As far as I know, there is no such country as Ingoland. There are also no such people called Ingotish. I want to make sure that no one gets offended and come to sue me for being insensitive to any race or religion. So please don't report my story for anything regarding disrespect to a certain group of people, thank you.
This story is entirely fictional. If there are any Japanese reading my story, please note that I am absolutely not trying to inflict any emotional harm to you. In fact, I like Japan. ^^ You will know why I keep emphasizing on this point as you read this story.
Anyway, I have challenged myself to write this story in Hibari Kyoya's perspective, and I am trying my best to minimise the risk of OOCness. All characters are in TYL form. Enjoy and review!~
I grimaced as I scanned the piece of dress shirt presented before me, glaring at the shivering person standing awkwardly by my desk.
"What is this?" I inquired sharply, causing the herbivore to flinch and cower behind her sheepish supervisor.
I pinched the shirt by its crooked sleeve and deadpanned at the cowardly woman, "this shirt can never be sold". Her face grew as pale as a white sheet and she better not faint right in my office. Her supervisor decided to speak up for her, "Hibari-san, please excuse her. She's just a newbie, so please understand her lack of steadiness with the sewing machine".
"Is that so?" I grumbled, rubbing my forehead, and suppressed the urge to add a 'she's clumsy to the point that she could sew the shirt to be torn in half'.
"Go back to work, and you, Sasagawa Kyoko, better look after her well enough so that she won't repeat the same mistake," I said and dismissed them with a small wave of my hand. Sasagawa Kyoko bowed and gently pulled the distraught herbivore out of my office, patting her back in comfort.
Leaning back against my armchair, I sipped my delectable Japanese green tea and examined the list of bills of the clothes sold last week. I glanced at the wall clock which read 1.43pm, thinking 'they should be here soon'.
The door flung open for the sixth time today and revealed one of the worst visitors I could ever ask for.
"YO HIBARI— GWAH!"
The man expertly dodged the book that I tossed with great strength and speed, aiming to smack him right in the face. I hissed in annoyance when I missed and glared daggers at him.
"HEY HIBARI! THIS ISN'T THE WAY TO GREET PEOPLE!" he shouted and stormed up to me.
"I do not permit entry to people who don't know how to knock," I stated coldly and pointed to the door, "get out if you don't have a valid reason to make a din here".
"C'mon, Hibari, don't be so mean! We're buddies to the extreme!" Sasagawa Ryohei declared and totally ignored the pissed aura I was emitting.
"Don't associate me with such herbivorous terms," I crossed my arms, losing the mood to complete the paperwork, "now out".
"I have some news to report," he said and for a moment I considered listening to him, but then the next horrible thing I knew was he threw a whole damn stack of papers onto my desk, "TA-DAH! MORE PAPERWORK FOR YOU! I SENT THIS ON THE BEHALF OF KYOKO!"
'NO DAMN IT NOOOOOO!' I yelled in frustration in my mind, and I swore my soul was flying off to nowhere.
"GYAHAHAHAHA! HAPPY WORKING, HIBARI!" Sasagawa Ryohei laughed his head off in a sadistic manner and I got the urge to literally throw him out of the window. He then tapped the top of the paper mountain and grinned evilly, "you know, I can burn this rubbish for you if you do me one small favour…"
"I won't take responsibility if Sawada Tsunayoshi kills you—"
"JOIN ME IN BOXING TO THE EXTREEEEMMEE!" he punched the air with his fists and began reminiscing on the 'delight' of boxing, "oh, you know, the feeling of punching your opponents is just great! The way their faces KEPOW in your fist and how you can hear the deadly WHAM and BRAM of their guts and the sight of their blood PWAH out of their mouths as you BOM BOM BASH POW CRASH WHAM PAM PAM PAM at them….!"
"P-Please excuse me for intruding your hearty conversation…" Kusakabe Tetsuya, my secretary, peeked warily from the corner of the door, sweat-dropping at the sight of the boxing lunatic fighting with an invisible opponent and greeting me with a bow, "you have a visitor, Kyo-san..."
"Who is the herbivore now—?"
"It's Kuri-chan".
Upon hearing that name, I stood up immediately and walked briskly out of my office to the foyer, where I spotted the little girl in Namimori Junior School uniform.
My daughter, Kuri.
"Ah, Otosan!" she called as she waved cheerfully and rushed toward me with open arms. I knelt down and engulfed her in a hug, smiling lightly as I smoothed her raven hair that she inherited from me.
"I want to show you something, Otosan!" Kuri said and fished for a sketchbook slotted between the books in her backpack. Flipping the pages of the book, she presented a drawing of our family sitting on a patch of grass under the bright morning sunlight.
"Wow, not bad. You've improved," I smirked and she beamed elatedly, turning over another page that showed my yellow canary. "I drew Hibird too! But for this drawing I coloured it with crayons instead of colour pencils," she explained, giggling when I gave her another simple compliment of "good job".
"What? That's Hibari-san's kid?"
"You don't know? Oh, I forgot. You're new here. Yes, it's surprising that he could get married and have a child".
"That's shocking! I can't think of any woman who would willingly marry such a scary man".
I rolled my eyes at the whispers coming from those herbivores, watching the ladies surround my daughter to pass her gifts.
"Here you go, Kuri. I made this bracelet for your birthday that is approaching soon," Kurokawa Hana grinned as Kuri mirthfully thanked her and tried on the bracelet that consisted of pastel coloured beads and artificial tiny flowers. Sasagawa Kyoko's present seemed to please her very much for the instant she saw the pretty sky blue dress, she squealed and danced about in joy. Miura Haru gave Kuri red ribbon hair ties to suit her pigtails and pink shoes dotted with small glitters.
"Hm?" I glanced around the foyer and was puzzled to find the person, who should have accompanied Kuri to the clothes factory, missing.
"Kuri," I gestured her to come over, "where's your mum?"
"Oh, Okasan's chatting with Auntie Yuni!" she replied, pointing to the outside of the entrance doors. I patted her head and strolled over to the open main doors, seeing Hinata Yuni engrossed in an ecstatic conversation with the person I was searching for.
My wife, Nagi.
Upon noticing my presence, Nagi smiled elegantly and pounced onto me in a bear hug.
"Kyoya!" she cried happily and rubbed her cheek against my vest, "I'm so glad to see you!"
I smirked and planted a light kiss on her forehead, "what? It's just been a few hours and you're already missing me?"
Hinata Yuni chuckled in amusement, "Chrome-chan loves you a lot, Hibari-san. Today she spent a long time in the market just to get the ingredients to make hamburgers for you".
Nagi blushed shyly yet charmingly, whispering something along the lines of "I have a very picky husband…"
"By the way, Chrome-chan, Hibari-san, this is my birthday gift to Kuri-chan," Hinata Yuni handed over a wrapped package to us before she bid us farewell and took her leave.
"Why are all the herbivores giving Kuri presents when it's not even her birthday yet?" I enquired Nagi, eying the package weirdly. "In two days' time, it will be our darling's birthday, but since the women have planned a bonding outing which unfortunately clashed with it, they decided to hand their gifts to Kuri beforehand," Nagi replied, leaning her head on my shoulder and I wrapped my arm around her waist.
"You aren't joining them?" I asked again.
"No," Nagi shook her head, "I rather stay at home with Kuri to celebrate her birthday".
"That's a good mother," I was about to kiss her lips when I noticed two tall, muscular men storming like intimidating giants toward our direction. Nagi winced and quickly hid behind me in fright.
"Get your boss out here," one of them, a brunette with ugly mustache, demanded rudely.
"What do you want?" I retorted without a hint that I was afraid of them.
His partner, a blonde with almond eyes, was going to shake a fist at me when the boss of the clothes factory, Sawada Tsunayoshi, stepped out of the doors and passed the men an envelope containing quite a large amount of money, ceasing the fight that was on the verge of erupting. The men snickered in satisfaction and departed without further ado.
"They've been coming here more often for taxes, huh?" I remarked while assuring Nagi that it was all right to come out of her 'hiding place' now.
Sawada Tsunayoshi sighed, "what else can I do than give them what they want?"
"No, I believe there is a better way to this problem. We can't keep being their slaves," I insisted firmly. Sawada Tsunayoshi smiled grimly and shrugged in defeat, walking back into the foyer and giving his wife, Sasagawa Kyoko, a peck on her cheek.
"I really pity Boss. He's under such pressure…" Nagi sighed in sympathy.
I groaned in irritation. If only those herbivores never intruded our homeland….
On the day of 14th February last year, 3.26pm, Japan's fate twisted in an unexpected turn. Silhouettes of distant jets were spotted in the vast monochrome blue sky and before anyone had time to react, the streets of towns and cities were destroyed in a blink of an eye when missiles crashed down. Grotesque corpses that might be deprived of certain limbs or even heads were strewn over the cracked ground and some were buried under collapsed buildings. Even my hometown, Namimori, was swallowed into the hell that was enveloped in nothing but smoke, debris and dead bodies.
I had gotten my petrified wife and daughter out of our house before we could get killed together with it. We dashed for our lives to the nearest bomb shelter where groups of families living in Namimori had crowded for safety.
For one of the few times in my whole life, I had felt scared.
Bombs, gun shots, screaming, shouting, and disturbing sounds of weapons piercing into the bodies of people could be heard from the outside of the bomb shelter. Women and children were crying, traumatised by the horrendous turn of events. I was scared for my family, and my relief when Nagi woke up from her temporary unconsciousness due to shock was beyond description. Kuri sobbed and hugged her soft toy rabbit, the only thing she managed to grab before I forced her out of our home.
At 5.13pm, a nationwide announcement was broadcasted through the radio.
The Japanese government was threatened to surrender Japan to the invaders, the Ingotish from Ingoland, a country which existence was known to no one.
"We, the Ingotish of Ingoland, are celebrating victory in this war of Ingotish Occupation. From today onwards, Japan will be under the rule of our superior Ingoland. To those who defy us, we will act without mercy and claim your heads!"
From the day when Japan was conquered by Ingoland, nothing could ever be the same.
There was no longer peace.
The Ingotish government sent its army to burn down every property and company in the cities and towns, leaving the Japanese with no other choice but to flee or be killed. That included the company I was working at, which was under Sawada Tsunayoshi's ownership then. All of us lost our jobs after the soldiers destroyed our building and robbed us of our wealth.
There was never a day when no one was murdered. Innocent people walking along the streets could be shot, slaughtered or beaten to death cruelly, and the number of cases of women being raped and killed increased at an alarming rate. It was a fact that the Ingotish were nothing but heartless and selfish creatures. There were extreme incidents in which the Ingotish had fun digging out the organs of their victims and babies' heads being cut off. Animals were often their guinea pigs to be tested for the effectiveness of the biological warfare that they invented.
One of the most serious taboos for the Japanese was the discrimination we suffered. The Ingotish government purposely implemented unfair policies that triggered the wrathful spark in the Japanese.
1) No Japanese children could enter university courses or further their studies abroad, even if they were highly qualified.
2) No Japanese could owe businesses or housing without the Ingotish Town Councils' permission.
3) No Japanese could be privileged to enjoy prioritised and better healthcare than Ingotish.
4) No Japanese could work in the government services or be given senior positions in Ingotish companies.
5) No Japanese could have a say in decision-making of elections. In other words, we could not vote even though this country rightfully belonged to us.
Any Japanese who tried to weaken the Ingotish government would face merciless torture and death. The worst-case scenario would be when they ordered a massacre of the citizens.
The Ingotish stole everything from us. Our contributions to the economy, our homes, our businesses that we needed to support our families, our status, our loved ones, our future.
Everyone lived in hardship and fear during the agony of war that could lengthen to a few years and even worse, forever. We possessed no freedom and happiness. We could never prosper to greater heights when the Ingotish were constantly stealing our credits. No soul had any idea about how we could turn the tables on the ruthless Ingotish. Even the Japanese police, army and government could not offer any help for they had all surrendered.
However, I told Sawada Tsunayoshi that we must not abandon hope. I still had a family to feed and care for, regardless of our poor circumstances. I refused to give up.
In the end, we set up a clothes factory in Namimori, after the Ingotish North Town Council had reluctantly agreed. Sawada Tsunayoshi continued to be the boss and assigned us to different branches that catered to various aspects of clothing. Gokudera Hayato, manager of the socks branch, had unwillingly let Lambo work as his supervisor. Yamamoto Takeshi was the manager of the pants/skirts/shorts branch with Miura Haru as his skilled supervisor. Sasagawa Ryohei was more than excited to be the manager in charge of the extreme job of making undergarments, in contrast to his wife, Kurokawa Hana, who expressed her disgust openly. I was given the position of the manager of the shirts branch, but that stupid herbivorous boss just had to assign Sasagawa Kyoko to assist me, insisting that she was very talented in designing and sewing.
However, finding new employment opportunities and houses meant needing to pay compulsory taxes to the Ingotish Town Council which would transfer the money to the government. The council members could kick down one's doors and demand aggressively for the taxes without warning, or they would simply send threatening reminders until they got what they wanted.
Our plight was definitely not pretty.
"Have a nice day, Hibari-san, Chrome, Kuri," Sawada Tsunayoshi said as he waved goodbye.
Nagi was uncomfortable with being addressed as Mdm Dokuro or Mrs Hibari, and I disliked others calling her by her first name, so the herbivores resorted to giving her a nickname, Chrome.
"Sayonara, Boss," Nagi smiled and urged Kuri and I to hurry home, "I'm going to make hamburgers tonight!"
"Yay, hamburgers!" Kuri cheered euphorically and I smirked. I loved Nagi's cooking.
At least there was something I would always look forward to, even during the crisis of war.
Nagi here has two eyes, btw. Hope you'll enjoy my new story. Please don't take anything here that is FICTIONAL to heart, okie! Review!~