Funae Amuro stood up, tears streaming down her face. “Is it because I used to call you a parasite and brought my friends to mock you… so you’ve always hated me, right?”
Yuki Asahi turned back, his brow slightly furrowed. “I don’t hate you. That was childish nonsense. I never held it against you.”
“Then why are you leaving? If you don’t hate me, why give me the money and cut ties?!” Funae Amuro’s emotions collapsed.
She grabbed the bank card and slammed it hard onto the floor.
“I don’t want your money! I don’t need you to pay off the loans! This is your home!”
“This isn’t my home.”
Yuki Asahi cut her off, his voice still indifferent. “My surname is Yuki, not Amuro. I’m just… an outsider.”
Those words stabbed like a knife deep into Funae Amuro’s heart.
With a thud, she fell to her knees, buried her face in her hands, and let out a long-suppressed sob.
“I’m sorry… waa… I’m sorry…”
“I know I was a jerk back then… I was jealous of you, so I treated you like that…”
“Before Dad died… in the hospital, he held my hand and asked… do you know what his last words were?”
Yuki Asahi’s pupils contracted slightly.
“He said… ‘Funae, you have to take good care of him for me. This is the debt we owe him. Tell him he’s our family.’”
Funae Amuro lifted her head, face soaked with tears, staring at Yuki Asahi.
“Even on his deathbed… he was more worried about you than me!”
“These past few years, even though you shut yourself in your room, even though you rarely talked to me… as long as you were in that room, as long as I saw your shoes still in the genkan, I felt… the home was still here.”
“If you leave… I really won’t have a home anymore.”
“Please… big brother… don’t abandon me.”
“Big brother!”
Yuki Asahi stood frozen, then let out a long sigh.
He turned around, walked slowly to Funae Amuro, and crouched down in front of her.
He picked up the bank card that had been thrown on the floor and gently placed it on the table.
Then, reaching out a hand, somewhat awkwardly, he gently wrapped his arms around her trembling shoulders.
“Don’t cry.”
His voice was no longer so cold, carrying a hint of helplessness and clumsy tenderness.
“I… I’ll stay for now.”
Funae Amuro lifted her head sharply, staring at him in disbelief, then grabbed the corner of his shirt tightly, as if afraid he might take it back, and cried even harder.
Yuki Asahi patted her back gently, his gaze drifting toward the night sky outside the window.
The waning moon hung high in the sky.
“One more set!”
Tokun High School, Third Training Hall.
At that moment, the warm spring sunlight was blocked out by the thick soundproof walls. The hall was filled with the pained groans of boys and girls.
“I can’t… I really can’t do it anymore, Teacher!”
Kazama Yin lay sprawled in a star shape on the simulated sandpit, his chest heaving violently. Sweat poured like a faucet, soaking his student uniform.
“Get up, Kazama.”
Yuanteng Teacher’s glasses flashed with white light. “Facing those desperadoes, you had the nerve to charge in with half-baked abilities and hot blood alone?”
He walked over to Kazama Yin and lightly poked his cheek with a pointer, his tone icy. “If someone hadn’t saved you, I’d be attending your funerals right now instead of wasting my spring break giving you extra training.”
Hearing the word “funeral,” Kagegaya Tsubaki, who was panting heavily while leaning on her knees, shrank her neck.
“But… Teacher, we were just seeking justice…”
“Justice?”
Yuanteng Teacher sneered, his gaze sweeping over the three. “Justice needs power to support it. Justice without power is just a self-indulgent suicide mission.”
“And you, Hanyu.”
Hanyu Suoluo, who was called out, stiffened.
He was trying to use telekinesis to make a towel wipe his sweat, but due to exhaustion, the towel wobbled in the air like it was drunk, then slapped onto his face with a smack.
“As the calmest among the three, you should have chosen to retreat and call the police, not follow these two idiots in their recklessness.”
Yuanteng Teacher shook his head in disappointment. “Everyone, run twenty laps around the hall. No using abilities! Now! Immediately!”
“Ehhh!!!”
Screams echoed through the hall.
At dusk, dragging legs that felt like they didn’t belong to them, the trio finally finished the hellish extra training.
They sat side by side on the steps by the school flowerbed, each holding a can of sports drink bought from the vending machine, gazing blankly at the campus in the sunset.
“I feel… like my soul is about to leave my body…”
Kazama Yin tilted his head back and chugged a big gulp of the drink, burping without any dignity.
“Yuanteng Teacher… is really a demon.”
“But, come to think of it…”
Kagegaya Tsubaki shook her can, her crimson eyes turning to Kazama Yin. “Even though we got scolded badly and had to run laps, this time… it wasn’t a complete loss, right?”
“Huh?” Kazama Yin tilted his head.
“Senior Yuki!”
Kagegaya Tsubaki gestured excitedly. “A living legend! We actually talked to him and ate oden together!”
“Though…” Her voice dropped a little, “he seemed to be having a hard time.”
Mentioning Yuki Asahi, the atmosphere among the three fell silent for a moment.
That man with eyes like dead ashes.
He was a completely different person from the legendary young hero.
“About Missy… we still haven’t gotten any leads.”
Kazama Yin sighed, a bit regretfully. “Senior Yuki said he doesn’t have any info either. If even he doesn’t know, who else can we ask?”
“And about my uncle…”
Hanyu Suoluo clenched his drink can, his knuckles turning white. “If DRG has really split or encountered something, like Miss Dream Child said, then my uncle…”
“Don’t be so pessimistic, Hanyu.”
Kazama Yin patted his shoulder. “Senior Yuki said he doesn’t have info, but he also mentioned he’d be leaving Japan soon, right?”
“Maybe he’s going to look for the legendary Missy?”
“Maybe…” Hanyu Suoluo forced a smile.
Suddenly, as if remembering something, he turned to Kazama Yin. “Hey, Kazama, there’s something I’ve been wanting to ask.”
“What?”
“Back at the convenience store, or later when we ate oden…”
Hanyu Suoluo lowered his voice, his gaze intense. “Since Miss Dream Child could possess you, why… didn’t she try to possess Senior Yuki?”
“If she could possess Senior Yuki, even for a moment, she might have read deeper memories, or at least… communicated more directly, right?”
Kazama Yin was dumbfounded.
“Yeah…” Kagegaya Tsubaki also caught on. “Miss Dream Child said she’s a consciousness entity, so she should be able to switch hosts, shouldn’t she?”
Kazama Yin blinked, as if listening to a voice in his head.
After a moment, his expression turned strange—a mix of shock and awe.
“Well… Miss Dream Child says…” Kazama Yin swallowed. “She can’t do it.”
“Can’t do it?” Hanyu Suoluo frowned. “Does Senior Yuki have resistance?”
“No… it’s not just resistance.”
Kazama Yin took a deep breath, repeating the ghost maid’s words from his mind. “Miss Dream Child says that if you compare an ordinary person’s mental world to a small pond, then our awakened mental worlds are more like a lake.”
“But… Yuki Asahi’s mental world…”
“Is the sun.”
“The sun?” Kagegaya Tsubaki’s eyes widened.
“Yes. A black sun… that is burning fiercely, releasing infinite light and heat, yet is extremely suppressed, on the verge of eruption at any moment.”
Kazama Yin pointed to his head. “Miss Dream Child said that the moment she approached Senior Yuki, she felt that if she accidentally touched his mental barrier, her consciousness would be instantly evaporated by that terrifying energy.”
“He’s too strong.”
“So strong that even ghosts dare not get close.”
“A monster…” Hanyu Suoluo shook his head with a bitter smile. “Is this the pinnacle of that era?”
“But hey, at least we’ve gotten to know such an amazing person—that should be a good thing, right?”
Kazama Yin was optimistic. He stood up and brushed dust off his pants. “At least in the future, if we run into trouble we can’t solve, we can drop Senior Yuki’s name… though I don’t know if it’ll help.”
“Don’t dream. Yuanteng Teacher will kill you first.”
“Ah! Don’t mention Yuanteng Teacher!”
Just as they were about to leave school and head home, the giant electronic news screen on the side of the teaching building suddenly flickered, cutting off the idol commercial that had been playing.
Bright red “BREAKING NEWS” letters popped up, accompanied by an urgent alarm sound.
“We interrupt with an international breaking news.”
“In the Kandahar region of Afghanistan, around the former GPRI Crimson Plan site, a large-scale armed conflict broke out early this morning.”
On the screen, the image switched to a satellite overview and blurry footage shot by war correspondents risking their lives.
Endless dust clouds obscured the desert, huge bursts of explosion light followed one after another, and occasionally strange flashes from some supernatural power flickered in the haze.
“According to local sources, the two sides in the conflict are suspected to be local armed forces and an unknown supernatural organization…”
“Casualties are unclear at this time. The Pacific Treaty Peacekeeping Force has intervened and is investigating…”
“The Crimson Plan.”
Hanyu Suoluo stared at the screen, his brow furrowed. “Something big has happened again…”
“The scale of this battle doesn’t look like a normal armed conflict.”
“This world is really still unstable.” Kagegaya Tsubaki sighed. “I thought Japan was pretty much done with big incidents.”
“Maybe that’s also why Senior Yuki wants to leave.”
Just as they were sighing over the news and about to walk out the school gate,
A tall figure, bathed in the glow of the setting sun, walked slowly from the direction of the administration building.
The person wore a beige trench coat, fiery red hair casually draped over the shoulders, holding a storage box in her arms.
Although not wearing a school uniform, the cool confidence that radiated from her bones instantly caught the trio’s attention.
“That’s…”
Kagegaya Tsubaki rubbed her eyes, then let out a delighted gasp. “Senior Dubian?!”