But before the joy could fully bloom in his eyes, it froze as he looked up. Terror and disbelief crashed in to replace it.
Because he saw it.
The gentle, bashful smile on Rize's face was twistingwarpingat an inhuman speed. It was no longer a human smile, but a snarl mixing frenzy, greed, cruelty, and rapture.
At the same time, an indescribable, suffocating aura surged off her like a tangible tide.
"I 'like' you too, Kaneki-kun" Rize's voice turned hoarse and syrupy, pulsing with a bone-chilling excitement. "So much I want to eat you up right nowevery last bit."
SPLTCH!!! A wet, teeth-aching rip of flesh being torn open.
Chapter 893: Toying with her food
"Aaaahhh!"
Before Kaneki Ken could even react, a tearing, indescribable agony exploded in his right shoulder!
His vision was instantly splashed red with a spray of warmth!
He stiffly lowered his head in disbelief
He saw his entire right shoulder, along with part of his collarbone, was gone!
A huge, mangled gash yawned there, splinters of bone and severed vessels starkly visible!
Blood gushed out like a flood through a broken sluice!
And the one who did itwas Kamishiro Rize!
Right now her mouth was chewing a great chunk of blood-soaked flesh, still faintly twitching!
Her lips stretched to an inhuman angle. Bright red trickled down her chin, staining her white dress!
What shattered Kaneki's soul most were Rize's eyes!
No longer that gentle violet
but blazing, hellish red kakugan!
Four purplish-crimson, barbed tendrilsher rinkakuthrashed behind her like living vipers!
A ghoul!
She's a ghoul!
That gentle, cultured Miss Rize was a man-eating monster!!!
"Ah aaahhh!!!"
Terror and pain at last ripped through his throat. Kaneki screamed, a keening so shrill it barely sounded human!
He staggered back, pupils pinched to needle points in sheer horror!
Run!
He told himself to run, but his legs betrayed him, trembling, going weak.
"Delicious too delicious!"
"This pure emotion and fearthey're the finest seasoning!"
Rize swallowed greedily, a sickly flush on her cheeks. Her kakugan burned with ravenous hunger.
"Don't run, Kaneki-kun~ Let's become one~!"
Like a cat toying with a mouse, she sauntered toward Kaneki, who had collapsed from pain and fear and was trying to crawl away. The four rinkaku writhed behind her, carving dangerous arcs through the dim night.
Kaneki dragged his broken, bleeding body across the cold ground in despair, leaving a horrifying smear of blood behind.
Death's shadow washed over him like an icy tide, while Rize's delighted, cruel chuckle clung to his fraying nerves like a curse.
"Hehehe run. Run a little faster~ Make it more fun for me~ my dear Ka-ne-ki-kun~"
Cold fear wrapped every inch of him like viscous slime, seeping into every nerve. The agony in his right shoulder had gone beyond mere "pain"it was the horror of life being ripped out of him.
Warm blood kept pouring from that gaping wound, soaking his clothes. It clung sticky to his skin, then flung off as he moved, dotting the ground with a broken trail of dark red.
He could feel his life racing away with it. His vision blurred; his ears rang. His lungs pumped like a torn bellows, dragging in hardly any air. Every breath tasted of blood and scraped him raw.
"Run a little faster, Kaneki-kun~"
That delighted, cruel, nightmare voice kept pace just behind him. She wasn't even trying to catch uplike a seasoned cat, savoring the mouse's futile struggle.
The whoosh of rinkaku slicing the air whispered like the Reaper, reminding Kaneki exactly where he stood.
Why?
Why is this happening?
That gentle Miss Rize who talked literaturethe beautiful presence he admiredwas actually actually
"Pff!"
His scrambled thoughts and racking pain made him stumble hard and crash to the ground, coughing up a mouthful of blood.
He tried to climb back up, but blood loss left him limp and powerless.
Just thenKRRRK!
A teeth-aching screech of twisting metal sounded overhead!
Kaneki looked up on reflex
Atop a nearby building under construction, the cable securing the rebar suddenly snappedwhether from age or something else!
Several thick steel rods, coldly gleaming, broke free like giant serpents and came screaming down right where he lay!
Death had never loomed so close!
Survival instinct crushed pain and fearKaneki found a final burst of strength from nowhere and hurled himself aside!
KRRR-BOOOM!!!
The rebar slammed into the spot he'd just occupied, biting deep into the ground and blasting up gravel and dust!
The thunderous impact left his eardrums buzzing.
Heart pounding as if to burst from his chest, Kaneki lay there gulping air.
His relief lasted only a heartbeat.
"My, my, that was dangerous, Kaneki-kun~"
Those dogged footsteps and that lilting laugh behind him yanked him back to reality.
I can't die!
I absolutely can't die here!
His scrambled brain clung to one last thoughtgo back! Back to Anteiku!
The manager is there, Tohka-san, Yomo-san they're good peoplethey'll save me!
It's safe there!
That thought jabbed his heart like a final shot of adrenaline, propping up his shattered body.
He didn't even care about directionclinging to a ragged sense of bearings and a stubborn will, he stumbled and crawled, rolling and lurching toward the Anteiku of his memory.
Blood drew a long, despairing trail behind him.
Rize hopped lightly over the scattered rebar. Watching Kaneki's staggering retreat, the red in her kakugan flared, a cat-and-mouse cruelty in her gaze.
"Oh? Choosing the more interesting route Trying to scurry back to that phony little haven before you die? Hehehe how adorably naive~"
She didn't hurry.
She kept on him with the same elegant, merciless stride.
She savored the chasethe pitiful hope a prey squeezes out in the very depths of despair.
~~~
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Chapter 894: Sudden Turn of Events! CCG Appeared on the Scene!
Maybe it was a final flare before death.
Maybe it was fateor misfortunetugging his strings.
Mortally wounded, Kaneki Ken somehow, miraculously, tumbled and crawled his way to the end of that familiar street lit by warm yellow lampsthe familiar "Anteiku" sign cast a faint, gentle halo in the night.
"I'm safe as long as I can reach that place"
A last spark of wild joy burst in his eyes. He used what little strength he had left and threw himself at the shut shop door. Even if he fell, he would crawl inch by inch. It was his only hope.
But just as his fingers were about to touch the handle
"Tsk, tsk. This is as far as you go~"
A foot came downright on Kaneki's hand.
"Urragh!!"
Ice flooded his veins. Kamishiro Rize had stepped up in front of him.
And then
FWASH! FWASH! FWASH! FWASH!!!
Without warning, several blinding, high-powered white searchlights flared from both sides of the street and the rooftop opposite, like swords of judgment. In an instant the entire streetespecially Anteiku's doorwayblazed as bright as day.
The glare stabbed into Kaneki's already blurred vision, blanking him out and freezing him in place.
Rize, right behind him, squinted against the sudden light, her kakugan narrowing. She halted on reflex, raising an arm to shield her eyes.
What is this?!
Alarms screamed in her head. These weren't ordinary streetlights.
When her eyes adapted and she peered through her fingers, even shean SS-rated Binge Eater used to doing as she pleasedfroze where she stood. The cruel, delighted smile on her face turned to stone.
Both sides of the street were packed with black vans. Their doors hung open. One after another, investigators in the CCG's trademark white coats emerged from the dark, silver briefcases (Quinques) in hand, silent as ghostsso many their ranks seemed endless.
The Doves encircled Anteiku in absolute silence, not a gap anywhere. Their faces were hard, their eyes razor-sharp, like hawks locking onto prey.
Worse, among them she felt several auras so powerful they made even her heart joltSpecial Class Investigators, and more than one, their Quinques radiating lethal intent.
The CCG's main force why are they here?! Surrounding Anteiku of all places?!
Before Rize could make sense of the sudden turn, a voice boomed over a loudhailer into the dead-still streetcold and commanding.
"Ghouls inside, listen up! This is the CCG! You are surrounded!
"Immediately cease all resistance. Hands on your head. Come out and surrender!
"Repeating: surrender at once!"
The command echoed down the empty street, brooking no argument, steeped in killing intent.
Rize was stunned. The Doves' target is Anteiku? How do they even know about this place? And why now of all times?!
She glanced at the figure frozen in the glareKaneki Ken, drenched in blood, barely clinging to lifethen back at her own snarling kakugan and the rinkaku lashing behind her. An absurd thought flashed through her mind: are they here for this kid or for me? But this much firepower?
While her doubts tangled
Creak.
Anteiku's heavy wooden door swung inward.
Yoshimura Kouzen stood at the front. The eyes that usually smiled shut were now fully open, filled with a gravityand a flicker of barely veiled furyhe had never shown before.
Behind him, Touka Kirishima, Renji Yomo, Kaya Irimi, and Enji Koma filed out one by one. Every face was drawn tight, bodies coiled for a fight. They had heard the commotion and the shouts.
Even for the seasoned Yoshimura, seeing the army-like encirclement outside made his pupils contract sharply.
And when their gazes cut through the blinding lights and landed on Kanekimangled and faint at their doorstepand on Rize not far behind him, kakugan feral, rinkaku whipping, her body still spattered with fresh blood
In an instant, all their questions found an answer in their hearts.
Her.
That reckless Binge Eater.
Her rampage must have drawn the Doves. And now she had led them right to Anteiku's door! Maybe she'd even leaked Anteiku's information on purpose?!
Ragemolten and overwhelmingsurged through Touka and the others. They stared at Rize with undisguised killing intent and loathing.
She was the one who shattered the 20th Ward's peace. And now she would drag Anteiku into ruin.
Pinned under those hate-filled stares, Rize opened her mouth on reflex to defend herself"N-no it wasn't me" But any words sounded feeble now.
The scene said everything: a notorious Binge Eater standing between a victim and Anteiku's threshold. It was the perfect accusation.
"Haa." Yoshimura drew a long breath, tore his gaze from Rize, and looked past her to the CCG forces arrayed like an iron wall. He knew it no longer mattered whose fault it was. Whether Rize brought them or not, the Doves were at the gates, and Anteiku's secret was fully exposed.
Only one path remained.
Despair spread among the Anteiku crew like a cold tide.
Across the street, several Special Class Investigators, their presence towering above the rest, stepped forward from the CCG ranks. Their icy eyes swept over Yoshimura, over Touka and the others, and finally fixed on the feral-eyed Kamishiro Rize.
Killing intent crashed in the air like a tangible cold front.
The battle was a breath away.
Chapter 895: Mitsuha Miyamizu's Dream
Itomori.
Night draped over the mountain-ringed town like soft, deep-blue velvet.
Stars, like crushed diamonds, were strewn thick across the velvety skyso clear it felt as if you could reach out and touch them.
With no neon from a big city to stain it, the sky here was pristine and grand, carrying an ancient, unchanging calm and mystery.
Mitsuha Miyamizu sat alone on the small hill behind the shrine, knees hugged to her chest, chin tipped up, staringentrancedat the glittering river of stars.
A mountain breeze, clean and sharp with the scent of grass and trees, brushed her cheeks and teased the hair across her brow.
After a day of miko duties and housework, this was her one pocket of quiet that belonged only to her.
The day's fatigue seemed to ebb away before the vast sea of stars, leaving only a spacious, steady stillness in its wake.
"So beautiful"
She whispered it. In her indigo eyes, ten thousand stars were reflected, as if her gaze were part of the night itself.
Just then, a particularly bright streak scored across the skylike a god dragging a brush across the deep-blue canvasripping the night open with a single, decisive stroke.
A comet!
A spark of delight flickered in Mitsuha's eyes. Instinctively, she pressed her hands together to make a wish.
But before she could even form it, something shocking happened.
Mid-flight, that falling comet suddenly split in two.
It became two blazing fireballs with white-hot tails, hurtling down along different paths.
One fell toward the distant mountains.
The other
The delight on Mitsuha's face froze into blank astonishment, then disbelief.
Instead of shrinking, that second fireball was swelling in her visiongrowing, growing at a terrifying pace.
Its fierce light outshone the stars, bleaching her frightened face bone white.
Its trajectory its target
It was headed for Itomori?!!
No. Impossible!
A vast, icy fear clamped around her heart. She lurched to her feet, wanting to scream, to runonly to find her body nailed to the spot, knees buckling, unable to move.
All she could do was watch as the meteor, wreathed in the flames of death, ballooned in her pupils, filling her entire world.
The next instant
"BOOM!!!"
A blast beyond words.
It felt as if heaven and earth were torn in two.
The ground beneath her feet heaved and cracked, violently, madly.
An enormous shockwavean invisible tsunamiswept down the slope, obliterating everything in its path.
The shrine's torii, houses, treeseverything was crushed, flung, set ablaze in an instant.
Mitsuha didn't even have time to feel pain. A shrill, piercing ring flooded her ears. Her vision was devoured by scorching white and flying debris.
Faintly, she seemed to hear distant, despairing screamssnatched away at once by the roar of the blast.
Then endless blackness and silence swallowed all.
"Ah!!"
Mitsuha jolted upright on the tatami with a scream.
Her chest heaved. She gulped for air. Cold sweat beaded across her forehead. Her indigo eyes were wide with terror and confusion.
"Sis?"
From the other futon, Yotsuha Miyamizu rubbed sleep from her eyes, puzzled by her sister's violent start. "What's wrong? Bad dream?"
