Chapter 8

An ability that required bleeding to activate could be very difficult to deal with, or very simple. All it took was using more force each time than the last.

Kamiki Yūhaku was human. His vitality would run down, and sooner or later, it would be exhausted and kill him.

Lying on the concrete floor, Kamiki Yūhaku looked at his bloodied fingers. "Honestly, how disgusting."

"As an informant, are other people's secrets just something for you to talk about?" Chūya Nakahara demanded. "Don't you have a single secret you don't want anyone else to know?"

Kamiki Yūhaku slowly pushed himself up from the ground and raised his hand. Just as Chūya Nakahara braced himself, he snapped his fingers at the air.

"Mission accomplished."

"Huh?"

"Never mind." Kamiki Yūhaku lowered his hand. "Actually, I got some information. Of course, don't ask me how I got it. That's a secret for an informant too."

Chūya Nakahara was utterly confused. "What are you talking about?"

"Huh? Am I a little early?"

No sooner had he spoken than a bank of white fog swept in, covering all of Yokohama. Though it was evening, it grew as dark as night. Chūya Nakahara stared at the fog strangely. It felt unmistakably familiar. Had he seen this fog before?

"Correct," Kamiki Yūhaku announced. Then he slowly moved the hand he held out in front of him, pointing off to their side.

Chūya Nakahara hesitated, then looked in that direction. The instant he saw what was there, his teeth ached.

At the edge of the white fog stood two things that were plainly not human. Yet they looked just like Chūya Nakahara and Kamiki Yūhaku, except that each had a purple crystal embedded in its forehead.

This feeling... Tatsuhiko Shibusawa.

"As for the attack on the Port Mafia, I did it because I was commissioned to." Kamiki Yūhaku spoke suddenly.

Chūya turned to look at him. "You..."

"The client was a mother who had lost her child. Her child died in the train explosion." Kamiki Yūhaku's voice suddenly became steady. The gentle, almost artificial vocal effects vanished, leaving only his natural voice as an adult man. "Mr. Nakahara, before you became a test subject, did you have anyone you called family?"

Chūya looked at him strangely. "What's that got to do with you?"

"I did," Kamiki Yūhaku murmured. "After I left that place, I tried to find them, but it was already too late. My disappearance had left them depressed, and in the end, they divorced and went their separate ways. They each have new families now."

Kamiki Yūhaku said, "I should have had a family."

[Recognition increased to 72%]

Chapter 8

"What exactly are you saying?!" Chūya Nakahara didn't even think about paying attention to the abilities beside them. His mind was full of what Kamiki Yūhaku had just said.

"I'm asking you! Are you..."

"Am I what?" Kamiki Yūhaku turned and met Chūya Nakahara's eyes. "An Artificial Ability User?"

Just then, Kamiki Yūhaku shifted his gaze to the side. Chūya Nakahara instinctively looked over and saw the ability wearing his face lunge straight at him, scattering the rubble and debris underfoot in its wake. Chūya Nakahara had to dodge the attack, but when he looked back, Kamiki Yūhaku was gone.

"Damn it!"

Chūya Nakahara slammed a fist into the ground.

"He got away."

But Chūya Nakahara had to admit that Kamiki Yūhaku's words had shaken him.

However he looked at it, Kamiki Yūhaku seemed to be telling him that he was actually a survivor of the explosion in the French Concession, a test subject in an experiment called the Artificial Ability User project. And unlike Chūya, who had been a blank slate from birth as Arahabaki's vessel, he still had his memories.

Chūya was "Prototype No. 258," so could Kamiki Yūhaku be "No. 257" or "No. 259"?

Chūya Nakahara was desperate to get to the bottom of it.

If it was true, did Mori Ougai and Osamu Dazai know? The information about Arahabaki from back then had been among Rimbaud's effects, and Chūya had learned some things about himself from them. There couldn't possibly have been only one test subject in the development of a military artificial ability.

So he was very likely...

Corruption's ability was dutifully carrying out its orders to kill its host. Veins bulged on Chūya Nakahara's forehead as he drew the gun at his waist and fired at the ability.

The bullets floated around the ability like a rain of bullets filling the sky.

Chūya Nakahara withdrew his hand, and bang, the bullets exploded in midair. Countless fragments and the blast wave sent the ability flying.

"I don't have time to deal with you right now." Chūya Nakahara walked toward his ability. "Be good and come back."

After roughly bandaging his arm, Kamiki Yūhaku gave a lazy yawn.

"It really takes some getting used to, not having Little Crow around." He strolled calmly through the white fog as though he were out for a walk. Neither the cars piled up in the street nor the empty shops along the roadside drew even the slightest bit of his attention.

"This fog is so thick. It looks like it's already swept across all of Yokohama." Kamiki Yūhaku touched a finger to his chin, its pale tip resting beside his lips. His red eyes held an incongruous gentleness. "The government will get caught up in it too, won't it?"

"I wonder if I'll see anyone I know. How exciting."

Humming as he walked, Kamiki Yūhaku advanced without the slightest hesitation. That alone showed he had long since chosen where he was going, so he had no interest in even looking at his surroundings.

He walked down two streets like that, then turned a corner and stopped, smiling at what lay ahead.

A minute later, a petite girl in a red kimono came running toward him, pulling a boy much taller than herself along with her. The moment she saw Kamiki Yūhaku, she forced herself to a halt. Atsushi Nakajima, caught off guard, fell flat on his face, while Kyōka Izumi had already pulled a dagger from her clothing.

Kyōka gripped her dagger and watched Kamiki Yūhaku warily.

"How dangerous." Kamiki Yūhaku raised his hands. As his sleeve slipped down, Atsushi, who was getting up from the ground, saw the bandage on his arm. It had been poorly dressed, and blood had already soaked through it.

"You're the person who saved Asaka at the docks back then?!"

Atsushi hurriedly thanked him. "Thank you for saving her. If it weren't for you, the seawater rushing in would have swept Asaka out to sea!"

"No need to thank me. It was just something I could do without any trouble." Kamiki Yūhaku lowered his hands.

"How can you say that? You saved someone's life."

Kamiki Yūhaku looked at Atsushi, his red eyes full of a gentle smile. "Good boy."

But Kyōka, standing beside Atsushi, couldn't stand watching any longer. She grabbed his hand. "Atsushi, he's dangerous."

"Huh?" Atsushi paused. "But he saved someone."

Kyōka stared unblinkingly at Kamiki. "Kamiki Yūhaku, the Port Mafia's exclusive informant back then. His job was to steal other organizations' core intelligence, including the government's secret documents. No matter the assignment, he carried it out almost perfectly."

"In other words, countless organizations, big and small, were destroyed indirectly because of him."

Kamiki Yūhaku looked at Kyōka, still smiling. "You know a lot about me, young lady. Did you work in the intelligence department?"

"No."

"Then you must have some connection to someone in the intelligence department." Kamiki Yūhaku looked at her, his red eyes full of warmth. "Oh, that's right, Kōyō—my former boss. Did you work under her, and that's how you know about me? That's wonderful. I haven't been back to Yokohama in so long, and I'd love to know how Kōyō's been."

"Is she doing well now?"

Kyōka stabbed at Kamiki Yūhaku with all her strength, but he caught her wrist.

Even though Kyōka was an exceptionally gifted young assassin, she was at far too great a disadvantage against an adult man who had spent years in the company of darkness.

"I'm not a member of the Port Mafia!"

"Let Kyōka go!" Atsushi lunged forward.

The two teenagers, having lost their abilities, naturally didn't have much fighting power. But Kamiki Yūhaku hadn't come to bully children. He let go, the depths of his eyes still full of warmth.

"Don't worry. I won't hurt you."

Atsushi stood in front of Kyōka and looked at Kamiki Yūhaku. "...Then what are you here for?"

"Let me come with you." Kamiki Yūhaku's voice was calm, his tone seemingly full of nothing but light, so much so that Atsushi and Kyōka sometimes felt he wasn't speaking to them. "I have a feeling that if I follow you, I'll run into someone I know."

He was a very strange person. The stories about him were frightening, but after meeting him, they found that he was even stranger than they had imagined.

Atsushi and Kyōka exchanged a look. Feeling an extreme sense of danger, they made their decision with their eyes. A moment later, Kyōka lowered her dagger. Seeing that she had made her choice, Atsushi breathed a sigh of relief. They tacitly accepted Kamiki Yūhaku's joining them.

If it were just the two of them, escaping the abilities hunting them would be difficult. If Kamiki Yūhaku could join the fight, things would definitely be

easier

for them.

With their tacit consent, Kamiki Yūhaku followed behind them, heading toward the Armed Detective Agency alongside them.

Just then, Atsushi seemed finally to make up his mind. He looked at Kamiki Yūhaku.

"Um, Mr. Kamiki."

"Yes?" Kamiki Yūhaku gently turned his gaze toward him, looking particularly sincere.

Atsushi said, "You're an informant, right? Then, as an informant, did you know this kind of white fog would appear here?"

"Yes." Kamiki Yūhaku answered without the slightest hesitation.

"...You knew." Atsushi instinctively clutched the hem of his shirt. "Then why didn't you tell everyone in advance? If you had, no one would have died."

Kamiki Yūhaku thought for a moment. "But Dazai knew too. Why don't you ask him that question?"