Chapter 276: Orange Hair

#The sky was clear, blue, and dotted with white clouds.

A hot wind rustled through what could barely be called a forest, as all the trees were bare and leafless.

H'el felt an ache in his waist and back, his bones felt fragile, and his muscles were weak, as if he hadn't slept for three days and nights. He was so exhausted that he just wanted to sleep and never wake up.

Suddenly, his nose began to itch intensely.

"Ha... ha-ha... ha... ha-choo!"

His body instinctively tried to conserve energy, making him want to keep sleeping, but the sneeze jolted him awake.

H'el opened his eyes, his thoughts flooding from the depths of his mind, followed by an overwhelming sense of fatigue.

From the darkness, he saw a dry blue sky and white clouds. Looking down, he saw a girl with orange hair, her eyelids half-closed, her cheeks sunken, and her body covered in coarse, brown cloth. Her loosely fastened clothes revealed her developing chest as she retrieved some branches.

It was she who had been poking H'el with the branch, accidentally poking it into his nostril, causing him to sneeze.

"Are you here to die too?"

The girl with orange hair spoke weakly, dropping the dry branch. Seeing H'el wake up, her eyelids drooped even more. Her dry, cracked lips barely moved as she mumbled, half of her body lying on the scorching, desert-like ground.

If not for the sudden appearance of a naked person in her death spot, she might not have used her last bit of strength to poke him.

H'el looked at the dying girl, starved and sprawled on the ground, then scanned his surroundings.

The terrain was rough and uneven, clearly not always a desert, as numerous dry, leafless trees stood here.

It must have once been a forest. Due to a lack of water, the grass had withered, the ground cracked, and the trees lost their leaves, leaving only dry, barren trunks.

From his knowledge, H'el recognized these trunks as Japanese cedars, which typically thrive in light, warm, moist climates, tolerant of cold but not extreme heat or drought, preferring deep, fertile, well-drained sandy soil.

They are mostly planted in Japan, widely used in forestry.

"Am I in Japan?"

H'el thought as he surveyed the scene, but his rumbling stomach interrupted his thoughts.

His stomach growled loudly, making a grumbling noise.

"Ha... ha... heh-heh..."

The orange-haired girl, lying weak and hungry on the ground, heard H'el's stomach growling and couldn't help but laugh, collapsing to the ground in a fit of helpless laughter. Eventually, her own stomach started growling as well.

At this moment, H'el realized that upon entering this new world, the mysterious energy that constructed his physical body through his spiritual power had turned him into a child about 1.4 meters tall.

H'el frowned deeply, feeling hunger emerge from his stomach, consuming his entire body from within.

He stretched out his hands to take a look: thin, exhausted, with the fatigue akin to lactic acid buildup, so weary that he didn't want to move.

"Where is this place?" H'el asked.

This body of his was in terrible shape.

Originally, before he entered this universe, he thought the weak, corporate drone-like body of his spiritual form was already feeble enough.

He didn't expect that the mysterious energy constructing his physical body through his spiritual power would turn him into a ravenous child.

Now, he was nothing more than a hungry, exhausted 13-year-old child who didn't want to move.

If nothing unexpected happened, with this weak body, he and the orange-haired girl would likely starve to death in this desert.

Of course, there was another option.

He could eat the girl in front of him, satisfy his hunger, and then leave the desert.

But H'el didn't see the need to do something so repulsive.

"Um..."

The girl, lying there with barely any breath left, had closed her eyes, breathing weakly and softly. She uttered a faint sound, the last proof that she hadn't starved to death yet.

It seemed she had already fainted from hunger and was becoming delirious.

H'el struggled with his tired body and only then realized that this child's body was naked, but this wasn't the time to care about such things.

He crawled a few steps on his hands and knees to the orange-haired girl, gently tapping her sunken, bony cheeks.

"Wake up, where are we?" H'el asked, lightly slapping her face and shaking her delicate body.

Fortunately, the girl hadn't completely starved to death and gradually opened her eyes, giving a weak response.

"Where are we? Wake up, I can get you out of here," H'el asked.

He still had some strength left. If he rested a bit, he believed he could find a city and survive if it wasn't too far away.

"Flower Desert..." the orange-haired girl murmured a place name before trying to close her eyes and succumb to sleep and death again.

H'el extended his fingers and held her eyelids open, preventing her from closing them, and said, "Tell me, which direction is the city?"

"This way," the girl pointed weakly to the east without lifting her hand.

H'el looked in the direction she pointed, then released her eyelids, which slowly closed again as she struggled to keep breathing.

There should be a village or city not far away, considering the girl's strength couldn't have taken her far from a city. At most, it would be a few miles.

H'el thought he could push his child's body to its limits to reach the city, survive, and see what this universe had to offer.

He took a deep breath to calm himself, then shakily stood up, preparing to head in the direction the girl indicated.

He glanced at the orange-haired girl. If he left her here, she would surely die by the time he returned with water and food.

H'el couldn't leave the girl to die. She had helped wake him up, which was a favor he couldn't ignore. Otherwise, he might have needed to return to the meditation chamber for a second attempt.

He struggled to lift the girl, draping her arm over his shoulder, and nearly dragged her as they walked east. He kept talking to her to maintain her consciousness.

"What's your name?"

"Matsumoto... Rangiku."

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