The shadow was over two meters tall and had to stoop to get through the dormitory door, completely blocking Xu Zhiyi's escape route. The pitch-black darkness of its body absorbed all the light around it.
Even from over a meter away, Xu Zhiyi could clearly feel the cold emanating from it. It felt familiar—it was the one that had sat behind her in the examination room. A strong sense of discomfort surged up from the pit of her stomach, her fingertips going numb—the instinctive repulsion of the living toward the dead.
At that moment, the shadow took a step toward her.
With no way forward and no way back, Xu Zhiyi's vision swam. She felt certain that today was the day she would die.
When she had entered this game, she had actually simulated several horrifying ways she might die, but she hadn't expected it to happen this quickly—she hadn't even caught a glimpse of Lin Yan.
Thinking of her brother, Xu Zhiyi mustered a bit more courage. Her eyes widened alertly again as she tried to find an opportunity to slip away.
She carefully watched the shadow, which had stopped approaching. The two of them maintained a delicate stillness, and for a moment, the atmosphere was almost harmonious.
For instance, she pretended not to see the hand it kept behind its back, even though the half-dried, withered human torso it held horizontally was swaying, threateningly asserting its presence.
The more she looked, the colder Xu Zhiyi's heart grew. If this ghost was so brutal toward its own kind, how much worse would it be toward a human standing on the opposing side?
She wanted to drag this out a little longer, but little did she know that this silent standoff had already been interpreted by the shadow as a signal that communication was possible. It gave a slight nod, then stepped into the dormitory. Before entering, it was even clever enough to turn the corpse in its hands vertically, so as not to damage its integrity.
The ghost clearly had no awareness of how a lone ghost and a lone human should share a room—it even closed the door behind it.
Xu Zhiyi watched helplessly as the door slowly shut, most of the light from the corridor blocked outside. Only a faint sliver of light seeped through the crack in the door—dim and murky, not even bright enough to illuminate the fear on her face.
Strangely enough, however, she could see the ghost's movements with perfect clarity. In her ears was the sound of her own heartbeat, pounding uncontrollably from tension. Before her was the shadow, clutching the corpse, shuffling step by step toward her.
It stopped in front of her. Its towering figure had to bend down to meet her gaze—though Xu Zhiyi couldn't find its eyes. After a few seconds of silence, a hissing sound like a snake filled the air. Xu Zhiyi took a moment to process it, then realized it seemed to be coming from the ghost.
"…You… are you talking to me?" Xu Zhiyi tested the waters in a small voice, trying to appease it with a conciliatory tone. "I can't understand, but whatever you said must be right, okay?"
The shadow paused. Its faceless visage betrayed no emotion. After a long silence, it brought the corpse in its hands toward her bed.
Xu Zhiyi was horrified. Her body instantly reacted with all the panic any normal human would feel when a corpse suddenly approached—she curled her legs, scrambling backward as hard as she could. Her back soon hit the wall with nowhere left to retreat, her heart pounding wildly in panic, her entire being resisting any possible contact with it.
No wonder it hadn't killed her—so its hobby was tormenting people.
Her eyes, which had just been crying, grew moist again, but she pressed her lips tightly together, holding back her tears.
If she had known she would one day face something like this, back when she used to sit with Lin Yan watching horror movies, she wouldn't have just hidden in his arms and used his hand to cover her eyes.
Just as she was spiraling into despair, the dark figure suddenly withdrew the corpse in its hands, though it still stood by her bedside, as if pondering something.
The air around her was infected by the temperature of his presence—cold and eerie. Xu Zhiyi breathed slowly, like stepping out from a warm room into winter. Though her body shivered from the cold, her muddled mind became much clearer because of it.
This dormitory had a problem. She gritted her teeth and analyzed: after entering, her pessimistic emotions had been amplified, and she kept thinking of her brother at every turn. She simply hadn't been prepared for these negative feelings to invade.
She shouldn't be this pessimistic. She would definitely see her brother.
Xu Zhiyi placed her hands on her knees and looked toward the dark figure by the bed. If the price of surviving a ghost's hands was having to coexist peacefully with a corpse… she could try her best, turn a blind eye, and perhaps manage to handle it with composure.
Just as she thought this, the dark figure suddenly straightened up and began shaking the corpse in his hands. Shaking it left and right twice wasn't enough—he flipped the corpse upside down and continued shaking.
Xu Zhiyi, who had just barely prepared herself mentally: "…"
She was dazed for a moment, then seriously considered whether this was some new illusion the dormitory had created to disturb her mind.
Clattering sounds came as various small personal items fell from the swaying corpse onto the ground. A marker pen, a small stone, and a palm-sized novel.
After finishing shaking the corpse, the dark figure calmly carried it to the window, opened it, and returned it to nature.
"…"
Xu Zhiyi watched the entire process, utterly dumbfounded.
But surprise aside, she took this opportunity to slip on her shoes, stepping onto the solid floor, barely gaining a sense of safety that she could escape.
The reason she hadn't run was partly because it was still naptime, and partly because the dark figure's behavior was simply too bizarre.
Xu Zhiyi lowered her head to look at the scattered belongings on the floor, truly unable to understand the logic behind his actions. Actually, ever since he had gently squeezed her fingers in the examination hall, a very absurd suspicion had been forming in her mind.
But when facing the dark figure, that genuine fear from the depths of her heart was also real.
The dark figure was quietly watching her.
Xu Zhiyi barely overcame her negative feelings toward him, stood up, still gripping the railing of the bed frame, and asked in a soft voice: "You… who exactly are you?"
It seemed neither of them could understand what the other was saying. Xu Zhiyi had to gesture with her hands for a while before the dark figure lowered his head and began writing on the dust-covered table.
Xu Zhiyi nervously kept licking her lips, and as she moved closer, she even held her breath, afraid of disturbing the integrity of the handwriting.
The result was deeply disappointing.
There were indeed two crooked characters written on the table, but no matter how she looked at them, they had nothing to do with "Lin Yan"… They didn't even seem related to any Chinese characters, as if separated by eighteen generations of ancestors.
Not only did the handwriting look like it was written with the left hand and eyes closed, but the type of script itself didn't correspond to any language she knew—it was simply a pile of meaningless horizontal and vertical strokes.
Lin Yan had beautiful handwriting that could pass for standard regular script even when writing with a tree branch. So clearly, this ghost was merely a relatively kind one, who, for some unknown reason, would do inexplicably friendly things toward humans.
Though Xu Zhiyi was disheartened, she still raised her face and smiled at the dark figure looking down at her with curved eyes, to show that she too was a kind human.
The dark figure pointed at the table.
Xu Zhiyi shook her head honestly. "I can't understand it."
The characters on the left and the characters on the right seemed somewhat similar, but after observing for a moment longer, she began to feel dizzy—it was even more unsettling than facing the Textual Uncanny Valley.
After a very kind-hearted human and ghost stared at each other in silence for a few seconds, Xu Zhiyi picked up the novel from the ground, took a marker, and copied the shadow's scratch marks one-to-one onto the blank flyleaf.
The moment she capped the marker, the shadow grabbed the head that had long been forgotten in the corner and destroyed every trace left on the desk.
"…" How tragic.
Xu Zhiyi reflexively touched her own neck.
To divert her attention, she lowered her head and studied the thing in her hands.
The novel was called Burning Incense. The cover fittingly depicted a burning incense burner, with smoke billowing and shrouding most of the scene in darkness. There was no author's name to be found. Xu Zhiyi casually flipped through a couple of pages, skimming the background introduction—it was a story set in the Republican era.
Beyond that, she couldn't examine it further. Most of the pages were stained with an indistinct light-black smudge, and the text on them had become distorted and illegible, quite similar to the characters the shadow had written. Xu Zhiyi quickly flipped to the last page and saw a library borrowing slip on the back cover.
It showed that the library stored two copies of Burning Incense, and this was one of the borrowed copies.
Xu Zhiyi's eyes trembled slightly.
At the same moment, her dormitory door was pounded twice, and a girl's urgent voice came through the door panel. "Student Xu Zhiyi—"
Xu Zhiyi casually stuffed the novel into her cotton-padded jacket pocket. She was about to open the door when she paused for a second, turned to look at the shadow, and intended to ask if he wanted to see anyone.
The shadow had already disappeared.
In the empty dormitory, with not a single ghost in sight, only the neatly placed head remained.
"…"
Xu Zhiyi withdrew her gaze with complicated feelings, turned around, and opened the dormitory door.
In an instant, the light from the corridor rushed in eagerly. She squinted, not yet accustomed to the sudden brightness.
It was the same girls as before.
When they saw the head on the dormitory desk, the smiles on their faces deepened.
"You killed them—you actually managed to kill them!"
"You're just like us—you belong to the school!" One of the girls clapped her hands. "Xu Zhiyi, help us drive them all away!"
Xu Zhiyi had no idea what they were talking about. Her tears hadn't even dried yet. Looking at their smiles, she only knew that these middle schoolers could push her around however they pleased, and her nerves were on edge.
"Do you want to?" they asked, their eyes clear and innocent.
Xu Zhiyi couldn't figure out their intentions, but just like her cooperation with the terrifying shadow, she nodded without any backbone.
After all, they had already come to her door. There was really no need for her to stubbornly make enemies of them.
After fobbing off those middle schoolers, Xu Zhiyi finally had a little time to herself.
She had thought these people would keep following her, but when they heard she was heading to the teaching building next, they became even more excited, clapping and cheering as they saw her off.
As she walked out of the dormitory building, whenever she slowed her pace, the people seeing her off would open their mouths in unison to urge her on.
Xu Zhiyi was stuck in a bind, so she could only let herself be pushed out like that.
Outside the dormitory building, those girls stood in the lobby, their cheeks pressed tightly against the glass door, watching her walk farther and farther away.
It wasn't just the girls' dormitory—the boys' Building B had the same scene, with people standing at their doors, smiling, watching.
Xu Zhiyi's pace quickened under the countless gazes fixed on her, until she was finally forced to break into a run. She didn't stop to catch her breath until the dormitory buildings in her sight had blurred into indistinct shapes.
She glanced around at the empty surroundings, then called out with little confidence, "…Are you there?"
Only the sound of wind answered her.
"I have something I want to tell you…" Xu Zhiyi hesitated for a few seconds, then added a soft "Brother" at the end this time.
"…"
Still no ghost bothered to respond to her.
She gritted her teeth, stopped looking around, and hurried on through the night, quickly reaching her destination.
The library on the first floor of the teaching building.
She hadn't come here for anything related to "scaring them off," nor did she have any interest in fulfilling their wishes.
She needed to find the copy of Burning Incense that hadn't been checked out yet.
If the text after that point hadn't been contaminated, then perhaps—just perhaps—she could use the two books side by side, like consulting a dictionary, to converse with the shadow.
Even if the shadow never appeared again from now on… she had to come here to confirm.
Those two characters.
Whether or not they really were Lin Yan.