?"

"For what?"

"To pick you up and play games at my place."

"I don't play."

"Then let's get a late-night snack." Cheng Shuo typed. "I'm renting a two-bedroom apartment off-campus. If you want, you can sleep over after eating. It's close to the university too."

Cen Zeng finally felt a bit sleepy. He squinted, clinging to this fleeting drowsiness, and replied, "We'll see."

After climbing back into bed, a message came from Cheng Shuo: "I'll ask you again tomorrow."

He still slept poorly. In his fragmented and numerous dreams, his mother cried and apologized to him. Then there was the piglet from the animal experiment; four people were holding its legs, but it still tumbled to the ground and started to run. In the dream, it successfully rushed out of the classroom and rammed its head into the building entrance, dying on impact.

Next was Director Li's face: "Cen Zeng, no one here has time to teach you what to do. The ones who can enter my lab are the cream of the crop. Either learn it yourself, or get out."

Then it was him saying, "I want to study medicine," his tone firm.

A gentle nurse smiled and said, "It's good to be ambitious, but it's very hard. Don't you want to think it over?"

He opened his eyes, his head splitting.

Wu Yin was already awake. He said, "Morning. I have a lab class this morning. Want a cup of instant coffee?"

He thanked him, took it, and had a few sips. He glanced at the time: eight-twenty. 'Good, I should be able to get to the laboratory before nine.'

"You're going to the hospital again?" Wu Yin asked.

He nodded, grabbing his bag and phone.

"So tough." Wu Yin sighed. "You're really a grinder."

"It's alright," Cen Zeng replied. "My advisor's requirements are quite strict."

"Sigh, it's Director Li after all, so it's normal for his requirements to be a bit strict." The person opposite him smiled. "See, I can't grind like that."

'It's not necessarily a bad thing,' Cen Zeng wanted to say. In the end, he just replied, "Good luck with your experiment."