Down and out

I stood inside the little booth housing a standalone ATM, with an impatient-looking old man waiting behind me.

The old man wore a straw hat and looked as though he had just come in from the fields. The autumn afternoon was rather hot. He kept lifting the brim of his hat, revealing a pair of puzzled eyes.

He couldn't understand why anyone would waste fifteen minutes withdrawing money. Nor did he know the boundless panic I felt as I stood in that booth, staring at my three-digit bank balance.

Three digits. In Japan, that was only enough to buy a bottle of water.

I numbly pulled out my card. Ignoring the old man's irritated expression, I left the booth and found that my legs had actually gone weak.

Something more terrifying than Toji getting arrested or Megumi falling ill had happened.

Poverty.

(1)

"Isn't there any other choice?"

"Lili, this is the only thing I'm good at."

At thirteen, I stood beside thirty-year-old Yuanli in a warehouse strewn with corpses. Our hands were covered in blood that belonged to neither of us, and beneath our feet lay lives already extinguished.

This was an utterly ordinary choice.

From our third lives to our tenth, from ancient times to the modern age, whenever we ran into problems making a living or finding money, Yuanli's first choice was always to use the skills she excelled at and lead me down a path I knew all too well.

It was as though we possessed a "craftsman's dedication," doing only one thing, following only one path, unchanged for decades, for centuries.

At first, my hands had actually shaken when I held a gun. The revolvers popular in the Middle Ages had a powerful kick. The heated metal and the bullet bursting out the moment I pulled the trigger had both frightened me.

I feared the lethal weapon in my hand, feared how quickly life could vanish, feared that one day I would come to regard everything I did as perfectly normal.

In my third life, I had been a coward.

I lived every day in fear and uncertainty. I was afraid Yuanli would abandon me, afraid I would die, afraid she would die. I was even afraid of lives disappearing at my hands.

At six, I had been too young. I didn't remember my previous lives or know what lay ahead. Like any creature instinctively imitating its mother from birth.

Without thinking about what I was doing, I had begun blindly copying Yuanli's movements, her behavior, and even her expressions.

The two of us gradually grew more and more alike. The same red hair, the same crimson eyes, the same expressions when we spoke, the same mercilessness when we drew our guns.

Even at the end of my third life, I had still imitated the way she died, all for what I believed was right.

Back then, I hadn't known that doing what was right never came from imitation, but from thought and searching.

My third, fourth, and fifth lives added up to fifty-four years. It had taken me fifty-four years to finally learn to ask questions.

I asked Yuanli whether we had to kill people.

She said that without killing, there would be no money.

Then I asked whether we had to have money.

She had been cleaning Quasar. At my words, she seemed to have heard the funniest joke in the world. Leaning against the sofa, she laughed until she nearly cried. Then, in a tone I couldn't decipher, she pointed her gun at me and said,

[Without money, even the people closest to each other will kill one another.]

From that day on, something seemed to click inside me. I was no longer afraid to hold a gun or end a life. I stopped thinking about what was right or what it meant to choose.

I needed money. I needed to use the only thing I was good at, the only path I had walked for a hundred years, to pile up money-and with it, a familial bond that would keep her from killing me.

(2) Prelude

Public safety in Kanagawa Prefecture was closely tied to wealth. The rich all lived in upscale neighborhoods, with well-trained security guards stationed at the entrances. Turn right after leaving, and there would be a police station within a hundred meters.

Those without money lived in small detached houses surrounded by countryside. All around them were fields that wailed like ghosts when the evening wind blew. At night, even with the moon standing watch, its light couldn't reach the darkness in the narrow lanes.

While Toji and little Megumi slept, I quietly slipped out of the house.

According to my investigations over the past few days, a small band of criminals operated in Kanagawa. Their main business was collecting protection money, with robbery and theft as sideline ventures.

I knew their thinking and movements all too well. In the past, they had been either my employers or my prey.

Hidden in the shadows, I waited until they left, then slipped into the building. Avoiding the last stragglers keeping watch, I reached the boss's office and easily forced open the safe.

I wasn't planning to take any money or valuables. Instead, I carefully examined the account books and contracts.

Unlike Yuanli, who excelled at killing alone and surrounding entire groups single-handedly, I was better at catapulting her straight to the head of an organization.

I liked being the one who paved the way. I was also used to letting her satisfy her material desires without a hitch before she met my need for familial affection.

I put the documents and contracts back, took the seal of the company this group had registered, then took the leader's personal seal as well.

I had also wanted to look for the leader's ID. Since they went out committing crimes at night, they certainly wouldn't carry anything that could identify them. Otherwise, that whole crowd wouldn't have worn black masks.

I turned everything upside down without finding it, but I did find the leader's home address. For some reason, Yuanli's usual methods came to mind.

Threatening people's families was another thing she excelled at. Even when a target's relatives wept bitterly, then looked at me and asked her, "Don't you have a child too? As a parent, couldn't you..."

I didn't want to remember that part. It was too horrifying.

I quietly slipped the address back into the drawer, just as I would secretly let those people go.

I left the building and went home.

Toji merely rolled over in the living room. Upstairs, Megumi had accidentally kicked his blanket onto the floor.

They were just ordinary people. All they needed to do was keep living peaceful lives. They didn't need to know what I had done tonight, didn't need to understand or witness the bloody murders that would one day stain my hands.

Just as I had silently piled gold coins beside Yuanli, I would quietly keep them free of worry. I would never let poverty turn this family into one that sold its own members or slaughtered one another.

Putting the documents and contracts into a drawer, I closed my eyes with peace of mind.

(3) Interlude

Toji rolled over and opened his eyes.

The projector, which also functioned as a television, was showing the forecast from tonight through tomorrow night.

"Starting this afternoon, a cold front will move into Kanagawa. From tonight through tomorrow, Kanagawa can expect light to heavy rain. Residents are advised..."

Toji switched off the television, kicked away the blanket, and stretched long and slow. His joints and muscles crackled as he extended his arms.

It had been far too long since he had properly exercised. His limbs were practically rusting.

Leaving the sofa, Toji first patrolled his territory like a big cat. Then he unexpectedly discovered that one of the kittens in his territory was missing.

Yuanli was gone again.

This was the third time this week that Yuanli had quietly left home without saying a word.

Toji felt uneasy. The hurt brought by that red schoolbag remained rooted deep in his bones. Grabbing a jacket, he decided to go out and find his "kitten."

Where would his "kitten" go?

The "big cat" took out his phone, only to realize that his son was the only one in this family who had a kitten-calling device.

-Yuanli doesn't have a phone.

Toji belatedly realized it.

Looking at the street crowded with overlapping figures, he suddenly felt his unease grow stronger. In a daze, he seemed to see that "kitten" walking resolutely down a thorn-covered path of no return during the time he had missed.

A human nose could only detect concentrated scent molecules within a given space. Once outside that space, the diluted molecules became odorless to humans. Dogs and cats had a much sharper sense of smell. They could accurately catch and distinguish scents drifting through the air.

A nose enhanced by Heavenly Restriction was better than even the finest police dog's. The jacket in his hand was now a perfect scent source.

There was no sweet candy scent, nor did it smell like the floral laundry detergent bought on sale at the supermarket that scented his own clothes.

It smelled of coffee. Strong and rich, with a bitterness deeper than the black coffee at any café on the street.

The smell assaulted his senses of smell and taste so intensely that a single sniff made Toji feel as though he had chewed a few dry coffee beans.

Swallowing the saliva that had involuntarily flooded his mouth, he followed the scent, weaving purposefully through the chaotic crowd. Amid the tangle of figures, he spotted his "kitten" at once.

Yuanli stood on a street lined with snack stalls, gazing intently up at a taiyaki shop. Perhaps Toji's stare was too hard to ignore; she turned, saw him, and inexplicably smiled.

-That smile was strange.

It was like the sudden, unannounced smile of someone experiencing a final rally before death. As though she were reassuring her family, or had found peace in knowing her time was nearly up.

Toji strode over to Yuanli. Like a big cat wanting to inspect a kitten thoroughly with his keen nose, he was just about to read the air when she said,

"Dad, it's too cold. Give me the jacket."

The oversized jacket covered Yuanli, thoroughly sealing away every scent molecule.

Rather than pulling back the overlong sleeves, Yuanli took Toji's hand through the fabric.

Holding his hand, she took him to buy so much food that one of his hands was hung with bags of it. Holding his hand, she went into a clothing store and picked out expensive clothes for her little brother and father. Holding his hand, she entered a pharmacy and bought a pile of health supplements without looking at the prices.

From beginning to end, the "kitten" held firmly, tightly, to the "big cat."

Being led around by his daughter, Toji had long since gone from initial embarrassment to gradually getting used to it. As a father, he actually loved the feeling of his child holding his hand. Yet for some reason, he still felt deeply uneasy.

They returned home safely. Nothing was different from usual.

Not until that evening, when Toji's search for his phone led him to the washing machine, which hadn't been started.

As he rummaged through the clothes in the drum, a familiar scent slipped into his nose.

Not strong, faint and intermittent-the smell of blood.

He roughly flung the clothes out one by one. At the bottom of the drum, he found a child's garment carrying a mixture of blood and soap.

And there was a long, narrow tear in the back hem of that garment.

Toji felt his mind go completely blank.