Chapter Two: Dead Fish Eyes in the Dark and the Hunter
At the
street corner outside the café, sunlight was cut into sharp fragments by
dilapidated advertising billboards. Anbian stood in the shadows, his dark green
trench coat bearing the lingering smell of gunpowder and alcohol. His
bloodshot, lifeless eyes, like those of a dead fish, were fixed on the
red-haired woman inside the café through the water-stained , fingerprint-strewn
glass window.
He
slowly pulled the silver flask from his pocket , his fingers trembling slightly
from the alcohol poisoning. With a "click," the spicy and cheap
whiskey slid down his throat, but it did nothing to suppress the nagging unease
in his stomach.
"Tsk,
what a hopeless idiot." The Kishibe muttered a curse under his breath,
exhaling a cloud of murky white mist.
From
the Kishibe, Makima's silhouette appeared elegant, slender, and harmless, like
an ordinary woman enjoying afternoon tea with her first love. But to the Kishibe,
it wasn't a human silhouette at all. He'd seen it far too many times — that
precise angle of her slightly tilted head , that deliberately softened tone
with a manipulative frequency, and those yellow, circular eyes that could
completely control the subject's cognition, like a swirling black hole.
That
was a hunt.
He saw that
just a second ago , Denji looked like a lost dog , huddled in a chair, his face
filled with the lingering image of the girl named " Reige ". However,
the instant Makima's fingers touched the back of Denji 's hand, Kishibe counted
to three in his mind.
Three,
two, one.
Denji
felt as if he 'd been struck by a 10,000-volt high-voltage current; his
lifeless pupils were instantly filled with a chilling excitement. It was an
expression of "forgetfulness." In his decades-long career as a hunter
on the Kishibe, he had seen countless humans manipulated by demons, but no
demon's power could so elegantly and completely bleach a person's soul like Makima.
He knew
better than anyone how deep the wound that girl named Reise had left in Denji
's heart. It wasn't just an ordinary heartbreak; it was the first time in Denji
's garbage-dump-like life that he experienced the hope of being
"chosen" and "escaping." It was his awakening as a
"human being."
But in
front of Makima, that profound pain that was enough to be remembered for a
lifetime was like a thin layer of snow that couldn't even last a second under
the scorching sun, quickly evaporating without a trace.
"That
kid, he's even forgotten why he was crying." Anbian took another swig of
wine, the alcohol burning his esophagus and reminding him of his long- dead
comrades.
Then, Denji
burst out of the coffee shop . He nearly knocked over passersby at the
entrance, a pure, almost chilling, smile on his face. He sprinted past like a
hound finally given a command to chase a ball, completely unaware that a pair
of eyes filled with pity and disgust were watching him from the shadows.
A few
seconds later, Makima gracefully walked out of the shop. She stopped by the
roadside, seemingly enjoying the warmth of the post-rain sunshine. Then, as if
she had accurately predicted her hiding place on the bank, she slightly turned
her head, her gaze sweeping precisely and sharply towards the narrow alley.
That was a provocation. Even from a distance, Kanbe felt as if a
cold, long needle pierced his brain. He could hear Makima's calm yet haughty voice
echoing in his mind: "Mr. Kanbe, peeping at someone on a date
is not gentlemanly behavior. Besides, this dog is now entirely mine."
Anbian
gripped the wine jug tightly, his knuckles turning white from the force. He
knew that this so-called "journey" was nothing more than a cage
prepared by Makima to completely sever Dianzhi 's humanity and strip him of his
last connection to reality.
"
Reige ... " On the Kishibe, looking in the direction where Denji
disappeared, there were only a few cherry blossom petals left, knocked down by
the rain and rotting in the sewage.
In the
boy's eyes, the whole world now consisted only of Makima. He even forgot that
he had been crying for another girl just minutes before. This
"forgetfulness" was not due to recovery, but rather because his
brain's defense mechanisms, his memory storage, and his definition of happiness
had all been completely taken over by that woman.
"Madmen,
dead men, and fools who've been completely fooled." On the Kishibe, he put
away his wine jug, pulled up the collar of his trench coat, and turned to walk
into the bottomless alley. His figure gradually blurred, only his hoarse
mutterings lingered in the wind:
"This
movie is so awful it makes you want to vomit . But I have to keep watching
until the last character leaves the theater."
(...To
be continued...)
