The passenger climbed in at exactly midnight. He cradled a black-wrapped bundle in his lap, his hoodie pulled low over his head, chin tucked down. The shirt underneath seemed to have darkened in color.
Lao Zhang forced himself not to glance at the rearview mirror, but he couldn't help it — his eyes drifted there on their own.
"Feels like the moment he got in, he turned into a completely different person," he muttered under his breath, casually tapping the one-tap emergency alert page on his phone.
"Huaihua Lane again?"
"Mm."
"Is that where you live? There's nothing left in Jiujiang's old lanes but old-timers. Someone your age is pretty rare out there."
"That's not where I live." The passenger's tone was odd — every sentence clipped, tinged with something somber.
"You sound local to me. Things haven't been safe around here at night lately — best not wander too far." Lao Zhang genuinely did not want to end up back in that haunted lane. He was terrified of running into the last passenger again. "Where's your place? I can take you straight home, how about that?"
"My home?" The passenger lowered his gaze to the black bundle on his lap and said nothing.
Seeing the passenger wouldn't speak, Lao Zhang didn't press further. He swung the car around, heading back toward the city center.
Once the taxi got moving, the atmosphere inside only grew more suffocating.
Sitting in the same vehicle with the man in the back seat, Lao Zhang felt as though the air in his lungs was being squeezed out. He rolled down the sealed windows.
The night wind rushed in, and only then did he start to feel marginally better. He lifted his eyes to study the passenger in the rearview mirror.
No matter how the road jolted, the man's upper body remained locked in the exact same posture.
He must have rushed out to pick something up in a hurry — his shirt was too wrinkled to have been changed, and the top button was undone, revealing a faint ring of bruising around his neck.
"Was he beaten before he got in? No wait — that looks more like it could be from hanging?"
The driver's nerves frayed further. Half his attention stayed fixed on the passenger, terrified that the moment he looked away, something behind him would change.
His pupils twitched. Lao Zhang's heart hammered — he was afraid of being caught sneaking glances, and equally afraid that the man in the back would do something insane.
He pressed the accelerator. Out here in the desolate outskirts, the best strategy he could think of was to drive faster. Once they hit a populated area, everything would be fine.
Every window was rolled down. Wind howled through the cabin. Lao Zhang kept watch on the back seat.
The passenger hadn't moved a muscle. But the black cloth bundle on his lap had been peeled open at one corner by the wind — a small section of fabric had slipped downward, revealing what lay underneath.
Blood rushed to his head. Lao Zhang's heart slammed against his ribs.
An urn.
The thing the man had gone to the crematorium in the dead of night to retrieve — it was an urn.
His arm began to tremble uncontrollably. His little finger curled inward as though seized by a cramp, and a cold, creeping chill started crawling up his spine.
The black cloth kept sliding. The passenger didn't seem to have noticed.
The taxi tore down the road. Under the assault of the night wind, the cloth on the other side was blown off as well.
Now Lao Zhang could see it clearly. Inside the black cloth was a black urn, and affixed to its center was a photograph.
The driver eased off the gas slightly, concentrating everything on the rearview mirror. His eyes locked onto the photo on the urn.
He couldn't make it out perfectly, but the jawline and the shape of the mouth looked eerily similar to the passenger sitting in his car.
"He went to the crematorium in the middle of the night and picked up... his own urn?"
Lao Zhang didn't dare follow that thought any further. His whole body was shaking. One hand gripped the steering wheel while the other groped beside him, trying to secretly call for help.
But the instant his fingers touched the phone, habit made him glance at the rearview mirror one last time — and reflected in the glass was a pair of bloodshot eyes, staring right back at him.