The Killer Knows Me Better Than I Do

When Jiang Xingzhi woke up, he couldn't remember who he was.

He remembered only one thing: this city, called Mirror City, had no way out. Everyone walking its streets had lost their memories, and every seven days, the city produced a crime scene. Someone had died, and they had to solve the case or disappear themselves.

Like a puzzle piece being removed from the picture with a gentle touch.

His teammates thought he was slow. Onlookers said he was holding them back. Then, during his third trip to a crime scene, he crouched beside a pool of blood and sat in silence for a long time. Suddenly, he looked up and asked a question no one else had thought of. The case was solved.

No one knew how he did it. He couldn't explain it himself, either. He only knew he had a gift: in each case, he could ask the truth three questions, and the answers would always be true.

But every question brought on a splitting headache. Every night, he dreamed of an unfamiliar woman lying in a pool of blood, and a smiling man speaking to him.

At the fourth crime scene, the victim was clutching a scrap of paper in the hem of their clothes. It bore his own handwriting, spelling out the name “Jiang Xingzhi.”

Some of the cases in this city seemed to have been designed by him.

And he was piecing himself back together. One piece at a time.