Now we are on Chapter 5 of Father Thy Blood! Recap: Ryoken was shocked that Spectre is sending him to a mental hospital all because his ghost father is in his mind. So Ryoken went for some air, but in his pajamas. He then later meets with Kanata again and she notices Ryoken's pajamas and reminds him about all of the mix ups he did when he was a kid, which made Ryoken embarrassed a lot. Then Kanata gives him a flower crown made out of bluebells, which are Ryoken's favorite flowers, and she got them from the flower field that she and Ryoken go to when they were kids, and Ryoken reminisce his childhood of him and Kanata laying down at the flower field and get excited about the world. Sound familiar people? After their little conversation, Kanata leaves and Ryoken went back home and Spectre asked him about the flower crown on his head. This chapter will be Ryoken going to live in the mental hospital at the Den City Hospital so that he can be cure of seeing his ghost dead father, but it's not going to be easy. Also, new characters will be featured in this chapter. Now, let's start the chapter!
The drive to the hospital wasn't that difficult. What's difficult is that he has to live in an asylum for who knows how long in Ryoken's mind. Spectre tells him it's for his own good. Couldn't he just hire an excorist to get rid of the ghost in his mind?
After a couple of minutes of the drive, they finally arrived at Den City Hospital. Spectre turns off the engine of the car and both he and Ryoken exit the car, and they went inside.
Spectre walks up to the front counter to where a nurse is on the computer typing something. The nurse looked up and looked at him.
"Ryoken Kogami. Here as your new mental hospital patient." He explained to her.
She typed down the name onto the computer and checks his files. "Okay. Patient #40196. Transferring to the mental hospital because he claimed that he is seeing someone who claims to be their father, who died 7 years ago, and nobody but him can see him. Is that correct?"
"Yes ma'am."
Ryoken crossed his arms in annoyance as the nurse types down the computer and Spectre walks up to him.
"I guess I bid you farewell, Ryoken-sama," he said, "I hope you get well very soon." And with that, Spectre leaves the hospital, leaving only just Ryoken. Oh. And his ghost father too.
The nurse got up from the desk and walks up to Ryoken and gives him a boring look. "Please follow me." She then walks away, and Ryoken follows her.
They stopped at the door that says "Mental" and the nurse opens it and they both went inside. Ryoken stops for a moment and looks at all the mental hospital patients who are all staring at him.
A man who looks like he's 21 years old with blonde slick hair and violet blue eyes gives out a smirk, and this smirk isn't a good thing in Ryoken's mind while another man who is kind of around Ryoken's age with brown "Carl Switzer" hair and wears nerdy glasses examines him a bit.
Another man that's probably a year older than Ryoken, probably around 19 or 20, with dark green hair that goes past his shoulders, is laying on a couch and he glares at him and gives out a mean grunt. He doesn't seem like the friendly type in Ryoken's eyes.
"Wow, some guy just enter this dump all of the sudden!" A girl who is somewhere around Ryoken's age with dark purple hair tied up in a ponytail with a red ribbon and bright green eyes said in amazement.
"I think that's the new patient here. Here because he claims he sees his late father, who died 7 years ago." A woman who is probably in her late 20s with long greenish blonde hair that goes down her back and dark blue eyes, has mahogany eye makeup on, and wears a black coat over her mental hospital outfit replied.
Ryoken just recently got here and these messed up people are already talking about him.
"Hey, Kogami," the nurse called out to him, which made him turn his head to look at her, "are you coming, or are you just going to stand there?"
Ryoken follows to where the nurse is going. They both stopped at a door. The nurse writes on a plaque with Ryoken's name on it. "This will be your room," she explained to him, "I also put your new clothes on the bed."
Ryoken looks inside his mental hospital room and sees a blue shirt and blue pants that are similar to the outfits those nut-cases are wearing now on the bed. "What? No straitjacket?"
"This is a mental hospital, not an asylum."
"That's basically the same thing…"
The nurse rolls her eyes in annoyance and then leaves.
Ryoken walks into the room he is now going to be living in until his ghost father is gone, he hoped. He took off the clothes he was wearing and puts on the blue mental hospital outfit that is on the bed. Then he puts his pink shirt, his Capri pants, and slip on shoes in the dresser, but leaves the blazer out. Then he leaves his room and heads towards the rec room where all of the patients are still staring at him.
"So you're the patient that claims to see your dead dad, huh?" The blonde slicked haired man said.
Ryoken looks at him for a moment, "I'm not claiming I see him, I really do see him."
"Suuure you are." He doesn't believe him. Of course… "Since you're new here, I think it be a perfect time to introduce ourselves. I'll go first. My name is Katsu Tanaka, but you can call me The King of all the Casinos I've been to!" He gives himself a bow like he's some kind of king, which made Ryoken's eyes roll a bit.
"Tanaka-san is amazing. He even made me his personal assistant," the man with the "Carl Switzer" and nerdy glasses said, "oh, by the way, my name is Osamu Ando. At your service." He lifted his hand to give Ryoken a handshake, which he did a little bit.
"Don't listen to those two, new kid," the woman with the greenish blonde hair and mahogany eye makeup on her eyes told, "Tanaka isn't the 'King of the Casinos', he just has a gambling problem"
"That explains a lot…"
"Just try to ignore him." Tanaka made an annoyed face when she said that. "Names Moriko Hirabayashi. Welcome to mental hospital, kid." She gives Ryoken a grin.
"Ryoken Kogami." He gives Hirabayashi and the other nut-cases a bow of introduction. He feels like he's back in school again, but this isn't a school.
"Nice to meet you," Hirabayashi shakes Ryoken's hand, then she notices a red mark on his right hand, "nice tattoo you got there. The symbols here look kind of cool."
Ryoken looks down at his right hand. He covers the mark with his left hand, "Actually, it's a birthmark."
"Well, it still looks kind of cool."
Just then the girl with dark purple hair tied up in a ponytail with a red ribbon came up to Ryoken close almost to his face, which surprises him. "Hiiiii! I'm Tomone Ohno, but you can call me Tomo for short," she said with just a energetic personality and with a smile on her face, "I hope we can get along just fine!"
"Uh… Sure, I guess…" Ryoken said weirdly as a sweat-drop appeared on his head.
Tomo turns around and faces towards the man with the dark green hair and she has these lovey dovey eyes when she faces him, which kind of made Ryoken confused, "Oh Yuki-senpai! Come over here and introduce yourself to Ryoken!"
He looks up and looks at Ryoken since he is laying on the couch and he look like he doesn't want to. "Why should I? It's just another mental patient just wanting to be cured from whatever disease or problem they have, right?"
"Yeah, but still we should be nice to the new comer. Like how I'm always nice to you?" She gives him a wink.
The man gives Tomo a disgusted look, then he gets up from the couch and walks away.
"Yuki-senpai! Wait!" Tomo starts to go after him.
'What the hell is up with that guy?' He thought to himself in question.
"That guy with the attitude is Nobuyuki Mizushima," Hirabayashi told Ryoken about his name, "it might be best if you just ignore him."
Ryoken gives out a nod. Obviously he's not here to make friends with these nut-cases, he just want to get rid of his ghost father and then go back to the things were.
And then all of the suddenly, the whack jobs starting introducing themselves to Ryoken all at the same time, which is making him overwhelmed, so he rushes away from them to the hallway.
He stops at his room and takes a breather from all that running. Then his ghost father appeared before him.
"You shouldn't have run away from those people, they were just trying to be friendly to you." He told him.
Ryoken gives him an annoying look, 'Those freaks were all over my face. I have to get away from them.' He communicated his ghost father through his thoughts.
"But since you are now at the mental hospital to try to get rid of me, you're also a freak too." He added.
Ryoken looks down at the floor, looking at bit upset and frustrated at the same time. 'This is my new life now?'
Suddenly, he felt someone bump into his back lightly and he heard some kind of gaming sound effects. He turned around and sees some small person playing a video game on a hand-held gaming console and the person didn't even pay attention where they were going.
When the game is finished, the person looks up from the game and looks at Ryoken. The person is just a little kid, somewhere around 10 or 11 years old and it's a girl. She has short light brown hair and almost all of it is covered with a blue winter hat and has green eyes. Her green eyes look similar to Playmaker's.
Ryoken wonder how did a little girl like her even ended up in this asylum in the first place.
"Um… Hi there. My name is Ryoken Kogami," he introduce himself to the little girl kind of awkwardly, "what's your name?"
The girl doesn't say anything or even tells him her name. She just stares at him the whole time. Then after what has been like 10 minutes, she looked down at her gaming console, started a new game, and walked away from him.
Ryoken just stood there dumbstruck when the girl walked away from him. "Was it something I said?" He just shrugs a bit and walks inside his room and lays on the bed for a bit until lunch time.
Ryoken did his best to avoid these nut-cases and went up to the counter where a woman in her middle age and has a big nose, has dark red hair tied in a bun, and is wearing a long blue dress with a apron tied on it and is wearing a chef's hat on her head.
"Oi! New patient! I hope you enjoy Chef Opal's famous veggie mush!" She uses the kitchen handle to fill up some yucky mushy… food?
Ryoken looked really disgusted really this. He even feels like throwing up a bit. "Don't you have something edible?"
"In the old country, this is edible!" She lifts down the kitchen handle and the veggie mush is poured into the bowl. Some of it splattered on Ryoken's face.
Ryoken groaned and he walked away from the counter. He looked around to see if there is an empty table where he could just sit alone, but they were all full of people. He might as well eat in his room.
"Hey, kid. Over here." Ryoken turns his head towards a table and sees Hirabayashi waving her hand. He then sighs in defeat. 'I have no other choice, do I?' He walks over to the table where Hirabayashi is sitting, and he sits down.
"You got a little something on your face." She pointed it out.
"Yeah. I know," Ryoken grabs a napkin and wipes Chef Opal's "veggie mush" off of his face, "I'm not eating this slop. Veggie mush is just gross…"
"Then you should probably avoid Chef Opal's meat smoothie or her mushroom surprise dish." Hirabayashi commented, which made Ryoken stick his tongue out in disgust.
Hirabayashi looks around for a bit, then pulls something out of her black coat. It was a lighter and a cigarette. She puts the cigarette in her mouth, then lights up her lighter, puts the flame on the cigarette and she takes a puff out of it.
Ryoken was kind of surprised that Hirabayashi is a smoker, especially since she is in a mental hospital. He remembered when he was a kid, he saw Dr. Taki smoking too, but she quit smoking because he was the one who told her that smoking was bad for her, only because he watch something about smoking in health class.
Hirabayashi notices Ryoken staring at her. She pulls out another cigarette from the box. "You wanna take one?" She asked, offering him to smoke with her.
"No thank you," he declined politely, "smoking isn't very good for your lungs."
"Suit yourself, kid." She takes another puff from her cigarette.
Ryoken looks at one of the tables and sees the girl playing her gaming console, all alone.
His ghost father appears next to him as he obverses his son looking at the girl. "You seem to take interest in that little girl."
Ryoken's eyebrows knotted in annoyance. 'I'm not taking interest in some kid. I'm just a little concern about her sitting at the table by herself.'
Hirabayashi noticed the look on Ryoken's face. "What's up with you?"
Ryoken looked at Hirabayashi in surprised when she asked that. "Oh. Um… I was just kind of curious about that girl sitting alone at that table." He told her, trying to avoid speaking with his ghost father through his thoughts.
"Tomo? She's not alone. She's sitting with Mizushima." She shows Ryoken to where Tomo is sitting and she is right. Tomo is indeed sitting with Mizushima. She is trying to feed him the veggie mush like some couples do whenever they are dating, but Mizushima looks like he's trying to avoid it and Tomo.
"No. I'm not talking about Ohno-san," he said, "I'm talking about that girl with the blue hat." He points to the girl with the blue hat to Hirabayashi as soon as he said those words.
Hirabayashi looks at the girl with the blue hat for a moment, and then turns back to Ryoken, "That's Chika Etsuko," she explained to him, "probably one of the youngest people to enter a mental hospital." She turns back to look at Chika and lifts her hand and waves it a bit. "Hey! Chika! Come over here!"
Chika looks up from the gaming console screen and looks at Hirabayashi. She gets up from the table she was sitting at and moves over to where Hirabayashi and Ryoken are sitting at right now, and she sits next to Hirabayashi.
"Chika, this is Ryoken Kogami," she explained to Chika, "he is the new patient at the mental hospital who claims he can see his dead father."
His eyebrows knotted when she said that. "Again, I'm not claiming that I can see him, I do see him."
Chika looks at Ryoken for a moment, then she looks down at her gaming console and plays on it.
"Oh Chika…" Hirabayashi sighs in a upset tone.
"Does… she hate me?" Ryoken asked. He already has Soulburner hating his guts because of the Lost Incident and what happened in Mirror Link VRAINS, he can't have a 10 or 11 year old hate him too all of the sudden, she doesn't even know that he's Revolver, Leader of the Knights of Hanoi. Wait… Does she even have a Link VRAINS account?
"Nah. She's been like this for probably 5 years now," she said, looking a bit sad, "her mom committed suicide."
Ryoken's eyes widen in shock when she said that. Suicide. It's a horrible word that he can think of.
"Her mom was pregnant during high school," she continued on, "and no, it wasn't Chika. She was pregnant with her brother, or half-brother. Her parents, Chika's grandparents, kicked her out of her house when she told them that she was pregnant, and then her boyfriend, her first kid's father, dumped her when she told him. Chika's dad took her in into his apartment he is living in. Then 6 years later, Chika was born, but 3 months after Chika was born, her half-brother disappeared all of the sudden."
Ryoken listens very careful to Hirabayashi as she tells him Chika's story. He might have this feeling who Chika's long lost half-brother is, but it's too soon to confirm it yet. Hirabayashi continues on though.
"6 months later, her half-brother was found and was send to the hospital, but wasn't the same after that. Her mom usually sends him to therapy to help him out and he feels a bit better. But by the time Chika turned probably 5 or 6 years old, she has been acting weird. She keeps staring up the light on the ceiling, rocking back and forth, doesn't like to be touched by someone, and not looking at her parents and her half-brother. Her dad thought she has some kind of mental illness, so he send her to the mental hospital. Her mom was so heartbreak that he did that that she went into a deep depression. Then later, she hung herself to death. Her body was found by her half-brother. Her father left town so he couldn't be asked questions, leaving Chika's half-brother all alone in the apartment. I saw the news myself, so did Chika. She got a bit upset when she heard the news that she never got to speak again."
Ryoken seemed to be a little sad after listening to that story. Chika loves her mother so much for as long as she can remember, but she ended up losing her. He kind of feels the same way he felt when his father died. "That… that kind of sucks…"
"Yeah. I wish I know who her half-brother is, but she won't say. Hell, she's been here for 5 years, she's probably forgotten she even has a half-brother."
Ryoken looks at Chika, who is still playing on her gaming console. She wasn't even paying attention to their conversation. And also, Chika's behavior that Hirabayashi mentioned, he also has this feeling what this behavior is.
Nighttime rolled over and almost all of these nut-cases are now asleep. The only people who are still up are Ryoken, Hirabayashi, and Chika.
Ryoken was supposed to be watching Stardust Road tonight at his home, but since he is now living in the mental hospital until his ghost father is gone, he can't even watch it.
"Enjoying some stargazing?" Hirabayashi asked.
Ryoken turns to look at her. "Nah. I was supposed to be looking out to Stardust Road tonight, but here I am…"
"A road that's made out of stardust? Are you sure you're only here because of you seeing your dad?" She asked, thinking that Stardust Road is just a road made out of stardust.
"No. It's where the planktons glow in the ocean very bright. It's really beautiful out there," he explained, "I used to watch it with my father when I was young, but… he's not here anymore…"
"Sorry."
"Hey, Hirabayashi-san, how did you ended up in the mental hospital?" He's curious about her mental health problem and what it is. And she better not say that she is from the future to save humanity…
"Been abused by my ex-boyfriend," she explained, "couldn't take it anymore, so I call the cops on him, and they send me here to help me recover. Been here for probably 6 or 7 years."
Ryoken made a sad face when she said that to him. "Sorry I asked…"
"It's fine. He was an asshole in the beginning, so I'm glad I ratted him out."
'I guess Hirabayashi-san doesn't feel guilty on calling the police on his ex-boyfriend,' he thought to himself, 'I wish I can be like her when I call the police on my father 10 years ago…'
Sometimes he wishes that he didn't call the police on his father and he wouldn't have the virus inside of him, even if it was the Light Ignis, and his ghost wouldn't be inside his mind, but he didn't call the police, then those 6 victims wouldn't have survived. Either way, he would still regret everything.
He notices Chika yawning a bit, even when she is playing her gaming console.
"Looks like someone is ready for bed." Hirabayashi commented.
Chika rubs her eyes for a bit, meaning she is very tired.
"Come on, let's get you to bed. And don't stay up all night playing video games." Hirabayashi picks up Chika and carries her over her shoulder, then she turns to look at Ryoken and gives him a small smirk. "See you tomorrow, kid." And with that, she went to the hallway to Chika's room.
Even though she is too busy playing on her gaming console, Chika raises her hand up as a signal of saying good night.
Ryoken smiles a bit and then he went to his room, got into bed, and fall asleep as tomorrow will be his second day in this… new mental hospital life.
And that concludes the 5th chapter of Father Thy Blood. And we were all introduced to a lot of new characters in this chapter. As for Chika's half-brother, you are all probably wondering who that is. Well, I'm not going to tell you. You all are just going to figure that out yourselves. Anyway, please comment on what you think of this chapter and I hope to see you all soon in the next chapter!