It was already morning, yet the dense fog shrouding the skies above Dongdu Airport showed no sign of lifting. Looking down from the control tower’s window, the runway lights glowed through the mist in smears of color that almost merged into one.

  This fog had persisted for over a dozen hours, and the feeble rays of dawn were powerless against its thickness.

  Air traffic controllers anxiously guided another plane in for landing. “If it weren’t for the advanced avionics in these new cockpits, there’d be no way to land in this weather!”

  Only when the aircraft drew very near to the runway did they, with the naked eye, make out its full silhouette—like something emerging suddenly from another world.

  “Thud!” The landing gear struck the tarmac with a thunderous roar; the massive fuselage shuddered a few times, then finally steadied—bringing hundreds of hearts aboard the plane safely down to earth.

  Even as the fog cast a perpetual twilight, the terminal building not far from the runway and apron stirred awake in that brief night.

  Passengers arriving one after another scattered through the empty arrival hall like green beans poured into a basin.

  The luggage carousel began its lazy rotation, humming as it spun.

  Just as Wu Letian stepped up to the Tianlong Airlines customer service desk opposite Carousel 9, two young staff—a man and a woman—were chatting idly. Their long day was just beginning; they hadn’t yet been drained of energy or patience by passengers’ demands, so they wore relaxed, energetic expressions.

  A few hours earlier, in this very spot, he had already sensed that the middle?aged woman with straight?cut bangs was stringing him along—but he’d still clung to a sliver of hope. After all, his flight from New York carried many important items; he couldn’t simply abandon them.

  Most crucially, he refused to believe that his triumphant homecoming—returning to assume his new post—should be derailed by so many obstacles from the very start.

  At not yet thirty, Wu Letian was already the most outstanding and youngest Investigation Chief at the Bureau of Aeronautical Investigations (BAI). Since joining BAI as part of its first cohort of agents six years ago, he’d cracked numerous difficult cases, swiftly rising to Chief, and had been handpicked by Investigation Minister Zhong Sheng as his successor upon retirement.

  On this trip home, he had just completed a year?long special training at the BAI Training Academy in New York. By the established plan, today—yes, today—he would take over from the retiring Minister Zhong and become the new Minister of the Investigation Department, reporting directly to Director General Ning Buwei.

  In other words, once he became Minister of Investigation, the next logical step would be the Directorship. He had no doubt that time was on his side.

  Now, he was back in Dongdu—yet his luggage was not. His flight, originally scheduled to arrive the previous evening, had been delayed until after midnight, and when the luggage carousel finally ground to a halt, his bags still hadn’t appeared.

  He’d asked the Tianlong Airlines desk staff—the same woman with the bangs—who told him his luggage likely hadn’t been loaded in New York due to the delay and would arrive on the next flight—which was, in fact, the one whose carousel he was now waiting at.

  He recognized her excuse, but had no better option—luggage doesn’t sprout wings and fly across the globe; if it truly wasn’t on his flight, the most plausible hope was the next.

  Of course, it was also possible they’d lost it, but until there was proof, he wasn’t about to give up.

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  Wu Letian interrupted the young pair’s conversation. “Excuse me—can you check the status of the flight from New York, the one scheduled to land at eight this morning? I’m here to collect my luggage.”

  “It’s not time yet—just wait. And your bags should come out on Carousel 9, over there.” The staff clearly regarded him as clueless and were annoyed by the interruption—theoretically, their shift didn’t even start until 8:00.

  At that moment, Carousel 9 was in motion, the first suitcases rolling out—though belonging to other flights.

  “But international flights usually land ahead of schedule, don’t they?” Wu Letian pressed. He knew landing priority went to international arrivals, and they often came in early—sometimes by an hour or more.

  “You can see the fog for yourself…”

  “Fine. My flight was delayed until after midnight, and my luggage still hasn’t appeared. Your colleague—the woman with bangs—told me it would be on this flight.” Wu Letian stifled his temper; he didn’t want to snap at them.

  “Oh…we don’t know. She’s not working today. Besides, it hasn’t even landed yet.”

  “Can’t you check for me? See how much longer until it arrives?”

  “There’s a big display over there with each flight’s status—you can look yourself.” Clearly, they thought he was being difficult; they had no idea how eager he was to report for his new role.

  But before reporting in, he had to retrieve his luggage. Was this how Tianlong Airlines treated their customers?! Wu Letian could take no more—he decided to give them a piece of his mind.

  At that moment, a scream rang out behind him: “Ah!”

  Followed by cries of terror.

  Before he could turn fully, commotion surged toward him, feet pounding in chaotic flight.

  Passengers fled from the carousel, despite its continuous spin and the stream of luggage—no one cared about bags anymore.

  “Someone’s dead!”

  “There’s a body!”

  Terrors echoed, panic and confusion in each shout.

  Wu Letian decided to forget Tianlong Airlines for now and address the immediate crisis.

  He pushed through the crowd, sprinting to Carousel 9—and there it lay: a corpse.

  Had an ordinary passenger found it first, it would have sparked panic. Yet to him, this body looked less like a corpse and more like a strange soul sleeping peacefully on the belt.

  He couldn’t bring himself to cry out.

  The deceased’s face was calm; he wore a one?piece gray casual suit, a pale striped shirt tucked neatly into his trousers, and lightweight black slip?on shoes. His hands and feet lay naturally by his sides.

  He was supine.

  Truly, at first glance, one wouldn’t think him dead.

  Yet he was—otherwise, he wouldn’t have remained so unperturbed by the chaos around him.

  Though no formal check had been made, Wu Letian was certain: this man was dead.

  But after arriving at that realization, a horror pressed in on him so hard he could barely breathe. Without his iron self?control, he, too, would have shrieked.

  He stared at the corpse’s face as though his eyes were deceiving him—and it was that face deceiving him.

  “This is obviously me!” he silently screamed inside. “No—no, it can’t be!”

  Waiting for his delayed bags, he’d discovered his own corpse—the body of the newly appointed Minister of the Investigation Department—emerging on the luggage belt!

  When he calmed enough to look again, the face matched his perfectly; even someone with poor vision could confirm it.

  If forced to spot any difference, the corpse’s face looked more weathered, slightly older—but a corpse lacks the glow of life.

  Moreover, the face radiated some otherworldly light.

  Before he could process that, he noticed in the corpse’s right hand an object that nearly floored him.

  “He’s holding Sylvia’s pendant?!”

  Wu Letian felt struck by a hammer. Gathering himself, he edged forward as the belt carried the body on, peering through the corpse’s right hand. There it was: the pendant.

  Its mandala?flower and water?drop design, its unique metal—no doubt about it, the same piece. And now it glowed faintly with the orange?red hue of a jet engine’s afterburner.

  The mysteries that had accrued since landing this morning piled up, colliding like storm clouds above his head—denser, darker, until thunder rumbled and rain poured down on him, chilling him to the marrow.

  He barely had time to catch his breath before an even more intense pressure from all sides—similar to what he’d felt minutes ago upon returning, but magnitudes stronger—crashed down on him, terrifyingly overwhelming.

  Reflexively, he jumped back, performed a backward roll, and cleared the baggage area entirely.

  Then, he sprang to his feet and hid behind a massive support column beside Carousel 11. This strut—thicker than the others—stood near the tall wall separating the baggage belt area from the arrivals exit; the narrow gap made a perfect hiding spot.

  It was out of direct surveillance, at a safe distance from Carousel 9, and close to the arrivals exit—if things went south, he could still escape at a moment’s notice.

  He didn’t know why he’d done it, but by the time he fully registered it, he was already cocooned behind that pillar.