Inside the Matsumoto Mansion, before the grief and fear had even dissipated, another person swept into this storm appeared—Takasugi Toshihiko, Matsumoto Sayuri's fiancé.
He had been full of anticipation for the upcoming wedding, but after receiving Inspector Matsumoto's incoherent and desperate phone call, he had rushed over with an ominous feeling. When he stepped into the foyer and saw his fiancée lying on the floor, seemingly asleep but dying, and Inspector Matsumoto sitting paralyzed nearby, looking ten years older in an instant, he froze completely.
"Sa... Sayuri?!" Takasugi Toshihiko collapsed to his knees, his trembling hands not daring to touch that pale, cold cheek. The happy future he had imagined was shattered in an instant, replaced by this nightmare before his eyes.
"Who... who did this to her?!" He suddenly looked up, his eyes bloodshot, his voice distorted by extreme rage.
Inspector Matsumoto's tears flowed freely as he opened his mouth; the name that terrified him rolled in his throat but finally turned into a painful sigh and a warning: "Toshihiko... don't ask... we... can't afford to provoke him..."
"Can't afford to provoke him?!" Takasugi Toshihiko was like a lit fuse, suddenly standing up, all his gentleness gone, leaving only the madness and fury of having his love taken away. "I don't care who he is! Anyone who dares to touch Sayuri! I'll make him pay in blood!! Tell me! Who is it?!"
In Inspector Matsumoto's fragmented and fear-filled narration, the name "Kanjuro" was etched into Takasugi Toshihiko's mind like a curse.
"Ye... Xiao..." Takasugi Toshihiko clenched his fists tightly, his nails digging deep into his palms, unaware of the blood seeping out. He looked at his dying fiancée, a raging fire of hatred burning in his eyes. "I, Takasugi Toshihiko, swear here and now! No matter who you are! No matter your background! I will find you! I will kill you! To avenge Sayuri!! Blood must be paid in blood—!!"
His roar echoed through the sorrowful Mansion, filled with a sense of powerlessness yet resolute tragedy. However, this oath of vengeance appeared pale and insignificant in the face of the absolute power gap.
Meanwhile, inside the Suzuki Family's Mansion, which was as luxurious as a palace, there was a completely different scene.
Sunlight spilled through the massive floor-to-ceiling windows into the warm and comfortable living room. Kanjuro leaned lazily back in the soft sofa, holding Ai Haibara (Haibara Ai), who was reading quietly but felt restless all over, in his arms. Akemi Miyano snuggled against his other side with a smile, using a small fork to pick up a piece of glistening fruit and feeding it to him. Elena Miyano sat on a single sofa a bit further away, looking at this "warm" yet twisted scene with a complex expression, silently tasting the fruit without any appetite.
Tomoko Suzuki walked in elegantly, bowed slightly, and reported in a calm, steady tone, "Lord Kanjuro, I just received a call from Matsumoto Kiyochika. He sounds... terrified, begging you to show mercy and spare his daughter, Matsumoto Sayuri, and stating he will agree to any terms."
As her voice fell, there was a moment of silence in the living room.
Akemi blinked her eyes curiously. Haibara Ai's movement of turning the page paused almost imperceptibly. Elena gently set down the silver fork in her hand.
Kanjuro slowly swallowed the fruit Akemi fed him and even lazily licked the corner of his mouth, as if what he heard was not the plea of a desperate father, but just an insignificant piece of news. He carelessly stroked the brownish-blonde short hair of Haibara Ai in his arms, feeling her body momentarily stiffen, and the corner of his mouth curled into an even more playful arc.
Then, he looked up at Tomoko Suzuki, his eyes as calm as a mirror without a single ripple. In a casual tone, as if deciding what to have for breakfast tomorrow, he clearly uttered a sentence that caused the air to suddenly freeze:
"Oh? Spare her?"
He chuckled with a hint of playful cruelty.
"Tell Matsumoto Kiyochika to wash his neck and wait for me to kill him tomorrow."
"..."
In an instant, one could hear a pin drop in the living room.
The smile on Akemi Miyano's face froze.
Ai Haibara slammed her book shut, her ice-blue eyes looking sharply at Kanjuro, filled with cold horror and disgust.
Elena Miyano gasped, and the silver fork in her hand fell onto the fine bone china plate with a clatter, making a piercing sound.
Tomorrow... go kill him!
So nonchalant, so matter-of-fact!
This was no longer a threat; it was a direct death sentence! And delivered in an extremely insulting manner!
Tomoko Suzuki seemed long accustomed to Kanjuro's style of doing things, merely nodding slightly. "Yes, Lord Kanjuro, I will go convey that now." She didn't even show a hint of surprise or unease on her face as she calmly turned to execute the order.
Kanjuro acted as if he had just done something trivial, returning his attention to Haibara Ai in his arms and the fruit by his side, even smiling at Akemi. "This fruit is very sweet, give me another piece."
However, Haibara Ai's body in his arms went completely rigid. She felt the temperature from Kanjuro's palm, which seemed to control life and death, and listened to his words that treated human life like grass. A chill spread uncontrollably from the depths of her heart.
Takasugi Toshihiko's painful oath on one side and Matsumoto Kiyochika's terrified plea on the other were, to Kanjuro, nothing more than a casual joke during a leisurely afternoon—a final notice for an ant about to be crushed at will.
Absolute power brings absolute coldness and cruelty. And Kanjuro was enjoying this chilling pleasure of controlling the lives and deaths of others. Tomorrow's visit to the Matsumoto Mansion was destined to be a bloody one. Takasugi Toshihiko's anger and despair finally broke the dam of reason. Through certain channels, he found the Suzuki Mansion where Kanjuro was (or rather, Kanjuro let him find it). Consumed by hatred, he actually brought a handgun and recklessly broke into this luxurious territory that, to him, was like a dragon's den or a tiger's lair.
"Kanjuro! Get the hell out here! You animal! Scum!!" Takasugi Toshihiko roared like a madman as he rushed into the magnificently decorated hall with his gun, his screams echoing in the empty space. His eyes were bloodshot, and his face was a mix of tear stains and manic killing intent.
The Suzuki Family's bodyguards appeared instantly, but they were all stopped by Kanjuro, who quietly appeared and raised his hand. Kanjuro was still wearing comfortable loungewear, slowly walking down the spiral staircase as if he were merely greeting an uninvited guest, with a hint of an interested smile on his face. Akemi Miyano and Suzuki Sonoko followed behind worriedly, but Kanjuro signaled them to stay where they were with a glance.
"Oh? It's you." Kanjuro looked at Takasugi Toshihiko, who was pointing the gun at him with a trembling hand, and said flatly, "Takasugi... Toshihiko, right? Sayuri's fiancé." He even emphasized the last few words with undisguised mockery.
"Shut up! You're not worthy of saying her name!" Takasugi Toshihiko roared, the gun shaking due to his agitation. "Do you know! Sayuri... she never forgot you all these years! Her diary is full of you! She thinks of you every day! She loved you so much! How could you... how could you do this to her?! To harm her like that?!"
He roared, trying to use Sayuri's deep affection to question Kanjuro and awaken any potential conscience he might have left.
However, Kanjuro's reaction once again exceeded common understanding.
Faced with Takasugi Toshihiko's heart-wrenching accusation, Kanjuro not only remained unmoved but instead burst out laughing as if he had heard a completely absurd logical flaw. He even leisurely took a few steps forward, completely ignoring the dark muzzle of the gun.
"Love me?" Kanjuro stopped, tilted his head, and asked back in an almost innocent yet cruel tone, "If she really loved me, why did she betray me and marry you?"
Takasugi Toshihiko was stunned for a moment, then roared, "That's because her father forced her! It was family pressure! She had no choice!"
"No choice?" Kanjuro sneered, his eyes suddenly becoming sharp and cold. "If she loved me, any family pressure or father's coercion should not have been an obstacle!"
His voice wasn't loud, but it carried a categorical, twisted certainty.
"Love is, by nature, the most selfish and exclusive emotion in the world. If she truly loved me, she should have given everything for me and betrayed the whole world! Even her family, her father—she should not have hesitated!"
He stared at Takasugi Toshihiko, articulating his chilling view of love word by word:
"Since she couldn't give everything for me and couldn't break free from those ridiculous shackles, it proves her so-called love was just cheap, fragile self-indulgence."
His tone became contemptuous and cold.
"Such love is worthless. Such a person... it doesn't matter if they die."
"Crazy! You're absolutely insane!!" Takasugi Toshihiko was shaking all over with rage from Kanjuro's blatant and extremely selfish remarks. "This isn't love! It's selfishness! It's a desire for control! It's perversion!"
"Selfish?" Kanjuro admitted frankly, his mouth curling into a wicked arc. "Love is inherently selfish. To desire complete possession and demand absolute loyalty—what's wrong with that? Is it a great love to watch the one you love marry someone else and think you're deeply devoted by silently guarding them? That's just self-consolation for the incompetent."
He stepped forward one pace at a time, closing in on Takasugi Toshihiko. That powerful pressure made Takasugi's hand holding the gun tremble even more violently.
"She couldn't betray her world for me, so she didn't love me enough. And I have no need to bestow any mercy on someone who doesn't love me enough."
"You... you devil!!" Takasugi Toshihiko's spirit completely collapsed, and his finger on the trigger suddenly pulled back—"Bang!"
A gunshot rang out!
However, at the moment of the shot, Kanjuro's figure shifted slightly like a ghost. The bullet grazed his sleeve and shattered the expensive vase behind him.
Kanjuro didn't even look back at the shattered vase. He just looked at Takasugi Toshihiko, who was stumbling from the recoil and full of disbelief, with eyes full of pity (as if looking at a struggling insect) and a hint of boredom.
"It seems your 'love' only goes this far," Kanjuro said flatly, then ordered the figures hidden in the shadows, "Dispose of him. Don't get the carpet dirty."
As soon as he finished speaking, two dark shadows sprang from the corners like leopards, instantly subduing the still-shocked Takasugi Toshihiko, seizing his handgun, and dragging him out like a dead dog. His final wails and curses quickly disappeared into the depths of the Mansion.
Kanjuro tidied his slightly messy sleeve, as if everything that just happened was merely a boring farce. He turned around and gave a gentle smile to Akemi and Sonoko, whose faces were a bit pale upstairs. "It's fine now, just a small interlude."
However, his twisted logic of "love means betraying the whole world" and his coldness in treating human life like grass were branded like cold irons into the hearts of everyone who witnessed this scene.
Takasugi Toshihiko verified the fate of a moth to a flame with his life, while Kanjuro once again consolidated his dark and solid kingdom built on absolute control and extreme selfishness.
Matsumoto Sayuri's "love" was worth nothing in his eyes, and Takasugi Toshihiko's "hate" was even more insignificant. In his world, only absolute obedience and possession were the sole standards for measuring everything. Takasugi Toshihiko wasn't directly executed. Kanjuro's command was actually "bring him here," not "dispose of him." Thus, this man, tortured by hatred and despair until he had almost lost his human form, was roughly dragged through the luxurious corridors of the Suzuki Mansion and finally entered a hidden, soundproof basement with a cold, hard decor.
In the center of the basement stood a crude wooden cross.
Takasugi Toshihiko was stripped to the waist by force, and his hands were tied firmly to the crossbar with rough rope. The cold air stimulated his bare skin, and humiliation and fear made him struggle violently, his mouth still letting out discordant curses: "Kanjuro! You demon! You will die a horrible death! Let me go! Kill me if you have the guts!"
Kanjuro slowly paced into the basement. He had changed into a set of black, slim-fitting clothes, appearing even more mysterious and dangerous in the dim light. He played with a simple-looking dagger in his hand, its blade glinting with a cold light, and that chilling smile still hung on his face.
"Kill you?" Kanjuro walked to the cross and lightly patted Takasugi Toshihiko's face, which was twisted with anger, with the cold blade. "That would be too easy, and too boring."
He walked slowly around the cross, like an artist examining his canvas, and began his cruel "teaching" in a calm tone:
"Takasugi Toshihiko, you think your anger is impressive? You think your hatred can bring power?" He sneered. "No, it's just the palest, most powerless wail of the incompetent."
The tip of the blade slid across Takasugi Toshihiko's chest, leaving a shallow bloody trail and bringing a sting of pain.
"You claim to love Sayuri, but what have you done for her? Other than howling here like a stray dog, what else can you do?"
His voice carried extreme mockery: "You can't even protect her, and even approaching me requires the foolish courage of a momentary impulse. What right do you have to say you love her? Your love is like the dust on the ground, worthless."
Takasugi Toshihiko wanted to argue, wanted to roar, but Kanjuro's words were like poisonous needles, precisely piercing into the most fragile and insecure corners of his heart. Indeed, he could do nothing... even his revenge appeared so laughable and weak... "Look at you now," Kanjuro's blade stopped at his heart, "bound to this cross that symbolizes sacrifice and atonement, don't you look like a pathetic wretch waiting to be judged? And the one judging you is me."
He leaned down, close to Takasugi Toshihiko's ear, his voice like a demon's whisper, full of temptation and destruction:
"Admit it, Takasugi Toshihiko. Your so-called love is worthless. Your anger is pathetic. Your life, before me, is a complete joke."
"You don't deserve Sayuri, let alone be my opponent. Your only value is right now, as a teaching tool to prove to me—those who resist me, whether through love or hate, will eventually be crushed to dust."
Takasugi Toshihiko's cursing gradually faded, turning into painful whimpers and gasps. Mental devastation was far worse than physical pain. Kanjuro's words stripped away his dignity as a human being, piece by piece, denying all his emotions and the meaning of his existence. He felt himself being completely swallowed and dissolved by a darkness named \"Kanjuro.\"
"Do you hate me?" Kanjuro lifted his chin with the back of the knife, forcing him to look into those bottomless eyes. "Then keep hating. Let your hatred be the only motivation for your lingering breath. But remember—"
His gaze suddenly became incredibly sharp and cold:
"Your hate, your pain, and your incompetence will all become the source of my pleasure. The more you hate, the happier I am. The more you suffer, the more interesting I find it."
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