Merry Christmas Everybody.
This chapter contains a revelation which will play an important role in the story.
I'm sorry for the delay, I try to balance between my fanfics that I have in progress, unfortunately I'm late in updating my stories.
Chapter 08: Deeper.
At one point, Ichiyo had disconnected from reality because her situation had become unbearable, she had been receiving beatings from the mayor for a while now, who apparently had decided to empty his anger at Mori onto her. She was in pain, too much pain, even extremely pain, which is why she began to wish that the man would shorten her suffering. Death had become an enviable option for her because it would at least allow her to escape, it was the only solution or rather the only door open for her to get out.
But suddenly she felt like there had been a change of mood, the mayor had stopped hitting her which was a respite for her and it allowed her to recover a bit. She could hear that there was a discussion going on but she couldn't discern well because of her ringing ears. She shook her head to try to shake off the dizziness because the panic gripped her tormented heart even more, the discussion she heard had turned into screams, it sounded like the mayor's voice, he seemed to be crying. .
A glimmer of hope lit in her and she looked up to see what was going on, her eyesight was blurry and the darkness around her didn't help, she began to believe that she might have gone blind, she received so many hits on her head that it probably damaged the function of her eyesight, but that guess was promptly dispelled when she saw a figure approaching her, it was the black shadow she had seen before passing out the day she jumped from the third floor. It was the devil or rather Akutagawa.
He stopped in front of her, apparently looking at her in silence. Ichiyo felt ashamed because of her pathetic state, she had screwed up her mission and ended up being saved by Akutagawa once again. She wanted to be able to see him more clearly so that she could know the expression on his face. Was he disgusted with her? Or angry? Or disappointed? He probably had a deep frown that decorated his face as usual.
"You are alive." She heard Akutagawa's deep voice like a distant echo because her hearing was not yet restored.
She couldn't understand if he was surprised to see her alive, maybe he expected to find his puppet worn out?
Why did she feel hurt?
He disappeared from her sight quickly as he appeared, it was as if she had hallucinated his presence. Doubt stung her chest, she may have been unconscious and imagined Akutagawa had come to save her. She didn't have time to linger in her new thoughts because she felt the bonds that bound her to the chair loosen.
Painfully, she released her hands and brought them back to her face, it couldn't be an imagination because the pain she was feeling was very real. She looked up again and found Akutagawa in front of her.
"I've been trapped," She said what tormented her mind the most. "He knows who I am and who sent me." She kept straining to speak despite the burning in her throat and the taste of blood flooding her mouth.
"I know." He replied with his cold voice which showed her that he didn't have any empathy for her.
She was just a fucking puppet to him after all.
"Since when?" She roared, feeling betrayed. "How long have you known he knew about me?" She insisted when he didn't answer. "Is it before you send me to kill him or after?"
"Before," Akutagawa growled after a long moment of suspense. "You were just a lure, the real purpose of this mission is to find the traitor in our ranks."
"So I'm a bait," She started to laugh despite the pain she felt doing so. "Hope you managed to find the traitor," She added sarcastically. "At least I would have served this noble cause by playing the role of a punching bag."
"We found the traitor through your sacrifice," He remarked, using a sarcastic tone in turn, that was the first time Ichiyo had heard him speak that way. "And now are you going to finish your mission?"
"What?!" She exclaimed upon hearing the man's last statement.
"Are you going to finish your mission." He rehearsed more seriously than before.
"What! Mission!?" Ichiyo asked as fear washed over her again. "Do you want me to die so that I sacrifice myself in the true sense of the word?"
"You have a mission, "He spat, obviously his usual foul mood had gotten the better of him. "You have to kill the mayor."
"I was going to do it before he drugs me and ties me here to torture me," She clarified, speaking harshly because she had decided not to submit anymore, maybe receiving a series of blows to the head made her lose her mind. "See, I didn't have a weapon or a free hand to attack him and he also had bodyguards."
After her last statement, Ichiyo wondered where the mayor was? She had been arguing with Akutagawa for a while, completely forgetting what happened before the man arrived. Now that her eyes have returned, she could see the scene behind Akutagawa's back, there were three new characters who joined the game and two who left. The two mountains of muscle that accompanied the mayor were sprawled on the ground, lying in a pool of blood. The mayor and the white-haired man named Ace were kneeling on the ground surrounded by the three new armed figures. An old man who had a Victorian era style with his monocle over his right eye and his classic outfit, a young man with red hair who had a bandage on his nose and another boy with long black hair who had a white mask that covered half of his face.
"You still want me to kill him." Ichiyo turned her eyes to Akutagawa when realization hit her.
He didn't respond verbally, he handed her a dagger identical to the one she had before.
She accepted the dagger and looked at it, losing herself in her mind. After everything the mayor had done to her, her urge to kill him had reached a very high point, now she had at least one personal reason for committing the murder, it wasn't for The Port Mafia or Akutagawa, it was for herself. She had turned to the dark side without realizing it and she had come to a point of no return, she had let the devil inside her wake up.
Killing had become normal for her, in fact everything that was taboo for her had become normal because she moved to the underworld, she was no longer an ordinary woman, she was a criminal.
Forcing herself to stand up despite the uneasiness that overwhelmed her. Her mind was lost in darkness as she was literally surrounded by darkness. She watched Akutagawa walk over to the others, telling them something she couldn't hear but she understood right after what it was. The red haired boy pulled Ace by his shirt before starting to drag him out, the other two following closely behind, leaving the mayor behind.
Ichiyo struggled to walk towards Aktagawa, standing over the mayor who was still on his knees on the ground. Without him telling her, she realized that Akutagawa expected her to kill the man and that is what she was determined to do. She squeezed the dagger to feel more confident.
The tables turned once again, she was the predator again and she liked it, it was like a rebirth because a while ago, she was ready to die at the hands of the man who was at her feet right now. She looked down on the mayor as he did with her except that unlike her, he was still smiling and it made her want to wipe the smile off his damn face even more.
"You will kill me." He spoke calmly, as if the subject was trivial to him.
She looked at him with incomprehension, how could he be so calm when he was about to die?
"Go on, do what your master orders you," The mayor looked to Akutagawa, his smile widening. "This girl is not part of your world, if you keep pushing her like that she will turn on you."
It was weird to see Akutagawa lose his temper, hitting the mayor with a kick in the face.
"As you did yourself," The mayor continued to speak even after receiving a knock. "You caused the loss of your own master."
"Kill him." Akutagawa roared, turning to her.
Ichiyo couldn't understand anything anymore, she was confused by the mayor's words and Akutagawa's behavior. She froze in her place because she couldn't move.
"Kill him." He repeated more firmly, his voice was ominous and threatening, he had clearly lost his patience.
"You don't need to kill me," The mayor spoke to her now, she noticed that his confidence had weakened a bit. "Let him do the dirty work himself."
Ichiyo's brain started to heat up as she thought too much, which is why she decided to stop her train of thought and clear her mind, letting her body handle the rest. She put to work her last few days training, with a quick movement, she leaned over the mayor who probably hadn't expected her to slit his throat because he hadn't struggled. She watched the blood flow from the crack she created in the man's neck.
The mayor was in shock, he tried to say something but incomprehensible sounds came out of his mouth. He squeezed his throat with both hands in the hopes of stopping the bleeding, which was pointless because he continued to bleed as though. After a moment that seemed to be endless for Ichiyo, he fell back, his eyes glassy dull.
This was the end of her first mission, she had killed the mayor of Yokohama before the deadline ran out and with the dagger, so she had officially entered The Port Mafia. Ichiyo Higuchi was a member of a criminal organization, she was a criminal.
She turned her eyes to Akutagawa who was staring at the mayor's body with hatred, he still hadn't calmed down even after the cause of his anger had left the living world.
"What do we do now?" She couldn't help asking him this question because she was confused and didn't know what to do next.
Akutagawa turned his gaze to her, his gray eyes gleaming in the darkness.
"What do you want your puppet to do now?" She provoked him to make him talk, it was crazy but her experience with the mayor marked her a lot, now she even had the courage to face Akutagawa.
"I want you to shut up," He growled as he narrowed the space between them. "Don't forget that you owe me your miserable life."
"I know," She spoke despite the terror that made her heart tremble, the man in front of her intimidated her so much that she was even more afraid now than when she was being hit by the mayor. "My life is yours, so give me an order." She looked him straight in the eye with determination.
He grabbed her by the back of the neck and brought her face closer to his, making sure she couldn't escape his terrifying gaze.
It was silly but what invaded Ichiyo's mind was her current pathetic appearance, without even looking in the mirror, she knew she was a total mess, her face was starting to swell after all the beatings she received and the blood had painted her skin, not to mention that the makeup had probably melted which was not going to fix her facade.
"Your life is mine," He hissed with a hoarse voice that came from the depths of his being. "You're mine."
Ichiyo nodded because her treacherous voice didn't want to come out of her throat. It was as if she had a demon in front of her, a demon that was about to swallow her soul or maybe he already swallowed it because she felt empty.
After a moment of endless gaze Akutagawa let go of his grip on the back of her neck and walked away from her.
"Let's go." He said as he started to walk in the opposite direction to Ichiyo.
Automatically, she followed him like a good trained dog because that is what she was to him, a slave.
