Bungo Stray Dogs - Volume 5 - Chapter Pr

PROLOGUE 

Never in the history of Yokohama’s underground society did so many corpses pile up as they did during that eighty-eight-day bloodbath known as the Dragon’s Head Conflict. A great number of organizations were involved in the slaughter. 

The night before its conclusion… 

A crimson full moon reigned over the night sky. Withered leaves danced in the wind as they descended upon the ground. A heavy air filled the streets as a low-level Port Mafia grunt, Sakunosuke Oda, jogged toward his destination. Gunfire echoed from the back alleys. Even Odasaku had his gun drawn, surveying every single crevice so as to not be caught off guard. After turning the corner, he found himself before an old, filthy brick building. It smelled like blood. 

I’m sick of this, Odasaku thought with a brief sigh. In every direction he looked, there was death—piles of bodies littered the streets. Each corpse had a gun in hand with shell casings scattered about. It appeared some opposing criminal factions had gotten into a shoot-out. 

“…?” 

Out of nowhere, Odasaku thought he heard something. It was a sound unfit for such a somber night. But there was no time to hesitate. Odasaku sprinted down the street in the direction of the voice, even though it led in the opposite direction of his destination. He arrived to find a car flipped on its side. There were people lying on the ground nearby who’d apparently gotten launched out of the car’s window. 

Upon approaching them, Odasaku holstered his gun and checked the bodies. They were most likely a married couple. The husband was lying on top as if to protect his family. He was unarmed, and his attire made it apparent that he was just an ordinary person who had simply been in the wrong place at the wrong time. 

The husband and wife had already taken their last breath, perhaps after being hit by a stray bullet. However, it appeared that they had managed to shield their child from any gunfire. The small, young girl was crying—the sound that had drawn Odasaku over. He scooped her up in his arms and checked if she was hurt, but she miraculously only had a few minor injuries. On a handkerchief peeking out from under her shirt’s hem was the name Sakura, clearly written by a child. 

“You’re lucky to be alive,” he said to her. 

Suddenly, loud static echoed from Odasaku’s earphones, followed by the voice of a very close friend. 

“Odasaku.” 

Odasaku sharpened his gaze the instant he got the call. 

“Dazai, where are you?” Odasaku asked in a low voice. 

“I have a good idea of what you’re doing, but you need to run. Now. All hell is about to break loose—,” came Dazai’s hasty reply, followed by more static when someone else connected to the call: “Outta the way, grunt!” 

Odasaku looked up at the sound of the new voice, and immediately a motorcycle shot right past him. 

Riding the motorcycle was a man wearing a distinctive black hat—the same person who cut in on Odasaku and Dazai’s call a second ago. He was a Port Mafia executive known as Chuuya Nakahara. Despite his small, modest build, he wildly twisted the throttle to drive even faster. A gentle, insouciant voice could be heard coming from Chuuya’s headset. It was Dazai’s. 

“Hey, Chuuya. You’re in the enemy’s line of fire now, so eat a bullet and die, okay?” 

“Shut your mouth!” Chuuya furiously yelled back. But when he glanced up, he noticed a grenade heading right for him just like Dazai had warned. It was from an RPG-7—a high explosive anti-tank rocket-propelled grenade launcher powerful enough to blast through thick armor. It wasn’t something you’d use against a single human. 

The grenade was heading straight for Chuuya, but he skillfully used his body weight to steer the motorcycle and dodge the projectile. Nevertheless, he had to tilt his vehicle almost parallel to the ground, creating sparks as his pedal scraped against the gravel. The grenade nicked his left shoulder as it went by and blew up the street behind him. 

The enemy fired a second shot, this time aimed slightly ahead of Chuuya as if they knew he would evade the first one. The road right in front of Chuuya was engulfed in an explosion, but he was able to dodge just in time once again. Then there came a third grenade, bringing with it a subsequent blast and shock wave. 

The road was riddled with craters and white smoke as gravel scattered through the air. No ordinary human would be able to escape these attacks. However, Chuuya emerged from the dense smoke on his motorcycle, furiously speeding ahead. The final grenade should have hit him, since there was no room for him to dodge its explosion like he did for the first two shots. So how did he do it? Timing. He promptly calculated the course of the projectile and slowed down his motorcycle so he wouldn’t take a direct hit. While he got hit by the shock wave, Chuuya could use his engine’s and motorcycle’s weight to minimize its impact. His powers of observation, kinetic vision, and computing capabilities helped him instantly predict the speed and trajectory of the grenade, and his dexterity like a race-car driver allowed him to handle his motorcycle with such precision. 

Chuuya let his bike’s wheels slide across the pavement as the black smoke tickled his nose. The enemy immediately came at him with a new method of attack as if he figured shooting him wouldn’t work. A masked man stood atop the building next to the prefectural office, looking down at Chuuya. The man raised a hand into the air, and instantly a bolt of lightning lit up the night sky. He then swung his arm, aiming a bolt of lightning right at Chuuya. 

“Tch. Damn skill user!” 

The lightning tore through the ground as it chased after Chuuya, who bitterly clicked his tongue. He tried to turn by tilting his motorcycle to the right, only to be surrounded by a different bolt. Between the power, the range, and the simultaneous attacks, the masked man’s skill was unbelievably strong. 

Lightning flashed over the street, and the ground started to cave in. Dust rose into the air, swallowing Chuuya. It looked like a direct hit, but at the very next moment, he reemerged from the smoke, riding perpendicular up the wall of the office building. The air-cooled engine roared; the rubber tires burned as they scraped against the wall. But the motorcycle, which should have fallen due to gravity, was still showing no signs of slowing down. The masked skill user aimed another bolt of lightning at Chuuya, who sped up and easily dodged. After arriving at the rooftop, Chuuya shot a piercing glare at the masked man on the neighboring building. 

“Ya got cocky,” scoffed Chuuya before revving his engine even more. He was headed straight for the masked man. 

Slipping between the back-to-back lightning attacks, Chuuya cleared the connecting passageway, then began climbing the wall of a neighboring building without losing any speed. The motorcycle soared over the surface, tires roaring as they spun in the air before landing on the rooftop—the same rooftop the masked man was standing on. Chuuya skidded the tires across the rooftop’s tiles to break the bike’s momentum, and the back tire let out an earsplitting screech as it scraped against the tiles. The masked skill user continued to strike as the motorcycle spun until he hit the engine with a bolt of lightning, causing an explosion. 

“…” 

The sound of the violent blast even reached Dazai, who was nearby—in fact, he had been on the same rooftop as the masked man the entire time. He watched as the motorcycle burst into flames. 

After being captured by the enemy, Dazai had been handcuffed and brought to this very location. His arms were wrapped in bandages, and he had a few faint bruises around his bloody mouth where he had been punched. His right eye was wrapped in the same bandages as his arms, making it hard to read his expression. Sensing there was someone behind him keeping watch, Dazai whispered into his hidden microphone, “Would’ve been a lot funnier if you’d been struck by lightning and died.” 

“You want me to kick your ass?” 

Dazai watched Chuuya as he emerged from the wreckage, grumpily blowing the flames off himself. Even though he appeared to have gotten caught in the blast, Chuuya didn’t even have a scratch on him. Dazai, however, didn’t seem the least bit surprised. 

“You’re five minutes late,” Dazai said before kicking the guard behind him into the air, rendering the man unconscious. “I got punched three times, you know,” he then joked. 

Chuuya sneered. “How about I kill you with a fourth?” 

“I’m not the one you’ll be killing today,” Dazai claimed before shedding his handcuffs. He had actually gotten himself captured on purpose. Knocking out the guard and undoing his handcuffs were but simple tasks for Dazai. 

He and Chuuya started to casually walk away when numerous masked men suddenly surrounded them. It appeared there were still enemies lurking in the shadows. 

“Pathetic garbage wastin’ my time…” Chuuya scowled. 

“Just hurry up and get rid of them,” Dazai said with an annoyed tone. “It’s not like you didn’t see this coming.” But right as Chuuya was about to retort, he noticed a skill user approaching—a masked man with bolts of lightning coiled on his arms. It was the same person who had been prowling after him. 

“…I almost forgot. I still owe ya for earlier.” Chuuya fixed a murderous glare on the lightning wielder. 

The building shook from impact, crushed under the force. A dust cloud was forming as bodies, including the masked man’s, covered the rooftop. Chuuya had used his skill. 

Riding up the wall on his motorcycle, blowing away the flames from the explosion—all of this was possible because of Chuuya’s ability. 

Chuuya headed toward the building with Dazai, not even glancing at the piles of the dead he was responsible for. The man they were after was inside. 

Once the two of them went down the emergency staircase, they discovered the inside of the building was rather run-down as well. The hallways were collecting dust, and there were signs of rats in various places. They walked in the direction where they sensed someone’s presence until they arrived in a spacious room with office desks and shelves stacked in the corner. The telephone line had been cut, and the fluorescent lights were flickering. Valuable bills and securities had been thrown away with unimportant miscellaneous documents. 

In the center of the room was what appeared to be some sort of strange pavilion. The man they were looking for was sitting inside. He was muttering to himself, eyes downcast as he flung several things into a bucket of fire. 

“It will be mine. It won’t be mine. It will be mine. It won’t be mine…” 

It was as if he were picking flower petals and trying to tell his fortune. Except instead of flower petals, he was using banknotes and securities. There were even glittering gems in the bucket. 

“It will be mine. It won’t be mine. It will be mine. It won’t be mine…” 

The banknotes burned, the securities were ripped to shreds, and the gems were lapped up by the flames. Dazai looked at the stones and muttered, “Those jewels are all real… Ah, and that one was worth fifty million…” 

Another large jewel was tossed into the fire with a clink. 

“…It won’t be mine.” The man sighed. That seemed to have been the last of the gems. “Why does fate always mock me? It appears that not even forming a syndicate will get me what I want.” 

The flames illuminated the man’s face as he crossed his arms. He had a pale complexion with white hair cascading down to his back. A single braid hung over his shoulders. Of all his attractive features, his lurid red eyes stood out the most. 

Tatsuhiko Shibusawa. 

Killing this man would end the Dragon’s Head Conflict. Chuuya took a step forward to get closer to the root of this tragedy. 

“…Give me back my men,” he quietly demanded. That was when Shibusawa lifted his head up as if he had finally noticed them. 

“Welcome, my boring visitors.” He turned his apathetic gaze to the two men. “I know neither of you will grant me my wish, either, so hurry up and die…like the rest of them.” 

A mist slowly rose behind Shibusawa, revealing something by his feet. Chuuya’s eyes opened wide the moment he noticed what that was. It was Chuuya’s colleagues—the six who had been missing. Each one of their pupils were dilated as they lay there unmoving. It was evident that they were already dead. 

“All your friends committed suicide,” Shibusawa continued. “Not even death can cure a boring person from being boring.” 

“You bastard…!” Chuuya went blind with rage. Red marks from his skill spread across his face. His clenched fist trembled, and his gloves burst into shreds. The marks even appeared on his now-bare arms. Chuuya unleashed his skill, surrendering himself to his rage. A gust of wind ruffled his hair. 

“Don’t even think about stoppin’ me,” Chuuya warned Dazai before facing Shibusawa. 

“Sigh…” Dazai simply took a step back. “Dark Disgrace? Hmph…” 

Chuuya’s skill then began to go berserk. Screams. Roars. Explosions. Every kind of sound could be heard as the building itself started to crumble. The air trembled under the shock wave, launching rubble like bullets. 

“…” 

A man was watching the miserable sight from afar. He had shoulder-length black hair and eyes like violet crystals that glowed in the moonlight. His mantle flapped in the wind. 

“Heh.” 

He gave an innocent smirk, but he had a mysterious expression on his face. The man—Fyodor—mumbled to himself, his delicate fingers gliding through the sky as if he were playing an instrument: “…This is too much fun.” 

Bullets rocketed through the air, gunfire echoed, asphalt was gorged out, and blood was spilled. The city was swallowed in the screams, cackling, and resentment of its people. Countless lives were lost, and irreversible damage was done during the Dragon’s Head Conflict. This struggle, which started as a dispute over five hundred billion yen, turned Yokohama into a war zone. Some fought under the alias Twin Dark; others lost family and turned adrift; and one individual would end up adopting the children orphaned during the sanguinary war. 

And six years later, a dragon began awakening from its slumber.