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Chapter 7: Monster

"I'm such an idiot! I'm so sorry Kaneki. Why did I leave you there? Why can't I do anything right? I hate myself… it's been almost 2 years and I just leave him there?! Why am I so stupid?" The pained, saddened voice filled the apartment. The tone was so sad, leaving one to wonder what was truly meant by those words.


Kaneki had been walking for 10 minutes straight, his legs were on auto pilot because his mind was somewhere else; thoughts.

Boy I'm so bloody hungry, how am I gonna get some food?

I can't hunt in broad day light with everyone here.

Do I really have to wait until night?

But I'm so-

*Rumble*

… hungry!

Kaneki's thoughts went wild, fuelled with hunger. He thought of waiting in the 14th ward's secluded alleyway until an unfortunate soul wandered in, but barely anyone goes there. The chances of feeding in that alleyway are really slim, which is why ghouls rarely use it.

But it's better than waiting for the night to come right?

What do I have to lose?

As Kaneki started to make his way to the alleyway, a wave of unease swept over him. He didn't hunt in just over a year, he just freeloaded off the crappy rotten ghoul meat the investigators gave him.

The hairs on Kaneki's neck spiked up as he felt goose bumps begin to form on his arms. The thought of hunting and finally getting something yummy to eat was so exciting!

The spikey hairs on his body soon flattened when he was greeted with the disgusting stench of trash and waste. He carried on walking into the alleyway while cats were scrambling from garbage bags as he went past.

He sat down on a small chair he found conveniently against a wall. Though the chair did see better says, it surprising supported his weight.

Kaneki rustled through his hoodie pocket, pulling out his beloved mask. He slipped it on smoothly and was surprised it still fit him so well. He noticed it was very clean and shiny, which was weird due to its age.

His mask perfectly matched his current outfit. It somehow reminded him of first fight against that stubborn investigator Amon.

Kaneki closed his eyes. The burning hunger in his stomach was starting to make him weak and tired. He hadn't been in such a dire situation since he just started being a ghoul.

Every second seemed like a minute and Kaneki's head soon found itself banging on the cracked wall in the dim alleyway.

I can't fall asleep… I'm too vulnerable here.

Even though the best thing for Kaneki to do is to get some shuteye until night, sleeping in such a shady alleyway isn't very smart. Finding a place to sleep would be to energy consuming and sleeping on a public bench is also a dumb idea because of the high chances that at least one dove would walk past him.

"Well, well, isn't it my lucky day?"

Kaneki immediately shot his head up and stiffened his body in anticipation of an attack. A figure was standing neatly on a loose power line that hung low into the alleyway. Just from the voice and shape of the body alone, Kaneki recognised the man.

"So you finally showed yourself huh?" Though it wasn't visible through his mask, Kaneki gave a small smile.

"So you did know what I was. On top of that you knew I was coming! My my, you have my praise little Ken." Although the man didn't sound scared but sounded confident, he couldn't help but feel confused why he was uneasy around the boy who was wearing that particular mask.

What's with that mask, why does it make me feel so uneasy?

On top of that he's a ghoul, but why does he smell so human let alone delicious?

Oh well, no matter. As long as he tastes nice then there's nothing to worry about.

Toshio jumped forward from the wire with the intent to land on top of Kaneki and crush him, but Kaneki moved out of the way before Toshio even bent his legs for the jump.

As Toshio landed, he heard the cracks of the damaged chair become nothing but chunks of broken rotten wood. He turned around to see Kaneki 10 metres away, putting his backpack down.

He's pretty good for a kid. Toshio thought as he brought out his kagune. Better get this finished quickly before people notice.

His Kagune erupted from his right shoulder blade. It slowly made its way in front of his chest and began snapping like crazy, making the deafening sound of two metals forcefully being smashed against each other.

Kaneki looked up to see a rather weirdly shaped koukaku kagune. It was as if the man had a brown crab claw snapping it's razor sharp blades against each other, in fact Kaneki was sure that's what he saw; a crab claw kagune.

Wow! That's actually pretty cool, how did he get a kagune like that?

The man leapt towards Kaneki, dragging the heavy claw with him. Once he was a meter's range from Kaneki, he hauled his kagune forward and opened its pincers.

The movement was so slow that Kaneki could've sworn it was in slow motion. Kaneki jumped up, dodging the enemy's attack and putting him above the tall ghoul. As he readied himself to drop and skate on the slow ghoul across the floor, he saw a fast flash of bright blue shoot up from the man's upper back.

Kaneki's eyes widened as he realized what he was looking at. Before any more thoughts managed to form in his mind, his whole chest was slashed violently, allowing a gush of blood to escape his body.

Kaneki found his back hitting the cold hard floor with a loud thud, allowing more of the released blood to ooze on the concrete floor.

The ghoul skidded to a stop and turned around to face a wounded Kaneki.

"You underestimated me pretty boy."

"I guess I did…" Kaneki slowly sat up and stared at the ghoul that was standing 2 metres away from him. On his right side was a crab claw while on his left side was what seemed to be sharp blue feathers shaping a wing. "I've never met an ukaku and a koukaku ghoul before, especially one whose kagune seems to resemble animal body parts so much."

"I'll take that as a compliment." The ghoul slowly started to make his way to where Kaneki lay.

"All I was doing was waiting for a nice little human to come along but it seems like I was greeted something less pleasant don't you think?" Kaneki gripped his bleeding chest as it started to heal. "But all this fighting, healing and waiting has just made me even hungrier." He looked at the ghoul's black and red eyes with a sadistic grin. "Although I would much rather taste the sweetness of a fresh, ripe human, I guess you'll have to suffice. I'm just too hungry to wait you see. It can't be helped right?" Kaneki was practically laughing at the end of his sentence. He was so excited to finally find something to dig his teeth in.

"As if you could." The ghoul stared at Kaneki's visible eye that now had its kakugan blazing. "If it was so easy to catch you of guard with my fast ukaku, then it'll be just as easy to finish you off with both my kagun-

Before Toshio could finish his sentence, a sharp sensation of strong pain ripped through his abdomen while he felt himself being flung across the dim alleyway.

"It also seems like you've underestimated me." Kaneki voice was menacing as it echoed through the length of the small passage they were in.

Toshio slammed against a wall and soon slid on the hard ground, leaving a deep crater on the crusty brick wall where his body hit. He rolled onto his side, where he saw a pair of feet in black trainers stand 10 meters away from him.

Wait… what the fuck just happened?

There's no way he just did that in the condition he was in 5 seconds ago!

He should be on the ground crying and wailing in pain as I eat him.

Does he really heal that fast?!

Toshio's thoughts were forcibly stopped as he heard echoing footsteps and saw the feet coming towards him. Shivers crawled down his spine as the sentence Kaneki had said not too long ago repeated in his mind.

'Although I would much rather taste the sweetness of a fresh, ripe human, I guess you'll have to suffice.'

Toshio's heart raced with fear as the footsteps grew louder and louder. Both his kagune had grown limp and soon retracted back into his body.

Kaneki stopped in front of the body and kneeled down, meeting his hungry gaze with a fearfully terrified one. Wordlessly, he unzipped the mask's mouth revealing his similar grin with drool all over his chin.

"Y-you monster!" Was all Toshio could say with his shaking breath.

"Me? Monster? But you're the one who was planning on eating me weren't you? So it's only fair that I try and eat you." Kaneki finished his sentence and opened his mouth wider than he ever had before, resulting in a terrified yelp to escape from his prey's mouth.

As Kaneki indulged in the feeling of warm soft blood slowly fill his mouth, (as well as the pained cries and pleas for help from his victim), he heard a voice coming from the entrance of the alleyway.

"This way is shorter, let's go through here."

Kaneki immediately turned his head to face the entrance of the alleyway while he caught the faint sound of footsteps coming their way.

Shit! Who's coming?

However, that distraction was all Toshio needed to escape from the terrifying monster that would surely eat him slowly, enjoying his pain as pleasure.

When Kaneki turned around, it was too late. Even though he knew that his speed was greater than the wounded ghoul's speed, chasing him would be stupid because he would surely make a scene out of it, causing people to notice.

Kaneki growled angrily, more spit and saliva shooting out of his mouth.

He was beginning to lose control, and he knew it. But the pleasure of getting something to eat was too good to pass.

He was truly a monster when it came to his food.

Kaneki, vision all warped with anger but mainly hunger, saw white blurs come to the corner of his vision.

Facing the weird blurs and trying his best to focus, he saw a small group of 3 investigators with their usual white trench coats in the distance, walking into the alleyway with silver briefcases in their hands.

Do my problems ever fucking go away?

All I wanted was some food!

Now they'll know that I'm still alive.

How much hell can one person get?

"Hey are you alright?" One investigator asked as he caught sight of Kaneki mumbling to himself while on all fours.

"A mask...? W-wait that's a kakugan! It's a ghoul, get your quinques ready!" One of the investigators shouted as he saw the white haired teen raise his head, kagugan activated and growling intensely with blood mixed with drool dropping to ground.

You'll pay for this! You let my meal get away! I'll eat you instead!

Kaneki was slowly edging to insanity, his hunger was blurring and distorting his vision.

"W-wait, that mask… rank 1 Kurumatani, that's the eyepatch mask!" One investigator slowly turned his head to his partner, but never taking his eyes off the ghoul and his crazed laughter.

"Impossible! You're imagining things, there's no way eyepatch is alive…" The rank 1 investigator called Kurumatani turned to look at partner whose eyes also shifted fearfully to meet each other's shivering gazes. "H-he died didn't he? Haise…"

"Well then who else would use that eyepatch mask while also having white hair coincidentally?" The 3rd, calmer investigator questioned, trying his best to mask his shock.

"Haise doesn't just have white hair! And he should be dead anyway…"

"Well looks like he isn't, and it also looks like he's not Haise Sasaki anymore but Ken Kaneki, SS rated Centipede so be careful. I don't have my phone with me, someone call for backup!"

When neither of the other two stunned investigators moved a muscle, he screamed, unleashing all his fear "Now!" His voice cracked under the deafening command prompting both of the investigators, currently scared shitless, to jump in surprise and start scrambling in their pockets for some sort of communicative device.

However, that shriek made the crazy giggles from the hungry ghoul stop. This also made the three freeze and stare at the crazed ghoul shaking on all fours.

"M-mum, s-s0 hungryyyyyyyyyyyyyyy… Maaaa FOd000DD! heEaaHAaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Kaneki was literally jumping up and down while still crouched on all fours. His grin spread wide enough to be just one centimetre from touching his ears. Kaneki's voice was so distorted, it sounded exactly like he was underwater. "AaahHHAgH, ymYum! I-I cAN aWeaDy TasTe y0u kUrUMaTawi1Iii!"

Nothing but the excitement of ripping through his feast filled his mind as he began to feel a tingle in his back. "FoO0oo0o0o0o00OO0o0o0o0o0oOo0o0o0o0o0oD T1mE!!!!!!!" At the end of his sentence, four HUGE centipedes practically erupted from his lower back, twisting, crawling, skittering in the cramped alleyway and each centipede now had a head which was equipped with two long antennae and two HUGE venomous fangs. The mouths were drooling with what looked like purplish green acidic venom while eating away at the walls, bins, bags everything!

It was truly a monstrous sight, one that no one could forget. Many things were different, evolved from his previous kakuja; more centipedes; the heads with venom; his armour. Kaneki had purple scaled armour coating his four limbs, giving his fingers and toes sharp claw-like metal spikes and the tip. His whole armour had spikes, everything was so…. so monstrous.

A mask started to grow over the beast's already masked face. However, unlike his previous mask with the shape of a single fang, this one had two long pointed fangs. The mask covered his whole face, only leaving room for his mouth, two mismatched, crazed eyes and the one, demon-like eye in between the two.

Kaneki brought his clawed hands to his masked face, scratching and clawing in pain. "AaaWWwwwW!?$*%£$?"

"I feE1 o Aw$0M3, Hhow doo0000 y0ooouuu feeeeeeeeeel?!?!%*"

The investigators stared with their jaws dropped.

"O-o-hhhhh… GOD HELP US!" One investigator screamed at the top of his lungs followed by the other two as the overgrown centipedes start crawling towards them on the floor and on the walls, leaving holes where their talon-like legs walked.

As the investigators attempted to run and scramble to escape the hellish nightmare that's unravelling before them, Kaneki launched himself in front of them, faster then how lightning strikes. The investigators realize his sudden movement too late as a not so lucky investigator is snatched up in the air by the four centipedes twisting and entwining together, gnawing at his limbs while Kaneki slowly makes his way to his tortured victim.

"WAHHHH PLEEEEEEEASE! ANYTHING! I'LL DO ANY-WAAAAAAAAAHHH!" The poor man screams as his right arm is twisted snatched off by a squirming centipede.

The other two investigators cry silently and watch the literal hell begin before them.

The endless screams that beg for help echo in the alleyway as Kaneki, accompanied by his four centipede buddies, tear the man apart.

Finally, after what felt like hours of tears, rips, chews and gulps, the man's face, heart and other insides were (deliciously) eaten alive.

No trace of life came from the mangled remains of his body.

Blood was splattered all over the alleyway from the painful shredding the ghoul had mercilessly done to him.

Silence now swept the alleyway, but was soon destroyed with the distant voices of worry from the entrance of the alleyway.

"What was all that screaming in the alley? Should we go help?"

"Idiot! Don't go in there, you'll get caught up in the fight! It's probably just a fight between gangs or something."

"R-right… let's go honey."

Now silence returned to blood stained alleyway. The centipedes were laying all over the thin walls, only twitching their antennae and flexing their blood soaked jaws that now had bits of flesh and bones hanging from it.

Kaneki, however, was still slowly licking and eating his victim's brain while murmuring something about you shouldn't be a picky eater.

"D-don't… make... a-a… sound... please. Or it'll notice us." one of the investigators whispered ever so slightly in a shaking voice to his absolutely petrified, soulless partner who couldn't reply due to his voice that had been clogged up through fear.

With their fate in the claws of that monster, both were silently praying and hoping to somehow survive this nightmare. Their quinque weapons were like toys compared to the beast before them; there was nothing they could do but wait out the torturous minutes in hope that the ghoul would be satisfied with one body; the body of their fallen comrade.

"Haise…" The other investigator finally found his voice although a bit quiet and squeaky.

"Shhhhhhhhhh be quiet. That's not Haise, that's a monster."

Kaneki licked the man's skull for the remains of his brain while wearing a bloodthirsty grin under his two masks. "Y-yuMMmmyyYy!" Kaneki breathed as he stepped over the completely demolished traces of what was once a human.

Kaneki held his mask in his purple, armoured hands, the tip of his claws lightly scratching the metal-like structure on his face.

I… feel so great!

B-but… why do I feel like… I'm doing something wrong?

Hehe, no matter!

I'll just eat mor-

"I can't wait to see the concert!" An awfully familiar voice from the entrance of the alleyway caught Kaneki's ears. "I should have left earlier to get a good seat though…"

Kaneki froze.

But why?

Why did he start shivering once he heard that?

Why did his head feel like it was on fire?

All from that voice… that familiar voice that Kaneki remembers all too well.

Insane or not, crazed or not, dying or not, Kaneki would never forget that voice… that voice that shed light on his shadowed, lonely life.

…no way. Impossible.

N-no, I'm hallucinating. He's not here, there's no way he could be her-

"I guess should take this shortcut." As it came closer and closer, the voice rang in his consciousness harder and harder, opening Kaneki's eyes to see the bloodshed before him.

"N-no… I-I, what did I do?!" Upon realising his murderous, monstrous act, Kaneki sobbed. He sobbed harder and more painfully than he had ever done before as the four vermin that came out of his back, slowly made their way back in. He fell on his hands and knees as his fanged mask and purple, scaled armour cracked and dissolved, allowing him to angrily rip off the leather mask concealing his sweaty face.

"Ugh… it happened again. W-whhhy? I TOLD MYSELF I COULD CONRTOL IT! WHAT THE FUCK MADE ME THINK THAT?! I'M SUCH AN IDIOT!" Kaneki screamed and shouted in pain and sorrow, unaware of the shocked figure that stood just a few feet away from him.

"K-kane… ki?" The voice whispered shivering, not from fear but from utter shock. "Th-that you man?"

Kaneki slowly eased his head up as he realized who was standing before him.

The other two investigators were no longer there as they took advantage of Kaneki's distracted state to escape the same fate as their not so fortunate partner; eaten alive.

Kaneki's mouth, clothes and hair was coated in blood and as he gazed at the figure before him; blond hair with dark roots, brightly coloured clothes giving that sunshine look and big, brown (shocked) eyes starting right at him.

"H-Hide…" Was all Kaneki could squeak before he felt all the energy being sucked out of him.

He wanted nothing but to die right at that very moment. Hide, his innocent friend, had literally just walked up on him when he and his four pets were eating a man alive. Embarrassment; shame.

He doesn't deserve to live, not after that! He doesn't want to drag Hide into his mess, Hide deserves better than this bloodthirsty beast, way better.

Kaneki's hands began to give way as his head fell forward to meet the blood stained concrete below. Closing his eyes, he waited for the impact to come but it never did.

Forcing open one eye, Kaneki saw a worried face splattered all over his best friend's face.

Worried? Worried? Worried?!

How could he possibly be worried?

This ghoul just literally ate a whole man alive in record time and he's worried?

Hide embraced Kaneki into a hug, despite all the blood on the ghoul, despite what the hell just happened.

How could he be so relaxed?

Hide… why?

I'm a monster, you don't deserve me.

Amazing. Purely amazing.

How could someone be so fearless? How could someone be so amazing?

… Meanwhile I'm a beast; a ghoul.

I shouldn't have someone like him… he shouldn't have someone like me-

"I know you didn't mean it. I know you didn't want any of this, so don't cry Kaneki."

Kaneki's eyes widened as he noticed the waterfalls flowing down his cheeks.

"Hide… Kill me…" Kaneki choked on the last two words painfully before faintly seeing Hide's mouth move but no words come out. Or maybe there were words coming out, who knows? Kaneki was too tired to use his ears or his strength as he fell numb in Hide's warm arms, slowly closing his eyes to be consumed by a deep slumber.


I'm sorry if this chapter was rushed, I felt like it would be best if it was all in one chapter. But anyway, thanks for the reviews that you all are giving me!