The door to his apartment slammed shut behind him, the dry click of the lock echoing in the silence. Chen Wei leaned against it, forcing himself to breathe evenly. The familiar scent of wood and dust, the smell of his sanctuary, did nothing to soothe the phantom chill that still clung to his spine.
"It was just exhaustion," he told himself, the whispered words sounding lost and thin in the empty room. "Stress. A sleep-deprived hallucination."
He flipped a switch, and warm, yellow light flooded the small living area. Everything was in its place: the stack of economics books on the coffee table, the coffee maker with a few stray drips, the art-house Wong Kar-wai movie poster on the wall. A tangible, logical, safe world.
He tried to anchor himself to that normality, but the image of the old woman's bottomless eyes and the wisp of gray smoke kept returning, a spreading ink blot on a perfect canvas.
After a scalding shower that did little to wash away the feeling, Chen Wei slumped into his desk chair. He couldn't sleep. He couldn't rest. A question was eating away at his mind, both terrifying and irresistible: What the hell happened on that train?
He opened his laptop, the screen's cool white light illuminating his still-pale face. His fingers hovered over the keyboard. What could he even search for?
First search term: "fainting on Shanghai subway".
Hundreds of results. News articles about a student with heatstroke, warnings about rush hour, general health tips. Nothing relevant. Too generic.
He took a deep breath, trying to recall the feeling. The drained sensation.
Second, more absurd search term: "feeling like life force was drained".
He almost laughed at his own foolishness. The top results were traditional Chinese medicine sites, talking about "qi and blood deficiency," "yin and yang imbalance." It was closer, but still theoretical. He skimmed a few health forums where people complained about chronic fatigue. Still not right.
Frustration began to set in. Maybe he really was just losing his mind.
But then he remembered the most critical detail: the gray smoke. That image was too real, too clear.
Third search term, a gamble on utter madness: "ghost on subway Line 2".
This time, the results were different. Most were still spooky stories shared for fun on major social media sites like Weibo, but as he dug deeper, into the third and fourth pages of the search results, he started seeing links to smaller, older forums. Websites with early-2000s interfaces, blinking ad banners, and garish fonts.
He clicked on one link titled "Shanghai Paranormal Investigation Society." The forum looked all but abandoned. But under the "Urban Legends Discussion" board, a post from six months ago made his heart skip a beat.
Title: [WARNING] Encountered a 'Star-Sucking Hag' on Line 2?
Poster: FengShui_Girl_95
Chen Wei's mouth went dry. He clicked the thread.
"Hey everyone, I don't know if anyone will believe this, but I have to write it down. Last night, on Line 2 heading towards Pudong, I saw a very strange old woman. She was radiating this incredibly heavy yin energy. I watched her 'drain' the qi from a guy standing near her, causing him to nearly pass out. It looked exactly like the descriptions of a Xī Jīng Lǎo Mǔ (Star-Sucking Hag) in the old texts—a type of urban ghoul that preys on the yang energy or life essence of the living to extend its own existence..."
Chen Wei read the words again and again. His heart pounded against his ribs. It was identical. Every detail matched. The yin energy. The draining. Line 2. He wasn't hallucinating.
He scrolled down to the comments. Most were dismissive or mocking.
"You've been watching too many movies."
"Line 2 is too crowded for ghosts to even find a place to stand."
But a single reply from another account, "Ancient_Daoist," answered seriously:
"@FengShui_Girl_95: What you describe is no joke. It's a type of Urban Yaogui. They're good at hiding, blending into the chaotic energy flows of the city. If you see it, do not confront it. Find a protective talisman that has been properly consecrated at a place with strong, righteous energy. They hate those things."
The post from FengShui_Girl_95 continued with a question: "So where in Shanghai can I find one?"
Chen Wei held his breath, scrolling down. There was no further reply from "Ancient_Daoist." But FengShui_Girl_95 had updated her own post a week later.
"Update: For anyone interested. I found a small feng shui shop near Exit 3 of the Yuyuan Garden station. The owner there seemed to know his stuff. Bought a black agate bracelet. The feeling of being watched has faded."
Yuyuan Garden.
The station where the old woman had gotten off.
The coincidence was too great to ignore. The chill in Chen Wei's spine was slowly replaced by a different sensation—a fragile sliver of hope, mingled with absolute terror.
He was no longer alone in his madness. There was a name for what he saw: Xī Jīng Lǎo Mǔ. And more importantly, there was an address. A clue. A next step.
He closed the laptop. The room was the same, but his world had changed forever. Beneath the concrete and steel shell of Shanghai, an invisible war was being waged.
And somehow, he had stumbled into a front-row seat.