Ren stood just outside the door, motionless. The old wooden frame was cracked, warped from years of neglect, but it was the voices inside that made him pause.
A man shouting—harsh, gutteral, furious.
Then a woman, shouting back.
A thwack cracked through the air, sharp and unmistakable. A fist meeting flesh.
Ren's expression didn't change, but his grip on his katana tightened. Then he loosened it.
Tch. No point bringing it in.
He let the blade drop gently by the door, metal gliding against the wall with a soft clink. Then he opened the door.
The scene inside froze as if time itself had stopped.
The man was mid-swing, his hand still in motion from striking the woman—Sayuri.
She stumbled back, one cheek red and swelling. Her blouse was torn at the shoulder, and blood trickled from her lip. Across the room, Hikari sat slouched against the wall, her eyes swollen, bruises blooming across her jaw. Her breath was shaky, but she didn't cry. Not even once.
On the floor nearby was Toshi, Still and empty-eyed. Detached from the chaos.
The man turned slowly.
Mid-40s, thick build, salt-and-pepper beard, leather jacket clinging to him like the stench of smoke and liquor. On the back of the jacket was a crude symbol: a skeletal hand wrapped around a serpent, fangs sinking into bone—a local gang insignia. The Osaka Jackals. Bottom-feeders with egos bigger than their balls.
The man's eyes narrowed.
"And who the fuck are you?"
Ren didn't answer. He looked at Sayuri first. Then Hikari. Then the bruises.
Then Toshi.
"Oi," the man snapped, walking a few steps toward him, chest puffed. "Didn't catch your name. You here for one of the girls? Sayuri, maybe? Bit used up, but she's still got some bite."
Sayuri glared at him through blood. "Fuck you, Renji."
The man—Renji—turned, backhanded her hard across the face. She crumpled to the floor with a grunt.
That's when Ren finally spoke.
"What's going on."
Renji scoffed. "None of your business unless you wanna get mixed up in this shit. Girl's daddy owed us. Dumbass went and died before clearing it. Now his kid pays up. Simple."
Hikari shifted in the corner but didn't speak. Her silence said enough.
Sayuri pushed herself up. "It's not her debt! You're a piece of shit—"
Renji pulled a knife from his belt, a gleam of steel under the cheap ceiling bulb.
"Shut the fuck up. You talk too much."
He pointed the blade at Hikari, grinning. "If she can't pay, I'm taking all five fingers on one hand. Right now. That might teach her to stop making excuses."
Sayuri lunged forward, but Renji slapped her away again like she was nothing.
And just as the blade neared Hikari's trembling hand—
Ren moved.
He was across the room in an instant, silent and fluid. He grabbed Renji's wrist mid-swing.
The man stopped, startled, eyes bulging. He tried to pull away—but couldn't.
Ren's grip was like iron.
Renji laughed nervously. "You got a death wish, pal?"
Ren said nothing. His stare was empty, calm, and so fucking cold it silenced the entire room.
"I said," Renji gritted, "Let go."
Ren turned to Sayuri. "Leave."
"What?"
"I said leave. I'll handle your little friend."
Sayuri hesitated. "Kaito—"
"I said leave."
The venom in his voice made it clear: he wasn't asking.
Sayuri stood and dragged Hikari with her toward the corner of the room. Renji's eyes darted between them and Ren.
"Alright, alright," the man muttered, trying to puff up again. "Look, no harm done. You wanna clean up their mess? Fine. Debt's still active. One week. Pay it, or I come back."
Ren didn't respond. He let go of the wrist. Briefly.
Renji adjusted his jacket, acting like he still held some control.
Then he reached down and grabbed Toshi by the collar.
"I'll be taking the kid, then. Collateral."
Ren's voice cut through the air like a knife. "What the hell do you think you're doing."
Renji turned. "What, this your bastard or something? He's with the girl. So he's part of the deal."
Ren took one step forward.
"I'm gonna say this once," he said quietly. "Put the boy down."
Renji rolled his eyes. "You're joking. What are you gonna do, huh?"
Then Ren reached out and grabbed Renji's wrist again.
And squeezed.
Bone crunched audibly. Renji screamed.
"FUCK—!! YOU CRAZY BASTARD—!"
Ren didn't flinch. His grip crushed down like a vice, fingers curling with surgical precision until the bones in Renji's hand shattered like glass.
Ren leaned in close, voice still like ice. "You come back in a week. You'll get your money. But if you ever lay a finger on them again… I won't go so easy on you."
He released him. Renji fell backward, clutching his mangled arm and scrambling to his feet.
He didn't say another word. He just ran.
The room was silent.
Toshi stared at Ren like she'd never seen him before. Maybe she hadn't.
But it was Hikari that caught his eye.
Bruised. Swollen. Bleeding.
But not crying.
She looked at him like she was seeing him for the first time too—but not with fear.
With something else.
"Thank you," she whispered.
Ren blinked.
That word.
Thank you.
How long had it been since someone said that to him? Since someone looked at him and meant it?
He didn't know.
He turned away, walking back toward the katana he'd left outside the door. He was going to kill her now, she had promised him information on Y but it was clear now that she was bullshitting him.
"You said you had a message," he muttered, not looking at her.
Hikari pulled something from her waistband—wrapped tightly in cloth—and handed it to him.
He took it, unwrapping it slowly.
A bracelet. Worn leather. A wolf's head etched into the center.
It meant nothing to him. But something twisted in his gut.
What the hell is this now, this is what Y wanted to give him? Why though? He couldn't understand Y, and it infuriated him not being in control.
"I called you," Hikari said softly, "because of Toshi."
Ren raised an eyebrow. "Why?"
She motioned for him to follow and led him to the corner of the room, where a small wooden bookshelf lay collapsed. Beside it, a steel table leg was bent in on itself, nearly snapped.
"He did that," she said. "Bare hands. One second, he was still and silent… the next, his eyes went black and he crushed it."
Ren knelt down, inspecting the warped steel.
This wasn't strength.
This was inhuman.
He turned slowly to Toshi, who still sat there, unmoving, staring at the floor.
Something cold shifted in Ren's chest.
He reached out and gently tilted the boy's chin upward, looking into those hollow black eyes.
For a moment, just a flicker, Ren saw something.
Blood.
A room.
A child. Covered in gore. Surrounded by bodies.
His breathing slowed.
He could feel it—not just a memory, but a mirror. Everything about this kid, from his silence to the deadness in his eyes, the explosion of power… It wasn't just familiar.
It was exact. It all made sense now why he had nightmares when he saw the kid.
This boy… was him.
Y hadn't just sent him on a mission.
Y had recreated him.
Same trauma. Same scars. Same broken silence.
And that bracelet… the wolf. The wolves. The ones he'd heard of in his fragmented memories.
Ren stared at Toshi, something tightening in his chest.
He didn't feel sympathy.
He didn't feel pity.
But for the first time since Emi… he felt something.
Still, he stood up, cold once more.
He looked at Hikari. "You didn't call me for help. You called me because of him."
She nodded.
"Kaito," she said softly, "who is he?"
Ren looked back at Toshi.
Then at the bracelet.
Then at the wall, as if trying to find the end of a thread knotted deep in his brain.
"He's the past," he whispered. "My past."
But his face remained blank, his voice dry.
Because this wasn't about connection.
This was about Y. He knew something about Ren no one else knew. He recreated himself through this boy, meaning he had the exact same experience Ren had before he was found in the blood soaked room. This boy could help Ren figure out who he was before his trauma, his real identity. Y knows who Ren was before the trauma.
And now, the fucked-up bastard had given him a key to his own forgotten blood-soaked beginning.
And Ren was going to find out why.
Even if it meant burning the entire underworld to the goddamn ground.