Ghost in the Mirror

Night quickly fell. At eight o'clock, the bell rang. Yu Cheng Yi's fever had subsided, and he was now awake. Shen Yu and Wang Jia Xin were in the room taking care of him.
Wang Jia Xin told Yu Cheng Yi everything that had happened in the past two days. Yu Cheng Yi listened, astonished, his mouth agape. His right arm still hurt, so he had to use his left hand to scoop and drink porridge, his clumsy movements making him look quite funny.
Shen Yu held the bowl of plain porridge, looking at his shocked expression, and said, "Eat quickly, my arm is numb from holding it."
Yu Cheng Yi immediately took the bowl from Shen Yu with his left hand, poured it all into his mouth, and swallowed it before he could even chew.
"So the mastermind behind this is truly too cruel, actually deceiving an entire village?!" Yu Cheng Yi wiped the water from the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand.
Shen Yu took the empty bowl and told Yu Cheng Yi to remove the thermometer from his armpit. After glancing at his lowered body temperature, he said, "Who knows? You just rest and recover these two days; the rest of us will try to meet the Old Priest."
"They said the Old Priest is at some You Shen Temple, but how can You Shen Temple be so easy to enter?" Yu Cheng Yi's mind almost couldn't keep up.
Wang Jia Xin then said from the side, "Brother Shen means we should find a time to sneak into You Shen Temple. After all, we can't just sit here and wait for death."
Shen Yu nodded, slowly opening his mouth, "Moreover, if the Old Priest wants to hide something from the villagers, then taking them to You Shen Temple to worship the gods would need to be done more frequently."
"Your minds are really quick." Yu Cheng Yi truly felt that lying down all day had made his mind muddled.
Although he wasn't very smart to begin with.
Yu Cheng Yi slightly pulled at the corner of his mouth, a smile lingering, "Alright, you should rest first. We also need to go back to sleep."
"Oh, okay, thank you both." Yu Cheng Yi was very grateful that they hadn't abandoned him, and had even expended energy to treat him.
Shen Yu felt a little strange, but didn't know what to say, pretending that they weren't on the same page.
Wang Jia Xin, however, spoke her mind, "Brother Yu, you don't need to say that. Aren't we the best of friends?"
Yu Cheng Yi chuckled upon hearing this, scratching his head with a somewhat silly grin.
He had slept all day, and his hair was as messy as a bird's nest.
He looked quite amusing.
The two left his room.
After leaving the door, they each returned to their own rooms.
Outside, the wind and snow were heavy. Even after closing the door, Shen Yu felt the cold didn't lessen; it made him cough twice. The snow outside was like last night, falling in clumps.
The snow on the roof was almost a meter thick.
He worried it would crush the low-rise house.
Shen Yu looked at the distant specks of light, which were the villagers' lanterns, twinkling and scattered haphazardly.
He wrapped his clothes tightly around himself and carried his toiletries out the door. Outside, every two rooms had a red lantern hanging. Shen Yu didn't count how many floors You Shen Building actually had, but each floor was like this, with lanterns alternating between floors.
So this place actually resembled a stove.
Unfortunately, it wasn't warm. Shen Yu coughed twice again. Snow had already blown into this corridor, and Shen Yu left a footprint with every step.
But where he had just walked, an unknown object suddenly erased his footprints, following closely behind Shen Yu, almost step for step.
At this hour, no one was out washing up; it seemed they didn't want to go out on such a cold night.
Shen Yu planned to quickly wash up and return. The restroom had no lights, and because it was night, no light could penetrate the window. The entire restroom relied solely on a red lantern hanging at the door for illumination.
Shen Yu quickly finished brushing his teeth. The winter tap water was so cold it made Shen Yu's teeth ache. He bent down, cupped some cold water in his hands, and splashed it on his face.
But as he closed his eyes, he immediately realized something was wrong.
Someone seemed to be staring at him.
Shen Yu buried his face in his hands, then opened his eyes again. He remained silent for a moment, the cold water in his palms flowing away through his fingers.
That person was hiding in the shadows. Shen Yu instantly felt that he was no longer cold.
He suddenly looked up.
Immediately turning his head to look back, in the area he could clearly see, there was no one.
Shen Yu leaned back against the sink, his back quite close to the mirror. Water from the faucet still trickled.
The water splashed onto Shen Yu's hands, then slid down his wrists, so cold that his skin turned red, looking somewhat mysterious.
But the illusion of being watched did not disappear.
Shen Yu's fingers unconsciously tightened a lot, the faint blue veins on the back of his hand abnormally prominent.
This feeling was not good. Shen Yu thought of the woman he saw on the first floor yesterday.
He planned to leave quickly, but suddenly a rush of cold air hit his armpits and ears. Then, a pair of withered, tattered hands reached out from behind him. Shen Yu's eyes narrowed slightly; there was no space behind him, only a mirror.
So these hands reached out from inside the mirror.
Shen Yu instinctively wanted to run forward, but was suddenly pulled back by a hand covering his mouth. The other hand tightened around his neck, giving him no chance to resist. Shen Yu's back was pressed backward, and a dry, wind-blown scent filled his nostrils.
He felt disgusted. Following the force of those hands, he suddenly arched backward, feeling the binding force loosen slightly. Shen Yu immediately reached back and grabbed the basin within reach, preparing to smash it against the mirror behind him.
But it had discovered his intention. It pressed the wooden basin tightly against the sink. Shen Yu immediately let go, turned around, and punched the mirror.
Although his body was not in good condition, he possessed the strength a man should have.
Instantly, the glass shattered, blood dripped from where Shen Yu's hand met the mirror, and the terrifying face of the woman in the mirror also shattered.
Shen Yu retreated. In the mirror, it vanished in a flash.
Immediately after, Yu Cheng Yi's panicked, anxious voice rushed in, "Shen Yu! Shen Yu!" Yu Cheng Yi had heard the noise from the sink and remembered the coughing sound that had come from Shen Yu's room earlier.
Naturally, he was extremely panicked.
Shen Yu looked towards the door upon hearing the sound. Yu Cheng Yi, wearing a fur coat, rushed in.
"Shen Yu?!" Yu Cheng Yi hurried over to support Shen Yu.
Shen Yu's eyes were fixed on the mirror. The mirror was shattered, and the images of the two people in it were no longer intact.
He looked through the broken glass and realized that the thing's hands had scratched his lips; now, there was still a trace of blood at the corner of his mouth.
"What was it?" Yu Cheng Yi followed Shen Yu's gaze and was also startled by the shattered mirror.
Before Shen Yu could speak, he also noticed the bloodstain in the middle of the mirror. He immediately lowered his head to examine it and saw Shen Yu's injured hand.
"I just saw a woman." Shen Yu was helped out of the restroom by Yu Cheng Yi, and only spoke after they had left the restroom door.
He told Yu Cheng Yi what had just happened.
Yu Cheng Yi was surprised, "So this You Shen Building really has 'it'?"
"It's not fake." Shen Yu had experienced it himself, so he naturally affirmed this fact.
"Never mind that for now, let's treat your hand wound." Yu Cheng Yi put his own down jacket on Shen Yu, because Shen Yu was already soaked from the fight.
Yu Cheng Yi dared not let Shen Yu, with his physique, go out into the cold wind.
Shen Yu had just collected himself, his breathing still ragged.
Yu Cheng Yi helped Shen Yu back to his room, then found clean clothes for Shen Yu to change into, and covered him with a thick quilt.
"Come, let me see your hand." Yu Cheng Yi's hand hadn't fully healed, so his movements seemed a bit clumsy, but he was careful and didn't do a bad job.
Shen Yu extended his hand. There were still shards of broken glass stuck in the wound, making Yu Cheng Yi frown tightly. Fortunately, Wang Jia Xin had left him some antiseptic supplies, so Shen Yu was quite resourceful at this moment.
"Did you see clearly what it was?" Yu Cheng Yi applied Povidone to his hand with one hand and asked with the other.
Shen Yu, wrapped in the quilt with only his head exposed, his voice deep and a little nasal, "A woman, a withered woman."
"Withered?" Yu Cheng Yi's scalp tingled.
"Mm, look at this wound on my lip; it wasn't caused by fingernails, but by her cracked skin." Shen Yu pointed out the wound on his lip to Yu Cheng Yi.
Yu Cheng Yi immediately felt curious, "How did you provoke such a thing?"
Shen Yu explained truthfully, "Last night I saw her on the first floor, and we looked at each other for a while."
"She must have been watching me then." After saying that, Shen Yu sneezed, then sniffed.
At this moment, Shen Yu suddenly felt his head become dizzy and heavy again, likely a sign of a cold. Yu Cheng Yi also noticed it; his head felt like it was about to explode, so he quickly made a cup of cold medicine for Shen Yu.
"Come on, drink some medicine, with your weak body." He brought the bitter-smelling cup of medicine to Shen Yu.
Shen Yu looked at the murky medicine, and finally drank it all in one gulp.
"How did you find me?" Shen Yu asked, holding the empty medicine cup.
Yu Cheng Yi took the empty cup from his hand and said, "I heard your cough when I passed your door. I had already lain down, but after waiting a long time and not hearing you return to close the door, I decided to check."
Just as Shen Yu had always thought, although Yu Cheng Yi appeared tall and rough, and his personality was unrestrained, his mind was a little more meticulous than others. He always remembered both useful and useless details.
But this was Yu Cheng Yi.
"Alright, you go back to sleep. I'm fine." Shen Yu told Yu Cheng Yi to go back and rest; he was also preparing to sleep.
Yu Cheng Yi heard the nine o'clock bell from outside and stood up, "Alright then, I'm leaving. Have a good sleep."
Shen Yu lay back on the bed, nodding at him, not wanting to say much more.
When Yu Cheng Yi left, he turned off Shen Yu's light and gently pulled the door shut. With a 'click,' the room became pitch black; he couldn't see his own hand.
Shen Yu looked at the pitch-black ceiling, recalling the bracelet on the woman's wrist. He didn't recognize valuable items, nor did he know what kind of antique it was, but judging by its style, it seemed to be a rather ancient bracelet.
Its price would probably not be cheap either.
If this woman was a ghost, then she must have had an extraordinary status in life.
He relied on memory to describe the bracelet's shape, remembering its distinctive features. There were three ancient characters carved on it. Shen Yu was not an antique researcher, so it was normal for him not to recognize the characters.
However, he still remembered the shape of the characters.
Thinking this, Shen Yu, who didn't have Wang Jia Xin's memory, turned over and got out of bed. He turned on the light in the room, then found paper and pen, and drew the approximate shape of the bracelet.
Then, he wrote out the three ancient characters stroke by stroke. As soon as he put down the pen, Shen Yu suddenly heard a rustling sound coming from outside the window. Shen Yu's vigilance immediately rose.
He took out his fruit knife from his bag and moved a little closer to the window.
The window was knocked.
"Knock knock knock." The first time.
Shen Yu was a little puzzled, thinking this ghost was really polite, even knocking on the window to announce its arrival. However, thinking of that face, Shen Yu felt terrified, and he didn't approach.
So it knocked a second time—
"Knock knock knock."
Shen Yu couldn't ignore it, so he pulled back the curtain, but unexpectedly, outside the window was not the female ghost, but Xie Tu, whom he hadn't seen for two days.
Xie Tu's attire was completely different now. After several days apart, his hair had grown much longer—no, it was too long. His hair was tightly bound with a red hair tie, from which hung an exquisite bell, draped over his shoulder. Tasseled earrings hung from his earlobes, making him look like a deity amidst the wind and snow. Shen Yu, inside, through the glass, the beauty and the deity gazed at each other from afar.
And he was wearing an outfit similar to those of the Miao Jiang people, embroidered with various intricate patterns and adorned with several bells. Even through the window, Shen Yu could hear the clear jingle of the bells.