Ultraman cubs begin to wreak havoc.

"Don't be nervous. I'm not here for you. You're a human being, a real human being. I won't make things difficult for you."

Subaru seemed oblivious to Akane Shinjo's defensive actions, continuing his conversation while completely ignoring her. He walked over, righted the display screen, examined it carefully, and said thoughtfully:

"Was it affected by my psychic vortex bomb? Hmph, even immortality can't escape a soul attack. I just wonder where that guy is hiding now... Akane Shinjo, can you help me find Alexis's location?"

"...Do you know what you're saying?"

Akane Shinjo's eyes widened slightly, as if she were amused by her anger, and she said with a 'kind' expression:

"Do you think you've got me wrapped around your little finger?!"

"Please don't misunderstand, I'm just making a request."

Subaru continued to use his telekinesis to sense the lingering aura of Alexis on the screen, and said softly:

“It was indeed rude of me to barge in like this, but compared to my rudeness, this alien seems far more dangerous. So, Akane Shinjo, if possible, I would like to ask you to help me deal with Alexis… um?!”

299 Despicable people who enjoy themselves

Gen Subaru looked down and saw that the art knife in Shinjo Akane's hand had already pierced his body. Moreover, the human girl had no intention of stopping. Her eyes were filled with hatred and anger as she continued to stab Gen Subaru's body. Streams of light red blood flowed from the wound. Although the amount of bleeding was not large, it still stained Gen Subaru's clothes red.

Watching the art knife being plunged deeper into his body, Gen Subaru paused for a moment, then slowly placed his hand on Shinjo Akane's head, gently rubbing the human girl's head. He didn't use his Nen to calm Shinjo Akane's emotional turmoil; Gen Subaru felt that she did need to vent.

Through this seemingly quarrelsome killing intent, Subaru Gen truly sensed it, sensing the root of Akane Shinjo's dissatisfaction with him. Combined with his telekinetic perception, he gradually constructed a mental model of this human girl in his mind—

She was overwhelmed by the many problems in real society, and at the same time, she was lonely and longed for friendship. Like many people who are addicted to the internet, she chose to escape reality.

In psychotherapy, there is a therapy called sandplay therapy. When this therapy is first formally implemented, the client is allowed to freely place various models or small toys in the sand tray. Ultimately, the shape of the entire sand tray will project the client's psychological state. The city of Azalea Terrace created by Akane Shinjo is a sandplay game that Akane Shinjo set up for herself.

In this world, she has 'humans' who will always stay by her side and always love her. She can modify the existence of this world according to her own preferences. She constantly cleans up the characters she doesn't like in this urban landscape and constantly "repairs" this world, making Azalea Terrace gradually become the way she likes it.

That's why she hated herself so much, unable to bear the real world, wanting only to immerse herself in her own world. She chose to stab herself, wanting to kill this stranger who had inexplicably intruded into her world, just so that this "beautiful dream" could continue.

Thinking of this, Gen Subaru sighed and continued to gently comfort the human in front of him. Humans have a very difficult life. Although Gen Subaru has always protected humans, he also has to admit that many times, even he cannot integrate well into the atmosphere of human society.

Although there are no monsters there, there are many more sinister thoughts that are far more terrifying than monsters. And not all the people living there can feel the kindness from others. In fact, Akane Shinjo represents a group of people in society who choose to escape reality because of loneliness or various reasons in their family and society.

In fact, without enough courage, resilience, and a twisted personality, death becomes a kind of relief. But this kind of death is avoidable. Deep down, they must hope that someone or some way can save them.

So, while gently stroking Akane Shinjo's head, Subaru Gen said softly:

"You must have had a tough time out there. You finally found a safe haven and didn't want me to destroy it, which is why you're fighting so hard, right? I understand, I sympathize. So, although I hope you can become stronger, if you really don't want to face it, I can help you rebuild a miniature world like Alexis did."

Hearing this, Akane Shinjo's eyes widened slightly, and the utility knife she was using stopped. She looked up at Subaru with disbelief, while the boy continued to stroke her hair, smiling softly as he said:

"As for this world, leave it to me. Although the 'humans' of Dujuan Terrace are not strictly speaking your kind, they have already developed complete thoughts and can be considered living beings. Let them continue to live peacefully here."

Minamoto Subaru noticed the reluctance in Shinjo Akane's eyes, thought for a moment, and then continued with a smile:

"If you want to come back, it's not a big deal. I'll build a bridge for you. You can come back from the new world anytime, or go back to the real world to take a look. But when you come back here, you can't just destroy other people's existence so easily. I will limit your power. After all, if you're not happy living here, you can go back to the new world."

"Are you... telling the truth?"

3仪唲叭义汜易Ⅲ纠

Akane Shinjo felt like she was listening to a story, the kind of urban legend or myth told by a drunkard, but she felt like she believed it. Her brain was saying, "This is probably a scam, don't believe it, just stab him to death," but her body just couldn't bring itself to do it.

"Why? Why are you helping me like this?"

Feeling the temperature of the liquid emanating from the utility knife, Akane Shinjo looked at Subaru Genji with some confusion and said:

"Can't you feel any pain? I really hit you hard, like I was trying to kill you. And you still want to help me?"

"There's nothing we can do. You're the kind of human who's already been caught up in this mess."

Subaru felt that Akane Shinjo's emotions had stabilized a lot, so he stopped rubbing her head and said softly:

"It would be too cruel to send you straight back to reality now, so I'll put in a little more effort to help you. As for the few times you stabbed me, it wasn't too bad. It didn't hurt that much. Compared to injuries from battle, it's nothing."

At this point, Subaru paused, looked at Akane Shinjo, and stared at her for a while. Then Akane couldn't help but ask:

"what are you doing?"

"Ah... I feel like I forgot to tell you something, but I can't remember what it is right now."

Subaru tilted his head, a little confused, and thought for a moment. After a moment of silence, he clapped his hands, said "Oh," and looked at Akane Shinjo, saying:

"What I promised you just now cannot be fulfilled yet. There are still enemies causing trouble outside this miniature world, like that monster model you used to blow me up before, which is one of them... Speaking of which, how did you create that Chaos Shadow? Have you seen it?"

"I've never seen it before. Alexis showed me the picture and wanted me to see if I could make one."

To be honest, Akane Shinjo really couldn't understand what the boy in front of her was thinking. He seemed a little too calm, and his overly familiar manner was almost unsettling. But since he reacted this way, Akane Shinjo continued:

"But when I was halfway through making it, Alexis said something like, 'There's a problem. If we continue, it won't be fun anymore,' and he immediately told me to stop."

"Finding amusement...finding amusement in Chaos itself is amusement in itself."

Yuan Mao couldn't help but complain. To be honest, enemies who take all sorts of actions just to have fun are quite difficult to deal with, because you don't know what constitutes fun for them, nor do you know what kind of rituals or actions they will perform to achieve their fun.

But at least for now, we know that Alexis is aware of Chaos and has some understanding of its concept or dangers. So, until we find him, we can only hope that this amusing person doesn't bring down anything related to Chaos just for fun.

"Shinjo Akane, can you help me find Alexis's whereabouts now?"

Thinking of this, Gen Subaru still focused his gaze on Shinjo Akane. The Azalea Terrace, this miniature world, was built by Alexis according to Shinjo Akane's wishes. Therefore, that entertainer can be considered the "administrator" of this miniature world. Without Shinjo Akane's help as the "group leader," it would not be an easy task to take down Alexis, especially if this entertainer deliberately hides himself.

"This...do you really have to find Alexis? To be honest, he hasn't done anything to me. At least until now, he's been helping me."

Akane Shinjo keenly sensed the hostility in Subaru's tone when he mentioned Alexis, and said in a slightly frightened voice:

"Besides, I really don't know how to find that guy. Usually, he's either waiting for me to come home from school on this screen, or he's just wandering around the house. He usually goes out with me, so... if you ask me where he could be hiding, I really don't know."

After saying this, Akane Shinjo looked at Subaru's chest and abdomen, which were covered in knife wounds, and the pale red blood that had begun to drip down his clothes, and said nervously:

"Um, should we go to the hospital? You... what kind of medical treatment do you need? Hmm... how about we just get some simple bandaging first? I'm really afraid that you'll suddenly die while we're talking."

"Don't worry, I won't die. This body is quite complex, and human standards can't be applied to me. Although I do feel a little dizzy right now, my combat reactions won't be affected. You can rest assured that I won't do anything underhanded because of the twenty or so stabs you gave me."

Subaru replied to Akane Shinjo dismissively. He had just absorbed some of the free-floating power of [Eternal Primal]. Although it wasn't much, he no longer needed to fuse with Gridman to fight.

To be fair, Subaru didn't have any issues with Gridman. It was just that the super agent's output was somewhat limited by the performance of the old computer. In every battle, Subaru's biggest concern wasn't whether he could defeat the monster, but whether the Rikka family's old computer could withstand the strain.

Now, Subaru can try to transform independently. Although he can only transform into the young Nexus Pro version at present, it is a good start. Next, as long as the enemy doesn't go too far and he finds the right opportunity and manages things properly, he can snowball his advantage.

As for Akane Shinjo, Subaru also realized her cleverness. She probably wanted to hedge her bets, protecting both his side and Alexis's side, just to be on the safe side and avoid ending up with nothing.

“Shinjo Akane, I just hope that, if possible, Alexis won’t stand against us. And since Alexis is just looking for fun, he’s probably helping you out of some fun too.”

Subaru continued reasoning with Akane Shinjo, speaking slowly:

"By the way, you should have noticed the big robot that was fighting your monster. That's called Gridman, a super agent. He was here because of Alexis's sneak attack and was forced to come here. So, in a sense, your previous troubles were caused by that guy."

"I do know this."

Akane Shinjo crossed her legs on the chair, gripped her ankles with both hands, and swayed slightly as she spoke:

"Alexis said there was a fake flying overhead, and he felt that if he hit it, he might find something interesting, so he flew up and took action."

"【Counterfeit】? What does that mean?"

Subaru raised an eyebrow, not expecting such an unexpected gain. He wanted to get more information from Akane Shinjo, but Akane really didn't know. As a fun-loving person, Akane also loved to be a riddle teller. In addition, Akane didn't care about such things. Therefore, she could only awkwardly smile at Subaru.

Subaru couldn't say much about this, but he hoped that if Akane Shinjo found Alexis's whereabouts, she would pass on a message to him so they could sit down and have a proper talk.

Then, Subaru began a new topic, such as "Don't use monsters to attack the people of Azalea Terrace," "If we have any reliable combat forces, let them come out to help when necessary," and "If possible, could we allocate a portion of the authority over the Azalea Terrace, this miniature world?"

Akane agreed to the request. Her first impression of the boy was quite good. He was good-looking, kind, and she didn't feel too uncomfortable interacting with him. So she didn't try to make excuses or try to get away with it.

However, while Akane agreed to the requests made by Subaru, she herself didn't know how to fulfill them. She could only let the boy figure it out himself and get it himself if he felt it was appropriate.

What could Subaru say? If he had that ability now, he wouldn't need the permissions for this miniature world. All he could say was that Alexis had indeed found a good 'partner' who seemed to know a little about everything, but in practice, he didn't have much initiative.

If Akane Shinjo weren't human, and Subaru Minamoto were in Alexis's position, the boy was confident that he could sell Akane Shinjo out, and she would still be counting the money for him.

At that moment, Subaru remembered something and made another request to Akane Shinjo, which was...

'Help him sculpt a model of Nexus.'

300 Zero: Can someone explain this?

After finishing his story, Yuan Mao planned to leave. To be honest, this matter was resolved much more easily than he had imagined. He had originally prepared for a fight to the death.

Well, even though there was no actual fighting, I still ended up covered in bruises.

"Oh, right."

Before leaving, Subaru remembered something, stopped in his tracks just as he was about to leave the room, and looked at Akane Shinjo, saying:

“My lodging is at the secondhand shop ‘Ayaka Junk Shop’ next door. If you need to contact me, you can go there. Even if I’m not there, others will pass on your information to me.”

"Ah, the Rikka family, I really didn't expect that..."

Akane Shinjo adjusted her slightly slipped glasses and said with a wry smile:

"Alexis and I have been searching for so long without finding you uninvited guests, only to discover you're right next door. Is this what they call 'the darkest place is under the lamp'?"

After saying this, Akane Shinjo lay on the table and said in a disjointed manner:

"Rikka, it seems like it's been a while since I've seen her. I really miss her."