Mysterious Awakening

Without any forewarning, Jing found himself in a state of shock when Miles abruptly terminated their call, giving him no room to argue or plead.

His strategy had been to delay Miles, to buy himself enough time to safely escape from the school. Once he was at a secure distance, he had planned to decisively sever ties with Miles, steadfastly refusing to surrender the piece of parchment. However, the unexpected decisiveness of Miles’s action had catapulted him into a state of confusion and panic.

To add to his already escalating fear, the sound of footsteps resumed behind him. The guidance that Miles had previously given had only offered a temporary reprieve from his ghostly pursuer.

“What do I do now? What do I do?” Jing found himself floundering in terror. Driven by fear, he instinctively broke into a run, hoping to create a safe distance between himself and the persistently approaching footsteps.

His attempts, however, were futile. The footsteps were drawing inexorably closer, and the surrounding darkness appeared to thicken, ominously threatening to engulf him entirely.

“I can’t just die here. I need to hand over the parchment,” Jing resolved. “Miles was correct. If I die, having knowledge of the future won’t serve me any purpose. After getting a general understanding of upcoming events, the parchment isn’t as valuable as I initially thought.”

Under the imminent threat of death, nothing could be deemed irreplaceable.

With hands trembling from fear, Jing managed to redial Miles’s number.

Upon connection of the call, he blurted out without waiting for a response, “I will surrender the parchment to you as long as you assure me that you will get me out of this predicament.”

Miles’s voice filtered through the phone, “Throw the parchment on the ground. I will retrieve it.”

Without any delay, Jing extracted a dark brown sheet of paper from his pocket and tossed it onto the ground.

“I’ve complied with your demand. Please, help me. I don’t want to die.”

“Firstly, let’s deal with the so-called ghost pursuing you. Move to your right,” Miles directed.

“Thank you, thank you,” Jing stuttered, hastily following Miles’s guidance.

“Turn right again,” Miles continued.

Jing obediently followed the instructions with instantaneous effect.

The footsteps trailing him gradually lessened, eventually disappearing completely. For the moment, he was out of harm’s way.

Miles, who had paused in his tracks, watched as Jing frantically maneuvered through the forest like a disoriented creature, a combination of fear and relief making his actions appear ludicrous.

With a cold smirk on his lips, he murmured, “What a fool.”

The footsteps that had been haunting Jing weren’t from a ghost. It was Miles himself.

Yes, there was no ghostly presence. It was Miles who had been trailing Jing.

Jing, who had been terrified by the idea of a ghost and unable to discern the reality, could not have imagined that it was simply a person stalking him.

Miles bent down to retrieve the discarded parchment from the ground, “So, this is the parchment that supposedly documents future events?” he mused aloud.

The object, bound in brown leather, felt surprisingly soft and emitted an uncanny chill, as if it had just been retrieved from a freezer, provoking a profound sense of unease and dread.

The moment his fingers made contact with the item, the ocular symbol on the back of his hand flickered open, radiating a soft, unsettling red glow.

“This isn’t parchment. It’s human skin, and there’s something inherently disturbing about it,” Miles contemplated, a chill prickling down his spine.

Upon unfolding it, he found a line of text inscribed within the leathery material.

“My name is Jing. By the time you come across this letter, I will have already died. Don’t be shocked. I am your future self, a decade ahead, transmitting vital information to you via a unique method. It’s of utmost importance that you engrave the forthcoming details into your memory.”

“Ghostly entities have begun to infiltrate our world. This is no jest. When you stumble upon this truth, you will already be trailing six months behind other ghost tamers.”

“Be on guard against your classmate, Miles. His future iteration is a terror to behold. He is the one who brings about my demise, thus it is imperative that you preemptively eliminate him, or you will undoubtedly meet your end at his hands. Remember this: Kill Miles.”

“On the 20th day of June of a certain year, you will encounter an entity known as Right. This is significant. Right is a ghost tamer affiliated with Interpol’s Asia Division, codenamed Ghost Baby Right. However, he is merely a nonimportant entity in your life, so there’s no need for excessive worry.”

“Be wary of the ghostly infant that manifests from his form though. It will undergo growth. Within a few months, the ghost infant will reach maturity. It’s strongly advised to maintain your distance or face the potential consequence of death.”

“It’s crucial that you align yourself with HQ as promptly as possible.”

“Stay away. Flee.”

“Ghost.”

As Miles perused these inscriptions, he observed that the text on the leathery surface was rapidly fading, dimming until it was almost illegible.

Crucial pieces of information were being systematically erased by an unknown force, rendering the text invisible. The once densely filled notations had transformed into a vast expanse of blank ‘parchment’.

It resembled the vanishing of characters on a computer screen, fading away one by one.

Miles barely had time to absorb any useful insights before the entirety of the text, presumably brimming with prophetic knowledge, disappeared entirely.

“What in the world is transpiring?” he pondered.

Examining the ‘parchment’ more closely, he confirmed that the text had completely vanished, leaving no remnants behind.

Faced with this inexplicable occurrence, Miles was reminded of a film he had once watched where alterations in the past caused ripple effects in the future.

Could it be that his acquisition of Jing’s prophetic parchment had caused his future self to erase the evidence?

Before Miles could further delve into his thoughts, he noticed an uncanny representation of himself emerging on the ‘parchment’.

Letters began to materialize one by one as if an unseen entity was steadily inscribing the words with an invisible quill.

“My name is Miles. By the time you read this letter, I will have already passed away. I am you from a decade into the future, corresponding with you through a peculiar method.”

A shiver ran down Miles’s spine, his eyes narrowing as he fixated on the ‘parchment’ in his hand. “What in the world is this?”

This was certainly not a parchment bearing a chronicle of future events.

He could perceive the sinister, malevolent energy emanating from this piece of human skin. The text that had surfaced earlier wasn’t erased by a future version of Jing but by the ‘parchment’ itself based on the user holding it.

“I can’t afford to trust the information this item holds. I must dispose of it,” thought Miles, a gripping sense of unknown terror pervading his being.

He glanced around, intending to discard the dreadful piece of human skin into a sewer, forever erasing its presence.

However, a new series of words abruptly materialized on the ‘parchment’: Do not under any circumstances discard this. It possesses the ability to aid you. Without its assistance, your demise is certain.

Quickly, all the words faded into obscurity, leaving only two behind: Keep it.

These two words were reiterated in a variety of sizes in distorted, irregular handwriting, filling the entirety of the human skin, driving home the sense of urgency and importance of their message.