3 раза кража души

Глава 2

"Yes, you guessed right. I'm looking for a Miss Ni Siqi. Is she in?"

"I'm sorry, young man, we don't have the person you're looking for here. Do you know where we are?"

Lin Hai was at a loss. What was going on? He hadn't dialed the wrong number. This was definitely the number Siqi had given him; there was absolutely no mistake. He didn't know how to answer.

The voice came through the microphone again: "You really don't know where we are?"

"I really don't know. I clearly dialed my friend's number. Did I make a mistake?"

The man suddenly sighed, then said in an almost terrifying voice, "This is the West Suburbs Crematorium."

Lin Hai nearly fainted upon hearing this. What? Did I hear that right? The crematorium? The one in the western suburbs of the city? Good heavens, how could this be? How could it have gotten there?! Was she deliberately playing a trick on me? But she didn't seem to be lying to me at the time. Lin Hai's mind was completely blank; he couldn't speak.

The person on the other end of the phone was still talking: "Young man, is this some kind of prank your friend played on you?"

Lin Hai answered incoherently, "I...I don't know, I really don't know."

“But young man, the person you just mentioned named Ni Siqi did indeed come here.”

What? Siqi has been to a crematorium. Who would go there for no reason? Most people would avoid it like the plague! But he still asked:

"Oh, you mean she went there."

"Yes, she did come, but she never came out after she came in."

Lin Hai jumped up from his chair in fright upon hearing this; he already had a vague idea of what was going on. No, this was terrifying!

Sure enough, the man then said something chilling: "Because she was already dead when she came in, she can't possibly get out."

Lin Hai was struck dumb. He couldn't believe his ears. Wasn't she alive and well right in front of him just two days ago? How could she be gone so quickly? It was unbelievable!

Lin Haiqiang asked calmly, "When was she sent to your place?"

"Oh, it's been about a month. I remember it was raining heavily that day."

"What? A month ago? But I'd only known her for a week! Could she be dead already? Then who was it that I met...?"

Lin Hai dared not utter that word; he was afraid he would break down.

The person on the other end of the phone sighed deeply again and continued, "Young man, listen to me. I am the director of the management department at the crematorium. In fact, countless people are brought here for cremation every day. Normally, it would be impossible for me to remember everyone's situation. However, I have a deep memory of the girl you mentioned named Ni Siqi because something incredible, strange, and bizarre happened to her."

Lin Hai was stunned. He was so shocked that he forgot his fear. He was determined to get to the bottom of it, so he asked the director to tell him the details of what happened.

The director remained silent for a moment before finally agreeing to tell him the whole story, but he instructed Lin Hai not to tell anyone after hearing it, so as not to cause unnecessary panic. Lin Hai agreed.

So the director told Lin Hai about this suffocating situation. At that moment, dark clouds filled the sky outside, indicating an impending storm.

"Here's what happened. About a month ago, we received a body for cremation; it was a woman. We checked her death certificate first, as per procedure, and it had the signatures of the hospital and the police. Then we started preparing for the cremation. The crematorium was handled by a cremator named Liu Qingfu, who had been doing it for over thirty years. Everyone here calls him Old Liu. Actually, all of this was told to me by Old Liu. He's always been honest and kind, and he never makes things up, so I believe what he told me is absolutely true, without any falsehoods."

According to Old Liu, he was in charge of cremating the body that day. He clearly remembered the girl named Ni Siqi on the sign. He said she had fair skin, slightly curly hair, and looked like she was asleep; she was very beautiful and must have been a very pretty person in life. Old Liu noticed that her nationality was listed as French on her death certificate, which puzzled him. Was this girl a foreigner? But she looked more like a Chinese person. Perhaps she was mixed-race or had changed her nationality. Old Liu didn't think much more about it and prepared to complete the work according to normal procedures.

But just then, he suddenly noticed that the corpse trembled. Old Liu was terrified; he thought he was seeing things. He shook his head and turned to open the furnace door.

When he turned around after preparing everything, he suddenly saw that the corpse had opened its eyes. He saw the girl's deep blue eyes, which seemed to be filled with resentment and emitted a pale green light.

Old Liu was so frightened that he collapsed to the ground. He had worked his entire life dealing with the dead and had never encountered anything so bizarre. He even wondered if God was punishing him, or if his job had caused him too much suffering. He gasped for breath and finally struggled to his feet. He mustered his courage and looked at the corpse again, only to find that it hadn't changed at all.

Could it be that his old eyes were playing tricks on him? No, impossible. It definitely wasn't a hallucination; the corpse really did open its eyes. Old Liu was drenched in sweat. He wiped the sweat from his brow, mustered his courage, and approached the corpse. He touched its nostrils; it was indeed not breathing. There was no doubt it was dead. Old Liu didn't have time to think anymore; he just wanted to get rid of this terrifying body as quickly as possible.

He tidied everything up again and pushed the corpse into the blazing furnace. He kept chanting Amitabha Buddha in his heart.

Old Liu then closed the furnace door. Suddenly, he heard a heart-wrenching scream coming from inside the furnace. The sound was terrifying, as if it came from hell. Old Liu was completely terrified. What happened today was a nightmare, and he was on the verge of collapse.

After more than ten minutes, the burning was finally finished. Old Liu stood up, trembling, and scraped out the ashes. He had finally completed this terrible job that he would never forget.

Later, Lao Liu secretly told me about it. We'd worked together for many years, and I was his boss, so he couldn't help but tell me. That's the whole story. To this day, Lao Liu hasn't gotten over it; he's always in a daze, like he's possessed. And it was because of this incident that I remembered the girl named Ni Siqi who was cremated.

The director let out a long sigh of relief; he had finally finished recounting this bizarre and true story.

After listening, Lin Hai remained silent for a long time before recovering. Suddenly, as if he had thought of something, he asked the director, "Do you remember who was the person who delivered the body that day?"

“I remember. And the body wasn’t brought by any of her relatives that day; it was just brought over by a hospital vehicle. I was also very surprised at the time. Didn’t this girl have any relatives? Why didn’t her family come? Later, it was said that her parents had mysteriously disappeared and could not be found. And since the body couldn’t be kept in the morgue for long, they had to bring it over for cremation first.”

"Do you know the cause of her death?"

"As for her cause of death, I did see it. It seems she died in a car accident after failing to respond to treatment. That's all I know. There are no other details."

Lin Hai didn't know what his expression was, but he knew for certain that the girl being cremated was Ni Siqi, whom he had seen several times in the past few days. From her description of her snow-white skin, long, curly hair, and those suddenly opened, deep blue eyes, he was certain that it was indeed the beautiful mixed-race girl he had longed for—Siqi. Moreover, the death certificate stated that she was a French citizen; there was no doubt about it.

But whether what I saw was a person or a ghost, it turns out she had died in a car accident a month earlier.

Lin Hai was deeply grateful to the director for telling him all this, and after saying a few words of thanks, he ended the call.

At this moment, he looked up at the window and saw that a strong wind had risen and the rain was pouring down.

(4)

I sat there quietly listening to Lin Hai's story. It was already past eight o'clock in the evening. I looked into his eyes, which were filled with fear. This incident must have greatly traumatized him, and I felt a pang of sympathy for him. Anyone would be frightened in such a situation. I took a sip of my coffee and then asked him:

"And then what? What happened next? What happened?"

His shoulders trembled as he looked around and said, "I thought it would end there, but little did I know this nightmare had only just begun. I'm now completely ensnared by this ghost."

Things were indeed not that simple, as I had anticipated, so I decided to keep listening.

I suggested we go eat together, since it was getting late, and Lin Hai agreed. So we paid the bill and left the coffee shop. By then it was completely dark, and we quickly found a restaurant, went in, and sat down.

After we ordered, while we waited for the food to arrive, I asked him to continue the story he hadn't finished. Lin Hai composed himself and finally mustered the energy to begin his narration again.

That evening, I returned home, but I still couldn't calm down. I was preoccupied during dinner and couldn't concentrate on anything.

My mom asked me what was wrong, and I could only lie and say that I was fine, just a little tired.

That night, I was alone in my room surfing the internet, hoping to alleviate my inner fear. I started playing games or chatting with people to pass the time, trying to relax my tense emotions.

Suddenly, a window popped up on my computer screen. A cute little girl was waving at me. And there was a message inside: "I'll come find you tonight!"

I was immediately startled, a sudden and extremely bad feeling creeping into my heart. It was as if the girl on the screen wasn't a cute little girl, but a vengeful ghost coming to claim my life. I quickly closed the window. Maybe I'm just overreacting, being a little paranoid.

I don't know what's wrong with me. My feelings are very complicated. The rain is still falling outside the window, and it doesn't seem to be stopping. Occasionally, flashes of lightning streak across the sky, accompanied by booming thunder.

Gradually, I suddenly felt my eyelids getting heavy, and before I knew it, I had fallen asleep on the table.

I don't know how much time passed before I was jolted awake by a clap of thunder. The rain was still pouring down, and it seemed to be getting heavier. The branches of trees outside the window were swaying in the wind, and I wondered how many ghosts were laughing coldly in the darkness.

Suddenly, I noticed that the window had been blown open by the wind and was flapping back and forth. I hurried over to close it, but as soon as I reached the window, I saw—a pair of hands gripping the window frame tightly, dangling outside.

"Oh my god! How is this possible? How can someone be outside? We live on the sixth floor!!!"

How could anyone possibly climb that high? I dared not approach any further; I was backing away step by step. Wouldn't you be frightened to see such a scene on this stormy night?

Then I saw those hands suddenly climb upwards, and immediately after that I saw a woman in white leap into my room through the window.

—Bang! A clap of thunder, accompanied by lightning, ripped through the night sky. I saw the face of the woman in white.

To be precise, it wasn't a person, it was a ghost, a terrifying female ghost in white.

Her hair was disheveled, like Sadako from "The Ring." Her white eyes seemed to have indistinct pupils, and one of them had popped out, revealing a black hole!

Her pale face was stained with blood, and green liquid was dripping from the corner of her mouth. She reached out and approached me step by step. I was completely terrified when I saw her hands. No, they were actually a pair of ghostly claws, two charred and incomplete ghostly hands reaching for me.

I had retreated to the corner of the wall, and suddenly I wanted to shout for help, but no sound came out of my throat. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't make a sound.

I was almost completely desperate. I didn't know what the female ghost would do to me. I was terrified.

Suddenly, the "female ghost" spoke: "What, don't you recognize me? I'm your Siqi."

"What! No, this can't be. She said she's Siqi. This can't be true."

I frantically waved my hands to keep her away. But she grinned maliciously, revealing her disgusting fangs, and continued to yell, "It's me, Siqi! Look at me! I've come to find you, because I know you're not looking for me, are you?"

I was completely paralyzed, and I watched helplessly as the "female ghost" lunged at me.

As Lin Hai finished speaking, my heart skipped a beat. I asked him, "What happened to you after that?"

He took a breath and continued:

"The moment she lunged at me, I lost consciousness and completely passed out..."

I don't know how much time passed, but I slowly opened my eyes, and everything in front of me was normal.

I checked myself first; nothing had changed. There was no one else in the room. I checked the window; it was closed properly. What was going on? Was what I saw just an illusion? My mind was in turmoil; I couldn't tell if the "female ghost" I'd just seen had actually appeared.

I slowly got up, then suddenly—

I noticed something on my bed. I rushed over to take a closer look and it looked like a fur coat or something similar.

I carefully picked it up and examined it. It was indeed a piece of leather, I think it was sheepskin. There were several words written on the sheepskin.

At this point, Lin Hai took the piece of sheepskin out of his pocket and handed it to me.

I took it in a panic, opened it, and saw several bright red, blood-like words: Ni Siqi—Your death is imminent.

.

Good heavens, I read it twice more silently. Ni Siqi, if you read it from another angle, isn't it just "Your death is imminent"?!

I asked Lin Hai, "Where did this sheepskin come from?"

He shook his head: "I really don't know. As I said, I found this after I woke up from the nightmare of the 'female ghost.' I really don't know where it came from or why it appeared in my room. But the words written on it have made me feel deeply that I am being haunted by a ghost. I even feel that 'she' is always wandering around me. If this continues, I will go crazy."

"But why have you come to me? Do you think I can help you in any way?"

Lin Hai looked up at me, his eyes filled with trust, and said slowly, "I do want your help."

"But how can I help you? Please explain more clearly."

"Do you remember this afternoon when I entered the chat room under the pseudonym 'Dramore' and asked you questions about 'The Head of the Lover'?"

Oh, that's right. I still couldn't answer his question. He asked me why the female protagonist took the head with her.

"But what does this question have to do with your bizarre story?" I asked, full of doubt and confusion.

"Because I feel that there seems to be a kind of prophecy in your novel. Don't you feel that it is somewhat similar to the plot in your book?"

When he said that, I actually thought of the book I wrote; they were indeed very similar.

Therefore, I decided that I would do everything I could to help this young man get out of his current predicament.

Chapter Two: Death Descends

(1)

In the early morning, as the first rays of sunlight streamed into my room, I was woken up by my alarm clock.