“Your father erased me.”
The girl’s voice was very soft.
Yet every word fell into Jiang Yu’s chest like ice.
At the school gate, Jiang Chengyue was still looking up at the second floor.
Across the entire field, the wall, and the reflective glass, Jiang Yu couldn’t make out his father’s expression. He could only see the hand held in front of his lips.
Silence.
That gesture wasn’t a coincidence.
He really could see the girl.
“Are you sure?” Jiang Yu asked.
“I wouldn’t mistake those eyes.”
The girl backed away step by step. Her body passed through the metal cabinet where the medicine was kept, leaving only a semitransparent outline visible outside it.
“He looked at me the same way three years ago.”
“Where?”
“I…”
She pressed a hand to her forehead.
“I can’t remember.”
“Then what makes you think it was him?”
“Because I remember what he said.”
Jiang Yu stared at her.
The girl’s lips had gone slightly pale.
“He stood in front of me and asked—”
She stopped.
As if an invisible hand had closed around her throat.
“Asked you what?”
The girl opened and closed her mouth, but no sound came out.
Jiang Yu took a step forward.
“Tell me.”
“I can’t…”
“Can’t, or won’t?”
The girl jerked her head up.
Jiang Yu had never seen that look before.
It wasn’t simple fear.
It was more like someone who had already escaped a burning building, only to suddenly smell smoke starting to rise from their own body again.
“Whenever I remember that sentence, I forget something else.”
Jiang Yu frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“Every time I try to remember what happened on the day I disappeared, I lose something I still remembered before.”
She lowered her head and looked at her hands.
“The first time, I forgot my birthday.”
“The second time, I forgot where I used to live.”
“The third time…”
She was silent for a long while.
“I forgot my mother’s face.”
Hurried footsteps came from outside the school infirmary.
More than one person.
School staff, a nurse, and a set of footsteps Jiang Yu knew extremely well.
Steady and measured. Not fast, but never late.
His father was here.
The girl turned and immediately backed into the wall.
“Where are you going?”
“Leaving.”
“Where?”
“As far away as possible.”
“Wait.”
Jiang Yu reached out to grab her.
His palm passed straight through her wrist.
The girl didn’t stop.
Half her body had already sunk into the wall.
Jiang Yu lowered his voice.
“Haven’t you waited three years for someone who could see you?”
The girl froze.
“And now you’re running because you saw my dad?”
“You don’t know who he is.”
“Then tell me.”
“I don’t know.”
“You just said—”
“I only know that he’s dangerous!”
The girl raised her voice for the first time.
Yet only Jiang Yu could hear it.
The footsteps outside had stopped.
The doorknob slowly turned downward.
The girl looked at Jiang Yu.
“If he asks whether you saw me, say no.”
“Why?”
“Because he won’t let a second person remember me.”
The door opened.
The nurse entered first.
“Jiang Yu, your dad is here.”
Jiang Chengyue stood behind her.
He was forty-six years old, tall and thin, with features somewhat similar to Jiang Yu’s. His brows and eyes were deeper, though, and his expression always seemed cold.
Even though he had hurried over, his shirt was still perfectly smooth, and his cuffs were buttoned neatly.
He looked no different from the father in Jiang Yu’s memory.
Ordinary.
Controlled.
Never losing his composure.
Only the number above his head was abnormal.
0.
It hung there quietly.
Neither flickering nor breaking apart.
Like a mark that had long since become invalid, yet was still being forcibly preserved.
Jiang Chengyue looked at Jiang Yu first.
“Where does it hurt?”
“I’m fine.”
The moment the words left his mouth, the girl hiding inside the wall looked at him.
You’re lying again.
She didn’t speak.
But Jiang Yu understood from her expression.
Jiang Chengyue entered the school infirmary.
“Your teacher said you hallucinated in class.”
“It wasn’t a hallucination.”
The nurse stood to the side, looking somewhat awkward.
“Mr. Jiang, Jiang Yu kept saying there was a nonexistent classmate in his class, and he was also pretty agitated. I recommend taking him to the hospital for an examination.”
“Thank you.”
Jiang Chengyue’s tone was calm.
“I’ll take him.”
As he spoke, his gaze remained fixed on Jiang Yu’s face.
He didn’t look at the girl.
Not even once.
The girl hid inside the wall, exposing only half her face.
She stared at Jiang Chengyue with all her might, not daring to move.
Jiang Yu suddenly wondered whether that silencing gesture really had been a coincidence.
Maybe his father had only raised a hand to straighten his collar.
Maybe he had only been looking at the infirmary window.
Maybe the girl had mistaken him for someone else.
Three years ago, she had already lost most of her memories.
Could someone who didn’t even remember her own name really recognize her killer?
Jiang Yu began to waver.
“Can we go?” Jiang Chengyue asked.
Jiang Yu didn’t move.
“Dad.”
“Yeah?”
“Do you know Lin Zi’an?”
His father’s pupils contracted ever so slightly.
Only for an instant.
So fast it was almost like an illusion.
“Who?”
“My classmate.”
“There’s no one by that name in your class.”
Jiang Yu’s chest tightened.
The nurse had only said he’d seen a nonexistent classmate.
She hadn’t mentioned a name.
“How do you know there’s no one by that name in our class?”
The room fell silent.
The nurse blinked.
Jiang Chengyue looked at Jiang Yu.
“Your teacher told me over the phone.”
“Which teacher?”
“Your homeroom teacher.”
“But it was math class just now.”
“Can’t your homeroom teacher know?”
Every sentence was perfectly reasonable.
There wasn’t a single crack in his father’s expression.
Yet Jiang Yu suddenly remembered that when the nurse had made the call, she said she was contacting his father—not that his homeroom teacher had contacted his father.
He looked at the nurse.
“Did the teacher tell my dad Lin Zi’an’s name?”
“Well…”
The nurse thought back.
“I don’t think so. I only said that you kept mentioning a classmate.”
Jiang Chengyue turned and glanced at her.
His look was faint.
Yet the nurse inexplicably stopped, as if she had suddenly forgotten what she’d meant to say.
A few seconds later, she added with a frown,
“Or maybe I remembered wrong.”
Jiang Yu said nothing.
His father raised a hand.
“Let’s go home.”
Just as his hand was about to touch Jiang Yu’s shoulder, the girl suddenly burst out of the wall.
“Don’t let him touch you!”
Jiang Yu abruptly stepped back.
Jiang Chengyue’s hand stopped in midair.
This time, his gaze shifted.
He wasn’t looking at Jiang Yu.
He was looking beside him.
The girl stood there, her face pale.
The two of them were less than two meters apart.
Jiang Chengyue silently watched her for three seconds.
The girl’s body began to tremble.
Jiang Yu saw it clearly.
His father really could see her.
“Who are you?” Jiang Yu asked deliberately.
The girl froze.
Jiang Chengyue looked at him.
“Who are you talking to?”
Jiang Yu pointed to where the girl stood.
“There’s someone here.”
The nurse followed his hand.
There was nothing there.
Jiang Chengyue also looked in that direction.
His face was expressionless.
“There’s no one there.”
The girl bit down on her lip.
Jiang Yu stared at his father.
“You can’t see her?”
“No.”
“Then why did you look at her just now?”
“I was looking where you pointed.”
“I hadn’t pointed yet.”
His father didn’t answer.
The air in the school infirmary seemed to have been sucked dry.
The nurse looked between father and son, then forced a smile.
“Mr. Jiang, you should take him to the hospital first.”
Jiang Chengyue nodded.
“Okay.”
He turned and walked toward the door.
After two steps, he stopped.
He didn’t look back.
“Jiang Yu.”
“Yeah?”
“Don’t keep remembering people who don’t exist.”
The girl’s face instantly lost all color.
Jiang Yu stood where he was.
“Why?”
Jiang Chengyue said mildly,
“Because Remembering is an invitation.”
With that, he walked out of the school infirmary.
The girl continued staring at the doorway.
“That’s the sentence.”
She murmured,
“What?”
“Three years ago, he asked me—”
The girl’s form suddenly began to flicker violently.
Like an image with a bad signal.
Her hair, uniform, and features all blurred in an instant.
Jiang Yu instinctively stepped toward her.
“What’s wrong?”
“Don’t touch me!”
“I can’t touch you.”
“Not you.”
She lowered her head and looked at her body.
Under her transparent skin, tiny black cracks surfaced one after another.
The cracks spread across her body like living things.
From her wrist, they crawled toward her shoulder.
The girl dropped to her knees in pain.
Jiang Yu crouched in front of her.
“What’s happening?”
“He knows you admitted you can see me.”
“So?”
“He’s starting to erase what remains of me.”
Jiang Yu looked toward the doorway of the school infirmary.
His father had already gone far away.
“He didn’t do anything.”
“He doesn’t need to do it here.”
The girl clutched her collar.
She couldn’t touch any physical object, yet she could touch herself.
“Jiang Yu, listen carefully.”
Her voice began to break apart.
“I might forget again very soon.”
“Forget what?”
“What I just remembered.”
“Then tell me now.”
The girl raised her head.
The black cracks had already spread to her neck.
“Your father found me three years ago.”
“Where?”
“A white building.”
“What kind of building?”
“I don’t know… It had no windows. The hallways were very long, and every door had a number.”
Jiang Yu took out his phone.
“I’ll record this.”
“It won’t help.”
“Why not?”
“Records related to the erased get deleted.”
“Then I’ll write it down.”
“Same thing.”
“There has to be something I can try.”
Jiang Yu opened the recorder.
The girl looked at him as if she were fighting desperately against something.
“He asked me how long I’d been seeing those numbers.”
Jiang Yu stopped moving.
“You could see them too?”
“I could before.”
“You just said you can’t see them.”
“I can’t now.”
Her gaze began to scatter.
“Before I disappeared, I was like you.”
Jiang Yu’s fingers went rigid against the phone screen.
The girl had once been able to see Love Values too.
His father knew about it.
His father found her.
Then she disappeared.
“Why did he erase you?”
“Because I discovered…”
The girl’s voice caught.
The black cracks crawled up her face.
She shut her eyes in pain.
“Discovered what?”
“The numbers aren’t…”
She suddenly couldn’t make a sound.
Her lips were still moving, but it was as if someone had erased her vocal cords.
Jiang Yu leaned closer.
“Take your time.”
The girl touched one of her tears with a finger.
Kneeling on the floor, she wrote on the white tiles.
Her transparent fingertip slid across the floor, where it shouldn’t have left any trace.
But this time, a faint black line appeared on the tile.
She wrote the first character.
Love.
Then the second.
Not.
The black lines began to fade.
The girl sped up.
She had written only half of the third character when her finger passed through the floor and could no longer leave a mark.
Jiang Yu stared at the three characters.
Love isn’t…
“Love isn’t what?”
The girl opened her mouth, desperately trying to answer.
Her face suddenly scattered like a reflection in water.
The next second, her entire body disappeared in front of Jiang Yu.
“Hey!”
Jiang Yu reached out.
His hand caught only a patch of cold air.
The words on the tile quickly faded as well.
Love.
Not.
Only a blurry upper half of the third character remained.
It looked like “exist.”
Or like “value.”
Jiang Yu immediately took a picture with his phone.
The shutter clicked.
In the photo, the floor was completely blank.
He looked down.
The words in reality were gone too.
His father’s voice carried faintly from outside the school infirmary.
“Jiang Yu, let’s go.”
Jiang Yu didn’t answer.
He stared fixedly at the spot where the girl had disappeared.
A few seconds later, a faint gasp came from behind him.
The girl reappeared beside the hospital bed.
She held onto the bed frame and looked around blankly.
The cracks on her face were gone.
Her expression had returned to normal.
Jiang Yu immediately walked over.
“Do you still remember what just happened?”
The girl looked at him.
Her eyes were unfamiliar.
A bad feeling rose in Jiang Yu’s heart.
“Do you remember my dad?”
“Your dad?”
She frowned.
“Have I met him?”
As expected, she’d forgotten.
Jiang Yu tightened his grip on his phone.
“You just remembered what happened three years ago. You said he erased you.”
The girl froze.
“I said that?”
“Yes.”
“Did you write it down?”
“The recording and the photo are both gone.”
The girl lowered her eyes.
She didn’t seem surprised.
Jiang Yu looked at her.
At least she still remembered him.
“Do you remember who I am?”
The girl raised her head.
“Jiang Yu.”
He relaxed a little.
“What about you?”
“What?”
“Who are you?”
The girl fell silent.
“I don’t know.”
“Not even a clue?”
She shook her head.
Jiang Yu looked at the uniform over her chest.
Its style was different from that of their school.
A white shirt, a dark blue bow tie, and where the school name should have been embroidered over her chest, there were only a few nearly invisible needle holes.
Inside the bow tie, he seemed to see a small section of a white tag.
“Turn around.”
The girl immediately became wary.
“Why?”
“There’s something behind your collar.”
After hesitating for a moment, she turned around.
Jiang Yu moved closer to look.
The tag had faded, leaving only one character written in ballpoint pen.
The ink was extremely faint.
But it was still legible.
Wei.
“That might be your name.”
The girl raised a hand to touch the back of her collar, but she couldn’t see it no matter how she tried.
“What character?”
“The wei in tiny.”
She repeated softly,
“Wei…”
The moment the character left her lips, the light in the school infirmary flickered.
The girl’s body trembled slightly.
“What’s wrong?”
She pressed a hand to her chest.
“I think I’ve… heard it before.”
“Shen Zhiwei?”
Jiang Yu didn’t know why that name had suddenly appeared in his mind.
He wasn’t even sure whether he had guessed it or whether it came from some forgotten memory.
The girl jerked her head up.
The next instant, all the lights in the entire school building went out at once.
The school infirmary plunged into darkness.
Students cried out in the hallway.
Jiang Yu’s phone screen lit up by itself.
No incoming call.
No notification.
Only a black screen he had never seen before.
A line of white text appeared in the center.
Deleted target detected: Shen Zhiwei.
Immediately afterward, a second line appeared.
Memory contamination range: 2 people.
Then a third line.
Beginning secondary purge.
The phone began a ten-second countdown.
10.
9.
The girl looked at the screen.
“Who are the two people?”
Jiang Yu raised his head.
In the darkness, he saw a number appear above the girl’s head for the first time.
It wasn’t zero.
It was—
1.
Jiang Yu suddenly understood.
“You and me.”
8.