Chapter 076: The Media's Doubts

  About twenty people rushed into the clinic, including both men and women, all in their twenties or thirties. Some were carrying cameras, some were holding still cameras, and others were holding microphones.

  A group of people suddenly appeared in the clinic, Tang Xiaosheng was startled and stunned for a while before finally realizing that these people were all media reporters.

  It was originally announced this afternoon that the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau held a press conference to report on the latest developments in the Xia Bai case. At the press conference, Deputy Director of the Public Security Bureau Bao Zhiming solemnly declared that there had been a major breakthrough in the Xia Bai case and that the real culprit had surrendered to the public security bureau three days ago. The culprit's name is Guo Yang, and Tang Xiaosheng, who was previously suspected of being a suspect, is innocent.

  This piece of information was like a heavyweight bombshell that left all the reporters present in a state of shock.

  Because over the past half month, due to the evidence found by the Public Security Bureau being extremely sufficient and powerful, almost everyone has determined that Tang Xiaosheng is the murderer. Although reports about Tang Xiaosheng have never stopped in recent days, and each one was more explosive than the last, no one has ever doubted the fact that Tang Xiaosheng is a criminal suspect.

  But today, the Public Security Bureau suddenly announced that Tang Xiaosheng was innocent, completely beyond everyone's expectations. The shock of this news is no less than hearing that the Chinese men's football team won the World Cup.

  After learning of the news, more than 20 media reporters rushed to Jinghua City Mental Hospital to interview Long Xiaoxue about this matter. Because in recent days, Long Xiaoxue and Tang Xiaosheng's romance has been widely followed by the media and the public, while Tang Xiaosheng, being a murderer, is also a subject of sympathy.

  Now that Tang Xiaosheng has been proven innocent, the media reporters naturally didn't want to let go of such explosive news and thought of collecting first-hand information in the hospital.

  But when they arrived at the hospital, they were shocked by an even more explosive piece of news.

  Upon arriving at the hospital, reporters learned from a female nurse that Tang Xiaosheng's mental illness seemed to have recovered this morning and had gone to the outpatient department to go through the formalities for discharge with the director.

  As soon as they heard this news, many journalists immediately realized that tomorrow's headline was already settled.

  Tang Xiaosheng is innocent, which in itself is a shocking piece of news; Tang Xiaosheng's mental illness has been cured, this is an even more explosive piece of news. And when these two pieces of news are combined, the shockwave is self-evident.

  A few days ago, when it was rumored that Tang Xiaosheng was the killer, news of his severe schizophrenia broke out soon after. However, today, the police confirmed that Tang Xiaosheng is innocent, and his mental illness suddenly improved.

  These two things combined make it easy for people to conclude that Tang Xiaosheng's mental illness is fake, and he pretended to be mentally ill in order to escape the wrongful case.

  Such a dramatic event is undoubtedly an eye-catching news story.

  Because at the beginning, Jinghua City Mental Hospital published the materials of Tang Xiaosheng's judicial psychiatric appraisal to prove that Tang Xiaosheng indeed suffered from severe mental illness. At that time, the content released not only included detailed analysis by appraisal experts from a professional perspective but also put the video of Tang Xiaosheng's appraisal process online for the public to browse.

  Almost everyone who saw the video of Tang Xiaosheng's dazed and dull-eyed appearance in the appraisal room thought he was indeed mentally ill. It was also because of the release of the appraisal video that for more than a dozen days afterwards, no one questioned the conclusion that Tang Xiaosheng was mentally ill.

  But today, everyone suddenly discovered that Tang Xiaosheng's spirit was not a problem at all. From start to finish, he was pretending. He not only deceived tens of thousands of people but also cheated the hospital's psychiatric identification experts.

  These forensic psychiatry experts have an extraordinary background. Initially, considering the complexity of Xia Bai's case, Beijing Huahua Mental Hospital specially established a strong appraisal team to assess Tang Xiaosheng. An ordinary appraisal team usually only requires three experts, but the team that assessed Tang Xiaosheng had five experts who were authorities in fields such as psychiatry, neurology, criminal psychology, human behavior studies, and hypnosis studies.

  Tang Xiaosheng actually managed to deceive such a professional appraisal expert group, it's really too unbelievable, and can even be said that it's almost a miracle.

  It was precisely because of this that when media reporters arrived at the hospital and heard that Tang Xiaosheng had recovered from his mental illness, their keen news sense told them that this would be explosive news, so they disregarded the hospital security guards' attempts to block them, and carrying microphones and cameras, swarmed into the outpatient department.

  Suddenly so many reporters came into the clinic, Tang Xiaosheng, Little Dragon Girl, Guo Xiang and psychiatrists were all a bit unresponsive.

  Just then, a reporter asked Tang Xiaosheng in a hurry: "Mr. Tang, I am a reporter from Jinghua Metropolitan Daily. I heard that you have recovered from your mental illness. Is this true?"

  Facing reporters' questions, Tang Xiaosheng slowed down and said lightly: "Thank you for your concern, my mental illness has indeed improved somewhat this morning."

  Everyone was shocked to see Tang Xiaosheng facing the interview so fluently. In the past half month, the impression left by Tang Xiaosheng on people is a foolish and stupid image with a crooked mouth and slanted eyes, now suddenly becoming normal, it's a bit uncomfortable.

  At this time, a reporter from the Jinghua Evening News asked again: "Mr. Tang, this morning the Public Security Bureau publicly announced that the murderer of Xia Bai's case was Guo Yang, and you were innocent. Now your mental illness has suddenly recovered, may I ask if your previous mental illness was always pretended?"

  Tang Xiaosheng smiled slightly and said calmly, "You're all thinking too much. How can mental illness be faked? I indeed have a mental illness, and this isn't my first time in a psychiatric hospital."

  The reporter did not give up and raised doubts: "You are an actor with better disguise skills than ordinary people. Are you using your acting skills to pretend to be mentally ill in order to escape the injustice?"

  Tang Xiaosheng shrugged: "You guys overestimate me, I'm not Chow Yun-fat, what acting skills do I have? Besides, my mental illness has been judicially certified, how could I possibly fake it?"

  The reporter was still skeptical and offered his own explanation: "Perhaps your acting skills are too good, even the identification experts were deceived. Otherwise, when the police first said you were a murderer, you immediately became mentally ill. Today, the police have confirmed that you are innocent, and your mental state has immediately returned to normal, all of this is just too coincidental."

  Another journalist chimed in: "Right, how could there be such a coincidence? Mr. Tang, please tell us how you deceived the appraiser?"

  Upon hearing this, the psychiatrist's face turned slightly awkward. As an expert witness, facing such questioning was clearly not a glorious thing.

  Tang Xiaosheng maintained a smiling expression and explained calmly, "Some things are just coincidental, there's no way to explain. For example, I was just thinking of leaving the clinic, and very unfortunately, you all rushed in at that moment. I couldn't possibly conclude from this that you were all waiting by the door, and only suddenly came in when I left."

  He paused for a moment, then continued, "Actually, my quick recovery from mental illness this time is mainly thanks to the help of Jinghua City Mental Hospital. The doctors and nurses here are very professional, it was under their careful treatment and care that I recovered so quickly."

  Tang Xiaosheng said these hypocritical lies in order to save face. If he were to confess to the media now, saying: "Yes, I was just trying to escape legal punishment by pretending to be mentally ill. The police are really useless and actually thought I was the murderer. Luckily, the so-called experts at the hospital are also idiots, so I pretended to be mentally ill and fooled them."

  If he were to reveal the truth in such a way, it would indeed be overbearing and pretentious. However, by doing so, he would offend many people, from the hospital's appraisal experts to the public security bureau, the criminal detention center, the procuratorate, and the court, as well as all the personnel and institutions related to the Xia Bai case. Tang Xiaosheng wouldn't be foolish enough to do such a thing, which is why he insists on claiming that he indeed suffers from mental illness.

  However, media reporters were not so easily fooled and continued to ask questions in various ways, trying to get Tang Xiaosheng to reveal the truth.

  If they were facing an ordinary person, they might have succeeded. Unfortunately, they were facing Tang Xiaosheng, an actor who was extremely skilled at disguising and lying. More than 20 people asked questions for over an hour, but still couldn't get the answers they wanted, and Tang Xiaosheng remained tight-lipped from start to finish.

  Helpless, the journalists had no choice but to shift the topic to other aspects.

  "Mr. Tang, may I ask how your romance with Long Xiaoxue began? How long have you been dating? As the daughter of Long Tianhao, doesn't it put a lot of pressure on you to be in a relationship with her?"

  "Mr. Tang, it's said that you once picked up 1 million yuan but voluntarily handed it over to the police. Can I ask why you didn't think of keeping it for yourself at the time? Is it related to your upbringing when you were young?"

  "Mr. Tang, you once donated 400 sets of clothing to nursing homes and orphanages. Can I ask why you did this? Are you enthusiastic about charity in order to call on more people to pay attention to the vulnerable groups in society?"

  "Mr. Tang, more than half a month ago, you risked your life to save others and single-handedly fought against the kidnappers on Nanfeng Mountain. Can you describe the situation at that time?"

  ……

  Facing these questions from the journalists, Tang Xiaosheng patiently answered them at first. As the saying goes, a guest is a guest, and since they have come all the way to interview you, you should give them some face.

  But he soon discovered that these reporters' minds seemed to be filled with a "Ten Thousand Whys" and their questions kept coming one after another, seemingly endless.

  Tang Xiaosheng answered for more than two hours, his mouth was dry and his tongue was parched, but the reporters still hadn't finished asking questions. And their questions were getting stranger and stranger:

  "Mr. Tang, I heard that the underwear you're wearing is red panda brand underwear. May I ask why you wear panda brand? Is it to evoke everyone's awareness of protecting national treasures?"

  "Mr. Tang, I heard you like to eat instant noodles, why do you have this hobby? As far as I know, your favorite brand of instant noodles is Uni-President, are you trying to express a vision for the unification of the motherland?"

  "Mr. Tang, someone once saw you riding a bicycle with two women on it parading in the street, may I ask why did you do that? Was it to call on everyone to enhance environmental awareness and promote cycling?"

  ……

  Facing these strange questions, Tang Xiaosheng was really speechless and didn't know how to answer. What's more, the reporters' enthusiasm for asking questions was still very high, with a hint of being deliberately confusing.

  It's not hard to understand the behavior of media reporters, Tang Xiaosheng has been a household name in Beijing for over half a month, with numerous reports about him every day. Now that they suddenly have the opportunity to interview him, these reporters naturally don't want to let it slip away.

  It just so happened that Tang Xiaosheng was in trouble. The reporters' questions became more and more far-fetched, and he was almost unable to defend himself.

  It can't go on like this, he furrowed his brow, and after a moment, his eyes rolled, and suddenly he had a bad idea. He slightly turned his head and gave Xiaolongnü a signal with his eyes.

  Little Dragon Girl saw Tang Xiaosheng give her a glance, but unfortunately, she didn't understand what this glance meant.

  It's okay, Guo Xiang is relatively quick-witted, she soon understood Tang Xiaosheng's intention, so she leaned her small mouth to the Little Dragon Girl's ear and whispered: "Sister Long, Brother wants you to use Jade Bee to drive away these reporters!"

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