He had met Erii only a short while ago.
It was the handiwork of Lu Mingze.
He had said things like, "Brother, you're an adult now. Since NoNo has left you, you're bound to find someone better." And so, in that secret chamber atop the Genji Heavy Industries building, he met the girl.
Uesugi Erii. A beautiful red-haired girl dressed in miko robes. She could only communicate by writing on paper, yet she was unexpectedly endearing. This girl, who had spent her entire life as a high-pedigree dragon-slaying machine confined to a small room, was taken out of her tiny world for the first time by him.
Lu Mingze had manufactured a date for them, taking them to all the most beautiful spots in Tokyo.
He didn't resist.
Every man meets a girl he likes, one way or another. Lu Mingfei had once promised himself that the next time he met a girl he liked, he would hold on tight.
But now, he felt uncertain. Having power did not equate to having a steadfast heart. They were two very different things.
The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates once compared life to a wheat field; Lu Mingfei felt that love was much the same. Everyone steps into their own field of wheat to pick the largest ear. Some pick the one they think is the biggest and leave the field immediately, unmoved no matter how much larger the stalks they see later. Others walk through the field, seeing one fruitful stalk after another, but always thinking there must be a bigger one further on. They hesitate, looking back and forth, and in the end, they either leave with nothing or settle for whatever is left.
Lu Mingfei felt he was the latter type. He had walked into the field and encountered two ears of wheat: one named Chen Wenwen, the other named NoNo. Both were quite grand, but neither belonged to him. Finally, he had found another.
Yet he wasn't sure if this one truly belonged to him, or if it was indeed the largest in his field.
He looked at his phone and softly read the message.
"Sakura, are you there?"
The ID on the other side was "Monster." The avatar was a pair of high-heeled Roman sandals, the ones Lu Mingfei had bought for her not long ago when they went shopping. He stared at the ID, suddenly recalling a conversation he'd had in his dorm with his teacher, Zoran.
"A monster, huh..." he sighed, his fingers dancing briefly across the keyboard.
"I'm here," he replied.
He promptly exited Line and looked at another notification. This message was from EVA, Cassell College's AI.
"Lu Mingfei, we need you."
The tone was as flat as ever. The so-called "we" meant Hilbert Jean Angers, Chu Zihang, and Caesar, all the comrades waiting for him to join the dragon-slaying battlefield. The message included a location:
The Red Well, Tama River.
A ding sounded. "Monster" had sent another message.
"Sakura, I'm scared."
Then, a flurry of messages followed in quick succession. Lu Mingfei could almost imagine her fair fingers flying across the phone screen. Her brother, Gen Chisei, had prepared a plane and a passport for her; she was supposed to leave an apocalyptic Tokyo for South Korea. But she seemed terrified. Her life, much like Lu Mingfei's used to be, was not her own. She kept asking Lu Mingfei about his situation over and over.
She wanted to see him.
In an instant, Lu Mingfei was faced with two choices. He could leave the wine cellar and step onto the battlefield of dragon-slaying, or he could find the girl called Monster and stand by her side. These were two starkly different paths.
Another choice. A word that always tasted of cruelty.
Standing among the remains of the Death Servitors, Lu Mingfei hesitated. Only a boy hesitates.
Just then, his phone chimed with a different notification sound. It wasn't Line; it was QQ. Lu Mingfei glanced at it, and his pupils constricted.
The avatar was a dark purple crescent moon. The ID was "Moon."
"Teacher Tso Lan!" he instinctively replied. His teacher had actually returned.
It was a link. Lu Mingfei tapped it.
In the next second, the world shifted before his eyes. He wasn't in a wine cellar; he was at the bottom of a dark, terrifying well. Spotlights beat down like it was a stage. On the stage, a young, delicate girl lay in the center, her body shriveled and bloodless. A disgusting man held her high, calling for the descent of a god.
Lu Mingfei shuddered. In an instant, he was back in the cellar. The scent of blood rushed at him, the metallic tang of rust filling his nostrils and snapping him awake.
What Zoran had shown him was a possible future.
Inexplicably, his heart ached. In that vision, the girl looked like a harvested ear of wheat, leaving behind only a withered husk lying lonely in death.
Lu Mingfei crushed the wine glass in his hand. Without pausing to wipe the Death Servitor blood from his face, he charged out of the wine cellar.
As he burst out of Takamagahara, he found a speedboat floating on the water outside the shop. He didn't know where it came from, but he leaped onto it. Without him even touching the controls, the boat sped off, cutting through the tide as if pre-programmed.
In a tunnel leading to the airport, a black Mercedes pushed through the crowds with difficulty. In the back seat, a girl in a white taffeta knee-length dress huddled like a fragile kitten. Her slender palms clutched her phone, the screen still lit up, held tight against her chest.
She had sent so many messages. She was so scared.
The Mercedes burst out of the tunnel and screeched to a halt. A row of cars blocked the road ahead, it was a dead end. Someone had long ago barricaded this essential route to the airport, waiting for the fish to bite.
They were members of the Oni Clan, those lunatics led by Herzog. They blocked the road, their leader clutching a set of wooden clappers, seemingly having waited a long time. It was a deathtrap. The girl could not escape Tokyo; she was Herzog's designated sacrifice.
The sound of the clappers rang out. The girl, despite her immense power, immediately clutched her head and collapsed in the back seat. Her pupils grew dull as countless images flashed through her mind.
The car door was wrenched open. A wave of derisive laughter followed. Erii, her gaze vacant, allowed herself to be dragged out, falling into the muddy rainwater.
So cold, she thought.
But in the next second, a familiar aura crashed through the curtain of rain. Like an enraged beast, it tore through the barricade of cars.
Lu Mingfei was in full dragon-form. He tossed aside the blocking cultists, his blistering flames turning the downpour into clouds of white steam. With scaled hands, he hoisted a member of the squad. Step by step, the steam-shrouded figure, looking like a demon crawled out of hell, approached the black Mercedes.
Through the eyes of that being, he had seen the future. Everyone has their own timeline; he had found hers, and he was going to change it.
Lu Mingfei had the power. He was no longer a cowardly child.
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