CHAPTER 240: SEED OF GREED

The man surveyed the surroundings first, his gaze gleaming in caution, but his face and posture remained that of a typical drunkard. Seeing no one else in his vision all around. He allowed himself to relax slightly. Then he moved his attention to the little boy crying.

The boy also noticed him and moved backwards in fear. The man said with some hesitation. "Hey, kid? How did you get here? Who did you come here with?"

The kid stood up and stepped back even more, showing a wary expression to the stranger. The man stopped trying to get close to him, sat down on the ground, and threw away the cigarette.

The man thought to himself that even though he had taken part in kidnapping the little girl, and that they would hand her over to the authorities of the rival companies of her parents. He had an idea about how things typically unfold in these scenarios.

Her parents would suffer a business loss of some kind to get her back, but nothing serious would actually happen to the girl. They might lose a lot of money, but that’s it. Their lives would not change much. But for him who had two children to take care of back at home, both ridden with rare and almost uncurable diseases, he needed all the money in the world he could get, even if it meant getting it through kidnapping other children; he had no choice but to do just that.

So, he was the softest one among his fellow kidnappers with a soft spot for kids, because of his own children. To look welcoming to the lost little boy. He dropped all pretense of being suspicious and drunk. Sitting on the ground and not getting closer, and trying to look as harmless as possible. Which seems to work slightly, as the blue-eyed kid eventually stopped crying and pointed out his small fingers in a specific direction.

He said in a trembling voice, "I...I came from there, and mom and dad disappeared. Please help me find mom and dad, PLEASE..."

The little kid started to sob again; the man got up, taking slow steps, and went closer. He patted the kid on the back, "It’s ok, kid, no worries, I’ll help you get to your parents, but I left my mobile inside. Why don’t you give me a minute, and I’ll get my phone back to call your parents. Okay?"

The kid looked at him with his innocent eyes and nodded reluctantly, "Okay, mister, please hurry, this place is scary."

The man nodded with a grim expression, turning around, he started to walk back inside, but just as he took a few steps forward. He stopped as he suddenly felt a wave of immense pain run through his entire body, from his back. He rotated his head backwards in a robotic motion, and there he saw it —the little blue-eyed kid, who had been crying just a moment ago; the confused and helpless little boy was nowhere to be seen.

Those blue eyes now gleamed in silent determination and violence. The little boy had stabbed a knife through his back. As their eyes met, the little boy grinned like a ghostly demon, radiating a haunting feeling. The kid pulled the knife back from his flesh before his mind could even comprehend the terrifying amount of pain. The boy stabbed him back again, and again and again.

The gut-wrenching cries of the man reverberated everywhere through the abandoned area of the factory. But that did not stop the boy as he stabbed them again and again and again, and again. The man started begging the little boy in fear, to let go, to let him live. But the boy remained as merciless as a demon.

Eventually, the blue-eyed boy shoved the knife right through the throat of the man. Killing him as a result, blood splattered all over his hands, face, and sleeves. His blue eyes contrasted deeply with the red blood all over his body.

The little boy flicked the knife on his hand, cleaning the blood from it, almost like a trained, ruthless killer. He walked forward in measured steps, anger and brutality evident in his eyes. He growled in fury, How dare these mongrels kidnap her? He was going to kill them all.

Entering the insides of the factory, through the door, the little boy had to squint his eyes, unable to see things clearly at first. Still, his eyes eventually adjusted as he saw the three other kidnappers; they were already present inside, they had gathered and came back at the first moment when they heard the gut-wrenching screams of their companion.

As the three kidnappers saw a little kid with black hair, blue eyes, holding a knife dripping with red-like liquid, the kid’s face and clothes all covered in blood, contrasting with his blue ocean eyes. This entire visage of the unknown kid sent chills down the spines of all three grown, ruthless men.

However, the boss was perhaps the most shocked. He knew that look, those eyes of a pure killer.

A true psychopath. The little boy also inspected them all, his eyes narrowed. And the moment his eyes landed on Sophia, who was lying on the ground, her beautiful, fairy-like figure covered in dirt and bruises. Seeing that scene, his mind went blank, gritting his teeth viciously and glaring at them in an unnerving violence. The little boy dashed forward with all of his might.

All three of the kidnappers brought out their own knives out of caution. But they were too confused with themselves to take the situation seriously, and the kid running at them with a murderous look, they could not help but doubt whether a stupid kid had really killed their fellow kidnapper.

And then it was a downright massacre, even the boss, who was said to have killed real people, did not stand a chance against the little boy, like a beast at its last leg or a demon with its sadistic nature disregarding its own safety; he killed all three of the goons. Their deathly despair-filled cries sounded everywhere, but there was no one there to help them. Their last moments were anything but...pleasant, and the boy made sure of that with all of his demonic fury.

The boy could barely walk or keep his consciousness intact; there were countless cuts on his little body, and he was bleeding all over. But he walked towards Sophia regardless of his near-death state with an iron will. He slowly cut the ropes, his hands shaking, removed the tape from her mouth, making sure not a single drop of blood touched her skin, and similarly, he removed the blindfold from her eyes as well.

Sophia had heard the terrifying and incomprehensible cries of her kidnappers and became more afraid of what was happening. She couldn’t see, which made the situation even more horrifying for her.

But when a small pair of hands removed her blindfolds, she couldn’t believe it, when her eyes met with the little boy, who was her only true friend. Wasn’t she kidnapped? How was he here? Unknowingly, a sense of relief washed over her entire body at the sight of the face she least expected to see at this moment.

But then, as her mind registered his utterly bloody state. Sophia felt her blood run cold in terror as Tyler collapsed in her small arms, her pink dress was painted in the blood of her best friend, her saviour. She looked around and saw the dismantled bodies of her kidnappers. She understood instantly what had happened. Tears fell from her eyes. But she did not immediately let her emotions cloud her judgement.

She found a phone nearby and instantly called her parents. Tyler needed to be treated as soon as possible. She begged her parents to hurry up and come here, and yet, her parents seemed as cold to her as usual when speaking, telling her to wait silently, as if it were any other typical day to them. Their calm and cold demeanour genuinely took Sophia aback, as if they didn’t even care if she was rescued or not. Though a part of her expected it, the reality of it still hit her small and innocent heart like the strike of a sledgehammer.

Her heart, which was already filled with immense fear after being kidnapped, shattered into a thousand pieces. Yet, amid that pain of despair, there was only one ray of hope: the boy who was her closest friend, looking again at the butchered bodies skewered with a knife. The bright red blood gushing out of their unrecognisable corpses, flowing down through the dusty floors, she strangely did not feel frightened by that scenery.

Instead, only one thought crossed her head, looking again at her lap, the bloody boy, 2 years younger than her, even smaller than herself, the one who did all this, and he did it for her, he killed those evil men, risking his own life for her sake. She caressed his face, more blood stuck to her palms, but Sophia didn’t care. At this moment, her subconscious mind triggered a mechanism, in a way, in a world where even her parents did not care if she lived or died. Tyler became her anchor to life—that one person who would always be there for you and do anything for you.

Slowly, something changed in her look, the way she looked at the little boy in her arms, a trace of greed formed in her heart, an insatiable dark greed, her survival instinct urged her to shield his entire existence, to have him to herself only, to own him for herself and herself alone. She hugged his bloody body and placed her ears right in his chest, hearing every heartbeat with a possessive greed. Nothing must happen to him, absolutely nothing. She would make sure of it.

Tyler belonged to her and her alone. She would absolutely kill anyone who tries to take him away from her, just like how he killed all those evil men who wanted to kidnap her. The little girl at that time didn’t understand what love was, but perhaps what she felt for him was more than love, much darker and sinister than love, much worse than love. Maybe a love that was more of a curse than a bliss. Thus, the seed of greed was born in her heart, and he became the purpose of her life. Her only Salvation...