Bizarre Honkai, a Wife-Chasing Crematorium

The wind howled all around. Holding Crimson-Dyed Sakura, strange and bizarre patterns appeared on Yae Sakura's right palm and wrist.

The ghosts on the blade of Crimson-Dyed Sakura spread along the hilt onto Yae Sakura's fair and delicate skin. Sharp claws carved strange and blood-red patterns on it, patterns of despair, collapse, and madness...

They were the expressions of many people before their deaths, mixed together to present a twisted, deformed appearance.

Gradually, her entire arm was contaminated.

"I won't let you... get another chance to get close to him."

Yae Sakura spoke coldly to the shepherd hiding in the depths of the sheep pen.

The shepherd stood up straight, transforming from a monster with a sheep's head and a human body into Yae Sakura's appearance, and imitated her posture of holding the sword.

He bent his waist, lowered his head, his eyes wide open, his body like an arrow ready to be shot at any moment.

A cursed blade identical to Crimson-Dyed Sakura appeared in his hand, but unfortunately, there was no blood flowing on it, only a dull, ordinary blade swallowed by darkness.

Yae Sakura flashed forward, and a blood-red blade light poured from her sword.

The shepherd made the same move, but in the next second, the sheep's head fell to the ground with a "thud," without even a chance to resist.

Under the absolute crushing power of completeness, the shepherd, who only possessed a single rule, was easily slain.

Ghosts do not die. The moment it was about to restart, its time and space were frozen.

No, strictly speaking, it wasn't frozen.

The restart was still in effect, but... the ghost did not update according to the established procedure.

The shepherd was already in a state of restarting, but countless ghosts grabbed every one of its blood vessels, every muscle... and forcibly dragged it back to the time node of its death.

In the end, it was dragged back into Crimson-Dyed Sakura, becoming a ghost that was forever restarting but could never truly restart.

After doing this, the madness in Yae Sakura's blood-red eyes began to fade, and pure cyan returned to occupy them.

The Crimson-Dyed Sakura in her hand turned back into Sakura Blizzard, as pure as a young girl's heart on a blank sheet of paper.

"Ugh—what am I..."

Looking at the white bones and mottled bloodstains on the ground, Yae Sakura was stunned for a long time before she reacted.

"I protected Mo-kun."

"The dirty things are starting to appear in the village again. No wonder Father is so eager to hold the festival."

"Only the festival can quell the chaos and prevent the demonic beasts from breaking into the village."

"I have to protect everyone's safety. I'll continue to patrol tonight, from the south of the village to the north."

Yae Sakura picked up her sword and walked north. The contamination on her arm recovered, leaving no ominous traces.

At Grandma Chiyo's house, Li Mo sat on the stairs between the first and second floors, constantly thinking about the differences between the festival Yae Sakura spoke of and the one in the original work.

Just as the Peach Blossom Spring and Yae Village were similar but not the same, many of the stories Li Mo remembered by heart were versions that had been altered for the sake of passing censorship and appealing to the masses.

The reason was unknown, but it was clear that not everything had to be investigated for a reason.

If everything could be traced back, that was not something a human could do.

Omniscience is omnipotence, and omnipotence is God.

Was the notebook omniscient? He wasn't sure... it wasn't important. First, he had to think about the relationship between the two festivals.

Li Mo began to dissect the nature behind Yae Rin's behavior in his mind.

But after much thought, he could only come to one conclusion: the writer was having a breakdown.

Was it just because she didn't want her sister to feel guilty?

But that sentence was clearly pushing Yae Sakura into a fire pit, wanting her to become a blood-soaked executioner, a tool for the villagers to alleviate their own sense of guilt.

Because the one wielding the blade was Yae Sakura, not them.

So they could choose the sacrifices with a clear conscience, and comfort themselves in their hearts that it wasn't them who did it, that they just wanted to bring about a timely rain to save more people.

"Yae Sakura had clearly expressed her disgust for the festival before. She was simple-minded and kind. If it weren't for what Yae Rin said to her at the end, she probably wouldn't have hypnotized herself later and become a numb killing machine."

Li Mo tentatively put himself and the people he knew into the perspective of the Yae sisters.

If he were in Yae Sakura's position, and they were in Yae Rin's, what would they say to him?

Mei would feel relieved: "If it can make my brother feel better, then even if I die now, Mei has no complaints."

Hua would have a look of relief: "When one arrives at Luoyang, the flowers are like brocade, yet when I came, it was not spring... I pour out my heart, and you are free to do as you please."

Pardofelis would scream and struggle desperately: "Ahhh!!! Boss Mo, save me! I don't want to die!"

Shigure Kira would be tsundere, glaring with a look of disdain, her first half-sentence harsh, but her second half soft: "Be decisive and give me a quick death. If you can, close your eyes. I don't want you to remember my miserable state before death..."

MEI would say after a brief silence: "People always look at something important other than themselves. After I die, there will still be traces of my existence here. I'm very curious if you will care about these traces, and even more so, if these traces disappear from this world, will you still remember at some point... these insignificant but precious traces that once existed but have already disappeared."

"After that, use no logic to create a logic that belongs only to you. Make all things become the way you like them most in your eyes."

"All the past is a dream, and reality is the continuation of the dream."

"If you really put someone in your heart, and you recognize their thoughts, respect their choices, and acknowledge their value."

"Then, you should realize their dreams. Practice their ideals, and understand how beautiful and broken things are in their eyes."

"What I am practicing is this path."

"In the end, what this world recognizes—is not empty words, but real struggle, isn't it?"

Li Mo was abruptly pulled out of his fantasy. He touched his eyes; they were a little wet. His pupils contracted into vertical slits.

His field of vision changed drastically. Every speck of dust on the ground, every crack on the wall was clearly visible.

But he did not see the owner of the words, the girl who wore a work uniform all year round, with black-rimmed glasses, who could easily see through all his thoughts.

After a long time, Li Mo's vertical pupils slowly returned to normal, becoming unfocused again.

Everything just now was like a dream, so unreal it was ridiculous.

"Ugh..." Li Mo drooped, rubbing his blurry eyes with his hand.

"How strange... These words, in terms of style, do sound like something MEI would say. But why would I..."

Why would I know?

Li Mo didn't understand. He had just subconsciously put himself into MEI's perspective, trying to simulate what MEI would say to him before her death.

But a substitution was just a substitution. It was impossible to really think from the other person's perspective and position.

Without personally experiencing everything the other person had experienced, empathy was out of the question.

So it was also impossible for him to completely understand what MEI was thinking.

But those words, it was as if MEI had really said them.

For some reason, ever since he had seen the Illusion Ghost, Li Mo felt more and more uneasy in his heart.

He couldn't say why, it was just a gut feeling...

His thoughts returned. The conclusion had not changed. That is, if the other person was someone he really cared about, then when he was about to die and could no longer accompany the other person, what he would think about was how to make the other person feel at ease. Only when he had a strong wish in life and recalled certain specific events when he was about to die would he be tempted to do something.

Yae Rin, with her simple mind and lack of experience, should not have said such words to the guilt-ridden and pained Yae Sakura.

Instead, she should have said something simple and clear like: "Sister, you must live on."

"In the end, what this world recognizes—is not empty words, but real struggle..." Li Mo repeated.

Words were indeed pale and powerless. A promise made was just a promise. If it was not fulfilled, it was just a meaningless verbal check, a lie that played with people's hearts.

To lose one's original intention for some unrealistic agreement was a very sad thing.

Just like in the original work, where Yae Sakura, for a single sentence from Yae Rin before her death, debased her own life, became a blade for the villagers, and numbly slaughtered the living people in the festival.

Among them were friends she had played with since she was a child, a sad person who had found their beloved and was about to enter a happy life but was chosen to be offered to the gods, an innocent outsider who was inexplicably sent to the altar...

The beloved, the innocent, were all pitiful things sacrificed first in the festival.

On the contrary, the cunning, the dark, and the unworthy survived to the end.

"...Compared to supernatural incidents, this kind of rule seems to be the real reality."

"Whether it's the animal world or human society."

"Without exception."

In his state of two deaths, his thinking speed and breadth were significantly enhanced.

So much so that Li Mo quickly associated it with the real world. After all, most of the Bizarre originated from various human emotions, so it didn't seem out of place for the phenomena born from them to conform to social laws.

"Ahhh!!!" Li Mo's thoughts scattered. Suddenly, a heart-wrenching wail came from little Chiyo on the second floor.

Li Mo turned and drew his anomalous pistol, observing Chiyo's room on the second floor, but did not immediately move.

"What's going on?"

Li Mo was puzzled. He had just checked the situation in Chiyo's and Grandma Chiyo's bedrooms a short while ago and had not found any traces of the Bizarre.

The ghosts of Yae Village acted according to human thinking. Even if they wanted to invade, they had to go through obstacles such as the threshold and the peach orchard.

Even if a ghost was lucky enough to break through these, when it reached the first floor of the house, there was still the peach wood rooster and him sitting guard.

Li Mo looked at the door. The main door was tightly closed, and there were no strange phenomena.

This also meant that no ghosts had entered through the door.

The window was on the east side, where there were the most peach trees. Plus the rules, the ghosts were unlikely to enter through the window.

So what was the reason for little Chiyo's scream?

As Li Mo thought, he walked uniformly to the outside of Chiyo's room on the second floor.

The door was open. Grandma Chiyo had immediately gone in after hearing Chiyo's scream.

Li Mo did not go in at the door, but carefully observed the situation in the bedroom.

Squeak—

Squeak—

Squeak—

On the beams of the room, rats were scurrying in groups. Dozens of small "green gems" flickered rapidly in the darkness, the same kind of eyes as the ghost sheep in the sheep pen and the ghost bear in the suburbs.

Glowing with a faint green light, the beams of the room were stepped on with a "creak, creak" sound.

"It hurts... so uncomfortable..."

Chiyo curled up into a ball, tossing and turning on the bed. No position could be maintained for more than three seconds.

Grandma Chiyo reached out but didn't know where to put her hand. She could only watch dryly as Chiyo's face twitched and she groaned in pain.

"..." Li Mo silently walked to the bedside, holding his anomalous pistol, wanting to figure out what was going on.

"What should I do! Chiyo, she now..."

"Don't talk," Li Mo stopped Grandma Chiyo's anxious words.

Because he had noticed.

When a human voice appeared, the rats on the beams would stop hiding and proactively walk to the edge of the beams to peek at the person speaking.

Li Mo remembered that he hadn't seen this group of rats when he came in before.

A bizarre rule?

Rats were not low in intelligence. They were unwilling to meet people face to face, usually active at night, coming and going without a trace. If they happened to meet a person, they would flee and hide like lightning.

Under normal circumstances, rats would not have the guts to listen to people speak at close range. But they were one of the animals in nature that could best sense the threat of human death.

A group of rats that actively eavesdropped on human communication, could they really understand?

Li Mo remembered this point. Perhaps... they really could understand. It was best not to speak carelessly.

"Ugh..." Chiyo struggled to open her eyes. After seeing Li Mo's face clearly, her expression relaxed slightly, but she still groaned in pain.

Chiyo called out weakly, "Big brother..."

Li Mo did not respond. He lifted the blanket, and a smell of decay rushed to his face.

Her small body trembled uncontrollably. Something seemed to be wriggling inside, very fast.

In just a few seconds, it had wriggled from her right calf to her lower abdomen, and the skin in her lower abdomen was pushed up.

Squeak, squeak—

The sound of chewing and strange noises inexplicably came from her flesh, muffled.

Immediately after was Chiyo's heart-wrenching scream.

A rat was inside her body.

But how did it get in?

Li Mo tentatively took out a bizarre coin. Although the rules on it were ten percent gone and could only attract ghosts for a short time.

But this short time was enough for the thing inside to crawl out of Chiyo's body, provided that the thing inside had the characteristics of a ghost.

Ting-tang. The sound of a coin falling to the ground sounded.

The group of rats on the beams began to stir.

At the same time, Chiyo opened her mouth, feeling a wave of nausea, as if something was about to come out.

The next second, a fat, blood-mouthed rat crawled out of her mouth and rushed towards the coin on the ground.

"A-a rat?" Grandma Chiyo was puzzled and scared.

How could there be a rat crawling in Chiyo's body?

No wonder Chiyo couldn't help but cry out just now. It turned out that a rat had crawled into her body and was gnawing on her flesh.

In surprise, Grandma Chiyo turned her gaze to Li Mo's face.

His gloomy, pale complexion and cloudy, dilated pupils were particularly strange in the darkness.

That coin...

Grandma Chiyo looked at the ground again. A swarm of rats had rushed over, fighting over the bizarre coin on the ground.

Was this the means of a ghost exorcist?