Forgotten Photo Studio

Chapter 15 The Information Ghost

Metro Line 7, Lianhua Road Station.

The lingering heat of the evening rush hour enveloped the subway station, the air thick and stuffy, making it hard to breathe.

Disinfectant, sweat, and a faint, sweet, metallic scent of rust soaked in tears—it was almost imperceptible, yet it seeped into my nostrils.

Xu Yan and Chen Zhiwei mingled among the few passengers, looking like two ordinary latecomers.

Xu Yan's camera bag was pressed heavily against his side, while the compass needle in Chen Zhiwei's hand trembled slightly, stubbornly pointing towards the depths of the platform, as if pulled by an invisible thread.

“The ‘texture’ of the aura has changed,” Chen Zhiwei said, her voice strained and filled with a sense of physiological rejection. “It’s not a concentrated resentment, but a fragmented, pervasive sorrow. It’s not in a single point; it’s in all the flowing electrical signals… it’s ‘alive.’”

Her perception, combined with the confirmation of the compass, delineated the scope of the anomaly.

They locked onto that billboard.

The model on the screen had snow-white skin and a smile so perfect it seemed unreal.

“Nothing seems amiss on the surface,” Xu Yan murmured, his gaze sharp as a knife.

“Look at its ‘shadow’.” Chen Zhiwei’s fingertip traced the edge of the compass, injecting a barely perceptible amount of energy.

The pointer suddenly froze, completely still!

Xu Yan stared intently at it.

The billboard cast a shadow on the ground under the pale light of the platform.

The edges are unnaturally "dissolving," like a pool of slowly seeping, writhing black oil, occasionally bulging with a desperate bubble that bursts with a pop, releasing a wave of sorrow that makes one's heart clench and nose sting with tears.

Every passing passenger felt as if they had been pricked by an invisible needle, their steps faltering slightly, a fleeting shadow passing through their eyes.

"It's filtering, amplifying... the most subtle sadness." Xu Yan felt a chill that went deep into his bones.

This kind of attack is silent and stealthy, yet it can precisely strike the softest corner of people's hearts.

“It’s more like… forced resonance and amplification.” Chen Zhiwei’s face turned pale. “It is itself a huge ‘resonance chamber’ of sorrow…”

Xu Yan closed his eyes and tried his best to recall the difficult method in "The Mirror of the Dark and Bright" about "seeing through illusion and peering into the flow of information".

He tried to focus a little of his attention on the camera.

I opened my eyes again, looking through the viewfinder.

The scene changed abruptly!

The billboard's light is as deceptively sharp as a knife, and the shadow it casts has transformed into a pool of boiling data asphalt.

Countless pixelated faces floated and disappeared within it: distorted emojis, crying pop-ups, fragments of cursed private messages...

They tear apart and reform, like digital vengeful spirits that can never be reborn.

These are aggregates of vicious comments, desperate news, and painful private matters.

Even more terrifying is that countless invisible data "roots" are extending from this abyss, greedily plunging into the surrounding light circuits, advertising screens, and even the Bluetooth signals of passengers' mobile phones, frantically sucking up the dissipating negative emotions!

"The root of the problem lies over there!" Xu Yan shouted, following the direction where countless data roots eventually converged.

At the end of the platform is an old equipment room with a sign that reads "Fault Repair".

The door was locked.

“I’ll do it.” Chen Zhiwei stepped forward and took out the mutilated, verdigris-covered Soul-Suppressing Bell.

Lightly press the bell's mouth against the keyhole, make a hand seal, and softly chant: "Ring ring ring, penetrate the mysterious gate, break through the illusionary barrier, open a ray of light!"

jingle--

A very faint, yet penetrating, ringing sound rang out.

The lock clicked, and the door opened.

Inside the door, an intense sadness and despair almost solidified, rushing towards us!

Within the confined space, cables tangled together, with a violently pulsating black data cocoon in the center frantically consuming and releasing energy.

When it appears, it is as if countless whispers are repeating their names in your ear.

It is the core of the "Eye of Sorrow".

The intruders alerted it!
The black cocoon suddenly trembled violently.

Woohoo... Waaah!!!

A huge sound wave suddenly exploded, as if the eardrums had been shattered by a hammer.

The crying faces on the screen dissolved and distorted, like rotten paint being washed away by water.

The subway announcements repeated themselves out of control, booming like the cries of countless babies.

In that instant, a gash was forcibly torn open in Xu Yan's consciousness.

A nearly forgotten voice, piercing through all the shrieks and roars, reached his ears clearly:

"Yan'er..."

The voice was soft, carrying a familiar weariness, as if it still carried the smell of cooking oil and the aroma of food from the kitchen of my home many years ago.

It is not an illusion; it is the softest, most untouchable piece of flesh deep in my memory.

Xu Yan's heart felt as if it had been suddenly clenched and then released by an invisible hand, leaving behind a bitter, empty void.

His eyes welled up uncontrollably, and he could almost feel his mother's cool fingertips about to touch his cheek.

His lips moved, but the response he was about to give was stuck in his throat, burning hot.

--mom.

But the sound stopped abruptly the next second.

It didn't fade away gradually, but rather, like a sharp pair of scissors, precisely severed the last thread connecting the past and the present.

The sound disappeared, along with the evoked, warm, and comforting sensation of everyday life, all of it was completely sucked away.

It is not that it is silent, but that it is nonexistent.

All the details of the voice and all the emotions associated with it in his mind instantly faded and turned cold, transforming into an objective, cold image that had nothing to do with him.

He lost it.

It's not that he can't remember, but that he knows clearly that it once existed, but has now been permanently and completely taken away from him.

A feeling of being stripped away, more cruel than any physical injury, left his chest feeling cold and empty.

Immediately, the shrill sound of the broadcast came rushing back, abruptly pulling him back from his hallucination.

It crashed into his consciousness like a tsunami.

He groaned, and blood gushed from his nose.

Chen Zhiwei was the first to be affected, her face instantly turning ashen, and the compass needle spun wildly, almost breaking.

She bit her tongue hard, the excruciating pain bringing a sliver of clarity, and with all her might, she raised the Soul-Suppressing Bell to her chest.

But this time, the terrifying sound wave data stream was too violent, and a single ringtone could not penetrate it completely.

Just as the sound waves were about to completely engulf the two of them, a resolute ruthlessness flashed in Chen Zhiwei's eyes.

She suddenly raised her hand, pulled a slender bronze hairpin from her hair bun, and without hesitation, fiercely stabbed it into the web of her hand holding the bell.

puff!
Fresh blood gushed out instantly, dripping onto the Soul-Suppressing Bell.

"Ding!!!"

The blood-stained bell's tone suddenly changed, becoming ancient, heavy, and somber.

Like a resounding bell, it forcefully shattered the tide of data.

"Senior brother! Now! Its core is in the cocoon's heart!" Chen Zhiwei shouted hoarsely, his body swaying precariously from blood loss and exhaustion. Xu Yan's eyes were bloodshot; he knew that ordinary filming would be ineffective.

He suddenly pulled out the dark gold wide-angle lens, his fingers trembling slightly with determination.

He knew the price to pay, but there was no turning back.

"Click!" The camera pans out.

The camera conveyed an almost scorching thirst.

He raised his camera, and the wide-angle view instantly locked onto the highly compressed, constantly exploding dark data core within the cocoon.

"Lock with shadows!!" he roared as he pressed the shutter for the first time.

Click!

The flashes of light, like black needles, pierced the data core.

A massive flow of information was forcibly extracted.

The black cocoon twisted wildly, releasing even stronger interference, and the crying faces on the surrounding electronic screens almost burst out of the screens.

Xu Yan's eyes were brimming with tears as he pressed the shutter again.

Click!

Fingers completely cold, executed like a corpse.
The white light exploded again, tearing a gap between the wailing and the shadows.

But at that very moment, Xu Yan's heart suddenly tightened.

He suddenly realized that his current posture was like that of a tool tied to a rope.

Once again, we go to clean up, to contain, and to maintain order for others.

"Is it that they need the comfort of being in the shadows, or am I actually doing the right thing?"

The thought, like a barb, suddenly pierced my mind.

His arms were still mechanically maintaining the posture, but his eyes began to go blank.

Every shutter click is draining a part of him—his memories, his mind, even his flesh and blood.

What happens after it can be contained?

Did those who died truly find peace?

Or is it simply being locked in some cold closet, becoming evidence of "order" in the eyes of others?

Just as he was about to press the shutter for the third time, the millions of weeping faces in the boiling black cocoon of data suddenly froze for a moment.

All the cacophony of cries coalesced into a stream of consciousness, a mixture of countless sounds yet remarkably clear, which crashed directly into his mind:

"It's... 'that gravedigger's'... camera and 'soul-suppressing bell'."

He also tried to 'fix' me.

"Ridiculous... How can something broken be put back together?"
"The River of Oblivion will eventually swallow everything, and you will be no exception."

It recognized the camera and the soul-suppressing bell.

It had contact with its master!

It's even possible that Master's investigation back then wasn't simply about eliminating it?!

This brief exchange of consciousness brought a tremendous information shock and a strange sense of "identity," slowing Xu Yan's actions by a fraction of a second.

And in that instant, the data core launched its final, and most terrifying, counterattack:

It is not an attack, but an opening.

The entire black river poured down into Xu Yan's consciousness with a thunderous roar!

It's not malice, not revenge, but a demonstration:

Look, this is what you have created.

Remember us.

Or, join us.

An overwhelming sense of grief and emptiness, as vast as the universe, pressed down upon him, threatening to completely assimilate and dissolve his consciousness in this river of sorrow!
"Senior brother!!"

Chen Zhiwei's heart-wrenching cry pulled him back from the brink of consciousness.

We must not give in!

Xu Yan let out a beast-like roar, resisting the boundless spiritual devouring, and with the last bit of will belonging to his "self," he fiercely and resolutely pressed down the shutter for the third time.

Click! ! !

The final burst of black light, like a cosmic black hole, completely devoured and sucked into the open data core that displayed the source of endless sorrow!
A blindingly bright, deafening blank space.

He instantly forgot the significance of his standing there, forgot why he was taking pictures, and was left only with a cold, mechanical instinct to complete the task, and an instinctive fear of that endless sorrow.

The data cocoon has completely disappeared.

All anomalies ceased.

Deathly silence descended.

Xu Yan staggered and knelt down, breathing heavily and hollowly.

Although he had the protective scepter, he still lost three pieces of the puzzle, one of which was almost his foundation and belief.

He suddenly realized that the cost of deprivation was not random.

The more powerful a being is, the more it is necessary to cut away the part closest to its soul.

A mother's smile, a master's conviction—that's how they set their prices.

The camera was scorching hot, and the three sheets of photographic paper it produced no longer showed ghostly figures, but rather countless distorted, compressed, painful faces made up of 0s and 1s, forcibly frozen in time.

Chen Zhiwei collapsed to the ground, exhausted. Blood was still flowing from the wound on her palm, and her face was deathly pale.

The compass was still vibrating wildly.

"Senior brother... this seems like a setup."

Her fingertips gripped the compass tightly, stained with blood, and the needle spun wildly as if held by countless hands.

"It has twisted the very fabric of the city. Resentment has accumulated and knotted in the sewers, the railway tracks, and even every fiber optic cable! This is not a single ghost, but a... burial that covers the entire city."

She looked up at Xu Yan, a rare look of fear and coldness appearing in her eyes:
"It devours not the souls of the dead, but the life force of the living."

Just then, Xu Yan's phone vibrated.

The message from Lin Lan arrived as expected, like a final verdict:
[E-03-II recovery complete, excellent efficiency. Keep it up, Mr. Xu. You are more suited to this world than we anticipated.]

Xu Yan slowly raised his head, the confusion and emptiness in his eyes replaced by a cold anger that had been suppressed to the extreme.

The anger was not boiling, but rather like ancient ice, radiating a chilling aura that could freeze everything.

"Knowing the subtle."

Chen Zhiwei raised her pale face.

Xu Yan's voice turned cold, like a frozen river:

"They're not cleaning out ghosts, they're digging an underground river."

"An underground river that could drown everyone."

　Thank you all for your support. You can make a small investment before signing the contract! Thank you for your support.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)