“Chang'an, what's wrong?”

  I asked right away while stepping out first and casually leaving my front door ajar.

  My friend noticed I’d deliberately shifted our conversation to the corridor outside the apartment. He looked a little puzzled but didn’t question it. Instead, he started with small talk: “I saw your text saying you’re taking leave from school. Are you feeling sick, or is something urgent? If now’s not convenient, I can come back another day.”

  “It’s fine. I just don’t feel like going to class today.” I brushed off the leave excuse and turned the topic back to him. “So what’s going on with you? You look awful, and you came all the way here—do you need my help with something?”

  “Yeah… there is something.” His attention was easier to steer than usual, and he was clearly weighed down by worry. “This is the kind of thing… I can only talk to you about.”

  “Oh?” My interest spiked immediately. “Don’t tell me it’s—”

  Before I could probe, he cut straight to it: “Exactly what you’re thinking.”

  I nodded as expected.

  I knew perfectly well how other people saw me. If there was ever a topic that required specifically consulting me, it could only be something involving the occult or supernatural.

  Sure, I often went looking for people involved in strange incidents, but it was extremely rare for someone to come to me first—especially my friend. He wasn’t some gullible person lacking basic scientific common sense, nor was he the type to make up stories just to mess with me. Any lead coming from him demanded serious attention.

  At that moment, Alice’s words from earlier suddenly echoed in my mind.

  —I’m… different from you. I’m a jinx.

  —Anyone who stays close to me, anyone who gets involved with me… they always end up dragged into inexplicable, abnormal events far more often than others.

  Hold on—she’d barely finished saying that before something occult-related came knocking at my door. Could her so-called “jinx aura” really be kicking in already?

  It was working way too fast… almost comically efficient. Calamity really doesn’t wait around, huh?

  Or was it just a coincidence?

  To me, Alice was an utterly unbelievable girl. If this incident somehow had a hidden causal link to her, then I needed to treat the whole thing with maximum seriousness.

  But honestly—without solid proof, even I couldn’t take her “jinx” claim one hundred percent seriously.

  “Since you’re free, why don’t you come to where I’m living now?” my friend suggested.

  Alice was still at my place. I didn’t want to go far.

  “Can’t you just explain it here?”

  “I could…” He hesitated. “But if you don’t see it with your own eyes, even you might not believe me.”

  “Really…”

  “You really can’t get away right now? Then I’ll wait until you’re done with whatever it is.”

  He said that, but the look in his eyes was burning with eager expectation. If I turned him down here, he’d be crushed.

  I raised a hand to pause him. “Give me one minute to think.”

  He waited patiently while I lowered my head and considered—

  What I’d originally wanted from Alice was simply the secret she was hiding. She’d already spilled everything, so half my goal was already met.

  The other half was verifying whether what she said was true.

  That meant keeping her here a few days until she recovered enough to demonstrate her superpower. Everything hinged on whether she could actually use it. In other words, Alice’s situation had shifted from “urgent” to “something that can’t be rushed.”

  The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  I wanted to keep her under constant watch, but I couldn’t just hole up at home until she recovered—wait, actually… could I?

  Meals could be handled with delivery. Keeping the door locked tight was completely doable. More importantly, I actually wanted to.

  But after thinking it over carefully, I reluctantly made a different call.

  “Let’s go. Right now.”

  “Great!” My friend lit up with relief.

  “Wait here a second. I need to grab something from inside—won’t take long.”

  I left him outside, closed the door behind me, went to the bedroom, and told Alice I’d be stepping out briefly. She didn’t seem to connect it to her own “jinx constitution” kicking in so soon; she just told me to be careful. To make sure she couldn’t retrieve the gun, I grabbed my backpack on the way out and buried the pistol deep inside.

  Since she still couldn’t move freely, I wasn’t too worried she’d slip away while I was gone. Still, worry makes you irrational—I couldn’t help imagining her vanishing the moment my back was turned. And the real reason I was going out with my friend now had another purpose.

  Nothing reveals a person’s true nature like being left alone. I wanted to see what Alice would do in my home when I wasn’t there.

  To do that, I needed to set up “surveillance cameras” inside.

  Obviously, I couldn’t install real hidden cameras in such a short time without her noticing—and I’m not the kind of person who keeps spy gear lying around the house anyway.

  So I would use my own superpower.

  Back at the entryway, I turned and extended a finger toward empty air.

  I’ll hold off on explaining exactly what my ability is for now.

  In truth, the power I possess isn’t anything so secretive or complex that it needs this much buildup. In the world of superpowered individuals, it’s probably quite common and straightforward.

  But my friend was about to take me somewhere that might involve supernatural phenomena—and in a situation like that, this particular ability could come in very handy. In a lot of fantasy stories, superpowered characters demonstrate their powers while casually explaining the mechanics. I’ve always wanted to try that scene for myself.

  So for now, I’ll just show the tip of the iceberg.

  A small orange-red spark appeared at my fingertip, floating upward like a firefly. Then a second, a third, a fourth…

  A dozen or so “fireflies” drifted out one after another, scattering to various corners of the apartment.

  These little things were linked to me mentally—they would serve as my eyes while I was away.

  With the setup complete, I opened the door and said to my waiting friend, “Sorry for the wait. Let’s go.”

  He looked eager and ready. Together we went downstairs, left the complex, and headed toward his place.

  All the while, I silently monitored my apartment through the “fireflies.”

  Strictly speaking, the information they shared wasn’t visual or auditory in the usual sense. If I had to describe it, it was like my imagination running wild, painting scenes and sounds directly inside my mind.

  Most people have experienced something similar—replaying a movie’s climax over and over in their head after watching it, or having a catchy song loop endlessly in their brain. It was a lot like that.

  Right after I left, Alice showed no reaction at all. She just sat quietly on the bed, resting in silence. But as time passed and she became reasonably sure I wouldn’t return immediately, the softness in her expression vanished. Her face turned cold and blank.

  She got off the bed at once, slipped on the slippers, walked slowly to the entryway, opened the door, and stepped out into the corridor to look around.

  She was getting ready to run?

  My heart jolted. I almost turned back right then.

  But before I could, she turned around, went back inside, and gently closed the door behind her.

  My friend noticed my expression shift.

  “Cheng, something wrong?”

  “Nothing—just felt like I was about to sneeze…”

  I steadied my breathing and continued secretly observing the mysterious, beautiful girl, analyzing her every move.

  Alice moved like a small stray dog that had just been taken in by a stranger—back stiff, constantly glancing left and right, occasionally whipping her head toward the entrance as if checking whether I might return unexpectedly.

  Every now and then she would pick up nearby objects, examine them closely, then carefully place them back exactly where they’d been. It didn’t seem like she was searching for anything specific—just quietly investigating who I really was.

  Maybe I wasn’t the only one who saw her as full of mysteries. To her, I was probably just as enigmatic.

  The realization made me a little happy—so I was a “mysterious character” too?

  From the very start she’d treated me like someone suspicious—bristling with defenses, openly hostile and guarded. Yet after I dealt with the police, she suddenly dropped her guard. I’d wondered if my “good guy” act had actually worked on her. Now I finally understood.

  The real reason she’d softened so suddenly was probably very practical—

  I had the gun.

  Even in such a disadvantaged position, though, she never once tried to flatter or appease me. Was it because she had too much pride? Or did she think such an abrupt change in attitude would make me suspicious instead?

  And at the root of it all—why did the police identify her as a serial killer?

  Why had she been wearing a hospital gown when I first found her? Had she escaped from some hospital? Maybe a psychiatric ward? Was everything she told me just the ravings of a madwoman?

  I wasn’t in a hurry for answers anymore. There would be plenty of time. I wanted to savor this extraordinary cohabitation experience slowly.

  —

  My friend, still visibly troubled, led me to a nearby cha chaan teng and sat down. I shifted my focus to him.

  “To avoid any unnecessary misunderstandings later, before I show you the thing itself, I need to explain the whole situation from the beginning,” he said gravely.

  “Go ahead,” I nodded.

  He started with a question: “You still remember where I live, right?”

  “Yeah,” I answered. “The place where someone died.”