You say this is a love game?

"Ok?"

A second voice emerged from his abdominal cavity.

How come... you're back... so soon?

The wind blew gently, and the tree trunk that had completely turned into charcoal trembled under the heavy burden. With the crisp sound of dead branches breaking, a piece of charred wood fell from the tree.

Click!

Suddenly, Kurosawa Ryohito woke up as if from a dream.

His eyes refocused and he held his head with a confused expression.

The next moment, the man was suddenly startled.

Kurosawa Ryojin suddenly raised his head and looked towards the school gate in disbelief.

"what happened?"

"How could Tang Shizi lose... Who did it? Brother Mizutani? Didn't he just get promoted? How is it possible..."

"No, Mizutani-kun is still in the school building, staying with that miko."

His attention shifted from the situation that was still under control, and he finally sensed the cheers from the gap, his eyes fixed on the lonely figure.

The girl walked alone on the road, looking around unnaturally, as if she were walking at night, her uneasy mood was almost obvious.

"...?"

Kurosawa Ryohito's expression froze.

"Why is she back?"

"It's not time for her to come back yet... not yet... not yet..."

The man muttered to himself, repeating the same thing over and over again. He looked nothing like his usual honest self, but instead revealed a strange paranoia and frenzy.

"It's too early."

"The egg hasn't fully recovered yet. It should be a little later. It's not yet time for her to enter..."

Kurosawa Ryojin lowered his head, his mind becoming increasingly chaotic, making him extremely anxious, as if a steel needle was piercing his head.

He muttered to himself until at some point he changed the subject, his tone revealing a strong sense of resentment.

"Soichiro, where are you hiding?"

"Where else can you hide?"

"I've searched everywhere for any gap..."

"Where are you?"

"where?"

……

……

on the other side.

Mizutani Makoto is located in the school building next to the cafeteria.

At the end of the corridor, the shrine maiden Furuya Ruriko was sitting quietly on a chair, listening to Mizutani Makoto talk about Matsushita Kei and the contract ghost story.

She had heard about the Contract Ghost Story yesterday, and just before Mizutani Makoto had his final battle with the Contract Ghost Story, he came to the school building and put Matsushita Kei's body in the dormitory, and now it was lying in the room.

However, when Mizutani Makoto held up the azure soul light, even Furuya Ruriko couldn't help but look moved.

"This is... the soul of the victim."

The miko couldn't help but reveal a sad mood.

Makoto Mizutani handed this quiet soul light to Ruriko Furuya, who took it and held it carefully in her palm.

Mizutani Makoto asked, “I wonder if this soul can still be saved.”

Furuya Ruriko was silent for a long time.

She lowered her head, giving the impression that she was looking at you.

Time passed minute by minute, and Mizutani Makoto did not urge her, but waited quietly for the shrine maiden to think, until the shrine maiden handed back Matsushita Kei's soul, and turned her head to look at the dormitory where Matsushita Kei's body was housed.

She said, "Lord Mizutani, do you know where the soul will end up?"

"I know."

Mizutani Makoto nodded. Kurosawa Ryojin had explained the worldview to him earlier. "Someone told me about the past life. In addition to the present world, there is another past life that the living cannot set foot in. All souls must return to the past life and reincarnate there to be reborn."

Furuya Ruriko nodded slightly.

She then asked, "Then, Master Mizutani, what do you think of death?"

die?

Makoto Mizutani is already a champion in fancy death methods, so Ruriko Furuya really asked the right person this question.

"I keep dying over and over again, but I'm not truly dead... My soul still stays here, but I guess the soul can't be the decisive factor, otherwise even ghosts can be said to be alive."

"What really matters is the existence of the physical body."

"In my opinion, a person's death is determined by the survival of their physical body. When their physical body dies, they are effectively dead. Even if their soul somehow retains consciousness, it can only be considered a ghost, and it cannot be said that the person is still alive... In fact, this person has already entered the process of death."

"Mr. Mizutani understands it very well. You are right. Death is the decay of the body. The awakening or degeneration of the soul is something that happens after death."

The miko turned to Mizutani Makoto and whispered, "In the eyes of us exorcists, the physical body is the basis of the present world. When a person's physical body dies, even if their soul is strong enough to remain in the present world, it is nothing more than a remnant."

This is what she felt most deeply.

Furuya Ruriko has been dead for thirty-seven years, and she never considered herself to be alive.

It's just the soul's last gasp.

Even for Satori Kako, her transformation into a Zashiki-warashi is another kind of rebirth after death. The person "Satori Kako" is already dead, and the reason she left her family was always that she did not want to trap her parents in the "past of the dead."

In the eyes of an exorcist, death is not ambiguous.

"Lord Mizutani, after a person dies, their soul's destination is normally to go to the afterlife."

She said:

"Matsushita Kei, he's dead."

"The light you hold in your hands now is nothing but his soul that has not yet passed away."

"And the reason his soul couldn't reach rebirth was because of the crack... This self-contained crack would capture the departed soul with its gravity, trapping it in the abyss of despair, unable to reach the afterlife, unable to transcend. Under the influence of the crack, it gradually lost its true nature, and even its soul completely dissipated."

"And a soul like the one in your hand... its fate is to be shattered in the cracks. Perhaps it will mix with other soul fragments and eventually form the soul that you, Mizutani-sama, picked up earlier."

She seemed to be answering a question that was not relevant to the question.

Mizutani Makoto actually wanted to save Matsushita Kei, but Furuya Ruriko was telling the story of his final outcome.

Mizutani Makoto remained calm and asked, "Is there any way to change this outcome?"

"Mister Mizutani, what exactly do you want to do?"

"When you said you wanted to save this soul, did you want him to be reincarnated into another world, or did you want to save Matsushita Kei as a person?"

Mizutani Makoto looked at Furuya Ruriko and nodded firmly.

"Save if you can."

Furuya Ruriko said, "Then, Lord Mizutani, please give up the thought of saving his life for now."

"His body is dead, and his life as a human being is completely over."

"You can't save him. Even gods can't truly revive a person. The cycle of life and death is part of the order of the world and cannot be reversed."

"However, there are very rare cases where their souls, driven by obsession and longing, linger in the present world, or return from past lives... If by chance, they can transform into a youkai or something similar, just like your Zashiki-warashi."

"There are more than just Zashiki-warashi in the world."

"If the conditions are right, he might be able to come back to life in another form."

"However, achieving a similar outcome requires extremely harsh conditions... If it's an Onmyoji who's proficient in spiritual power or Onmyoji magic, it's still okay; the likelihood of their obsession remaining after death is much higher than that of an ordinary person. But the person you're trying to save is an ordinary person. You may have the intention to save him, but ultimately, whether he can be saved depends on his will to live."

She said, "He has to save himself too."

Is that right?

Mizutani Makoto fell silent.

After a long pause, he whispered, "I can't make any decisions for him, and I can't judge whether he has the will to live."

"But maybe I can give him the opportunity to choose."

Furuya Ruriko gave a peaceful smile.

She said, "Then, Master Mizutani, you can go to the back mountain and give it a try. His body is completely dead, but the tree demon's spirit core has always been full of vitality and spiritual power. If you use the spirit core as his new heart, combined with his intact soul, he may still have a chance of revival."

Mizutani Makoto's face was calm and he just nodded.

The cold moonlight shone through the empty corridor, so dim that patches of silver-grey light were reflected on the wall, swaying in the breeze, and the wind blew the trees. The boy's determination was as hard as steel, and was coated with a layer of blood-like ferocity by the scarlet moonlight.

The witch opened her red lips slightly:

"I wish you good luck in martial arts."

The action is gone.

Mizutani Makoto left the school building and rushed towards the destination mentioned by Furuya Ruriko.

The spirit core that the witch mentioned was undoubtedly the ancient toon near the swamp.

How to kill this ferocious tree demon?

At first, Mizutani Makoto also thought about going to the mortal world to bring gasoline, pouring it directly on the hillside, and setting it on fire.

But a little thought will show that this is absolutely not possible.

It’s not that monsters like Mu Mei and Gu Chun are not afraid of fire. In fact, fire attack is definitely one of the best ways to deal with tree monsters, but the problem lies in a more realistic problem - it is easy to set a fire, but how to put out the fire?

This is a wildfire.

The mountain behind the crevice has been enlarged by obsession, and its scale spans the entire enlarged private Hiiragiyama Academy. Once this mountain catches fire, the whole scene will become extremely terrifying. With his strength, it is impossible for him to control the raging mountain fire.

How long will this fire burn?

What will the whole mountain look like after it burns?

Moreover, the ancient cypress and a few wood spirits are all located in that filthy swamp. Once the wildfire and the swamp are connected... the words "dry firewood and raging fire" are not enough to describe the tragic situation.

As far as Makoto Mizutani knows, a swamp fire broke out in Southeast Asia in 2015. To this day, it is still unknown how many people were killed in the fire. The only estimate is about 100,000.

That kind of magnificent fire that set the entire mountain on fire should be able to burn the ancient cypress to death.

Even if they are not burned to death in a short period of time, they may be slowly roasted to death by the flames.

However, if a wildfire burns in a swamp, it will definitely take months or even years to burn. The flames will continue to burn like cigarettes and will not be able to be extinguished before the fuel is exhausted. In the process of burning, a huge amount of thick, low-lying smog will erupt.

At that time, there was no way that Mizutani Makoto would have been able to brave the flames and poisonous smoke and rush into the burning swamp - that place was in the hinterland of the back mountain, and he couldn't even run there. He would have been suffocated to death by the poisonous smoke before he could run any distance.

So what can he rely on?

sword.

The sword in his hand.

And people.

People who trust him.

Chapter 125 Gu Chun: Are you trying to set me up?

The night was like a spilled bottle of ink, slowly pouring down along the ridgeline.

The mountains and forests were immersed in a halo of silver and crimson, the treetops stacked into undulating dark green waves, and the serrated edges of the leaves were slightly rusty, as if the entire forest had just been fished out of a pool of blood in a slaughterhouse.

When the wind blows, the leaves soaked in moonlight rustle, and the whole forest seems to come alive suddenly. But when the wind stops, it looks like a dark giant beast crawling in the night, and the dull feeling of oppression weighs heavily on people's hearts.

Makoto Mizutani stood in front of the rusty barbed wire and looked up. It was still the small mountain road surrounded by guardrails that he had visited several times before. A "No Entry" sign was hung on the rusty iron gate.

"Yako, digest this."

Mizutani Makoto took out the [Contracted Spirit Core] from his backpack and made final preparations for the battle.