When I was eighteen, I made a phone call to Jiang Yu.

　　I didn't know why I called her, perhaps still holding on to a bit of fantasy, hoping that she could save me.

　　If she had a little bit of compassion.

　　If she cared even just a little bit about me.

　　If she could let me know that there was still someone in this world who loved me - maybe then I could catch a glimpse of some hope amidst the overwhelming and suffocating self-destructive tendencies, seeing a bit of hope for life.

　　When the call connected, she was as cold as ever.

　　I called her 'sis', without the usual resentment, just softly asked her, "If I really died..." Please.

　　"...what would you do?" Save me.

　　The fruit knife on the table reflected the light from outside.

　　I heard my own breathing merging with the darkness in the room.

　　The hand holding the phone trembled slightly.

　　Jiang Yu didn't curse me as crazy.

　　I heard her voice.

　　Cold and calm.

　　It smashed on the ground, shattered into ice chips, and swiftly, accurately, landed on my heart.

　　She said, "That's great.

　　You killed Mom.

　　You deserve to die." In an instant, the seawater engulfed my head, and I kept falling downward.

　　Just as I was about to suffocate, I suddenly woke up, gasping for breath like a wild beast.

　　The moment when the blade cut through the flesh, it didn't really hurt.

　　In the brief moment of dark red blood, I felt like I was brought back to that day.

　　In a deep, secluded alley, where no light could penetrate, a stranger man used a force that I couldn't resist to forcefully pull my hair back.

　　I cried and shouted.

　　I said I was sorry.

　　I begged him.

　　I begged him to let me go.

　　I begged him.

　　Please let me go, okay? But he didn't.

　　He was like the cruelest beast in the world, gradually pulling me into the deepest darkness.

　　He slapped me many times.

　　Each time I begged for mercy, he hit me.

　　The salty and bloody taste filled my mouth, and I couldn't speak a complete sentence anymore.

　　He tore my clothes apart.

　　The smell of burnt flesh mixed with cheap tobacco entered my nostrils.

　　Lit.

　　Extinguished.

　　Lit.

　　Extinguished.

　　Slowly moving from my waist to my shoulders.

　　Until a whole cigarette turned to ashes.

　　I don't know how long it lasted.

　　From crying and yelling until exhausted to numbly enduring, I lay in the dirty mud, while the wild beast ran rampant over me.

　　I smelled the stench of my own flesh and the rotten smell coming from within me.

　　If only I could die right away.

　　But what did I do wrong again? I was just walking on the road.

　　Just wearing my favorite clothes.

　　Did I do something wrong?