Chapter 11
The sound of hurried footsteps echoed through the white halls of the central hospital. Nurses turned their heads as a girl no older than seventeen dashed past them, her school bag still strapped across her shoulder. Her face was pale, her breaths ragged, but her eyes burned with one thing—fear.
"Room 304," the nurse called after her, but Lily had already seen the number.
She pushed the door open with trembling hands.
There, lying on the bed, was her brother.
Nii-san!
His skin was pale, tubes connected to him, his chest slowly rising and falling. His once black hair now carried faint streaks of white, like snow brushing against the night.
"Brother…!" Lily gasped, her knees almost giving way. She stumbled to his side, clutching his hand with all the strength she had.
For a moment she could say nothing, tears blurring her vision. Then, in a whisper, she said the words she always carried in her heart:
"Don't leave me too… please… You're all I have."
Behind her, a man walked in quietly. It was Choji. His arm was wrapped in bandages, and his face looked haggard, but there was relief in his eyes.
"Lily-san…" he said softly. "He's alive. Your brother's alive."
Lily turned, wiping her tears quickly. "You—you were there, weren't you?"
Choji nodded. "Hai. And I… I thought I'd lost him. I thought we'd all die in there. But somehow
Renji-san… he endured."
He clenched his fists, shame flooding his features. "I couldn't protect him. Not the way I promised. But" his eyes softened as he looked at Renji , "he's still breathing. That's all that matters."
Lily squeezed her brother's hand tighter, as if by holding on she could anchor his soul to the world. Her voice was gentle but firm.
"Nii-san … you promised me. You said everything will change. So you can't go back on your word. Not now."
The room was filled with the quiet hum of machines, the smell of antiseptic, and the raw bond between siblings. For a moment, the world outside didn't matter.
Back at the Hunters Bureau the atmosphere inside the Hunters Bureau was tense.
The room was filled with guild leaders, high-ranking officers, and the Bureau Chairman himself. At the head of the chamber stood Takeda Ryojin, the SSS-rank hunter who had returned from the dungeon. His presence alone made even seasoned A-rankers lower their heads.
Chairman Wang Chi leaned forward. "Ryojin-dono. Tell us what you saw."
Takeda's golden eyes scanned the room before he spoke. His words were calm, but every syllable carried weight.
"The dungeon was… empty."
The room erupted into murmurs.
"Empty?!" one guild master shouted.
"That's impossible," another argued. "An SSS-rank dungeon doesn't just… vanish."
Tang Shi, who sat near the front with a bandaged arm, slammed his hand against the table. His pride was wounded, his voice sharp.
"I was there. I fought that monster. I felt its power. That wasn't a beast any of us could defeat. It was real, tangible. Are you saying it simply disappeared?"
Takeda's gaze fell on him, piercing. "I do not deal in lies".
Know you are place and suddenly..takeda flunts his aura the whole hunters building tremble with just a mere fraction of his overwhelming aura .. flunting tang shi to apologize on his rude behavior I entered the dungeon myself takeda said . There were no corpses. No remains of a boss. Nothing. The only thing I found was the boy."
Silence fell.
"The boy…" Wang Chi repeated slowly. "You mean renji-san."
Takeda nodded once. "His body had no injuries. No scars. Nothing that could explain how he survived inside an SSS dungeon. That alone defies logic."
Tang Shi leaned forward, eyes narrowing. "So what are you suggesting, Ryojin? That the boss simply bowed down and let him live?"
Takeda didn't flinch. "I am suggesting… that something we do not yet understand is hiding inside that boy. And if my instincts are correct, it is something far more dangerous than Helga ever was."
The room went cold.
Even Tang Shi, usually brash and arrogant, sat back in disbelief. "More dangerous… than that thing…?"
Takeda folded his arms, his golden aura shimmering faintly. "The Bureau must decide carefully. Either that boy is humanity's salvation… or its destruction."
Back at the hospital renji found himself in a dark void
He drifted in it, weightless, as though his soul had been tossed into an endless void. At first there was nothing—no sound, no light—only the suffocating silence of a place beyond life.
Then, it came.
A voice. Low, resonant, almost ancient.
It whispered a single name:
"Januza…"
Renji flinched. His chest tightened.
Again, louder this time—
"Januza Samael."
The darkness around him shifted. Shapes flickered in and out, like broken fragments of a shattered mirror. He saw glimpses: a battlefield soaked in blood, corpses piled like mountains, a shadowed figure raising its hand and commanding entire legions to kneel.
Renji breathing grew ragged.
He couldn't see the man's face clearly, but he knew… the voice was calling to him.
"No… no, that's not me," Renji whispered in panic. "I'm I'm Renji Just Renji…"
But the voice thundered through his soul once more, rattling his very bones:
"You are JANUZA."
The images grew sharper—chains, flames, screams that stretched across centuries. A torment both unbearable and endless.
Renji cried out in pain, clutching his head
And then, his eyes snapped open.
The Hospital Room
RENJI!!
The blinding white ceiling above him came into focus. His vision blurred, but he immediately felt something warm wrapping around him. His little sister.
Lily had thrown herself into his arms, sobbing against his chest. Her entire body shook as she clung to him, refusing to let go.
"You idiot!" she cried, her voice breaking. "Don't scare me like that… Don't you ever scare me like that again!"
Renji froze for a moment, overwhelmed by the flood of emotions. Slowly, he lifted his trembling hand and placed it on her back. His throat was dry, but he forced the words out.
"I'm… I'm here, Lily. I'm not going anywhere."
Her tears soaked through his gown as she tightened her embrace. "You promised me everything would change, remember? You can't leave me behind. You're all I have, brother."
Renji chest ached—not from his wounds, but from the unbearable weight of her words. The voice of Januza still echoed in his mind, clawing at him, whispering his name like a curse. But Lily's voice, trembling and fragile, was louder. Stronger.
"I'll keep my promise," he whispered, this time with more conviction. "I swear it."
At the foot of the bed, Choji had been standing silently the entire time, his broad shoulders trembling. For the first time since Renji had met him, the cheerful miner looked broken. His eyes brimmed with tears he could no longer hold back.
"Damn it, Renji.…" Choji muttered, wiping his face with his sleeve. "You scared me half to death. I thought you were gone. I thought I'd lost my best friend."
Renji turned his head weakly, managing a faint smile. "Me? Gone? No way. You still owe me lunch, Choji-san."
Choji let out a choked laugh, rubbing the back of his head as tears streamed freely down his face. "Heh… you idiot. Still cracking jokes after all this."
The room, once heavy with sorrow, now overflowed with fragile relief. For Lily, for Choji, this moment meant hope.
But deep inside renji's mind, beneath the warmth of his sister's embrace and the loyalty of his friend, the echo remained.
Januza.
The name would not fade.