Chapter 5: I Love You.
The accursed words echoed.
They screeched and cried within her head at all times, like the sound of cicadas.
And just like cicadas, as if trying to compress a lifetime of love into the single week they actually lived…
I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—I love humanity—I love you. I love you. I love you.—I love all of the human race!—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—I have the confidence to love every human being equally—I love you. I love you.—You don’t have the confidence to do that, do you?—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—And I want to love you, too—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—But no, I can’t—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—Because you are my host—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—So I will love—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—I will love humanity for you—I love you. I love you. I love you.—So love me—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—You can’t live without me anymore, can you?—I love you. I love you.—So love me. It’s the only option—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—I know that this is selfish—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—But there’s no way to stop it—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—I shall teach you—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—About this emotion—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—About this passion—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—About this exultation—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—Oh, oh!—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—Since you cannot love humans, I shall teach you—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you.—About the great wonder and beauty of humanity—I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love I love I love I love I love I love I love love love love love love love love love love lovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovevelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovevelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelovelove
The only thing that made these voices different from cicadas was that rather than a single week or a single summer, they continued on endlessly, never to cease.
On this day, like any other, the voices sounded in Anri Sonohara’s head.
But she was not particularly insane. At least, not that she was aware.
Perhaps she had already gone mad, but they said that often people who are insane don’t realize that they are insane, so her ultimate decision was not to pay any mind to the thought of whether she was insane at all.
The words of insanity chanted from the vicinity of her right arm.
If anyone heard those words, they would assume right from the start that something was wrong—but the voices did not actually stem from her mind, her brain.
They were an abnormal thing, neither physical nor mental.
“Saika.”
Known to the rest of the world as a “cursed blade,” it was in fact the thing that plagued the body of Anri Sonohara—and formed the central role of the recent serial slashings.
However, that did not mean that Anri was responsible for the slashings—if anything, she was purely a victim.
Saika desired “children” that would prove the love between her and humanity. Those children were created by implanting Saika’s consciousness into her victims by the act of cutting them. In that sense, it truly was a curse.
Before Anri was chosen to be the host, she was just another girl who had been slashed. The child Saika implanted into her sought twisted love for humanity, just as its mother had. An uncontrollable episode after that resulted in the incident in question.
The incident was brought to an end when Anri managed to control all of the “children.” The slashings stopped, and the minds that Saika had taken over were returned to their hosts—except for when they needed to fabricate details about the slashings themselves, to make sure all of the ends met properly.
In other words, everyone who had been attacked claimed that they “couldn’t remember the face” of whoever attacked them.
After that, nothing ought to have changed.
As usual, the accursed voices spoke inside of Anri, echoing through her heart without end.
But she did not consider that to be a big problem.
She just observed both the world she saw through her eyes, and even her own mental state, from outside the picture frame.
Objectively. As if it was not her own concern.
If anything bad happened, she would be feeling it from a removed position where it didn’t hurt as much.
Every tragedy was as distant as a painting of a massacre in an art gallery.
That was the only part of this that made her think that perhaps she was insane.
Perhaps it was why she was able to put up with the screams of love without going mad herself.
The slashing incidents should have been buried in the darkness of mystery so that she could return to her normal life.
But since it all happened, something had indeed changed in her life.
At first she couldn’t tell what it was—this vague feeling that plagued her with anxiety.
Normally she could ignore such a nagging feeling as something within the picture frame, but she just couldn’t brush it aside this time.
After a long period of searching, she realized the answer.
The source of her trouble was actually outside of the frame.
Masaomi’s…different somehow.
Two boys had emerged from the painting within the frame, reached out, and touched her heart.
Mikado Ryuugamine and Masaomi Kida.
After suffering an injury with one of her “children” and spending several days in the hospital, Masaomi had changed gradually.
It wasn’t a clear and obvious change.
Even his best friend, Mikado Ryuugamine, hadn’t noticed anything was wrong.
But as she was accustomed to viewing the world from outside of the painting, Anri was always aware of the subtle change that was blooming within Masaomi.
After several days of this evolution, she came across an unpleasant topic in the chat room.
There were two groups of youths called color gangs, and each of them believed that the other side was responsible for the serial slashing attacks.
When she became aware of this, Anri was plagued with guilt.
She did not cause the attacks, but she had been relieved under the assumption that the incident was over. This leftover resentment suggested otherwise.
Something had to be done.
She summoned the “children” that her “children” created—in other words, from Saika’s perspective as the progenitor, the grandchildren or great-grandchildren.
She did not want to use Saika’s power to control anyone’s mind, but she told herself that the use of force was necessary to stop pointless conflict.
She paid the price for this soon after.
She reached out to some of the boys known as Yellow Scarves among the slashing victims, hoping to use Saika’s power to learn more detailed information.
What she heard from one of them shocked her.
“Our boss is Masaomi Kida. I’ve seen him together with Mom before.”
She was stunned into silence.
“Um, he said he would avenge the girl with glasses, living vessel of Mom.”
The children all thought of the original Saika within Anri as their “mother.” While it was Anri who wielded control, they clearly only saw her as the host for their mother.
For a moment, she didn’t even process what the child had said.
Several minutes later, when Masaomi’s face finally flashed through her mind, she realized that a tremendous amount of cold sweat was trickling down her skin.
“It…can’t be…”
It was a lie. It had to be a mistake.
But Saika would not lie to the original, the mother.
Which meant the child had to be mistaken.
It was obviously just a boy with the same name who happened to also look like Masaomi.
It wasn’t possible for bright, cheery Masaomi, who claimed that he loved her, to stand at the head of a dangerous gang. She didn’t want to believe it.
Especially not that he had returned to the group in order to take revenge on her.
That was why she came.
To the ruined factory that was the gang’s hideout.
When Masaomi received the call, she decided to sneak after him, just in case.
After saying good-bye to Mikado, she went home and changed into her normal clothes before leaving again.
She already had two of the Yellow Scarves who were her children volunteer to guard the entrance so that she could sneak onto the grounds undiscovered.
In the end, she saw the last thing she wanted to see.
She saw Masaomi…but a different Masaomi than the one she knew.
His actions and attitude were the same, but the air surrounding him couldn’t have been more different.
And then, Anri realized.
That alien feeling she’d sensed since she wound up in the hospital was pouring out of Masaomi right before her, and she’d only picked up hints of it leaking out into his ordinary behavior.
And now that she knew everything, she was hiding in a crevice of the factory’s scrap material, drenched by the rain in the darkness.
How had it come to this?
Her emotions roiled in confusion.
The rain beating her body grew harder and colder over time, churning her confusion into something greater.
Kida…
I have to escape…
Why is Kida…doing this…?
Who knows what’ll happen…if they catch me…
She was full of fear and questions at the sight of her friend in a state she’d never seen before.
Meanwhile, she was being hunted by an unfamiliar army of yellow.
What would Masaomi say if they caught her?
Would he free her?
Or would he stay the unfamiliar Masaomi, the stranger?
Even if he spared her, what would he tell his companions?
And more importantly, if he learned the reason that she’d come, would it only cause him to change further?
Was she actually causing him great anguish by doing this?
What would happen with the Dollars group?
What was Masaomi planning to do?
Countless questions popped into her head and vanished.
The only thing that stayed behind was anxiety. She listened intently to her surroundings.
Most sound was swallowed by the rain, but she could hear a few people running around.
When she sensed the running sounds getting closer, Anri slid farther back into a tighter gap in the mountain of scrap metal.
The rain was perhaps both a help and a hindrance to her attempt to hide, but she didn’t have the wherewithal to determine which it was. The only sound was the words of love.
The accursed voices knew the present situation.
It’s so simple.
I’ll love everyone.
That boy Masaomi.
And the other children in yellow.
I’ll love them all equally.
Since you cannot love others,
I will love for you!
Deeply, deeply, deeply!
Anri immediately pushed the voices and their deal with the devil alike deep into the picture frame.
Everyone cut by Saika was implanted with Saika’s voice somewhere in their minds. For that reason, while they retained their own wits, they were all under a form of brainwashing in which they couldn’t disobey the mother’s orders.
Yes, using that ability might easily allow her to break out of her predicament by force.
But then…Kida…
Hurting Masaomi was out of the question, and Anri did not want to unnecessarily hurt anyone, period, including his friends. Normally those who hosted Saika were forced into slashing strangers, but Anri kept her mental control by forcing the voices inside the frame.
That was how she was able to completely ignore Saika’s bargain, but that might not last forever in the current situation.
Even with Saika’s children on her side, there was no telling what might happen to those boys after this was over, and taking them all over was out of the question. She would be no better than the slasher in that case.
Plus, if she did choose to force her way out…
Kida will recognize me.
It was an obvious and predictable outcome, but it was the worst kind of despair to Anri at this moment.
She didn’t want to ruin the place she’d found for herself.
That was why she was here. But if Masaomi learned that she was not an ordinary person—if he learned that she was Saika…
Perhaps she ought to present herself and apologize. But she would still have to explain the situation—and that meant explaining about those who had let her into the factory grounds.
She could just say that she snuck in, but Masaomi would come to the conclusion that she couldn’t have climbed over the walls on her own. As a matter of fact, she could do it with the extra help of Saika, but again, that would reveal her abnormality to him.
Why…why did it come to this?
She just didn’t want things to be ruined.
If Masaomi learned about the secret of Saika, he might tell Mikado, too.
Perhaps he would listen to her if she begged him not to tell anyone, but she wasn’t in any position to make such a demand.
Please let the night pass without anyone spotting me, she wished to no one but the rain. No sooner had the wish come to her than a voice from nearby crushed it without remorse.
“Hey! Don’t you think someone could hide in here?”
They had found the crack in the piled-up junk that she used to slip back to her spot. She was hidden farther back, but if they started looking into the crevice, they would find her momentarily.
“Shit! It’s too narrow for me to fit!” growled a deep voice.
A different voice hit Anri’s eardrums, cutting him off.
“I’ll go.”
!
Even in the rain, there was no mistaking it.
That was Masaomi’s voice.
Masaomi circled around the factory from the opposite side to narrow down the search, but no intruder appeared.
He searched through the scrapped material and vehicles one by one, assuming that she had to be hiding somewhere. Eventually he reached the largest pile of scrap, which a number of boys were gathered before.
It was a mountain of rust and rubble, junked cars and metal, so large that it made him wonder if the factory was treating industrial waste. Or maybe this had served as shelter for some homeless for a while, and they’d added to the pile.
Being somewhat smaller than average, Masaomi offered to lead. He moved to squeeze into the narrow crevice. There were plenty of members skinnier than him, but he didn’t want them thrashing the pile and potentially endangering the life of the woman hiding inside.
If he was going to settle this peacefully, he needed to go in himself and make it clear that he meant her no harm.
But only if she doesn’t mean harm herself.
“Sh-Shogun!” yelped a frightened voice, stopping him in the process of squeezing into the crack.
“Told you to call me Masaomi. What is it?”
“Uh, over there…”
Masaomi spotted a shadow in the direction they were looking.
Something even darker than the rain-soaked darkness.
So dark that it seemed to absorb that very rain…
A figure of pure, deep black.
Amid the tense silence, the cell phone clutched in Anri’s hand vibrated and glowed.
“!”
When she saw the message on the screen, she immediately began to type a response.
Her fingers were clumsy, unfamiliar with the buttons.
The message to her was short and simple.
“I’m at the factory. Where are you?”
There was only one thing Anri could do, trapped as she was.
She asked for help through the cell phone she’d just recently purchased.
From another person who wasn’t supposed to exist, either in public or in secret…
“The Black…Rider…?”
Masaomi’s eyes went wide. It was the very person they’d just been talking about moments ago, an urban legend often seen around the neighborhood.
Anyone who lived in Ikebukuro long enough was familiar with the rider, but when facing the legendary figure with potential personal business on top of that, it was a much more imposing presence.
The other boys began to murmur among themselves.
“Uh…are you saying…that was the intruder?”
“N-no way! I’d have recognized that freak right away!” shrieked one of the boys, clearly terrified of their dark visitor. Masaomi turned around and saw that someone must have alerted the others, as the rest of the boys from inside the factory were now on their way, walking toward them as a crowd. Some of them were even running, and the tension was thick among the rain.
“It’s the Black Rider!”
“The real thing?”
“Oh crap!”
“You serious?”
“Let’s rumble!”
One boy spoke up and compressed all of these emotions further. “I-I saw the rider pop over the wall… Like, just leaped over it, bike and all.”
They were the words of someone in a state of deluded confusion, but Masaomi had heard enough rumors about the Black Rider to know that this was expected. It’s what the Black Rider can do, he thought. There was a more pressing concern at the moment.
What is the rider…doing here now?
The timing was perfect—almost expectant.
The rider was stopped about sixty feet away, apparently pulling out a cell phone in the middle of the rain.
He could see the faint glow of the screen in the darkness, but there was obviously no way to make out the contents from this distance.
Suddenly, the light vanished.
Here he comes, Masaomi guessed right as the motorcycle began to silently ride forward. It sped up slinkingly, like a predator with prey in its range, spraying the falling rain as it raced toward the group.
At first it seemed to be coming right for them, but the course veered just slightly—and the bike crashed directly into the pile of vehicles.
“Whoa!” the boys exclaimed. The motorcycle chugged its way over the mountain of wreckage like an off-road bike conquering a rocky path, only to vanish into the little valley between the piles, the very crack that Masaomi was facing.
The image burned itself into his eyes.
Countless shadows extended from the bike, tangling and gripping onto the scrap to pull the vehicle over the hump.
He had heard the rumors.
It seemed like too impressive a gimmick to be relegated to the level of “urban legend”—but there was no doubt that he had just witnessed something eerie, something unexplained, amid the pouring rain.
Confusion reigned over every inch of Masaomi.
Just as it did for the intruder shivering behind the rubble.
“Ce…Celty.”
Anri’s eyes were full of surprise, gratitude, and her ongoing confusion as the huge black thing descended from overhead.
“You okay? How did this happen?”
Celty produced her PDA for Anri to see, fashioning a tiny shadow umbrella to keep it out of the rain.
“S-sorry…”
“You can explain later. Let’s scram. Get on the back.”
“Um, o-okay…”
Anri tried to quickly get onto the motorcycle, but it being her first time, she had trouble straddling it. Celty helped her up and placed a hand on her face.
“Uh…”
Black shadow began to spread over Anri’s features, until just a few seconds later, she was wearing a helmet very similar to the one Celty wore herself. Only the shape was the same, however; Anri’s was pitch-black.
There was a small viewport so that Anri could see, and the little glowing PDA screen shone through.
“Better to keep your face hidden while we escape, I’m guessing.”
“Th…thank you!”
It would have been bad for Masaomi to catch sight of her face, though Celty wouldn’t have known that fact. Anri was filled with gratitude.
“Hang on to me tight,” Celty typed, then stashed the PDA away and cranked the throttle.
A sound like a horse whinnying erupted from the engine of the bike, and Anri experienced a forward lurch in gravity, like the instant a roller coaster begins to dip.
The boys bore witness.
A black shadow leaped from the small hill of scrap as the motorcycle engine screeched.
The only difference was that now a girl wearing a black helmet was seated behind the rider.
When Celty and Anri emerged from the piles of junk, they saw several dozen young men waiting for them. Among the crowd were a few girls, too, but they stared at the two just like the boys.
They were surrounded by a wall of humanity on all sides. Such a wall would be easy to break, but it would only guarantee that some of the Yellow Scarves were injured in the incident.
Are they even aware…that I’m a member of the Dollars?
If that was the case, any act of open hostility here was a bad idea. The leader of the Dollars was an acquaintance of sorts, and she was a properly registered member of the Dollars—but taking an antagonistic attitude here would cause trouble for a great many people beyond just herself.
It would be fantastic if the situation were resolvable through dialogue, but that didn’t seem like an option at this point.
“Who are you, huh? I’ve seen you around for ages. Sorry, it’s just that I’m a fan, see? Can I have an autograph?” came a flirtatious, out-of-place question.
Celty focused in the direction of the voice and saw a single boy approach the bike.
“First of all, do you understand Japanese? Let’s start with that. Do you know the word for love? It’s ai. That refers to me: Ai am in love with the girl sitting behind you. And I don’t appreciate you swooping in and taking her away from me.”
Huh? Isn’t that…the one who’s always hanging out with Mikado and Anri…?
“No response, huh? Well, maybe you really are foreign. Actually, if it turns out you are a woman after all, I think that’d be perfect. Love isn’t me—love is you. How about that? I always thought the contours of that riding suit were too slender to be male. I wouldn’t care about you if you’re a guy, but I could love you based on the riding suit alone if you’re female. Love a nun, love the habit. What do you say? I’d be perfectly content to love you and your passenger at the same time, if you want.”
He’s sharp…and oddly pervertical.
Wait, was pervertical even a word? Celty was momentarily distracted by her own thought process as the boy strode over to her, step by step.
That’s when she realized something.
As Masaomi approached, the arm Anri had clinging to Celty’s waist trembled slightly. She pressed her upper half into the small of Celty’s back, trying to hide her helmet-concealed face even farther.
I see now…
Anri didn’t want him to recognize her.
Celty decided that now was not the moment to ponder why the boy Anri associated with was among the Yellow Scarves. All that mattered right now was to get the girl away from this place. She abandoned the PDA method and decided to go straight for the urban legend angle.
If she tried to reason with them, they would demand that Anri show her face to them.
Of course, I’m sure Shinra or Izaya would be able to talk their way out of this.
But sadly, Celty did not have the power to extract them from this situation through dialogue alone.
Well, if he wants a foreigner, he’ll get one. And hey, he’s not wrong—I just happen to understand the language, she noted ironically. Celty ignored whatever Masaomi was saying and slowly expanded her shadow in a vortex of black.
Ugh. This feels exactly like what happened last night…
Celty was momentarily gripped with fear as she remembered her run-in with the police. But the trembling of the girl clinging to her brought Celty’s sense of reason back. Under the cover of the rain, she materialized her shadow into a different shape this time.
But I bear some of the blame for yesterday. Then again, even if I hadn’t, it wouldn’t have changed the outcome.
The shadow extended from Celty’s feet, writhing like a snake as it gradually condensed to take on solid thickness.
At least I can say…I feel no shame in rescuing her now.
The shadow grew larger and faster over time, channeling the waves of menace she exuded. The majority of that menace and anger was actually directed toward herself, but she pretended not to notice this.
“Whoa… Wh-what is that thing?”
“No…way…”
At first, the boys assumed that it was just the rain spraying off of the ground, but they gradually murmured louder as they noticed the abnormal activity of the shadow.
And if I am at fault, this doesn’t count, because I’m not realizing it.
For an instant, the entire ruined factory was dominated and subsumed by a single noise.
БoOoovvoovvvWVVWWwwwwvvvvooooooЯяяяooo
It was less the sound of an engine than the cry of some creature.
They could tell it was an animal.
But the boys couldn’t even begin to imagine what kind of animal it was.
The fierce, eerie shriek of some thing that did not actually exist in this world.
The black motorcycle’s engine roared a sound that came directly from the depths of hell itself.
The sound resonated with the shadow creeping across the ground, each amplifying the other as it sped up toward the wall of youth.
In the past, Celty had tested herself to see how far the shadow could go. She stood on the Yamanote Line and extended it all the way to the next train station over, but she was unable to tell what was beyond that and had to prematurely end the experiment.
She had always tried to limit the use of any mammoth shadows to cut down on the image of herself as a monster, but that hesitation had disappeared since the Dollars’ meeting a year ago.
Ultimately, that lack of caution had come back to bite her with that scare the previous evening.
But it wasn’t because I knew I had a get-out-of-jail-free card…
The shadow erupted upward and took a form that resembled a gigantic horse.
It only resembled a horse because in the spot where its head should have been, there was nothing.
The headless horse leaped upward with another braying from the engine and charged straight at the boys. The ones directly in its path screamed and leaped to the sides for safety.
The horse plunged straight through the resulting empty space, then melted back into the earth, leaving only a long path of shadowy ground behind.
And most importantly…there are no police here! Celty laughed selfishly. She took her partner’s engine into a high-pitched shriek. The headless horse roared, planting seeds of terror into the ears of all who heard it.
It was as if she wanted to force the others to feel the same fear that she had experienced the day before.
“This is bad.”
“Huh?” said one of the nearby Yellow Scarves, turning to look at his leader.
“H-hey, Masaomi… What…is that…thing?” asked a different boy, his throat tight with fear.
Masaomi shook his head. “What makes you think I’d know that?”
He was unable to process what he was seeing as an illusion, but he didn’t want to accept it as reality, either. He found himself taking a step backward.
“All I know is that thing is dangerous. It’s not like us… It came from somewhere else.”
Masaomi felt a cold sweat trickling down his back. He stared at the back of the Black Rider.
“Okay, but…what about the chick riding on the back of that ‘dangerous thing’? What’s up with that?”
“D-don’t let ’em get away!” one of the terrified Yellow Scarves shouted.
“Wait! Don’t just attack them!” Masaomi commanded, trying to control his partners, but the shock wave spread through the other boys. None of them was reckless enough to stand directly in front of the bike, but several were ready to swing pipes and two-by-fours from the sides.
The result of this action took them even further into shock.
Anri felt a breeze blow through the visor of her helmet. She looked out at the scene.
It’s Kida, she realized, noticing that he was staring right at her. She looked away. Hopefully she had mistaken someone else for her friend, but the face she’d just seen was too much of Masaomi Kida to be a coincidence.
The black helmet completely covered Anri’s face, but she couldn’t help the terrifying feeling that he was going to realize who she was.
The moment she turned her eyes away from him, she saw something else, something that completely overrode her own fears.
It was the dull silver gleam of a metal pipe, hurled directly at the motorcycle carrying her and Celty.
Look out.
Madness trained in their direction.
Weapon hurled in their direction.
Anri’s reflexes took over in the face of these two simultaneous volleys, driving her into motion. Normally, the sight would be pushed back into the picture frame—but realizing that Masaomi was just nearby left her mind unable to perform that act in the moment.
Instead, her body acted without her.
Her arm throbbed, and the cursing voices that rang throughout her heart bellowed in one loud voice.
In her haste to not spend an instant of time listening to them, Anri yanked the throbbing in her arm directly out of her body, all at once.
It slid right into Anri’s hand at the same time that it ripped through the sleeve of her jacket in one smooth motion.
At the exact moment that the metal pipe bore down on Celty, she turned it onto the projectile without thinking, and…
It might as well have been a stage magician trick.
As the bike sped away, stones, umbrellas, lumber, and scrap material flew through the air at it. Most of the junk hit nothing but air or other projectiles, unable to handle the acceleration of the motorcycle—but a few of them were perfectly placed to intersect the bike’s path.
But just as the first pipe was about to collide with it, a metal sound reached the boys’ ears.
Twing. The sound of something freezing instantly. Or perhaps endless mic feedback compressed into a single moment.
What they saw next was two halves of a metal pipe floating in midair.
Next, a stone heading for the motorcycle crumbled into dust, disappearing amid the rain.
In what little time they had to wonder what was happening, a flying piece of wood provided the answer.
It was in the hand of the girlish figure on the rear seat of the bike.
A long, sharp cylinder that gleamed in the little amount of streetlight illumination that reached the factory.
“A…katana…?” Masaomi heard someone say.
That word brought a fresh image to the mind of everyone present.
The slasher.
They saw clearly that the figure sitting in the rear was holding a katana.
Stunned by the sudden appearance of this deadly weapon, all the boys stopped throwing objects and scrambled away from the path of the bike. When the person in the rear seat noticed this, she slid the katana away somehow, in the same magician’s way that she produced it.
Before the boys could regain their footing, the black motorcycle picked up speed, attempting to break its way right through one of the exits.
It roared.
It roiled.
Dancing along with the whinnying of the engine.
Drops of black shadow mingled among the spray of the rain.
The rising shadow seeped back into the motorcycle and its rider.
Black mist enveloped both person and bike, giving it the momentary appearance of one giant creature.
It leaped in time with another bray from the engine—just as the headless horse had moments earlier.
Seated on its back was a girl, her face hidden by a pitch-black helmet.
A headless horse ridden by a girl with a silver blade.
Such an image was not their intention, but as they rode through the darkness, they created the very picture of the headless dullahan from the fairy tales.
The boys didn’t even have the wherewithal to throw objects anymore. It seemed to be dawning on them that perhaps just letting them go was the safest plan of action.
“Can a katana…actually cut a steel pipe…in half?” someone murmured, picking up a piece of the severed pipe. The boys around him examined the shockingly clean cut—and began to pray in earnest that the Black Rider left them in peace.
Now that no one blocked its way, the motorcycle rode along the path of shadow it had created for itself toward the exit of the factory.
The few guards still standing there had no way to stop the speeding bike. The black thing simply turned its back on the helpless youths and vanished, the same way it had entered—without a sound.
The scene was completely silent except for the soft pattering of rain, as if nothing had ever appeared.
Amid the rain, Masaomi had a thought.
It wasn’t just Masaomi. Most of the boys in the gathering reached one solid conclusion from the event they’d witnessed.
Their heads were churning with a deluge of information.
The rumor that the Black Rider was one of the Dollars.
The slasher, who still hadn’t been caught.
The suspicion that the slasher might also be a member of the Dollars.
And the intruder who had been snooping around after them.
An intruder swinging a katana.
And the Black Rider swiftly coming to the intruder’s rescue.
Masaomi didn’t know if his conclusion was correct or not.
He didn’t even know if he should hope that his guess was wrong or be certain that he’d finally nailed down a proper opponent.
But there was one thing he was sure of at last.
No matter what he thought personally, there was no way to maintain complete control of his followers after what they’d just seen.
“Hey,” he said, soaking in the rain.
“Wha…?” responded a young man at his side.
“Do you know what a dullahan is?”
“Uh. Umm…nope.”
The kid still hadn’t recovered from the shock of the experience. It was all he could do to summon that response, his face ghostly.
Masaomi quietly continued, “A dullahan’s a headless knight on a headless horse who visits the homes of those who are about to die. I guess you might call it a Grim Reaper of sorts.”
“Uh, okay…”
In contrast to the serenity of Masaomi’s voice, the youths around him looked more concerned than ever. He ignored their consternation. “That’s just something I heard from Yumasaki when he got all worked up about it a while back.”
He did not elaborate on that thought, retreating within his own mind.
But if that monster is one of those things…does that mean one of us is supposed to die soon?
Shit…that’s not ominous at all.
Several minutes later.
“I wonder why,” Masaomi muttered as he stared up into the rainy sky, the chaos of the earlier scene morphing into solid tension that gripped the group. “Why would I suddenly feel like I wanted to see Saki at a moment like this?”
His thought was swallowed by the rain. No one answered him.
The memories of the girl in the hospital reverberated within Masaomi. He also thought of a pair of other figures, two of his classmates. But they were the people he wanted to see least at this moment in time. The images of Mikado and Anri melted into the rain.
Only the picture of Masaomi’s former lover remained in his heart.
The rain buzzed onward, showing no signs of stopping.
Masaomi strode slowly, eyeing the wall of the ruined factory. His comrades had covered it with their own graffiti and meaningless scribbles. Surrounded by tags and pieces of varied designs was a hastily scribbled message done in yellow spray paint.
THE BLUE SKY IS ALREADY DEAD.
“The sky is dead.”
It was a phrase used as the slogan of the Yellow Scarves Rebellion in real life, the movement that kicked off the beginning of the Romance of the Three Kingdoms epic about ancient Chinese history.
Masaomi hadn’t imagined that any of his rough-and-tumble companions knew that phrase. He recognized it, but only because he’d read a manga about the Romance of the Three Kingdoms story.
He looked back up at the sky, sensing that the string of events that had just happened was setting something into motion.
“Well, it’s not blue,” he snorted ironically in an effort to bottle up his honest emotions, his eyes open to the sky despite the falling rain. “But it’s not yellow, either.”
The rain buzzed onward, showing no signs of stopping.
Fshh, fshh, fshh, fshh.
A few minutes later, somewhere in Tokyo
Celty rode the route to Ikebukuro, spattered by the rain.
The girl clinging to her back did not speak, either because she knew Celty was driving or for some other reason. Celty chose not to pry. They maintained their silence as they rode through the rain.
So, what to do now? Celty wondered.
The circumstances were clearly too serious to simply drop her off at her home and leave. Celty might not have anything to do with the situation, but Anri was not a stranger. She was not such a pragmatist or head-in-the-sand pacifist that she would ignore the girl’s plight.
If anything, Celty did not help others out of calculating self-interest—she would extend a helping hand to anyone she saw who needed one, regardless of if she had a reason.
She wasn’t omnipotent, so there were times—as with Shingen—when she had to pick and choose.
I guess I could bring her home with me…and kick Shinra out so she can change.
Should she buy Anri a fresh change of clothes, then? She couldn’t give the girl Shinra’s clothes, and the ones that Shinra bought Celty and asked her to wear were bizarre, creepy things like swimsuits, maid outfits, and single button-up shirts with nothing else.
Fortunately, she did have the twenty thousand yen she’d confiscated from Shingen not long ago. She thought she remembered that there was a Uniqlo nearby and sensed around to get a grasp of the area—when her mind caught a glimpse of white.
Even with the umbrella, there weren’t many people who would venture out into Ikebukuro wearing a white lab coat. As soon as she picked up the white gas mask peeking out around the umbrella, Celty increased the speed of her motorcycle just a bit.
That sly rascal.
She could block his path in an acrobatic manner, but Celty wasn’t agitated enough that she’d forget the presence of Anri behind her. Instead, she killed the engine sound and snuck up on Shingen as he tread on the sidewalk, casting ropes of shadow that tangled up her target’s left foot and the nearby guardrail before he was aware that she was there.
“Wha—?!”
Shingen lurched forward and nearly fell. When he noticed Celty standing in his way, his panic was clear even through the gas mask.
“Ce-Celty!”
Looks like he was slipping away from the apartment to go somewhere else.
Celty cracked the knuckles of both hands, delighting in her good fortune.
She considered beating him to an immobile state, then taking him back to the apartment with Anri. The horsepower of the black bike—an evolution of an actual headless horse—easily surpassed those of regular motorcycles its size. She could fashion a sidecar made of shadow, which would be enough to carry heavy objects like that and was one of the reasons Celty was so suited for courier work.
The sidewalk was empty up ahead, so she stopped the motorcycle there for the moment and showed Anri her PDA.
“Sorry, give me a minute.”
As Anri blinked in surprise, Shingen spat disgustedly. “Damn, you really can do anything with that shadow of yours! Don’t you ever feel a bit guilty or self-conscious about having such a ridiculous trick up your sleeve? And who’s that with you?”
He struggled against her binding shadow, trying to escape, before giving up and questioning the girl still sitting on the rear of Celty’s bike.
“That doesn’t matter. Are you ready for this?”
Celty advanced on Shingen, still cracking her knuckles. Anri watched with curiosity and raised the thin shadowy visor that narrowed her vision to get a better look.
“Oh…?” Shingen murmured, noticing the distinctive round glasses visible through the gap in the helmet. “Are you…?”
The next moment, that thought spilled out of his mouth. “Are you the daughter of Sonohara-dou?”
“Huh?”
Sonohara-dou.
That was the name of the place where Anri had lived, the antiques shop that her parents owned and managed. A sudden shock ran through Celty’s body.
Oh no!
Celty knew the truth.
She knew that the Saika that had made its home in Anri was originally owned by Shingen.
Somewhere in what she presumed was her brain, she recalled what Shinra had said.
“He actually owned it until a few years ago, when he sold it to an antiques trader he knows. I believe the trader’s name was Sonohara.”
After that, Celty had contact with Anri on several occasions, learned that the girl’s parents had died in a slashing incident in the past, and assumed that there were complicated circumstances behind that. But she had never asked Anri about it directly.
“Ah, such a shame about your paren— Mwurr!”
“Lucky you.”
Celty deemed it unwise to allow Anri to be any more upset, so she covered the entirety of Shingen’s head in shadow and got onto the bike again.
“Let’s go.”
“Um, Celty, who is this? How does he know me…?”
“He’s a pale-faced monster, an evil boogeyman who reads the hearts of others and pretends to know them to take advantage,” Celty lied to keep things simple. She turned the grip throttle, lamenting how much of a bother this had become.
“I think you should keep your face hidden.” She lowered the visor of Anri’s helmet and removed the shadow enveloping Shingen’s head.
There were no more messages from her after that. The motorcycle rode onward through the rain.
The drops continued to pelt them, cold and wet.
Under the uncertain sky, Celty felt an eerie sense of unease.
All she could do was ride.
For now, she was still nothing but an outsider.
She rode on through the rain, understanding her place in the events.
Silently, so silently.
Chat room
—KANRA HAS ENTERED THE CHAT—
<Gooood evening! Huh? Is it just Tarou tonight?>
{Good evening.}
{Seems that way.}
<Darn.>
{Are you disappointed? lol}
<No, but there’s not much for us to talk about, is there?>
{Hmm…well, actually, there was something I wanted to ask you.}
<Wow, what? What is it? If I can answer it here, I’ll tell you anything you want to know.>
<Private Mode> <And I’ll even waive my usual fee.>
{…}
{Umm, I didn’t see many of the folks in yellow around today.}
<Ahh. What if they were just having a meeting somewhere?>
{Er, well… Have those Yellow Scarves always been in Ikebukuro?}
<Let’s see, they showed up for good around three years ago.>
{Uh-huh.}
<At the start, they were pretty chill, but there was quite a ruckus when they clashed with Blue x Blue…the “Blue Squares.”>
{A gang war, then?}
<Yes, although it didn’t turn into front-page public news. The girlfriend of the Yellow Scarves’ leader was kidnapped and got hurt really bad… It was an ugly situation in many ways.>
{Many ways?}
<Many ways.>
<The Yellow Scarves calmed down after that…but a few years ago, another team started a huge war, and a bunch of people got arrested. After that, the color gangs started to fade out from the scene. Also, the Blue Squares were dealing a lot of drugs…until they disappeared.>
{Because of the police?}
<No, they caught the notice of a man named Shiki from the Awakusu-kai, and they couldn’t keep selling after that.>
{Awakusu-kai?}
<Just one of the associations of, shall we say, “professional gentlemen” in Ikebukuro, of which there are many.>
{…I’m amazed you can just pull up names like that out of a hat.}
<Eek! A girl’s got all kinds of information hidden in her pockets! >
{That does not call for the use of a .}
{So because of that, they had to disappear?}
<And they picked a fight with one of the people you’re never meant to cross.>
{Oh…you mean Shizuo?}
<If you give me some kind of present, I’ll tell you more sometime.>
<Private Mode> <After this point, it’ll cost you.>
<Private Mode> <I’ll make it five thousand yen.>
{…I’ll pass, thanks.}
<Awwww. C’mon, I was hoping to hear you beg for it.>
<You’re no fun!>
—KANRA HAS LEFT THE CHAT—
{Wow, Kanra, how low can you sink?!}
{But, ultimately…}
{The Yellow Scarves stuck around.}
{Is it because the Blue whatevers disappeared?}
—THE KANRA HAS ENTERED THE CHAT—
{“The”? That’s a bold change.}
<Hee-hee, just a change of heart.>
<Now, about the Yellow Scarves…>
<Private Mode> <…Here’s the deal. The Blue Squares didn’t die out.>
<Private Mode> <The Yellow Scarves’ leader got tired of fighting and left the team…>
<Private Mode> <And they joined up with the remaining Yellow Scarves.>
<Private Mode> {Huh?}
<Private Mode> {They had a merger?}
<Private Mode> <That’s the quick way to describe it.>
<Private Mode> <The thing is, who’s really going to keep track of which person is in which group, aside from the leaders and important members? If you take off your blue gear, then say you want in with the yellow side, who’s going to care?>
<Private Mode> <Plus, when the Yellow Scarves were weakened after the loss of their leader, they might have welcomed the chance for some fresh blood.>
<Private Mode> {Then, the former leader…?}
<Private Mode> <Probably has no idea.>
<Private Mode> <I bet he’d feel real conflicted.>
<Private Mode> <Knowing the guys who sent his girlfriend to the hospital were working with his old pals.>
<Private Mode> <I bet it would be fascinating to tell him that.>
<Private Mode> {Let’s not. That’s pretty tacky.}
<Private Mode> <Yeah, I won’t. That’s it for story time.>
<To tell the truth, I hardly know a thing about them.>
{Hey, don’t lead me on!}
<Anyway, the Yellow Scarves have changed a lot over the years.>
<And then you’ve got the recent slashings.>
<I’d be careful if I were you.>
{I’ll try to keep my distance.}
<Private Mode> {I’ll send a message around to the Dollars urging them not to instigate anything with the other side.}
<Private Mode> <That’s a good idea. But…>
<Private Mode> {But?}
<Private Mode> <I don’t know if you’re aware of this…>
<Private Mode> <But there are some people playing both sides of the Dollars and Yellow Scarves. Be careful out there.>
<Private Mode> {…}
<Private Mode> {I will. But if we tell the other Dollars that there’s no connection, maybe that will trickle back to the Yellow Scarves through them.}
<Private Mode> <Assuming it really wasn’t the Dollars who did it.>
<Private Mode> <There are no rules in your group, and you’re not keeping tabs on every single member.>
<Private Mode> <Perhaps one of the Dollars is acting as the slasher outside of your sphere of knowledge.>
<Private Mode> <It’s the Dollars’ system. If you’re hoping to stay on “this side”…you ought to be prepared for that kind of rude awakening.>
<Private Mode> {…I’ll keep it in mind.}
{Well, I’ve got to go for now.}
{Thanks for everything.}
—TAROU HAS LEFT THE CHAT—
<Okay. Good night! >
<Maybe I laid the threat on a little heavy. Tee-hee!>
<Well, good night.>
—THE KANRA HAS LEFT THE CHAT—
—THE CHAT ROOM IS CURRENTLY EMPTY—
—THE CHAT ROOM IS CURRENTLY EMPTY—
—THE CHAT ROOM IS CURRENTLY EMPTY—
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