Time rewound by several hours.

Back to the moment before Ye Weibai stepped into Mangfu Elementary, still cocooned in the taxi like a seed in its husk.

One sliver of his mind drifted with the driver’s warm chatter, while ninety-nine parts sank into the document sea on his phone, pages like dark fish flickering past.

Those were the case files he had loaded before he left, bricks of evidence stacked tight in a glowing wall.

With Mu Ling absent, the lake of his thoughts calmed; without her sparrow-bright chatter pecking at the surface, a quiet spread like dawn over still water.

Perhaps the soul is barred by flesh—by Bai Ye’s body, already dimming like a late autumn lamp—so thinking had become a grinding sport, iron shoes trudging through mud.

Each time he tried to seize a key thread, irritability rose like a sudden hot wind, filling his skull with grit; his mind’s lightning ran through rusted pipes, snagging and sparking.

Yet now, though his body crouched in a cramped shell and someone’s voice buzzed like a summer fly, he felt the gentlest peace since coming to this World, a hush like snowfall.

“I should’ve seen it—”

In the narrow space where storm clouds pressed low over the city, the driver’s words shimmered like heat haze, wind skirting his ears while street scenery bled backward like rivers of light.

As the taxi gathered speed, weights slipped from him like wet coats; shackles, dregs, heaviness tumbled behind, and his body rose like a kite cutting free.

He felt his mind return, windows wiped clear; even his heavy, uncooperative brain grew glass-bright, as if a trapped bird had found the open sky.

He sat sculpture-still, face calm as carved jade, lashes lowered; in Bai Ye’s once-clouded eyes, a glow that belonged only to Ye Weibai began to flow.

“When did I ever fear death like this? Tiptoeing, second-guessing?” Memory pricked like thorns; then his mouth curved, a thin smile with a blade’s gleam. “[Interesting] outweighs [Life]—that’s me.”

“This isn’t mine…” He let his body loosen, sinking into the cushioned seat as into a soft tide, his expression light as evening air. “—It’s Bai Ye’s.”

“That [Fear] belongs to Bai Ye, lingering in the flesh and staining me.” With his true state restored, Ye Weibai pierced through the fog like a needle through silk. “What does he fear? Fear etched to the bone, the soul gone, yet its echo still clings to the meat.”

“Maybe it isn’t hard.” He watched the files sweep past on the screen, his black-and-white eyes mirroring the [Real]. “He only fears—finding [It].”

…

Track the culprit.

If you can’t locate him outright, read the wind and predict where he’ll appear—read his next target like a shadow on the wall.

Who is [It] hunting?

A noble-school flower? A runaway girl walking alone? A homebound rebel nesting in a dim room?

Who…?

Ye Weibai read every file end to end, pages turning like leaves in a dry grove.

The victims had passed into double digits; the method never changed, but status, looks, temperament—no shared thread, no visible knot to tug.

Usually, the first strike is pure impulse, a firework without aim; after that, a tilt shows, sometimes as neat as “chestnut bob,” sometimes as loose as “easy-to-bully girls,” but there’s always a grain pattern in the wood.

“[It]’s targets look random, no fixed tilt. Some think [It] just spots someone on the street, decides, then pounces. This kind of predator is fog to grasp; you narrow by territory, sweep, and wait.”

Sitting alone beneath the square pavilion in Mangfu’s small garden, Ye Weibai glanced at a sky turning bruise-dark. “But—is that really it? If you read carefully—read each victim’s past—you’ll find a quiet chord. In recent years, every violated little girl shared… [Loneliness].”

—Li Manzhi’s [Loneliness] bloomed from divorce; her father dragged different women home like stray cats and never fed the child, moans seeping through thin walls like rain. How does a small girl sleep under that sound?

—The factory-found runaway’s [Loneliness] sprouted with her baby brother; a new child should be joy, but in a son-worship house it tipped the scales, and she was left to grow like a weed. Even vanishing for a day and a night, her parents’ hearts stayed stone.

—After talking with Manzhi, he watched two more third-grade girls; their paths differed like rivers, but both ended wrapped in [Loneliness] like a cold shawl.

Unbelievable as it seems, maybe [Loneliness] is [It]’s chosen scent.

But—

“Even looks and height can be faked—[Loneliness] is even less a trait you spot at a glance.” He scanned photo after photo of small faces, a Detective’s privilege granting basic city records like a lantern in a dark lane.

“Some wear sunshine and laugh easily, yet inside is a hollow, a room with bare walls. Like Manzhi—flirty, precocious, reckless outside; who’d guess her heart is a winter field?”

As always, Ye Weibai stepped into their shoes, empathy a blade and balm; his eyes brightened like stars. “So how does [It] pick? If it were me—if I were [It], proud and precise—I wouldn’t settle for cursory checks. I’d only strike after I’d proven the girl’s [Loneliness] to the bone.”

“That isn’t simple; most people can’t do it.”

“Unless you’re already close. Or you hold detailed records… or you see more than most, hawk-eyed beyond habit.”

“At this point…” he murmured, watching banyan branches outside sway and refuse to still, each leaf a restless whisper. “Isn’t it clear who fits those preconditions? Either you’re from the police station, or—”

A detective agency.

“Wouldn’t you say?”

Ye Weibai lowered his gaze and tightened his grip on the flattened silver bell in his pocket, cold metal like a moon shard against his palm.

…