Chapter 94: Cruel Fate
Mei Terumi, carrying a small bamboo basket, gathered fallen branches in a safe area near the village.
Humming a cheerful nursery rhyme, she skipped and hopped about energetically, full of youthful life.
Although her grandmother had strictly forbidden her from wandering off alone anymore, Mei Terumi—clearly strong-willed and spirited even from such a young age—only half-listened to her grandmother's worried instructions.
Besides, her grandmother's legs had grown weak and ached terribly during winter, and their small house remained bitterly cold.
Mei Terumi couldn't bear watching her grandmother suffer in the freezing temperatures, having to brave the heavy snow to gather firewood at her advanced age. So she frequently used the innocent excuse of "going out to play" to secretly venture into the mountains and forests, collecting branches and doing whatever she could to help ease her grandmother's burden.
The small bamboo basket quickly filled with gathered branches.
"Hmm, this should be plenty!"
Mei Terumi wiped the sweat from her flushed face, glanced at the rapidly approaching dusk, and revealed two cute, pointed fangs in a bright smile: "Alright, I should head back now, or Grandma will start worrying again!"
Her thin, small frame—carrying a bamboo basket nearly half a head taller than herself—struggled to trudge through the thick accumulated snow.
She hadn't walked far when she stopped abruptly again, her eyes widening with delight as she stared at a certain spot: "Ah! A rabbit!"
There in the clearing sat a plump rabbit weighing at least ten pounds, apparently unconscious near the base of a tree.
It appeared to have bumped into the trunk while running at full speed and knocked itself out cold.
"Oh wow! What an incredibly fat rabbit!" Terumi Mei, still carrying her bamboo basket, waded through the deep snow with considerable difficulty. She tied the unconscious rabbit's hind leg securely with rope, then—her young face flushed with exertion and excitement—lifted it up to examine it more closely. She exclaimed with pure delight: "This is amazing! Hehehe, I'm so lucky today! When Grandma sees this, she'll definitely praise me!"
They usually barely had enough food to eat, and meat was an extremely rare luxury.
Now, having suddenly found such a plump rabbit—easily enough for both of them to enjoy a proper meal—maybe even get a little bit of precious cooking oil.
"Grandma hasn't been feeling well lately... hmm... the rabbit's leg is quite big, I'll give that part to Grandma!"
Terumi Mei's mouth watered with anticipation. The little girl happily clutched the rabbit, already planning to take it back to help her grandmother recover her strength: "I'll just eat a tiny bit~ I'll save the rest for Grandma, hehehe."
Today's unexpected windfall made the little girl incredibly happy.
She picked up her bamboo basket once more, took a deep steadying breath, and—afraid the rabbit might somehow wake up and escape—held it firmly in her arms while heading back toward the village.
Humming her cheerful little tune, she made her way slowly through the thick snow.
Soon enough, she could finally see the familiar village ahead.
"Grandma! Grandma, I'm back!"
Terumi Mei felt exhausted and covered in sweat, but remained indescribably happy. Holding up the plump rabbit triumphantly, she called out loudly: "Come and see, Grandma! Look what I brought back!"
However, strangely, the entire village remained eerily silent—nobody answered her excited call.
"Grandma?"
Terumi Mei felt confused, slowly walking deeper into the village with growing concern.
Suddenly, a glaring splash of bright crimson red in the pristine white snow—like a sharp knife blade—pierced straight through her innocent heart.
Scattered throughout that crimson-stained snow were her familiar neighbors—those kind and gentle elderly people who always smiled at her—now cruelly severed at the waist. Their lifeless grayish-white eyes remained frozen wide with absolute terror, their faces permanently contorted in expressions of unbearable pain, as if desperately trying to tell an unfinished story.
"Grandma!"
Mei Terumi's bright eyes narrowed with dawning horror, her small face gradually turning deathly pale.
A terrible sense of dread instantly enveloped her entire being as fear—like an invisible hand with crushing grip—suddenly seized her frantically beating heart.
Thump!
The bamboo basket tumbled from her numb fingers, hitting the ground.
Even the precious plump rabbit was carelessly dropped and forgotten.
Terumi Mei, consumed by rising panic, ran desperately toward the village center while shouting with increasing desperation: "Grandma! Grandma! I'm back! Where are you?! It's Mei! Please answer me!"
Her voice echoed hauntingly through the deathly silent village, but aside from those hollow echoes bouncing off abandoned buildings, absolutely no one answered her increasingly frantic calls.
Finally, Terumi Mei reached their familiar small house. Exhausted and panting heavily, she approached the dwelling step by trembling step, still subconsciously calling out with fading hope: "Grandma, Mei is back home! Please... don't scare me like this, okay?"
Deathly silence answered her plea.
The wind howled mournfully and heavy snow continued falling with merciless intensity.
Not a single sound emerged from inside the room—that deeply unsettling silence made Terumi Mei's heart sink like a stone into freezing water.
She didn't know how her legs continued moving forward; she felt like a stiff mechanical puppet, slowly forcing herself toward the doorway. Her large emerald eyes filled with profound unease and mounting terror. Finally, desperately mustering every ounce of remaining courage, she forcefully pushed open the worn wooden door.
Blood!
Fresh blood!
Blood was splattered absolutely everywhere throughout the small room.
The floor, walls, bed frame, table surface, even the ceiling overhead—bright crimson blood could be seen in every direction, slowly flowing in rivulets and dripping steadily from cracks and gaps.
A nauseating, overwhelmingly pungent metallic stench of blood assaulted her senses with brutal force.
"Grandma...?"
But when Terumi Mei's gaze fell upon the nightmarish scene dominating the center of the room, her pupils suddenly contracted to pinpoints as her face turned absolutely deathly pale with pure horror.
Suspended in the very center of the room hung a person.
The person's hands, feet, shoulder blades, and other parts of their broken body had been pierced completely through by kunai, leaving them covered in countless oozing wounds. Almost no uninjured flesh remained visible anywhere; the crisscrossing cuts and gaping wounds exposed white bone in numerous places. The sheer cruelty of the torture was absolutely unbearable to witness.
"GRANDMA—!"
Mei Terumi instantly recognized that mutilated face despite all the blood and horrific damage.
The person being tortured and suspended like a grotesque puppet was her beloved grandmother.
Thump!
Mei Terumi's legs gave out completely as she collapsed hard onto the blood-soaked floor, her small forehead striking the ground with force.
Completely ignoring the sharp pain, she lunged forward desperately on all fours, throwing her arms around the elderly woman's dangling legs. Tears and mucus streamed uncontrollably down her face as her overwhelming grief reached an absolutely unbearable peak: "No, no! Grandma, please don't leave Mei! Please, please don't leave me alone!"
"AHHHHHH—!"
Terumi Mei screamed with raw, throat-tearing anguish, clinging desperately to the old woman's cold body: "Grandma, Grandma, don't die! Please! I'm begging you!"
"God, please—don't take Grandma away from me! She's all I have left in this world!"
A crushing despair, helplessness, and primal fear unlike anything she'd ever experienced before completely engulfed her in that single devastating instant.
When people experience overwhelming sadness and heartbreak, they instinctively look upward.
In those moments, they place their desperate hopes on ethereal gods and divine beings far above, desperately hoping that those sacred powers can somehow save them from unbearable suffering.
But no matter how much she begged and pleaded with the uncaring heavens, absolutely no one answered the grief-stricken girl's prayers.
"Grandma... Grandma!"
Terumi Mei sobbed with completely uncontrollable agony, repeatedly banging her forehead against the hard floor: "Is there anyone... anyone at all... who can help me... save Grandma? I don't want to lose her! Please!"
"My... dear... granddaughter..."
At this critical moment, the old woman—who should have been tortured far beyond any point of survival—suddenly found strength from somewhere deep within, speaking with her very last burst of desperate energy: "Don't... cry... my precious child."
"Grandma?!"
In that moment, Terumi Mei truly believed that all the divine beings had finally heard her desperate prayers: "Grandma, please hold on! I'll go find medicine right now! I'll get a doctor! Just wait for me!"
The old woman, using her final remaining strength, grabbed her granddaughter's small arm with a trembling, blood-covered hand and spoke with her last ounce of fading life: "Run... my dear granddaughter! Don't look back! Don't stop running! Those people... those ninja... they're... searching for you! Run! Run away from here!"
The old woman had desperately held onto life until this very moment for one single purpose—so that her beloved granddaughter could escape quickly and never look back.
[End of Chapter 94]
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