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墨書 Inktalez
Chapter Two
Lin Sui stood in the bathroom of the Nanchang Road Old House, her fingers still clutching the yellowed boat ticket. The low sound of rain outside echoed in her ears, as if someone were whispering. She stared at the butterfly shadow code on the wall, her heartbeat drowning out the sound of raindrops. The sequence of symbols matched the black market price list in the family letter—In 1947, France Currency had plummeted like an avalanche, and Shanghai's black market transactions concealed exchanges of gold bars and silver dollars with coded language. Shen Jingqiu, a female writer, how could she be involved in such matters? Taking a deep breath, Lin Sui forced herself to calm down. She needed to get to the bottom of this; otherwise, the eerie atmosphere of the old house would ensnare her like creeping vines.
By the time she left the old house, dawn was breaking. The streetlights cast a dim yellow glow, reflecting off the wet cobblestones like a mirror. She returned to the archives and dug out the 1947 edition of the Damei Evening News. The paper was brittle and yellowed at the edges; she carefully turned to the feature page, where a striking headline caught her eye: "Female Writer Disappears Under Suspicion." The article was sensational, stating that Shen Jingqiu had vanished from her residence in the French Concession in early April, taking with her twenty gold bars, yet leaving behind a Blue Butterfly wing on the windowsill—an inconsistency with rumors about the gold bars. The reporter speculated that she had fled overseas, but no one had seen her leave Shanghai. Lin Sui frowned; the ticket was dated April 25th—if she intended to leave, why wait until the end of the month?
Lin Sui decided to investigate further. She first looked into Shen Jingqiu's background—thirty years old, unmarried, living in a small building on Xiafei Road in the French Concession, known for her suspense novels with a sharp writing style. In 1947, her last story titled "Blue Wing" was published, telling of a woman who made a deal with a demon to escape reality and transformed into a butterfly. Readers thought it was a metaphor, but now it seemed more like some kind of confession. Lin Sui flipped to an accompanying photo in the newspaper—a blurry black-and-white image of Shen Jingqiu standing by a window, her gaze hollow as if her soul had been drained.
She then contacted the construction site manager. The rusted safe had been unearthed just days prior; inside were records from the central bank's seizure. She borrowed copies of the documents which revealed that Shen Jingqiu's account had been frozen on April 2nd due to "suspected illegal transactions." Frozen on the day she disappeared? Lin Sui's heart tightened. In Shanghai in 1947, France Currency was worthless; gold bars had become hard currency. If Shen Jingqiu truly possessed twenty gold bars and her account was frozen, how would she survive? Black market trading was the only answer—but what did the Blue Butterfly wing signify?
Returning to the old house for more clues, she found that its daytime atmosphere lacked the nighttime eeriness but was filled with a heavy silence instead. Pushing open the bathroom door, sunlight streamed through broken windows onto tiles that shimmered faintly. She crouched down to examine last night's wall; the butterfly shadow code was gone as if erased. Stunned, she reached out; the wall felt cold beneath her fingers and faintly carried a metallic sweetness. As she stood up, her foot kicked against a loose floorboard revealing a notebook underneath. She picked it up; its cover read "Shen Jingqiu, March 1947."
The pages were yellowed with neat yet chaotic handwriting. The first page read: "The gold bars are my last salvation, but what they want is not money; it's me." The following pages detailed her fears: someone knocking at her door, voices echoing from within walls, and Blue Butterflies fluttering outside her window. She wrote: "I signed a contract thinking I could escape, but time has stopped." The last page contained a farewell note: "On April 1st, I will leave—not walk away but disappear." Lin Sui's fingers trembled as she read this. Comparing it to her boat ticket dated April 25th—Shen Jingqiu hadn't left; she had been trapped.
Flipping back to the newspaper, Lin Sui noticed a detail: after Shen Jingqiu's disappearance, neighbors reported hearing low murmurs coming from her room at night that sounded like wings flapping. A chill ran down her spine as she looked up at the bathroom mirror. Dust coated its surface reflecting her face; however, something seemed to move at its edges. Wiping it clean revealed a Blue Butterfly within—the wings slowly flapping. She stumbled back, heart racing like thunder. This was no illusion; the butterfly shadow in the mirror was as clear as if it were alive.
Leaning against the wall for support and breathing heavily, Lin Sui reminded herself that she had seen strange things before—old artifacts often carried stories—but this felt different. Shen Jingqiu's despair pierced through her heart like a needle. She recalled that night when her mother disappeared—the blue butterfly outside her window—the cold touch seared into her memory. She had always believed something had taken her mother away; now Shen Jingqiu's Blue Butterfly seemed to mock her fears. Closing her eyes tightly and gripping the notebook until her nails dug into her palm.
She tried to sort through her thoughts. Shen Jingqiu's account had been frozen; she sought help from the black market and signed some sort of "contract," only to find herself trapped instead of escaping. Was Blue Butterfly a symbol or a curse? Opening her eyes again, she focused on the butterfly shadow in the mirror—it remained still but she distinctly felt a chill seeping from its surface as if it were pressed against her face. Remembering a scene from "Blue Wing," where a woman transformed into a butterfly and became eternally trapped in cycles made Lin Sui feel as though she too were being pulled into some kind of loop—the air in the old house pressing down on her suffocatingly.
She wanted to leave but felt as if lead weighed down her legs. She feared both truth and that she might share Shen Jingqiu's fate. As a child, she often dreamt of seeing her mother standing by the window looking back at her with hollow eyes like those of a corpse. Now Shen Jingqiu’s shadow seemed to replay that nightmare before her eyes. Gritting her teeth, she told herself not to retreat—the truth was her only weapon even if it would tear open old wounds.
Taking a deep breath, Lin Sui shoved the notebook into her backpack and turned to leave when suddenly—the bathroom light flickered on—a chandelier with glass shades cracked all over illuminated dimly like candlelight. She froze; power had long been cut off in this old house—how could this light be on? Looking up revealed shadows dancing around it as if someone were gently swaying above it. A wave of dizziness washed over her as whispers filled her ears like wings brushing against one another. Covering her ears did nothing; they grew clearer as if emanating from within: "You have arrived..."
She suddenly looked into the mirror, and the Blue Butterfly was gone, replaced by a blurred shadow resembling the outline of a woman. She blinked, and the shadow vanished, but the whispers remained. Gritting her teeth, she ran downstairs and burst out of the old house. The rain had stopped, and the air was damp and cold. Turning back, she saw the bathroom window dark and hollow, like an open eye. Leaning against a streetlamp to catch her breath, she looked down and noticed a mark on her wrist—a faint outline resembling butterfly wings.
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