Autophagy

As Song Lei was charging in, he dodged the bullet in front of him. However, as soon as he did so, another soul bullet appeared in front of his face. He didn't have the time to dodge anymore.

"Fuck!" He shouted.

The bullet penetrated Song Lei's forehead as he froze in his place. He dropped his sword to the ground as his eyes went black. The woman looked at Song Lei's still standing corpse and spat out a little bit of blood.

"This nobody managed to force me into such a situation. And he hasn't even woken his soul up yet. I will have to spend a lot of time recuperating," the woman muttered to herself. "And he is still standing after dying. What kind of monster is this?"

She walked towards Song Lei to take the gemstone from him. However, just as there was less than a meter left between them, the woman felt an incredible force crushing down on her windpipe.

She stumbled backward and fell to the ground while holding her neck. She was gasping for air as her throat had almost been completely crushed.

"You let your guard down," Song Lei said while charging at the woman again. He didn't want to give the woman any chance to recuperate. The woman, having lost her ability to breathe, started unleashing all of her soul power to launch a desperate attack.

Unfortunately, although Song Lei was fast, he couldn't kill the woman before she unleashed her soul power.

The wave of green aura hit Song Lei square. He had to protect his face from the pressure with his hands. Suddenly, a notification appeared.

[Your soul is under attack! High soul stat protects you!]

Smiling, Song Lei launched his last fist and crushed the woman's neck.

[Congratulations! You've managed to beat Yao Mei of The Secret Blood Order! You've leveled up and gained two stat points!]

[As you've beaten a being with an awakened soul, your proficiency in the skill "Tri-force I" has risen!]

"Huh... So she was an awakened after all..." Song Lei muttered to himself. The fox fires surrounding him disappeared as the city went back to its normal state. As the effects of the adrenal rush ran out, Song Lei felt like all of his body was ripping apart from the pain. It was hard enough just to keep his consciousness up. Bearing the pain was putting even more of a toll on his mind.

He entered the apartment and got on the elevator.

'I... Need to hold on...' Song Lei firmed his resolve. He was trying his best to not faint. The door of the elevator opened with a ding.

Song Lei kept walking while holding the walls.

*Thud

"Fuck," Song Lei cursed. While walking, his left leg suddenly spasmed. He couldn't feel it anymore for some reason. If he spent his stat on body right now, he could faint because of excessive pain. He didn't know what would happen then. He wanted to be relatively safe before doing so.

As Song Lei was trying to crawl into room 1407, the door opposite was opened. Before Song Lei could see what was going on, he was pulled into room 1408. In front of him, was the face of a little girl.

"Are you okay uncle!?" She said.

"Shush... I... Will be okay," Song Lei said. He brought up his stat sheet and spent two points on his body stat. As soon as he did so, he spasmed and lost consciousness...

...

Song Lei opened his eyes to an unfamiliar ceiling. The sun was already shining with all of its power, penetrating into Song Lei's eyes. He tried to move his arm and found it really hard to do so. As he was forcing it to move, constant snapping noises resounded in the room.

After moving around a bit, his arm was much better. Figuring this out, Song Lei kept moving and relaxing parts of his body.

When he was done relaxing, he looked around to see what kind of situation he was in.

'Huh...'

He was currently in a room that had the exact same layout as his. Next to him was a twin-size bed with two people lying on it. These were Yao Ai and her father. Yao Ai was the little ghost girl Song Lei had fought when he had just arrived in the New World.

'She must've helped me last night,' Song Lei thought while looking at the two. Although Yao Ai was a little girl who was young enough to still sleep with her dad, she had to take care of him in a daily manner. Being blind, her dad probably didn't have anyone that would look after him. Song Lei was thinking more about where these two were getting money from.

'Whatever...' Song Lei discarded his thoughts. He got up ad looked out of the window. Sun was already out and shining. Yao Ai and her father would probably wake up nearly. Song Lei decided to prepare a meal for them before leaving.

Having had to take care of himself and his sister for quite a long time, Song Lei had quite good cooking skills. He quickly put together a meal, put it on the table, and left for his room.

"Huff..."

Taking a deep breath, he entered his room carefully. He was cautious because he believed that someone could be waiting for him inside his house. Fortunately, that wasn't the case. He managed to safely get in.

After checking everywhere to see if anyone or anything was waiting to ambush him, Song Lei found nothing. He went to the video camera he had left recording. Of course, it would've already stopped recording by now. Seeing what happened just after he left would be enough.

Going to the corner of the room, a deep frown formed on Song Lei's face.

"Fuck..." He cursed. The video camera was gone. Someone had taken it and left. 'Where did it go..?'

Highly disturbed, Song Lei took another look around the room.

'I shouldn't linger anymore,' he decided. He opened the door of the bathroom and entered it. The insides of the bathroom were still the same. It was untouched.

He placed the little piece of the mirror he had taken from here when he had first entered the remnant world.

When he did so, all the glass pieces that had turned into fine dust started floating and becoming one. Song Lei took out the red gemstone too and put it on the mirror. The gemstone blended into the mirror, making it blood-red in color. Instantly, the whole room started shifting. It was blurring into a color of blood. Song Lei felt slightly dizzy because of the bent reality. Shortly after, the shifting stopped. Song Lei was back in the New World. He was in that familiar bathroom covered with yellow talismans.

While he was taking in the fact that he had managed to get out, the mirror pieces that were laying on the ground started shining brightly. Song Lei looked at this beautiful light and slightly backed off.

The mirror pieces disintegrated, turning into small pieces of light balls. Those light balls all had different colors. They floated around without a care in the world.

"Beautiful..." Song Lei couldn't stop himself from muttering. While he was looking at the lights in awe, lots of system notifications filled his sight.

[You've managed to shatter the remnant world!]

[Your skill 'The Master' has leveled up! Your average active summoning time has been increased!]

[As you've cleared a remnant world, all the leftover souls have turned back to their soul essence forms!]

[You can pick a soul essence to take in:

Sugihara Tokiyo

Nishimura Mayumi

Yao Ai

...]

Song Lei looked at the long list of names. He honestly wasn't sure who he would pick if he picked any at all. After all, these souls would dissipate as soon as he picked one of these. He didn't know how it would feel for them. After all, getting shackled and used again after being slaves in the remnant world for such a long time would probably not be something they want.

And more importantly, all of these people were normal souls that didn't really have anything related to the New World. If he let them go right now, they would achieve eternal rest. Any soul that would come with him would have to keep suffering in this hellish place.

"Whatever... I wonder why Toda Anzai isn't on the list..." Song Lei muttered. He sighed deeply. Just as he was about to let all the souls go, a small, red light ball shone brighter than the others. It seemed to be trying to signal something. Noticing the flickering little soul, a gentle smile appeared on Song Lei's face.

He didn't discard the notification and picked a soul.

[You can summon Sugihara Tokiyo for ten minutes twice a day.]

As all the soul essences that were scattered around faded away, the little red spirit started getting bigger and forming a human shape.

Shortly after, Sugihara's familiar face was formed in front of Song Lei. She smiled widely.

"He- Hey...!"