Dead silence!

The whole office was so quiet that you could hear the sound of a needle dropping.

After everyone’s brief stupor, Deputy Dean Zhang roared, "What do you think you’re doing? Do you even know what you’re doing?"

As the leader in charge of logistics, seeing such a scene made his sphincter tighten involuntarily.

Du Heng was also a little dazed.

He had expected these women to cause a scene.

But what he had predicted was them cursing and weeping loudly. He believed there was a chance the women might resort to physical violence, but he thought it unlikely, as that would escalate things significantly.

Yet, to his surprise, things had gone differently than he expected. He was momentarily half a beat slow in reacting, watching wide-eyed as the three women charged toward him, his face moments from being bloodied.

But the security guard standing in front of him reacted quickly—so quickly that Du Heng hadn’t even processed it before the budding commotion was brought to an abrupt halt.

The guard, holding an anti-riot fork, thrust it out once, sending the foremost woman reeling back against the wall, where she was pinned and partially immobilized.

If it took the woman three seconds to charge over, it probably took her only one second to be sent flying back.

She was pushed back so fast that even as her back hit the wall with a SMACK, she was still mid-sentence, "You beast, I’ll fight you... huh?"

The woman didn’t finish her last word before being silenced by the intimidating steel fork in front of her. Feeling the solid wall behind her and the constraint on her chest, her mind went blank. This was different from what she had experienced before.

The two other women who had charged alongside her shuddered, slammed on the brakes, and immediately threw themselves into reverse, their eyes wide with horror as they scrambled to put distance between themselves and the guard.

Especially when they saw the dark anti-riot shield steadily advancing, they voluntarily pressed themselves flat against the wall, their shouts dying in their throats.

The guard holding the steel fork said sternly, his expression righteous, "Get back."

However, upon hearing his superior’s words, he looked momentarily confused, then turned and said, "I’m stopping violence from occurring.

The Dean said last time that our duty is to protect the safety of the Hospital’s medical staff, maintain the normal working order of the Hospital, and prevent possible illegal infringements and irrational violent behavior."

As he spoke, he glanced from the woman pinned before him to the onlookers. "These women were trying to attack the Dean. That’s violent behavior.

So, I was performing the duties assigned to me by the Hospital. I was stopping violence from happening."

The guard before them, though appearing rather dense, spoke flawlessly. He directly cited his job responsibilities, leaving Deputy Dean Zhang speechless.

Moreover, after the security guard finished speaking, he turned to Du Heng and asked with a blank expression, "Dean, did I do something wrong?"

At this moment, Du Heng let out a long breath. As his heart relaxed, he realized that his impression of this security guard was quite deep.

This was the same guard who, a while ago, had eagerly stepped forward during the incident with the Old Lady in the Internal Medicine Department—the one who was making a scene, demanding the Hospital refund her medicine.

He was a veteran who had returned to civilian life to work as a security guard at the Hospital, the youngest in their group.

"You did nothing wrong; you did very well," Du Heng said, looking at the seemingly slow-witted guard in front of him and smiling faintly.

Although the guard appeared quite dim-witted, Du Heng believed that this was just his disguise. If he were truly dim-witted, his reactions wouldn’t be so quick, and his logic so clear.

"Your duty is to proactively prevent such violent acts from occurring," Du Heng spoke again before Deputy Dean Zhang could interject, once more validating the guard’s conduct.

This validation dispelled the guard’s fear of being undermined by his leader, and he held his steel fork even more steadily.

As Du Heng affirmed the guard’s actions, there were different reactions from both sides in the office.

First, on the Hospital’s side, the initial shock among Du Heng’s colleagues gradually gave way to relief as he spoke. Du Heng’s words set the tone for the situation, giving them confidence and direction. This provided them with a template for dealing with such unreasonable outbursts in the future.

As a result, faint, almost imperceptible smiles eventually touched their lips.

The five troublemakers, however, transitioned from horror to sheer bewilderment.

When did the Hospital start acting so forcefully and assertively?

In the past, whenever they caused a commotion like this, wouldn’t the authorities negotiate with them? In the end, the amount of money they received varied, but at least there was an attitude and action of negotiation from the Hospital’s side.

But why were these people acting so unpredictably now?

Were they really not worried about the situation escalating?

Did they genuinely not care about the impact on their reputation?

Did they not care at all about what their superiors thought of them?

The group was somewhat bewildered as they looked at the white gowns and gray uniforms before them, and the faint smiles on their faces. It seemed these Hospital people genuinely didn’t care.

Could they still play hardball?

Of course not.

They were all intelligent people and definitely wouldn’t push their luck. They had plenty of tactics; otherwise, they wouldn’t have survived in this line of work for long. Anyone not clever enough was weeded out long ago.

After a brief moment of confusion, the woman pinned to the wall quickly resorted to her true specialty.

As soon as Du Heng’s words fell, her body went limp, and she slid down the wall to sit on the floor.