My youth story cannot be a knight war

"New one, Ryuki."

The familiar voice in my ears opened up the dusty memories of the past.

11. Only by fighting can we survive

[The already cold night wind suddenly became as cold as a polished Nepalese machete. When the wind blew up the hem of Hayato Hayama's clothes, he truly felt countless invisible blades passing by his side. He even heard the wailing of countless invisible microorganisms in the air after being cut.

"Is it you this time?"

In this gust of wind as sharp as a knife, a person's calm words came from behind.

"New one, Ryuki."

Ye Shan couldn't help but hold his breath, his pupils contracted, he saw it.

Through a rearview mirror standing in front of the road, he saw a pair of black boots appear at the edge behind him... and the overwhelming sense of presence that washed over his soul.

"Aura" is a very metaphysical term, but it is a concept that really exists in reality.

People of all kinds, such as the leaders of internationally renowned companies, the heads of chaebol families, and even the big brothers of the underworld, are different from ordinary people in status, so they are filled with a unique aura. This is a trait given by the living environment they have lived in for many years. It is a power that comes from the heart. The atmosphere brought by this power cannot be created by disguise.

Because of his family background, Ye Shan has been exposed to various leaders of various forces since he was a child. Having felt the atmosphere emanating from those people up close, he knows very well that those so-called actors and actresses in the entertainment industry, whose acting skills are praised by the audience as being no different from reality, are trying their best to create nothing but empty facades.

The core spiritual power of a truly powerful person cannot be brought about by any superb acting skills. The aura that extends from the spiritual power cannot be imitated. You will understand this as long as you experience it up close and personal in reality.

——But even so, Ye Shan had never felt this level of atmosphere from those in power.

The night wind stopped blowing unconsciously, the moonlight hanging in the sky became dim, and even the faint chirping of unknown insects in the ears disappeared. The distance of the entire street seemed to silently lengthen in Ye Shan's eyes, and the end of the road led to unfathomable darkness.

Moreover, this voice... no way?

"Gudong~"

The curve of his Adam's apple moved a few times, and his right hand silently clenched the card box in his trouser pocket. Ye Shan slowly turned around, and his clear black pupils reflected a figure as he turned around.

When Ye Shan saw the whole figure, his pupils slowly widened.

The other person was standing quietly on the street not far behind him, the hem of his black windbreaker fluttering in the wind. Under his somewhat messy black hair, a pair of even darker pupils radiated a desolate light in the night.

A man dressed in black stood silently on the street illuminated by street lights, but when the light of the street lamp shone on him, it could not illuminate his figure. Instead, it made the black color brewing on the figure appear deeper, and even the light was gradually suppressed.

The sense of existence that Ye Shan felt came from the man in front of him. He just stood there, and a deep and cold atmosphere emanated from his body, gradually spreading to the surrounding space and eroding into a part of himself.

At this moment, the eyes of both parties met, and the eyes of the same color touched each other.

"—!"

Staring at those eyes, Ye Shan's pupils shrank rapidly and the edges of his pupils trembled.

The moment his eyes met those eyes, Ye Shan immediately remembered. He remembered the memories of those eyes and everything the owner of those eyes represented.

He had seen these eyes before, but he chose to bury the memory of them with his own hands!

Many years ago, during his high school days, Hayama, who had attended Sobu High School, witnessed a scene on his first day of second grade that he should never forget.

That day, at the freshman entrance ceremony, in the auditorium, he was curious about the presence of a certain person and cast his gaze at that person, and the other person also returned his gaze.

When Ye Shan saw those eyes at that moment, it was at that moment that he felt an emotion he had never felt before since he was born.

That is, horror.

What he saw in those eyes was endless coldness and darkness, as if all the negative emotions in the world had settled in the depths of those pupils and turned into some kind of indescribable dark liquid. When the eyes touched, the black liquid followed the gaze and invaded the depths of the soul.

It was also at that moment that Ye Shan, through a brief eye contact, saw through the true nature of the person who possessed these eyes.

He is not a human, but a monster.

It was a foreign creature with the same skin as humans, but its inner nature was completely different. This monster, which had never been human, had always been hiding in the depths of those eyes, peeping at the world in the guise of a human.

After that day, Ye Shan erased the image of these eyes from his memory. This was not his wish, but the result of his own physiological protection mechanism. The horror of seeing "something that was never human" made his brain judge it as a mental impression that was harmful to survival, and then deleted it directly.

But at this moment, the memory that had been deliberately forgotten that day resurfaced and stung Ye Shan's brain.

At this moment, the other party spoke, and his calm and indifferent voice spanned the distance of dozens of meters between the two of them, so clear that it seemed to ring directly in Ye Shan's ears.

"But before asking you this, shouldn't we first say—'Long time no see'?"

The man tilted his head slightly, his black bangs brushing past his emotionless black pupils.

"Hayama, Hayato."

"You are……"

With his brows slightly raised, Ye Shan looked at the man. His eyes were exactly the same as the ones he saw that day, still so cold and dark.

Opening and closing his mouth, Ye Shan said the other person's name in disbelief:

"Hikigaya...classmate?"

"It seems that you still remember me."

Squinting his eyelids slightly, looking at the shocked Hayama, Hikigaya Hachiman said indifferently:

"This thing called 'fate'... is really disgusting, isn't it?"]

An expressionless man appeared above the curtain, his eyes deep and calm, standing quietly without any movement.

But this does not mean that the others who see this man will be as calm as him.

"This person is..."

The raised cell phone slid gently from her ear as her hand dropped. Hikigaya Komachi stared blankly at the face that appeared in the curtain, her eyes completely occupied by the other person's appearance.

"……elder brother?"

"--wrong!"

With her hands pressed tightly against her plump breasts, Yuigahama Yui's gaze trembled as much as her tone.

"This person—he's not Xiaoqi! He gives me a completely different feeling than Xiaoqi!"

"He gives people a feeling... so cold and scary. It feels like, it's..."

“…That person is me.”

A voice sounded faintly in the silent service club. Hikigaya Hachiman also put down his raised mobile phone. He turned his back to everyone, and only that face existed in his eyes.

"Yuigahama, that person...is indeed me."

"Yuigahama-san, face the reality. It is indeed Hikigaya-san."

Yukinoshita Yukino placed a hand on Yuigahama's shoulder, shook her head slightly when she looked over, and spoke softly.

"After all, he looks almost exactly like Hikigaya-san now. Could it be that Hikigaya-san has a twin brother besides his sister?"

"No! Xiaoxue, you obviously don't think that way! How could that person be Xiaoqi?!"

The pink-haired girl became inexplicably stubborn at this time. She stubbornly grabbed Yukinoshita's arm, pointed her other hand at "Hikigaya Hachiman" in the curtain, and spoke in an anxious tone.

"Xiaoxue, you felt it too, right? That person, that person—in short, he absolutely cannot be Xiaoqi! Absolutely not!"

"..."

Her words were extremely confusing and illogical, without any logic at all. All that could be heard from them was stubbornness and willfulness, but they made Yukinoshita silent.

Glancing obscurely at Hikigaya's back, Yukinoshita was unable to answer Yuigahama's question, but she understood what her illogical words were trying to express.

——How could someone who is filled with darkness and coldness from the bottom of his heart be Hikigaya Hachiman?

This is what Yuigahama really wants to express, and Yukinoshita really wants to agree with her idea, but she takes "correctness" and "never avoid" as her life creed and cannot deceive herself into denying the facts she sees.

Because that was indeed "Hikigaya Hachiman", and he had even acknowledged it himself.

“Those eyes…!”

His body inexplicably trembled strongly, Ye Shan looked at the man in the curtain in disbelief, and his feet unconsciously took a few steps forward.

And "Hikigaya Hachiman" in the curtain happened to raise his head at this time. Due to the spatial perspective, his line of sight just reached a "direct" angle with Hayama outside the curtain.

When he saw those eyes, the scene in front of Ye Shan suddenly became blurred.

Buzz——————

An indescribable loud noise suddenly rang in his mind, stinging his eardrums and echoing in his brain.

It's like hearing someone scratching a blackboard or glass with their nails, which is physiologically unbearable, and the whole person suddenly falls into a state of madness close to "blank".

All the scenes in front of me suddenly flashed a blurred and chaotic mosaic frame from the edge, and all kinds of bizarre colors came from all directions to fill the scene.

Amidst this strange and distorted scenery, a voice rang out.

The voice was cold and indifferent. There was not a trace of human emotion in it. Only surging darkness and coldness were stirring in the words.

The voice said:

Fight.

"Well……!"

"Pah!" There was the sound of a body falling, followed by a woman's voice, her voice distorted by surprise.

"Hayama-san!?"

【“…”

Hikigaya Hachiman lowered his upturned face again and looked at Hayama. There was no trace of emotion or joy in his eyes for this "old classmate" who met again.

There was only indifference and coldness. It was more like a train passenger watching the scenery passing by outside the window than looking at a person, and not even a trace of impression would remain in the heart afterwards.

However, compared to Hikigaya Hachiman's indifference, Yeshan had a lot to say.

"Is... is this really you? Hikigaya... classmate?"

Looking at this former classmate whom he hadn't seen for several years, Ye Shan didn't feel any nostalgia, only surprise and confusion.

"You, haven't you already..."

"disappeared?"

Hikigaya Hachiman finished the last sentence he hadn't said, and with a calm look in his eyes, he took a step forward and walked towards Hayama.

stomping on...

On the quiet street, the only sound that could be heard for a moment was Hikigaya Hachiman's footsteps. As Ye Shan looked at the person walking towards him, his body subconsciously took a defensive posture.

Because the body felt a sense of danger before the consciousness as Hikigaya Hachiman approached, this sense of danger was like the side of a dagger sliding across the skin, causing the pores in every part of the body to open upwards.

Regarding this old classmate whom he had never known well, Ye Shan chose to act on his intuition rather than emotion, and he immediately took out his card box.

But it was only a brief moment when his vision was diverted. When he raised his head again, the figure walking towards him had disappeared.

"Your qualifications are quite good."

"!?"

Every strand of hair seemed to stand up because of his numbing scalp. Hearing the sound behind him, Ye Shan's eyes froze.

He slowly glanced behind him from the corner of his eye, his black scarf fluttering behind him, while Hikigaya Hachiman, with his back to Hayama, spoke again.

"That's good, keep it up."

"Just like that, keep fighting."

Hikigaya Hachiman said softly, ignoring the gaze from Hayama behind him and looking at the other end of the street.

"Because only by fighting can we survive."

"……What's the meaning!?"

Ye Shan suddenly smelled a very dangerous atmosphere from Hikigaya Hachiman's words. He immediately turned around and looked back with a slightly changed expression, wanting to get something clear.

"Literally, this is why I came to see you this time."

But the other party's voice came again from behind him. Ye Shan looked at the empty street in front of him, and the corners of his eyes twitched slightly.

"This is a war, a war for knights, and only the knights who fight to the end can survive to the end."

Hikigaya Hachiman turned his head and looked at Hayama, who was standing with his back to him, with a look without any emotion.

"Go and defeat all the knights, and then come before me as the ultimate victor."

"Then I will grant you everything you desire most, everything you long for most... provided you fight."