Jiayan placed both hands on her shoulders and whispered into her ear, “What did you see?”

The scene before Ci’an’s eyes began to waver. A crack split the vermilion door down the middle, while countless tiny fractures spread out in every direction. The dream was on the verge of collapsing.

“You saw it, didn’t you?” Jiayan’s voice was hypnotic, slowly coaxing her onward. “You saw it. Tell me—where is it buried?”

Ci’an abruptly closed her eyes. For an instant, the dream collapsed, then immediately restored itself without a single flaw.

“Who buried what, and where?” Kai Xin came over and stared suspiciously into Jiayan’s eyes.

Jiayan straightened and raised her hands in surrender, looking completely harmless.

“You heard wrong, Little Kai Xin. Miss Ci’an and I weren’t whispering about anything.”

“Jiayan, I’m warning you, tell me the truth. I heard everything just now.”

“What a headache. I thought I could keep it a secret.” Jiayan sighed. “Fine. Actually, I want to be buried underground after I die too. I’ll be buried together with Little Kai Xin, so neither of us will ever be lonely.”

Kai Xin believed her. She put her hands on her hips and laughed.

“Okay, then. I won’t forget. You can be on my left when the time comes.”

“Little Kai Xin. Next time, I want to be a proper person.”

Kai Xin traced a few characters in the air with her finger and nodded, committing it to memory.

“You’re already a person now. You’re such a grown-up, yet your name is so complicated. If I accidentally forget it, don’t blame me.”

Jiayan merely smiled. This time, she didn't argue back.

Ci’an opened her eyes.

It was the vermilion door that had cracked open.

It opened toward them, extending a silent invitation.

Red candles burned on the altar. Thin wisps of incense smoke slowly rose through the boiling air, illuminating the Buddha’s face in gloom, its eyes clouded with dust.

This Buddha had descended into the mortal world. At its feet there were no devotees, only ordinary mortals wrapped in human skin, burdened by desire and sin, unable to turn back.

The first person to step inside was Ci’an.

She walked in and closed the door behind her.

Now, there was only one believer left.

But this time, she was neither a believer nor a sacrifice.

She stared directly at the compassionate Buddha. Her hateful gaze seemed almost capable of piercing through the bloody light of the dismembered forms before it. Yet her words were as calm as a confession.

“Buddha, I saw it.”

“What did you see?”

The Buddha had no need for confession.

“There are corpses buried underground.”

“Whose corpses?”

The Buddha treated everyone equally.

“My corpse.”

“Good child. The Buddha will protect you.”

The Buddha spoke to itself.

At last, the Buddha within the bloody mist revealed its true face.

A young, childish face filled with a sinister aura.

Ci’an stared at that face as though looking at another version of herself.

A version of herself that had died and returned to life.

She had hidden herself in darkness, surviving by feeding on the living essence of others. She was a genuine little ghost, awakened by the arrival of the female ghost. Once, she had fled desperately, but now she had sworn to reclaim everything.

The little ghost climbed down from the altar. The tip of her nose touched Ci’an’s.

Coldly, she demanded, “Why are you still alive? Why? Why?”

“The one who should die is you,” Ci’an said calmly.

The little ghost exploded in rage. She threw Ci’an to the ground, wrapped both hands around her neck, and screamed with all her strength:

“Liar! You’re lying! You clearly took everything away from me! If it weren’t for you, how could I possibly be the one who had to die?! Liar!”

“Are you going to kill me?” Ci’an asked.

The little ghost froze.

Then she snarled viciously, “You deserve to die! You murderer! I curse you to die ten thousand times!”

Her expression suddenly became blank.

“But…”

“But what?”

“I don’t understand. Why are you still alive?”

She seemed trapped in an enormous confusion. No matter how hard she tried, she could not understand how much effort a child had to expend simply to survive.

Ci’an slipped free with a slight tug.

Above the altar, the Buddha’s light shone brilliantly, immaculate and spotless.

A woman sat cross-legged with her back to Ci’an.

Knock. Knock. Knock.

The wooden fish sounded again and again.

After forty-nine recitations of prayers for the dead, the wooden fish fell silent.

A voice spoke.

“You’ve come back.”

“Why am I still alive?” Ci’an asked.

The woman sighed.

“Good child, you are not the one who should go to hell.”

“If not me, then who?”

Ci’an looked toward the little ghost beside her. Suddenly, she smiled.

“Her?”

The little ghost bared her teeth at Ci’an, as though frightened by that smile, and vanished in an instant.

Ci’an appeared unconcerned.

She stared at the woman and, like a sinister little ghost, demanded coldly, “If you already left, why did you come back?”

“Good child, I have always been here.”

The Buddhist hall before Ci’an’s eyes wavered.

Nightmarish human forms flickered back and forth. Eyes watched. Ears listened in secret. They rearranged themselves, gradually combining into the familiar face of a woman.

Ci’an turned around.

“Good afternoon, Miss Ci’an.”

Aunt Yu’s face had not appeared out of nowhere.

It had been there all along.

This house was filled with spies.

Only its most senior housekeeper had remained unnoticed.

“Miss Ci’an, I’m sorry. Those fish weren’t killed by you. I killed them myself and framed you for it. I did it to protect you from interference from the outside world. I never expected this day would come.”

“Was that protection, or depriving me of my freedom? Being sent to a sanatorium was protection too?”

“Liar.”

“Demon.”

“Murderer.”

Ci’an lifted her foot to leave.

A hand suddenly seized her wrist and pulled her into an embrace.

The woman’s carefully pinned-up hair spilled loose, cascading down inch by inch over Ci’an’s skin until it completely enveloped her, as though nurturing her inside its own body.

“Good child, Mama did it all for you.”

Her mother’s voice drifted down from above, as though singing a mournful song, calling out to wandering souls with nowhere to go.

Ci’an lifted her head from within the layers of cold, viscous hair.

Her gaze passed through an unbearable weight of love and met her mother’s eyes.

She still looked so beautiful.

She was no longer young, yet she had never seemed to grow old.

“Little Xin, Mama loves you. Mama did everything for your own good!”

Her mother called out the female ghost’s name.

The immense grief that descended left no room for retreat.

Ci’an was plunged into profound confusion.

Who was Ci’an?

Who was the female ghost?

Something was wrong, but she had forgotten.

Who was she, really?

Who was Little Xin?

Who was Yu Xin?

Which one was real—Little Xin or Yu Xin?

“A…”

“Mama, I love you too,” she said without hesitation.

Then her expression twisted with unbearable pain.

“But I can’t tell which one is real…”

“Mama, am I real? Is this world real?”

“If this world is fake, and I’m fake too, then who are you?”

“Mama, if I kill you, will it hurt?”

“Will you still smile at me?”