He Has More Influence Than Me

At 9 a.m., the hospital conducted a conference regarding the formation of spiritual civilization. 

As the PCR Group representative, Zhou Wen attended the conference at the administrative building because he was the only person in the group who was free. 

The director was speaking passionately on the stage, but his employees were falling asleep.

Zhou Wen, too, felt a little bored, so he was looking at some documents that were in English on his phone. 

After reading two or three pages, someone touched his elbow. 

He turned and saw the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology representative, who was sitting on his right.

A female doctor who was young and beautiful. 

Zhou Wen looked at her questioningly. She looked like the younger version of Gao Yuanyuan.

The female doctor wrote in her notebook, "Where is Xu Jiajia?"

Zhou Wen opened his notepad and typed, "She's in the lab."

The female doctor wrote quickly. "I have a favor to ask from her."

Zhou Wen smiled, thinking to himself, 'If you need a favor from her, why are you telling me?'

He did not even need to think to be able to guess what the female doctor wanted to do. 

All of the hospitals located in the whole Jiangzhou district, including five municipal districts and four counties, sent all of their major pathological testing samples to the same testing center in Building One. Those samples, in addition to Building One's own patients, meant that the workload at the testing center was incredibly heavy. 

Because of the long queue, tests that should take less than 24 hours to complete usually end up taking seven to ten days. 

So, those who had a network in the testing center would often ask the people who they knew to help them rush the process so that the patient could receive their treatments sooner. 

Zhou Wen typed, "Call her, then." 

The female doctor continued writing - "I am not very close to her; I feel a little embarrassed to do that."

Zhou Wen nodded and stopped responding. 

What did she expect? Was he supposed to entertain her just because she was pretty?

There were so many good-looking nurses in the hospital; he could not even count them with his two hands. 

This matter had nothing to do with him. 

Meanwhile, Shen Xue waited for a while but received no response; she felt a little upset. 

Her cousin, who was diagnosed with gastric cancer, just completed surgery the day before, and they were waiting for their post-surgical pathological testing.

However, it had to take at least seven days for the results to be released. 

Her cousin found her mom, and her mom asked her to help find someone in the hospital who could help to speed up the process. 

Nevertheless, she just joined the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology last year as an intern, so what type of network could she have developed?

However, due to her ego, she could not say no. 

'Why do you have to be so egoistic?' Shen Xue thought to herself.

Shen Xue glanced at Zhou Wen's phone. Her English was not too bad - she scored more than 500 marks for her College English Test at level 4 and level 6. Yet, she had no idea what Zhou Wen was reading; there were too many words that she had never even seen before.

Seeing how focused he was on reading, Shen Xue did not dare to disturb him anymore. 

Not only would she be seen as annoying, but he might also not even be able to help. The operations at the testing center were regulated extremely strictly, unlike in the hospital, so not everyone could help. 

Then, she pulled her phone out to text Jiajia, "Are you there?"

She met Jiajia at a hospital educational conference, and they came from the same hometown, so they would occasionally chat in the hospital's group chat, but they were not considered close at all. 

At 8 a.m. this morning, she texted Jiajia, but Jiajia just replied, "I'm busy" and did not respond again.

But now, she had no choice but to text Jiajia again. If Jiajia did not reply, then she would just give up. 

Just when she was thinking of what she should tell her mom, her phone vibrated; it was a text from Jiajia. 

"Hi! I'm quite busy today, anything?"

Shen Xue had her hopes up again and quickly replied, "I need a favor from you…"

After phrasing her request carefully, she sent the message. 

Around two minutes later, Jiajia replied, "I can ask for you, but I can't guarantee that they'll help. Send the patient's information to me."

Shen Xue quickly sent the hospital record from her gallery and said, "Thank you."

Three minutes later, Jiajia sent an "OK" emoji. 

Shen Xue pondered for a while and asked, "I'm at the conference center, and someone from your group is sitting next to me. What's his name?"

This time, Jiajia responded quickly, "His name is Zhou Wen, a new colleague in our group."

Then, Jiajia sent a voice recording. 

Shen Xue took out her Bluetooth earphones discreetly and pressed play, "Ask him for help; he has more influence than me."

Shen Xue asked, "Didn't he just join?"

Jiajia replied, "He's a special one. I can't explain it in a few words; just do as I say."

"Okay, then. He looks a little… distant."

"Just say that you're my friend and see if he's willing to help."

"..."

She just told Zhou Wen that she was not close to Jiajia. 

"Okay, then. Thanks! I'll treat you to a meal next time."

"No problem."

Shen Xue kept her phone away and began thinking about how she should ask Zhou Wen for the favor.

Yet, even when the conference ended, she still had not mustered the courage to ask him. 

It was mainly because Zhou Wen was too focused on reading his documents, so it would be too rude to disturb him. 

After the dismissal, Shen Xue followed Zhou Wen out of the conference hall and went down the lift with him. 

When they reached the designated floor, Zhou Wen walked leisurely to the testing center. Shen Xue, on the other hand, hesitated for a while and shouted, "Eh, please wait. Zhou… Wen."

Zhou Wen turned around and saw the female doctor who was sitting next to him. 

He just realized that this female doctor was really tall - about 170cm - and she was very slender as well. 

"Yes?"

Shen Xue walked towards him and said awkwardly, "Uh… I wanted to ask you for a favor."

Zhou Wen replied, "I'm new to the hospital; I don't think I'll be able to help with anything."

'Too much humility is pretentiousness,' Shen Xue thought to herself, but she did not know what to say. She had never had to ask for a favor from anyone before, and she did not know what attitude to adopt. 

"Uh…" Shen Xue pondered. Then, she gritted her teeth and took her phone out to play Jiajia's voice message. 

"Ask him for help; he has more influence than me."

'This woman is really giving me unnecessary trouble,' Zhou Wen thought to himself. He felt a little grumpy as he was busy with his paper. Therefore, he did not really have much time to help. Although there was no deadline for his paper, there was a lot of preparation work to do. 

He rubbed his eyebrow and asked, "What's the name of your cousin?"

Shen Xue was ecstatic and quickly told Zhou Wen her cousin's name and the information about the test that was conducted. 

Zhou Wen nodded. "Okay, got it,"

Then, he left. 

Shen Xue did not get to say thanks, so she puffed her cheeks up and thought, 'Are all geniuses so mean?'

Meanwhile, Zhou Wen arrived at the entrance of the testing center. The person who took his Zhonghua cigarette and 500 dollars, Lu Qing, called him. He said that the requested chemicals and drugs were all ready. 

Zhou Wen thanked him and hung up.

Then, he went to the sample processing group on the third floor. 

The specimen from the surgical room will firstly be sent to the Department of Pathology. After the sample had been collected and documented, it would be sent to the sample processing group in the testing center. 

Fix, dye, slice, examine, observe the nature of the lesion, determine if it was malignant or benign, determine the severity of the lesion, and so on. 

Shen Xue's cousin had only sent her specimen yesterday, so it should still be in the queue. One week would be an optimistic estimate for the time it would take for their sample to be processed. 

Zhou Wen went straight to the office. Every group leader had a deputy leader. Take Wu Yan, for example. She was addressed as the deputy leader. The deputy leader was mainly in charge of helping the group leader with some administrative work. The deputy leader of the sample processing group was called Sun Jing.

She was 30 this year and was already a mother of two. Sun Jing was very close to Wu Yan, so she was pretty nice to him too. She was the one who got his little lab room for him. 

Sun Jing was writing a data report when Zhou Wen came in. She smiled and said, "Ah, you came just in time! I was just wanting to ask you for a favor."

Zhou Wen smiled. "Please ask! I'll do anything for you."

Sun Jing laughed. "Don't sweet-talk me. I won't ask you for too much. I have a friend who is queuing for a viral test now. You're an expert, so I wanted to ask you for help."

Like the doctors in the hospitals, the researchers in the testing centers had many "friends." Every day, there would be all types of cousins, friends, classmates, aunts, and so on, asking for help. 

Ever since he joined, Zhou Wen had heard the phrase "I have a friend who…" for so many times that he had already gotten used to it. 

Before he could finish his sentence, he heard a notification from the system. A task was triggered. 

[Ding! A task from Sun Jing's friend, do you want to accept it?]

Zhou Wen was a little amused as he would have never guessed that Shen Xue was the key to triggering a task. 

Then, he wondered what would have happened if he had declined her request; would he still receive this task?

It was hard to say. 

"No problem. I'll do it later today! But you'll have to stop calling me an expert; I just got lucky." Zhou Wen made a pitiful face. 

Sun Jing laughed again. "What do you mean, you got lucky? The group leader for the Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Lin Huaidong, commended your ability in public, in front of so many experts! How could it be just luck? An expert is an expert; it cannot be faked; there's no need to sell yourself short!"

"Yes, yes, yes…" Zhou Wen could not argue with her, so he could only accept the title - 'expert.' 

He took the chance to talk about Shen Xue's request. 

Sun Jing checked the computer records right away and found that the patient was arranged to be tested eight days later. She immediately re-arranged the patient's schedule to this evening and even added a remark - 'urgent.'

"The result will be out tomorrow morning…"