The Eerie Paper

Fang Jing had not expected Yang Jian to hang up so decisively, leaving him no room to negotiate at all.

He had only planned to stall Yang Jian for now, then turn hostile without hesitation once he had left the school and was safely out of danger, refusing to hand over the Human-Skin Parchment.

But Yang Jian's decisiveness and bluntness threw him into a complete panic.

Even more fatal was that the footsteps behind him had returned.

Yang Jian's guidance earlier had only temporarily helped him shake off the ghost behind him.

"What do I do? What do I do? What the hell do I do? Without Yang Jian's help, I definitely won't be able to get out of here. I'll die at the hands of a vicious ghost. I don't want to die! My future has only just begun. With the Human-Skin Parchment's help, I'll definitely become someone above others in this world. How could I possibly accept dying like this—

Here?"

Panic filled Fang Jing's heart. Cold sweat poured down his face as he instinctively started running again, hoping to put more distance between himself and those footsteps behind him.

But it was still useless. The footsteps behind him drew closer and closer.

The darkness around him also seemed to grow thicker, as if it could swallow a person whole.

"No, this won't do. I can't die. I'll give him the Human-Skin Parchment. Yang Jian is right—if I die, then knowing more won't matter. Besides, I've already roughly learned and grasped the information about the future. The Human-Skin Parchment isn't as valuable to me as I imagined."

Under the threat of death, there was nothing that could not be abandoned.

Fang Jing's trembling hand picked up his phone and dialed Zhang Wei's number again.

"Beep, beep beep."

The call connected.

"I'll give you the Human-Skin Parchment, I'll give it to you. Just promise to get me out of here." Before the other side could speak, he hurriedly said it first.

Yang Jian's voice came through the phone. "Throw the Human-Skin Parchment onto the ground. I'll come take it."

This time, Fang Jing did not play any tricks. Without hesitation, he took a stack of dark brown paper from his pocket and threw it onto the ground.

"I did what you said. Help me, hurry and help me! I don't want to die!"

Yang Jian said, "I'll first teach you how to shake off the ghost behind you. Go to the right."

"Okay. Th-thank you, thank you." Fang Jing was completely flustered and hurriedly followed Yang Jian's instructions.

"Further right," Yang Jian continued.

Fang Jing did as instructed again, and the effect immediately became apparent.

The footsteps behind him gradually grew more distant before vanishing completely. Fang Jing was both shocked and delighted. He knew he was safe for the moment.

"Idiot."

Yang Jian put down his phone, a cold smile appearing at the corner of his mouth. He stopped walking and watched Fang Jing wander around the woods ahead like a headless fly, looking both frightened and overjoyed. He found it laughable.

The footsteps following Fang Jing were not from a ghost at all.

They were his.

That was right. No ghost had been following Fang Jing. Only Yang Jian had been behind him.

Fang Jing had been terrified by ghosts and could not see through the Ghost Domain. How could he possibly know that the thing following behind him was actually a person?

"So this is the Human-Skin Parchment that records information about the future?" Yang Jian picked up the object from the ground.

It was brown leather, soft and slightly icy, as though it had just been taken out of a freezer. It gave off an ominous and eerie aura.

The moment it entered his hand, the eye on the back of his hand opened on its own, emitting a faint red glow.

"This isn't parchment. It's human skin, and there's something very wrong with it." Yang Jian's heart tightened at the thought.

He opened it and looked.

A line of writing was on the Human-Skin Parchment.

"My name is Fang Jing. By the time you see this letter, I am already dead. Do not find it strange. I am you from ten years in the future, using a special method to pass information from the future to you. Please make sure that your past self remembers the following content well."

"Ghosts have already appeared in this world. This is not a joke. By the time you learn this news, it will already be too late. You are at least half a year behind the other Ghost Tamers."

"Be careful of your classmate Yang Jian. The Yang Jian of the future is terrifying. I was killed by him, so you must kill Yang Jian in advance. Otherwise, the you of the future will definitely die by his hand. Remember, kill Yang Jian."

"On June 20 of a certain year, you will encounter Zhou Zheng. This is very important. Zhou Zheng is a Ghost Tamer affiliated with the Asia Division, codenamed Ghost Infant Zhou Zheng. However, he is merely a passerby, so there is no need to pay him too much attention."

"Beware of the Ghost Infant that escapes from his body. That thing will grow. Within a few months, that Ghost Infant will grow into... It is recommended that you stay away, otherwise you will die."

"You must join Headquarters as soon as possible."

"Remember. Golden Paper."

"Stay away. Run."

".Ghost."

When Yang Jian saw this information, he discovered that the writing on the Human-Skin Parchment was rapidly becoming blurry and dim.

The crucial information was continuously being erased by some force, vanishing completely before his eyes. What had originally been densely packed notes had now become a large blank sheet of Human-Skin Parchment.

Like characters on a computer screen, they disappeared one by one.

Yang Jian had not even seen anything useful before all the writing on the Human-Skin Parchment, which recorded information about the future, vanished.

"What the hell is going on?"

He frowned deeply and turned the Human-Skin Parchment over in his hands.

The writing truly had disappeared, leaving behind no trace at all.

Faced with this phenomenon, Yang Jian could not help thinking of a movie he had watched before. If the past changed, then the future would also change.

Could it be that because he had taken Fang Jing's Human-Skin Parchment, which recorded information about the future, the Fang Jing of the future had erased the traces?

However, Yang Jian had not pondered for long when writing appeared on the Human-Skin Parchment once again.

Stroke by stroke, it emerged before his eyes, as though an invisible person were continuously writing with a fountain pen.

"My name is Yang Jian. By the time you see this letter, I am already dead. I am you from ten years in the future, using a special method to pass information from the future to you."

Yang Jian felt a chill run through his entire body. His pupils contracted slightly as he stared at the Human-Skin Parchment in his hand. "What kind of ghostly thing is this?"

This definitely was not a Human-Skin Parchment that recorded information about the future.

He could sense the eeriness and evil nature of this human skin. The words that had appeared on it earlier had not been erased by the future Fang Jing at all. This human skin had erased them on its own.

It had changed owners and needed to erase the former owner's information. That was why it was now generating information for Yang Jian.

"Nothing written on it can be trusted. I can't keep this thing."

Yang Jian's gaze flickered as he felt an unknown terror.

He looked around, intending to throw the human skin into a sewer and make it disappear forever.

But a string of writing appeared on the Human-Skin Parchment: Never throw me away, never throw me away. I can help you.

Without me, you will die, die.

Soon, all the writing vanished, leaving behind only two words: Keep me, keep me.

The two words repeated endlessly, crooked and disorderly, uneven in size, covering the entire sheet of human skin.

The power went out and there was no internet, so this was delayed. Sorry.