Heart of the Infiltrators

(Senran Kagura x Male Reader)

Chapter 68: Unbarred Despisal

Throughout the remainder of his day at school and on his way home, the young man heard the constant speculation and debate regarding whatever had happened with Oda and the dignitaries. From students to online newscasters, everyone was talking about the several videos taken of a woman and a man appearing out of thin air before making a mad dash away along with the fact that an ethnically Chinese man was having a physical fight with no one in the middle of the relief camp while an apparent terrorist was bleeding out nearby. For the average person, the sheer number of newfound developments were too much to discuss when compounded by the events of the Yōma. Ultimately, the young man decided that there was nothing that he could do other than hope that the skeptics who were claiming that the videos were edited, despite the vast number of angles that'd been recorded, somehow found some solid ground for their claims. In the meantime, the boy had a different decision to make.

Standing at the front door to his apartment, the young man had to decide between going on with his day or checking in with Sato on the fact that her parents, who were mentioned as detained suspects in several articles, had been arrested. He glanced off to her door, wondering if she was crying her eyes out or cold to the situation entirely, and then back to his door, reminding himself that Chomubach had to be fed. He took a step to the side and then paced back to his door before cursing and marching toward Sato's apartment, claiming to himself that he'd be quick and curt.

The young man knocked on her door a couple of times and waited, hearing a yelp and some skittering on the other side. Then nothing happened for a short while and the young man leaned his body to the side impatiently. After realizing that too much time had passed, he knocked again and called, "Sato? It's your neighbor."

There was a pause and a rapid thumping of feet before the door popped open, held from being completely open by its chain, before Sato peered her head through the crack with a surprised expression, her hair still tied into her new pigtails and her glasses flashing with familiarity. She blinked and said, "Ah, sorry. I'm not used to visitors coming through the door." After a pause, she said, "Here," and closed it, "I'll let you in…" With the sound of the chain sliding against wood and metal announcing that it was free, the door was swung open and Sato peered at the young man with wide eyes. Though she was initially excited to greet him, hoping that their past was finally being forgiven and left behind, an uncomfortable tension between them both began to make itself known. The young man's calm and unexpressive features faced off against her once merry smile before she meekly crumbled and hunched her head down to murmur, "Please, come in."

"Thank you," responded the young man as he took a step inside, "though I'll be quick." He looked around at the apartment, shaped and organized in the same way as his own, before turning back to the girl, "I just wanted to…" before briefly averting his gaze and mumbling, "well, I'm sure you already know about the news."

"No, what happened?" asked Sato, her expression twisting with worry before she took a prying step forward.

The young man faced her and hid his mental recoil, "You don't know?"

Sato shook her head innocently, "The only things I know are what I'm texted or whatever Murakumo and Yomi-, what anyone talks about when they come to visit," before she gestured to the window again. She then pointed to the door and said, "Otherwise, I only go out for groceries…" before asking, "Is there something going on?"

"Yeah…" mumbled the young man as he awkwardly rubbed at the side of his neck, "…though… it'll be a bit more difficult to be the announcer of what's all come about…" before moving his hand to pinch the bridge of his nose, "Honestly, I'm surprised your phone isn't getting bombarded by the newsfeeds…"

"Ah, well…" started Sato as she briefly turned her eyes away to announce, "…feel free to call me an uninformed plebe…" as she finally found the courage to face the boy, "…but I don't really like the news. Too dark, too depressing, and too lacking in cheery things."

Ignoring the faint resonance that he felt in that moment, the young man gave a single nod of agreement and took a long breath as he tried to figure out how to go about announcing to the girl that her parents had been arrested. He looked to the table in the dining area and gestured to one of its chairs, "You may want a seat for this. I don't know how hard this may hit."

"Did anyone get hurt?" asked Sato as her voice restrained the amount of alarm that she was feeling.

"I don't have any details on that," said the young man as he gestured to a chair again, "though I know that only one person was killed…" Just as Sato's eyes went wide, the boy caught himself and extended a palm into the air, "It was some nameless dignitary that the news didn't identify. They didn't show any pictures of him but I don't think it's anyone we know."

Raising a hand up to her mouth to take a deep breath, the girl calmed herself and nodded her head with a mumble, "It's no one we know, it's no one we know…" Once she gave herself a solid nod, "Good," she moved over to the table and took a seat, "Well, uh, did anyone we know get hurt?"

"I can't say for sure," said the young man as he followed and took his own seat across from her, "I've sent Oda a few texts but he hasn't responded yet…" After a few seconds' pause, he closed his eyes and opened him again to say, "What happened was that the dignitaries staged an attack on the relief camp earlier today." He raised a hand, "Again, as far as I know, only the one dignitary was killed while the others were all apprehended…" before lowering it to straightly announce, "But… among them all were… I assume they're both of your parents, what with the names that were released both being Hazuki…"

Sato briefly opened her eyes in surprise, wondering if she'd heard correctly, before they fell and she nodded in comprehension. She turned her head to the side and gazed off to somewhere that couldn't be found within the room before she mumbled, "It was probably them… As far as I can remember, we were the only family with the name Hazuki…" Once she found her mind coming back to reality, she nodded her head once to herself and turned to repeat the gesture to the young man, "Thanks for telling me."

Put off by the lack of a reaction, the boy stared for a second before tilting his head ever so slightly, "Are you going to be alright?"

"I'm fine," said Sato as she scratched the top of her head, "I mean, it's a bit of a shock… don't get me wrong there…" before dropping her hands to the table and tapping her fingers along the wood, "…but it's more-, I only feel a bit shocked because, you know, it's like knowing someone who just got arrested. Beyond that, there isn't really all that much for me to say."

Suddenly, from atop the refrigerator on the far side of the room, there came a quick and welcoming, "Mer!"

The young man looked up and did a doubletake as he found Chomubach staring at him with a curious and tilted head, half of her body still caught inside of an open vent. Sato was the first to stand up and excitedly greet, "Hello, little kitty," before she began to gush up to the hungry feline and made her way to the fridge.

As the girl pulled open the door to forage for food, the young man slowly pointed a finger up to his cat and confusedly asked, "How did-, why is she up there?"

"She uses the vent to come over and beg for food sometimes," answered Sato as she produced some sliced chicken and closed the fridge.

"But…" murmured the young man as awe started to run through him. He paused, put his hands onto his hips, and pondered the situation as he mumbled, "I mean, I've noticed that she disappears somewhere on occasion… but-, and I figured it was here… but…" He then raised both of his hands and stared blankly before announcing, "I checked all of the vents…! How'd she get into that one…!?"

"Did you check the one above your fridge?" asked Sato frankly as she offered chicken to the spoiled cat, who greedily took it and chomped away.

"Yes, I checked it…" responded the young man.

As though she knew his error, Sato turned and asked frankly, "Did you pull on it? Hard?"

Unwilling to acknowledge his error, the young man's mind repressed its memory and quickly pointed up to the cat, "Chomubach, ye been naughty! Vents are dangerous for little brats like you."

As though she were giving him a middle finger, the cat finished the chicken that was offered to her, wiggled her rear, and flicked up her tail as she laid down, "Mer."

Sato then turned to the young man and gleamed to him, "Well, it's not just the vent either. She sometimes comes pawing at the outside windows, walking along that edge out there."

"Chomubach," cried the young man, "that's dangerous!"

"Mer."

Sensing the stubborn nature of his cat, the young man sighed, drearily turned to Sato, and spoke frankly, "Since I'm getting the feeling that she's going to keep trying to do this, would you mind if I put a hole in the wall? I'd rather not have to go catfishing in the vents or mourn a stain on the sidewalk down below."

Sato was about to nod delightedly before she paused and thought to herself about something. Unsure if it was appropriate to bring up such a subject, she slowly raised her hand and weakly muttered, "For Chomubach's safety, I'd have no objection… but that'd let a whole lot more noise through."

The young man stared blankly, "Ah… Am I really that loud?"

"When you're having one of your bed parties…? Yes. Yes, you and everyone else can be."

The young man's face did not go red but he did freeze his body in its entirety before staring at the girl. He then said extremely slowly, "I – am – so – sorry…"

"We both are."

"I'll make sure we keep it down…"

"With how loud Miyabi was in particular… I seriously doubt that."

"Hush… I don't need to know how much you know…"

By that point, the two were no longer looking at each other. The young man was staring down to the floor and Sato had turned her head as far to the side as possible. If an observer were to be nearby and listening closely, the faint sound of their throats croaking in sync with one another would be heard. Seeking to change the subject, Sato eventually quietly commented with a tinge of hoarseness in her voice, "Chomubach left, right? Could I lure him back with some chicken?"

"No, she's gone and I don't want her going through the vents anymore than she already does," answered the young man in a mirrored tone. Then, just as he realized something that he hadn't thought about, his eyes lit up and he turned to Sato with a brow quirked up, "Hold up, how do you have a budget for chicken if you never leave this place?" As a few potential answers came to mind, he then leaned back on the balls of his feet while relaxedly crossing his arms, "What, did you have some savings in the bank or something?"

"Nope," answered Sato frankly before raising a finger to answer, "When I ran out of food the first time, I contacted Oda."

The young man held his relaxed position for just a second before blinking and leaning forward to speak in a hushed but rough tone, "Pardon?"

"I asked Oda," repeated Sato with a shrug of her shoulders, "I mean, I had to argue a bit but he ultimately relented because I'm in witness protection." Sensing a coming change in atmosphere, Sato then tried to end her statement off on a joke, "I mean, we can't really go out and get jobs, right?"

Unfortunately for her, the young man's eyes had eventually shifted straight onto hers and proceeded to burn a hole through her head. They were so narrow and fearsome that Sato had to take a few steps back while sputtering a few words of caution both to him and to herself. However, when it came time to vent his anger, the young man simply hunkered his head down and muttered, "I need to think of these things first one day…"

Sato blinked a few times, still leaning away from the bomb in the room, before she edged a foot forward, thought about how to change the subject, and innocently asked, "So… while we wait to put a hole in the wall… perhaps I could come over and visit…? We could play games-," before she was cut off by the young man turning to glare at her. She paused for a second before scratching her ear to say, "…Or I could just play with Chomubach so that she doesn't feel the need to go through the vents anymore…?"

"I'd be more accepting of that idea if it didn't require me to see you," uttered the young man before he turned to the door, "Play with Chomubach another time…" as his frustration stemmed from what he'd learned a few moments ago and was compounded by everything that occurred between them in the past.

Sato sucked in a quick breath and inaudibly stuttered a sentence before scratching her head. She started to ask, "Look, if he's not covering your food, we can give Oda a call-," but was immediately interrupted.

"I'll handle it," jabbed the young man as he paused midstep, "There's no 'we' when it comes to you and I."

The girl didn't back down, "It doesn't have to be that way though."

"Sure, it doesn't have to be," said the young man in a high voice that mocked Sato's before he spoke frankly, "but I want it to be that way." He fully turned to face her and made an X with his arms, "I want no involvement with you," before throwing them down, "I'm happy to be civil while you talk with anyone else and I'm fine with letting Chomubach come over through a hole in the wall or whatever we do with that situation." He then took a loud stomp forward and hissed, "But I have no desire, at all, to even be near you… I only came here today because I felt some stupid principle beckoning me to check on you."

Fed up with the hostile treatment that she'd been receiving from the young man both that day and other times in the past, Sato briefly threw her arms up before hovering her palms close together pleadingly, "What is it? Just tell me what you're mad about and tell me what I can do. I don't want to be your enemy… especially with all that's been going on and likely to continue going on."

The young man snorted with disdain before shaking his head in disbelief to repeat, "What is it?" as his eyes scrunched up. With a showy wiggle of his torso, he then said with mocking cheer, "Well, let's have a look in the manual, shall we?" Then, as though he had an invisible book in his hands, he maneuvered his arms in the same way one would flip pages, "Let's see… it has to be here somewhere…" before poking his finger downward with a sneer, "Ah, here it is. Page one: trying to kill me for some reason that I still don't quite understand. Yep, that'll do it."

Knowing the full gravity of her past actions, Sato recoiled a bit and closed her eyes. After a couple of nods, she said, "Alright… yeah, I can understand that…" She then began to say, "But, look, I've apologized-," before her voice was interrupted by a roar.

"Whoop-de-doo! You've apologized! That changes nothing!" The young man raised a finger to her and took a few aggressive steps forward, "You can't just try and kill me, for money nonetheless, and think that I'm going to be so forgiving!" He threw his hand in the air, "It'd be like dragging me into an alley, cracking my skull open, and acting like the victim-," before he covered his mouth and quietly uttered, "Oh, I'm sorry…" before booming, "You've already done that!"

"Well, what can I do!?" shouted back Sato as she held her ground, "What did everyone else do once they were done trying to kill you!? What did they do to make you forgive them so much that you're actually dating, like, seven of them!?"

"Nice deflection," rumbled the young man before he held up a flattened palm, "There's some key differences between your situation and theirs. I showed up with the intention of provoking them and they were the ones who bridged the gap in the middle of the fighting." He then held up his other palm, "You, on the other hand, came to me when I was already bruised up and attempted to kill me once, twice, and potentially a third time during that battle with the Yōma… and after all of that, it was me that had to take the opportunity to talk with you… to make you join our side or whatever you want to call it. All the while, I still don't rightly understand why you were trying to kill me in the first place."

Sato pressed her lips together and closed her eyes before taking a breath and trying to answer, "If a dignitary manages to kill an infiltrator… they're reward with a large sum-," but was cut off again.

"A large sum of money," finished the young man before he flapped his hand up and down, "Yeah-yeah-yeah-yeah-yeah, I know that. But why did you need the money?" He tilted his head to one side, "Did you have a sick relative who needed that money?" and then to the other, "Perhaps you had some kind of debt to pay?" before going back to the other, "Was there a struggling charity trying to help some poor crippled child suffering from cancer or some other terminal illness?" He finally clapped his hands frustratedly, "What – was – it!?"

Fearing the response that she was going to get with an honest answer, Sato turned her head to the side and weakly mumbled, "I… was going to… I wanted to leave my parents' house… to move out into some tiny, cramped apartment and be done with them and the dignitaries for however long the reward could last…"

For a moment, complete and utter disbelief ran through the young man's features. He wondered if the girl before him had so little value for human life that she would kill just so that she could live in a different place. Then, figuring that there must have been some other circumstance that he wasn't seeing, he held his tongue. He nodded his head a few times, "Alright, alright," and put his hands onto his hips, "I think I can guess the other details…" before looking Sato in the eye, "Were your parents… bad people…? Did they… shout at you…? Hit you…? Maybe both…? Something worse…?" When Sato didn't answer him, he asked her plainly, "What was it about your home that made you so desperate as to kill someone in order to try and get out…?"

Earnestly wishing that she had some kind of heartbreaking backstory to offer, Sato remained silently and hardened herself up for the coming verbal lashing that she was going to take. She then faced the young man and answered slowly with as much of an honest voice as she could muster, "It wasn't anything like that…" She parted her lips to continue before clinging to her resolve and finishing, "At the time, I just… didn't feel like I was living with a family. We ignored each other, any attempt to start conversation would result in one-word answers… It wasn't… at all what… I wanted…" She had to refrain from turning her head away as the young man's blank eyes remained on her, "So… I heard a quote some time ago that… basically said that it'd be better to live alone than with poor company…"

The young man continued to lean his head forward, expecting more of a story with a dramatic twist that suddenly raised the stakes, but he was met with complete silence. He spread his hands to gesture to the girl, "And…? What else happened?"

With her courage as high as it could go, Sato answered frankly, "Aside from not wanting to be a part of the dignitaries anymore, there's nothing else."

Staring for a few seconds longer, the young man then clenched his eyes closed and thought that his heart had stopped beating for a second. He paced into the dining area with a dizzy wobble before all of the anger rushed into him like a bullet train. Unable to control himself for a second, he launched one of his hands down to the table and smacked his knuckles into it extremely hard. While it would hurt and bruise his knuckles, all of the pain he felt in that moment only grew his rage even more and he soon gripped the underside of the table with both hands and proceeded flip it over with all of the strength that he had in him. Sato darted back a few steps as all of the furniture toppled over with a loud and frightening crash. When she dared to look at the young man after the fact, she found his eyes burning with the fires of hell as he faced her. The boy was huffing and puffing as he tried to restrain himself from doing or saying anything drastic but found himself unable to keep it all in, "MOMMY AND DADDY WEREN'T VERY ATTENTIVE TO YOU! THE DIGNITARIES WEREN'T A VERY NICE ORGANIZATION! SO WHAT BETTER WAY TO RESOLVE THOSE ISSUES THAN TO TRY AND KILL ME!" As he finished his sentence, he kicked over one of the few chairs that remained standing and didn't flinch as some of the wood cracked from the crash into the ground.

Sato had already flinched her head away at that point, "That's bad-," but wasn't allowed another second.

"IT'S ATROCIOUS!" roared the young man with a stomp. His foot thundered into the floor a few times more, "IT IS ABSOLUTELY DISGUSTING!" before holding his head with both of his hands, "FOR THE SAKE OF HEAVEN AND EARTH," and locking his eyes onto the girl harshly, "AT LEAST-, AT THE VERY LEAST, TELL ME THAT YOUR LIFE OR SOMEONE ELSE'S LIFE WAS IN DANGER!" By that point, Sato couldn't even speak as she feared the boy was going to physically attack her. When she didn't offer a word, the young man hissed as his throat cracked in two, "…ANYTHING AT ALL…!?"

Shivering as she didn't know what was going to happen next, Sato stared at him and shook her head, "…Nothing…"

The young man covered his eyes and wiped the coming sweat off of his face as he regained what composure he could knab. His breaths were long and hot as his anger kept trying to desperately claw its way out. But fortunately for both of the teenagers, he held on for a few seconds and held his breath to count to himself. When he believed that he could speak without raising his voice, his hoarse voice came out as a whisper, "Of all the people I know, the amount of frustration that you've caused me is the one to actually match my brother, Haruo." Unsure of how to respond to that, Sato remained silent as he continued and paced around the apartment, "People like you two… you think you're the center of your own little world… Your actions don't have significant repercussions on any of the other billions of people on the planet… No, we're all just side characters to your own tragic story… Your every action is justified in some way and your every word carries the weight of the world… so much so that we should all just forgive you when you've tried to kill us for the wrong reasons." He then crossed his arms as a sour smile came onto his face and sneered, "You know, I've wanted to leave the infiltrators for a while now… For about five to six years, actually…"

Sato blinked, feeling the heated aura behind his smile, and didn't dare to meet his eyes as she answered, "I… didn't know that… No, actually, I think Murakumo mentioned that at one point…"

"I don't expect you to care much," said the young man as he craned his head toward her, "especially since both of your wishes have been fulfilled." He held up one finger, "You're no longer living with your absentee parents," and then another, "and you're out of the dignitaries…" His hands came together to mockingly applaud her, "Congratulations. You've accomplished what I've been trying to do for years in just a couple of weeks or whatever… You win." He then paused midstep and stopped his pacing to say, "In fact, you've achieved the impossible. You've accomplished your goals, got a free apartment with free meals, and a cat to come and play with you… all by being a complete and utter screwup."

When he realized that Sato wasn't looking at him anymore, the young man clapped his hands a few times, "No, no… you're going to listen to this…" before pointing an accusatory finger at her, "You failed to kill me once, you failed to kill me twice… and then you were probably plotting to kill me a third time, that or you just resigned yourself to fate…" After a few hot and angry breaths were vented through his nose, the young man pounded his fist into the empty air, "Yet, it was by the pleas of Murakumo, the mercy of Oda and the rest of the shinobi, and Miki's help with coordination that got you to the end goal." With a shake of his head, the young man stated, "No, seriously, congratulations for being such a complete and utter waste of space…! So much so that your enemies had to throw the match and allow you to switch teams at the last possible second!" Unable to hold back for a second, the young man shouted, "Congratulations, you've got about the same luck as my brother!"

By that point, Sato was looking him right in the face. But as she felt tears well up in the corners of her eyes, her focus did not fall on the young man's fiery mocking of her. Rather, her focus fell onto the fact that he was crying by that point himself. Though his enraged voice carried on as tough as steel, his dribbling red eyes and locked jaw conveyed the sorrow that he was feeling. Feeling as though his yelling was over, the girl took a few cautious steps forward and extended a hand toward his shoulder before it was suddenly smacked away.

Becoming aware of his expression, the young man tightened his mouth and wiped his eyes while shaking his head. He mouthed a few words that came out inaudibly, took a breath, and repeated them with a clear throat, "You keep the hell away from me…" He sucked in a breath, steadied himself, and wiped his hands over his face again. He repeated quietly, "…keep the hell away…" before locking his gaze on Sato, "You don't get to comfort yourself by sympathizing with me… I will not let you have that." Clenching his teeth again, he hissed, "Unlike you-," before his throat choked up and he had to stop. Once he could speak again, the young man growled, "Unlike you, I've been working to get away from the infiltrators… without trying to kill anyone, mind you, because I actually know the value of life." He crossed his arms and clasped onto the insides of his elbows as a mix of the utmost fury and sadness wracked his voice, "I've worked for years to break away while keeping to every good principle I ever believed in…"

There was a brief pause and Sato dared to open her mouth while bobbing her head up and down in affirmation to his statement, "You've worked hard. Much harder than me."

"Damn right, harder than you," jabbed the young man in a loud voice before he clenched his eyes closed, "Years and years…" before opening them and targeting his gaze right into Sato's, "…and it only took a single action of someone who is supposed to… protect me-, isn't that what older brothers do?" The young man's voice croaked and his nose repeatedly flared with quick breaths as he started to ask, "Aren't… brothers and sisters-," before he caught himself and continued his initial thought, "It took a single action, throwing me under the bus in the face of his consequences for screwing around with shinobi… It took only that to ruin it all…" Moving one of his hands to cover his mouth, the young man began to shake his head, "…And it's not like it ends here… It's not like I can actually look forward to a peaceful life once all of the corrections are done here… As much as I tell myself that I'm going to be free once this is all over." He then threw his hand away and defeatedly added, "Those years spent trying to get out? Those were dedicated to not only convincing every single infiltrator cell that I was not only going to keep quiet about them all… but also arguing that I would be a useless infiltrator anyways… That there'd be no point in keeping me around because I'd be a drain on resources… Good luck to me if I ever try to argue that point ever again, with how many shinobi my family will boast that I've corrected… and they will boast… Anything at all if it means that I won't leave."

Having exhausted himself, the young man's voice could continue no further without cracking into silence. He could only look to Sato and stare at her with all of the scorn that he could muster. His head shook, his mouth opened and closed, and another sentence seemed to dance along his lips. But instead of going off on another tirade of rage, he weakly waved his hand and said, "And then along came you, on top of all that crap and the other bits of drama that I've gotten wrapped into… Because of you, a domino effect started that shook the dignitary beehive…" His face then tightened and he pressed his head forward, "And you get to just… sit on your ass all day, having your meals paid for without any need to worry… You sit on your ass all day and you're staring at me with that pitiful look in your eye, like you have any right to feel bad… All of this because you did everything wrong…" He then finished bitterly, "You're the wretched embodiment of what's wrong with the world… because, even after everything, I'm the one who's still cleaning up Haruo's mess, both through corrections and through insufferable process I need to do in less than two weeks, while you two get to kick back and relax."

Having vented all that he'd ever wanted to say, the young man spun on his heel and stomped to the door while wiping at his eyes and cheeks. At the same time, Sato could only hang her head and wonder if there was anything that she was supposed to say to all of that. But despite however much anger and prejudice poisoned the young man's view of her, everything had otherwise hit the nail on the head.

When the young man made his way through the door and slammed it shut behind him, he ran the fingers of both his hands over his eyes. When he opened them and blinked until his vision was clear, he turned to the side to find that both Yumi and Miyabi were sitting on the hallway floor in wait. From all that could be guessed by him, they intended to either check in on him after the news of what'd happened earlier that day at the relief camp or, if they were unaware of that, they were simply going to surprise him with another eventful night. Either way, the young man could only take an exhausted breath before shaking his head. He then greeted the two, "Hey."

They wordlessly looked up to him before standing up and approaching side by side. Once they were in reach of the young man, they both eased their hands forward and began to wrap him in a hug while watching for any sign of objection. When they received none, they moved a bit quicker and tightened their hold around the boy, who was thumping his hands against their backs in hopes of convincing them that he was fine. But he knew that they'd see through that easier than clear glass and, not wanting to discuss all that'd occurred in that moment, he pulled away and said to them, "I'm… going inside the apartment." His eyes guiltily danced around before he offered, "You're free to come in, I know it takes some time to get here… but I'd like to be left alone for tonight."

"We'll come in," whispered Yumi before she turned to Miyabi for confirmation, who nodded in response. The younger girl then spoke in as gentle a voice as she possibly could, "If you need to talk or if you simply want either or both of us to be there, just let us know…"

"I will," said the young man as he moved around them and to his apartment door. Before he could reach the knob, a different thought occurred to his mind and some weight settled onto his shoulders. He then turned around and spoke frankly to both women, "I'm not sure how much you both heard… but… don't let however angry I am at my situation let you feel like I regret meeting all of you and, you know, getting together."

"We wouldn't think that," said Miyabi as she began to follow after the young man, "It's… it's only the circumstances around how we met…"

"It's just that alone," affirmed the young man with a nod before shrugging his shoulders up, "Well, that and all of the salt that's been burning the wound all this time…"

He then retreated into the apartment with both girls following behind him. While they would sit around in hopes of seeing the boy and being of some kind of comfort after having gotten all that he had off of his chest, the young man laid down in his room and wondered about the existence of things like God, karma, and the spiritual state of his mind. Having confronted the parallels between him and Sato head on and having vented them all out, he could only feel as though there was nothing in the world that actively rewarded just and principled people. No, rather, it felt as though the world he lived in was just one bent by wicked lawlessness… Perhaps he was just being a bratty child when he thought those things… but that was how it all felt when he looked at the grand scheme of things.