Spirit Realm Wanderer

Chapter 2: The Disappearance

“Did Brother Bing send this?” Zhang Yuanqing furrowed his brow after reading the letter. What does “change your life” mean? What does “uncontrollable” mean? Seriously, he didn’t explain himself clearly at all... He turned his gaze back to the black card, examining it repeatedly to confirm that it was just an ordinary card. If there was anything unusual about it, it was that it felt nice to the touch, and the material seemed quite rare. Could it be a VIP card from some high-end club? A girl with a 36D bust—only a unique guy like me could handle her. Lei Yibing was his best friend since childhood, nicknamed “A Bing.” Two years his senior, they’d lived in the same alley until his maternal grandparents bought a new home. Lei Yibing had top-tier Strength and Speed, with a C in Intelligence. He’d looked out for Zhang Yuanqing since childhood—charging into fights first and taking the brunt of the blows to cover his retreat. If anyone mocked Zhang Yuanqing for being a fatherless child, Lei Yibing would always stand up for him. That’s why Zhang Yuanqing had always called him “Brother Bing.” A-Bing’s grades in high school weren’t great, so he went to college in neighboring Jiangnan Province. Since then, with them living so far apart, they’ve kept in touch less often. As Zhang Yuanqing slipped the black card into the pocket of his windbreaker, he picked up his phone and sent Brother Bing a teasing text “Which club’s VIP card is this? At least give me the address or contact info.” Half an hour had passed since he sent the message, and he still hadn’t received a reply. Zhang Yuanqing decided to just call Bingge. After two rings, the call connected, and a deep male voice came through the speaker “Hello! This is Lei Yibing’s father.” “Uncle Lei?” Zhang Yuanqing paused for a moment, then said happily “Is Bingge coming back to Songhai this week? Could you have him pick up the phone? I need to talk to him.” There was a moment of silence on the other end, followed by a pained voice “Yuanzi, I’m in Jiangnan Province. Bing has gone missing...” Brother Bing is missing?! Zhang Yuanqing stood frozen in place. After a few seconds, he asked, his voice a mix of bewilderment and urgency “What happened?” How could Bing Ge be missing? He clearly just sent me a package. “He went missing the day before yesterday. Aunt Zhou and I received a notice from the school yesterday, so we rushed over right away,” Uncle Lei said, his voice heavy with sorrow. “Did you report it to the police? What did the Public Security Bureau say?” Zhang Yuanqing asked in a grave tone. Uncle Lei was silent for a long time before saying hesitantly “It’s hard to explain. Bing’s disappearance is a bit strange...” Strange? What does that mean... Zhang Yuanqing was taken aback. Uncle Lei said “Ah Bing went missing from his dorm room the night before last. The police checked the surveillance footage in the dorm hallway and found that he hadn’t left his room all night, but early the next morning, he was gone. “His roommates said they saw him right before going to sleep, but when they woke up, he was gone. They just assumed he’d gone out.” Zhang Yuanqing blurted out, “How is that possible...?” "Do people just vanish into thin air? Even a three-year-old wouldn't believe that. " Zhang Yuanqing suppressed his anxiety and said in a low voice “Uncle Lei, did Bing offend someone at school?” His first thought was that Bingge had offended someone at school—someone with a certain amount of local influence—which would explain why the surveillance footage showed nothing amiss, as that often implies the school administration was covering it up. In this age of information overload, anyone who’s ever been online has heard stories like this to some extent. “The school administrators said they’d do their best to cooperate with the police, while the officers told us to go home and wait for updates—they’ll investigate… Your aunt and I haven’t slept a wink all night.” Uncle Lei’s tone was laced with frustration and worry. Just the kind of response I expected. Damn it... Zhang Yuanqing took a deep breath and reassured him “Don’t worry just yet. As you know, my grandfather and my cousin both work at the Public Security Bureau. I’ll ask them how to handle this kind of situation and what to watch out for. If there’s anything you don’t understand or need to ask, feel free to call me anytime. “Also, you should definitely ask his classmates at school. If Bingge has offended anyone, one of them is bound to know.” Uncle Lei felt a little relieved and said “Got it, Yuanzi. Don’t worry—I’ll let you know as soon as I hear anything.” After hanging up, Zhang Yuanqing felt restless, pacing back and forth in his room, worried about Bingge’s safety. People don’t just disappear for no reason. If the surveillance cameras didn’t capture anything, then they must have been tampered with—I just don’t know who Bingge might have offended. But who could a junior in college possibly have offended? Wait a minute—he went missing the day before yesterday... The day before yesterday?! Zhang Yuanqing was startled. It takes 2–3 days for a package to be delivered from Jiangnan Province to Songhai. Based on the timeline, Bingge must have gone missing the very night he mailed the package to me... Is this a coincidence? Or is there some connection here? At that thought, he instinctively reached for the black card in his pocket, but as his hand slipped inside, he suddenly froze. The black card was gone. Did it fall on the floor? Zhang Yuanqing quickly looked down, his eyes darting across the floor of the room. It wasn’t there! He crouched down and peered under the bed. The space beneath was covered with a layer of dust and scattered with odds and ends—coins, pens, buttons, and the like—but the black card was nowhere to be found. The card was gone, yet he remembered clearly that he had put it in his pocket. How could it have vanished into thin air? Thinking of Bing Ge’s mysterious disappearance, the strange letter, and the black card that had vanished so mysteriously, Zhang Yuanqing felt an inexplicable sense of dread and confusion. “Could the black card be connected to Bingge’s disappearance? Or is it an important clue?” Taking a deep breath, Zhang Yuanqing decided to use his “old ailment” to jog his memory. First, he poured some cold water into a glass, took the medicine bottle from the nightstand, unscrewed the cap, then took off his shoes and lay down on the bed. After doing all this, he closed his eyes, lay completely still, and visualized his father’s face in his mind. The condition for triggering the “old ailment” was to calm his mind and visualize an image—preferably one he had seen before but could not quite recall clearly. This would stimulate his brain, gradually warming it up until his mental faculties were in full swing. After so many years, his father’s face had long since become a blur—making it the perfect subject. As time ticked by, his father’s face gradually shifted from blurry to clear, until every fine detail was visible, and Zhang Yuanqing’s heart pounded violently, like an overloaded engine. In that moment, time seemed to flow backward; scenes from an hour earlier flashed by frame by frame, like a movie. He saw himself opening the package, reading the letter, slipping the black card into the pocket of his windbreaker, and then sending a message to Bingge. From there, for the next half hour, he sat motionless at the table, scrolling through short videos for over ten minutes and exchanging a few racy images with the perverts in his gaming group. He saved a few high-quality images. Then he read a novel for a few minutes, but since he kept thinking about the card, he called Bingge. After hanging up, the crucial moment arrived. Frantic, he paced back and forth in his room—this was the time when it was easiest to lose the card. In his flashback, he saw himself pacing around the room with a furrowed brow, then reaching out to feel for the black card—only to discover it was gone. Zhang Yuanqing suddenly opened his eyes, his face filled with terror. Gone?! The black card was just gone—vanished into thin air. What the hell did Bingge send me, anyway... For a split second, his scalp prickled. Before he had time to think further, a chaotic din rang in his ears—like the voices of countless people layered on top of one another—and fragmented images surged into his mind like an erupting volcano, flooding his consciousness all at once. A warm liquid trickled down Zhang Yuanqing’s nose, and his head felt as if it had been hammered with steel nails. His face contorted as he crawled toward the head of the bed. Shaking uncontrollably, he tipped out five small blue pills and shoved them into his mouth, then, still trembling, grabbed a glass of water, tilted his head back, and swallowed the pills along with the water. A moment later, Zhang Yuanqing sat pale-faced at the head of the bed, gasping for breath. At this point, he was fairly certain that Bing Ge’s disappearance was somehow connected to the black card. “Brother Bing went missing after mailing me the Black Card, and there’s something strange about that card—it’s clearly no ordinary object...” This inevitably led him to suspect that Bingge might have faced some kind of threat, forcing him to move the item. “But why didn’t he hand it over to the local police station instead of mailing it to me?” Could it be that I—a college student who’s never even killed a chicken or slept with anyone—am more trustworthy than the officers at the police station? Zhang Yuanqing suddenly recalled the detail that “neither the surveillance cameras nor the dorm staff had noticed anything unusual.” To pull something off on this scale, one must necessarily possess a certain level of influence. The soldier didn’t turn in the black card to the local public security bureau because… the bureau couldn’t be trusted either? Or perhaps the person or force responsible for his disappearance had influence that extended to the local Public Security Bureau. “Did he send me the black card because he knew my grandfather is a retired police chief and my cousin is the captain of the Public Security Bureau, and that we have deep connections in Songhai City—so people from Jiangnan Province couldn’t influence me?” I have to tell my cousin about this. “Ding-dong~” Just then, he heard the doorbell ring—coming from the entryway. His grandmother’s footsteps immediately followed as she crossed the living room to the entryway and turned the doorknob. “Who are you looking for?” “Hello, we’re investigators from the Kangyang District Public Security Bureau. Is Zhang Yuanqing home?” the person at the door replied.