"Welcome to my humble home," the voice came from the darkness, which now that the door had close behind Sora, surrounded the criminal.

"Hello, Seer," Sora said, trying as hard as he could not to breathe. "I have some questions for you."

The Seer is how the ones who knew about him called the old man. He was a knowledge merchant, and Sora was one of the few who had been stubborn enough to find him.

"Yes, yes, you always do," the man exhaled and Sora closed his eyes as the opium reached his face. "But you must remember my services have a certain cost. Knowledge is power, and so to maintain the balance of power, when I give something away, I must receive something of equal value."

"There's a gang whose members wear a purple band around their arms," Sora untied one of his sacks and tossed it in front of him. "I believe this should be enough."

Sora heard the sound of the sack being opened and of someone unfolding several pieces of parchment.

"Yeeees," the voice said, "this will do just fine. Now, there is only one operative gang with that uses the color purple. You will find all you need to know about them here."

Sora felt a small projectile flying towards him. A small cloth sack hit his chest ad fell on his hands. Almost running out of breathe, the scoundrel made a small bow and walked back towards the black door. He then opened it and ran out of the room, closing the door shut behind him and breathed heavily, coughing for the lack of oxygen.

Back at his shelter, the scoundrel read the contents of the package carefully. The gang is called the Purple Sparrow. It had been active for more than two hundred years, though its power had been at its peak since about twenty years, as a rumor started running, that said that they had acquired a strange, dangerous artifact that could be used effectively against shinigami. Because of these rumors, the gang was attacked by the reapers about fifteen years ago. Miko Hibiki, the head of the gang survived, but it lost many soldiers, and it is unsure if they still possess the artifact, or if they even had it in the first place... The rest of the document was a register of the gang activities, territory, properties, and hierarchy.

Yes! Here it is! Sora found what he was looking for,their schedule...

Apparently, the head of the gang had a thing for soba, particularly the one they served in a small restaurant in district fifty-seven. He had lunch every day from Monday to Friday near nine o'clock, just after the gang meetings, usually escorted by from four to six bodyguards.

Great, the scoundrel thought, that gives me all the time I need.

Sora opened his money pouch and counted how many coins he had left. Looking satisfied, he stood up and headed for the apothecary.

"Five bottles of sake, three noodle soups, three salmon rolls and one special soba."

"Yes, Miko-san. I'll be back in no time," the waiter said and leaved the room.

The leader was sitting at the end of the table, with three henchmen at each side. They had requested the same private room they always did, but fortunately for the young criminal, its walls were as thin as any other.

Sneaking behind the walls, Sora found the back door to the kitchen, and, after making sure nobody was watching, then silently slipped through the door. The kitchen was not as crowded as Sora though it would be, but still, if someone actually saw him he would have no excuse for being there, and starting a fight by himself in a public place with enemies in the next room would be really stupid. Luckily for him, he found a blue apron hanging on a nearby hook, and so, now disguised as an employee, ventured deeper in the kitchen.

"Hey you!"

The scoundrel turned around startled, and saw one of the cooks standing next to a table with bowls, dishes and some bottles on two metal trays.

"You're the new one, right?" he said, and without waiting for an answer. "I'm leaving early, tell Kei to take these to the private room."

Right after the man left, the scoundrel took a few vials from one of his pouches and walked towards the dishes.

The red with the white one, wait until it turns pink then add the grey dust to dissimulate the color, add the yellow catalyst if it's a liquid meal, Sora mentally repeated the formulas as he mixed the normally harmless powders and seeds,and for the big boss, I think it was the orange? Yes, orange with green.

Just after he finished, a young man, almost a kid, walked in, "Hey, is Miko-san's order ready?"

"Yes," the young criminal said, supposing the man was Kei, "you should take it right away."

The man did so, and Sora waited for a few seconds before taking off the apron and going out of the kitchen. The resaurant was quite empty for that time of the night. Perhaps that was one of the reasons the Purple Sparrows' head chose this place. He saw Kei coming out of a room with the empty trays, carelessly leaving the door only half-shut. He walked to the door and looked into the room the men were in.

Unsuspectingly, the boss and his bodyguards started eating their meals, and before Sora's eyes, each one of then fell under the effects of the poison. The henchmen stopped moving suddenly, with terror in their eyes, as they already knew they were finished. The boss watched how his men fell on the table, and tried to scream, but all that came from his mouth was a low grasp. Then it was when Sora entered the room.

He ran on top of the table and jumped against the crime boss, tackling him to the floor and sticking his knife in his stomach. Though the weakening poison wouldn't let him scream, the scoundrel knew he could still feel the pain.

"I guess you must be Uechi Sora," the head of the gang muttered after a few seconds.

"You sent your thugs after me," he answered, twisting his blade.

"Well," Miko said, enduring the pain in silence, "you did attack one of ours. We couldn't let something like that stay unanswered."

"Is that so? I wonder how're you going to answer once you're dead, Miko." Sora unsheathed his other knife and pressed it against the man's throat.

"You want to kill me? He," the man managed to laugh a bit. "Sure go ahead, but Miko Hibiki will never truly die. You want to know how the Sparrows survived for so many years? Because there have been four Miko's so far. My death will only mean the rise of another leader."

"What?" Sora said. "No wonder I felt this had been all too easy..."

"Yes, you see..." the crime boss explained, "The first Miko was weak, he trusted in his men too much and so his right hand killed him in his sleep and took his place. About fifty years later, the first Miko's heir poisoned him as a vengeance and took his grandfather's position back. He was our strongest leader, but even he wasn't able to stop the reapers from taking our treasure."

"Wait, your treasure?" Sora interrupted, "You mean they took..."

"Yes, they took our relic!" the man confirmed the young scoundrel's suspicions, "They were afraid of its power, and so they took it from us, together with the life of our leader."

"And then what of the package?" the scoundrel asked, putting more pressure on his knife, "What of the package I stole for the Sin Qua Non?"

"A mere decoy," the fourth Miko explained. "Only a small circle of gang members know that we no longer have the artifact. After all, what made the Sparrows so feared was his power to threaten the shinigami, and so we couldn't let something like that come out."

"So if the SQN has a decoy..." Sora reasoned.

"They're not going to be very happy with you!" Miko made the closes thing he could to a smile. "They've been following you since they found out the package was garbage! In fact, I believe they might be out there right now!"

He wasn't wrong, through the paper door the young criminal could see the shadows of three men, who a second later stormed into the room. Though they were not wearing their traditional white robes, he recognized the face of one of them, his former contractor.

Fuck, this doesn't look right.

He quickly sliced Miko's throat with one knife and with the other hand he cut through the first attacker, who having charged against him, fell helplessly against the light wooden wall, which not being built to stand such assaults, collapsed under the weight of the wounded man. Sora jumped though the hole in the wall towards the dark streets, followed by the two Sin Qua Non hitmen. And so the scoundrel ran from his pursuers through the streets of Rukongai. He knew he had to seek a crowded place to escape, and so he entered the first building he saw that had the door open, a tavern.

"Ah! It's a criminal!" one of the clients yelled.

Oh, shit, concentrated as he was, he didn't noticed that he had came in running with blood on his clothes and his knifes in his hands.

He didn't have time to explain, as the SQN assassin was entering the room right at that moment. Pushing the people aside, he attacked Sora, but the criminal moved aside, and so a terrified customer got the blade in his arm, giving Sora the chance to move to a more advantageous position. The people, scared as they were, scattered giving the two men enough room to fight. Sora made sure to put the tables between him and his enemy, but he jumped over them and tried to reach the young criminal. He then grabbed one of the bottles, which appeared to have high liquor content, and threw it towards the Sin Qua Non hitman. Blinded because of the liquor in his eyes, he couldn't didn't notice Sora picking up the oil lantern until it was already crashing against him, igniting the drink and turning him into a flaming torch. Screaming with pain, he began running around the room, luckily not hitting the walls, as a fire in a wooden building would result in tragedy. The customers and employees wisely evacuated the tavern, leaving the burning man and Sora inside. This last one gripped both of his knives tightly, and rammed towards his opponent stretching his arms forwards. Just as he felt the two blades piercing the tug's chest, he let go off the handles and ran out the front door.

Just outside of the building, Sora stopped to get some air, as the public was too panicked to try to stop him, and saw the other man walking towards him from beneath the mob. He was going to start running away again, but then a voice came from behind him.

"Spinner of fate, unwind and cast yourself. Bakudou number four, Hainawa!"

A rope suddenly came out of nowhere and wrapped around Sora's body. The scoundrel then felt someone pulling the rope, and making him fall to the ground. He looked up, and saw a man dressed with a black kosode carrying a sword under a white himo.

"I've got you, murderer," the reaper said. "You'll be rotting in Maggot's Nest for a long time."