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Chapter 217: A Cruel Joke
"Since you want to know so badly..."
Blake slowly raised his hand, gripping the edge of the comical Action Kamen mask on his face.
"As the current Kaitou Kid, your performance is immature, but passable. To reward your struggle just now, I'll let you see this face."
Click.
The mask's clasp released.
Kaito held his breath, gripping the card gun tighter, even though he knew the thing was now scrap metal.
Under the moonlight, the mask was slowly removed. A face was exposed to the air.
It was the face of a middle-aged man, slightly weathered but still handsome and refined. The two iconic mustache strands, the eyes behind the monocle that always held a smile as if they had seen through all the mysteries of magic in the world. And that familiar, gentle smile that had always brought infinite security to his younger self.
Clang.
Kaito's card gun fell to the ground.
His pupils contracted to the extreme, his mind going blank in an instant as if the noise of the entire world receded far away. Only the face before him remained. The owner of the face he had seen in his dreams countless times, in photos countless times, and whose voice he had heard countless times on the tapes in the secret room.
"D... Dad?"
Kaito's voice trembled, carrying an extremely fragile, broken quality.
How is this possible?
Didn't Dad die in that magic show accident eight years ago?
It wasn't missing; it was confirmed death. Although the body was never found, in such a fire...
"Long time no see, Kaito."
Blake—currently wearing Kuroba Toichi's face—spoke with a voice that became mellow and magnetic. It was Kuroba Toichi's voice. Even the unique, elegant rhythm in his tone, as if reciting lines on a stage, was exactly the same.
"You've grown up."
Blake took a step forward. The wind binding Kaito had dissipated at some point. But Kaito didn't move. Or rather, he had forgotten how to move.
Tears welled up without warning, blurring the vision behind his monocle. All reason, all vigilance, all poker faces collapsed at this moment.
That was his father.
The back he had chased all his life.
The only reason he risked his life to become Kaitou Kid, seeking the truth.
"You... You're still alive?"
Kaito stumbled a step forward, wanting to reach out and touch that face but fearing it was a phantom. "If you're alive, why haven't you come back to see me for eight years...?"
"Why did you leave me alone?"
The boy's voice carried the sound of weeping, like a child who had suffered a great grievance.
Looking at Kuroba Kaito, whose emotions were completely out of control, the smile in Blake's eyes deepened. He opened his arms slightly, making a gesture of embrace.
"Because I have a mission I must complete, Kaito."
"This world is big, bigger than you can imagine. The highest realm of a magician is to cheat death, isn't it?"
"Come, let me see what you've learned all these years."
Kaito could no longer control himself. The ecstasy of regaining what was lost washed away everything. He rushed forward, wanting to throw himself into that broad embrace, wanting to confirm the reality of it all.
Just as his fingertips were about to touch the corner of Blake's clothes.
"Pfft—"
An extremely untimely, even ear-piercing laugh rang out abruptly.
Kaito's movement froze. He looked up, staring at his "father" in astonishment.
He saw that the face, originally written with kindness and vicissitudes, was now twisted into an extremely exaggerated, extremely malicious expression. The gentleness was gone. Replacing it was the mockery and ridicule of someone watching a clown's performance reach its climax.
"Hahahahahaha!"
Blake finally couldn't hold it back. He clutched his stomach, laughing back and forth, even exaggeratedly wiping tears from the corners of his eyes.
"I can't... it's too funny..."
"Student Kaito, your expression... Hahahaha! Really, that expression just now was simply a world-class masterpiece!"
"If I took a picture and sent it to Nakamori Aoko, she could laugh at you for a lifetime!"
Kaito stood frozen in place, hands still maintaining the posture of wanting to hug, feeling as if a bucket of liquid nitrogen had been poured over him from head to toe.
Bone-chilling cold.
"You..."
Blake straightened up, and the muscles on his face began to wriggle strangely. The bone structure and skin texture belonging to Kuroba Toichi reorganized quickly like melting wax.
In the blink of an eye.
The face of the middle-aged man that he had dreamed of disappeared. Replacing it was a young, handsome face wearing an infuriatingly malicious smile.
It was Blake's original appearance.
"Oops, sorry, sorry."
Blake waved his hand with zero sincerity, wearing a smile that made one want to punch him. "The atmosphere was just right; I felt like I'd be letting down the moon if I didn't act a little."
"But seriously, Kuroba Kaito."
Blake leaned in closer, staring into Kaito's eyes, which were now bloodshot from anger and shame.
"You didn't really think I was your dad, did you?"
"As a magician, to be deceived by visuals so easily?"
Silence.
Dead silence fell over the rooftop. Only the faint sound of Inspector Nakamori shouting "Surround the building" with a megaphone came from below.
Kaito stood there, his whole body trembling violently.
It was shame. It was anger. It was the agonizing pain of having the softest scar in his heart ruthlessly trampled upon.
He felt like a fool. Like a marionette being manipulated to perform a farce called "Father and Son Deep Affection" on stage, with the only audience being this despicable bastard in front of him.
"You... BASTARD!!!"
Kaito roared. At this moment, he was no longer the elegant Kaitou Kid, just an enraged boy.
Snap!
With a flip of his wrist, a spare poker card appeared at his fingertips.
Blake merely raised two fingers casually and lightly caught the poker card capable of slicing through steel plates. It was like catching a falling leaf.
"Angry?"
Blake applied a little force with his fingers, and the special alloy poker card instantly twisted, snapped, and fell to the ground as scrap metal.
"Is this the extent of your capacity, Second Generation Kid?"
"A magician controlled by emotions will fail."
The smile on his face converged slightly, and that high-and-mighty divinity surfaced again, pressing down on Kaito so hard he couldn't breathe.
"Besides, although I'm not your dad, letting you see the father you miss so much counts as a good deed, right?"
Kaito gritted his teeth, forcing himself to calm down.
I can't beat him.
Absolutely can't beat him.
The burst of attack just now was easily neutralized, which meant the strength gap between them wasn't even in the same dimension. Continuing to fight would be meaningless except for inviting more humiliation.
"What exactly... do you want?"
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