The man rummaged through the cabinets and drawers, able to see with only one eye.
The pain was stimulating his brain. His movements grew increasingly rough, and his arm snagged on something, leaving a long gash.
Blood dripped from his elbow onto the gleaming floor tiles, and a woman in red emerged from the stain.
The drops of blood began to change, as though someone were using fresh blood to write out lines of text.
"Your method can't find the path to that school. You failed. You lied to me. You can't give me freedom, and you've wasted your own life."
The pain forced the man to hunch over. Like a shrimp tossed into a wok of boiling oil, he flung the contents of the cabinet across the floor.
He squeezed his eyes shut and plunged into darkness. His body collided with furniture, both hands flailing wildly, like a helpless drowning man.
Medicines and various medical instruments scattered across the floor. A bookshelf toppled over, and several professional textbooks related to eyes landed by the man's feet.
"Intraocular fluid loss, wound infection along the margins, optic nerve atrophy, loss of light perception — even my good eye has started to develop problems, as if something is pressing on it. It's getting harder and harder to open!"
The man kept his eyes shut. There was clearly only one person in the room, yet he screamed desperately, as though these words were meant for someone else's ears.
"But don't worry — as long as I'm still alive, there's still a chance to turn things around!"
The eyes are the windows to the soul. When the eyes can no longer open, the world within the heart is plunged into total darkness.
The man thrashed like a beast, venting his pain until he was utterly spent, and collapsed unconscious beside the dining table.
The light in the room flickered and dimmed. The entire room seemed subtly different from before.
The scattered bloodstains on the floor had coagulated into dark, brownish patches, like a series of scars.
In the suffocating silence, a woman in red appeared in the room.
Her face bore no resemblance to Wen Yu's, but she looked somewhat like Qiumei from Deskmate.
The woman silently walked to the space between the man and Wen Yu. She picked up the notebook that had fallen from the bookshelf earlier.
Bloodstains marked the cover. Inside was a name written in red ink — Qiumei.
The first half of the notebook was written in black ink. The diary entries in the latter half were all penned in red.
The woman flipped to the last few pages.
November 30th: That woman in red keeps trying to stop the surgery. It's as though once the eye is swapped out, she'll disappear for good. Looks like Chang Gu wasn't lying to me — finally, I can stop being haunted by this ghost.
December 1st: The woman in red appeared again. It was she who lured me into Wen Yu's body years ago, making me the next Wen Yu. She was never my friend, even though she's always been living right beside me.
December 2nd: The surgery is too risky, and with the ghost's interference — she's acting like a madwoman trying to stop the eye transplant. Looks like Chang Gu's method really can end all the suffering.
December 3rd: As long as this ghost is around, the surgery can never go smoothly. So the only option is to trap her. I haven't spoken to her in years. This time, I'll play a little game with her.
December 4th: The eye transplant was a success. The red-robed evil spirit who'd been clinging to me finally vanished — though I never imagined it would happen this way. After the surgery succeeded, I became the new red-robed evil spirit.
December 5th: The first time I trusted someone other than my grandmother, I lost my freedom and became a scapegoat. The second time I trusted someone, I couldn't even return to the body that sheltered me. What do I do now? Trust him a third time? Or…