Bungo Stray Dogs - Volume 5 Chapter 2 Part 4

2—4

A single car sped wildly down the streets that night in the empty city frozen in time. Every time they turned a corner, the car would let out an ear- piercing screech and violently shake. Maybe it was because they were pushing the car’s speed to the limit. Be that as it may, Kyouka didn’t slow down for even a second. Sitting in the passenger seat was Kunikida, applying pressure to the wound on his left side.
“Kunikida,” started Atsushi from the back seat, “you said you figured out the mystery behind the serial suicides, right?”
“Those skill users didn’t commit suicide,” answered Kunikida with a suppressed tone. “They were killed by their own skills.”
“…”
“Killed by their own skills.” It was so hard to believe that it left Atsushi and Kyouka speechless, but they couldn’t deny it. After all, they had just seen Demon Snow a few moments ago. Not only that…the large, ferocious beast that attacked them earlier…
Atsushi decided not to think about it, wanting to believe it wasn’t possible.
…Was that the tiger? Atsushi wondered. Is the tiger trying to kill me?
After all, Atsushi hadn’t been able to use Beast Beneath the Moonlight earlier. Did the tiger somehow separate itself from Atsushi without his knowing? Was that even possible? In the midst of the deep silence, Kunikida ordered, “Let’s head to the agency for now.”

There was not a single soul inside the redbrick building enshrouded by fog. The Armed Detective Agency was in a terrible state.
“What the…? What happened here?”
Lockers were crushed, furniture and lighting were knocked over, and even a desk was caved in as if someone had hit it. Documents and scraps of paper were scattered about, so there was hardly any space to walk around. Even the conference room, where everyone had gathered only a few days ago, was no different. The long table had been destroyed and knocked over, the chairs were splintered, and the monitor had fallen off the wall. It was a mess. It would be harder to find something intact.
While the battle remains threw Atsushi in a state of bewilderment…
“To the president’s office,” urged Kunikida. Atsushi and Kyouka nodded, then began helping their friend, who was bleeding in agony, to their destination. They saw the infirmary on the way with its curtains torn and shelves turned over.
Was there a fight in the infirmary as well? The more they looked, the more they realized just how bad things were here. Atsushi’s heart raced. The fact that they still hadn’t run into anyone else from the agency made it all the worse. On the bright side, though, they also hadn’t found any bodies. Surely their seasoned superiors could take care of themselves. More importantly, they had to focus on what they could do now. Atsushi reassured himself as they rushed to the president’s office. As expected, documents and collapsed furniture were scattered about just like in the other rooms. There wasn’t even a hint of the office’s usual tranquility.
Kunikida suddenly shook Atsushi and Kyouka off him and rushed toward the back of the room where he relentlessly kicked the president’s desk out of the way. The thick, mahogany table flipped over.
“Kunikida?!” cried Atsushi in utter astonishment. Kunikida then pulled his detective ID card out of his breast pocket and stuck it into the floor. Upon closer inspection, Atsushi noticed a slot disguised as a grout line between two tiles. When Kunikida slid his card down the slot, it lit up and started making a soft, mechanical noise until the tile completely moved out of the way. Underneath the floor was a complicated-looking piece of electronic equipment. Atsushi had no idea this even existed. Kunikida wasted no time in scanning his palm against the device.
“What is that?” Atsushi asked curiously.
But before Kunikida even responded, a loud noise echoed in the room, and a hidden LCD panel emerged from the wall. Black-and-white static appeared on the highly sophisticated mechanism, and a voice could be heard amid the noise.
“…It looks like it’s going to connect.”
The static on the display was struggling to take the form of a person. It appeared Kunikida was trying to contact someone. The voice was coming from the other side of the monitor.
“Try to keep this level steady. It appears they won’t be able to jam our signal for the time being… Can you hear me?” It sounded as if that last sentence was directed toward this side of the screen. “Is that you, Mr. Fukuzawa?”
“It’s me, Kunikida,” replied Kunikida to the scrambled screen. Perhaps the connection was bad. “I currently don’t know the president’s whereabouts. I am speaking with the Special Division for Unusual Powers, correct?”
Special Division for Unusual Powers? Atsushi stared at the screen, surprised by what he heard Kunikida say. The connection must have finally stabilized, as the static disappeared to reveal a scholarly-looking young man wearing glasses.
“Yes, this is Ango Sakaguchi of the Special Division for Unusual Powers.” Without even pausing, he continued, “Kunikida, could you tell me your current situation?”
“I’m here with Atsushi Nakajima and Kyouka Izumi. The rest of the agency’s staff are currently missing.”
“I see…,” replied Ango in a somewhat dismal tone. “Our connection isn’t stable, so I’ll be brief.” The only light in the president’s dark office came from the glow of the monitor. “The fog phenomenon has appeared in Yokohama. However, no records exist of one this large in scale.”
The screen suddenly switched to what appeared to be a satellite view of Japan. The monitor gradually zoomed in on the image until it was just a close-up of Kanagawa Prefecture. There was a white fog enveloping the eastern side of the prefecture—Yokohama. Ango’s voice continued in the background:
“The fog has stopped spreading, but just about all of Yokohama is engulfed. The city is currently disconnected from the outside world. Nearly all of Yokohama’s inhabitants have gone missing or disappeared. It appears that only skill users are still present, but they—including you—are in grave danger.”
The screen switched back to Ango’s face.
“That corroborates what we’ve seen here,” Kunikida confirmed, his expression stern. “Skills are splitting from their owners and attempting to kill them here as well.”

Meanwhile, as Atsushi observed Kunikida and Ango’s exchange, violent battles were taking place all throughout Yokohama. On top of a strange, oval-shaped pedestrian bridge were two identical teenage boys facing each other. One was a shadow who was spinning a signpost with such force that it produced a small gale. It was a red stop sign, but it was currently proving to be rather ineffective.
With no means to defend himself, the other freckled teenager, Kenji Miyazawa, jumped off the pedestrian bridge. Fortunately for him, the bridge wasn’t too high from the ground, and there were many cars still frozen at the intersection. He landed on top of a car roof, then glared at the shadowy figure who looked just like him as it easily twirled a signpost that weighed several hundred pounds. It was Kenji’s skill, Undefeated by the Rain, having split from his body. The skill faced its master with the intent to kill. A red crystal twinkled on its forehead.

Meanwhile, a white mist blocked Junichiro Tanizaki’s vision. He cautiously observed his surroundings, but while he was distracted by the illusion, ten delicate fingers wrapped themselves around his neck. The illusion disappeared, revealing a lush green plaza with a fountain and monument. Tanizaki’s face twisted in pain as his body was slowly lifted off the ground. The shadowy figure strangling him from behind shared his face. It was his skill, Light Snow, with a red crystal on its forehead. Light Snow could produce snowfall and project illusions on said snow, which Tanizaki’s opponent used perfectly.

Crossing blades over the stone pavement in the plaza were Yukichi Fukuzawa and his skill, All Men Are Equal, a peculiar ability that allowed him to suppress and control his subordinates’ skills. Therefore, it did not have any special powers like Kunikida’s, Kenji’s, or Tanizaki’s. Nevertheless, the separated skill was still a mirror image of its owner. In other words, it possessed the same skill set as the man once known as the Silver Wolf. The two of them engaged in a fierce clash under the backdrop of a beautifully symmetrical granite colonnade, shaking the row of gingko trees and scraping the stone pavement with every blow they exchanged. The skill, which shared Fukuzawa’s form, quickly glided over the ground to create some distance between them. Nevertheless, when it turned back around, it had a red crystal on its forehead just like the other skills. Fukuzawa turned his sword at his opponent once more. The area creaked, and then there was silence. The battle between the Silver Wolves continued at a pace beyond what the average person’s eye could keep up with.

Akiko Yosano was facing her own skill, Thou Shalt Not Die, which allowed the user to heal external wounds. She swung her trusted hatchet at the woman who looked just like her, and with the help of centrifugal force, the weighty blade sliced off its right arm. The appendage flew into the air before dropping to the ground, but the female figure with a glowing red crystal on its forehead didn’t panic. It swiftly leaped back, picked up its arm, and pressed it against its severed limb. There was a bright flash of light as its right arm reconnected to its body. The skill had managed all this in a mere few seconds. The shadowy figure then taunted Yosano with its newly attached arm, causing Yosano’s lips to curl into a sneer.
“Yep. This is gonna be tricky,” she quietly muttered. The battle seemed like it would never end. Defeat the skill and win or simply be killed—or wait until the cause had been dealt with.

“Fortunately, we’ve located the skill user behind this phenomenon.” Ango spoke concisely from the other side of the screen on the Armed Detective Agency’s wall. The screen then cut to the same satellite photograph of Yokohama from a few moments ago. A red dot was glowing in the center of the fog. “He’s in an abandoned high-rise building known as Skull Fortress, located in the middle of the Yokohama Settlement.”
An eerie jet-black tower appeared on the screen as Ango continued. Something about its numerous intricately carved spires was extremely sinister. With no other tall buildings in its vicinity, it stood alone as if it had scared them all away.
Staring at the screen, Kunikida asked, “So is Tatsuhiko Shibusawa really the one behind this?”
“…!”
Tatsuhiko Shibusawa.
Atsushi subtly reacted to the name he remembered hearing during their earlier meeting.
What…?
The name weighed heavily on Atsushi’s mind for reasons that even he did not understand.
“…”
He suddenly visualized a door that he had seen somewhere before. It was a sturdy-looking white door, majestic and divine.
But that door must never be opened. I must never remember what happened.
Atsushi stopped thinking about it and focused on Ango’s voice, oblivious to the fact that Kyouka was looking at him with concern.
Ango continued, “…I have an important task for your agency.” The screen was no longer showing the fortress but Ango himself. “I need you to eliminate Tatsuhiko Shibusawa, the man behind this, by any means necessary.”
Kyouka narrowed her eyes. “…” She then nodded with a sharp gaze as if she had just figured something out.
“Additionally…,” continued Ango indifferently, “Dazai appears to be with him.”
“Dazai’s in the fortress?” said Kunikida. His eyebrow twitched, perhaps out of fear that something bad had happened. The light of the monitor glinted off his glasses. Curious as to why Dazai was in the fortress, Atsushi suddenly chimed in, “Do you mean he was captured?”
This was Dazai, after all. It was hard to imagine the enemy got the better of him, but the situation was still worrying. Panic crossed Ango’s face for the first time when he heard Atsushi’s question. His reply was impatient:
“Yokohama will be done for at this rate! You are our only hope—” Bzzzzzz.
Ango’s voice was cut off and followed by loud static. The screen had returned to a jumbled sandstorm of black and white. Right as Atsushi began to lean forward, an explosion suddenly echoed, and the building shook.
“It’s here…” Kunikida knit his brow. What he experienced in the last hour made it immediately clear to him what was happening: The noise and shaking were caused by a grenade hitting the Armed Detective Agency. The enemy was most likely a tall man wearing glasses with a red crystal on its forehead and holding a notebook that possessed the power to materialize whatever was written in it. It was Kunikida’s skill, The Matchless Poet.
This was the same enemy who had injured Kunikida before he ran into Kyouka and Atsushi. He had a good idea how his skill was going to attack, seeing as it was a part of him once. He also knew that, unlike his notebook, the phantom’s notebook had the word Compromise written on the cover. A copy of himself that didn’t follow ideals but made compromises was an abomination to Kunikida. That was why he suggested, “You two go on ahead. I’ll take care of him.”
“But, Kunikida…” Atsushi followed after Kunikida as he walked away. “There’s no way you can win against your own skill…”
“It’s not a matter of winning.” Kunikida paused. “What matters is whether you should fight.”
“…!”
Atsushi stopped in his tracks and lowered his gaze. Kunikida then firmly stated, “I will prevail against myself…just like I always have.” And with that declaration, he knocked on the wall next to Fukuzawa’s hanging scroll that had HEAVEN DOES NOT CREATE ONE MAN ABOVE ANOTHER written on it. The scroll then shook before a hidden shelf swiftly descended from the ceiling. Lying on the shelves were several firearms.
“What are these…?” muttered Atsushi in bewilderment as he looked at the weapons.
“We are an armed detective agency, you know,” Kunikida replied confidently. After picking up a handgun and a machine gun, he skillfully loaded them. There was a hard, metallic clink.
“Take these.”
He handed Atsushi and Kyouka each a gun, but Kyouka insisted right away that she didn’t need it, leaving only Atsushi with a firearm. He couldn’t hide his reluctance about holding the cold, heavy weapon. While rummaging for a weapon of his own, Kunikida revealed, “My skill can’t create a weapon bigger than its notebook.” He grabbed a weapon as if he had made up his mind. “Use the back door to escape while I distract it.”
Kunikida had chosen a Remington M870 pump-action shotgun, which was over three feet long. He loaded it up, then pulled back on the fore-end so he would be ready to shoot at any given moment. The shotgun gave an imposing click.
“Hurry!”
“…!”
Atsushi and Kyouka sprinted out of the room, urged on by Kunikida’s shout.

Around the time Atsushi and Kyouka were escaping the Armed Detective Agency, Ango Sakaguchi was clenching his fist. The room was dark. Numerous people wearing suits faced the countless ever-changing monitors and worked at their desks. Hurried voices mixed with the sound of busy keyboards.
This was the Special Division for Unusual Powers.
Ango stood up from the command chair. The signal had just cut off during his conversation with Doppo Kunikida at the Armed Detective Agency. There was no chance they would be able to reconnect the call, so he gave up and asked one of his agents, “Have you pinpointed skill user A5158’s location yet?”
“I have,” they replied.
“Then could you give him a message?” “What would you like me to tell him?”
Ango quietly stared at the image of fog covering Yokohama. They were out of time. With a hint of desperation in his voice, he responded:
“…‘It’s time to pay Professor Glasses back.’”

After getting back in the car, Atsushi and Kyouka began driving off when they heard explosions in the background.
“Kunikida!”
Atsushi looked back from the passenger seat and saw smoke rising from the brick building. It was coming from the fourth floor where the agency was located. The darkness of night glittered with flames. Was Kunikida all right? Regardless, they couldn’t head back to the agency. They just had to believe in him.
“…I hope Kunikida’s okay,” Atsushi muttered weakly. Kyouka, on the other hand, was not even fazed by the explosions as she drove.
“What we need to focus on now is eliminating Tatsuhiko Shibusawa,” she said.
“Tatsuhiko Shibusawa…,” repeated Atsushi in a daze. There was something about Shibusawa that had been strangely bothering him ever since he first heard his name in the conference room. “I wonder what he’s like…”
Kyouka shot Atsushi a quizzical glance before Atsushi continued, “You say we need to eliminate him, but…it doesn’t matter how evil he is. There’s no reason to kill him. We just need to capture him.”
Atsushi racked his brain for a solution in an attempt to escape from his own fears. Eventually, the image of a sand-colored overcoat popped into his head, reminding him of the man he owed everything to.
“That’s it!” Atsushi looked to Kyouka. “I’ll bet Dazai will know what to do. We just need to save him.”
He mumbled to himself in an act of desperation, trying to convince himself of those words:
“Yeah. Dazai has to know what to do. Once we save him, he’ll…” “…”
But Kyouka didn’t respond, and Atsushi never even noticed the ice-cold look in her eyes.

Interlude 2—1

A bell could be heard in the distance. The pale moon illuminated the mist circulating through the pitch-black night. It was as if a sea of fog had consumed the world with no horizon in sight. The black tower pierced the clouds as it stretched to the moon. Gentle curves and countless sharp spires intertwined around the fortress in the center as if holding it upright. The ornaments on the tower’s facade were exquisitely intricate, to the point of obsession even, and emitted a vaguely ominous aura. To some, they truly looked like human bones.
A party was about to begin in the sinister tower.

“Dazai.”
A voice called out to Dazai from behind as he gazed down at the city from the glass wall on the top floor. The sound of footsteps approached until a man with crimson eyes and white hair appeared. It was Tatsuhiko Shibusawa.
“Are you not bored of looking at that?” he asked Dazai. “…Bored?” repeated Dazai, his expression faded.
Shibusawa nodded. “I know I certainly am,” he replied.
There was a skull on display on the table between them for some reason. Brilliant-red apples surrounded it as if to add some life to it. Two of the apples were pierced with knives even though there had been just one knife only seconds ago.
Shibusawa slowly approached the table and said in almost a whisper, “A sea of ivory and nothingness…a nondescript world full of coarseness.” He turned his gaze toward the table’s surface. “Tonight, all the skills in Yokohama will become mine.” He spoke of his prediction with a dull tone, as if it were fact. “Yet again, it appears no one will be capable of outsmarting me or defying my expectations… How truly boring.”
“I used to be bored just like you,” answered Dazai while he gazed out the window.
“How did you overcome it?” “It’d be quicker to show you.”
Dazai finally turned around and faced Shibusawa before approaching the table. He then leisurely took a seat in one of the three chairs. Shibusawa simply watched him without saying a word.
“See? You don’t even know my true intentions right now,” Dazai calmly claimed. “You don’t know whether I’m helping you or using you.”
Dazai’s eyes weren’t focused on Shibusawa, and it was impossible to infer from his voice how he really felt. Nevertheless, Shibusawa smirked at the taunts and replied, “You’re the only one who thinks your intentions are unknowable.”
Dazai slowly lowered his gaze. “I guess you really do need salvation.” “And who can save me?” Shibusawa snorted softly.
“Hmm… Maybe an angel?” Dazai picked up the skull on the table. “Or maybe a demon?”
There was a diagonal cut across the skull’s cheekbone, and another knife had unnoticeably appeared, piercing a third apple. At the same time, another voice suddenly joined in on their conversation.
“It’s obvious what both of your true intentions are, if you ask me.” The third man mirthfully cackled and took the skull from Dazai’s hand. “You cannot write a play with such lies. It would shatter the audience’s immersion.”
He brushed back his warm-looking mantle as his boots clicked against the floor. The earflaps of his ushanka fluttered with each step until he stopped to regard Dazai and Shibusawa with his violet eyes, which were almost hidden under his black hair.
“Fyodor the Conjurer…,” Shibusawa warmly welcomed the third man. “You shall dance for me as well…as my collaborator.”
“Him? Help you?” Dazai said with a chuckle. “He’s the one mostly likely to betray you.”
“I can’t deny that,” Fyodor himself agreed delightfully before comfortably taking a seat. Shibusawa thereupon drew a chair for himself. His expression was calm and brimming with confidence. “No one has ever exceeded my expectations… I anticipate great things from you.”
Each of their goals and intentions crossed paths, but there was still no way of knowing who would be able to fulfill their objective. In fact, nobody even knew what the three of them were after.
“Of course,” said Fyodor almost in singsong manner, “it’s this city’s skill users that I feel most sorry for.” His frigid smile was reminiscent of the heart of winter. “Because no matter which one of us three prevails, they will all perish.”