Zhou Huai nodded, thinking, 'As expected.'

This little girl knew about her own physical condition.

He continued to press.

"When did your condition start?"

"How long has it been going on?"

Natsume Rinku hugged her knees, lost in thought.

Zhou Huai didn't rush her, just watched her quietly.

He had plenty of patience.

After a long while, Natsume Rinku slowly raised her head.

"It probably... started when I was six years old."

"Back then, I always heard a voice in my head."

"There was a very gentle older sister; she always talked to me when I was asleep, telling me many stories I didn't understand."

"I thought then that she was just an imaginary friend."

Natsume Rinku's voice carried a hint of self-mockery.

"Because Mom and Dad were never home, and my brother... my brother didn't like me."

"I was very lonely."

"So, I was very happy to have an older sister accompany me."

"Until... until I was nine years old."

Her voice dropped even lower, filled with fear.

"That day, my brother became a Transcendent, and brought many bugs back."

"He said he wanted to make me braver."

"Then, he poured all those bugs onto me."

"I was so scared, those bugs crawled on me, bit me... it hurt so much, and it was so itchy..."

"I cried and begged my brother to take them off, but he just stood there laughing, laughing very loudly."

"He said that if I could hold back my tears, he would let me go."

"But I couldn't hold it in..."

The little girl's tears burst forth again, streaming down her face and dripping onto the old tatami mat, soaking into small, dark stains.

"Just when I thought I was about to be bitten to death by the bugs..."

"The older sister helped me get rid of the bugs."

"From then on, my body became very strange."

"I would always fall asleep inexplicably, and sleep for a very long time."

"Sometimes, when I woke up, I would find myself in a completely unfamiliar place."

"I knew it was all the older sister's doing."

"By then, she had slowly started to control my body."

Zhou Huai watched her, waiting for what she would say next.

"At first, she only came out occasionally."

"But recently... recently, she's been coming out more and more frequently."

Natsume Rinku couldn't control her emotions anymore at this point, and burst into tears.

"She wants to completely steal my body!"

"She wants to kill me, she wants to completely replace me!"

The girl suddenly looked up, her eyes red from crying.

Like a drowning person grasping at a final straw, she used all her strength to crawl to Zhou Huai's feet.

"Brother... am I going to die soon?"

Zhou Huai looked at her, his gaze calm, and did not answer.

He just reached out and gently placed his hand on the girl's trembling head.

He softly asked in return:

"Do you want to die?"

Natsume Rinku shook her head frantically, tears splashing everywhere with her movements.

"I don't want to die!"

"Brother, I don't want to die! I want to live!"

That's right.

Even with a Hell-difficulty start.

Her father, mother, and brother were all terrible.

And an unknown monster resided within her body.

But this little girl had never thought of suicide.

Struggling to survive in a nightmare-like life.

This was far stronger than those who wanted to jump off a building after a little setback.

For some reason, Zhou Huai seemed to see his own reflection in the little girl.

Hadn't he done all this, even infiltrating Sakura Country, just to snatch back the pendulum of life and successfully live?

For nothing else.

Just for her words, "I don't want to die, I want to live."

Just for this will to survive.

Zhou Huai decided to help her.

He gently stroked Natsume Rinku's head, his voice exceptionally soft.

"Don't cry."

"I can help you."

These few words, like the first ray of dawn piercing through endless darkness, instantly illuminated Natsume Rinku's despairing world.

She abruptly looked up, and an incredible light burst forth from her swollen, red eyes.

Hope, as if within reach.

"Rea... really?"

She excitedly reached out her hands, gripping Caesar's arm tightly, as if clutching the last straw of hope.

Zhou Huai, wearing Natsume Masahiro's face, nodded calmly.

However, he changed his tone, and the expression on his roguish face turned serious.

"However, although I can help you, the only one who can truly defeat her is yourself."

He stared into the girl's eyes, enunciating each word.

"She wants to possess your body, what about you?"

"Do you have the courage to fight her to the end, even if it means death?"

Natsume Rinku was startled by Zhou Huai's serious demeanor.

In her clear eyes, fear and hope intertwined, and finally, an unprecedented light gathered within them.

A moment later, the twelve-year-old girl's gaze also became resolute.

She looked at Zhou Huai, and very earnestly, with all her strength, said:

"Brother, I do."

Zhou Huai smiled.

He gently stroked Natsume Rinku's little head again.

"Remember what you said."

Natsume Rinku looked at him blankly, not understanding the meaning of his words.

The next second.

The gentle smile on Zhou Huai's face ◈ Nоvеlіgһт ◈ (Continue reading) vanished abruptly, replaced by an icy indifference.

His large hand, which had just been gently stroking the girl's head, suddenly moved down without warning, like an iron clamp, tightly seizing Natsume Rinku's slender neck!

"Ugh..." 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝙬𝙚𝓫𝒏𝓸𝓿𝓮𝒍.𝓬𝙤𝓶

Natsume Rinku's expression instantly froze.

All hope, gratitude, and reliance, at this moment, turned into extreme terror and bewilderment.

She completely didn't understand what was happening.

Just a second ago, he was the gentle brother who promised to help her, so why was he now trying to kill her?

The sensation of suffocation surged like a tide.

Air was instantly drawn away, and a burning pain came from her lungs.

She instinctively reached out her hands to scratch at the arm that was choking her life, but the other party's hand was like cast iron, unmoving.

"Bro... brother..."

She wanted to beg for mercy, to question, but only faint, painful gasps could escape her throat.

Her legs thrashed uncontrollably on the tatami, making dull thudding sounds—the last futile struggles of a life.

Zhou Huai was unmoved.

He controlled Caesar, coldly watching the tender face below him, which had turned purplish-red from lack of oxygen.

The girl's pupils began to dilate, and the light in her eyes rapidly dimmed.

Her struggles grew weaker, her limbs gradually drooping powerlessly.

Consciousness, like sinking into the deep sea, was swallowed by boundless darkness and cold.

She was about to die.

Zhou Huai calmly felt the girl's life force rapidly draining away.

He raised his eyes, as if looking through this frail body, making eye contact with another presence hidden deep within.

"She's about to die."

"Aren't you going to act?"

Indeed!

The next second!

A colossal, cold, and tyrannical energy, like a volcano that had slumbered for a thousand years, suddenly erupted from within Natsume Rinku!

Boom—!!!

A black Qi wave swept out, and Caesar's arm, which was clutching her neck, was violently flung away by this immense force.

Natsume Rinku, who had already gone limp, eerily floated up slowly, half a foot off the ground.

Her pupils, which had been unfocused from lack of oxygen, suddenly widened!

At this moment, those eyes no longer held the fear and innocence of a twelve-year-old girl.

Instead, they were filled with endless coldness, ancientness, and... deep-seated resentment.

She stared intently at Caesar, or rather, at Zhou Huai behind Caesar.

A hoarse, overlapping, inhuman voice emanated from her, enunciating each word, filled with heart-stopping majesty and fury.

"You and I have no grievances, why do you repeatedly target me?!"