Tales of the End of the Century

By the time Bai Ye carried the stack of old books into the shop, it was already completely dark. Winters in the north get dark early. It was only a little past five o'clock, and the vendors outside were already starting to pack up. Bai Ye stood at the shop entrance, smoking a cigarette, watching Old Li across the street pile porcelain bowls and plates onto his tricycle. Old Li cursed as he piled them, saying he'd worked for nothing again today; not even a single person had asked the price.

Bai Ye threw the cigarette butt on the ground and stomped it out before turning and going inside.

Jubaozhai's storefront isn't large, but it's quite deep inside. The first few rows of shelves are cluttered with old books, antiques, and bottles and jars of dubious authenticity. Further inside is Old Hu's "territory"—a well-worn old elm wood table, a rattan chair, and a yellowed copy of "The Eight Immortals Crossing the Sea" covered in dust hanging on the wall.

Old Hu was squatting on the ground, struggling with a box.

It was military green, old-fashioned, with brass-plated corners that gleamed from wear. The clasps were rusted shut, and a string of Russian letters was printed on the box, which Bai Ye couldn't recognize.

"Where did you get this?" Bai Ye squatted down.

"From the north," Lao Hu said. "A friend brought it over from the border, saying it was pulled out of some abandoned barracks. You pry it open."

Bai Ye found a screwdriver, inserted it into the lock's gap, and pried it open forcefully.

With a click, the lock opened.

He reached out to lift the lid of the box. His fingers touched the cold brass clasp—

Then, the world changed.

It doesn't change gradually; it's a sudden "click." Like changing a TV channel, everything in front of you is cut off in an instant.

A blizzard. Everything was covered in white.

A gray, concrete building, its roof covered in snow. Barbed wire. A figure runs by, wearing a white lab coat, face obscured. Then comes a basement, its lights a stark white, containing an iron bed with a person strapped to it.

A middle-aged man in a white coat turned around.

His face was contorted. His mouth was wide open, as if he were screaming.

But Bai Ye couldn't hear anything. There was only one sound—a sharp, continuous sound, like the grating static of a radio tuned to the wrong channel—drilling from the depths of his brain.

And then, everything was gone.

Bai Ye found himself sitting on the floor. His back was covered in sweat, and his heart was pounding so hard it felt like it would jump out of his throat. A screwdriver lay at his feet.

Old Hu squatted to the side, holding half a cigarette between his fingers, the ash long and untouched.

"What's wrong?"

Bai Ye opened his mouth, his voice a little dry: "It's nothing. Maybe it's low blood sugar."

Old Hu glanced at him.

That glance was strange. It wasn't concern, nor was it indifference. It was more like the look he gave when examining the old objects he'd collected, pondering whether they were valuable or not.

"Let's take a break then." Old Hu stood up, put the cigarette back in his mouth, and asked, "What's in the box?"

Bai Ye then went to look at the box.

Inside was a neatly folded old military overcoat. Underneath the overcoat were several Russian technical manuals and a few yellowed maps. Below that, a flat, stiff oil paper package.

Old Hu peeled off the oil paper.

It's a notebook. Black hardcover, with no cover or anything.

Old Hu flipped through it; it was full of handwritten Russian text, densely packed, with diagrams drawn in some places. Circuit diagrams? Or something else? Bai Ye couldn't make them out.

"It's in a foreign language." Old Hu tossed the notebook back into the box. "I'll have someone take a look at it later. Alright, it's getting late, you can go back now."

Bai Ye didn't say much. When she stood up, her legs were still a little weak.

Stepping out of Jubaozhai, a cold wind blew, making the sweat on my back feel icy. The night stalls in Panjiayuan were already lit up, a sea of ​​yellow and white lights. Some people were squatting by the roadside eating boxed lunches, while others were shouting and haggling with customers, creating a noisy scene.

Everything is normal.

But the distorted face and the inaudible scream in Bai Ye's mind remained stuck there like a thorn, impossible to pull out.

It was almost seven o'clock when I got back to the tenement building.

The tenement building was an old-fashioned six-story building. The hallways always smelled of the same thing—cooking fumes, coal stove fumes, and disinfectant from the public toilets, all mixed together. Bai Ye's room was on the fourth floor, about ten square meters, and the monthly rent was 120 yuan.

As I took out my keys to open the door, the door next door opened.

Lan Susu peeked out.

"You don't look well," she said.

Lan Susu moved in three months ago. She said she teaches psychology at a university and researches something about "consciousness and cognition." Bai Ye didn't quite understand, only that her room was piled high with books and a tarot deck that looked very expensive.

"It's nothing, I probably just caught a cold," Bai Ye said.

Lan Susu stared at him for a few seconds. Her gaze was somewhat similar to Lao Hu's, but not exactly the same. Lao Hu was pondering whether something was valuable, while she looked at experimental data.

"Have you recently come into contact with anything... unclean?"

Bai Ye was stunned for a moment.

What does "not very clean" mean?

Lan Susu thought for a moment, seemingly considering how to phrase it: "It's like those objects that have some... information attached to them. When you encounter them, you might see some images or feel some emotions. It's not a ghost, it's residual information."

Bai Ye's hands clenched unconsciously.

How did you know?

Lan Susu didn't answer, but stepped aside to make way for the doorway: "Come in and sit down. I'll draw you a few cards."

Bai Ye hesitated for two seconds before going inside.

Lan Susu's room was twice the size of his, but it felt even more cramped. One wall was lined with bookshelves, crammed full of Chinese, English, and other books in languages ​​he couldn't recognize. A heavy laptop sat on the table, next to the tarot deck with a gold six-pointed star on the back.

"Sit down," Lan Susu said, pointing to the sofa.

Bai Ye sat down. Lan Susu sat down opposite him, picked up the cards, and shuffled them several times.

"Keep in mind the thing you encountered," she said.

Bai Ye closed his eyes. The image flashed through his mind again—a blizzard, barbed wire, a white coat, a distorted face.

"Alright. Cut the cards."

Do it day and night.

Lan Susu laid the cards in an arc on the table, slowly slid her fingers across the back of the cards, stopped on one card, and turned it over.

grim Reaper.

On the card, a black-armored skeleton knight rides a white horse, with fallen corpses and kneeling people at his feet.

Lan Susu's expression didn't change. She put the cards aside and continued to choose the second card.

A tall tower.

Lightning struck the spire of the tower, flames spewed from the windows, and two people fell from the tower.

The third one.

moon.

A huge moon hangs in the night sky. A path winds its way through the moonlight towards two distant towers. A dog and a wolf howl at the moon from the roadside. A scorpion crawls slowly in the water.

Lan Susu looked at the three cards and remained silent for a few seconds.

"That's interesting," she said.

"What do you mean?"

"Death doesn't represent actual death. It represents change. Big, irreversible change." Lan Susu pointed to the second card, "The Tower. What you used to believe, the set of beliefs you were used to, is collapsing."

She pointed to the third card: "The moon. What's hidden underneath. Fear, illusion, and... talent."

"talent?"

"It's not by chance that you can 'see' those things." Lan Susu leaned back on the sofa. "A very small number of people are born with the ability to perceive things that ordinary people cannot. We call it 'information residue.' Strong emotions—fear, pain, despair—leave traces on objects. Most people can't feel anything. But a very small number of people, like a particularly sensitive radio, can receive these signals."

"You mean, I'm possessed by an evil spirit?"

Lan Susu shook her head: "It's not an evil spirit possession. It's your own constitution. To put it in a way you can understand—you might be in the initial stage of something called 'Candle Illumination Realm'."

"The Realm of Candlelight?"

"It's like striking a match in a dark room. You can see something, but it's unclear, and you can't control it. The light flashes and then goes out." Lan Susu paused. "What did you see?"

Bai Ye hesitated for a moment, then recounted the scene. A blizzard. Barbed wire. White coats. A distorted face. A silent scream.

After listening, Lan Susu remained silent for a long time.

"That box," she said, "take me to see it tomorrow."

Bai Ye nodded.

As he got up to leave, Lan Susu called him back.

"white night."

"Um?"

"What you saw wasn't a hallucination. It was something that actually happened, recorded by that box. You just happened to be able to read it." She looked at him, her expression becoming serious. "But this ability is a double-edged sword. You sense it, and it senses you. From today onward, some things may change."

"What is it?"

Lan Susu did not answer.

Bai Ye returned to his room and lay on his bed, staring at the cracks in the ceiling.

The look in Lao Hu's eyes. Lan Susu's words. The Candlelight Realm. Residual Information. Talent.

These words swirled in my mind like a swarm of insects unable to find their way out.

He turned over and closed his eyes.

That distorted face is back again.

This time I could see it more clearly. The middle-aged man in the white coat had a scar above his left eyebrow. His mouth opened and closed repeatedly.

Bai Ye suddenly realized that he wasn't screaming.

He was speaking.

What is he saying?

Bai Ye suddenly opened his eyes and sat up. His back was covered in cold sweat again.

The streetlights outside cast a dim yellow light onto the ceiling. The sound of car horns drifted from afar. The lights were off in Lan Susu's room next door.

Everything was quiet.

But he knew that something had changed.