Wang Ji’s home was not large, about sixty to seventy square meters, an utterly ordinary old-style apartment.
With a layout of two bedrooms and one living room, the decor was quite dated, featuring large patches of earthy yellow wallpaper with wood grain. The sparse furniture made the already small room feel even more empty.
When Jiang Zhi stepped into this house, he finally felt the chill that Wang Ji had mentioned, a coldness that seeped into his bones like a parasite, something he was all too familiar with.
He wandered around a few rooms, but to his surprise, aside from the cold, there was nothing unusual about the place. The atmosphere was very clean, and he couldn’t even sense the common wandering spirits.
Although he had lost his cultivation and his heavenly eye was sealed, years of practice had left him with heightened senses compared to ordinary people.
Yet, he felt nothing at all.
He casually took out his compass, but it showed no signs of disturbance.
It was clean to the point of being astonishing.
In such situations, it was either a truly blessed place or something significant was suppressing it. Given Jiang Zhi’s current abilities, noticing anything would be akin to a fool’s dream.
With no one to assist him, he could only curse himself inwardly for being “overly ambitious,” thinking to himself, “I’ll take it one step at a time,” and placed a few talismans in the corners as a form of psychological comfort.
After doing this, he walked into the master bedroom, where Wang Ji was lying neatly on the bed, preparing to sleep.
This was what they had agreed upon before coming, as someone was missing and time was of the essence, so they decided to skip unnecessary preparations and get straight to the point.
After returning to this house, Wang Ji’s mental state had noticeably stabilized, his complexion softened, revealing a gentle and honest appearance.
But one should not judge a book by its cover, Jiang Zhi thought.
He pulled a chair to sit by the bed, searching for all the fire incident records he could find in Shanhai Town on his phone while casually striking up a conversation with Wang Ji.
“Can you sleep?”
“I’ll try my best.”
“How long has this house been here?”
“Almost forty years, I think.”
“Have you lived here since you were a child?”
“Yes.”
“Have you ever thought about the possibility that Yang Dong might not exist?”
Jiang Zhi suddenly asked. Wang Ji fell silent for a long time, so long that Jiang Zhi thought he had fallen asleep. When he looked up, he found Wang Ji still quietly staring at the branches outside the window, his gaze calm and unruffled, watching the leaves sway in the wind.
“Actually, I met him a long time ago,” he slowly began, “I recognized him at first glance, but it seems he has forgotten me.”
“I can’t be mistaken; Yang Dong definitely existed.”
“Whether in the past or present, I must find him.”
His tone was so resolute that it stirred something in Jiang Zhi’s heart. For someone who had left no trace, his description felt like an obsession.
He had seen many such obsessions, each with different beginnings, but they invariably turned into an endless wildfire, consuming anyone who intentionally or unintentionally fell into it.
No one could escape.
By the time Jiang Zhi flipped through dozens of pages of fire incident information, the sun was gradually setting, and Wang Ji’s breathing had finally become more stable.
He glanced at the time; it was five thirty-six in the afternoon. He wondered if falling asleep during the day would have the same effect.
His eyes were growing sore and his neck stiff, so he put down his phone and stood up to stretch. Suddenly, he heard a rustling sound coming from the bed.
Jiang Zhi looked over curiously and found that Wang Ji, who had been sleeping quietly, was making strange noises.
His sleeping posture was very stiff, lying straight with his arms at his sides, arranged as neatly as a corpse.
Only his mouth was moving.
Jiang Zhi stood there listening for a moment before realizing that Wang Ji seemed to be speaking.
At first, the sound was very soft, like an incomprehensible murmur. Gradually, it grew louder, and he could clearly sense the changes in tone, but it remained too muddled to understand.
Just as Jiang Zhi thought it was merely meaningless sleep talk and was about to continue searching for his information, he suddenly heard a sentence that was crystal clear.
“What time is it now?”
Amidst the chaotic sounds, this question stood out sharply, and Jiang Zhi immediately caught it. As he continued to listen, it reverted to the previous incoherent mumbling.
After a while, another clear sentence emerged.
“What time is it now?”
The tone was identical to Wang Ji’s, but the accent was different.
Although Wang Ji was a local of Shanhai Town, he had lived outside for many years and spoke standard Mandarin habitually, but this sentence had a strange accent, neither resembling the local dialect nor any dialect Jiang Zhi knew, carrying a thick rural accent, yet it was still understandable.
Another round of indistinct murmurs followed, and then again, “What time is it now?”
It was as if a stubborn person, not receiving a response, kept repeating their question.
Response?
Jiang Zhi suddenly had a somewhat absurd guess; Wang Ji, or rather some malevolent entity lurking in Wang Ji’s dream, seemed to be trying to communicate with him.
He quickly took out his compass, but the surrounding magnetic field showed no signs of disturbance.
He felt somewhat caught off guard; this was entirely different from all the situations he had encountered before. An abruptly appearing entity with no prior signs was completely unlike the common possession or takeover.
Instinctively, he slapped a talisman onto Wang Ji’s forehead.
But Wang Ji, or rather the entity within him, showed no signs of being affected.
Once again, amidst the vague murmurs, the question “What time is it now?” was asked.
The breath released between the opening and closing of the mouth sent the talisman fluttering, as if mocking Jiang Zhi’s audacity.
Jiang Zhi took a deep breath. He glanced at his phone screen and tentatively replied, “It is June 21, 3084, at five fifty-two in the afternoon.”
Uncertain of what the entity was specifically asking, he decided to provide the full date and time.
This time, the strange noises ceased, and the overall sound stabilized. Jiang Zhi guessed that the chaotic consciousness within Wang Ji had finally unified.
“It’s too late, it’s too late…” the entity murmured.
It was indeed responding to his answer.
“What’s too late?” Jiang Zhi asked at the right moment.
“They all lied to me, that person is going to die soon, I need to go there, if I don’t go now, it will be too late.”
“What?” Jiang Zhi was left in a fog.
“Zichou Road No. 671, there’s something there, I saw it, but they all said it was fake.”
Jiang Zhi slowly began to discern some clues, “What did you see?”
“I saw…” The voice abruptly halted, as if something had suddenly choked it, the words drowned in a series of uncomfortable “coughing” sounds.
In just a few seconds, that strange “coughing” transformed into a chilling “cawing” laughter, like a fierce ghost crawling out of hell, the laughter dripping with undeniable malice.
It seemed that the entity within Wang Ji had switched its consciousness in that instant, and even the accent changed; the thick local accent turned into fluent Mandarin, but the pronunciation habits were entirely different from Wang Ji’s.
The voice was low, as if it was coming directly from the throat, accompanied by a strange “buzzing” sound that felt oddly familiar to Jiang Zhi.
He instinctively reached for the talisman in his pocket, but heard the entity slowly utter a sentence:
“Long time no see.”
“Jiang Shi.”
His hand froze at that moment; the familiar name felt like a spell that tightly bound his wrist, forcibly pulling him back into a heavy old dream that lingered between life and death.
He clenched his fist, his nails digging into his palm, the familiar pain slightly steadying his shaken mind.
“Who are you?”
The entity seemed to have anticipated his question, its laughter filled with unabashed self-satisfaction: “How could you forget me?”
“Seven years ago, in the Demon Suppression Land, I was your great benefactor.”
He finally recalled where the familiarity in that voice came from; seven years ago, indeed seven years ago, he had died once, the root of his downfall lay here, seven years ago.
Though the tone was different, the speaking habits were identical.
“You actually escaped.” Jiang Zhi’s voice grew colder.
“If you didn’t die, how could I have any problems?”
“After all, I was once, considered a part of you.”
Jiang Zhi’s forehead began to throb; those few short sentences forcibly peeled back the ugly past he was unwilling to face, revealing a bloody mess.
In an instant, he felt an uncontrollable rage, a desire to directly strangle the person saying these words.
Just as his gaze fell upon the calm-faced Wang Ji on the bed, he immediately calmed down, realizing that this voice seemed to be deliberately provoking him.
Thinking of Wang Ji’s obsessed friend, he speculated that this entity might possess some special ability to pry into others’ hearts, using secrets to lure people in.
Its words could not be fully trusted; in that Demon Suppression Land, amidst mountains of corpses and rivers of blood, with not a single bird chirping for miles, aside from himself, nothing else could have survived.
Jiang Zhi took a deep breath, his voice still filled with anger, seemingly completely provoked.
“What do you want?”
The entity cackled twice, its malice mixed with unmistakable pride and mockery.
“You came to find me.”
“You know where I am.”
“Let’s come together and settle the score.”