Chapter 5: Chapter Three — Necromancy

Chapter Three — Necromancy

At ten o’clock, the hospital nurse came on her rounds precisely on time. She was a young woman who had only recently graduated, with cropped hair and a touch of makeup, and she chatted warmly with Wu Jianxiang about an embarrassing thing that had happened when she first started at the hospital.

“I remember my first internship — I was assigned to care for a middle-school boy who’d just had his appendix out. I saw a plainly dressed woman by the bedside and, without thinking, said loudly, ‘Good morning, auntie!’ — and do you know what? She was actually the boy’s older sister… Oh my God, I was mortified! The boy nearly died laughing. By the way, the person who came to see you earlier — was that your brother?”
she giggled.

She was sweet and innocent.

But Wu nevertheless had to ignore her parting admonition — “Get some sleep! See you tomorrow! Teehee!” — and stay awake.

In the dark, silent ward the little cassette in his chest felt heavier and heavier, a constant reminder of the tape’s existence. At last he could not stand it any longer. He slid out of bed and decided, furtively, to leave the hospital and go home.

He remembered his younger brother had bought a DV camcorder — it should be able to play that little tape. Wu could not bear his curiosity about its contents.

His brother, now twenty, had been drafted into the army and was stationed in Hukou, Hsinchu. Apart from long holidays he rarely came home, preferring to stay with friends in the north. Before enlistment he’d spent his wages on trendy watches, new mobile phones, PDAs and digital cameras. Two years earlier he had bought an expensive DVD player for the family; the digital camcorder had been purchased with the last of his money right before he enlisted.

Thinking of this, Wu dressed quietly and eased the ward door open. He slipped into the corridor and scanned both ends for movement.

All the patient rooms were shut; only a few ceiling lights burned, and there was no sound of voices or footsteps.

He walked slowly to the nurses’ station. A bespectacled nurse nearing thirty bent over and concentrated on some chart. Before she looked up, Wu spoke: “Excuse me,” — he had memorized the name card of the vacant bed beside his and now asked politely — “which room is he in? I’d like to visit.”

“Sir, I’m sorry — visiting hours are over,”
the nurse said sternly. “Besides, I recall that patient was discharged yesterday morning.”

“Oh, I see. My mistake. I’ll call him. Thank you.”
Wu left the desk with ease and headed for the hospital exit, grateful the chatty young nurse had not been on duty — otherwise he would’ve had to try one of two more complicated ways to get home, and his chances of success would have been lower.

Outside the hospital he flagged a taxi and, after telling the driver his destination, sat in the back lost in thought.

For about twenty minutes later he was near his home. He paid and walked through the dark streets alone.

From the moment he’d sat in the cab, the “Bone-Gnawing Demon” case haunted him. When he first earned the precinct’s attention years before, he’d encountered that notorious, unprecedented case. At the time he’d only assisted with manpower allocation for the city police’s investigation, but he’d been fascinated by criminal profiling and had studied materials by psychiatrist Dr. Li Gandang. Six years later, Taiwanese police were no longer ignorant of profiling, yet no copycat like Hong Zechen had ever surfaced again. The method hadn’t been tested in Taiwan beyond theoretical borrowing from foreign cases.

He was surprised that Captain Gao had linked the Zhong Sizao case to Hong Zechen.

At first the connection seemed abrupt, yet it hid a terrifying possibility.

When Hong Zechen’s crimes were investigated, there had been no mention of Zhong’s name. The two men had no link. Even if both had lived in Sanmin District, their friends and relatives did not overlap.

If Zhong had been killed by someone imitating Hong, three possibilities followed: first, someone who knew Hong imitated his method to kill a stranger. That seemed unlikely — those interviewed about Hong had only superficial knowledge; Hong had few close acquaintances. The media unearthed unverifiable stories showing Hong had no friends, and that his life drew little attention until his identity was revealed.

Second, someone who knew Zhong imitated Hong to kill a friend or acquaintance. This was more plausible, but it raised contradictions: killing an acquaintance implies conflict, yet the crime scene yielded no clues about Zhong’s social circle. The killer seemed intent on hiding identity; the impenetrable sealed-room condition showed meticulous planning. A killer this careful would not make the illogical choice to imitate a notorious, executed murderer: copying a famous method invites scrutiny.

Third, someone who didn’t know Hong imitated him to kill strangers. At the thought of this, Wu felt a chill: that implied Kaohsiung might again be under the shadow of a serial killer. A mysterious murderer could have learned of Hong’s methods from press accounts and copied them.

Even worse: this mystery killer might be more careful than Hong, leaving no physical forensic trace. The building’s surveillance captured nothing; it was likely the forensics team would find no hairs or fingerprints at the scene.

Clearly, Zhong’s strange behavior in the month before his death might be explainable as the result of threats or harassment by an unknown person — all part of an impeccable plan. A killer both sane and insane.

Captain Gao must have considered this final possibility but, worried, chose not to raise it in the full search meeting. He confided it to Shaode and told him to deliver the news at the hospital, because Shaode and Wu were two of the precinct’s best hands who could conduct a discreet investigation, and Wu was the only member who had studied the Hong case in depth.

Wu wondered whether the DV tape and the other leads had a common thread.

He fitted a key into his front door. The metal clicks in the lock were sounds only he seemed to hear.

His parents, now in their seventies, were already asleep; it was 10:40 p. M.

Wu’s family lived in a four-story townhouse in Lingya District on Heping 1st Road. Unlike Kaohsiung’s commercial districts, most residents here turned off their lights and went to bed after ten. Because of his job, Wu often came home late to a dark foyer.

His parents slept in the master bedroom on the third floor; his own room was on the second floor, so he could come and go without waking them. His younger brother’s room, however, was also on the third floor, so tonight he would have to climb up and fetch the camcorder.

When his brother bought that camcorder he’d enthusiastically explained its operation. Although Wu hadn’t been particularly interested, he had once helped film a cousin’s wedding toast.

The television and VCR stood in the living room on the first floor. Wu opened his brother’s door quietly, switched on the light, took the camera box from the cabinet and padded downstairs.

On the VCR shelf sat several blank VHS tapes — the ones Wu used to record Discovery Channel’s “Detective Mysteries.” He planned to play the mysterious DV tape on the TV and simultaneously dub it to a VHS tape. If the footage aided the murder investigation, he would bring the VHS to the precinct tomorrow and let the team view it in the conference room.

He removed the camcorder and accessories from the box, found the necessary connectors, and loaded the small cassette from his pocket into the camcorder. He connected the external power, attached the audio/video cable to the VCR’s input, set the camcorder to VCR output mode, and finally switched on the power.

Lowering the TV volume, the video channel’s black chaos and faint static frames shredded across the screen like a sandstorm. Wu selected a VHS tape that could be overwritten, placed it in the recorder, and pressed record.

He consulted the instruction manual while recalling his brother’s explanations, setting the playback parameters. Just before pressing PLAY he placed a notebook at his side to jot down images and sounds as they appeared.

Seconds after PLAY, color gradually resolved on the screen. The camera focused on a wall in a room; the image shook violently as though someone were lifting the camera. A man’s voice could be heard — weak and indistinct — and a woman’s laughter.

He turned the volume up a little.

“… Ready? Ready now? I’m starting!”
the voice said.

“Wait a little, I’m not ready yet,”
the woman replied in a sweet, cheerful tone.

The camera spun and then framed the upper body of a young girl in white. She sat behind a low table, brushing her bangs back with one hand, her eyes lifted as she toyed with her hair.

“Oh— it’s starting?”
she said.

“Miss, I’ve been waiting so long I’m about to fossilize!”
a man teased.

“All right then!”
she cooed playfully.

She sat up straight and looked directly into the lens, still smiling. Wu could finally make out her face. She appeared no older than twenty-four, with long hair, a small oval face and clear, bright eyes that were clever and charming.

“Tell me, where do you live?”
the man asked — presumably the cameraman.

“Kaohsiung.”

“Where in Kaohsiung?”

“Hmm… You know that already, so why are you asking me?”

“I just wanted to ask one more time!”

“All right, all right—Kaohsiung… Heehee… I live here!”

“Would you really like to live at my place?”

“… Is that no good? Are you not welcoming me?”

“Would I still have a good life if you came to stay?”

“How rude! Hmph—I’ll make sure you never have a good life again!”
Laughter and teasing followed.

“How old are you this year?”
the man asked.

“Secret.”

“Height?”

“Secret.”

“Weight?”

“Secret.”

“Measurements?”

“Secret.”

“Why is everything a secret?”

“I’m not telling you.”

“Then I’ll just have to investigate secretly another day!”

“How will you do that?”

“I won’t tell you.”

“Oh, you’re so mean.”

“All right, then tell me — what’s your name?”

“My name… Is very pretty, very pretty… Zhang, like the archer Zhang; Zhi, like the Weaver Girl; Mei, like ‘seeking plum in the snow’… Heehee… You can call me Mei-Mei.”

“You’re the Weaver Girl, then — are you looking for the Cowherd now?”

“You pervert!”

Wu hit the camcorder’s pause. The screen froze on Zhang Zhimei pulling a face and sticking out her tongue.

From the dialogue, the tape looked like a couple’s playful recording. What was striking, though, was that the man holding the camera never appeared on screen, so his face remained unknown. Perhaps he was Zhong Sizao, and the girl on the tape his girlfriend.

According to tenant testimony, the girl who visited 401 was indeed in her early twenties, with long hair and large dark eyes, slim — a close match to the Zhang Zhimei in the footage. She was also wearing white in the video.

Although there was a DV cam in 401, proving which camera shot the tape would be impossible — at most they could infer resolution and image quality, not identity. And even if they could match a specific camera, that wouldn’t prove the man was Zhong — only increase the likelihood. Wu continued watching.

“You really hate perverts?”
the man teased.

“Of course!”
she replied.

“But I’m a pervert.”

“You’re different. Hee… My face just turned so red.”

“Mei-Mei, tell me your interests.”

“My hobbies… Watching movies, singing, shopping at department stores, buying clothes… Oh! Didn’t you promise to take me to Xin Jue Jiang last time? You lied!”

“Mei-Mei, I’ll definitely go this Saturday. But you don’t have enough clothes yet.”

“Who told you to ask my hobbies! And it’s already a new season.”

“All right, all right,”
the man said. “Now, Mei-Mei, sing your favorite song for me.”

Zhang Zhimei cleared her throat and began.

Please cherish me, stay here and don’t leave.
If I can love you, I’ll give everything.
I want you to say I’m adorable — to mean it inside.
Ah! Wonderful — please accept my heart—

The melody was vaguely familiar; the unfamiliar words seeped into Wu’s chest through her soft, intimate voice. He noted the earlier line about the season changing but drifted into the spell of her singing — surprised at how intoxicating her voice was.

Zhong had moved into the Nantai Road apartment that January; neighbors had occasionally seen him and a girlfriend enter 401 together. If the girl on the tape was Zhang Zhimei, the timing fit.

Please try to understand me a little more, with a childlike, innocent heart — I will do the same.
Don’t let me feel sorrow; if you do, well — like I said, I’ll still smile.

Her song ended, but Wu secretly wished she’d sing a little more.

“Wow, that sounds beautiful,”
the man said.

“Of course. I sang that just for you!”
she cooed.

“At last, Mei-Mei, is there anything you want to say to me?”

Leaning close to the camera, gazing into the lens with a tender smile, Zhang Zhimei murmured, “Sizao — please love me forever.”

As Wu shook off the thrill, the TV returned to its scattered black noise.

Her final words confirmed they were lovers, and established her as a person of interest in the murder. Wu felt a stab of melancholy — young lovers, and the man suddenly and violently taken. He wondered how the girl would react upon learning the news. On the other hand, he couldn’t dismiss the possibility that such a lovely young woman might be deeply implicated.

Zhong had lied to his employer and landlord; he had kept company with an attractive girl, and an ugly swell of jealousy rose in Wu’s chest.

He closed his eyes, shook his head, and forced the image of Zhang Zhimei from his mind. Now was the time to stay level-headed.

—Zhong had apparently scrubbed the contents of the tapes in the living-room cabinet, leaving only this one. That fact suggested not only that he loved Zhang Zhimei, but also that she could be intimately tied to the case.

One of Captain Gao’s investigative leads had made a meaningful breakthrough: at least the victim’s girlfriend’s appearance and name were now known.

Wu tidied the AV gear, deciding to return to the hospital for some sleep, then report the discovery to the captain after his discharge the next day.

He pocketed the DV cassette, placed the VHS copy inside the desk drawer and locked it. Satisfied, he left the house.

Outside, he didn’t expect to find an odd-looking stranger approaching from the street corner.

“Officer, I’ve been waiting for you a long time,”
the man said.

It was already 11:30 p. M. The pale high streetlight cast long, ghostly shadows. Wu started — his instincts told him to be cautious.

“Let me introduce myself,”
the man said. “My name is Xia Yongyu. But my name doesn’t matter.” He continued that he was here to give the police an important lead on the murder.

“What did you say?”

“Maybe now is the best time to mention it… No, I know the timing’s odd, but please trust me — I can provide the key clue.”

The streetlight backlit him so Wu couldn’t make out his features; only rimless glasses and a slight frame about 165 cm tall were visible. His speech was clear, yet his manner suggested a trembling unreality.

“Really? What clue?”
Wu asked.

“I’m not sure of specifics yet. If you’ll come back to 401 with me, I can tell you.”

Wu felt absurd. “Mr. Xia, sorry, I can’t agree. First, I don’t know you. Second, you can’t even say what the clue is. Besides—”

“My origins and my name are as unimportant as that!”
Xia’s panic quickened. “Officer, if I said I’m the next victim, would you come to 401 with me now?”

“You… Is that true? How do you know you’ll be killed? Why—”
A thousand questions rose in Wu’s mind, but Xia ignored them all. He seemed to treat such details as irrelevant.

In the end, Wu gave up questioning and agreed to accompany him to 401. Xia insisted it be right away.

“My car’s parked at the corner,”
he said. “Let’s hurry.”

In the passenger seat, Wu watched Xia’s right hand tremble around the keys.

What is this man so afraid of?

From the start Xia’s behavior had unnerved Wu. He’d spoken as if he didn’t know Zhong at all — always saying he had “a clue” for the police, never claiming he knew the killer. Why not simply name the murderer? If he knew the crime occurred in 401, why not go look alone, even at night — even if the police had sealed it off? Why insist the police accompany him? Why now?

Too many riddles. Wu decided not to press further and drove along, using cooperation to pry more information. The car was plainly furnished; nothing revealed Xia’s profession or background. Once inside, Xia sat rigid, staring at the windshield as if suppressing panic.

Because of the late-night traffic they reached the building quickly. At the entrance Wu studied Xia more closely and noticed his lips were deathly pale.

The caretaker recognized Wu but tilted his head at Xia in confusion. Wu ignored it, explained their purpose, and the two climbed to the fourth floor. Only one corridor light burned; two strips of yellow police tape crossed and blocked the small square opening cut into 401’s iron door.

The strike team hadn’t cleared the cabinet behind the door yet, so entry from the interior was still impossible. They would have to crawl through the square hole.

“I’ll go in first!”
Xia squeezed through the hole without waiting.

Wu followed, climbed through, and when he stood up realized Xia was not beside the opening. A bad sense of danger rose in him — his eyes struggled to adjust to the dark.

Just as Wu reached to draw the penlight from his pocket, a heavy blow struck the back of his head and sent him crashing to the floor. He didn’t lose consciousness instantly, but his limbs went numb and useless; he could only curse inwardly.

Xia Yongyu had indeed been plotting something… As Wu slowly came around from a half-faint, he realized his hands were tightly bound behind his back and he was being dragged into Zhong Sizao’s bedroom. The light was on; Wu’s chest pressed against the floor as he looked up to see Xia standing over him.

“Please forgive me, officer. I have a very grave reason that forced me to do this,”
Xia said, his voice still trembling. “I’d hoped to settle this at the hospital.”

“…”

“I know he liked playing with camcorders like I do, so he must have hidden an important tape somewhere. I’m sorry… If you hadn’t slipped out of the hospital I might have gotten your tape more easily.”

“I don’t understand…”
Wu said, and noticed the DV cassette—the same one that had been on his person—now clutched in Xia’s hand.

“In any case, I achieved what I came for. Now I must ask one more favor.”

“Xia Yongyu! What on earth are you talking about?”

“Officer, I’m about to do something potentially dangerous. I need someone else here with me, and the best person would be you.”

Wu ran through possible, rational explanations for Xia’s bizarre behavior, but found none. He could only look at him and listen.

“Listen carefully. I don’t have time to worry about whether you believe me. I just want to resolve my own problem in my own way.”
His voice shook. “I don’t care if you believe me—just cooperate for a while. Once my crisis is over I’ll accept any legal consequences.”

“I want you to play the role of the interrogator. For an experienced detective like you, that should be easy.”

Wu heard Xia take a ragged breath. His eyes seemed to stare painfully into the distance; the air in the room grew thick as if frozen.

“The person who died in this room—whoever he was—I will summon his spirit and have it possess me. You will interrogate him. Find out whether he knew how he was killed.”

Are you mad? Wu wanted to shout, but the words stuck in his throat.

“Maybe you’ll think it’s absurd,”
Xia laughed weakly. “But I must know how he died… I have no time left. Start now!”

Wu had no chance to respond. Xia slammed the bedroom door and switched off the light. He folded into a cross-legged posture, hands crossed at his chest, lips trembling as he chanted under his breath. He inhaled and exhaled in repeated, forceful rhythm as if the calm concentration was itself strenuous exertion.

The boarded windows of 401 had been cleared of nails; moonlight mixed with distant sodium-lamp glow leaked into the room at midnight and painted Xia’s grave face with an eerie pallor that made him look like a figure carved from stone.

Wu felt transported to a foreign, uncanny realm, utterly unsure of what would happen next.

Xia’s breathing slowed until his body went rigid—stone-still. Time seemed to stop. Wu could hear only his own breathing. He stared at Xia and thought of Zhong Sizao, who had died in this very room.

Still, Wu didn’t submit to helplessness. He strained at the ropes behind him with all his might, trying to loosen the rough knots.

Sweat poured from him, soaking his sleeves, but the knots held fast. For some reason he didn’t scream for help—perhaps a part of him wanted to know whether this necromancy would work.

After an unknown span of time, Wu heard low, muffled sobbing. Could it be…? His scalp prickled; he turned his neck stiffly toward Xia.

“Uu… Uu…”
Xia began to sob. The upright posture he’d held crumpled; he trembled and shook.

“Xia?”
Wu called. “What’s wrong?”

Xia didn’t answer; he only continued shaking and began to writhe inwardly.

“Xia! What’s the matter?”
Wu shouted louder.

At Wu’s raised voice, Xia clapped his hands over his ears and howled, refusing to speak.

What on earth was happening? Seeing Xia’s unstoppable crying and finding himself without options, Wu forced himself to ask the unthinkable: “Are you Zhong Sizao?”

Xia shrank further into himself, hands glued to his ears.

“Zhong Sizao? Are you Zhong Sizao?”
Wu pressed. “Tell me — what happened in Room 401?”

“Uuu—”
the sound rose, but still no words.

“Who killed you?”
Wu demanded, absurdity and a sliver of hope warring in his chest. He knew the question bordered on the impossible—whether necromancy actually existed was still a question mark in the world—but he had to try.

“Uuu—”

“Why won’t you answer? Why?”
Wu urged.

“Zhang Zhimei—she’s your girlfriend, isn’t she? Where is she now? Is she involved in this murder?”
Wu blurted the questions piling up in his mind: “Why did you seal yourself in this room? How could the killer get in and out?”

“Wah—! Uuu—!”
Xia’s sobs escalated. He reacted to the questions, but only with raw, restrained emotion that looked as if he fought to hold himself back.

Why would he refuse to answer anything?

At that instant Wu felt the ropes give. With a final burst of effort he freed his wrists and leapt at Xia.

To Wu’s shock, Xia screamed, “Don’t come near me! Don’t! Don’t come near me!” and struck Wu squarely in the chest with a powerful punch.

Wu hadn’t expected the blow; he fell back, coughing and clutching his sore ribs. Xia, still weeping, bolted toward the farthest corner and plunged into the wardrobe.… This is exactly how Zhong behaved before he died, Wu thought, a chill lancing through him. Xia’s necromancy—could it be real? Had Zhong’s spirit truly possessed him?

Wu scrambled to the wardrobe and tried to open it, but the man inside clutched the door from the inside and pulled it shut, screaming now not in grief but in terror.

Wu answered with brute force and finally burst the wardrobe open. Inside, the man’s eyes were wide as brass, pupils pinched, mouth gaping in a horrified O, neck cords bulging as if frozen mid-scream—a figure like a waxen corpse crouched at the bottom.

Wu dragged Xia’s rigid form from the wardrobe and checked for pulse and heartbeat. They were faint but present; the man was not dead. Wu glanced at his watch: it was midnight. The entire séance had felt like a nightmare.

Although he tried to calm himself, he failed. The mysteries in the night peeled back like the layers of an onion and thickened with each revelation.

Had Xia lied? Was he a medium—or a charlatan?

“Don’t come near me!”
—that one terrified cry was the only ‘utterance’ the ‘dead man’ had made. And yet the sound forced Wu to consider the terrifying possibility that Zhong’s spirit truly had taken hold of Xia. The voice on the DV tape— the man filming Zhang Zhimei—had sounded very similar to what he’d just heard.

Wu wasn’t entirely closed to the supernatural. He’d encountered a case where a kidnapper claimed to have killed a hostage and could not remember the burial place, but soon after the victim’s family reported a dream that precisely revealed the location. Though some questioned whether the family were complicit, evidence ultimately discounted that theory. The phenomenon was labeled, provisionally, telepathic intuition.

In any case, whatever had manifested offered no clear answers. From Xia’s behavior it was plausible that whatever had terrified Zhong in life had been so extreme he isolated himself in a sealed refuge and avoided contact. If the investigators could discover what Zhou had been terrified of, perhaps all the riddles would unravel. Xia—the man who’d proclaimed himself “the next victim”—might hold the key. No matter what, Wu had to find out more.

He took the rope he’d been tied with and bound Xia’s hands again behind his back. He slapped the man’s face repeatedly until Xia stirred. When Xia regained enough composure, he demanded, “Well? What did he say?”

“He… Didn’t say anything,”
Wu answered.

“Nothing?”

“Nothing.”

“I don’t believe that!”
Xia’s voice quivered with a hollow panic. “You must know something you’re hiding from me, right?”

“I don’t. I asked him all the questions we wanted to know. He didn’t say a word—he only cried.”

“He cried?”
Xia seemed astonished and aghast. “Why would that be…? Of course…”

“Enough. Xia, tell me now,”
Wu said with a hard look, “everything.”

“I…”
Xia’s voice trembled. “I thought… I thought I could get answers from that person’s mouth.”

“You aren’t acting this out, are you? You really expect me to believe in necromancy?”

“Officer, I don’t care whether you believe. I just want my problem solved. And necromancy exists—I summoned his spirit.”

“Oh? Even though you don’t know his name?”

“Yes. If he died here, I can summon his spirit here.”

Wu was bewildered. He had rarely met someone who spoke of such things with such sincerity. Xia’s behavior was baffling, but his words were consistent: summon the dead, ask questions, find answers.

“All right. I’ll play along for now,”
Wu said. “Tell me—what is your problem?”

“I…”
Xia faltered.

“Say it. Whatever it is, I’ll try to believe you.”

“All right,”
Xia said. “Officer, do you believe in ghosts?”

“Ghosts…? What do you mean by that?”
Wu felt gooseflesh creep up his skin at Xia’s next, strange faith.

“Ghosts—yes! Do you believe ghosts exist?”

“I—I don’t know. I’ve never seen one.”

“Okay… If—if—suppose I told you there’s a method that will let you see a ghost, would you try it?”

Wu was dumbstruck and felt a chill run down his spine.

“Really? There’s such a method? I don’t believe it,”
he said. “Even if there were, so what?”

“If there is, someone will try.”

Wu had no reply. They were in a bedroom where a rotting corpse had been found just days before; the question made the air feel even colder and more spectral.

Suddenly Xia’s face went white with shock.

“What is it?”
Wu asked.

“Did you… Hear a sound?”
Xia whispered.

“No.”

“No… Nothing,”
Xia forced himself calm. “But it wasn’t a hallucination.”

“I don’t understand—what do you mean?”

“Let me go! Let me get out of here!”
Xia’s facial muscles twitched. “Officer, you really didn’t hear it? Uuu— the sound’s getting closer!”

“You… I didn’t hear anything.”

Xia’s behavior turned more irrational. Wu tried to steady him by holding him, but his panic only worsened.

“I really don’t know!”
Wu said. “What sound?”

“He’s coming.”
Xia fell unnaturally calm though his body trembled. The calm unnerved Wu more than the screaming. “I can’t resolve my problem… I’m too late— but I won’t cry. I’ll be composed. Officer, you must feel this is beyond belief. It’s okay. I promise I’ll tell you the whole truth. But now—there’s no time.”

“Then—”

“Before I die, you can find my ID and driver’s license in my pocket. From the registered address you can find where I live. There you’ll find materials that might be clues. Promise me two things: first, find a medium—someone whose power matches mine—and have that medium summon my spirit. Then I’ll tell you everything that happened around me these past two weeks… Every strange night.”
Xia’s face was drenched in cold sweat; he fought to steady his voice.

“Second, if you can find my missing girlfriend—her name is Zhang Zhimei—she might save more people… I believe she holds a vital key.”

“Zhang Zhimei?”
Wu asked, surprised. “The girl on the DV tape?”

“You mean that DV tape?”
Xia’s manner grew more unstable. The bedroom felt damp and icy; despite the corpse having been removed only three days before, the room still seemed filled with its presence. Xia spoke as though on the verge of death, dictating a will.

“Yes,”
Wu repeated. “Who killed you? Tell me!”

“He came in,”
Xia whispered. “I saw him.”

“Saw what?”

“The thing that killed me,”
he said with a despairing laugh. “A ghost.”

At the moment Xia uttered that single word, Wu was plunged into a nightmare he would never have believed possible and would never wish to recollect.

A cold, nauseating gust of air seemed to whip past him toward Xia. A flash like a blade flickered at his peripheral vision. From the side of Xia’s neck a geyser of viscous blood burst forth, splattering the floor and Wu’s face, hair and clothes.

For perhaps half a minute Wu could not comprehend what supernatural event had occurred. He could only endure the overwhelming shiver that clenched his chest. When he gradually cleared his vision through the coagulated spray, he could barely draw breath.

Xia’s throat had been torn away—the flesh gone, pale vertebrae exposed. His eyes stared wide and lifeless; the rimless glasses reflected a cold, white light. The expression matched the terrified visage Xia had worn while allegedly possessed by Zhong.