Chapter 51: Rainy Night Massacre

Resentment and hatred, anger and repressed frustration—these were certainly present, only they had been covered up by one "I’m doing this for your own good" after another.

"Don't embarrass me," "Are you still not done making a fool of yourself?", "You really are so unreasonable"...

The emotional suppression caused by a lifetime of longing for love has, in fact, never been released to this day.

Even if she only learned long after that no one had ever loved her. At the end of her life, Tang Rui had wanted to go crazy just once.

She raised her head, her eyes filled with endless sparks. Yet, there was also struggle.

Because in this world, there are still too many rules that bind.

Wen Xishu was also very clear on this point; if the apocalypse were still in the distant future, if the world were not about to see the collapse of order...

He would not have extended such an invitation.

If there were sufficient time, he would, like many protagonists in films and television, design a precise revenge plan that would not be sanctioned by legal rules.

But if there were less than forty-eight hours, then Wen Xishu would choose to do those impossible things alone.

Settling scores and avenging grievances—if placed in a martial arts story, perhaps it would be met with cheers and applause. But placed in an orderly, harmonious reality, that is sin and cruelty.

Fortunately, the apocalypse is coming.

The era where the survival of the strong is the only truth is arriving soon. Wen Xishu decided to give Tang Rui a chance, but he also handed the power of choice to Tang Rui herself.

"We’ve both had the drink; you know what that feeling is like, but you can also choose not to believe me. Whether you go or stay, it’s all up to you."

Thunder crashed down, the night as bright as day; in that instant, all the lights in the entire bar seemed dim beneath the thunder.

The next instant, Tang Rui also stood up. She suddenly wanted to stop thinking, just as she had let herself play an unprecedented game of truth with a stranger not long ago.

She finally stopped struggling and grasped Wen Xishu’s hand.

"Alright, let’s go kill them all."

Historically, this rainstorm in Jiangcheng lasted for three whole days, causing the drainage system of Jiangcheng to paralyze.

These three days of heavy rain troubled many people, but that did not include Professor Yan Zhihai.

Many years ago, Yan Zhihai understood one thing: education could not make him money, but the vanity of parents could.

For example, a mathematics competition initiated by a certain private training class—he was the examiner and also the one who set the questions; he also hyped up the prestige of these competitions himself.

Naturally, many parents would have their students participate in the competition. Before the competition papers were even finished, Yan Zhihai would happen to be able to arrange for some students to know in advance which questions would appear.

After repeating this set of operations a few times, Professor Yan had raked in quite a lot over these years.

To some parents, a child not studying well is a disease, and Professor Yan Zhihai is the famous doctor who can cure it.

Their children went from not liking to study much to becoming winners of such-and-such competition; this huge change made Yan Zhihai a famous teacher they recognized.

No matter how unskilled a student was at studying, in the series of competitions arranged by Professor Yan, they could always get a ranking.

In this process, whether the child suffered or had been humiliated did not matter. Because to the outside world, they could proudly say, "My child won an award in the competition."

Yan Zhihai knew better than anyone that the ones who were sick were not the children who couldn't study well, but the parents who couldn't achieve things themselves back then and expected their children to do so.

There were no shortage of such parents.

So on such a stormy night, some were trembling in fear while avoiding the rain in underground garages, some were running in a sorry state with their bedding rolled up in subway stations...

But Professor Yan could lie on the terrace of his three-story detached villa, under a huge outdoor parasol, listening to the rain with a look of comfort.

He wasn't just listening to the rain; the moment the thunder crashed, there was a little girl shivering and looking terrified beside him.

Yan Zhihai was very happy.

Especially after just finishing a phone call with the little girl's parents, the way the little girl's eyes gradually lost their luster made him exceptionally excited.

He was grateful for this world; this world was truly beautiful. The morning sunshine was beautiful, the night was beautiful, the heavy rain was beautiful, and the lightning was beautiful.

These parents who had no time to care for their children and blindly trusted the teacher made him feel that everything in the world was beautiful.

Many children are afraid of thunder, and the child beside Yan Zhihai was no exception.

When the child was shivering and looking at Yan Zhihai with pleading eyes—

Yan Zhihai was suddenly inspired, feeling that he could write an article for people to let go of their inner obsessions and feel the beauty of the world.

Once published, many people would surely like it; the children's parents would marvel at his extraordinary state of mind and would trust even more that he was an excellent teacher.

Lightning struck again, and the child finally couldn't help it and began to wail.

The child's crying was also beautiful, but it had, more or less, disturbed his elegant mood for creation. Yan Zhihai frowned, his fat palm raised, ready to strike down.

But suddenly, the sound of conversation pierced through the rain.

"Are you sure it's here?"

"It can't be wrong. I have never... never let go. So I have always been silently inquiring about some things regarding each of them."

"That's good. One must not forget their roots, and even more so, must not forget their grudges. Maintain this beautiful virtue."

Two voices, one clear and one hoarse, sounded as if they were deliberately trying to be heard; they spoke quite loudly.

The little girl turned her head abruptly and saw two soaked figures appearing at the other end of the balcony.

Yan Zhihai was also instantly alert and said sternly:

"Who are you people? How did you get in! This is trespassing on private property!"

His fat body tried to get up, but he nearly fell.

The man on the other side said:

"I'll set an example for you first. Whether you want to take action is up to you. You haven't done this kind of thing before; you might be psychologically resistant the first time."

"Once you do it, it’s equivalent to crossing a line from which there is no return."

"But I still suggest you try. Even if we cannot reconcile with our past selves, we can help him take revenge."

Yan Zhihai's questioning was ignored by the man. The man was wearing gloves; those were gloves named "Forgot the Keys" by an old madman.

Not long ago, the double-door alloy security door of this villa had been broken by these gloves.

It just so happened that at the moment the thunder vibrated the eardrums, Yan Zhihai was appreciating the little girl's fearful posture.

The people who had come were the butcher and the avenger in the rainy night—

Wen Xishu, Tang Rui.

Yan Zhihai was suddenly afraid. Under the influence of some strange power, he seemed to feel the malice of the newcomers.

That malice was constantly spreading.

The light from inside the balcony illuminated Tang Rui's profile; he felt inexplicably familiar with it. But he really couldn't remember where he had seen it.

It was just that the tattoo on her body, and that red and green hair, seemed to remind him of some things he had heard before.

And that man approached him step by step, making him feel a sense of suffocation.

"You, are you here to rob? What are you doing? I am a teacher! I am a good person! I have money!"

Thud.

A dull sound mixed with the crack of bone made the fat Professor Yan instantly fall silent.

"So noisy," Wen Xishu said in a low voice.

Blood had already stained and dirtied his gloves, only to be instantly washed away by the heavy rain. This punch landed directly on Yan Zhihai's skull; the violent vibration caused Yan Zhihai to kneel down directly.

But he did not fall, because Wen Xishu held him up.

"If you kill people in the future, I don't suggest using gloves, because they are too blunt."

Before he finished speaking, he withdrew the hand holding Yan Zhihai. As Yan Zhihai's fat body tilted and fell, another heavy punch made this fat body find its balance point again.

Thud, thud, thud, thud, thud—Wen Xishu threw several consecutive punches, like hitting a sandbag, smashing fiercely into Yan Zhihai's chest, forehead, and bridge of his nose.

Blood vessels began to rupture, causing Yan Zhihai's eyes to turn blood-red. Under the intense pain, he seemed to remember something.

But he could not make a sound; his throat and mouth were full of blood.

Tang Rui watched Wen Xishu beating him continuously, every punch aimed at killing the other person. She had a brief struggle in her heart.

If she retreated now... perhaps everything could still be saved, and she could return to that familiar world.

But this thought only flashed by. When she heard the crying of the child not far away...

Those past memories returned in an instant.

Under the effect of the Strange Sequence 99: Mixed Feelings, those fears and hatreds carved deep into her soul seemed to have substance.

At this moment, Yan Zhihai, influenced by the sequence power, finally remembered everything completely:

"It's you... it's you... how could it be you!"

Coldness, fear, humiliation, resentment—these emotions permeated into the depths of Yan Zhihai's spirit.

He seemed to see a monster full of tentacles tearing apart a girl's body.

The monster made a disgusting, greasy sound, and that sound was one he was extremely familiar with; it was his own voice.

This was his image in the girl's heart many years ago.

He also saw that the once well-behaved and cute girl was now covered in tattoos, like a delinquent girl hanging out in nightclubs.

Tang Rui's body was trembling slightly. She stepped forward a few steps and covered the little girl's eyes with her hands, not letting the sight of the knuckles smashing flesh and blood frighten the little girl.

"You must learn to love yourself in the future, and learn to protect yourself. Don't expect things from people you shouldn't expect from, don't believe that anyone will come to save you. You have to become strong, you know?"

The little girl was a bit dazed. She should have been afraid, but for some reason, she felt a sense of stability.

"Be good, leave here now and go downstairs to hide."

The power of the sequence gave the little girl a brief moment of peace, and she obediently ran away.

Wen Xishu suddenly stopped, because under the effect of the Strange Sequence: Mixed Feelings, he felt something else.

Killing intent.

It was a kind of killing intent that wanted to pierce through a person's flesh and blood completely and crush it to pieces.

"Can you do me a favor?"

"I am at your disposal today."

"Thank you, could you help me drag him into the study?"

"As you wish."

Wen Xishu was like a diligent and uncomplaining butler; he wiped the blood from his face and revealed a gentlemanly smile.

This fat body weighing several hundred catties was easily dragged by him into the study.

Yan Zhihai, who was on the verge of death, finally had a moment to catch his breath. He wanted to beg for mercy, but suddenly, that chill made his mind go blank.

When Tang Rui also appeared in the study of this villa, she held a kitchen knife and a fountain pen in her hands.

Her footsteps were soft, and she hummed the song that was full of youthful vitality from the music box.

Yet even as she hummed, one could hear the hoarseness in her voice.

Tang Rui arrived beside Wen Xishu and in front of Yan Zhihai.

Wen Xishu tactfully stepped back:

"It's all yours. But you'd better be quick; we have quite a lot to do tonight."

He had originally been a little worried.

In case Tang Rui had awakened the traits of a Breaker and was bound by the rules, she would be unable to use violence.

Fortunately, this was only the sixth floor of the Desire Tower, and there were no Breakers. Tang Rui also raised the knife and hacked down fiercely!

The sharp kitchen knife landed in a spot that was not fatal, but due to the astonishing force, this strike still splattered a large amount of blood, enough to be lethal.

A pig-like scream was finally let out, but to Tang Rui's ears, it was entirely the sound of her own crying from many years ago.

One strike landed on the shoulder, one stabbed into the abdomen, one chopped toward the thigh, and one slashed toward the arm!

Before long, Yan Zhihai lost his balance and fell to the ground. His roaring did not last for more than a few seconds before he weakly fell silent due to excessive blood loss; a patch of dirty red appeared beneath his massive body.

At first, Tang Rui thought of torturing the other party with every strike, but as that hatred erupted continuously from the bottom of her heart...

She gripped the knife with both hands and began to hack wildly.

Yan Zhihai's flesh and blood were hacked into shreds, and the filthy blood splattered onto Tang Rui's face, making her look like a soul-reaping demon from hell.

She was a little tired, so she threw away the knife, then used the fountain pen in her hand to stab fiercely into Yan Zhihai's eye socket.

Tang Rui had imagined this scene many times; she wanted to slap him, she wanted to make this fat pig do problems, and for every one he got wrong, she would cut him once. She wanted to hum the music from that damn music box and slice this fat man to pieces, one cut at a time!

But anger made her kill the target too quickly. When she finally sobered up amidst the continuously erupting crimson...

Yan Zhihai was already dead through and through, and his huge, fat face had been poked into a bloody mess by the fountain pen.

Tang Rui stared at this face, stared for a long time, and then she burst into loud laughter.

This was the first time in her life she had let out such a carefree and unbridled laugh.

For over twenty years, every time she wanted to laugh, every time she felt a subtle joy, she would instantly blame herself, afraid of getting carried away, afraid that joy would turn to sorrow, and afraid that she would encounter misfortune the next second.

As she laughed, tears and snot also came out, and the laughter turned into wailing.

Because of the grievance.

In the crying, Wen Xishu felt the terror of this sequence.

He more or less understood why this girl's experience moved him so much; perhaps it really was because there were parts similar to his own, but fundamentally, it lay in the "Mixed Feelings" sequence.

Tang Rui laughed until tears and snot flowed; both the crying and the laughing were both satisfying and painful, as if she had finally crossed time and space to see herself from many years ago.

She felt heartache for that child from many years ago, and that child also felt heartache for her.

A long time later, Tang Rui stopped paying attention to the pile of broken flesh and blood on the ground. She stood up, remained silent for a good while longer, and then slowly spoke:

"Can you... answer one more question for me?"

Wen Xishu smiled:

"I cannot guarantee it will be the truth."

"It doesn't matter, I trust you."

Tang Rui walked into the rain, letting the rainwater wash the filthy blood off her body.

"After that big fire, were they still alive? Would you still care about them? Would you occasionally think of them?"

Wen Xishu sighed lightly:

"What a deadly question."

He pondered how to organize his words, and only after a short silence did he speak:

"The effect of the wine glass really affects my image. If it weren't for the Truth Wine Glass, I would tell you another version of the story."

Tang Rui nodded:

"I want to hear about you now, too."

Wen Xishu said:

"If it weren't for the Truth Wine Glass, I would tell you that I was a freak since I was a child, and that I never had the ability to feel love."

"In the orphanage, I was always playing pranks, always making the other children feel afraid."

"When my foster parents came to find me, I disguised myself so well that they thought I was a well-behaved child."

"I never craved love; I just treated them as my new toys."

"When they were filming various parent-child videos, I was always thinking, if they died, would anyone in this world suspect me?"

"Then, out of curiosity, I just did it. So the fire burned them to death, and I became the pitiful child in the eyes of the world."

"People sympathized with me, but I was thinking, hurry up and let me go to a new family to start another journey."

This was truly a version that made people's hair stand on end, as if he were branding himself as a born evil seed.

"I really hope this is my true experience, because that would make me look like I have no weak points..."

"Make me look like a strong person who has never hoped for those ethereal things."

"But unfortunately, the reality is that I had long discovered that their love for me was just a tool to build their persona and gain attention."

"I kept convincing myself that this was love, until one day... I heard their plan, and only then did I confirm that they didn't love me."

"It was also at that time that I thought I must survive no matter what, because the world is so big, I cannot have my steps hindered by people who don't love me."

Tang Rui looked at Wen Xishu; Wen Xishu's tone was so flat.

"What... did you do?"

"Nothing, I just made their plan happen earlier. That big fire that was supposed to burn me to death—I wasn't inside, but they were."

Wen Xishu continued:

"For a period of time, I did indeed have withdrawal-like symptoms, and I did indeed think about some questions."

"But gradually, in the process of surviving, I began to stop caring about these things."

"For a while, I became a very capable person, and I did some very cool things. My body seemed very suited for doing those dangerous extreme sports."

"I played those sports that could test life and death to the extreme."

"At least in the eyes of others, that was what they longed for in their hearts but dared not do. They felt a kind of wanton happiness from me, a kind of pleasure in mocking fate."

"But they had their own lives, their own shackles. They worked nine-to-five and had to support their families; this made them happy, and it also made them miserable."

"They couldn't become me, and I couldn't become them. But at that time, I realized one thing from their praise."

Tang Rui asked:

"What is it?"

Wen Xishu looked at Tang Rui:

"Only when we don't care whether we are loved and go to complete ourselves can we truly be loved by others."

"Begging for love from those who make us incomplete will only make us more incomplete. This is a vicious cycle."

Tang Rui was slightly startled.

In her life, who were the ones who made her incomplete?

The answer was so obvious.

Yan Zhihai, who had long since turned into rotten meat in the house, had indeed hurt her.

He made her incomplete, made her full of fear, made her obedient and cowardly... and caused irreversible damage.

But she could have avoided meeting such a terrible person.

Her life could have been outside the parrot cage. She could have picked up a guitar, she could have chosen to sing the songs she liked.

She had never, like the children on the internet, looked down on her parents for being poor, or looked down on her father and mother for being unable to provide affluent material conditions.

She envied the Youth Palace outside the cage, but never dared to hope for it.

She only longed to receive praise from her parents, to receive love. To receive recognition, to be able to get some encouragement from here.

But in this process, she instead became increasingly inferior, sensitive, and incomplete. As for the many hardships in her later life, she never thought of blaming her family, only thinking that she hadn't done well enough.

She didn't even dare to think about the root cause of everything.

But Wen Xishu's words made her start to carefully think about the reason for living in this current state for the first time.

Wen Xishu said:

"Our situations are different; my foster parents wanted me dead, and if they didn't die, I would have to die."

"But your parents didn't want you dead; you were not in that kind of life-or-death situation."

"I really dislike Freud; he attributes all problems to the original family, to the point where on the internet, everyone attributes the reason for their poor lives to their parents."

"But the vast majority of parents in this world, while perhaps not perfect, do love their children from the bottom of their hearts."

Tang Rui looked at Wen Xishu with a complex expression, feeling somewhat at a loss for a moment.

Wen Xishu suddenly smiled:

"Did you think I was going to persuade you to stop?"

Tang Rui nodded. But Wen Xishu laughed even more happily:

"Rest assured, I am a petty person. Tang Rui, since I have already come here, it is to take you to commit evil."

"Admittedly, your parents did not necessarily want you dead, but living with a massive void is actually more painful than death. Fortunately, you are kind by nature and did not grow up to be a monster."

"Likewise, in this world, there are countless people whose parents love their children from the bottom of their hearts; the suffering of those people actually stems from themselves."

"But you are not one of them."

"Tang Rui, your suffering can absolutely be blamed on them. Of course, you could also find a hundred reasons to defend them, if..."

Wen Xishu said word by word:

"If they had never seen that page of the diary."

Tang Rui's body trembled slightly.

Under the influence of a complex mix of emotions, Wen Xishu and Tang Rui had effectively exchanged their experiences in depth.

Therefore, Wen Xishu was very clear... Tang Rui's parents were indeed among the very few truly unfit parents.

At this moment, Tang Rui also remembered again—her parents had actually known about the persecution she suffered when she was a child all along.

That missing page of the diary had actually been torn out by her parents. It was just that she had always deceived herself into not thinking so.

And as of today, were it not for Wen Xishu's arrival, and were it not for this exchange of heartfelt truths tonight, Yan Zhihai would still be living very well.

And there would be other girls with a fate similar to her own.

This meant that in the eyes of her parents, the vanity brought by the awards hanging on the wall was far more important than the girl's body back then.

Tang Rui let out a soft scoff, and Wen Xishu said:

"Let the scum have the ending of scum, and let the degenerates have the ending of degenerates. The heavy rain has not yet stopped, little parrot, I still have unfinished business; it is time to set off."

The rapid updates over the past two days have caused a change in the update schedule. Tomorrow, updates will return to normal; they will still be updated at twelve noon every day. In addition, the levels of the Weird Tower will also be broken down and not glossed over, so don't be anxious... I am just writing a bit slowly, but I really haven't been slacking off.

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(End of this chapter)