Chan Mei Ling, 34, taught math at a Bukit Timah
primary school by day and tutored kids in the
evenings. Her clients ranged from kiasu parents
desperate for PSLE marks to teenagers who’d
rather play mobile games than study. She never
expected that one rainy Tuesday would change
everything.
Her late grandfather’s will arrived via post,
sealed with wax and addressed to her in his
looping handwriting. Inside was a jade pendant,
its surface etched with unfamiliar symbols, and
a note: “To protect what we built.” Mei Ling
laughed it off—old man’s ramblings, nothing more.
But when she placed the pendant on her desk, the
classroom clock stopped midtick. The lights
flickered. A student whispered, “That’s not your
name on the board.”
She checked the whiteboard. Her name had been
replaced with Chan Mei Lin, the name of her
grandmother, who had vanished during the
Japanese Occupation. That night, she dreamt of a
woman in a cheongsam, standing in a kampong now
buried under concrete. The woman handed her a
ledger filled with names—students, teachers,
resistance fighters. All missing.
Mei Ling’s HDB flat had always felt… hollow. Now,
it hummed with whispers. At first, she blamed
stress. Then, the fridge stopped working, the
taps ran dry, and her students began reporting
strange shadows in the corridors. One boy
claimed he saw a girl in a red sash, the same as
the one on the pendant, sitting in his seat
during class.
She found the ledger’s entry for herself:
“Guardian of the Archive.” The rule was clear—
the living must keep the dead quiet. If she
failed, the spirits would rise, unbound, and
take over the estate.
Her first test came during a tuition session. A
girl named Li Wei collapsed, convulsing. Mei
Ling pressed the pendant to her chest. The
girl’s eyes cleared, and she whispered, “I
remember now. I was there. In 1942.”
Mei Ling’s hands shook. The pendant wasn’t just
an heirloom—it was a key. And she was the last
keeper of a secret that could unravel Singapore
itself.
By week’s end, the spirits had taken over the
lift. It now only stopped at evennumbered floors.
The security guard, a former NSman, refused to
speak about it. Mei Ling knew the rules: No
modern tech, no outsiders, no breaking the chain.
She stood in the empty classroom, the pendant
glowing faintly. The ghost of her grandmother
appeared, not as a shadow, but as a woman with
eyes like polished jade. “You’ve seen the truth,
” she said. “Now you must choose. Protect the
past or let it consume the future.”
Mei Ling smiled. “I’m a tuition teacher, not a
ghost hunter.”
She opened the ledger. The pen moved on its own,
writing her name in bold. The spirits stilled.
The world turned back to normal. For now.
The pendant stayed on her desk. Waiting.
