203: Chapter 203 The Seventh Day

Liars, madmen, eccentrics.

Her mother couldn't take it anymore; she went mad and died.

Sadako didn't want to remember how her mother died; that memory was instinctively locked away in her deepest depths.

But after her mother's death, the first thing Ikuma did wasn't to grieve, or even feel guilty—he simply switched the test subject from her mother to Sadako.

Measuring brainwaves, drawing blood, recording psychokinesis levels. Injecting unknown drugs.

She was locked at home like a laboratory rat.

No hugs, no "good girl," no bedtime stories. Only cold instruments and endless experimental reports.

When Sadako was eight, her consciousness fractured for the first time.

Under long-term imprisonment and drug suppression, she split. One was "Big Sadako," who retained most of her humanity and emotions—the girl now standing before Qin Ming; the other was "Little Sadako," who bore all the resentment and darkness.

Sadako's hands were trembling, not from fear, but from rage.

That kind of rage, suppressed for too long, too deeply, and too thoroughly, was like black water at the bottom of a well; once a crack appeared, it would surge upward uncontrollably.

The gravel on the ground began to vibrate violently.

It was no longer the faint tremor from before; the entire wasteland was resonating.

The abandoned corrugated iron fence let out a sharp metallic screech. A concrete slab half-buried in the dirt was hoisted by an invisible force, spinning twice in mid-air before exploding into fragments with a "bang."

Qin Ming raised an eyebrow.

Sadako snapped her eyes open and thrust her hands forward.

A visible ripple of spiritual power exploded from her palms, sweeping up dust and gravel as it slammed fiercely into the white figure over ten meters away.

Shirai was hit head-on by this psychokinetic force. Its entire body was like it had been struck by an invisible truck, sent flying backward, bouncing twice on the ground before rolling away and vanishing.

Sadako froze.

She looked down at her hands; her fingers were still twitching slightly, and a numb, static-like sensation lingered in her palms.

"I... I did it?"

She turned to look at Qin Ming, her eyes shining with an unbelievable light.

Qin Ming was about to say something.

Ding-ling.

The smile on Sadako's face instantly froze.

Shirai reappeared.

Right in front of Sadako, less than five meters away. That featureless, deathly white face "stared" straight at her.

Closer than before.

"Don't panic. Keep your eyes on her," Qin Ming's voice came from behind.

Sadako stared fixedly at Shirai, and then, a voice came from behind her.

"Sadako..."

It was her mother's voice.

A gentle, weary voice with a hint of a sob, sounding as if it had drifted from a very, very far place.

"Sadako... turn around and look at Mother..."

Sadako's eyes instantly reddened, and her body turned slightly, out of her control.

"Don't look back." Qin Ming's voice was like a bucket of cold water. "That's not your mother."

Sadako shuddered, forcibly suppressing the urge to turn her head.

Tears streamed down her cheeks, but her gaze remained fixed on Shirai, not shifting even an inch.

Shirai tilted its head, seemingly confused that its bait had failed.

Qin Ming walked to Sadako's side. "Sadako, do you know what will happen to you in the future?"

Sadako didn't answer; her entire attention was focused on the white figure opposite her.

Qin Ming's voice, however, sounded like he was talking to himself, his tone so light it was almost scattered by the wind.

"Day one. Darkness." Sadako frowned slightly.

"Day two. Cold."

"Day three. Hunger." Qin Ming recited each word as if reading someone's epitaph.

"Day four. Voice gone hoarse from screaming." Sadako's shoulders began to tremble.

"Day five. Fingernails all broken."

Sadako's breathing quickened. She saw something—not with her eyes, but with her innate "Precognition."

Blurry images flashed in her mind: a dark, damp, cold well wall; broken fingernails wedged into rough stone crevices; blood snaking down.

Those were her own hands.

"Day six. No longer struggling."

"Qin Ming-kun..." Sadako's voice was terribly hoarse. "What are you saying... these are..."

"Day seven—"

Qin Ming didn't finish.

Because there was no need to.

Sadako's Precognition exploded at that moment like a kicked-in door. Fragmented images of the future surged in—someone would push her down. A deep well, a sealed well cover. Then death—a lonely, desperate death where no one heard her cries for help. Thirty years of helplessness, thirty years of resentment.

And the person who did it... Sadako's pupils constricted sharply.

The resentment within her exploded.

Deep within the seal, "Little Sadako" felt this emotional tsunami and let out a silent scream from the lowest level of her consciousness.

The man-made rift between Big Sadako and Little Sadako was pierced through in an instant by the same emotion—hate.

Sadako's long black hair began to rise against gravity, floating strand by strand in mid-air like black tentacles with a will of their own.

Shirai seemed to sense something. For the first time, changes resembling "expressions" appeared on that blank face—it was retreating.

Qin Ming stepped back, giving Sadako space.

Sadako's eyes had changed. Her originally gentle and cowardly gaze was covered by a thick layer of black—not uncontrolled madness, but a sober, bone-chilling loathing.

Her long hair shot out like a living thing.

Dozens of black hair strands turned into sharp tentacles, precisely wrapping around Shirai's neck, limbs, and torso.

Ding-ling, ding-ling, ding-ling—the bells rang frantically, like a signal for mercy.

But Sadako didn't stop.

Her long hair tightened, cutting into Shirai's pale skin as black cracks spread across its body.

More hair rose from behind Sadako like pitch-black spears, mercilessly piercing Shirai's chest, abdomen, and shoulder blades.

Shirai struggled to vanish, but every single strand of Sadako's hair firmly locked onto Shirai's spiritual fluctuations.

Sadako slowly raised her right hand.

All the hair strands piercing Shirai tightened and twisted simultaneously.

"Crack."

Shirai's body was torn in half down the middle.

Black spiritual fragments, like confetti scattered by the wind, drifted in all directions and dissipated into specks of dark light in the night sky.

The wasteland returned to silence.

Sadako's hair slowly fell, returning to its normal state.

She stood there, two trails of tears silently sliding down her cheeks.

Qin Ming stepped forward; he didn't say "you did well," nor did he say "it's okay now."

"Let's go. Back for tea."

Sadako lowered her head, reaching up to grab the hem of her clothes, her knuckles turning white.

"Qin Ming-kun."

"Hmm?"

"Afterward..." Sadako's voice was very small, almost inaudible. "Will someone come to save me?"

Qin Ming stopped in his tracks.

He looked back at Sadako with a flat expression, but his tone carried an unquestionable certainty.

"There's no need to wait for someone to save you."

"Because the person beside you won't let that first day happen."

Sadako bowed her head; in those black eyes on her tear-stained face, Qin Ming's silhouette was reflected.

She nodded vigorously.

Qin Ming turned and continued walking, muttering something about point settlement.

And deep within Sadako's consciousness, inside the sealed space, Little Sadako sat cross-legged, her long black hair covering the entire floor of the space.

She closed her eyes, and the corners of her mouth curled into an extremely faint arc.

The ends of her long hair were slowly growing, climbing the edges of the seal like vines.