Chapter 221 Reunion

Jiang Lai no longer focused his gaze on the braided girl in front of him. His eyes moved to the overlapping darkness behind the girl's desk.

If his guess was correct, then the real Riko and [birth] should be behind this vastness, guarding the fortress of the most beautiful memories.

Gojo Satoru obviously noticed these details. His glassy blue eyes looked over there, then retracted slightly, facing the sailor-style braided girl in front of him, and said in a brisk tone, "Mind taking us to the back, Tennai?"

"Behind?" Tenuchi Riko tilted her head, looking puzzled. She turned halfway and looked behind.

Facing the endless darkness, the girl showed fear and hesitation. She was still holding the drawing paper in her hand and whispered nervously, "It's very dark there."

"Relax, Tennai~ There's nothing to be afraid of. The strongest is right here." Gojo Satoru shook his finger, and then his tone was restrained. There was a convincing power between his eyebrows, and his beautiful blue eyes calmed down, "I will solve everything."

He habitually took it all in, and then he caught a glimpse of the black-haired young man beside him, and chuckled and changed the subject: "Or rather - we will solve everything. Trust me, trust Lai, Jay and Glass, and many more people, we are all here."

"..." Tenuchi Riko bit her lower lip. The cheeks of the junior high school girl still carried the tenderness of youth. Her eyelashes fluttered, "But I'm still scared."

"What are you afraid of? The darkness or the unknown?" Jiang Lai spoke slowly, his expression gentle, "If it is darkness, we can light a lamp for you. If it is the unknown, we can explore together. Besides this, what else are you afraid of?"

Tenuchi Riko was stunned for a moment, holding the drawing paper between her fingers, her thoughts wavering. But she finally made up her mind - in fact, Riko has never been a timid person.

She raised her eyes, with determination in them: "I'm not afraid."

Tenuchi Riko put down the colored pencils in her hand and faced the endless darkness behind her. Her straight figure seemed to have made some kind of determination.

At this moment, Jiang Lai and Gojo Satoru's emotions also calmed down a little.

They knew that this was a breakthrough in the fortress of this dream world, and the real path ahead would be revealed to them.

The braided girl in a white headscarf straightened her expression, left the small desk, and walked away from the light of the dim yellow desk lamp.

Before stepping out, she waved her hand: "Come on, follow me!"

"Here I am~ I definitely won't lose you, so you can go wherever you want in Tennai." Gojo Satoru raised the last syllable of his voice and spoke in a light tone.

He put his hands in his pockets and walked with the rebellious steps he had in college.

Jiang Lai smiled and shook his head gently, then naturally changed his clothes into a navy blue kimono. At the same time, he turned his cell phone around and turned it back to its original simple book style.

The next second, Gojo Satoru stretched out his hands and changed his unruly gait to a normal one.

Jiang Lai: “?”

Jiang Lai was stunned for a second, then reacted with some amusement: Gojo Satoru seemed to think that he changed back to his old attire and took out his original book so that he could take advantage of him not walking properly and use it as an excuse to hit him on the head.

The white-haired man on the side curled his lips, glanced at the ancient book with his blue eyes, and came over and said, "I say, Lai, you still want to hit my head in the dream world, isn't that immoral? I'm going to make a scene, I really am going to make a scene, okay?"

Facing Gojo Satoru's empty words, Jiang Lai replied lightly: "I haven't done anything yet."

He held the book in his right hand and placed it on the palm of his left hand. "It's just a change of style, don't be nervous. And this is not to hit you, it's for-"

"Hey, it wasn't changed for me? I'm going to make a fuss." Gojo Satoru joked, and he casually added, "Then why?"

At this point, Jiang Lai was silent for a while. After a long while, he slowly uttered the second half of the sentence: "...It was exchanged for [rebirth]."

Perhaps it was just like a kind of homesickness, Jiang Lai also had an emotion that he couldn't accurately express in his heart. As he walked deeper and deeper, his heart in his chest was beating.

He didn't know if he could see his eldest sister (eldest brother) in the conceptual sense. Moreover, even if he could see her, she might be unconscious.

Maybe there won't be any communication on their side.

However, Jiang Lai still adjusted his appearance to make it as similar to the style of the Heian-kyō era a thousand years ago as possible. If they could meet again, it might make it easier for [Rebirth] to recognize him better.

Although Jiang Lai knew that they recognized each other not by appearance but by the aura of the soul, he still felt complicated and couldn't help but dress up as before.

When they met each other, they were still the same as before, as if they had never been separated by the distant mountains and rivers for thousands of years.

After hearing this, Gojo Satoru fell silent for a rare moment.

This time, he didn't continue to joke about this point.

Although in the eyes of most people in the world of spellcasting, Gojo Satoru is a carefree and self-centered person who can't read the air. However, in reality, he has his own unique thoughtfulness and will not really expose the scars of his friends.

"That's good. He is worthy of your expectation and change." Gojo Satoru said smoothly. He raised his hand and pointed at Jiang Lai's hair. "Do you want to grow your hair long? I still remember what you looked like then."

"Clothes can be adjusted through magical powers, but the characteristics of my body cannot be changed so easily." Jiang Lai shook his head and smiled, "A thousand years ago was the era of long hair, and I naturally had long hair at that time. In the modern world, I have changed to short hair, and I can't change it for a while."

"Is that so? I thought you could control your hair to grow freely, just like..." Gojo Satoru placed one hand on his chin, his eyebrows slightly raised, "like in Disney princesses and fairy tales?"

"Hey." Jiang Lai tapped Gojo Satoru lightly with the book as a joking response.

In front of them, Tenuchi Riko had already stopped walking. So they stopped chatting and turned their attention back to the braided girl in front of them.

At this moment, they have left the dimly lit desk area and merged into the boundless darkness.

This darkness seemed to have no boundaries, and wherever you turned, there was only hazy fog.

However, the girl with pigtails and a white headscarf seemed to have a goal in mind. She walked forward steadily, unafraid of the cold and humid air and the increasingly dark scene.

Now, she finally stopped, leaving Jiang Lai and Gojo Satoru with a thin but firm back.

“…Amenai?” ​​Gojo Satoru tilted his head and called out.

The girl with the braided hair did not turn around. Her voice came softly from the front: "Do you want to change, or accept the status quo?"

These words sounded a little strange and even a little abrupt. However, Gojo Satoru responded very naturally and quickly: "Of course it is change."

His pure white eyelashes were lightly raised, and his dense eyelashes were like a small fan. His unique blue eyes were shining brightly: "Why give up? Life belongs to us."

His words were light, but the context carried a lot of weight.

In front of me, Riko Amauchi half turned around and smiled.

That smile with curved brows and pursed lips was just like the scene in Hongxing Palace when she was faced with the decision to change her fate and return to the human world, and she made the choice and stretched out her hand.

The dark mist floating around gradually expanded, enveloping the figure of the girl with the braided hair.

Facing the sudden change in the dream environment, Jiang Lai and Gojo Satoru were not nervous because this was the spiritual world of Tenuchi Riko and [Rebirth], and they would not hurt the two of them.

Jiang Lai stared ahead, his face calm as he waited, but deep down he felt as if a kitten was petting him.

A little bit of cursed energy was floating around, and the rising dark mist gradually began to dissipate. Right in front of him, the figure of Amauchi Riko appeared again.

However, the Riko that appeared this time was no longer the junior high school girl wearing a sailor uniform in the memory, but an adult wearing a light purple kimono.

She still wore her hair in a long braid, but she no longer wore the white headscarf. Her light purple kimono was simple and elegant, with no special patterns on it.

On her shoulder, there was a beautiful green kingfisher. The kingfisher was very small, with bright and moist eyes. At this moment, it tilted its head and looked at Jiang Lai in the distance.

Inexplicably, Jiang Lai felt a sense of familiarity with the kingfisher.

A gentle, tolerant and caring aura emanates from those bright and translucent eyes.

——This is not [birth], but it does have the breath of [birth].

For a brief moment, Jiang Lailian thought of the black liquid fox.

The Nightmare Fox was born from the power of this [Existence], and it also carries some of its own abilities and aura - so was this beautiful green bird in front of it also born from [Birth]?

Just like he left a little fox for Wu, is this [birth] left for Riko?

When thoughts came to his mind, Jiang Lai opened his lips slightly.

But before he could speak, the adult-sized Amanouchi Riko nodded and said, "Mr. Gojo, and Mr. Gojo's friends. I didn't expect to see you here."

——This is the real Amanouchi Riko.

"Mr. Gojo?" Facing this title, Gojo Satoru tilted his head slightly and said jokingly, "Oh, I didn't expect that you respect me so much now. I think you called me a "cocky ghost" back then. It sounds a bit surprising."

The white-haired man spoke in a brisk voice, as if he was trying to adjust the atmosphere.

Riko Amauchi raised her lips and smiled, but unlike the phantom of the girl's memory just now, she did not make faces or other movements.

——Time has changed her a lot. Her days in the CSRC have worn away her innocence and cheerfulness.

She is no longer the lively and innocent girl she used to be.