Section One: The Man in the Patrol Car
Rainwater streamed down the patrol car's windshield.
The wipers swung back and forth.
Swish.
Swish.
They sliced the neon, streetlights, and flickering red sign outside the apartment building into jagged fragments of distorted light and shadow.
The man in the back seat was soaked through.
His gray short-sleeved shirt clung to his skin. Water still dripped from his hair, and a black digital watch circled his right wrist.
His name was Jason Huang.
At least, that was what he had told the police.
Five minutes earlier, the nearby police station had received an emergency call.
The caller claimed that someone had broken into Room 404 on the fourth floor of Evergreen Apartments, No. 44, Section 4, Heping Road.
The call lasted forty-one seconds.
The officer on duty heard the caller repeat over and over:
“He looks exactly like me.”
“He wants to steal my name.”
“Please, get here now.”
At the very end of the call came the violent pounding of a door, followed by the sound of shattering glass.
When the patrol car arrived, a young man was standing barefoot outside the apartment building.
He was soaked through.
His expression was dazed.
The first thing he said when he saw the police was:
“My name is Jason Huang.”
The second was:
“Don’t go into Room 404.”
Now.
The man claiming to be Jason Huang sat in the back seat of the patrol car.
His arms were wrapped around his shoulders.
He was shivering nonstop.
The young officer in the front passenger seat turned around.
“Mr. Huang, tell me again. Who’s in the room?”
The man lifted his face.
His features were identical to those in the ID photo in the police database.
Facial recognition had passed.
His ID number was correct.
The bank accounts, company email, contacts, and private photos on his phone were all normal.
He had even entered his phone's passcode correctly.
“I don’t know.”
Jason Huang’s voice was hoarse.
“When I woke up, he was standing in my room.”
“He looked exactly like me.”
“He didn’t say anything.”
“He was holding something strange.”
The officer asked, “How did you get out?”
A brief blankness crossed Jason Huang’s face.
“The window.”
“You jumped out of a fourth-floor window?”
“No.”
He shook his head.
“There wasn’t a street outside the window.”
The two officers in front exchanged a look.
“Then what was there?”
Jason Huang’s lips moved a few times.
Only after a long while did he answer in a low voice:
“A hospital.”
“What hospital?”
“I don’t know.”
His breathing gradually quickened.
“The walls were green.”
“There were a lot of doors.”
“Every door said 404.”
He raised both hands and grabbed his hair in a death grip.
“Someone in white called my name.”
“I answered.”
“And then…”
He suddenly stopped.
“And then what?” the officer pressed.
Jason Huang slowly raised his head.
“Then I walked out.”
The answer clearly made no sense.
But the security footage from the scene showed that less than two minutes after the emergency call, he had walked out through the main entrance of Evergreen Apartments.
At the time, the building’s security gate had never opened.
The footage first filled with static.
Then he was standing outside the gate.
As if he had been edited into the video.
The officer in the front seat was about to continue questioning him when the radio beside the driver suddenly crackled.
“317, what’s the situation on the fourth floor?”
“Captain Lin just went up.”
“Do you need backup?”
The driver picked up the radio.
“Not for now. The caller is under control. His identity has been preliminarily confirmed as Jason Huang.”
The man in the back seat immediately raised his head.
“Don’t confirm it.”
The officer turned around.
“What?”
“Don’t confirm who I am.”
Jason Huang’s voice suddenly became urgent.
“You can’t say it.”
“You can’t admit it.”
“It’ll hear you.”
The two officers frowned.
“Who will hear you?”
The man did not answer.
He looked up at the fourth floor of the apartment building.
The window of Room 404 glowed with white light.
Someone seemed to be standing behind the curtains.
The figure did not move.
It watched him through the curtain of rain.
Jason Huang began to tremble violently.
“He’s still inside.”
“Who?”
“The other me.”
He lunged toward the car window and began pounding on the glass.
“Don’t let him out!”
“He’s the fake!”
“I’m Jason Huang!”
The instant the final sentence left his mouth, every light inside the patrol car went out at once.
The radio cut off.
The dashboard went black.
Even the streetlights outside vanished at the same moment.
The world plunged into total darkness.
The officer in the front seat immediately pulled out his flashlight.
“What happened?”
The button did nothing.
The batteries seemed to have died in an instant.
Rapid, ragged breathing came from the back seat.
“I said the wrong thing…”
Jason Huang muttered.
“I shouldn’t have said it.”
“It knows now.”
“It knows which one is outside.”
The driver turned around.
By the faint red glow of a distant sign, he could make out only the blurred outline of the man in the back seat.
“Mr. Huang, calm down.”
The man suddenly stopped trembling.
He sat upright in his seat.
His hands rested flat on his knees.
His previously frantic breathing returned to normal within seconds.
“I’m perfectly calm,” he said.
His tone had changed.
It was no longer hoarse.
It was no longer frightened.
It was so calm that it seemed as if all his reactions just now had been deliberate imitations.
The officer in front noticed something was wrong.
“Put your hands where we can see them.”
“Okay.”
The man obediently raised both hands.
A distant headlight swept past.
For an instant, it illuminated the back seat.
Both officers froze.
The fingertips of those hands were completely coated in a pitch-black liquid.
Like ink.
Or clotted blood.
The man lowered his head and looked at his hands.
He looked puzzled.
“What is this?”
Then he raised his index finger.
On the fogged-up car window, he wrote three characters.
Jason Huang.
The handwriting was exactly the same as the name carved with fingernails into the floor inside Room 404.
When he finished, he stared at his name for two seconds.
Then he slowly wiped it away with his palm.
“That’s not right,” the man said softly.
“Someone’s already using this name.”
The patrol car fell silent as the grave.
The next second, all the power came back.
The headlights lit up.
Static returned to the radio.
The man in the back seat curled into a ball again.
His hands were perfectly clean.
There was no writing on the window.
He raised a terrified face.
“What just happened?”
Neither officer answered.
The driver’s hands were already slick with cold sweat around the steering wheel.
The young officer in the passenger seat immediately opened the door.
“Get out.”
“What?”
“I said get out!”
He dragged the man from the patrol car, pressed him against the hood, and quickly searched him.
No weapon.
No black liquid.
Aside from his phone, wallet, and keys, he had nothing on him.
“What are you doing?”
The man began to struggle.
“I’m the one who made the call!”
“The one in the room is the fake!”
The officer forced his hands behind his back.
Just as he was about to put on the handcuffs, a tremendous crash came from the fourth floor of the apartment building.
Bang!
The window of Room 404 exploded outward from inside.
A rain of glass shards fell toward the street.
Everyone instinctively stepped back.
The curtains billowed out through the broken window in the violent wind.
A figure appeared behind the shattered frame.
The same gray short-sleeved shirt.
The same face.
The same black digital watch.
Another Jason Huang.
He gripped the security bars with both hands and shouted through the rain:
“Don’t believe him!”
Everyone on the street looked at the man beside the patrol car at the same time.
Then they looked up at the fourth-floor window.
Two people.
Completely identical.
The Jason Huang pinned against the hood struggled frantically.
“I told you!”
“He’s the fake!”
The Jason Huang on the fourth floor shouted too:
“He answered to the name!”
“Don’t let him leave!”
The two voices came at the same time.
The timbre.
The volume.
The speed.
Even the way their voices trembled with fear.
Everything was identical.
The young officer in the passenger seat went pale.
“What the hell…”
Before he could finish, a hand pressed down on his shoulder.
“Don’t choose,” a deep male voice said from behind him.
Ethan Lin stood beside the patrol car.
His black coat was soaked with rain, but his expression was unnervingly calm.
He looked neither at the fourth floor nor at the man being restrained.
He only ordered the two officers:
“From this moment on, don’t call either of them by name.”
“Don’t confirm anyone’s identity.”
“No matter what they say, don’t answer ‘yes’ or ‘no.’”
The young officer was still in shock.
“Captain Lin, but there are two…”
“I can see that.”
Ethan Lin cut him off.
“Take the one beside the car to the station.”
“Keep him isolated.”
“Don’t speak to him on the way.”
“What about the one upstairs?”
Ethan Lin looked up.
The person at the window of Room 404 was still standing there.
Rain ran down his face.
The face looked both real and terrified.
“I’ll bring him down.”
The Jason Huang being restrained immediately shouted:
“Don’t let him out!”
“Officer Lin, listen to me!”
Ethan Lin’s eyes settled on him for the first time.
“You know me?”
The man froze.
“The officers just called you Captain Lin.”
“Did they?”
Ethan Lin’s face remained expressionless.
“I don’t remember anyone calling me that in front of you.”
The man’s lips moved.
A brief, almost imperceptible blankness flashed through his eyes.
It was not the panic of someone being questioned.
It was more like a program in progress had suddenly encountered a question it could not answer.
But less than a second later, fear returned to his face.
“I might have heard it over the radio.”
“I don’t know.”
“My head’s a mess right now.”
Ethan Lin did not press him further.
He turned and walked toward the apartment building.
As he passed the entrance, a yellow taxi pulled to a slow stop across the street.
The driver was an elderly man with thinning white hair.
There was no passenger inside.
The vacant light was off.
He simply sat in the rain, quietly watching Evergreen Apartments.
Ethan Lin’s steps paused for a moment.
He had the distinct feeling he had seen this taxi somewhere before.
But before he could remember where, the taxi started moving again.
It disappeared around the corner.
The building’s security gate stood open.
The stairwell inside was dim.
Before stepping through, Ethan Lin took out his phone.
The screen showed 9:22 p.m.
He made a call.
It rang three times.
The other party answered.
“Hello?”
A woman.
Her voice was alert and cool.
“Claire Su,” Ethan Lin said.
“I need you at the scene.”
There was two seconds of silence on the other end.
“A murder?”
“Not yet.”
“A kidnapping?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then what is it?”
Ethan Lin looked up toward the fourth floor.
Above him in the stairwell, someone seemed to be slowly walking down.
The footsteps drew closer, floor by floor.
Click.
Click.
Click.
“One person,” Ethan Lin said.
“Appearing twice.”
Claire Su did not respond immediately.
The footsteps stopped on the third floor.
A man’s voice came down from the corner of the stairs.
“Officer Lin.”
It was Jason Huang’s voice.
“You don’t need to come up.”
“I’ve already come down.”
Ethan Lin stood on the first floor.
His gaze fixed on the darkness above.
He did not answer.
Claire Su asked over the phone, “What do you see?”
“Nothing yet.”
“Then what do you hear?”
“Someone who shouldn’t know my last name.”
The voice upstairs chuckled.
“Aren’t you here to find me?”
“I’m right here.”
Ethan Lin gripped the gun at his waist.
He slowly stepped onto the first stair.
“Claire.”
“Yeah?”
“Look up an address.”
“No. 44, Section 4, Heping Road. Evergreen Apartments.”
“Also look up every past tenant of Room 404.”
Claire Su did not ask why.
Keyboard clicks immediately sounded on the other end.
Ethan Lin continued upward.
When he reached the second floor, Claire Su spoke.
“I found it.”
“That fast?”
“There isn’t much data.”
“The current registered tenant of Room 404 is Jason Huang, twenty-four, a software engineer. His lease started today.”
“What about the previous tenant?”
“There’s no record in the system.”
Ethan Lin stopped.
“What do you mean, no record?”
“It’s not missing data,” Claire Su said.
“According to the building registration records, Evergreen Apartments doesn’t have a Room 404.”
The stairwell went quiet.
Ethan Lin looked at the floor plan posted on the wall.
The fourth floor clearly showed four units.
401.
402.
403.
And 404 at the end of the hall.
“I’m inside this building,” he said.
“I know.”
The sound of Claire Su’s keyboard stopped.
“But according to the government building survey plans, the fourth floor has only three units.”
“The location of 404…”
She paused.
“Should be empty.”
Footsteps sounded upstairs again.
This time, they were not coming down.
They moved back and forth between the third and fourth floors.
Click.
Click.
Click.
The same two steps.
Over and over.
Ethan Lin raised his flashlight.
The beam swept toward the corner.
A long shadow appeared on the wall.
The figure stood above.
Its body did not move.
Only its head slowly turned toward the stairs below.
“Are you still coming up?” Jason Huang’s voice asked.
Ethan Lin switched off the flashlight.
The stairwell sank back into darkness.
“Of course,” he answered.
Claire Su immediately spoke on the other end.
“Ethan.”
She rarely called him by his first name.
Usually, she did so only when she sensed serious danger.
“What?”
“You just answered it.”
Ethan Lin gripped his phone.
He said nothing.
“You don’t know who you’re talking to,” Claire Su said.
“But you confirmed its question.”
“This could be an interaction test.”
“It may be checking whether you can hear it.”
At the third-floor landing, the shadow slowly pressed itself against the wall.
Like a mass of thick ink, it flowed down the concrete.
Then it vanished.
A faint chill ran along the back of Ethan Lin’s neck.
A voice sounded right behind him.
“So you can hear me.”
He spun around.
The stairs were empty.
The call was still connected.
Claire Su seemed to have heard it too.
“Don’t answer any more questions,” she said.
“Leave the stairwell immediately.”
Ethan Lin did not comply.
He looked up toward the fourth floor.
“There’s still someone inside.”
“You can’t be sure it’s a person.”
“That’s why I need to go up and confirm.”
“How will you confirm it?” Claire Su asked calmly.
“DNA?”
“Fingerprints?”
“Memories?”
“The one downstairs already passed every identity check.”
“If the one upstairs can do the same, which one are you going to believe?”
Ethan Lin stepped onto the third floor.
“I don’t believe either of them.”
“Then why are you going up?”
“To find a third answer.”
There was a brief silence on the other end.
Claire Su quickly said, “Stay on the phone.”
“I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
“Don’t enter the building.”
“That’s not a suggestion.”
Ethan Lin said, “No one is allowed inside until I confirm the area is safe.”
“That includes you.”
“Got it.”
Claire Su agreed too quickly.
Ethan Lin knew her.
That usually meant she had no intention of obeying.
He climbed to the fourth floor.
The motion-sensor light came on with his footsteps.
Click.
Yellow light spilled across the hallway.
The doors to 401, 402, and 403 were all tightly closed.
At the end of the hall, the door to Room 404 stood open.
Bright white light shone from inside.
A Jason Huang stood in the entryway.
His face was deathly pale.
His lips were split, with traces of blood still clinging to them.
In his right hand, he held a transparent plastic card.
When he saw Ethan Lin, he did not call for help right away.
Instead, he took a step back.
“Don’t call my name,” he said.
Ethan Lin stopped two yards from the door.
“I wasn’t planning to.”
The Jason Huang inside looked past him.
“What about the one downstairs?”
“He’s under police control.”
“Don’t take him to the station.”
“Why?”
Jason Huang’s lips trembled.
“He answered.”
“Answered what?”
“The name.”
Ethan Lin did not question him further.
His eyes swept over the room.
The door was intact.
The window was intact too.
It was completely different from what they had seen downstairs.
Everyone on the street had witnessed the window of Room 404 explode.
But now the glass was undamaged.
Not even rain had entered.
“You were standing by the window?” Ethan Lin asked.
“Yes.”
“Did the window break?”
“No.”
After answering, Jason Huang suddenly realized something.
“You saw the window break?”
Ethan Lin did not confirm it.
“Is anyone else in the room?”
“There was someone before.”
“And now?”
“I don’t know.”
Jason Huang looked beneath the bed.
Ethan Lin followed his gaze.
The bedsheet hung naturally down.
The space beneath was pitch-black.
“Did the other person come out from under the bed?”
“At first.”
“What happened after that?”
“He became me.”
“And after that?”
“The person outside the window took him away.”
Ethan Lin looked toward the window.
The glass reflected the two people inside the room.
His own reflection was clear and normal.
Jason Huang’s reflection was half a beat behind him.
The real Jason Huang had already turned toward the window.
But the reflection was still looking at Ethan Lin.
Ethan Lin gripped his gun.
“Don’t look at the glass.”
Jason Huang immediately closed his eyes.
“You saw it too?”
Ethan Lin did not answer.
The Jason Huang in the glass slowly smiled.
Then he raised one finger to his lips.
A gesture for silence.
Ethan Lin looked away.
“Pull the curtains shut.”
With his eyes closed, Jason Huang felt his way toward the window.
Just as he was about to touch the curtains, the reflection on the glass suddenly raised both hands.
Through the pane, it clamped them around Jason Huang’s neck.
The real Jason Huang immediately gasped in pain.
Ten bluish-purple finger marks appeared out of nowhere on his neck.
His whole body was dragged backward.
Ethan Lin rushed forward and grabbed his arm.
Jason Huang’s body was unnaturally heavy.
It was as if another force on the other side of the glass was pulling him away.
“Don’t open your eyes!”
Ethan Lin held him with one hand and yanked down the curtains with the other.
Swish!
The heavy fabric covered the glass.
The force choking Jason Huang vanished instantly.
Both men fell to the floor.
Jason Huang gasped for breath.
Ethan Lin immediately examined his neck.
The marks were real.
The capillaries beneath the skin had ruptured.
No psychological suggestion could have caused injuries like these.
“Captain Lin.”
Claire Su’s voice came through the phone.
“I heard a crash.”
“What happened?”
“Someone choked him.”
“Who?”
Ethan Lin looked at the window hidden behind the curtains.
“His reflection.”
There was two seconds of silence.
“You believed it?”
“I believe the injuries.”
Ethan Lin helped Jason Huang sit up.
“What’s that in your hand?”
Jason Huang handed him the transparent card.
It appeared completely blank.
But several marks left by fingernails ran across its center.
Ethan Lin held it up to the light.
At a certain angle, a line of extremely faint black writing appeared inside the plastic.
Move-in confirmation complete.
Below it, there should have been a name and a date.
But they looked as if something had rubbed them away.
Only blurred traces of ink remained.
“My name was on it before,” Jason Huang said.
“And April 4.”
Ethan Lin looked at his phone.
Today was April 1.
“There were rules on the notice?”
“Yes.”
“How many do you remember?”
Jason Huang told him everything he had seen.
Items provided upon move-in.
Lock the door at midnight.
Reflections in mirrors.
Names outside the door.
Contact the landlord.
The tenant in Room 402.
A second pair of feet beneath the bed.
The name belongs to the last person who responds.
Ethan Lin did not interrupt.
After each rule, he made a note in his phone.
By the end, Jason Huang’s voice had grown quieter and quieter.
“I don’t know whether these rules are saving me.”
“Some of them are real.”
“But they only appear after something happens.”
“It’s like…”
“Like someone is recording the ways people fail.”
Ethan Lin looked up.
It matched the conclusion he had just reached.
The rules had not been written in advance.
They had been left behind by people who had encountered the anomalies before.
More accurately, this was not a safety manual.
It was a record of deaths.
Behind every rule was perhaps someone who had once made the wrong choice.
“Who’s the landlord?”
“I contacted him through the rental platform.”
“You ever met him?”
“No.”
“What about the lease?”
“Electronic signature.”
“Where did you send the rent?”
“I have it on my phone.”
Jason Huang took out his phone.
The screen unlocked normally.
The conversation on the rental platform was still there.
The landlord’s account name was Mr. Chen.
There was no profile picture.
No identity-verification badge.
The receiving account belonged to a company called Evergreen Asset Management Co., Ltd.
Ethan Lin sent the information to Claire Su.
“Look into the company.”
“Already doing it,” she replied.
“Also, I’m near the apartment building.”
Ethan Lin frowned.
“I told you not to come in.”
“That’s why I’m still in the car.”
“Which car?”
“You can’t see me.”
Ethan Lin walked to the window.
He did not pull open the curtains.
“Why not?”
“Because I’m parked at the corner,” Claire Su said.
“There’s a yellow taxi outside the apartment building.”
Ethan Lin’s eyes darkened.
“I just saw it leave.”
“It didn’t leave.”
“It’s still there.”
Ethan Lin tightened his grip on the phone.
He recalled the image of the taxi driving into the rain.
The license plate had been blurred.
The taillights had disappeared.
Everything had seemed perfectly natural.
“Is there anyone inside?”
“Yes.”
“An elderly male driver.”
Claire Su paused.
“There’s someone in the back seat too.”
“Can you see him clearly?”
“Not his face.”
“But he’s holding a file made of kraft paper.”
“The cover says—”
A sharp burst of static suddenly cut through the call.
Bzzzt—
Claire Su’s voice was severed.
Ethan Lin immediately looked at the screen.
The call was still connected.
“Claire?”
There was only static.
A few seconds later, another voice came through the phone.
It was Ethan Lin’s own voice.
Calm.
Low.
Perfectly identical to his.
“The Thirteenth Case Investigation Unit.”
Jason Huang heard it too.
His face went white.
The “Ethan Lin” on the phone continued:
“Case designation.”
“13-044.”
“Room 404.”
“Investigator.”
The voice paused.
Then, one word at a time, it read:
“Ethan Lin.”
The lights in the room went out.
It was not a power failure.
The phone screen, the light from outside the window, and the motion-sensor light in the hallway all disappeared at once.
In the darkness, the voice continued through the phone.
“Move-in date.”
“April 1, 2028.”
“Expected end date.”
Jason Huang’s breathing quickened.
Ethan Lin said nothing.
The voice on the phone slowly announced:
“April 14, 2028.”
Click.
The lights came back on.
The call had been disconnected.
The phone screen was open to the notes app.
Every Room 404 rule Ethan Lin had just recorded was gone.
Only one new line remained.
First investigator, move-in complete.
Jason Huang stared at the words.
“It thinks you’re a tenant now.”
Ethan Lin deleted the line.
“Maybe.”
“Aren’t you scared?”
“Being scared won’t solve the problem.”
“But you’ll die.”
Jason Huang’s voice trembled.
“On the fourteenth day.”
“Everyone who moves in has something happen to them on the fourteenth day.”
Ethan Lin put away his phone.
“How do you know that?”
Jason Huang froze.
“I…”
He opened and closed his mouth, but no answer came.
The notice had never mentioned fourteen days.
Neither had the landlord.
Neither had the old woman.
None of the voices tonight had said it.
But for some reason, the number fourteen existed in his mind.
It was as clear as a memory he had possessed for years.
“I don’t know.”
He clutched his head.
“I just know.”
“It’s like someone told me.”
“And yet it also feels like…”
He slowly raised his head.
“I used to live here.”
Ethan Lin looked at him.
“Today was your first time here?”
“Yes.”
“You’re sure?”
Jason Huang did not answer immediately.
He began thinking back to everything before his move.
The rental website.
The landlord’s messages.
His company.
His luggage.
Everything seemed complete.
But when he tried to remember why he had clicked on the rental listing for Room 404, there was a blank space in his memory.
He only remembered that the rent was cheap.
He could not remember what the listing looked like.
He could not remember when he had completed the lease.
He could not even remember where he had started from before moving in today.
“Where did I live before?” Jason Huang asked quietly.
“You’re asking me?” Ethan Lin said.
“I can’t remember.”
The color drained rapidly from Jason Huang’s face.
He took out his ID card.
The registered address was a residence in New Taipei City.
His phone map also had a location marked “Home.”
But he had no memory of that address.
There were no photos of his old room in his album.
There were no moving-related conversations in his messages.
It was as if his life had begun only after he stepped into Evergreen Apartments today.
“These memories are wrong,” he said.
“What’s wrong with them?”
“They’re too complete.”
Jason Huang looked at the information on his phone.
“Everything can prove who I am.”
“But I…”
“You don’t remember.”
Footsteps suddenly sounded in the hallway.
Not one person.
At least four or five.
The officers were approaching Room 404.
Ethan Lin walked to the doorway.
“Don’t come in yet.”
The officers outside stopped.
“Captain Lin, something happened to the one downstairs.”
“What happened?”
“He suddenly passed out.”
“Vital signs?”
“Normal.”
The officer’s voice became hesitant.
“But his face…”
“What about it?”
“It changed.”
The officer continued, “Facial recognition originally confirmed he was Jason Huang.”
“But we ran it again just now.”
“The system says he’s someone else.”
“Who?”
“We can’t find out.”
“No household registration.”
“No fingerprint records.”
“No identity data of any kind.”
“It’s as if this person never existed.”
Ethan Lin looked back at the Jason Huang inside the room.
The other man was looking at him too.
“There’s more,” the officer outside said.
“His phone went blank.”
“His photos, contacts, and accounts all disappeared.”
“There’s only one photo left.”
“What photo?”
“Room 404.”
“There’s someone standing by the window in the photo.”
“Who?”
There was silence outside for several seconds.
The officer’s voice grew very soft.
“You.”
Ethan Lin did not react.
But the Jason Huang inside the room suddenly looked toward the window.
The curtains remained tightly closed.
“When was the photo taken?” Ethan Lin asked.
“April 14, 2028.”
Silence fell over the fourth-floor hallway.
Thirteen days later.
Exactly the date the voice on the phone had predicted.
Ethan Lin opened the door.
Three officers stood in the hallway.
One of them held an evidence bag.
Inside was a black phone.
Its screen was lit.
It displayed the interior of Room 404.
Ethan Lin stood by the window in the photo.
His back was to the camera.
The glass reflected the front of his face.
But the Ethan Lin in the reflection had one hand raised, his palm pressed against the glass.
As if trying to keep the photographer from approaching.
Below the photo, an automatic location recognition had produced a line of text.
Ren'an Sanatorium, Fourth Ward.
Ethan Lin stared at the words.
A blurry image flashed through his mind.
Green walls.
An old iron bed.
Someone behind glass speaking a name.
The image did not belong to his memory.
Yet it was exactly the same as what Jason Huang had described.
“Captain Lin?” one of the officers called.
Ethan Lin came back to himself.
“Take the person downstairs to the hospital.”
“Record everything.”
“No one is to ask his name.”
“What about here?”
Ethan Lin looked into the room.
Jason Huang was still standing where he had been.
“Seal off Room 404.”
“Evacuate every tenant on this floor.”
One of the officers said, “No one answered the door to Room 402.”
“There’s an old woman in there,” Jason Huang immediately said.
The officer looked at him.
“We checked the tenant roster.”
“Room 402 has been vacant for three years.”
Jason Huang’s body instantly went rigid.
“That’s impossible.”
“I saw her today.”
“She even spoke to me.”
Ethan Lin walked toward Room 402.
A thin layer of dust covered the door.
The keyhole was rusted.
A pile of flyers had been stuffed beneath the door.
The top one was dated three years ago.
It certainly did not look as if anyone lived there.
Ethan Lin put on gloves.
He gently knocked.
Knock.
Knock.
There was no response from inside.
He was about to order the officers to break down the door when an old woman’s voice suddenly came from within.
“Don’t come in.”
Everyone in the hallway stopped at once.
Jason Huang went pale.
“That’s her.”
The old woman inside said breathlessly, “Room 404 has already chosen its tenant.”
“If you go in now…”
“It’ll choose another one.”
Ethan Lin stood before the door.
“Who are you?”
The old woman did not answer.
“You live in 402?”
Again, silence.
Ethan Lin changed the question.
“Do you know Ren'an Sanatorium?”
Something fell inside the room.
Then came the hurried slap of slippers.
The old woman seemed to rush to the door, but she did not open it.
“Who told you that name?” she asked, her voice full of fear.
“Answer me.”
“Who told you?”
Ethan Lin did not answer.
The old woman began pounding hard on the door.
Bang!
Bang!
Bang!
“Don’t let it remember!”
“Did you hear me?”
“Don’t let Room 404 remember what it used to be!”
The pounding grew louder.
The door shook violently.
“Burn the files!”
“Burn all the names!”
“Before the thirteenth person comes back—”
Her voice cut off.
The hallway fell silent again.
Ethan Lin knocked once more.
There was no response.
He signaled the officers to break in.
Two of them rammed the door.
The first time, it did not open.
The second time, the lock came loose.
The third time—
Bang!
The door burst open.
A wave of dust and mildew from years of confinement poured out.
There were no lights in Room 402.
The flashlight beams swept across the living room.
Every piece of furniture was covered in white cloth.
Dust blanketed the floor.
There was no sign that anyone had lived there.
And there was no old woman.
But in the center of the living room stood a wooden chair.
Its back faced the doorway.
An old cassette recorder sat on it.
The recorder was running.
Every voice they had just heard had come from it.
Ethan Lin walked closer.
The tape label had long since yellowed.
A line of handwriting appeared on it.
April 1, 1998.
Jason Huang stood outside the door.
When he saw the date, his breathing caught.
“Twenty-nine years ago?”
Ethan Lin pressed the stop button.
The recording cut off.
Then he pressed rewind.
The tape spun rapidly.
Click.
The rewinding finished.
He played it again.
After a burst of static, the old woman’s voice came through.
“Don’t come in.”
“Room 404 has already chosen its tenant.”
Every sentence was exactly the same as before.
The recording continued.
“If you go in now…”
“It’ll choose another one.”
Then came the questions Ethan Lin had just asked.
“Who are you?”
In the recording, his voice answered.
The officers in the hallway all went pale.
The tape had been recorded in 1998.
Yet it contained the conversation from twenty-nine years later in its entirety.
Even the pauses, breathing, and rain outside the door were exactly the same.
The recording continued.
The old woman pounded on the door.
She called out the name Ren'an Sanatorium.
She warned them not to let Room 404 remember what it used to be.
Until the line—
“Before the thirteenth person comes back—”
Everyone waited for the recording to cut off.
But this time, the tape did not stop.
The old woman said the rest of the sentence, words no one had heard at the scene just now.
“Leave this building.”
“Because the thirteenth person…”
“Isn’t a tenant.”
“He’s the first person to bring Room 404 out.”
Heavy footsteps sounded on the recording.
Then a young man walked into the room.
His voice was calm and clear.
“Case designation.”
“13-044.”
“Investigator.”
“Ethan Lin.”
Everyone’s eyes turned to Ethan Lin at the same time.
The man on the recording continued:
“I’m the thirteenth.”
“I’ve come back.”