Destination

Returning to the death world, everything was terrifyingly quiet.

Cold moonlight shone on the bed. The things my parents burned had turned into tradable universal points, clothing exchange coupons to name a few.

I recalled the old man's condition – unfortunately, I hadn't fulfilled it. Honestly, I didn't even know what his granddaughter looked like. How could I tell her? He had undergone a second death; I didn't know his destination. How could I ask? "Where does one go after the second death...?"

"You want to know what the 'next layer' is?" The speaker was Sister Zhu, a long-term resident of the death world, my neighbor, also a central administrator – a very intelligent, mature person who usually took good care of me, saying I reminded her of her still-living daughter.

She took me to the "Forgetfulness Library" at the city's edge, filled with unclaimed memories from life and books written by death world inhabitants. She pulled a yellowed journal from the shelf, author signed "Zhou XX," titled "Dreaming of the Second Death."

"When I first died, I thought this was the end. But as I aged here, one day I closed my eyes... I dreamed I fell deeper."

The journal described a black hole-like, infinitely vast space with countless glowing orbs floating, each encasing a sleeping soul. "That place is called ‘Void,' " Zhu whispered. "Those who undergo the second death carry their memories and attachments, turning into primal energy. With luck, perhaps after eons, they might be randomly cast into some newborn universe..."

A chill ran through me. "No heaven? No reincarnation?"

"Who knows." She closed the journal. “Maybe so-called heaven is just another name for Void?”

In the deepest section of the library, there was a book thick with dust, its cover leather long unglued. I secretly opened it; the thick blank pages only had a few scribbled lines, as if written in haste:

"The death world is piled from corpses and longing – the first deceased created this place, and upon their second death, created the next layer. The second deceased abandoned everything and ascended... We are trapped in some deceased's lingering dream, their attachments."

Abandon everything? I began to guess why some were taken upward – they belonged to an upper death world, perhaps closer to the Void. And those of us who fell downward just fell into a deeper "descendant world."

Of course, just speculation. I couldn't understand what they wrote. Maybe it was just nonsense stuffed into the shelf by someone after a nightmare.

Zhu's fingers gently traced the book's unglued margins . “ Pofei chose to forget spontaneously. He chose to go to the Northern Europe Death Zone, where covered with thick snow. Everyone guesses the snow there is beautiful, souls have no temperature, snowflakes can stay in your hand for a long, long time, very beautiful..." she suddenly said.

"You also know Pofei?" I interrupted, surprised.

"Of course. You whisper his name in your sleep every night. The walls are thin; I hear. I was curious, so I looked him up during work. Thought he was someone you cared about while alive, beyond my expectation, he left this world before you... Do you want to know more about his information?" She pulled a file from her bag.

"Yes!" Oh, I wanted to know so much...

The file contained a photo of a soul standing in a pure white room, facing a winged messenger – but different from the one who pulled me, this one's wings were snow-white.

"Every soul emigrating to another death zone needs to erase all memories, leave a record of the transfer, and have a proof photo created based on the messenger's description. So-called death is just the first threshold," Zhu pointed at the text on the document.

"Here, every soul must face their attachments from life. Some choose to carry them downward, like us, waiting for the second death. Some..." The page turned, showing Pofei tossing papers filled with writing into the white room's fireplace. "...choose at the moment of death to exchange memories for ascension eligibility, or, after some thought here, apply for ascension emigration."

"But... I remember when I was brought up, no messenger asked me if I wanted to keep my attachments and memories?" I only remembered being dragged down by the messenger after parting from my parents directly, no such step.

"Silly," Zhu laughed, tapping my nose. "These actually can be determined by your personality and life experiences. He didn't have much to linger for; the death world could directly assess and notify the corresponding messenger – that's one of our central work, integrating information from before and after death to make decisions."

"Of course, those who fly upward aren't necessarily purer, without any attachments," Zhu closed the file. "They're just more resolute, decisive."

Outside the window, fine snow drifted. This snow fell from Pofei's upper death zone, right? Even with the window between us, perhaps because of what Zhu said, I found this snow exceptionally heartless. Like the senior in the photo, become hollow.

"As for the initial deceased – the first to arrive in this death world – they must have experienced prolonged loneliness before actively choosing to emigrate. Their soul ascended one layer, their corpse and attachments descended one layer, becoming the structures of the second layer world.”