Like sinking into the depths of an abyss-dark ocean floor, struggling for a long time before finally surfacing again to recover her long-lost five senses. Lin Xi opened her eyes with effort. The incandescent light on the ceiling was so blinding that it took her a long while to regain her wits.

What had happened to her? Lin Xi held her head and thought. Right, hadn’t she been watching surveillance footage before? How did she end up lying on the floor asleep?

Even using her toes to think, something was wrong. Lin Xi quickly sat up and found she was still in the museum office. Not far from her on the floor was a large pool of fresh blood.

Lin Xi stood up in shock. Although she felt weak, she felt no pain, so it definitely wasn’t her blood. Besides her, there was only Fan Ze in the office—could Fan Ze have been injured?

The bloodstains had already dried, and the clock on the wall showed it was past nine o’clock. Lin Xi remembered it should have been past seven in the evening when she lost consciousness—over two hours were blank.

But it wasn’t accurate. Lin Xi felt very empty in her stomach, not like she had eaten dinner. The museum office was completely enclosed without windows, so she had no idea if this was nine o’clock the next morning.

Her phone was gone, her purse was missing, and the computer had been turned off. Lin Xi roughly scanned around the office, her gaze fixing on a certain spot, frightening her into suddenly retreating several steps.

For no other reason than there was actually someone standing silently in that corner.

To be precise, it should be a ghost or something like a spirit standing there.

Everything in Lin Xi’s field of vision was clear, but only that ghost was blurry and indistinct. She couldn’t even make out its features clearly, only vaguely determining it was a man wearing a police uniform.

She had to admit that seeing a ghost without any psychological preparation really made her skin crawl, nearly making her scream out loud.

As if sensing Lin Xi’s gaze, the ghost walked toward her.

Lin Xi’s terror lasted only an instant. She immediately deduced that Fan Ze might have already been murdered, and his soul was lingering here for some unknown reason, still visible to her.

Perhaps because supernatural events often occurred around her, Lin Xi’s acceptance level had greatly improved. She calmed down in an instant and said to the ghost: “Fan Ze, don’t worry, I’ll avenge you.”

The ghost stopped upon hearing this.

Lin Xi judged that the other party could hear her speak. Suppressing the grief and sorrow in her heart, she said like a rapid-fire barrage: “Fan Ze, who harmed you? Since you’re still here, can you give me some hints? How could this happen? Wasn’t the cause just a kingfisher feather hairpin? And why was I left behind? Was it to make me suspected? Or was someone already planning to target us? Is it because we were still investigating Zichun’s case?”

The ghost took a few more steps forward, trying to touch her but seeming to fear something.

Lin Xi had been very afraid of ghost stories before, becoming suspicious at any unusual movement, but now she felt no fear at all. She took the initiative to grasp the ghost’s hand.

She caught nothing, but perhaps it was an illusion—she felt a chill in her palm, as if she had touched the other party.

Her chaotic heart suddenly calmed down. Lin Xi took a deep breath, released the other’s hand, and walked to the desk intending to call the police. Her eyes didn’t leave the ghost before her, thinking about how to report the scene.

She reached out but grasped nothing.

Lin Xi was stunned, thinking she had misjudged the distance, and reached out again.

This time she turned her head back, so she watched with her own eyes as her hand passed through the telephone and desk, yet she felt nothing of touching objects.

She looked at her own hand in disbelief, eyes wide.

Just then, the office door was opened from outside by several police officers.

“It’s here, we haven’t touched anything at the crime scene!”

The crowd filing in—not one person looked toward Lin Xi standing in the center of the office.

Lin Xi was thunderstruck, her whole person as if falling into an ice cellar.

Was she… already dead?

Had she already become a ghost?

Lin Xi’s mind was in chaos, remaining blank for a long time.

In an instant, Lin Xi thought of many things.

She thought of her parents having to bury their child, whether they could bear such a blow; thought of her life having only passed through twenty-something years, with many places in this world she hadn’t visited; thought of so many things she wanted to do but hadn’t had time to do yet.

She thought of how she still hadn’t found Du Zichun.

Lin Xi suddenly came to her senses.

The ghost beside her kept circling around her, trying to touch her with both hands, wanting to comfort her.

But how could one easily accept something like already being dead?

“Fan Ze, how long can we stay in this world?” According to all folk legends, souls lingering in the mortal world had time limits. Lin Xi quickly looked around but didn’t see anything like ox-headed horse-faced demons or black and white impermanence.

The ghost beside her stopped, obviously unable to answer this question either.

Lin Xi smiled bitterly and mocked herself: “I’m also foolish. How would you know? We’re both freshly minted rookie ghosts.”

The police officers in the room were all working quietly. Section Four had been dispatched—the most excellent department in their station. Lin Xi just watched them check the entry door, search for evidence in a grid pattern along the scene, test for wiped bloodstains with luminol reagent, place marker signs for evidence chains, search for footprints with monochromatic light sources, identify blood pool patterns, have forensics take blood samples and fingerprints, take photographs…

She had done these procedures many times before, just never expected to personally watch others investigate her own murder scene.

As she watched, she suddenly felt something was wrong, as if something was missing.

Strange, if she and Fan Ze were both murdered, why wasn’t the body placement marked at the scene?

But Lin Xi soon felt relieved. Perhaps this wasn’t the crime scene, just the criminal scene. Perhaps the perpetrator had knocked them unconscious and then moved them elsewhere to kill them.

But she and Fan Ze hadn’t offended anyone.

And why choose the museum as the crime location? Wouldn’t it be easier to commit the crime on their way home after watching the surveillance?

After all, the museum’s surveillance and security were much tighter than ordinary residences.

Or perhaps the perpetrator had no choice but to deal with them at this time.

Was it related to that broken SIM card? Because of the case Zichun was investigating back then? Maybe someone in the forensics team leaked the information…

As for whether they were killed because of that stolen kingfisher feather hairpin, Lin Xi felt it wouldn’t be that dramatic. If so, wouldn’t the previous officers who came to investigate have died several times over? Besides, they hadn’t discovered anything yet!

But had they really discovered nothing?

Lin Xi vaguely felt she seemed to have seen something at the end, but couldn’t remember.

The ghost beside her moved closer, as if wanting to say something to Lin Xi, but made no sound.

Lin Xi didn’t care whether the other party could hear her, pointing at the blood pool and stains to analyze: “Fan Ze, this should be your blood, right? But the blood pool area is slightly large—it might cover previous bloodstains. But looking at the blood loss, it should have been when you were still alive. But there are no drag marks or bloody footprints. Did the criminal also clean the scene?”

When Lin Xi got nervous, she habitually talked a lot. But now the only one who could hear her speak was presumably just a motionless ghost. Lin Xi made deductions herself, then overturned them herself, going back and forth for a long time—so long that the Section Four officers who came to collect evidence and investigate had all withdrawn.

Almost all evidence in the office had been taken away, even the computer and chairs were moved. Lin Xi stood in the empty office, feeling a wave of emptiness and fear.

After death, what should one do?

Or rather, what could she still do?

While confused, she suddenly saw the office door being opened.

It was the museum director.

He leaned on his walking stick, looked at the doorway for a while, raised the old film camera in his hand, aimed at the empty office, and pressed the shutter.

Lin Xi was stunned, her eyes going white from the flash, taking a moment to recover.

Strange, how could she still be blinded by a flash after becoming a ghost?

But even stranger was this director.

Who would photograph a crime scene for no reason?

The director didn’t enter the door. He lowered his head as if confirming the remaining film count in his film camera, then left leaning on his walking stick.

Lin Xi hesitated, but intense curiosity overcame everything, and she immediately lifted her legs to follow.

The moment she walked out of the office, she was grateful she could still move freely, rather than being like the earthbound spirits written about in novels, unable to leave specific locations.

Behind her, the ghost in police uniform also followed, and seeming to sense her intention, quickened his pace, always walking half a meter to her front left.

This was a formation protecting her heart side.

Lin Xi was stunned for a moment, then smiled bitterly.

When Du Zichun was still around, he liked to protect her while walking like this, whether executing official duties or accompanying her shopping. After Du Zichun was gone, Fan Ze often imitated Du Zichun’s care for her, but no matter what he did, her heart was always filled with bitterness.

Even if he could do exactly the same, so what? They were completely different people!

Lin Xi’s heart was filled with mixed feelings. She had later maintained distance from Fan Ze precisely to avoid misunderstandings, but never expected they would both end up in such a situation.

Following the director dejectedly, when Lin Xi came to her senses, she found the director had entered his office and opened a cabinet door on the wall—inside was actually another room!

There was definitely a problem! Lin Xi perked up, her mind flashing with various speculations about inside jobs, but after following in, she discovered this was just a darkroom for developing film.

Film cameras used photographic materials like silver bromide to create film for photographing objects. After shooting, the film had to be developed to form images on photographic paper.

This type of film camera was invented over two hundred years ago, but in the new century, its life was coming to an end.

Digital cameras replaced old film cameras, and Kodak stopped producing film in 2009. Photo development shops similarly became history.

Now such darkrooms only existed in movies and TV shows, or in the homes of hardcore film photography enthusiasts.

Unexpectedly, this museum director was also among them, though now even film within its expiration date was probably hard to buy, right? This director really had refined interests.

Lin Xi looked at the various equipment in the darkroom and the bottles and jars of all sizes. She didn’t understand much, but knew these were developing solutions, fixers, and other chemicals used for photo development that were now hard to obtain.

When the door closed, the darkroom became completely dark. The director turned on the red safety light and put on gloves. He was obviously an experienced photo developer, his movements extremely skilled in the dim light. Lin Xi watched for a while and found it boring, because no matter how she looked, the director was properly developing photos, just using a somewhat varied mix of chemicals. Just looking at the various labels, one could guess they were special chemicals with some history.

This director was obviously a senior film camera enthusiast. Taking photos in front of the office earlier was probably because the film had only half a frame left and he couldn’t bear to waste it.

Lin Xi’s family had also used such film cameras when she was small. Although they were rated for 36 photos, if you wound them carefully, you could still take one or half an extra shot at the end.

Another wrong lead.

But Lin Xi didn’t know where to go next for the moment, so she could only stand in the darkroom in a daze, unconsciously listening to rustling, clinking, or liquid pouring sounds… Huh? Why were there three people’s breathing sounds in the darkroom?

Lin Xi’s five senses were very acute, which was also her advantage when taking the police academy exam.

She believed she hadn’t heard wrong, and the darkroom was so small you could see to the end at a glance. She and the ghost had to squeeze together to avoid bumping into the director, their bodies pressed together.

When she discovered this, she was also extremely uncomfortable but helpless.

There was no one else in this darkroom, so these breathing sounds were made by the two of them?

But they were already dead—why would they still breathe?

Lin Xi couldn’t figure it out and had no one to ask.

Time passed slowly. After the director finished developing the photos, he clipped them one by one with small clips to a string to air dry naturally. After doing all this, the director removed his gloves, picked up the walking stick beside him, and limped out.

For some reason, Lin Xi didn’t follow out but stood motionless in the darkroom.

As if a voice in her heart was telling her not to go out.

Lin Xi looked up at the photos hung in the darkroom. As time passed, the development on the photographic paper became increasingly clear. Most of these photos were of antiques the director had photographed. Under the special red safety light of the darkroom, the old film presented a texture incomparable to digital cameras, and the antiques photographed on film also had a vicissitudinous historical atmosphere.

There were also several landscape photos that the director had casually taken, all particularly artistic.

Lin Xi, extremely bored, looked at them one by one, finally stopping below the last photo.

This photo was half overexposed, probably because the film had reached its end. But one could still see it was the empty office.

What shocked Lin Xi was that there were two figures in this photo.

In the center of the photo, she stood with vacant eyes above the blood pool, while beside her, a long-unseen handsome face looked at her with worry.

How was this possible? Wasn’t Zichun missing? How could he be in the photo?! How could he be beside her?!

Her nose felt sour, her eyes instantly blurred. Lin Xi instinctively wanted to take down this photo—she must be seeing things.

The moment her fingers touched the photo, she belatedly realized—wasn’t she already dead? How could she still touch this photo?

Behind her, a pair of arms finally couldn’t restrain themselves and held her tightly in an embrace.

“Xiao Xi, I’ve always been by your side.”

Lin Xi’s tears finally fell.