The Dust-Calamity Theater: Returning to Truth After Nine Lifetimes

My grandfather died.

He left me a haunted old house and a will written in blood, consisting of three rules.

Stay for forty-nine days.

Don’t take the copper bell from around your neck.

Never open the basement door.

I thought it was the rambling of an old man.

Until I pried open the coffin in the basement and saw a face identical to mine.

He was me in my eighth life.

And I was the ninth one destined to die on the fifteenth day of the seventh month.

I wrote the seven death contracts in Green Locust Alley.

I set the nine trials aboard the Eternal Night Train.

Every rule that could kill me was carved into stone by my own hand.

The woman in the white dress who stood outside my window every night.

She had waited for me for ninety years.

And killed me in eight lifetimes.

She was my wife in my first life.

The final boss I had pursued through nine lifetimes.

The moment I took off the mask.

I finally realized.

He was me in my first life.

Nine cycles of reincarnation were no heavenly punishment.

They were a trap I had set for myself.

This time, I’ll kill myself with my own hands.