Desperate people, accept the seed of my soul!

"I am the son of the third-ranking committee member of Lieyang Province, and a formal member of the Five Mountains Society. My life is more valuable to you than my death. You can use me as a hostage to escape this encirclement, or even make me your eyes and ears in the shadows. With just your nod, the entire Wang family's resources will be at your disposal!"

He stared intently at Li Rui, then revealed his final trump card.

"Li Rui, I'm not your only enemy. There's the Special Investigation Bureau, other people in the province who are eyeing this force, and those madmen who want to possess 'supernatural' for themselves—it's not pleasant to be surrounded by enemies. You need a powerful ally."

"And I'm willing to be your ally. If you don't kill me, you won't get a worthless corpse, but a pass that allows you to roam freely throughout this city, and even the entire Lieyang Province!"

Wang Shijun finished speaking.

He believed his words were impeccable, precisely hitting all the weaknesses and needs of a person in dire straits.

However, he had no idea what kind of world Li Rui was seeing at that moment.

Li Rui ignored the noise about "resources," "cooperation," and "passes."

From the perspective of Karmic Fire, with each word Wang Shijun uttered, the nauseatingly thick black marks on his body grew even more intense.

That is the most direct and concrete manifestation of sin in the fire of karma.

The black mist twisted and wriggled on Wang Shijun's suit, spreading outwards as if it were alive.

Through the suffocating darkness, Li Rui saw countless faces.

He saw those innocent people who had been captured by Zhou Xie and taken to the underground laboratory, where they were tortured to death on the cold dissection table as "consumables".

He saw the female college student who had been brutally tortured and killed by Zhang Ziqian, but died with her eyes wide open because of a forged mental evaluation.

He saw the witnesses crushed by power, the ordinary people with nowhere to turn for redress, who could only weep in the dead of night...

And at the very center of all these images is Xiaoxiao.

It was that torn light apricot-colored knit sweater, that lone shoe lying in the dust, and that brooch stained with blood.

All the sins, all the despair, all the tears, ultimately converged on the high and mighty man before them.

And this culprit is now standing at the center of all sins, trying to use "cooperation" and "profit" to cover up the blood on his hands.

ridiculous.

sad.

Can be killed.

Wang Shijun waited for a full three seconds.

He looked into Li Rui's dark red eyes, which held no anger, no greed that had been persuaded, and no fear of being in dire straits.

It was an absolute indifference, a nihilism that transcended the laws of human transactions, leaving only the will to judge.

Wang Shijun's heart finally sank to the bottom.

He knew that all his assets, the power and money that had been invincible in the secular world, were worthless in front of this Asura who had been completely reshaped by hatred.

He lost.

We've lost completely.

Wang Shijun slowly pulled his forward-leaning body back, taking a step back until his back pressed against the cold floor-to-ceiling window.

Outside the window lay the city of Chenxi, which he once thought he could overlook forever.

In this desperate situation where there was no way to retreat, Wang Shijun calmed down.

He suddenly chuckled softly, a laugh that carried the desolation of a dead end, and also a hint of indescribable mockery.

His gaze swept over Li Rui's cold, stern face one last time, and he suddenly murmured a sigh:

"As expected of the person my sister chose, he has a firm will."

He remembered Wang Shiwei's anxious phone call and his sister's secret obsession with this man over the years.

Upon hearing these words, Li Rui's eyes flickered slightly for a moment, but the scorching hot brooch on his chest immediately burned away that fleeting thought.

There was no response to Wang Shijun's remarks, nor was any charge of the trial read out.

Li Rui simply raised his right hand calmly.

Dark red flames, like a burst dam, poured out from his palm in an instant!

The flames were no longer thin lines, but had transformed into a rolling sea of ​​fire, roaring as they rushed toward Wang Shijun in front of the French windows.

In that instant, the entire world in Wang Shijun's eyes was filled with this dazzling dark red.

He did not close his eyes.

In the final moments before he was engulfed by flames, what he saw was no longer simply intense heat and destruction.

He saw it—the trial itself.

……

The dark red sea of ​​fire, like a huge blood-red curtain, completely enveloped Wang Shijun, this arrogant and powerful man, the moment it touched him.

This is a spectacular sight that completely defies the laws of modern physics.

Instead of spreading outwards, the flames rapidly contracted inwards, eventually transforming into a translucent, dark red pillar of fire that stretched from the ceiling to the floor.

Wang Shijun was sealed in the center of this pillar of fire.

His body was "lifted" into the air by an invisible force, his feet dangling in the air.

He found himself unable to even make the slightest struggle; his limbs and bones felt as if they were nailed firmly to the air by countless invisible steel nails.

But what terrified him most was that the karmic fire used a cruel and meticulous method to forcibly keep his brain running—the karmic fire wanted him to live, to consciously feel the sensation of every inch of his sins being burned.

Oh, so what was burning was sin.

The inner walls of the pillar of fire began to twist, and the dark red flames shifted, gradually revealing countless clear images.

Wang Shijun, with his eyes wide open, was forced to watch this "replay of his sins."

He saw the female college student who had been brutally tortured and murdered by Zhang Ziqian; the girl's eyes, bulging with pain, were staring intently at him.

He saw the experimental subjects in the Starlight Laboratory, who were being kept in transparent glass chambers as "consumables." They were reaching out their arms, covered in needle marks and ulcers, to him through the firelight.

He saw the investigative reporter he had just dealt with before coming to Dawn City—the one who refused to go along with the corrupt practices and was imprisoned by him with a single sentence…

One after another, faces torn apart, souls of the wronged who died in despair.

At this moment, all these faces emerged from the inner wall of the pillar of fire. They opened their mouths, which were made of flames, and roared silently as they turned towards Wang Shijun from all directions, frantically tearing at his soul.

These resentful faces were reflected in Wang Shijun's pupils, and his skin began to crack under the tearing force.

Beams of dark red light were shining through the cracks.

However, amidst this extreme pain and resentment, a strange thought emerged deep within Wang Shijun's consciousness.

That was an arrogance etched into his very bones, the arrogance of someone "born into nobility."

"So... this is my sin?"

He sneered inwardly amidst the pillar of fire.