sovbooks Chapter 56 Caffeine and Breaking Bad
Chapter 56 Caffeine and Breaking Bad
Wang Qiang's face twitched.
As a well-known "anti-counterfeiting expert" in the province, he was fawned over wherever he went. Even the managers of large chain pharmacies had to bow and scrape and offer him cigarettes.
"Register?" Wang Qiang laughed angrily, tapping his fingers on the silver briefcase, making a crisp "tap-tap" sound. "Young man, I see you won't learn your lesson until you're faced with the truth. I'm here to enforce the law, not to seek medical treatment! If there's nothing wrong with your tea, what are you afraid of an inspection for?"
The internet celebrity "Iron Head" next to him had figured out the secret to generating buzz, shoving his phone camera directly into Wang Minyu's face: "Look, folks! This is just a guilty conscience! He won't even get checked, there's definitely something fishy going on! You can buy a miracle drug for 9.9 yuan? It's probably laced with stimulants!"
The live stream chat exploded instantly.
I knew it! There's no such thing as a free lunch.
[It must have contained caffeine or amphetamines; of course it would make you feel energetic.]
Investigate! Investigate thoroughly! We cannot allow such unscrupulous businesses to harm people!
Li Siyuan got anxious and tried to rush out from behind the counter to argue, but Zhao Na held him back tightly.
Su Qing remained calm, staring intently at Wang Qiang's neck, her eyes seemingly estimating the depth of his carotid artery.
Guan Shan was gnawing on his third sticky rice chicken at the door when he heard the noise. He stuffed the last bite into his mouth, patted the oil off his hands, and moved over like a mountain.
The shadow fell, completely obscuring the boastful internet celebrity.
"What's all the noise about?" Guan Shan asked gruffly. "If you keep making noise, I'll smash your phone."
Tie Tou shuddered, took two steps back, but remained defiant: "Violent resistance! Family, they're panicking! They're going to beat us!"
Wang Minyu waved his hand, signaling Guan Shan to step back.
He put down his teacup, stood up from the recliner, and walked to the counter.
"Since you're so eager to investigate, then investigate." Wang Minyu casually pulled an unsealed packet of Qi-boosting tea from a box under the counter and tossed it on the table. "However, let me make this clear from the start. If we can't find any problems, what about the losses I incur in doing business?"
"If I can't find the problem, I'll eat this whole table right now!" Tie Tou is really going all out for clicks.
Wang Qiang ignored the internet celebrity's crazy ramblings. He opened his briefcase, revealing a row of precision test tubes and test strips, as well as a small portable chromatograph.
Looks very professional.
"This is currently the most sensitive alkaloid detection reagent on the market." Wang Qiang put on white gloves and skillfully sampled, dissolved, and titrated the sample. "Any synthetic stimulant, hormone, or even high concentration of caffeine cannot escape its detection."
The onlookers held their breath.
Although they felt good after drinking the tea, they were still unsure of themselves in the face of this "scientific instrument".
After all, if the effect is too good, it is itself worthy of suspicion.
Wang Minyu leaned against the medicine cabinet, arms crossed, with a look of schadenfreude on his face.
He didn't need to worry. The mutated medicinal materials produced by the system, although highly active, were purely natural plant alkaloids, completely different from artificially synthesized chemical drugs.
This is like eating a ton of spinach to supplement iron versus swallowing an iron ingot directly—those are two completely different things.
The liquid in the burette slowly changed color.
One minute, two minutes.
Wang Qiang's originally confident expression began to crack.
The test strip did not turn red (representing a stimulant) nor blue (representing a hormone), but instead showed a light grassy green color.
"Impossible..." Wang Qiang frowned, a thin layer of sweat appearing on his forehead.
According to the information provided by Sun Botong, something must have been added to the tea.
Even without drugs, adding cheap caffeine powder to keep someone alert is a common practice.
How come there's nothing there?
"Is the machine broken?" Tie Tou leaned closer and asked in a low voice.
"Shut up!" Wang Qiang hissed.
Unconvinced, he took out a new test strip and this time inserted it directly into the concentrate.
It's still green.
Moreover, the chromatographic peaks showed that the sample contained extremely high concentrations of flavonoids and polysaccharides, with an alarmingly high purity.
"How's it going, expert?" Wang Minyu peeled a peanut he'd pulled out of nowhere and popped it into his mouth. "What did they find? Heroin or ecstasy?"
Wang Qiang's hands were trembling slightly.
He took a deep breath, his eyes darting around, and suddenly pointed at the green test strip, shouting, "Something's wrong! This green color is strange! This is...this is a reaction to a new type of covert stimulant! It's an unlisted compound!"
wow——
The crowd erupted in uproar.
"I knew it!" Iron Head exclaimed excitedly. "Family! It's confirmed! A new type of drug! This heartless doctor is a real Breaking Bad master!"
Zhao Na trembled with anger: "You're talking nonsense! This is a natural reaction between plant chlorophyll and flavonoids!"
"Who's the expert, you or me?" Wang Qiang removed his white gloves and sneered. "This ingredient has an extremely complex structure; it's impossible for ordinary Chinese medicine to extract it. Unless it's synthesized in a laboratory! I have reason to suspect that you're engaged in illegal drug manufacturing!"
If you want to add a crime, there is nothing wrong with it.
Wang Minyu chewed on peanuts, looked at Wang Qiang's righteous and awe-inspiring face, and suddenly laughed.
"Expert Wang, you've been staying up late a lot these past few days, haven't you?"
Wang Qiang was taken aback: "What?"
"Your eyelids are swollen, the whites of your eyes are yellow, and your hands tremble involuntarily when you speak." Wang Minyu pointed to Wang Qiang's hands. "And you have a certain odor."
"What's that smell? I shower every day!"
"It's not the smell of sweat." Wang Minyu took a step closer, his nose twitching. "It's a... caramel mixed with sulfur smell. This is caused by the leakage of stagnant internal energy due to long-term use of 'powerful stimulants'."
He turned to the internet celebrity with the thick head: "And you, stop holding your phone. Your pupils are dilated right now. Even though you're wearing colored contacts, the light just now made the reflection look off. Have you been feeling like you have endless energy lately, not wanting to sleep for three days and three nights, but wanting to bang your head against the wall as soon as you stop?"
Iron Head's hand jerked violently, and his phone nearly fell to the ground.
"You...you're changing the subject!" Wang Qiang said, his tone fierce but his voice betraying his underlying fear. "We're talking about your tea!"
"My tea is fine; the problem lies with you." Wang Minyu's eyes suddenly turned cold, like two scalpels piercing straight into people's hearts. "Expert Wang, dare you take out that little silver pillbox in your pocket and show it to everyone?"
Wang Qiang instinctively covered his pocket: "What...what are you doing? These are my personal belongings!"
"If you don't want to take it, I can have my employee take it for you." Wang Minyu glanced at Guan Shan.
Guan Shan grinned, took a step forward, and the floor shook.
Wang Qiang's face turned ashen, and he retreated step by step.
He knew all too well what he was eating.
To meet deadlines and for social obligations, he has been taking Kangmei's specially supplied "energy pills" for the past two weeks.
That was given to him by Sun Botong, who said it was pure Chinese medicine and had amazing effects.
"Since you're not taking it, let me guess." Wang Minyu pressed on, "It's an upgraded version of 'Top Scholar Pill,' right? The ingredients are purer, and the toxicity... is stronger."
"You're talking nonsense!" Wang Qiang roared. "These are legitimate health products!"
"Legitimate?" Wang Minyu suddenly reached out, his speed like lightning, and grabbed Wang Qiang's wrist.
[Pulse diagnosis: The pulse at the cun-kou point is floating, large, and hollow, like pressing on a scallion stalk. Heart rate 140, a sign of sudden collapse of kidney yang.]
"Your kidneys are already 'crying'." Wang Minyu's voice wasn't loud, but it sent a chill down everyone's spine. "If you don't believe me, press down three inches below your lower back right now. Press hard."
Wang Qiang was stunned.
In extreme fear and under Wang Minyu's resolute gaze, he inexplicably reached out his left hand and pressed it against his lower back.
It's just a light press.
"ah--!!!"
A heart-wrenching scream echoed through the old street.
Wang Qiang sprang up as if he'd been electrocuted, then knelt heavily on the ground, clutching his waist and writhing in pain, his white shirt instantly soaked with cold sweat.
The pain felt like a red-hot hook was being churned inside my kidneys.
"Kidney Qi deficiency, causing internal heat to burn your body." Wang Minyu looked down at him. "This is the consequence of the 'legitimate health supplements' you've been consuming."
The live stream room was deathly silent, followed by a frenzy of comments flooding the screen.
Holy crap! This plot twist was too fast!
Did this expert ruin his own health by taking medication?
Is Dr. Wang's mouth blessed? He can pinpoint exactly where it hurts!
Seeing that things were not going well, the internet celebrity with the iron head turned around and tried to slip away.
"Stop." Su Qing's cold voice rang out. She had somehow gotten to the doorway, holding the mop she used to wipe the floor, her eyes looking at a corpse trying to escape. "The floor isn't dry yet, you've made a mess, you'll have to pay for it."
Iron Head stood frozen in place, his calves twitching.
Wang Minyu walked up to Wang Qiang, squatted down, and picked up the packet of "Renxin Buqi Tea" that Wang Qiang had thrown away from the ground.
"Do you want to live?" Wang Minyu shook the paper bag in his hand.
Wang Qiang was in so much pain that he couldn't speak; he could only nod frantically, like a dying dog.
"Then drink it." Wang Minyu tore open the packaging, poured the powder directly into Wang Qiang's mouth, then grabbed the half-empty bottle of mineral water that Guan Shan was drinking next to him and roughly gulped it down. "Since you say this is poison, then let's fight poison with poison."