Mid-September, 10 a.m.

  Most people were either at work or in class by now, but I had called in sick to school and stayed behind in this off-campus rental apartment. Today I had something far more important than attending lectures.

  I knew perfectly well that what I was doing couldn’t bear the light of day.

  Guilty conscience made me skip opening the windows for fresh air this morning. When I approached the window, I only dared to part the curtains a sliver. Blinding sunlight hit my face, and the peaceful morning view of the neighborhood came into view.

  Outside, the world looked perfectly normal. No one had any idea that two outcasts—people society would never accept—were hiding inside this room.

  I picked up the cold metal object on my right and raised it to eye level.

  It was a handgun.

  I didn’t know the exact make or model. In all my life up to now, I had never handled real firearms or ammunition; I knew next to nothing about them. The one thing I could tell for certain was that this was no toy model like the ones I played with as a kid. This was the real thing—one pull of the trigger could blow someone’s head off and land me in prison for life.

  Verifying it was easy. With clumsy fingers I removed the magazine. Inside lay three gleaming brass cartridges, cold to the touch, and one more already chambered, radiating menace. No doubt about it: live rounds.

  Relevant legal clauses from online searches floated up in my mind automatically:

  Whoever illegally possesses or conceals firearms or ammunition shall be sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment of not more than three years, criminal detention, or public surveillance; if the circumstances are serious, the sentence shall be fixed-term imprisonment of not less than three years but not more than seven years.

  After staring at the deadly weapon in my hand for a long moment, I turned to look at the beautiful girl sitting restlessly on the bed.

  “Let me repeat what you just said. You’re telling me that in the future, the world plunges into an unprecedented catastrophe. Bizarre phenomena keep appearing one after another, monsters roam everywhere committing indiscriminate slaughter, and human civilization shatters under the assault of countless supernatural forces…” I sorted through the information I’d just heard and tried to steady my own emotions. “And you—you’re a survivor from that apocalyptic world, who somehow crossed time and space from the distant future to arrive here, in the present?”

  She nodded.

  “And your purpose now?” I pressed. “You want to stop the apocalypse from happening in this era?”

  “That’s right…” Her eyes fixed on the gun in my hand. “So… can you give me back my gun now?”

  —

  My first encounter with this strange and dangerous girl happened just last night, during one of my urban-legend investigations at a nearby abandoned construction site.

  Urban-legend hunting is my hobby. Basically, I go in person to check whether the ghost stories and creepy tales circulating among people are real or just rumors.

  There’s nothing particularly unique about wanting to verify such things—curiosity is human nature. When a school is said to be haunted, students often sneak in to test the rumors themselves. What I do isn’t fundamentally different.

  What sets me apart—what draws a clear line between me and everyone else—is that I’ve been doing this obsessively since childhood.

  As a kid I was addicted to the magical adventures described in books, dreaming of experiencing those thrilling battles against world-destroying foes myself. I was equally fascinated by real-life mysteries that defied explanation: the Bermuda Triangle, the Wildman of Shennongjia, or internet-famous entities like Slender Man and Kuchisake-onna—those utterly unreal existences so far removed from my everyday life that they captivated me completely.

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  I was also deeply drawn to concepts drenched in otherworldly mystery—feng shui, Qimen Dunjia, black magic—and I never hesitated to test them in practice, hoping to confirm their truth.

  Needless to say, almost every hands-on experiment ended in debunking or dead ends, and my explorations of ghost stories earned me a rather unsavory reputation.

  Whenever I heard that someone local had witnessed a paranormal event science couldn’t explain, I would track them down and ask for details. Sometimes it turned out to be a misunderstanding, sometimes pure superstition from people lacking basic scientific knowledge, sometimes vague answers or deliberate evasion. Occasionally the person would get angry and defensive.

  Some who felt humiliated by my questions would complain to others: “That guy Z is just another poser who only likes the idea of the supernatural. If he ever ran into the real thing, he’d piss himself in terror!” And plenty of listeners agreed.

  At university, most people saw me as an eccentric loner. I didn’t cause real trouble, but genuine friends were rare. The one friend I did have was baffled by my persistent pursuit of nothingness. Once he probed deeper and tried to talk sense into me.

  “Since you’ve never actually encountered any real supernatural force, why do you keep investigating these legends?” he asked. “No matter how excited you were at first, after failing over and over you should’ve cooled off by now. But I hear you’ve been at this since middle school. Isn’t that kind of weird?”

  He paused, then added, “You’re not even doing live streams for views or money. You’ve never found any solid proof or clue. There has to be some kind of positive feedback… some evidence to keep you going, right?”

  I caught the implication and cut straight to it. “Stop beating around the bush. Just say what you want to say.”

  He dropped the pretense. “I think you should stop risking yourself chasing these ghost stories.”

  “Why? Even you think I’d shit myself if I met the real thing?”

  “No, that’s not it. I’m just worried you’ll break the law.” He gave a wry laugh. “Sometimes you give off this lawless vibe that actually scares me. You’re not planning to rob ancient tombs or join some cult ritual just for the thrill, are you?”

  “…”

  “You’re not, right?” His tone shifted, suddenly uncertain.

  Whether I ever planned anything like that or not, maybe he wasn’t truly afraid of me committing crimes—maybe he just threw out that exaggerated line to avoid a direct confrontation after my sharp retort. After all, I’ve always been a law-abiding citizen.

  In the end, he didn’t convince me.

  And recently, my attention had turned to the abandoned construction site near campus.

  Word was it was haunted. Ghosts of workers killed in past accidents supposedly appeared at night, covered in blood, abducting any female students who passed by.

  The very night I heard the rumor, I grabbed my heavy-duty flashlight and headed there alone.

  The site was a half-finished building left to rot after construction halted. No doors or windows had ever been installed; the walls were bare concrete. Once I stepped through the dark doorway, all I saw in every direction was dull gray concrete, dust, and scattered construction debris.

  Even homeless people avoided the place. Mosquitoes seemed unwilling to enter this barren wasteland. Outside lights and noise were muffled into silence; only dead quiet and darkness remained, accompanied by the lonely sound of my own heartbeat and breathing.

  The flashlight beam lit only what was directly ahead. The darkness behind felt solid, pressing wetly against my back, urging me to turn around. But the moment I did, I’d worry something might appear in front, so I was constantly on edge, glancing everywhere.

  That unreal atmosphere filled me with both chills and strange comfort.

  My friend had a point: no one can stay passionate forever chasing a direction with no hope in sight.

  At some point I came to understand on my own that the real world isn’t as fantastical as stories make it out to be. Most mysteries turn out disappointingly mundane. People claiming to wield magic are just skilled illusionists; self-proclaimed diviners rely on cold reading; priests who promise protection are simply good talkers, and their followers excel at self-deception. For a while, I sank into a swamp of disillusionment.

  But everyone dies eventually.

  Compared to dying in a life without ripples, I’d much rather die in the middle of a bizarre, story-like adventure.

  I wanted my life to spiral out of control. I fantasized about monsters bursting into a classroom and slaughtering teachers and students right in front of me. If something that absurd really happened, how would I react? Would I summon unexpected courage, or reveal unimaginable cowardice? I wanted to know. I wanted the world I lived in to lose control.

  What truly hooked me wasn’t petty ghosts and goblins, but adventures completely beyond my experience—unpredictable, impossible, mind-shattering.

  I didn’t expect this trip to deliver anything truly extraordinary, but I still sharpened my senses as much as possible. A genuinely bizarre encounter would surely bring unimaginable danger. Even I couldn’t guarantee I’d walk away unscathed.

  I advanced cautiously through the ruins, sweeping the flashlight beam over every detail, imagining lethal threats lurking in the unseen corners—like ferocious predators lying in wait, holding their breath, ready to pounce the instant I blinked and tear out my throat.

  Monster—if you really exist, show yourself right now.

  I’ll prove I’m not just another poser.

  Suddenly, a loud crash of something heavy and hard echoed nearby.

  The space had been so silent I could hear my own heartbeat clearly. The noise exploded like thunder, slamming straight into my chest.

  I snapped alert, locked onto the direction of the sound, and sprinted toward it.

  It was only a corridor away. I reached the spot quickly and shone the light on the source.

  A scaffolding frame had toppled over. That explained the heavy crash. But scaffolding doesn’t fall by itself—someone must have knocked it down.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I caught something in the shadows at the edge of my vision: a vague dark silhouette slumped against the concrete wall, sitting on the floor.

  Blood trailed across the ground like several writhing little snakes, slowly, slowly creeping out of the darkness into the flashlight’s beam.

  They said the ghost haunting this abandoned site was a blood-soaked spirit of a worker killed in an accident.

  Suffocating pressure gripped my throat—I realized I’d been holding my breath without knowing it. Alone and isolated, my limbs turned as stiff and cold as a corpse.

  Trembling with both fear and eagerness, I slowly moved the flashlight beam to illuminate the blurry shadow.

  What appeared before me was indeed a person drenched in blood.

  But not the terrifying vengeful ghost I’d imagined.

  It was a slender girl in a blue-and-white striped hospital gown, delicate features, strikingly beautiful.