The woman could not sleep.
She lay in her bed, staring at the ceiling. The money from the old Chinese man's wallet was under her pillow. She had counted it three times before lying down. It was not a lot. But it was something. It was easy.
She should have felt satisfied. But she did not.
The room was too still. Strangely, the usual street sounds that were always there were gone. No motorbikes. No dogs barking. No distant call to prayer. Just silence. The kind of silence that does not belong in a city. The kind of silence that makes you afraid to do anything.
She sat up. Looked around. Her eyes moved from the door to the window to the chair in the corner. Everything was where it should be. The walls were the same walls. The ceiling was the same ceiling. But something was wrong. She could feel it in her bones. Her heart trembled.
She whispered: Who is there?
No answer.
She waited. The silence pressed against her ears. She could hear her own breathing. Too loud. Too fast.
She asked again: Who is there? What do you want?
Behind her, the second soul smiled. Just a chilling smile. He had been standing there since she woke. She could not see him or hear him. But she felt him. In her spine. In the hair on her arms. In the part of her brain that still remembered what fear felt like before she learned to ignore it.
He leaned close. His lips almost touching her ear. He whispered: You people. I don't know if you're brave or not, but really... ahahaha. You dare to make a move on the King of Hell?
The words did not enter her ears. They entered her directly. Into her mind. Into her chest. Into the place where her soul lived, if she still had one.
Then the second soul stepped backwards and was gone.
The silence broke. The street sounds returned. A motorbike passed. A dog barked in the distance. The fan blades turned, pushing air that she could finally feel.
She sat in her bed, shaking. The money under her pillow felt different now. Heavier. Dirty. She wanted to throw it away. She wanted to give it back. She wanted to forget it had ever been in her hand.
She did none of those things. She sat in her bed until the sun rose.
That woman did not sleep again that night.
---
In the hours before dawn, the soul moved through the city.
He did not walk. He did not fly. He simply was where he wanted to be. One moment he was in the room with the woman. The next moment he was standing in a narrow street where a man was locking his cart after a long night of selling fried things.
This man had been in the crowd. His fists had connected with Wen De's ribs. His mouth had shouted words the soul did not need to hear again. The man was humming now. A song on the radio. He did not know what was coming. He did not know he had been seen.
The soul looked at him. He reached out. Not with a hand. With something deeper. He touched the man's fate. A thread. Thin. Invisible. Connected to his birth. Connected to his death. Connected to every choice he had ever made and every choice he would ever make.
The soul pulled the thread. Not hard. Just enough to mark it. Just enough so that when the time came, the thread would not break. It would hold. It would pull back.
The man felt nothing. He finished locking his cart. He wiped his hands on his shirt. He yawned. He walked toward his house. He would sleep well tonight. It would be his last good sleep for a long time.
The soul moved to the next one. A teenager who had kicked Wen De's legs while he was on the ground. The boy was lying in bed, scrolling through his phone, watching a video of a cat falling off a table. He laughed. He did not know what was watching him from the corner of his room.
The soul marked him.
A woman who had spit on Wen De as he tried to stand. She was in her kitchen, making tea. Her hands were steady. Her face was calm. She had already forgotten the old Chinese man. She would not forget him again.
The soul marked her.
A man who had taken a photo with his phone, smiling. He was sitting on his couch, looking at the photo. He had sent it to three friends. They had all laughed. The soul looked at the photo over his shoulder. Wen De on the ground. Blood on his face. The crowd around him, smiling. The man in the photo was smiling too.
The soul marked him.
A vendor who had done nothing, watched everything, and then turned away when it was over. He was already at the market, setting up his stall. He had not told anyone what he saw. He had told himself it was not his business. He had told himself the old man probably deserved it. He had told himself many things.
The soul marked him.
One by one, the soul marked them all. Dozens of them. The ones who swung their fists. The ones who kicked. The ones who shouted. The ones who watched and did nothing. The ones who smiled. The ones who took photos. The ones who walked away.
He did not kill them. Killing was too fast. One cut ends the pain. A thousand cuts — that was different. That was a lifetime.
He thought about what Wen De had asked for. Alive but dead at the same time. Every waking hour in deep pain. Every sleeping hour in deep pain. No cure.
He thought about the death by a thousand cuts. The place where he had landed. The country that did this to its own people because of their face, their name, their blood, their religion, their ethnicity. Not one cut. A thousand cuts. A lifetime of cuts. A system of cuts.
He touched his own nose. He thought.
Then he looked beyond the individuals. Beyond the woman and the crowd. He looked at the system that had made them. The majority that owned the country. The government that shared their face, their religion, their name. The laws that protected them and no one else. The police who looked away. The courts that closed their eyes. The schools that taught them this was normal. The centuries of cuts that had fallen on people like Wen De. His grandfather. His father. His mother. All of them holding it. Tahan. Hold it.
The soul smiled.
He said: So be it. Let the game begin.
---
The day passed peacefully.
Wen De went about his routine. He cleaned the kitchen. He checked on his mother. He sat on the step outside for a while, watching the street, feeling the heat on his neck. His left hand did not tremble. He noticed it again. He did not question it.
The woman went home. She locked her door. She sat in her room, staring at the wall. She did not leave again that day.
The market closed. The vendors packed their carts. The teenager went to bed early. The photographer scrolled through his photos one more time. The vendor counted his money and went home.
The city settled into its usual night rhythm. Motorbikes. Dogs. The call to prayer at dusk. Then silence. Then the slow winding down toward midnight.
No one knew what was coming.
---
At 11:59 PM, on the border of midnight, time literally stopped.
The fan blades hung motionless. The dust motes froze in the light. The sound of motorbikes cut off mid-roar. The call to prayer from the mosque two streets over stopped mid-note. Even the air stopped moving.
The second soul appeared in the air. In the middle of the town.
He floated there, looking down at the frozen city. At the woman in her bed, still shaking. At the vendor with his cart half-locked. At the teenager with his phone still in his hand. At the photographer with his photo still on the screen. At all of them. The ones who swung their fists. The ones who kicked. The ones who watched. The ones who smiled. The ones who walked away.
He smiled.
Then he raised his hand. The black flag was not in his hand. It was his hand. It was his blood. It was his soul. It was the thing the Jade Emperor had given and could never take back.
He said: San Geng. The Third Watch. The hour when the gates open.
His voice was not loud. But it went everywhere. Through every wall. Through every door. Through every window.
He said: Spirits of this land. Wandering ones. Hungry ones. Forgotten ones. The ones who were beaten. The ones who were robbed. The ones who were called names and told to hold it. The ones who died with no rites. The ones whose blood still stains the earth.
He paused.
He said: I am the Second Soul. The one sent to protect Yanluo Wang. And I say — the gates are open.
He lowered his hand.
And the shadows moved. In the corners. In the alleys. In the places where the light of the frozen city did not reach. Shadows stretched and rose. Shapes. Faces. Eyes. Finally full figures. Some normal. Some grotesque.
They came. From the crossroads. From the rivers where the drowned still waited. From the graves with no markers. From the places where the system had cut them and cut them until there was nothing left but waiting. Thousands of them. Tens of thousands. Finally, more than one million.
The second soul looked at them. He smiled again.
He said: Each of you. Choose a mark.
He flicked his hand. In the frozen city, each marked person glowed. Not light. Something deeper. A thread. A wound. A door.
He said: Each mark can be occupied by ten thousand ghosts. Ten thousand of you. One body.
The ghosts stirred. Their eyes burned.
He said: Choose freely. Occupy them. Make them live their life in hell.
He paused. His smile widened.
He said: Feel free to use any method you can think of.
The ghosts did not wait. They poured down. Into the woman's room. Into the vendor's stall. Into the teenager's bed. Into the photographer's couch. Into the ones who swung their fists. Into the ones who kicked. Into the ones who watched and turned away.
Ten thousand per body.
The woman sat frozen in her bed. She could not move. Time was stopped. But she felt them enter. One by one. Hundred by hundred. Thousand by thousand.
Each ghost brought its own death. Its own hunger and pain. The marked victims would relive their days — awake or sleeping — with the memory of torture that every ghost had endured their whole life. They would endure it for as long as the ghost had endured it.
She could not scream. Time was stopped.
But when it started again — she would scream. For the rest of her life. Every waking hour. Every sleeping hour. No cure. No god would hear her. No god would help her.
The second soul floated above the city. He watched the ghosts enter. He watched the marks fill. He watched the system that had cut Wen De for fifty years begin to feel the weight of every cut it had ever made.
He laughed. Softly. To himself.
He said: Now. Let's see if your god can help you.
Time started again.
---
END OF CHAPTER NINE