Following the university evacuation, Li Zhanxan became possessed by a singular, haunting realization: every time he reached for the boy, the world itself conspired to tear them apart. "Is this a curse?" he whispered into the hollow air.
He felt his strength failing - first, the image of the urbex boy appeared before him, then the one from his dreams, and finally, that of the mysterious architect. Three distinct figures, but what if they had been the same person all along?
"I am truly losing my mind, I have to escape from here," Zhanxan sobbed.
***
Across the distance, in the dim light of a dormitory room, Hei Yanshan sat staring at his vacant phone screen, battling the same gnawing emptiness.
Seeking solace, he began to draw, his hand guided by a force that felt divine.
He designed a structure that mirrored an ancient Imperial Library, but with a surreal twist: the corridors never intersected, yet from every angle, one could catch the fleeting shadow of someone on the opposite side. It was, though he did not know it, a monument to their shared curse.
As he finished the sketch, Hei Yanshan’s fingers trembled with graphite dust and inner tension.
Deep within his soul, a realization pulsed louder than ever: since the appearance of the unknown "L.Z.," his life had become as tangled as a cursed silk thread.
He couldn't grasp it with logic, yet he felt in every fiber of his being that the stranger who liked his urbex photos, the war god haunting his dreams, and the elegant man from the studio were one and the same. This supernatural certainty filled him with both terror and a kind of aching longing.
He had tried desperately to find answers. He returned to the department, plying the secretaries with clumsy excuses about the businessman’s identity, but he struck a wall; they refused to give him any information, as if the world itself were conspiring to hide the truth from him.
Finally, driven by an inexplicable, almost sacred inner urge, he opened the app.
He felt that the post about the ancient Imperial Library would not be just a simple image sharing, but a silent cry into the darkness, a beacon lit amidst the storm of fate. With his finger hovering over the screen, he prayed silently, hoping that L.Z. would be the one to find his call through the digital noise.
***
In the Heavenly Realm...
Official Wang and Junior Official Chen watched the data packets flickering across the celestial network.
"The Paradox is trying to corrupt the files!" Chen shouted.
"It’s injecting viruses into Yanshan’s image to make it invisible to Zhanxan!"
"Let it try," Wang smirked, his eyes fixed on the screen.
With a subtle flick of his wrist, Wang gave a tiny nudge to a single packet of data – a minor shift in the digital tides.
***
Three days later, driven by a strange, inexplicable intuition, Li Zhanxan opened his long-dormant XHS account. His breath hitched.
@BlackMountain_Urbex had posted again.
It wasn't a photograph this time, but a blueprint – a drawing of an ancient, impossible building. As Zhanxan gazed at the lines, a single tear traced a path down his cheek. An overwhelming sense of recognition washed over him, a feeling so familiar it felt like coming home.
***
Author's Note:
Just a little eye candy for my favorite readers! :)))))
I put together some quick character designs so you can get to know Zhanxan and Yanshan better.
I used AI magic for the music and visuals, but the lyrics came straight from my heart.
Meet the boys here: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/F0UsEavYKBY
