Trunks looked utterly unlike himself. He rushed up to the girl like lightning and reached out to touch the necklace of crystal fragments around her neck. "Annie, it has to be you!" he choked out.
Some of the former Rainbow Sickle Mercenary Group mercenaries gathered around Trunks, their eyes full of uncertainty. Grant, whom Han Shuo had thrown aside, could not help saying, "Commander, Miss Annie didn't look like this!"
"It's Annie. I gave her this Crystal Necklace, and there's a black mole behind her left ear. They both prove she's Annie!" Trunks cried out, his voice choked as he held the girl and sobbed with joy.
The mercenaries who had been uncertain a moment earlier were wild with delight once Trunks confirmed the girl's identity. They cheered in excitement, pounding one another's chests as though they wanted to express their excitement through pain.
"Annie, Annie, what's wrong? Why can't you speak?" Holding Annie, Trunks noticed that the girl in his arms was motionless and silent as a doll, and cried out in panic.
"Let me!" Han Shuo moved in a blur and appeared before Trunks. He pressed his right hand against Annie's back, and a streak of dark light flowed from his palm into her body, clearing away the power that restrained her.
Color suddenly returned to the face of the girl, who had been hanging her head without any sign of life. As though sensing Trunks shaking her, her long lashes fluttered, and she abruptly opened her bright eyes wide, gazing in confusion at Trunks as he held her.
After a moment of stunned silence, a piercing scream suddenly burst from the girl's mouth. She struggled violently, striking Trunks with both hands and feet. As she kicked and hit him with all her strength, she shouted curses. "Damn