The apartment felt heavier that night.... as though the walls had soaked in the earlier chaos and refused to let it go.
Qin Yuelin lay unconscious in Zhao Liren's trembling arms, his body slack, his face pale beneath the flickering light. The scent of blood still clung to him...faint but metallic, like guilt that refused to wash away.
Shen Lian's jaw clenched. His pulse throbbed somewhere between anger and fear, a rhythm he couldn't separate from the sound of Yuelin's weak breathing.
When Zhao reached to lift Yuelin, Shen moved first, swift and wordless.
He bent, one arm under Yuelin's knees, the other behind his back, lifting him effortlessly. The boy's head fell against his shoulder. For a brief, terrible moment, Shen felt the warmth of his breath against his neck... fragile, human.
"…We'll talk about this later," Shen muttered. His voice was low but steady. "For now, do what I said."
He didn't wait for Zhao to answer. His eyes flicked, briefly, to Yi Chen... who stood a few feet away, half-hidden in the hallway light. The boy's expression was unreadable. His mismatched eyes... one brown, one blue... seemed to reflect two worlds that had never met.
Shen's gaze lingered on him, suspicion stirring under his calm. There was something too quiet about him. Too patient.
He turned away, carrying Yuelin toward the bedroom.
Zhao followed, his steps uncertain, the weight of helplessness breaking through his bravado. His lips trembled, but he refused to let the tears fall.
He had always been the loud one, the one who laughed too easily, cursed too loudly... yet now, he moved like a man afraid to make a sound.
Shen laid Yuelin down carefully, tucking him in like someone who had done it before...not with children, but with ghosts that never left.
He brushed the hair from Yuelin's forehead. The skin beneath his fingers was burning.
Zhao stood behind him, silent. His knuckles were white.
"Come with me," Shen said suddenly. His tone left no room for argument.
They went to Shen's room... a dim, narrow space that still smelled faintly of cigarettes and rain-soaked fabric. The air between them was brittle, like glass waiting for a reason to shatter.
Zhao leaned against the doorframe, voice unsteady. "What do you want to talk about?"
Shen turned to him. His eyes looked darker than usual... not from anger, but from the exhaustion that comes when fear disguises itself as logic.
"You wanted to know why I brought Yi Chen here, right?"
Zhao blinked. "Now you want to talk about that?"
"Now," Shen said firmly.
Zhao exhaled and crossed his arms, nodding warily. "Fine. Why?"
Shen drew a long breath. "Dr. Huo called earlier. She said something… strange. Yi Chen's blood and He Mingzhao's blood ... they match. One hundred percent."
Zhao's brows furrowed. "What do you mean match? Like… relatives?"
"No," Shen said quietly. "Same person."
The silence that followed was sharp. Zhao let out a disbelieving laugh. "You're telling me that boy is He Mingzhao? Impossible. He Mingzhao's been dead for years-"
"I thought so too," Shen interrupted. His voice grew lower, rougher. "But Dr. Huo said the DNA pattern doesn't indicate two related individuals. It's one and the same. She also said… He Mingzhao never had any family, any relatives. Nobody claimed his body. Nobody came for him."
Zhao frowned, confusion etched deep in his features. "Then who the hell is Yi Chen?"
"That's the question, isn't it?" Shen murmured.
Zhao raked a hand through his hair. "What if he is a relative? Maybe the doctor's wrong-"
"She's not," Shen cut in again, sharper this time. "I went to the hospital myself. When I saw him, he wasn't like this. He was screaming, clawing at his own skin, terrified of something I couldn't see. And now-" Shen gestured vaguely toward the hall, "...he's calm. His wounds are gone. Like they were never there."
Zhao stared at him, his confusion shifting into something more fragile... fear.
"Why would you bring someone like that here, Shen? Why would you risk it? My Yuelin-"
"Your Yuelin?" Shen snapped, his temper finally cracking through. Then, quieter, almost regretful: "He's not a child you can keep safe forever, Zhao."
Zhao stepped closer, anger flickering through his grief. "Don't talk to me like that. You don't know what he means to me."
"I know," Shen said. His voice dropped again, calm, dangerous. "But listen first. Yi Chen said something before I brought him here."
Zhao scoffed. "And since when do you believe strangers with haunted eyes?"
Shen ignored the jab. "He said a spirit is always with him."
Zhao blinked. "A spirit?"
Shen nodded once. "And that spirit… wants Qin Yuelin."
For a moment, neither spoke. The only sound was the faint creak of the ceiling fan and the muted city noise from the street below.
Zhao's voice was almost a whisper. "How does he even know Yuelin?"
"I asked him that," Shen said, pacing now, restless. "He said he doesn't. But the spirit does."
Zhao rubbed his temples. "This is ridiculous..."
"Before I could ask more," Shen continued, "he said he has nowhere else to go."
Zhao's temper flared. "So you brought him here? Out of pity? Since when do you care, you bastard?"
"It wasn't pity," Shen snapped. Then, quieter: "It was instinct."
Zhao blinked. "Instinct?"
Shen's eyes softened, but his voice trembled. "Yi Chen knows something we don't. He knows the woman I told you about."
Zhao froze. That woman. The shadow from their case. The one who shouldn't exist, but whose fingerprints had turned up where no one had entered.
His lips parted, but before he could speak...
Bang.
A violent sound echoed through the apartment. Both men turned toward the hall.
Bang... bang...bang.
Someone was slamming a door, over and over again.
They rushed out. Yi Chen was at the end of the corridor, struggling to hold the door closed... Zhao and Yuelin's bedroom door. His face was pale, his body trembling, but his mismatched eyes were burning with fear.
"Yi Chen!" Shen barked, running toward him. "What's going on?"
Yi Chen's voice cracked. "Yuelin...he...he's trying to get out!"
The door shuddered again under the weight of something inside. The wood groaned; the hinges whined like wounded metal.
"Hold it!" Zhao shouted, throwing himself against it beside Yi Chen. "Yuelin, it's me! Calm down..."
But the pounding only grew louder, harder, desperate.
Zhao's arms shook as he pushed back. "He's strong... too strong...Shen, do something!"
Shen's mind was a storm... flashes of Yuelin's face from earlier, pale and broken, now twisted into something violent on the other side of the door. His chest tightened. He couldn't tell what it was... fear or guilt or something older, unnamed.
"Move!" he yelled, joining them, pressing his weight against the door.
For a moment, it held.
Then Yi Chen's hand slipped... maybe accident, maybe something else... and the door flew open with a deafening crack.
Qin Yuelin burst out.
His eyes were black. Not dark, not shadowed ...but pitch, like the world had poured night into them and forgotten to stop. His veins bulged faintly beneath his skin, his lips were blood-red. He didn't look human.
He lunged.
Zhao barely had time to gasp before Yuelin's hands were around his throat, forcing him to the ground.
"Yuelin!" Shen's voice cut through the chaos. "Stop...listen to me!"
Yuelin didn't listen. His nails dug into Zhao's skin. Zhao struggled, eyes watering, but he didn't fight back ... he couldn't.
"Liren!" Shen shouted. "Don't... just hold on..."
He grabbed Yuelin by the shoulders, dragging him back. Yuelin snarled... an animal sound, guttural and wrong. His strength was unnatural.
Shen didn't flinch. He took the scratches... across his arm, his cheek, his neck. Blood welled, but he held tighter.
"Yuelin... look at me!"
No response. Just that inhuman growl, like something ancient speaking through a broken mouth.
"Help me lock him in!" Shen yelled.
Zhao staggered to his feet, coughing, eyes red with both fury and fear. Together, he and Shen forced Yuelin back into the room.
Yi Chen joined them, pressing his shoulder to the door. The three of them pushed until the lock clicked shut.
On the other side, Yuelin's fists pounded against the wood. Each thud was a heartbeat. Each scream... a shattering echo.
The corridor went still, except for the sound of their breathing. Zhao leaned against the wall, trembling. Shen wiped the blood from his chin, staring at the door as if it could answer the questions forming behind his eyes.
Then Yi Chen spoke, voice soft but cutting through the silence.
"…Is Qin Yuelin the son of Qin Yang?"