Rize Kamishiro's past

Ignoring the ghoul's corpse entirely, Amahane Byakuya tossed the kagune aside with a flick of his hand, then took the crowbar with him.

He did not want to leave any traces at the scene and end up with the police or the CCG's ghoul investigators knocking on his door.

Of course, his act of self-defense was perfectly legal. Besides, ghouls had no legal protection whatsoever; the law applied to humans. He simply could not be bothered to explain how he had killed a ghoul without a Quinque.

As long as he left no obvious traces, the death of a single ghoul would not cause much of a stir. Ghouls killing one another was perfectly normal, and police officers and investigators generally did not care much about a ghoul's actual cause of death.

Leaving the kagune there was fine. Once cut off from the nourishment supplied by the ghoul's body, it would gradually wither away until it vanished.

That was also why making a Quinque required a kakuhou as well as a kagune. The kakuhou supplied the kagune with rc cells. To be precise, the kagune itself was made of hardened rc cells.

Suddenly... getting my hands on a Quinque seems like a good idea...

That was what Amahane Byakuya thought as he left the alley.

Given his current circumstances, a Quinque would be the best weapon for him. Fighting ghouls barehanded was still a bit of a hassle.

But to obtain a Quinque, he would have to join the CCG, formally known as the Commission of Counter Ghoul, a government agency in Tokyo dedicated to dealing with ghouls.

Only CCG investigators who had passed the assessment and reached at least Rank 2 were entitled to a Quinque of their own.

Within the CCG, ghoul investigators were ranked, from lowest to highest: Rank 3, Rank 2, Rank 1, First Class, Associate Special Class, and Special Class. There was actually an "investigator assistant" position below Rank 3, but those were essentially noncombat personnel who only handled miscellaneous tasks, so they had no formal rank.

Amahane Byakuya considered when he should pay the CCG a visit.

Ward 20, a movie theater.

After meeting at the Antique Café, Amahane Byakuya and Rize Kamishiro had arrived at the movie theater.

This world seemed to be in the 2000s, around 2010. Almost everyone still used flip phones. Phones were not yet so smart or convenient, and people were more inclined to visit places like movie theaters.

After buying their tickets, Amahane Byakuya and Rize Kamishiro chose seats in the middle and sat together.

Although Amahane Byakuya was not particularly interested in watching movies at a theater, since he had come to keep a girl company, he was willing to sit through the whole film.

Whatever else she was, Rize Kamishiro was still a girl at heart, even if this particular girl was exceptionally vicious...

Halfway through, Amahane Byakuya gradually realized that the heart of the movie's story was a little...

It was rather similar to Rize Kamishiro's experiences.

The film's female lead had long suffered unfair treatment from her family. They treated her purely as a tool for making money and favored her older and younger brothers.

By this point in the story, a male lead had appeared. Presumably, the plot would go on to show him helping her escape the family she had grown up in.

Having watched Tokyo Ghoul, Amahane Byakuya knew Rize Kamishiro's history very well. It was even more tragic than the female lead's.

Rize Kamishiro had been born into the Washuu Clan, a ghoul clan that could be called the strongest in all of Japan.

Rize Kamishiro's ancestry was exceptionally pure, consisting of undiluted Washuu ghoul heritage. In a fantasy world, someone like her would normally have been a prodigy prized by her clan, but her actual circumstances were the exact opposite...

Despite being a ghoul clan, the Washuu Clan revered human ancestry. The more human ancestry a Washuu ghoul had, the higher their standing in the clan. As a result, Rize Kamishiro's status was extremely low.

This was different from the mixing of bloodlines that produced half-humans or half-ghouls. Bloodlines and ancestry were separate matters; the vast majority of ghouls had some human ancestry.

Not only was Rize Kamishiro's status low, but she was also forbidden from living with the Washuu Clan and had instead been relegated to a place called the White Day Garden.

She had not even been allowed to inherit the name "Washuu." Left without a surname, she had only acquired the surname "Kamishiro" later on.

Most tragically of all, the pure Washuu ancestry that had caused her low status had also led to her being selected as a "breeder," also called a "womb."

In other words, a "childbearing machine" whose sole purpose was to give birth. It went without saying how miserable that would be.

Had her childhood friend Furuta Nimura not helped Rize Kamishiro escape the White Day Garden, she would never have broken free of the Washuu Clan's control.

Even now, Rize Kamishiro was, frankly, still being hunted by the Washuu Clan. If she were caught, she would have almost no chance of escaping again. Yet she still brazenly preyed on humans wherever she went. She was far too careless.

The movie drew to a close.

"It's finally over. It really was as good as everyone said."

Rize Kamishiro sounded a little moved.

There were still tear tracks on her face, as though the movie had touched her enough to make her cry.

Amahane Byakuya knew she was most likely faking it, so he paid it no mind.

He offered his own opinion. "It really was good, but the one flaw was that the male lead was too indecisive. A little weak, too."

"That's true, now that you mention it. He waited until the very end to do anything. If he'd just run away with her from the start, they wouldn't have had to go through all that."

Rize Kamishiro thought he had a point.

Since they had attended a late showing, it was already past nine, nearly ten at night, by the time the film ended.

After leaving the theater, Amahane Byakuya and Rize Kamishiro continued discussing the movie as they walked home.

Just then, two girls in school uniforms approached from the opposite direction and passed them.

They were Touka Kirishima and one of her classmates.

Seeing Rize Kamishiro still walking with that human boy so late at night, Touka Kirishima could not help looking back.

"..."

Touka Kirishima stared at Amahane Byakuya's retreating figure, her brow furrowing slightly.

"Touka, what's wrong?"

When Touka Kirishima suddenly stopped, her classmate immediately asked what was wrong.

"Nothing..."

Touka Kirishima looked away and answered flatly.