Defeat the system! Kiss my little monster!

Adrian was not surprised by Colin's appearance. He stood still and said, "Where he is is none of your business."

"Adrian, you actually knew all along, didn't you?" Colin's voice was cold and hard. He was dressed in black, with unhealed knife wounds on his arms and forehead, and the wound on his neck was particularly severe, as if he had been strangled by a red-hot iron chain, the flesh bloody and revealing a hideous scar.

He said, word by word, "Release my brother."

Colin had previously suspected that Adrian was deliberately framing him, but after escaping, he reflected on it and realized that perhaps that wasn't the case.

Colin had very little chance of escaping after entering the palace, and Adrian had no reason to take such a big risk to tell him about the blood transfusion.

Unless there's more to it than meets the eye.

Colin was not an insect that could be easily fooled. He pressed the old doctor who had drawn his blood in the main hall that day and learned that he had indeed secretly switched the blood of Colin and another female insect.

...Then why are the test results still the same?

Colin's head was buzzing for a moment.

The things buried deep in his memory finally began to surface.

"Let him go? I can't." Adrian's pupils shifted as he spoke, "I've already deeply marked him."

Colin's face darkened: "You're only B-level, you can't mark him."

“I got promoted a few days ago, just reached A.” Adrian chuckled. “What can you do about it?”

“You…” Colin froze, the gun pressed against Adrian, but he hesitated to pull the trigger.

Once deeply marked, the female insect can never leave the male that marked her unless her glands are removed. Killing Adrian would also mean the end of Maurice.

“Colin, you’ve come all the way here to see me, so it seems you’re not completely beyond redemption,” Adrian said. “I’ll give you a chance.”

Colin frowned: "What?"

A sudden burst of mental energy erupted inside the room. Colin instinctively took a step back, but he lost his footing and was struck on the back of the head by a sharp spike of mental energy that suddenly attacked from behind. Colin froze on the spot, and after a few seconds of disorientation, he collapsed to the ground.

Adrian kicked the pistol in his hand aside and looked up at Maurice, who was standing in the doorway.

Morris withdrew his mental energy, a strange tension appearing on his face: "This is the worm you were talking about?"

Adrian rubbed his right temple. He didn't answer, but simply said, "Your brother."

The air seemed to freeze. Maurice stared intently at Adrian for a moment, then suddenly strode forward and removed his hand. The skin beneath the white hair remained unchanged; Maurice knew Adrian was faking it again.

“What would you have done if I hadn’t come?” Morris’s tone turned serious. “Colin wouldn’t have gone easy on you.”

Adrian didn't seem to care much. He chuckled and said, "I knew you were there, otherwise I wouldn't have dared to let an insect into the room."

Morris gripped Adrian's wrist, a hint of displeasure on his face: "You should have told me beforehand."

Adrian was somewhat surprised by this. Since his rebirth, Maurice had always been mostly obedient to him, but now he was making demands of Adrian, revealing his true nature.

“Alright, I’ll let you know in advance next time this happens.” Adrian said helplessly, then shifted his gaze to Colin, who was lying unconscious on the floor. “But Colin scared me pretty badly today, so I locked him in the attic upstairs.”

Morris's eyes flickered. He frowned at Colin, and after a few seconds nodded to Adrian: "I'll do it."

Adrian knew Maurice's plans. He didn't intend to interfere in the brothers' affairs, but could only create a small space for them to communicate for the time being.

Morris handled things efficiently; he tidied up the upstairs storage room and dragged Colin inside.

Hearing the door open and close inside, Adrian took a few steps and then lay down on the bed to calm his nerves.

The man who was barely surviving watched him from the sidelines and sighed, "Alas—Colin is a victim of injustice too."

Adrian scoffed, remaining noncommittal.

The white paper records Colin's fate. This book, written by him, chronicles his short, tragic, and especially poignant life.

In his past life, Adrian stabbed Sean to death. He stabbed him more than twenty times, tearing his entire heart apart, but Sean still survived.

Who can save him?

Adrian could only think of one possibility. Besides that pink ball, what other insect possessed such a power to defy fate?

Love is about giving.

His birth is my birth.

Colin made a deal with the Pink Ball, giving Sean all his life force to bring him back to life. However, Sean's heart was already rotten, so in order for him to live like a normal worm, Colin ultimately transplanted his own heart into Sean.

On the day Sean was reborn, Colin was buried on the road to the underworld.

"This is what they call a love-struck idiot," Adrian exclaimed in amazement. "What a freak."

"Of course it scares insects, love-struck brains are contagious." The creature, surging upwards, its red glow flickering under the lights. "If you love the right insect, everyone's happy. If you love the wrong one, it's just mutual torment."

Adrian: “…”

"You are quite knowledgeable?"

"I know everything!" Smugly clinging to life, it continued, swaying its head, "So-called love, hate, anger, and delusion are nothing but human illusions. Only by seeing through the illusions of the world..."

Adrian sneered, "Are you crazy?"

To live a life of ignominy: "..."

Colin didn't wake up until noon the next day. His limbs ached, and his throat was incredibly sore. The knife and gunshot wounds had healed, and after the suppression ring was removed, the red marks on his neck had faded, leaving only a ring of scars.

Morris sat on the wooden chair by the door. He noticed Colin's movement and lifted his eyelids slightly: "Commander, how are you feeling?"

"...Maurice?" Colin was in a daze for a moment before regaining his senses. He suddenly sat up in bed and looked across at the other person. "Are you alright?"

The bandage around Morris's right eye had already been removed, and there was no wound around his eye; it was a normal situation, just like with any other insect.

Not long after Colin finished speaking, he realized something. He slumped onto the bed, his tone full of sarcasm: "Adrian really made a fool of me."

“You’re so stupid, you’ve been tricked by bugs countless times already.” Morris frowned. He didn’t want to waste words with Colin and said, “What are you doing here? There are wanted posters for you all over the place. You really know how to find a place to hide.”

Colin's throat bobbed, and he began, "Maurice, I know you saved me that day. I..."

Colin seemed embarrassed to speak; he paused for a few seconds but couldn't utter a word.

Morris got angry when he saw him like this: "Colin, look at yourself! All for Sean? Huh? You idiot! Do you know how many bugs he's infected?"

As he spoke, he tossed all the photos in his hand to Colin.