The situation now was that after receiving two tasks consecutively, Yan Junze faintly illuminated two spacetime nodes on the Spacetime Atlas, enabling the first time rewind line to become usable.
Through this rewind line, he could create a time rewind of no more than 5 minutes.
Of course, this time rewind line did not look stable and might completely extinguish after just one use.
Unless he completed tasks and gained the corresponding Different Dimension Energy, as suggested by the tasks, only then could he illuminate stable spacetime nodes and secure a stable time rewind line.
If all the nodes on the entire Spacetime Atlas were illuminated, would it be possible to travel through spacetime once more and return to the world he came from before? At the very least, if he could use the Atlas to resolve the Supernatural crisis right before him, would there be even more surprising things waiting for him after lighting up the whole Atlas?
If things were really as Yan Junze speculated, then he must carefully consider which task to complete first using this single opportunity to rewind time.
The first task triggered was "Hair Washing," with a task level of "Anxiety-Inducing (Minor)." The second task was "The Old Woman Knocking at Mid-Night," with a task level of "Anxiety-Inducing (Medium)."
Actually, from the description of the tasks, "Hair Washing" felt more terrifying and seemed to carry a higher degree of danger than "The Old Woman Knocking at Mid-Night." However, contrarily, the level of "Hair Washing" was only (Minor), evidently not as dangerous as the latter.
This puzzled Yan Junze quite a bit.
However, the task hints indicated that "The Old Woman Knocking at Mid-Night" had sub-tasks that had yet to be triggered, and he wasn't very clear whether the slightly higher level was due to this.
It seemed that choosing the "Hair Washing" task first was more reliable.
After weighing his options for a while, sleepiness finally overcame him, and Yan Junze had made up his mind. He quickly closed his eyes and fell asleep.
The next morning.
Yan Daguo woke up early and opened the bathroom door to confirm that the red-clothed little girl had vanished before he washed up and rushed to the factory.
Li Man also got up early, as the cleaning company had her schedule packed in the morning, and she needed to finish cleaning two families' homes that had already been booked.
After cooking a bowl of noodles for Yan Junze, Li Man followed Yan Daguo out.
Yan Junze gobbled down the noodles in no time and took out his phone to scroll through his usual call logs. Noticing that a name called Zhou Heng appeared with high frequency, he called Zhou Heng's number.
A young man's voice soon came through the phone, somewhat uninhibited, "Hello, little Junze, missing your grandpa already that early?"
Best friend, that must be the best friend of this body's original owner.
Yan Junze knew he had guessed correctly and spoke, "Zhou Heng, come to the entrance of my community. We'll go to school together."
"What did you call me?" Zhou Heng sounded somewhat surprised on the other end.
"I don't have time for your nonsense," Yan Junze deliberately made his tone heavy, "Remember to hurry. Call me when you get here, then I'll come down."
"Alright, you little rascal must have done something bad!" Zhou Heng laughed heartily, "Don't worry, I, Zhou Dali, am always your strong brother, ready to stand by you no matter what happens."
After hanging up the phone, Yan Junze pondered a bit and muttered to himself, "Is this guy's nickname Zhou Dali, or strong brother?"
He had asked Zhou Heng to come pick him up for a reason, without the original body owner's memories, Yan Junze had no idea where the school was, so he used this method.
But interacting with classmates would definitely not be the same as before, so Yan Junze prepared to use having experienced strangeness as an excuse to create an image of a boy who just lived through horror, a bit bewildered, and whose behavior contrasted with the past.
"It's impossible that he's usually called strong brother because that way of addressing him… is effeminate." Yan Junze stood up and headed for his parents' bedroom.
As expected, Yan Daguo did not take the bathroom key with him but left it in the bedside table.
There are three identical keys, all on the same keyring.
Yan Junze took one of them out, then removed one of his own bedroom keys and swapped it on.
The locks were the same, and the shape of the keys barely differed; unless you looked closely at the teeth of the keys, you wouldn't notice the switch.
After changing the keys, Yan Junze kept the removed bathroom key close to him, preparing to perform the "Hair-Washing" task that very night.
After waiting for a while, his phone rang. Zhou Heng's voice seemed to come from a speakerphone, saying he had arrived at the community entrance.
Yan Junze picked up his sling bag and left the house, locking the door behind him and heading downstairs.
His residential area was named FH Community, definitely old, at least forty years old. The tallest building only had seven floors, and Yan Junze lived in Building No. 7, which had five floors; his home was on the fourth floor.
Granny Ren, the old woman who knocked on doors at midnight, lived on the fifth floor.
Just before leaving the community, Yan Junze looked back at the fifth floor. There were four families living there, and he did not know which one was Granny Ren's. However, the entire fifth floor seemed eerily quiet, with no one coming in or out, exuding an air of gloom.
Standing at the community entrance was a boy, also with a sling bag. At the very moment he saw him, Yan Junze understood why the guy was nicknamed "Zhou Dali."
If you calculated by cross-section, Zhou Heng was at least equivalent to three slender Yan Junzes, not to mention his limbs, thick as hammers.
Could this guy be born into a family of martial artists? Yan Junze wondered.
However, he knew from a few days' acquaintance that although this world was not the same as Earth, it didn't involve urban powers or cultivation of immortality. There weren't as many bizarre settings.
For now, only an exorcist could deal with supernatural events, so even if Zhou Dali was built strong like a passionate bull, he would be of no use in the face of supernatural happenings.
"You're here, what did you want to tell me?"
Zhou Heng's voice was in direct proportion to his body, basically shouting when he spoke, startling the nearby pedestrians with a sudden outburst, drawing astonished glances.
Yan Junze could barely hold back a laugh, waved his hand, and, hooking arms with him, seemingly led by Zhou Heng, headed towards Shuntian No. 3 Middle School.
Zhou Heng made no suggestion to take the bus, and Yan Junze held back from speaking, simply describing the strange encounter in the bathroom the previous night, which left Zhou Heng baffled.
Zhou Heng then said, "Speaking of supernatural occurrences, your community is really old, so the chances of those happening must be quite high. My community just handed over the houses last year, all new residents, with laughter and prosperity everywhere, a peaceful and prosperous era, without so much strangeness. It's a lot safer in comparison."
"But..." Zhou Heng's tone shifted, "Nowadays, you really can't tell. Isn't there a public restroom in the New Century Residential Area's square? I'll tell you, for two straight weeks, no one dares to go in there to use the toilet anymore."
"Aren't you just contradicting yourself?" Yan Junze found it amusing, and casually asked, "Why?"
As he spoke, he looked up and saw the gates of Shuntian No. 3 Middle School.
FH Community, where he lived, was only about ten minutes away from the school. If he had known it was this close, he could have found it just by walking around, without needing Zhou Heng to come pick him up.
Zhou Heng, not noticing Yan Junze's expression, continued, "They say there's a woman in red high heels in that public restroom; whenever someone uses a stall to poop, the sound of those red heels starts clicking, and soon appears outside the stall. You know Wang Shicong from class six, the fat guy?"
Yan Junze didn't know the guy at all, but he nodded anyway.
"Wang Shicong and I live in the same community. That guy played basketball in the square this weekend, ran into the toilet halfway because his stomach hurt," Zhou Heng vividly recounted, "Later, I heard that right when Fat Wang was halfway through taking a dump, the red shoes showed up. You could see them through the gap under the toilet stall's door, just standing there motionless outside where Wang was pooping."
"They say..." Zhou Heng paused, looking up at a 45-degree angle towards the sky, his face full of admiration, "Fat Wang was so scared that he forcefully used his Shit-Cutting Skill, making three equal lateral cuts of that turd, didn't even wipe his ass, and finally managed to pull his pants up, climbed over two stalls cursing, and rushed out of the restroom. The guy couldn't get out of bed when he got home, and his dad has already asked for sick leave from the class headteacher."