Revolving lantern, back to zero

It was still dark in the industrial area.

When Lin Shen arrived, the scene was already cordoned off. Three police cars were parked outside the warehouse, their red and blue lights flashing alternately, making the walls of the abandoned factory look like an electrocardiogram. Two police officers stood at the door and nodded simultaneously when they saw Lin Shen get out of the car.

"Team Leader Lin."

Lin Shen did not respond. He crossed the police line and entered the warehouse.

Flashlights and survey lights illuminated the interior. The oil stains on the cement floor, the rust marks on the iron frames, the cobwebs in the corners—everything was exactly as he remembered. The only difference was the presence of a corpse on the floor.

Forensic pathologist Lao Zhao was squatting beside the body, conducting a preliminary examination. Hearing footsteps, he looked up, saw Lin Shen, and his expression changed. Lin Shen had seen that expression many times—the expression of a forensic pathologist seeing an acquaintance. But this time was different; besides regret, there was something else on Lao Zhao's face that was hard to describe.

Like confusion.

"Team Leader Lin," Old Zhao stood up, took off his gloves, "you'd better be prepared."

Lin Shen walked to the body and looked down.

Lying on the ground was a man, dressed in dark clothes, his face turned to the side. The wound on his neck had stopped bleeding, revealing dark red muscle tissue and a white tracheal incision. The fatal wound was in the neck, a clean and swift horizontal cut.

It was exactly the same stab that killed him in the flashback scene.

Lin Shen squatted down and carefully examined the deceased's face.

She looks exactly like him.

It's not just "similar," it's exactly the same. The same brow bone, the same bridge of the nose, the same jawline, the same small mole above the right ear. Even the length and parting of their hair are exactly the same.

Lin Shen reached out and examined the deceased's right hand.

There was an old scar on the web of his hand, exactly the same as the one on his palm. Not just "similar," but the location, length, shape, and even the white scar pattern left after healing were identical.

"Time of death," Old Zhao flipped through his notebook, "preliminary assessment is between 23 PM last night and 1 AM this morning. The fatal wound was a sharp object cutting the neck, a single fatal blow. The murder weapon was likely a single-edged knife, with a blade width of about three centimeters."

Between 23 PM last night and 1 AM this morning.

That was the first time Lin Shen entered the revolving lantern. That was the time he "saw" himself being killed in the revolving lantern.

"Any other discoveries?" Lin Shen's voice was calm, so calm that even he himself felt unfamiliar with it.

Old Zhao hesitated for a moment, then took something out of the evidence bag.

A key.

It is bronze in color with a layer of dark green rust on the surface, and the label says "317".

It was exactly the same as the one in Lin Shen's pocket.

Lin Shen felt his pocket. The keys were still there. Two keys, the key to locker number 317, one in his pocket, the other in the deceased's pocket.

"There's one more thing," Old Zhao said, flipping up the deceased's collar, "found on the back of the deceased's neck."

Lin Shen leaned closer to take a look.

There was a tattoo on the back of the deceased's neck.

A black snake coils around a rose.

It was exactly the same tattoo on the killer's wrist as he remembered. It was exactly the same tattoo on Shen Ruo's wrist.

But the location is different. This tattoo isn't on the wrist, it's on the back of the neck. The snake's head is facing upwards, its forked tongue pointing towards the hairline, like a snake crawling out of the collar, heading towards his brain.

Lin Shen stood up and took a step back.

All the clues in his mind were like overturned puzzle pieces, scattered all over the ground, but suddenly he saw an outline—not a complete image, but just a blurry shape, like someone lighting a match in the dark, illuminating a corner.

The deceased had a 317 key in his pocket. He had a black rose tattoo on the back of his neck. He had an old scar on the web of his right hand, identical to his own. His face was exactly the same as his.

This is not another person.

This is another version of him.

He is someone who has survived to this day in a parallel world, ended up in the same warehouse, and was killed by the same person in the same way.

Lin Shen turned and walked to the warehouse door. A cold wind blew in and blew on his face, but his mind was hot, as if something was burning inside.

Xiao Chen stood at the door, his face pale. He had arrived ten minutes earlier than Lin Shen and had already seen the body. He knew what the body looked like. He looked at Lin Shen's face, then at the body in the warehouse, his lips trembled, and he said nothing.

"Chen Xu," Lin Shen said, "go check all the files from the Black Rose case three years ago, including those that weren't filed, those marked 'questionable,' and those that were destroyed."

"Destroyed?" Xiao Chen was taken aback. "How do you check if something has been destroyed?"

"Go find Lao Zhou," Lin Shen said. "He knows how to investigate."

Xiao Chen opened his mouth, wanting to ask who Lao Zhou was, but seeing Lin Shen's gaze, he swallowed his words. He nodded, turned, and left.

Lin Shen stood at the warehouse entrance, watching the sky begin to lighten. The night had passed just like that. Twenty-four hours earlier, he had been sleeping in his rented room, dreaming of the Black Rose case. No, that wasn't a dream. It was a revolving lantern. A message from his deceased self in another world before he died.

My phone vibrated.

Unknown number:

"You saw him. He is you. You are him. The only difference is—he is dead, and you are alive. But this is not luck. He chose to die. He chose to die in your world, not in his own. Because he knew that only his death could allow you to see that tattoo."

"—Another You"

Lin Shen stared at the line of text, his fingers slowly tightening.

He chose to die.

Another version of myself chose to die in the warehouse, at that time, in that location—just so he could see the tattoo on the killer's wrist. Just so he would know that the real culprit in the Black Rose case was still out there.

But who is the killer?

If the killer isn't Lu Ming—Lu Ming disappeared three years ago, and the case file doesn't mention tattoos, indicating that tattoos weren't a primary feature of the Black Rose case—then why would there be a photo of tattoos in Lu Ming's case file? Who put that photo there?

Cabinet No. 317.

Old Zhou.

Lin Shen looked up at the road across from the warehouse. The streetlights were still on, but the light was very dim, like candles about to go out. A black sedan was parked across the road, its windows closed, making it impossible to see if anyone was inside.

But his intuition told him that someone was watching him.

Lin Shen didn't go over. He turned around and went back into the warehouse, walking up to Old Zhao.

"Old Zhao, have you collected the DNA sample from the body?"

"It's been collected and sent for testing. The results won't be available until tomorrow at the earliest."

"Express," Lin Shen said. "I need to know the results today."

Old Zhao glanced at him but didn't ask why. He'd been in this business for twenty years and knew when to ask and when not to. Lin Shen's eyes told him: now was not the time to ask.

Lin Shen walked out of the warehouse; it was already dawn.

He opened the car door, got into the driver's seat, but didn't start the engine immediately. He closed his eyes and went through everything that had happened from last night until now in his mind.

The warehouse is murdered → Awakening in a revolving lantern → Waking up at home → Found Lu Ming's case file in cabinet 317 → Encountering another version of myself on the second floor of the warehouse → Su Wan appears → Lao Zhou appears → Receives a text message from "another you" → Mental Health Center → Meets Shen Ruo in ward B7 → Shen Ruo says "Don't trust anyone" → Found another version of myself's corpse in the warehouse.

Each step was like a domino effect, one link after another, precisely pushing him to his current position.

But who's pushing?

Old Zhou said he was a loser in the "revolving lantern" phenomenon. Su Wan said she was looking for Lu Ming. Another version of herself said, "I'm sorry." An unknown number said, "You're not the first."

The information from everyone's mouths, pieced together, formed a vast, dark, and boundless labyrinth. And he stood at the entrance of the labyrinth, holding only three keys—one in cabinet 317, one on Shen Ruo, and one on himself.

But he didn't know how to use it.

My phone vibrated again.

This time it wasn't an unknown number; it was Xiao Chen's.

"Captain, I found Lao Zhou." Xiao Chen's voice was very low, as if he were in a place where it was inconvenient to speak. "He said he wants you to go to a place. North of the city, Cuiping Residential Area, Building 3, Room 402."

Lin Shen's heart skipped a beat.

Cuiping Residential Area, Building 3, Room 402.

That was Su Wan's address. On the "Future File" in cabinet 317, it said that he would die at that address tomorrow.

"Did he say why?" Lin Shen asked.

"He said—" Xiao Chen paused for a moment, "He said the second key isn't on Shen Ruo, it's on Su Wan. Shen Ruo is just a signpost. Su Wan is the door."

Lin Shen tightened his grip on his phone.

The second key. Old Zhou previously said the second key was with Shen Ruo, but now he says it's with Su Wan. Did he say something wrong, or did he deliberately say something wrong?

Or is it that Old Zhou is also being pushed along by something?

"I understand." Lin Shen hung up the phone and started the car.

Cuiping Residential Area is located in the east of the city; to get there from the industrial zone, you have to cross the entire city. The morning rush hour has already begun, and there are more cars on the road. Lin Shen weaves through the traffic, his mind racing.

Su Wan.

She's been investigating the Black Rose case ever since she was suspended from her job three years ago. She's been to the industrial park, the mental health center, and the places Lao Zhou mentioned. She knows about cabinet 317, Lu Ming, and Shen Ruo.

But she's not a power user. She can't enter the revolving lantern.

So she resorted to the most foolish method—pushing herself to the brink of death. Slitting her wrists. Jumping off a bridge. She tried everything that could bring her to the edge of death.

She couldn't get in.

But she was looking for someone. Lu Ming. A person with the ability to teleport for three years.

Why?

Su Wan and Lu Ming were once lovers. Lin Shen knew this. But after a lover has been missing for three years, a normal person's reaction would be to give up, accept it, and start a new life. Not to go to a mental hospital in the middle of the night, not to cut their wrists, not to live like a ghost.

Unless she knows that Lu Ming is not dead.

Unless she knows that Lu Ming is somewhere she can see but can't touch.

Unless she has seen Lu Ming from another world—just as Lin Shen has seen himself from another world.

Lin Shen stepped on the brakes and stopped at the red light.

He suddenly remembered one thing.

When Su Wan saw him in the warehouse, the first thing she said was, "You're still alive." Not "How did you get here?" or "You've come," but "You're still alive."

She wasn't speaking to Lin Shen. She was speaking to Lin Shen from another world.

Lin Shen, whom she had already met, was living in another world.

The light turned green. The car behind honked. Lin Shen released the brake, and the car continued forward.

We've arrived at Cuiping Residential Area.

Building No. 3 is an old six-story residential building. Most of the paint on the exterior walls has peeled off, revealing gray cement. Several rusty bicycles are piled up at the entrance of the building, and the walls are covered with small posters for unclogging drains.

Lin Shen got out of the car and walked into the building.

The motion-activated lights were broken, and the stairwell was dark, with only a pale gray light filtering in from the broken windows. He climbed the stairs very quietly, but the old staircase still creaked.

Fourth floor. Room 402.

The door was closed, but a sliver of light shone through the crack. Someone was home.

Lin Shen knocked on the door.

No one answered.

He knocked three more times, this time harder.

The door opened a crack.

Su Wan stood behind the door, only half her face visible. Her complexion was worse than last night, and the dark circles under her eyes resembled two bruises. She was wearing an old T-shirt, and her wrist was wrapped in gauze, with blood seeping through the gauze and staining a small area red.

"You cut it again?" Lin Shen asked.

Su Wan didn't answer. She opened the door, turned around, and went back inside.

Lin Shen followed him inside.

The room wasn't large, about 60 square meters, with two bedrooms and a living room. But there was almost no room to step in the living room—the floor was covered with documents, photos, notebooks, and photocopies of files. The walls were covered with sticky notes, connected by red thread, forming a huge, dense network of relationships.

Lin Shen glanced at the net.

At the center is a photograph. Shen Ruo's.

Shen Ruo's photo is surrounded by more than a dozen red lines, leading to different names: Lu Ming, Su Wan, Lao Zhou, Cabinet 317, Mental Health Center, Black Rose, Revolving Lantern...

There was another name, circled three times in red pen, with a question mark next to it.

The forest is deep.

Su Wan walked to the wall, picked up a red marker, and drew another circle over Lin Shen's name.

"What are you doing here?" Her voice was hoarse.

"Old Zhou sent me," Lin Shen said. "He said the second key is with you."

Su Wan paused for a moment. She turned around and looked at Lin Shen.

"Old Zhou also said that you are a door," Lin Shen added.

Su Wan stared at him for a few seconds, then smiled. That smile sent a chill down Lin Shen's spine—not a handsome smile, not an ugly smile, but a smile that said, "Finally, someone asked that question." Like someone trapped at the bottom of a well for a long time, finally hearing a sound coming from the well's mouth.

"Do you know what the door means?" Su Wan asked.

Lin Shen shook his head.

Su Wan walked to the window and drew back the curtains. Sunlight streamed in, casting a yellowish glow on the documents filling the room. With her back to Lin Shen, she spoke softly:

"The meaning of the door is—once it's opened, you can't come back."

Lin Shen remained silent.

Su Wan turned around and looked into his eyes: "You've seen another version of yourself. You've also seen his corpse. You know he wasn't a hallucination, not from a parallel world, not some kind of mysticism. He was real. He was a living person who lived in another world until last night, and then chose to die in your world."

"How do you know he 'chose' to die here?" Lin Shen asked.

Su Wan tore a note off the wall and handed it to Lin Shen.

The note had only one line of text, and the handwriting was exactly the same as his:

"I will die in your world, so that you can live in mine."

Lin Shen's fingers trembled slightly as he looked at the words.

"When was this written?" he asked.

"Three years ago," Su Wan said, "the night Lu Ming disappeared. He left me an identical note. He said it was written by him in another world. He said that one day you would see the same note. He said that when that time comes, you will know what to do."

"What are you doing?"

Su Wan walked up to Lin Shen and took something out of her pocket.

A key.

It's black, not metallic, but looks like some kind of carbon fiber material, and feels cool to the touch. The key handle is engraved with a number: B7.

It's exactly the same as the one he got from Old Wu at the mental health center.

But this one has no rust or wear; it looks brand new.

"The second key isn't on Shen Ruo," Su Wan placed the key in Lin Shen's hand, "it's on me. Because Shen Ruo is just a signpost. I am the door."

She took Lin Shen's hand, made his fingers close together, and held the key in her palm.

"Are you ready?" she asked.

"What are you preparing?"

Su Wan didn't answer. She let go, walked to the wall, and tore the huge network of relationships off it. The sound of tearing paper was particularly jarring in the quiet room.

Behind the wall was a door.

A door that I've never seen before, deep in the forest.

The door frame was black, the door panel was black, there was no handle, no keyhole, only a handprint-shaped indentation in the center of the door panel.

It perfectly matched the outline of Su Wan's palm.

Su Wan placed her hand on it.

The door remained closed. But words began to appear on the door panel, line by line, as if someone had carved them with their fingernails on the other side of the door:

"A revolving lantern is not a memory. A revolving lantern is a transmission."

"Every death creates a new parallel world."

"All versions of you in parallel universes are real."

"Returning to oneness is not the end. Returning to zero is."

As the text appeared to the last line, the handprint in the center of the door panel suddenly lit up, and then something popped out.

A key.

It is bronze in color with a layer of dark green rust on the surface, and the label says "317".

The third key.

Lin Shen reached out to take it, and just as his fingers touched the surface of the key, all the lights in the room suddenly went out.

It wasn't a power outage. The light itself was absorbed by something.

The sunlight was still streaming through the curtains, but it couldn't penetrate the room. Light still shone through the crack in the door, but vanished at the threshold. The entire room was like a container emptied of light, leaving only darkness.

In the darkness, Su Wan's voice came from very close by:

"The third key is with you. You've been using it all along. You are the door."

Lin Shen wanted to speak, but it felt like something was choking him.

He remembered Shen Ruo's eyes. Those black eyes without pupils, like two abysses.

He remembered another version of himself on the second floor of the warehouse. The figure that disappeared into the darkness, leaving behind the words "I'm sorry."

He remembered the black rose. Its black petals reflected no light.

He remembered the text message from the unknown number:

"The revolving lantern isn't a door, it's a key. You are the door."

The darkness grew thicker.

Lin Shen felt something emerge from the darkness and grab his wrist.

That hand was cold.

There is a tattoo on my wrist.

A black snake coils around a rose.