The Forgotten Missing

Every so often, someone in this city disappears completely. They don’t die or run away. It’s as if an eraser has wiped them from the world. Traces of their existence fade bit by bit: photos turn white, records vanish, and all that remains in their loved ones’ memories is a hazy shadow. In the end, nobody remembers they were ever here. Lin Yuan always thought it was just an urban legend. Then, in the crowded subway station he passed through every day, he watched a strange woman freeze in place before his eyes, fade, and vanish like smoke into the surging crowd. Even more frightening, he seemed to be the only one who noticed her eerie disappearance. The photo of her back that he had just taken on his phone was visibly blurring. He began recording every detail in a notebook, only to find that the words he wrote were fading away too. The missing people weren’t unrelated. They all seemed to have had contact with a counseling center called “The Other Shore.” Lin Yuan knew he had touched something he shouldn’t have. And the next name to grow blurry was slowly pointing to him.