mynovelweb Chapter 343 343: Waiting for It to Open
Chapter 343 343: Waiting for It to Open
Reid pushed open the creaking wooden door and stepped into the dim thatched hut. Joy Boy followed beside him, while Joy Boy curiously looked at the person lying on the ground.
Their arrival immediately put the two people inside on alert.
The young man, curled up in pain, struggled to rise, forcing his weak body to shield the girl beside him. He glared at Reid with hostility, his voice trembling but firm.
"Get out! You lackeys of Minister Fang! I will never touch your cursed stuff again! And don't even think about taking her away from me! You'll have to step over my dead body first!"
The sudden movement and emotional strain almost drained him completely. His body swayed as if he might collapse again at any moment, but his eyes never left Reid. There was fear in them, and something deeper, helplessness in the face of power.
Reid stopped walking.
His crimson eyes calmly observed the young man. The blood mist around him did not move.
He shook his head.
No emotion in his voice. No mockery. No pity.
Only a simple statement of fact.
"Minister Fang is dead. I killed him."
The young man froze. So did the girl.
Disbelief filled their faces.
Reid ignored their shock and continued in the same steady tone.
"I can help you get rid of the addiction."
He paused slightly.
"But the process will be extremely painful. Ten times worse than what you are feeling now. Maybe a hundred times worse."
"You will feel like your bones are being crushed bit by bit, and your soul is being thrown into molten lava."
In truth, it would not be quite that bad.
Reid simply added extra weight to the description.
Pain made people remember.
The young man finally forced out a question through clenched teeth.
"Why… should I trust you?"
"Believe it or not, I don't care. I don't waste time convincing ants."
"I only ask one question."
"Yes or no."
Reid returned the choice to him.
No comfort.
No reassurance.
The hut fell into a brief silence.
The girl clutched her brother's arm tightly, her eyes confused and frightened. No one expected someone to walk in and offer salvation, only to demand a decision that could decide life or death.
Her gaze shifted between Reid and her brother, filled with uncertainty and fear of the unknown.
The young man gritted his teeth. Sweat poured down his face.
He stared into Reid's crimson eyes.
There was no deception there. Only a detached, almost indifferent calm.
And in that moment, something inside him shifted.
He remembered what he had almost done earlier.
Selling his sister.
Just to get another hit of that cursed "Happy Grass."
Guilt and survival instincts collided inside him. More than anything, he wanted to remain human, not a hollow shell consumed by addiction.
His responsibility as a brother finally overpowered everything else.
People who defended drug traffickers deserved no mercy.
With all his remaining strength, he squeezed out a single word.
"…Yes."
Reid got his answer.
"Good."
The blood mist surged instantly from around him, engulfing the young man.
In the blink of an eye, he was wrapped in a dark red cocoon.
A piercing scream erupted immediately.
The sound was so intense that the girl turned pale. Even Joy Boy instinctively clenched his fists.
Joy Boy stood frozen.
He had traveled the seas, faced countless dangers, but this was different. Reid had just opened the door to something far beyond what he understood.
His smile faded for a moment, then slowly returned.
Because the world was broken like this, it needed happiness even more.
Reid, however, simply watched without expression.
For him, detoxing poison and rebuilding damaged systems was no different from handling life itself.
Especially for someone deeply addicted like this, gentle treatment was meaningless.
Time passed inside the screaming cocoon.
The cries slowly turned hoarse, then weaker, then disappeared entirely.
Finally, the blood mist withdrew back into Reid's body.
The young man remained on the ground, soaked in sweat, pale as paper, completely exhausted.
But his eyes were clear.
For the first time in a long time, they were no longer clouded.
He looked at his trembling hands, then turned sharply toward his sister.
"Little sister…"
"Brother!" she cried, rushing into his arms.
The two siblings embraced tightly, sobbing with relief.
Joy Boy's face lit up immediately.
"See! I told you! I told you there would be someone who could be saved! Reid, you saw that, right? We succeeded!"
"We should save the others too! We have to cure everyone in this country! We can bring them real happiness again!"
But Reid simply glanced at him, expression unchanged.
"No."
Joy Boy froze.
"Why?" he asked.
Not in anger.
Not in accusation.
Only confusion.
He could not understand why someone with the ability would refuse to help.
Reid did not judge him.
Some people would call it kindness.
The kind that drags you out of despair whether you want it or not.
The kind that looks like salvation until it isn't.
Reid picked up the bowl of clean water beside him and took a sip.
"I saved him because he still wanted to resist."
"Because he still wanted to live as a human being."
"That kind of person is worth saving."
He set the bowl down.
"But the others outside?"
His voice turned cold.
"They've already given up thinking. Given up resisting. They accepted being controlled by false pleasure."
"They are just empty shells now. Walking addictions."
"If even they don't want to save themselves, why should I bother saving them?"
He looked directly at Joy Boy.
"I won't waste even a bit of effort on people who don't want to live."
"If you want to save them, go ahead. Do it yourself."
With that, he stopped paying attention to Joy Boy.
Reid remained inside the broken hut, casually poking the young girl's cold cheek, as if testing something idle and unimportant.
The girl sat quietly nearby, unsure what to say, simply existing in the silence.
Reid once remembered a saying from his past life.
Something about flowers blooming.
Someone had commented:
"You only need to wait for them to bloom."
-------------------------------------
Hooked already? Let me know what grabbed you leave a review and fuel the journey forward! and if we hit every 250 Power Stones, a bonus chapter drops!
Things are just heating up. Read ahead in Unbound Evolution and stay ahead of the crowd.
[email protected]/_tey
Change @ to a.