CHAPTER 1 Welcome Several days earlier Not too close and not too far from the center of Ikebukuro was the antiques shop Sonohara-dou. It was located on the first floor of a home that had been renovated for business. The display window facing the street contained a number of old-fashioned items for sale. There was a well-used flower vase, a hanging art scroll from an unknown artist, a vacuum tube radio—items that bore no common era or type but which most people would recognize and identify as “antiques.” In contrast to the dusty, ancient atmosphere of the storefront, however, the worker inside was a young woman. She was not quite like your typical modern girl; her mannerisms were more reserved and old-fashioned, which matched the various items around her. If you were in a more supernatural state of mind, you might think that she was an avatar given life by the shop itself. While she was not even twenty years old, Anri Sonohara was indeed the owner of the antiques shop, and her odd manner made that fact feel appropriate to anyone who visited. The young owner offered a gentle smile and an incline of the head to the boy who came into the store. “Welcome. Er…it was Mizuchi, yes?” she asked. Her younger visitor looked taken aback. “You remember me?” “Yes. How is the radio working?” “It’s good. It makes my place feel nice and chill to hang out in.” This was Yahiro Mizuchi’s second trip to the shop. He’d been hoping to find something like a cheap TV for his apartment, so he’d visited this shop, which was run by a graduate of Raira Academy, the same school he was attending. He’d left with a nice antique radio. It seemed to Yahiro that this made for a strange situation: a store for old secondhand items patronized by a young high school student and run by a recent graduate, also young. From what he’d heard, the store was originally run by Anri’s parents before their deaths, and once she had become independent, she had acquired the license to reopen it. He stared at the alumna of his school, almost reverent in his respect for her ability to run her own business so soon after leaving high school. When she saw how shocked he was that she remembered his name, she giggled and admitted the truth. “Ryuugamine’s told me about you.” “Ryuugamine… You mean the library committee chairman?” “He was very delighted to have an extremely talented and promising underclassman on the committee.” “So you know him?” Yahiro asked. Anri stared into empty space, reminiscing on the past. “We were classmates. He’s still very important to me,” she said meaningfully. Yahiro wondered if there was something more there, but he wasn’t quite sure how to follow the comment. He didn’t want to be rude and ask her directly. Instead, the boy who’d come into the shop with him spoke up. “Huh? Whoa, what’s that all about? Are you goin’ out with Ryuugamine or something?” “Kuon, you can’t just ask that sort of thing,” Yahiro grumbled. “I can’t believe you of all people are telling me that…” Yahiro’s classmate, Kuon Kotonami, feigned an exaggerated look of shock. His dyed green hair was especially out of place in the old-fashioned store interior. From behind him came a harsh comment from an inexpressive third customer. “Only Yahiro could say something like that. I mean, I cringed at your comment, but I’m assuming that he chose to chastise you out of concern for your future.” “…Do you hate me or something, Himeka?” “Not at all. I feel about the same toward you as I do toward the other random people walking around town.” “I’ll chalk that up as ‘totally uninterested,’ then,” Kuon said glibly. The girl clarified, “No, it’s not the same as disinterest. It’s more like a state of zero, where all the good and bad things cancel each other out.” The frankness of Himeka Tatsugami’s stone-faced comments put a cold sweat onto Kuon’s brow. “Uh…I’m not sure how to process that comment.” Yahiro patted him on the shoulder and nodded earnestly. “It’s all right, Kuon. Let’s work on increasing your good points. I’ll do my best to help you.” “What are you going to ‘do your best’ at?! How does that translate to becoming a better person?!” Kuon snapped at him. Yahiro had no response for several stunned moments. At last, he opened his mouth to say, “By…taking a class on morals…?” “Wow… Another normal, thoughtful response that I have no idea how to react to…” “It’s normal? You think so? Whew, I’m glad to hear that…” “Stop being relieved! Ugh, man, you throw me off my game so bad!” Kuon shouted, ready to cry from frustration. But when he noticed the gentle, pleased smile of the shop proprietor out of the corner of his eye, he decided to change the topic. “Anyway, enough of that! What’s the answer, ma’am? Are you going out with Ryuugamine or not?” Anri briefly considered how to answer. “That’s…a secret.” Afterward, the teens bought a number of items and left. Once they were gone, Anri thought back on them and smiled. It makes me remember the old days…after I’d just met Mikado and Kida… There were similarities between the younger kids and her own friends that gave her a quiet and comfortable sense of normalcy. Running an antiques shop wasn’t all fun and games, but she certainly did feel joy at finally having the place in the world that she’d always wanted for herself. Her fate had charted a strange path in Ikebukuro over the last few years. After her life’s course had been diverted toward the abnormal by a series of major events, primarily around the Headless Rider, she had the sense that those kids from Raira Academy were going to experience a similar fate. All she could do was pray that their travels would be safe. She did not pray quite as hard for her own safety down the path she took. From the moment she chose to continue this shop, which brimmed with both good and bad personal history, she knew to expect some level of turbulence—but Anri considered turbulent history to be like arms that would keep her connected to many other people she knew. You could say, of course, that Anri Sonohara’s strange fate was still a work in progress. As if to prove this point, the door to the shop opened at that moment, bringing a fresh wave of unrest with it. “Welcome,” she said to her new customer, bowing from her usual spot behind the counter. But the odd visitor—a young man whose face was covered with bandages and who wore his glasses over them—did not respond to her greeting. He looked around the room to confirm there was no one else present. “Are you Anri Sonohara?” “Yes…? That is my name…,” she said, a bit confused that this unfamiliar man already knew who she was. The man was here on business, and he briefly yet forcefully told her what product he was seeking in her shop. “…I want you to sell me Saika.” Saika. The simple sound of that name turned Anri’s smile into a grimace. She was silent, listening cautiously, as the man continued his business pitch. “I can offer you…five million yen for the moment.” And then, just to make clear that he knew exactly what he was asking for, the man added another option. “Or you could just cut me and make me your child.” That night, Shinra’s apartment, along Kawagoe Highway “I think I’ll go back to work.” Shinra Kishitani blinked in confusion at the sudden comment from his co-tenant, Celty Sturluson. “Where is this coming from, Celty? You’re already working a job. You know, helping out with that teenager’s utility man service.” At the moment, she was performing something like a part-time job for Kuon Kotonami’s agency, which went by the name of Snake Hands. The jobs weren’t frequent by any means, and she had no idea how he found such high-paying requests, but Kuon’s jobs were often very lucrative, which provided Celty with a rather comfortable life, especially when you considered that she didn’t have to buy any food to eat. “Not that part-time thing. I want to go back to doing serious full-time courier work.” “No way, Celty! Working is what losers do!” Shinra wailed, reaching out to grab her. She peeled him off and calmly showed him the rebuttal on her smartphone screen. “Who are these losers, and what are they losing to?” These were reasonable questions to ask, and Shinra answered them with all the honesty in his heart. “Me! Losing to reality! How am I supposed to deal with the loneliness when you’re not around the apartment because you’re out working?!” “Hit the CONTINUE button and keep playing,” she typed, feeling annoyed. Shinra reached toward her and cried, “Then I’d better add some more money to my arcade card so I can put more credits in the game! Once I get one good hug from you, I’ll be back to full health, full wallet, and infinite lives for— Bfuhgh!” “If you’re going to grab at me, at least spare me the nonsensical rambling! Anyway…there’s a reason I want to resume courier work.” She sat on the sofa, and Shinra assumed a formal kneeling position on the carpet facing her. “Very well. I’ll hear what you have to say, Celty. I’ll find something to complain about, no matter the reason. If it’s a problem that money can solve, I’ll put up the necessary funds! In a monetary economy, the power of cash to solve problems is unparalleled! Money makes the world go round!” “I’m amazed at how you can say these things without a hint of shame…” He leaned forward, eyes sparkling. “At this point, I would be embarrassed to assume that kind of false propriety. Oh, but I can say one thing: It’s true that money is essential, but it’s not the most important thing! That would be you, Celty! And the second most important is, of course, you again! Number three, number four…oh, just take them all, you thief! Even the fifth most important thing is Celty! The whole world is Celty! The resting place of your soul depends on Celty; feast and famine are Celty! It’s a Celty, Celty, Celty, Celty world!” “…Do you actually understand the sentences that come out of your mouth as you’re saying them?” “Oh, it’s like a dream that the top five most important things in the world are all Celty. Being around you is basically like getting all the five major food groups at once! Tasting you is like tasting the rainbow-ow-ow-owww!” “Sorry, it’s getting creepy now.” Celty had given him plenty of slack, but she could tell that they were quite off topic and gagged Shinra’s mouth with shadow. “Mrm-guh-gmm-brh?” “Just shut up and listen.” Shinra’s arms and legs were bound in a formal kneeling position, like a criminal being judged in some samurai play. Celty took advantage of the situation to type out the things she’d been thinking about for the last several months. “I don’t actually care what society thinks of me. As long as it doesn’t cause trouble for you, I’m fine with whatever happens. That’s been true, and it will continue to be true.” “Mguh…” “But in the six months that I was away, the world changed. I’ve been living here in Ikebukuro for over twenty years, and I can tell you that the values people have and the way the town looks are changing at a whirlwind pace. For example…you remember the situation between the Dollars and Yellow Scarves? It’s only been a few years, but all those color-repping street gangs have completely vanished. It’s like they’re a relic of the past, you know?” “Mummumah, umm-umm,” Shinra gurgled into the shadow gag blocking his mouth. “I wouldn’t care if I wanted to live like a hermit in the mountains,” Celty continued, “but I don’t enjoy feeling like I’m coming untethered from the values of the city, losing touch with people…as if I’m not in sync with human beings anymore.” “Muh-muh-muh.” “You might just say that’s because I don’t have ideals of my own or I’m just being swept along by the flow. But it’s not like I don’t have any convictions at the core of my being. My hope is to have a reasonably happy life with you, Shinra.” “Mguh-guh-guh?!” Shinra squealed, his body twitching with spontaneous delight, but because of the gag around his mouth, it made him look like he was excited in a very different way. Celty benevolently ignored his reaction. “I want to make you happy, and I want to be happy with you to some extent… Of course, I feel like the quickest way to achieving that is getting you to quit performing illegal black market medical services, but it’s too late for that at this point, and I’ve given up on the idea that you might actually get a better job if you quit doing it. Just don’t get involved in drugs, and I’ll be fine with it.” “Mrrr! Mrrr!” Shinra nodded vigorously. However, Celty was already fairly certain that wasn’t going to be a problem anyway. Akabayashi from the Awakusu-kai was known for his hatred of drugs, so if Shinra did anything involving that, his happiness would be less of a concern than his life itself. He understood that, too, surely. “And if you got arrested, I would wait until you were out of jail.” “Mrrgl…euehhugh…” “Basically, it’s like physical therapy to get back in the game. I just happened to get a text yesterday from someone I worked for a while back, saying they wanted to meet. It’s a nice opportunity to get out, so I’m going to see how the city feels for myself.” When she undid his bondage after she told him everything that had been on her mind, Shinra immediately cried, “Celty!” and tried to leap on her, which she easily evaded, and she left the apartment with time to spare before her meeting. In the basement parking lot, she sat down on Shooter and thought, Then again, it’s not like my job is exactly on the up-and-up… I’m regularly committing traffic violations, for example… She thought of the traffic cop—her enemy—and shivered. …What would happen to me if I got arrested? I’d be considered a test subject… Experimental labs… Shady deals with the U.S. government… Area 51… Area 51…?! W-wait…what if I run into aliens there?! Celty continued to shiver, imagining all the horrible kinds of aliens she might find in the secret American facility, from gray aliens to reptilians to psychics to ethereals to silicon life-forms. Only squeezing the handles of her black motorcycle could drive away the fear her imagination summoned, sending her out into the night on the Kawagoe Highway. She had no idea what was awaiting her on the other end of this job. The next morning, Yahiro’s apartment “And that’s why I won’t be able to do any Snake Hands work for the next few days. I’ve already told Kotonami about this, so I assume it’s all right.” The sun was climbing high into the sky when Yahiro received that text message from Celty. He leaned his back against his apartment wall as he read it. “She feels like she’s drifting off from the city itself, huh?” He examined the message very closely; Celty had explained in painstaking detail her reasons for the decision to resume working as a courier. Yahiro let his thoughts travel to his own past. He couldn’t help empathizing with what she was going through. A similar unease had afflicted him from a young age. Am I different from the others? I’m out of sync with the rest. Am I abnormal? I’m out of sync. I don’t want to be different. I’m out of sync. Should I really be with everyone else? In fact, it was probably the only thing he thought about. Truthfully, he was strange compared to everyone else. It seemed unfair at the time, but since coming to Ikebukuro and meeting all kinds of people who weren’t his own family, he was starting to accept that he was odd and different. Even still, I think everyone else took it too far… He’d been beaten at full force with nail-studded bats, hit by a truck from behind—things that went far beyond the realm of a children’s squabble. But with his present perspective, he also understood that his actions were what had dredged up this malice in all those people—not that understanding such a thing made it any easier to swallow emotionally. If you told him that he could go back to the past and start his life over again, Yahiro couldn’t imagine himself doing it any better the second time. What was he supposed to do, just let the very first obnoxious bully completely have his way? When he told Kuon about this, the boy just shrugged and said, “You just gotta find the sweet spot to get along with them. Most of them are idiots, so you just play along and flatter them enough that they don’t hit you, and if they do bully you anyway, just pick a fight, and if the other kid starts crying, you’re good. And you’re strong enough to do something like that pretty easy, right?” Yahiro didn’t think that would work. He didn’t have a sense of what that “sweet spot” was. How far was he supposed to go to protect himself? At what point did he go too far? Experience had shown that he was catastrophically bad at judging this fine line. When he considered that this might be what made him stick out from the rest of society, then what Celty said in her text made perfect sense. He actually felt newfound respect for the Headless Rider for trying to conquer that part of herself. I’ve got to do something about that… Speaking of which, I need to work hard on Snake Hands first. Yahiro, however, did not spare a second thought for whether his involvement with Snake Hands, which was already half into the business of Ikebukuro’s underworld, was going to help his estranged relationship with society or not. I’ve got to pull my own weight and not make things worse for Himeka and Kuon. I need to make sure they don’t think I’m super weird. That’s a good initial goal to strive for. Given how totally dense he was about his own peculiar nature, he believed those few human connections he had to people like Kuon, Himeka, and Celty were really the final hope he had to keep from drifting away from regular society. Just then, one of those rare connections called out to him. “Hey, Yahiro. Thanks for waiting.” Saburo Togusa was the younger brother of his apartment’s landlord. He owned a large van and had been nice enough to give Yahiro rides for exams and such on a few occasions. “Thank you for helping me out early on a Sunday,” he said, handing Yahiro the bucket and rag he was carrying. “I’ll do all the waxing and finishing. You can just hand me tools while I’m working on the chassis, and you can spray the water for me.” This, too, was something like a simple part-time job. After Yahiro’s trip to Sonohara-dou, Saburo had asked him, “Can you help me with a little car maintenance and a wash? I can pay you enough for a meal or so.” Yahiro was just happy that someone wanted to ask him for help, and so he quickly agreed. “It’s still so weird to me that you know Celty and you got into a proper fight with Shizuo.” “…No, it was hardly a real fight. He totally beat me up.” “Don’t lie. I saw that video. You were putting up a really good fight. There’s hardly a single person in Ikebukuro who’s lasted more than three seconds against Shizuo. And when you’re talking about putting on a proper fight, there’s only Simon…plus a guy named Izaya, but I haven’t seen him around lately.” This was merely small talk while they worked, but it truly delighted Yahiro, despite his placid expression. After Saburo learned what he was like during the serial street attacks the previous week, Yahiro was terrified that Saburo would avoid him or—even worse—kick him out of the apartment. However, Saburo had kept Yahiro’s secret and hadn’t changed how he acted toward him. After a lifetime of being treated like a monster by everyone around him, Yahiro didn’t have the words to describe the joy he felt. “Saburo…don’t you think I’m dangerous?” “Why would I? You’re a good kid, real courteous. Oh…well, yeah—I guess it’s a bit dangerous if you go after those street attacker guys, but I don’t have room to talk about being reckless during my school years. It’s not like I learned from my mistakes, so I don’t have the right to preach.” “Well…what I mean is, aren’t you scared of me?” “Huh…? Oh…that’s what you mean?” Saburo asked, suddenly understanding. His answer was on the exasperated side, though. “Listen, you know how many years I’ve lived here? A place with Shizuo and Celty as people I see on the regular?” “…Good point.” That was the single most convincing answer Saburo could have given. “But…the people around here are scared of Shizuo, right?” Yahiro asked. “Yeah, the majority of folks are. I mean, if you saw a guy who could pull a telephone pole out of the ground and swing it, would you think you had nothing to worry about with him? The thing is, if you actually talk to him, you’ll know that as long as you don’t make him mad, he’s a normal guy. I didn’t believe it myself when Kadota told me about him—until I actually talked to him myself. Listen, the people who get it, get it. So you don’t have to go out of your way to feel bad for him or anything, okay?” Togusa exhaled deeply. “Besides, if you want to talk about dangerous, I’d say Karisawa and Yumasaki are a different breed altogether…” “Really? Them?” Yahiro asked skeptically. Togusa carefully washed around the vehicle’s windshield wipers. “Yeah, you just don’t know what they’re like…but if you hang out with them, you’ll see eventually. I didn’t want you to get to know them, but now that you’ve started talking, the cat’s outta the bag.” Togusa sounded tired, but then he perked up as he remembered something. “Oh yeah, you seemed to be under the assumption that you recently met those guys for the first time, but you already met them a couple months ago in this very van.” “Huh?” “I gave you a ride to your entrance exam for school, didn’t I? Remember how those people were carrying on in the back seat?” “…Oh!” I remember now. Some people were hanging out in the back, talking about manga the entire time… That was Karisawa and Yumasaki? I didn’t really get a good look at them, so I never realized… Although to be honest, I barely even knew what Saburo looked like at the time… He was too nervous about his imminent exam to dedicate any brainpower to remembering the faces of the people who happened to be sitting in the back seat, but the guilt was eating him up inside. His nervousness was an excuse, but he still felt awful. “What should I do?” he asked Togusa, worried. “I had no idea. I carried on with them as if we had only just met. That was so rude of me…” “Eh, it doesn’t seem like they noticed it, either. Besides, they’re way worse at recognizing human faces than manga faces…,” Togusa said, sighing again before grumbling, “I’ve known those two a long time, but this damn door, I swear…” He was staring at the side door of the van, which was plastered with a gigantic sticker of some kind of anime character. “They always find a way to stick it on when I’m not paying attention, and the next time I notice it, they’ve switched it to a different one…” “You don’t peel them off?” “…Well, I owe them some favors…so I feel like this door is the one thing I’ll let them get away with…but if I’m gonna be driving a cringy decked-out car around, I’d prefer to just put Ruri Hijiribe over the entire thing…” “Why don’t you?” Ruri Hijiribe was an extremely popular singer who also worked as a model and actress. Saburo was apparently a senior member of her fan club, and it seemed like he brought her up about half of the time when chatting with Yahiro. Yahiro was a big movie buff, so he’d known about Ruri Hijiribe since her early days as a special effects makeup artist. He considered himself a fan, too. The first time Saburo had mentioned her to him, Yahiro had said, “Oh, she’s really special, isn’t she?” and Saburo had been inviting him to join the fan club ever since. He just didn’t feel he was worthy of being a member, given how passionate Saburo was about her. In that sense, it was a wonder that he hadn’t plastered her picture all over the van already. Togusa shook his head. “Nah, there’s issues with likeness rights, and I don’t think Ruri would appreciate knowing there’s a van out there with her face all over it… Yumasaki suggested we cover the van with a manga character that Ruri voiced, and I’ll admit that was a little tempting…” Togusa made his way around to the back of the van, wiping the windows, and pointed out a spot next to Yahiro, who was washing the rear bumper. “But see, I love Ruri, and I love my car. So I’m fine with a little display to show that off.” It was a sticker reading RURI HIJIRIBE 4 LIFE, with an official mascot design that was supposed to be a cutesy version of Ruri. “Finally came up with a sticker design that satisfied me.” “So it’s a custom sticker…” “Yeah. Just knowing that a part of Ruri’s soul is here in the car through that sticker makes me naturally get into the act of driving way more. It’s the one thing I won’t let Yumasaki and Karisawa mess with. If they scribble anything on it, I’m gonna drag them behind the van for a hundred laps around the Shuto Expressway circular route…”
Chapter 49
23 min read