The restaurant was indeed as Kanjuro described—elegant and tranquil, with soft lighting and low background music creating a perfectly intimate atmosphere. Kanjuro had reserved a quiet window seat in advance; sunlight filtered through thin curtains, casting a soft glow on his handsome profile.
During lunch, Kanjuro exerted his charm to the utmost. He was no longer just the gentle comforter but also a witty, knowledgeable, and extremely attentive listener and conversationalist. He skillfully guided the conversation, discussing art, travel, and even some life insights; the profound understanding and unique perspectives revealed in his words made Yumi unconsciously immerse herself, temporarily forgetting yesterday's pain and real-life worries.
He thoughtfully served her dishes, remembered her casually mentioned taste preferences, every eye contact carrying just the right amount of focus and appreciation, as if she were the only person in the world worthy of his attention. He no longer called her 'Officer Yumi' but naturally and affectionately addressed her by name 'Yumi,' each call like a gentle feather tickling her heart.
Miyamoto Yumi's defenses gradually crumbled under this intensive, high-quality gentle assault. She had to admit that being with Kanjuro was an ultimate pleasure. He was handsome, gentle, considerate, strong (evident from his Go skills and conversation), almost fulfilling all a woman's fantasies of a perfect partner. Compared to him, yesterday's Hideyoshi's rough words and actions seemed even more like a nightmare.
When dessert arrived after the meal, Kanjuro put down his utensils, his gaze calm and serious as he looked at Yumi, those deep eyes seeming to have vortices swirling within, ready to suck in one's soul.
'Yumi,' his voice was lower than usual, carrying an unmistakable emotion, 'There are some things I've thought about for a long time and feel I should tell you.'
Yumi's heart skipped a beat, sensing something, instinctively tightening her grip on the water glass, her fingertips slightly cold.
'From the moment I saw you yesterday, your vulnerable appearance when crying, your stubbornness when pretending to be strong, and today, you wearing your uniform and working seriously... all have deeply imprinted on my heart.' Kanjuro's tone was sincere and passionate, his gaze burning, 'I've never felt such a strong and urgent feeling for anyone before. Yumi, I like you. Perhaps this sounds abrupt, but I don't want to miss any possible chance.'
He confessed! So directly, so passionately, and so sincerely (at least it seemed).
Miyamoto Yumi's brain buzzed, going blank. Her cheeks instantly became burning hot, her heart pounding wildly in her chest, almost jumping out. A huge wave of mixed surprise, panic, shyness, and guilt overwhelmed her.
She looked at Kanjuro's face, which was so close and filled with expectation and deep affection. She listened to his deep, magnetic confession and felt that focused gaze that seemed capable of melting anyone... For a moment, she almost drowned in it, nearly nodding her head regardless of the consequences!
Such a perfect man was confessing to her! Right after she had been deeply hurt by her boyfriend! This was practically a life-saving straw thrown by fate, a beam of bright light in the darkness!
Just say yes... Hideyoshi treated you like that... Mr. Kanjuro is so good... A tempting voice echoed in the depths of her heart.
Her lips trembled slightly, and the word "okay" was almost on the tip of her tongue—
However, at the very last moment, her remaining reason washed over her burning nerves like a cold tide. Hideyoshi's face—though it bore yesterday's ferocity—was mostly filled with his past gentle smiles, his clumsy care, and the bits and pieces of their years together, flashing through her mind like a revolving lantern.
No... I can't do this... I'm still with Hideyoshi... The shackles of morality and the habits of a long-term relationship made her stop dead in her tracks at the edge of the cliff.
She abruptly lowered her head, avoiding Kanjuro's gaze that could make one lose themselves. Her voice carried a heavy tremor and a faint, imperceptible sob:
"I'm... I'm sorry, Mr. Kanjuro... Thank you... Thank you for your feelings. But... but I already have someone I like..." she said with difficulty, as if exhausting all her strength. "Unless... unless I break up with him... otherwise... I can't... I can't be with you..."
After saying those words, she felt as if a piece of her heart had been hollowed out, feeling both a sense of relief and an endless sense of loss.
Kanjuro listened quietly. His face didn't show much surprise, nor the embarrassment of a rejected suitor. His eyes merely dimmed for a moment before he revealed an understanding and gentle, bitter smile.
"It's him... Hideyoshi, right?" he asked softly, his tone devoid of any jealousy or displeasure.
Yumi bit her lower lip and nodded slightly, not daring to look at him.
"I understand." Kanjuro's voice remained gentle, even carrying a heartbreaking level of tolerance. "Feelings cannot be forced. I respect your choice, and I respect your feelings." He paused, his tone becoming even more sincere (at least it sounded so to Yumi), "I will wish you the best, Yumi. I truly hope you can find happiness."
This posture and these words were like the most precise arrows, completely piercing through Miyamoto Yumi's final defenses. Having just experienced Hideyoshi's hurt and comparing it to Kanjuro's extreme tenderness, Kanjuro's "letting go" and "blessing" at this moment appeared so noble, so selfless, and so... heart-wrenching!
A massive sense of guilt and emotion instantly overwhelmed her. She raised her tear-blurred eyes, looking at the man before her who seemed shrouded in a layer of holy light, and said through sobs:
"Kanjuro... you're so good... really... you're too good..."
She felt she didn't deserve such affection and felt deeply apologetic for her "rejection." Little did she know that this exclamation, which seemed like a "nice guy card," was exactly the result Kanjuro had meticulously calculated. He had successfully established a tragic image in her heart—perfect, affectionate, yet forced to "let go." This was far more effective at stirring a kind woman's heart than a persistent pursuer, and it paved the way for his subsequent plans.
Kanjuro smiled slightly, a smile tinged with loneliness but still gentle: "Go back to work quickly, don't be late."
Yumi nodded and left the restaurant with a complex heart, Kanjuro's confession and his "blessing" constantly echoing in her mind; the scales in her heart regarding Hideyoshi had already begun to tilt violently. Meanwhile, after she left, Kanjuro slowly withdrew the expression on his face. His eyes returned to a bottomless calm, as if the affectionate confession just now was nothing more than a performance with a pre-written script. After parting with Miyamoto Yumi, Kanjuro returned to the hotel. Unsurprisingly, before long, Akai Hideyoshi appeared at the suite door like a prisoner awaiting final judgment, his face pale and his eyes shifting nervously.
"Mr... Mr. Kanjuro..." His voice was dry and raspy, carrying an uncontrollable urgency and fear. "How was it? What... what did she say?"
Kanjuro sat leisurely on the sofa, looking up at him with a playful smile on his lips. He didn't answer but instead asked, "Watching from a distance, or just imagining the scene of me confessing to her... how does it feel? Isn't it... a bit exciting?"
Akai Hideyoshi's body trembled violently. A flash of panic at having his ugly inner thoughts seen through crossed his face, but immediately after, a distorted flush surged up. He lowered his head, not daring to meet Kanjuro's eyes, and muttered in a voice barely audible even to himself: "It... it's a little... I... I don't know why..."
He felt ashamed and sinful, yet that sickly stimulation accompanied by heartache entwined around him like a drug addiction.
Kanjuro nodded with satisfaction, as if commending a well-behaved student. Only then did he say slowly, "Your girlfriend, Miyamoto Yumi, loves you very much."
These words were like a needle, popping certain dark expectations in Hideyoshi's heart, making him subconsciously breathe a sigh of relief as if a heavy burden had been removed. But immediately following that, a strange sense of disappointment—one that even he found terrifying—quietly surfaced. She rejected him? Did that mean... he wouldn't be able to complete the trial of the "Way of Heartlessness"?
This contradictory psychology caused him immense pain.
"She rejected me," Kanjuro stated clearly, observing the complex and changing expressions on Hideyoshi's face. "She stated clearly that unless she breaks up with you, she cannot accept me."
Hideyoshi stood there blankly, the relief of his luck intertwined with the disappointment of being unable to grow stronger, leaving him unsure of how to react for a moment.
"Mr. Kanjuro... then... then what should I do?" He was like a child lost in the dark, only able to seek help from the "mentor" before him who was leading him into the abyss. His voice was full of confusion and a sort of desperate dependency.
Kanjuro stood up, walked over to him, and looked down at him. His gaze was like a cold searchlight, seemingly able to penetrate the filthiest corners of the depths of his soul.
"Since she is so 'loyal'," Kanjuro's voice carried a cruel calm, as if stating the most natural plan in the world, "then you need to personally... break that loyalty. You need to create a 'reasonable' excuse for her, and for yourself, that can cross moral boundaries."
He leaned in slightly, close to Hideyoshi's ear, and in that deep, seductive voice, delivered the final command that would completely crush his humanity:
"Go see Yumi today. Tell her that you have an... unspeakable'special fetish'."
He paused deliberately, letting those words ferment in Hideyoshi's mind.
"Tell her that you... hope she can meet more with Mr. Kanjuro—that is, me—and talk more..."
The corners of Kanjuro's mouth curled into a demonic arc, his voice as light as a whisper yet carrying the weight of a thousand pounds.
"And... what you desire most in your heart is to see her... have sex with me."
"!!!"
Akai Hideyoshi jerked his head up, his pupils shrinking to the size of pinpricks. The color drained from his face as if he had heard the most terrifying and absurd curse in the world! He opened his mouth wide but couldn't make a sound; only a "cluck-cluck" noise, like someone suffocating, came from his throat.
Letting his own girlfriend... go with another man... and personally saying that he hoped they would have sex?!
This was no longer a simple "offering"; it was taking his own dignity, love, and even his basic sense of shame as a human being, and personally presenting them to be trampled upon! This was more cruel than any physical injury; it was the complete defilement and destruction of the soul!
"No... no... this won't work... this is too..." Hideyoshi shook his head frantically, his body backing away uncontrollably until he hit the wall, his eyes filled with extreme terror and resistance.
"This is the ultimate trial of 'Heartlessness', Hideyoshi." Kanjuro's voice was cold and firm, leaving no room for negotiation. "Only by personally tearing apart everything you cherish most—including your dignity—and tasting the fallen 'pleasure' within it, can you completely sever all 'human' weaknesses. Only then can your chess truly step into the 'inhuman' realm. Think of the supreme Shogi Way, think of being 'invincible' and standing above all living beings!"
"Invincible..." Akai Hideyoshi repeated the word with vacant eyes. Kanjuro's words were like the most potent poison, eroding his final traces of reason. His desire for power and his frantic obsession with breaking his own mediocrity engaged in a final struggle against his current immense fear and nausea.
He looked into Kanjuro's eyes, which seemed to contain an endless dark power. There was no joke in them, only a bottomless, despairing seriousness.
In the end, that twisted desire, like a wildfire across the plains, burned away the last wasteland in his heart named "humanity." It was as if all the bones had been removed from his body; he slumped down the wall and sat on the floor, his hands clutching his hair tightly as he buried his face in his knees.
After a long time, a raspy voice like the howl of a wild beast, yet carrying a bizarre decisiveness, came muffled from between his knees:
"...I'll... I'll go... say it..."
Kanjuro looked at this "work" beneath his feet, which had completely collapsed and been reborn in a twisted form. A smile of unmasked control and pleasure finally appeared on his face.
"Very good. Go, Hideyoshi. Go complete your 'ritual'. I look forward to the moment... you are reborn."
Akai Hideyoshi struggled to climb up from the floor. His eyes were hollow, like a marionette whose soul had been extracted. He stumbled out of the room toward his fated, destructive showdown. Meanwhile, Kanjuro seemed to already see the expression of despair as Miyamoto Yumi's faith collapsed upon hearing this absurd request, which brought him immense pleasure.
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