Chapter 22: The Person Who Vanished in the Mirror

On the other end of the phone, the people around Shen Jiayun noticed her sudden loss of composure and immediately gathered to ask what had happened.

Li Tianque was struck as if by lightning, left utterly stunned.

Everything had unfolded so abruptly, so inconceivably. The lively child who had been playing before his eyes was now suddenly dead, snatched away by fate.

What chilled Li Tianque even more was Shen Jiayun’s description: Xiao Dong’s hair had been caught by the top of the drop tower, and it was likely that the machine’s force had torn away the entire scalp. If this was true, then Xiao Dong’s manner of death was identical to the ghostly image of the child Li Tianque had seen earlier!

“This can’t be… Sister Shen, please calm down… Where are you right now? I’ll come immediately!” Li Tianque was starting to panic.

“Of course! You have to come! I’m calling the police! I must call the police!” Shen Jiayun had lost all control, screaming hoarsely like a madwoman, yet still did not say which hospital she was at.

The chaos on the other end was overwhelming; the gentle, kind mother had turned into something wild and feral, completely unhinged. Only after quite some time did someone else snatch the phone and give the address to Li Tianque.

Li Tianque hurried to the hospital, which was in utter turmoil.

“We’re deeply sorry about this incident. Our legal team will reach out to discuss compensation. We sincerely hope…”

“You monsters! You bastards! Sorry? What good is sorry? If it were your child hanging up there, would you accept an apology?” Shen Jiayun’s shrieks echoed down the corridor.

The staff near the emergency room were at their wits’ end; no one had expected such destructive fury from this frail woman. The representative from the amusement park had his suit torn, evidence of a previous altercation.

After explaining the situation to Xiao Dong’s family, Li Tianque followed the police to an office, where they took his statement.

He sat down and answered their questions truthfully, not even hiding the fact that he’d seen a blood-covered child before.

The two officers found his testimony so peculiar that they kept exchanging odd glances, barely restraining their laughter.

“Are you sure you really saw a ghostly figure identical to Xiao Dong appear before you? And that it looked exactly like his current state?” the officer asked, finally unable to hold back a chuckle.

“What are you laughing at? I’m telling the truth! I saw it with my own eyes—the ghost jumped from Xiao Dong’s bedroom!” Li Tianque insisted.

“Don’t worry. We’re professionally trained. We usually don’t laugh—unless we can’t control it.”

“You… you’re joking, aren’t you? Honestly…” Li Tianque gritted his teeth in frustration, but there was nothing he could do.

After all, his statement sounded like the ramblings of a lunatic.

The officer shrugged and smiled, “Alright, just sign here and put your fingerprint next to your name. If we need further investigation, we hope you’ll cooperate.”

Li Tianque pressed his fingerprint with resignation and hurried out of the hospital.

It was his first time encountering the death of a stranger so closely.

Looking back, everything seemed utterly surreal.

Especially the ghostly figure he’d seen earlier—thinking it over, it seemed almost like a grim omen of Xiao Dong’s death!

Did he somehow foresee Xiao Dong’s demise?

Or was he, like those recently deceased shop-streamers, the victim of some curse?

Li Tianque found the thought absurd, but the facts were undeniable.

Such an unbelievable thing had happened—right to him!

It was past ten at night, the subway had stopped running, and Li Tianque wandered the streets, weary.

He wanted to go home, but for the first time, the way back seemed strangely distant.

He hailed a cab and returned to his rented room.

Despite making some money from streaming, he was reluctant to splurge. Running a video channel alone, he figured a bed was enough and hadn’t moved out, continuing to live in a shared apartment.

There was no private bathroom, only the bedroom counted as his personal space.

His roommates were a couple: Hu Jiangsheng, who delivered packages for Tongbang Express, and Wu Xiaonan, who worked as a receptionist for a bank outsourcing company.

They were deeply affectionate and got along well with Li Tianque. Hu Jiangsheng, a native of Chaozhou, liked to add “Ah” before names, often calling him “Ah Que.”

Because their jobs kept them busy, they should have been asleep by now.

Li Tianque, worried about disturbing them, kept the door as quiet as possible.

Yet, since it was an old building, the main door still creaked loudly as he opened it.

Once inside, the apartment was silent; the bedroom doors were shut tight, not a hint of light escaping. Li Tianque turned on the living room light, put down his bag, and planned to wash his hands.

But when his gaze fell on the half-open bathroom door, he froze, nearly crying out.

Wu Xiaonan was still awake at this hour, wearing a red floral nightgown, standing motionless with her back to him, staring at the bathroom mirror.

The bathroom light was off, only cold moonlight streaming in through the window, casting a pale glow.

At such a late hour, a woman standing stock-still in a dark bathroom, blankly gazing at the mirror—it was unsettling.

Li Tianque swallowed, peered through the crack again, and confirmed it really was Wu Xiaonan.

She stood stiffly, her posture unnaturally rigid, reminiscent of zombies in Western horror films, her body hunched and awkward.

Something about the scene seemed wrong, but he couldn’t immediately grasp what.

After a moment, he tentatively called out, “Xiaonan… haven’t you gone to bed yet?”

She didn’t respond, remaining motionless.

“Hey… Xiaonan?” he tried again.

The woman with her back to him still didn’t move, her head slightly tilted back as if looking upward.

Now Li Tianque was truly unsettled. He edged closer, but hesitated to intrude on the bathroom since she was a young woman.

As he drew near, his scalp prickled and his pores seemed to open all at once.

He finally realized what was wrong: in the bathroom mirror—

Wu Xiaonan’s reflection was nowhere to be seen.