"Boss! I've already lost two hundred thousand yen at the pachinko parlor!"
"Me too! I lost a hundred thousand!"
"My life is over! I just got my hands on a hundred and fifty thousand, and now it's all gone!"
"There's no way we can keep living like this. I thought the Black Bear Gang could make a fortune off pachinko."
"Damn, we've blown all our savings. All we got in return was a few packs of free tissues!"
"Why don't we go smash up that place, boss?"
"Yeah! Let's wreck that pachinko parlor and get our money back! Otherwise, the three of us will have to share a single bowl of instant noodles!"
"Get lost! Are you eyeing the six hundred yen I have left!?"
"I can't accept this, boss! I can't accept losing all the time! I'm going home to smash my son's piggy bank and give it another shot!"
"Don't be such a lowlife. You're taking your kid's money too? That's just despicable!"
"What's the problem? If my son finds out, I'll tell him Santa Claus took his money!"
"Shut up, you good-for-nothing! Someone like you doesn't deserve to call himself a member of the Black Bear Gang!"
"Then what do you suggest? What's your idea? Go on, let's hear it!"
"How should I know? If I had that kind of brain, do you think I'd have ended up like this?"
"..."
Akimoto Yosuke was surrounded by a bunch of burly men. The bento boxes on the table had long since been polished off, and even the beer in his fridge was gone.
As he listened to his underlings argue, he leaned gloomily against the sofa and smoked.
Beneath his sunglasses, his scarred face looked weathered as he stared at his empty wallet. He'd lost everything too.
He'd wagered all his money at the pachinko parlor.
And what happened? Those man-eating machines had swallowed it all.
"Boss Yosuke! Say something! At this rate, the Black Bear Gang is finished! We'll all have to become adult film actors!"
The gang's second-in-command, a man with an afro, stepped in front of Akimoto Yosuke and spoke.
The other underlings crowded around too.
The Black Bear Gang might have been a small yakuza group, but at least it controlled three shopping streets. Now, though, the whole gang had lost their pants at pachinko.
"At this rate, the Black Bear Gang won't be passed down to the young master, Yoichi. Boss, we have to figure something out."
"We just gambled away all the protection money we collected this month. Should we smash up that pachinko parlor, or come up with another plan?"
"Boss, the Black Bear Gang is at a critical juncture! Are you really willing to let it fall apart? More than a dozen of us are going to go hungry!"
Faced with everyone's hopeful gazes, Akimoto Yosuke stubbed out his cigarette with his fingers.
He looked around at them, then suddenly shouted, "I lost more than 1.8 million yen, damn it!"
Who was the most devastated? Akimoto Yosuke, of course.
He'd lost the most!
As the boss, he'd had the most money—and lost all of it. Seeing their leader in such a state made the gang members feel a little better.
"The Black Bear Gang can't fall apart. It has to be passed down to Yoichi." After letting off some steam, Akimoto Yosuke calmed down a little.
"Our Black Bear Gang has been passed down through five generations. Yoichi has to become the sixth."
"No matter what, I won't let the Black Bear Gang disband while I'm in charge!"
Hearing Akimoto Yosuke say that, the Black Bear Gang members immediately felt reassured.
They might have been his underlings, but they were all around thirty-five now. Every one of them was a middle-aged man.
At this point, there was no way they could return to normal society and look for jobs.
"Just like I'd expect from Boss Yosuke! A boss is a boss!"
"Boss will definitely figure something out!"
"I knew that as long as I followed the boss, I'd never go hungry for a whole day!"
"I'll follow you forever, boss!"
"In this life, you're the only one I trust!"
"..."
Ignoring the cries of his idiot underlings, Akimoto Yosuke lit another cigarette.
He took off his sunglasses. His fearsome, unmistakably yakuza face was calm and composed.
Under everyone's watchful eyes, he spoke slowly. "So I've decided to hand the Black Bear Gang over to Yoichi right now! That way, the gang won't disband under me. It'll disband under Yoichi instead."
Then Akimoto Yosuke let out a deep breath, as if a great weight had lifted from his shoulders.
His underlings were dumbfounded by their boss's announcement.
It took them a few seconds to understand what he'd said.
"Boss! You're still leaving us to eat weeds!"
"Exactly! How can you just hand the Black Bear Gang over to the young master when he's so young?"
"Isn't the young master still in high school? At least wait until he graduates!"
"I've heard some bad rumors too. They say the young master's been studying really hard lately. Isn't that right? If he doesn't practice cutting off his own fingers, how's he supposed to make it in the underworld?"
"That's right! The young master definitely can't lead the Black Bear Gang!"
"Shut up!" Akimoto Yosuke bellowed. His fierce gaze swept across the crowd. "What, can't I make Yoichi drop out of high school? That kid was just nagging me the other day about needing over a million yen for tuition! I might as well make him drop out and take over the Black Bear Gang!"
"Of all the things he could do, he wants to study? I didn't send him to school so he could learn."
"I went to all that trouble to get him into a good high school so he could bully the rich kids!"
"Since the Black Bear Gang is about to go under, I'll hand him the hot potato—hand him the Black Bear Gang! We need fresh blood!"
The afro-wearing second-in-command and the other underlings nodded in agreement with Akimoto Yosuke's declaration.
It was only natural for Akimoto Yoichi to be the next leader.
That was how the Black Bear Gang had managed to carry on for so long without any infighting over the leadership: it was passed down through the family.
They knew Akimoto Yoichi well, too.
After all, they came to the Akimoto Family's house for meetings whenever they had the chance. The Black Bear Gang was too small to afford the kind of mansion with a traditional Japanese garden that the big bosses lived in, so they had to make do with a detached house.
They'd all watched Akimoto Yoichi grow up, and each had taught him everything they were best at, from the birds and the bees to how to get free tissues at a pachinko parlor.
With everyone working together, they'd indeed raised Akimoto Yoichi into a real piece of trash.
And yet, the same Akimoto Yoichi who'd been such a little punk as a kid suddenly wanted to study.
When he saw his uncles, he no longer asked them for cigarettes like he used to. Instead, he sat there memorizing English vocabulary and Japanese literature.
They were all terribly disappointed. Their young master had gone and turned over a new leaf.
They'd already been unhappy about Akimoto Yosuke sending his son to high school. Now that Yoichi had gotten hooked on studying, they were even more disgruntled.
Hearing that Akimoto Yosuke was going to set the young master back on the right track made the underlings very happy.
The Black Bear Gang was broke and on the verge of collapse, but at least they could enjoy seeing Akimoto Yoichi turn back into a piece of trash before it was over.
"Shut up, old geezer. Who said I was dropping out?" Akimoto Yoichi had just reached the door when he heard their conversation from inside.
Before you continue