Lin Xiao lay flat on the floor of the "Oblivion Used Bookstore," his entire arm squeezed into the gap between the furthest bookshelf and the wall. His fingertips were clawing at the spine of a dark blue Data Structures textbook.
"It's stuck dead," he muttered, shifting his angle for another try. The book didn't budge.
The only sounds in the store were the low hum of the fluorescent lights and the musty scent of old paper. Behind the counter, Old Man Li, wearing reading glasses, was engrossed in his newspaper, completely oblivious to the commotion.
Lin Xiao simply pressed his face against the floor, peering into the dark crevice. The smell of dust rushed into his nose, making him squint. Deep in the gap, the corner of the book was wedged behind a loose brick.
He reached in, his fingers brushing against the edge of the brick.
The texture was wrong.
It was cold, smooth, and carried faint ripples—like touching a pool of still water. It was entirely devoid of a brick's roughness.
Before he could react, the "brick" collapsed inward.
It wasn't a physical movement; it was more like space itself had shrunk inward by a fraction. Immediately after, the surrounding scene began to distort. The wood grain of the bookshelf rippled, the mold spots on the wall blurred and expanded, and all sound instantly vanished.
Absolute silence.
Lin Xiao felt a gentle but irresistible force pulling him forward. There was no sense of impact, no falling—just a momentary daze before his feet planted firmly back on solid ground.
He looked up and found himself still crouching, but his surroundings had completely changed.
The bookshelf was brand new, the wood perfectly smooth. The incandescent bulb overhead cast a warm yellow halo, swaying gently. Most importantly, the sound was gone—a thorough, eardrum-oppressing silence.
Temporal Rift.
The term suddenly jumped into Lin Xiao's mind, accompanied by a surge of heat rising from the base of his spine. The heat wasn't scalding, but it was clear and overbearing, instantly sweeping through his limbs and bones before throbbing at his glabella. He instinctively knew—this wasn't a hallucination; something that had always been dormant inside his body was awakening.
He slowly stood up, his movements stiff with shock. Just then, he saw a "figure."
At the counter, a young man in his early twenties stood with his back to him. He wore faded blue work clothes, his hair cropped extremely short, and he was carefully wiping the cover of a thick book.
The young man finished wiping the book, placed it squarely on the counter, and turned around. It was a face full of vitality, with bright, sharp eyes. Lin Xiao noticed that the young man's footsteps were incredibly light as he turned; his posture was as steady as a boulder, and the flip of his wrist carried a strange, rhythmic flow.
Martial Arts. The thought popped up without any warning.
The young man walked to the bookstore entrance—which was now a brand-new wooden door—pushed it open, leaned out, and waved vigorously across the street.
Lin Xiao followed his gaze. Standing across the street was a girl in a floral dress, her hair in two braids, pushing an old-fashioned bicycle. She was smiling brightly, waving back.
The young man pulled his head back in, closed the door, and the smile on his face faded slightly. He walked back to the counter, took out a notebook from a drawer, opened it, and picked up a fountain pen.
With the pen tip suspended over the paper, he paused for a moment.
In that very instant, the heat surging within Lin Xiao violently jumped.
Immediately after, he "saw" what would happen in the next half-second. It was more like a "premonition" directly appearing in his consciousness rather than a visual image: the young man would tilt his head slightly to the left, his right index finger would unconsciously tap the desk three times, and the sunlight from the window would perfectly graze his left cheekbone.
Then, reality and premonition perfectly aligned.
The young man really tilted his head to the left, his right index finger tapped the desk three times, and the sunlight grazed his cheekbone. Not a single deviation.
Lin Xiao's heart pounded wildly. Is this... an ability?
He tried to concentrate, guiding that heat toward his eyes. The next moment, his vision changed. On the surface of every object, extremely faint, flowing silver-gray lines emerged, like the scars of time. The lines on the bookshelf were dense and slow. The lines on the thick book he had wiped showed regular fluctuations. And on the young man himself... his entire body was enveloped in a hazy silver light, the flow of the light much faster than the surrounding environment.
Chrono-Affinity. Another unfamiliar concept flooded his mind.
Right then, the young man put down his pen. He stood up and stretched his shoulders—a remarkably fluid movement, his shoulder blades opening and closing like wings. Then, he turned his head. His gaze crossed the counter, the books, the air, and landed squarely on Lin Xiao.
Their eyes met in mid-air.
Lin Xiao froze entirely. In the young man's eyes, there was no panic. First confusion, then surprise, and finally, an indescribable sense of understanding. He tilted his head slightly, the corners of his mouth curling into an extremely faint, almost imperceptible arc.
Then, he raised his right hand, lifted his index finger, and gently pressed it against his lips.
—Shh.
A silent gesture of hushing, seemingly from another era.
At that precise moment, Lin Xiao felt the heat within him completely erupt. Silver-gray light seeped out from under his skin, and the world before his eyes was instantly submerged in brilliance. His perception of time fell into chaos—he "felt" his heartbeat dragged out into slow motion, yet also "felt" the flickering of the fluorescent light as fast as a gale. Simultaneously, a bizarre "sense of displacement" occurred: he was standing right here, yet he felt as if he simultaneously existed in the positions of half a second ago and half a second later.
This distortion lasted only for a split second.
The light faded, the silver-gray lines vanished, the absolute silence shattered, and the familiar hum of the fluorescent light poured back into his ears. Lin Xiao stumbled, grabbing the bookshelf for support. He looked down at his hand—the silver light at his fingertips was rapidly receding under his skin.
He bent down and picked up the Data Structures book at his feet. This time, the book was loose, coming out with a gentle pull. Opening the title page, the ballpoint pen handwriting was clear: "Li Weiguo, 1987.9.15."
Thirty-eight years ago.
Holding the book, Lin Xiao walked to the counter. Old Man Li finally lifted his eyelids from the newspaper, his eyes behind the reading glasses calm and unrippled.
"Boss, I found the book."
Old Man Li put down the newspaper, took the book, glanced at the title page, and paused. He took off his reading glasses, slowly wiped the lenses with a velvet cloth, and took quite a while before putting them back on and looking at Lin Xiao.
"This signature on the book, Mr. Li Weiguo... Is he the founder of this bookstore? Or, is he related to it?"
Old Man Li's finger tapped gently on the edge of the counter. It was very light, but Lin Xiao noticed it. The rhythm of that tap was exactly the same as the young man's tapping on the desk in the Temporal Rift just now.
"Ten bucks," Old Man Li finally said, his tone flat. He took the money, found ten one-yuan coins, and placed them on the counter.
Lin Xiao picked up the coins one by one, turned, and walked toward the store door. Before pushing it open, he took one last look back.
Old Man Li had picked up the newspaper again. In the corner of the counter, the spine of a half-hidden old book was exposed, bearing the faint words: Introduction to Energy Channeling Arts.
Energy Channeling Arts. One of the foundational training methods of traditional martial arts.
Lin Xiao withdrew his gaze and pushed the door open.
When he returned to the dorm, Chen Hao was gnawing on a steamed bun with pickled mustard tubers. Seeing him enter, he mumbled, "Got the book?"
"Got it." Lin Xiao threw the book on the desk, sat down, and exhaled a long breath. The heat within him was still faintly surging.
Chen Hao stopped chewing, turned around, and looked closely at Lin Xiao's face. "What's up with your eyes?"
"My eyes?"
"For a second there, your pupils seemed lighter, tinged with a silver-gray." Chen Hao frowned. "And there's this... weird feeling about you. Like you're physically here, but your shadow is off by half an inch."
Lin Xiao smiled bitterly. He recounted exactly what had happened in the bookstore—the Temporal Rift, the premonition dodge, the time perception, and Li Weiguo's hushing gesture.
Chen Hao listened quietly. After a period of silence, he finally said, "I believe you. And it seems I've... encountered something similar."
He spoke of the "cool stone" in his village's old ancestral hall when he was a kid, of seeing figures in old clothes and a soundless world. Listening to him, the last bit of Lin Xiao's self-doubt dissipated.
"So," Lin Xiao said slowly, "it wasn't my hallucination."
"At least, not completely." Chen Hao nodded, his expression turning serious. "That hushing gesture, Old Man Li's evasion, and that book on Energy Channeling Arts... Xiao, I think we might have accidentally stumbled into a... world we weren't supposed to know about?"
Before he finished speaking, the low rumble of a car engine sounded outside the window.
Both of them turned their heads simultaneously. Downstairs, a black commercial van slowly came to a halt. The model was ordinary, but the windows were made of dark, privacy glass. After stopping, the doors didn't open immediately, nor did the engine shut off. It just parked there quietly.
The heat inside Lin Xiao surged violently, rushing rapidly near his spine.
Right then, the passenger-side window rolled down halfway.
The light inside the car was dim, but Lin Xiao saw it clearly—sitting in the passenger seat was a man around thirty, with a buzz cut and hard facial features, wearing a dark jacket. The man's gaze swept over the dormitory building and finally seemed to lock onto their window. His right hand rested casually on the edge of the car window, and on his wrist, he wore a silver-gray metal bracelet. The surface of the bracelet flickered rhythmically with a faint blue light.
A Martial Arts Monitor? A Gene-Lock Suppression Ring? Or some kind of energy-sensing device?
The man's gaze lingered on their window for three seconds, then he raised his left hand and lightly pressed the bracelet on his wrist. The blue light intensified briefly, then returned to normal. Following that, the window rolled back up.
The van still didn't drive away.
"Is that..." Chen Hao's voice was very low.
"I don't know." Lin Xiao stared at the van, the heat within him becoming increasingly active with his gaze. He could "feel" every slight vibration of the engine inside the car, "feel" the steady but powerful heartbeat of the man in the passenger seat, and even "feel"... an extremely obscure aura seeping out of the car, carrying a martial arts rhythm similar to what he felt from Li Weiguo.
That was no ordinary person.
Lin Xiao took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. "Haozi, do you remember that rumor during the Martial Arts Club recruitment last semester?"
Chen Hao thought for a moment. "The one saying the real coach of the Martial Arts Club isn't a PE teacher at all, but... someone from a special department?"
"Right." Lin Xiao stared at the van below. "And the rumor also said that occasionally, students with 'special talents' would appear in the school, get 'special attention,' and then... transfer, or suspend their studies, disappearing without a trace."
Chen Hao's face changed.
Outside the window, the autumn sun remained bright, and cheers for a scored goal drifted from the basketball court. Everything was as usual.
But Lin Xiao knew that some doors, once pushed open, could never be closed again.
He clenched his fists, feeling the unfamiliar yet powerful heat flowing in his veins.
"Haozi," he said, his voice carrying a certain conviction he hadn't even noticed himself, "we might have... really gotten ourselves into something massive."
Downstairs, the black commercial van's engine still hummed low.
Inside the car, the man stared at the screen of the bracelet on his wrist, which was currently displaying a line of jumping data:
[Target A: Temporal Affinity abnormal fluctuation, peak 47.3. Verdict: S-Grade Potential.] [Target B: Vitality Index 91. Verdict: Foundation-type Potential.] [Observation level raised to Tier 1. Recommendation: Initiate Contact Protocol.]