A Chill That Followed Like a Shadow

After leaving the suffocating detention center and climbing back into her comfortable car, Sun Tingting stomped on the accelerator. The engine roared, and the car shot forward. She tried to use speed to shake off the discomfort that clung to her like maggots to bone.

The scenery outside the car window sped past, but in her mind, Lin Feng's cold, lifeless eyes kept reappearing like a frozen close-up, impossible to banish.

Those were nothing like a human being's eyes!

There was no anger in them, no pleading, no despair, not even hatred... Only a bottomless calm, like ice that had lasted ten thousand years. It was a calm that made her heart race, that frightened her.

Sun Tingting shook her head hard, trying to drive away the absurd feeling.

"He's just a prisoner! Putting on a spooky act!" she muttered. Her voice sounded a little shrill in the enclosed car, as though she were trying to bolster her courage.

She tried to recall how meek and spineless Lin Feng used to be, how easily she and Teacher Li Jing had manipulated him, hoping to rebuild her sense of superiority and security. But those cold eyes always intruded at the wrong moment, smashing those fragile fragments of memory to pieces.

Back at school, the familiar atmosphere of the ivory tower dispelled some of her unease. Her roommates gathered around, curious to hear about her visit to "that molester."

Sun Tingting immediately put her victor's mask back on. In an exaggerated, contemptuous tone, she described Lin Feng's miserable, wretched state, embellishing the story of how "elegantly" she had mocked him and how she had made him "too ashamed to show his face." She enjoyed her roommates' astonished, faintly admiring looks, as though they could prove that the moment of alarm during the visit had been an illusion.

"Tingting, you're amazing! You even dared to go see him!"

"Scum like that deserves to suffer in there!"

"You got your graduate recommendation! From now on, you won't even be on the same level as us!"

The flattery sent her floating on air again. That was right. She was the winner, a favored daughter of heaven with a graduate recommendation. Lin Feng was just a criminal rotting in the mud. What was there to fear?

Yet when night fell and the dorm lights went out, leaving her lying alone in the dark, the unease she had forcibly suppressed during the day surged up like a tide.

The silence amplified every faint sound, and the fear in her heart as well.

Those eyes appeared again.

Cold and lifeless, as though they were staring at her from the darkness.

She snapped her eyes open and switched on her bedside lamp, her heart pounding. She looked around and saw only her sleeping roommates and the familiar dorm furnishings.

"Psycho..." she muttered at herself. She turned off the light and forced herself to sleep.

But it was no use.

Whenever she closed her eyes, those eyes followed her like a shadow.

She began to suffer from insomnia, tossing and turning for a long time before drifting into a hazy sleep. Even then, she slept lightly, waking with a start at the slightest sound. Dark circles quietly crept beneath her eyes.

After a few days, the mental torment left her irritable and quick to anger. She even began to see danger everywhere.

That afternoon, after shopping with her best friend, she was in a slightly better mood. She walked alone toward the dorm building, talking and laughing. When she reached a relatively secluded path, she happened to glance back.

Not far behind her, a homeless man in a tattered, filthy padded coat was walking along slowly. His hair and beard were tangled together, and his whole body gave off a sour, rancid stench. His gaze seemed... seemed to be fixed on her?

Sun Tingting's heart skipped a beat, and an inexplicable chill crept up her spine.

She quickened her pace and deliberately turned onto a busier main road. Using the glass display window of a roadside shop, she pretended to fix her hair while secretly watching behind her.

That homeless man! He was still following her! He was moving at the same unhurried pace, his head lowered, but he was undoubtedly heading her way!

Fear seized her in an instant!

If it had been someone who looked like a student, or a well-dressed man following her, she might have dared to confront or even berate him. But faced with a homeless man like this, who might not even be right in the head, all she felt was fear! A person like that had nothing to lose and nothing to hold him back. Who knew what he might do?

She no longer dared return to the dorm, terrified of revealing where she lived. She ducked into a milk tea shop, ordered a drink, and sat by the window, watching outside with her heart pounding.

The homeless man actually squatted down on the street corner across the road, curling up there like a heap of discarded garbage. But whenever he raised his eyes, his gaze seemed to sweep over the entrance to the milk tea shop, whether deliberately or not!

Sun Tingting's hands began to shake. She took out her phone, intending to call her best friend or her boyfriend, but then felt embarrassed-she, Sun Tingting, had been frightened this badly by a homeless man? It would sound ridiculous if word got out.

She sat in the milk tea shop for a full half hour, and the homeless man squatted across the street for the whole half hour.

At last, unable to bear the mental torment any longer, she gathered her courage, rushed out of the milk tea shop, and ran full tilt toward the school security office.

She did not dare look back, but she could seemingly hear unhurried footsteps behind her!

Only when she saw the sign for the school security office did she breathe a little easier and dash inside. She told the security guard on duty, in a jumble of words, that someone was following her.

The guard went outside to look around, then came back shaking his head. "There's no one there. Miss Sun, did you see wrong? There are only a few students passing by outside."

Sun Tingting ran to the entrance and cautiously peered out. Sure enough, the homeless man was gone.

She let out a long breath. Had it all been a false alarm? Maybe he really had just been going the same way?

But over the next few days, similar incidents happened one after another!

Whether she was leaving the library after studying, returning to the dorm from class, or even just going to the school gate to pick up a package, she would always catch a glimpse of that familiar, terrifying homeless figure somewhere, at some moment!

He did not come close or do anything. He was simply there in the distance, silent, like a filthy shadow, like a maggot clinging to bone that she could not shake off!

That silent, omnipresent gaze was more devastating than a direct threat! Sun Tingting was on the verge of a breakdown. She no longer dared go out alone, insisting that a classmate go with her to class and accompany her back to the dorm. Her insomnia grew worse at night, and the slightest rustle would wake her with a start.

Finally, while shopping at a supermarket off campus, Sun Tingting confirmed once again that she was being followed, and she broke down completely. Hiding behind a supermarket shelf, she dialed the police with trembling hands.

"Hello... is this 110? I want to report a crime! Someone keeps following me! He's a homeless man! I'm so scared..." Her voice was thick with tears.

A patrol car arrived quickly. Two officers found a terrified, pale-faced Sun Tingting at the supermarket entrance. Following her directions, they found the figure squatting beside a trash can across the road-it was the beggar deathsworn, Wang Wu.

The officers approached and questioned him as a matter of routine. "Hello, we're police officers. This student says you've been following her. Is that true?"

Wang Wu raised his head, revealing a numb, dirty face and cloudy eyes. He looked at the officers, then at Sun Tingting, who stood at a distance, afraid to approach. His voice was hoarse and calm, but carried the shameless, utterly unyielding manner peculiar to a lowlife thug.

"Comrades, does her family own this street? Did her family build this road? Why can she walk here but I can't? I'm just picking up a few bottles and bits of cardboard. Who am I bothering?"

The officer frowned. "Watch your attitude! We received a report that you've followed this student for several days in a row, causing her distress and fear."

Wang Wu immediately began shouting, raising his voice and attracting passersby who gradually gathered around. "Distress? Fear? What did I do? Did I lay a finger on her? Did I curse at her? I'm just walking down the street and collecting scrap. Is that against the law now? You cops can just go around falsely accusing good people?"

The more he spoke, the more worked up he became. He even began waving his arms and shouting at the onlookers. "Everybody, come take a look! Tell me who's in the right! The police are bullying people! They look down on us scrap collectors! Don't we poor people have human rights? We get questioned and arrested just for walking down the street!"

The crowd began pointing and whispering among themselves. The officers found the situation extremely troublesome. The man had done nothing obviously illegal and was only arguing with them, and he was good at stirring up the onlookers' emotions.

A slightly older officer tried to bring the situation under control. "Calm down! We're just asking routine questions! We never said you broke the law!"

But Wang Wu refused to listen and kept shouting that "the police are bullying the poor," drawing an ever larger crowd.

The two officers exchanged helpless glances. They truly had no reason to pursue the matter further. In the end, they could only give Wang Wu a verbal warning and a talking-to-he appeared utterly unmoved-before turning and walking over to Sun Tingting.

"Miss," the officer said, a hint of helplessness in his voice, "we've looked into it, and he... really hasn't done anything obviously illegal. This is a public street, and we can't stop people from walking on it. You... try to stay safe, and it would be best to travel with someone. If you find that he takes any further action that actually harms you, such as making physical contact or issuing verbal threats, call the police immediately."

Sun Tingting watched the officers get into their car and leave, watched the crowd gradually disperse, and watched the homeless man across the road slowly squat down beside the trash can again. He even seemed to grin in her direction, though perhaps it was an illusion. She felt cold all over, completely engulfed by immense helplessness and fear.

Even the police could do nothing about him!

This man... what did he want?!

She stood by the roadside, feeling as though she were caught in an invisible, filthy net. The more she struggled, the tighter it wound around her.

And could all this have something to do with those cold eyes in the detention center...?

A thought that made her shudder uncontrollably surfaced for the first time.