Baccano! - Volume 22 - Chapter 29

Chapter 29 We’ve Got No Choice

Somewhere in New YorkA guest room at the Runorata Family’s villa

“…In Central Park?” Melvi Dormentaire frowned.

Huey Laforet nodded, smiling faintly. “That’s right. If this goes on, I imagine it’s going to cause an uproar. Many people saw an enormous bear running through town. Since it ran into the park, the Division of Investigation is apparently getting the police to cordon it off. Even so, I doubt they’ll be able to deter the would-be spectators.”

“Damn that Salomé… Why would he do something that would draw so much attention?”

“In his own way, he probably wanted to prove the results of his research. A method of manipulating bears using sound would be rather useful… He must have planned on putting the Runorata Family in his debt,” Huey said indifferently. He was still wearing that smile.

Meanwhile, Melvi’s expression had turned sour. “Are you insinuating I’m not capable of controlling the Runoratas from the inside, Huey?”

“No, not at all. I don’t think you’re incapable, and controlling the Runoratas was never my intention in the first place. I only meant that someone else may be thinking it. I would imagine there are many Runorata Family members who find both of us a nuisance.”

“I really don’t want the remaining two days of the casino party to be canceled over this.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that. The incident in Central Park is superficially unrelated to Ra’s Lance. Even if all the people causing it have ties to the casino.”

“You may be all right with that, but—”

“Does the House of Dormentaire have a different intention?”

Huey’s words seemed like a test, and Melvi’s eyes narrowed slightly.

Don’t look down on me, you bastard. You won’t be able sneer like that much longer.

Melvi had been sent by the Dormentaires to work for Huey Laforet, but personally speaking, he had no respect for the immortal.

Do you understand at all?

You may be an old immortal, but all you’ve done is accumulate more knowledge than I have.

Really, if I put my right hand on your head right now—

For a moment, Melvi’s perception of time stopped. It wasn’t only his mind that had frozen; his heart might have stopped briefly as well.

He’d realized there was something on his forehead.

The moment he recognized the sensation as Huey Laforet’s right hand, he broke out in a full-body sweat, although he couldn’t move a muscle.

That’s ridiculous. Ridiculous, ridiculous, ridiculous.

When on earth did he…? When did he—?!

“Ever since I was a boy, I’ve had a particular talent for this sort of thing. Something as simple as putting my right hand on a man in front of me takes less time than it does to blink.”

“Ah…kh…”

Melvi couldn’t even breathe properly, let alone speak. All that left his mouth was a low groan.

“You’ve left yourself completely vulnerable, Melvi. Firo Prochainezo is willing to kill you if he must. If this is all you’re capable of, he’ll eat you, and that will be the end of it. If I were you, I’d avoid being in the same room with him. Actually, I wouldn’t even enter the same building.”

“……” Melvi was silent.

Removing his hand from his forehead, Huey slowly got to his feet.

A flash of intense emotion nearly caused Melvi to lunge at Huey, right hand first—but all his nerves rejected the orders his brain was sending.

A moment later, his mind got the message as well.

He’s left no openings.

Melvi did have an explosive temper, but he wasn’t foolish enough to let it destroy him on a whim. He couldn’t have become Time’s leader otherwise.

The experience he’d accumulated over the course of his relatively long life seemed to be screaming at him that now was not the time to act.

“…Don’t worry. I won’t get careless with Firo Prochainezo.”

“I suspect there are many people besides Firo that you should be wary of. Several of them are currently causing a disturbance in Central Park.”

“It’s all right. I’ll handle them somehow, too. Personally.”

“You don’t have to be so eager, you know. Whether you succeed or fail at the casino party, the very existence of the event means my objective will be achieved.”

Shrugging, Huey left the guest room.

“As far as I’m concerned, both your animosity toward Firo Prochainezo and this uproar in Central Park are mere distractions. Meanwhile, they are your greatest objectives. I won’t interfere with the results, so…”

Huey was still smiling faintly. As he pulled the door closed behind him, he gave the petrified Melvi one last bit of encouragement.

“By all means, enjoy the gamble as much as you can… Don’t leave yourself with regrets.”

Central Park

“Ha-ha! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Hellooooo, Martian girl! It’s been forever!”

Ladd Russo was the first one to speak, of course.

That said, even if Chané had been able to use words freely, she had no intention of shooting the breeze with Ladd. Naturally, she wasn’t inclined to listen to him, either. The knives in her hands flashed through the air again and again.

“Man oh maaan, it really has been ages! Well, how’s it going, little girl? You finally grow up? Is your pwecious puppy love for that Huey Laforet bastard still—? Whoops!”

Still yelling enthusiastically, Ladd bent backward, and silver streaked through the air where his throat had been a moment earlier.

Ladd didn’t try to distance himself from the barrage of slashes. Instead, he flipped his torso back in the other direction, wedging himself into a gap between the blades.

“—!”

Before she could counter with another slash, Ladd slammed a punch into her.

A shock like a blow from a steel ball ran through Chané’s forehead, but she’d dodged just in time to avoid taking major damage.

“Ha-ha! I was gonna break your nose, but I missed!”

“……”

His brutal smile hadn’t changed a bit.

Chané considered Ladd her mortal enemy.

She understood she’d had the disadvantage on top of that train, and that he wasn’t a good match for her. She didn’t shrink from him, though.

Unlike in her earlier fight with Ladd, her footing wasn’t unstable here. That one difference had improved Chané’s movements dramatically.

Ladd was fighting under the same conditions, of course, but Chané had always been the type to capitalize on her speed and leap every whichway. Not only was she on stable ground now, but she had a lot more room to maneuver. This environment was much more favorable for her.

…At least that was what Chané thought, but she didn’t let herself get careless.

The stability also helped Ladd’s footwork, and being able to plant his feet let him punch harder. She couldn’t ignore either of those things.

Plotting the best trajectory for slitting Ladd’s throat, Chané ran her blade along the “track” she’d envisioned. Her blades didn’t move quite as fast as her thoughts, though; they missed Ladd’s arteries by a hair, and she only grazed his skin and drew a little blood.

Of course, she didn’t stop there.

She swept her knife through space by the shortest possible route, planning to jam her blade into his side as he bent backward, but…

“Whoa, that ain’t—safe!”

…his steel hand sent that knife flying.

Even then, Chané didn’t stop. She spun, slamming her second blade home in a follow-up attack.

Ladd caught it between the joints of his prosthetic hand.

The creak of those iron joints echoed between them, and their animus seemed to shimmer in the air around them.

“……”

“Ha-ha-ha-ha! Nice! This is great! Your moves are even sharper than before! That said, we always were pretty sharp mentally, you and me!”

Chané was pouring all the focus she’d gained by losing her speech into the fight. In contrast, Ladd flexed his strength while talking a blue streak, but she couldn’t sense any stagnation in that “strength”—that violence.

Even his taunts felt like nothing more than an outlet for his excess energy. He was grinning like a fool, but if there was such a thing as “purity” in bloodlust, Ladd Russo had to be giving off the purest stuff in New York City at the moment.

Shaft knew both of them well enough to read that much of the situation, but there was one thing he hadn’t picked up on.

The murderous aura around Ladd wasn’t lusting for Chané’s blood.

It was concentrated on Huey Laforet, Melvi Dormentaire, and Claire Stanfield. Men who weren’t even here.

“What…is that guy?”

Sickle had been wondering whether she should go back Chané up, but it didn’t seem like the sort of fight anybody could break into.

Her muscle-bound Larva teammate had rushed Ladd, intending to pin his arms, but Ladd had said, “Whoa there, don’t rain on my parade, fella” and sent him flying with one arm. Soaring, really, even though the man weighed well over two hundred pounds.

When she’d seen that, Sickle had turned her attention to Graham, who was still blocking their way. “No human’s got an arm like that! What the heck is that guy?! How do you have to grow up to get like that?!”

“I’m pretty sure my man Ladd grew up in a normal family. He said he was raised in the usual way, by ordinary parents, who steered clear of the mafia. But! Ladd didn’t let them tell him who to be! He became a true-blue killer, which means he’s no ordinary fella! Before they sent him to the big house, he used shotguns and knives and what have you, but now he doesn’t even need that. He’s gonna get rid of all the knives and guns on the planet! He’s a messenger of peace!” Graham’s eyes from behind his bangs widened in crazed admiration.

Meanwhile, as Ladd evaded Chané’s knives, he said from behind Graham, “That ain’t it, Kid Graham. If I’ve got a weapon, I’ll use it. I’m just not in the mood right now is all. When I use guns, that thud of the recoil and the spray of blood give you that feeling of ‘Oh yeah, I killed somebody.’ With knives, the shunk and the heat of the other guy’s blood make you think, Wow, damn, I really killed that guy. I like ’em both just fine.”

As he dodged a string of knife strikes with footwork on the level of a pro boxer, Ladd went on smoothly. It was as if his mouth and vocal cords belonged to some completely different creature.

“Lately, I’ve missed it like you would not believe—the feeling of crunching something with my fist or the raw krxxk of snapping necks. Goddamn, give me anything, a thud or shunk or grunch or krxxk—just give me something. Anything! Here’s the thing! My urge to kill just has to get through to the other fella. If I pull out a gun, everybody knows I’m trying to kill him right off the bat, see?! They say the only ones who should kill are the ones who are prepared to be killed, but hey, I’m prepared. Now, if I don’t give the other guy a chance to be prepared, it’s rude, get me?”

“Whoa! I think we might not be talking about the same thing anymore. Still, from what you said, did I get it wrong again?!”

“Nah, the part about not needing weapons to kill people was right on the money, so you were half right. I’d give it fifty points.”

Chané leaped in as Ladd spoke, and he tumbled forward, dodging by going right under her.

As Sickle watched him, the furrow between her eyebrows got even deeper. “How is he managing to dodge knives that fast with all that yelling?”

Next to her, a man who seemed to have spawned from thin air spoke with a knowing look. “It’s the other way around. He’s using his words to set the rhythm for his body. That’s what lets him move like that.”

“……?!”

When Sickle saw who’d spoken to her, she shrieked and did a double take. “Chris?! You’re— Why are you here?!”

“The guidance of Nature. It’s been a few months, huh! All right, let’s sing! A song to celebrate our reunion and to praise Nature! ♪ Cooome, carried off by a beeear, weeee will reuniiite in its stooomaaach, la-la-laaaa. ♪ Also, sooorry, that stuff about his body and the rhythuuum was just something I pulled oooouuut oooof myyyy aaaaass. ♪”

Christopher was singing in a pointlessly operatic way by the end, and everybody else noticed him at once.

“Hrumph! There you are, you devil… I guess we’re done with both sad stories and fun stories now.”

“Oh! Miria! It’s the magician from that one building!” “You’re right!”

“Chris?!” “Christopher!” “…You’re finally here, hmm?” “Christopher! Where’s Rail?!”

As Graham, Isaac and Miria, and all of Larva cried out in astonishment, Christopher jerked his chin at Chané and Ladd, who hadn’t even noticed his arrival.

“Hey, this is peanuts. Forget this, watch the rest of that.”

“Hey, you wanna know somethin’? I met that Huey Laforet bastard,” Ladd said from out of nowhere.

Chané attacked anyway. “……!”

Huey had told her some of what had happened at Alcatraz, so she knew Ladd had been there as well.

“There he was, snoring away, right in front of me… If I’d been one of those immortal folks, I coulda put my right hand on him and that woulda been it. What were you doing while your precious Huey was all vulnerable, huh? Strolling around New York, sightseeing? Nice! Man, I’m jealous! You were out here enjoying the Big Apple, and all it cost was Huey’s life! Whooee!”

“……”

Ladd struck back as he taunted her. Chané jammed her knife into his fist, but it only scratched the surface a little, and then he knocked her arm away.

It’s heavy.

Chané narrowed her eyes, observing her opponent’s “weapon” without diluting her own deadly intentions.

From what she’d felt, she was sure the false hand was metal.

There was no telling how he’d trained, but even though the prosthetic came partway up his left arm, he was swinging that arm around just as rapidly as his flesh-and-blood fist.

Remembering her past humiliation, Chané was convinced: While it might be true that the man didn’t have a gun, he was actually more of a threat now than he had been on the train.

“……”

No matter which hand he used, every blow he paid out was phenomenally heavy.

If even one of those landed, she would be in trouble.

Even so, Chané darted into the gaps in that barrage of fists.

She banished the human life she’d had during the last few years, and her hopes for her own future, from her mind. Just for now, she even erased the conversations she’d had with her father over the past several days.

If she had any happiness left, she’d fear losing it.

That fear would become terror, and then her legs might go weak.

Huey had told her that to protect herself, to carry out her missions without fail, she always had to keep fear in her mind. For the moment, though, she got rid of that memory as well.

This man was using her fear as fuel.

In that case, it was fine if she was just an automaton.

On that thought, Chané mindlessly ran her blades along the best possible paths, turning herself into a system powered by killing intent.

On the other hand, this only sharpened Ladd Russo’s hunger.

The woman was discarding her for Huey Laforet, and Ladd was delighted: She was a wall, and that wall would be extremely satisfying to demolish.

“Whoa! Yeah, I see!” Her knife grated against his prosthetic, and the sparks flew into Ladd’s eyes. “I thought that Huey bastard was a cool customer, but I guess he would be, huh?” He took the sparks without even blinking, and his eyes shone as he shouted, “After all, he’s got this thick, sick, slick trick of a wall!”

“……”

“So how many more layers does this wall have? How close are you to Huey? …Hey! I know you’re watching this from somewhere, bird-girl!”

When Ladd yelled that, several birds faltered in flight.

Nobody noticed, though. Most of them were busy wondering what he was talking about.

“Bird-girl! Go run a message to Huey! You tell him to line up all his walls in front of me! Tell ’im I can’t wait to see whether he can keep his cool after I’ve busted through all of them!”

It would have been natural to assume that a man who talked this much during combat was leaving himself wide open. However, even the members of Larva, who had been specifically designed for combat, and the twins who were circling the perimeter on their motorcycles, keeping an eye on the situation—all of them could tell that Ladd was giving no openings.

If Chané Laforet was an inexhaustible storm of blades, then Ladd Russo was the vast energy of a volcano on the verge of erupting, encased in a thick rubber skin.

These two dangerous objects were clashing, one pitting its speed against the other’s strength.

The people who knew what the pair could really do came to the same conclusion, and every one of them thought…

…If we even touch one of ’em, it’s not gonna end well for us.

Meanwhile, two figures were watching Ladd from the car.

“Uh… You’re sure we don’t need to shut that down, Ms. Lua?”

Shaft had decided staying outside came with a risk of taking damage from the fight, so he had returned to the driver’s seat and was talking with Lua.

“Ladd seems to be enjoying himself…doesn’t he? I was wondering what it would be like if I were as strong as that girl.”

“I think it’s probably best not to think that too much.”

“Do you? …Sometimes I think if I were strong enough to fight Ladd in mortal combat, we would be able to understand each other better. I can’t make him that angry or make him smile that much, you know,” Lua said, a little wistful.

“But as women go, you’re far and away the one he likes best, Lua,” Shaft told her.

“Huh?”

“He said so, a while back.”

It was something another member of Sham had heard in prison, but Shaft kept that part to himself.

“Once, when some thugs messed with Ladd, I hear they asked him if he didn’t care what happened to his girl. And he told them, ‘Lua’s waiting for me to kill her. There’s no way she’d get killed by some other guy. I trust her more than I trust anyone.’”

“Ladd…said that?”

“…Well, I know it kinda sounds awful, but he really did believe in you, see? He trusted that you wouldn’t get killed by anybody else.”

When Ladd had said those lines to Firo, Sham had been down for the count, so his memories were pretty fuzzy. However, as he told the story, he cleverly filled in the blanks.

Lua was silent for a while. Then her pale face broke into a fragile, beautiful smile. “I see…,” she said, her voice a bit more cheerful than usual. “So Ladd said that about me…”

“Um, I know you could interpret it as him abandoning you when you were a hostage, but don’t, all right?”

“It’s all right. I know… But if I had become a shackle to him, and he broke that shackle to do something he wanted to do…it would mean he was the one who’d killed me, so I’d still be happy.”

“Uh…huh.” He responded noncommittally. This lady’s a little weird, too.

Lua went on, her cheeks flushed. “But then…Ladd remembered our promise, didn’t he…?”

Apparently, that was enough to satisfy her. She gave a sigh of relief, gazing rapturously at Ladd. “Oh, I wish everyone but he and I would expire peacefully at the peak of happiness, right this minute… Heh-heh. I know it isn’t possible, but I end up wishing anyway… It really would be better if I died, wouldn’t it…?”

“Please don’t ask questions I can’t actually answer.”

Maybe she’s more than a little weird…, Shaft thought.

Lua ignored him. Her eyes turned to the enormous bear and to the woman on its back. She cocked her head, perplexed. “…Isn’t that Miria? What do you suppose she’s doing up there?”

“Well, well. What should we do about this, I?”

“Those are Huey’s handpicked underlings. Is it okay if we just zotz them all, Me?”

“No, we shouldn’t interfere with the Runoratas’ guest. If anything, we should probably assist his people, but young Master Carzelio takes priority right now. Let’s secure the bear.”

“We’ll need to get a truck over here, though.”

Gabriel and Juliano stopped their motorcycles temporarily and sized up the scene.

A confused fight involving multiple parties had broken out abruptly. At this point, the situation had condensed into mortal combat between a man and a woman, but the murderous intent that radiated all the way to the fringes of the group made it obvious that the group melee had been safer. If one of those two had had a gun, no doubt several people would have been hit by stray bullets by now.

Given the danger, the pair had decided that Charlie, Cazze’s pet bear, couldn’t get hurt in the fray. They were planning to show him some food in an attempt to get him to follow them, but—

“Say, Me. Who’s that up on his back?”

“Who knows? It’s a mystery, I. However, they do seem very calm for people riding a bear, don’t they?”

“Hey, Miria, what do we do? Why did Ladd and Chané just start fighting like that?”

“Maybe they were hungry…”

“They do say hunger is the best spice! I hear wars were fought and villages plundered over salt, way back when… They say the Roman emperor Domi-what’s-his-face fought using pepper!”

“I see! We make blinding powder with black or red pepper, too!”

Isaac had provided information that didn’t quite fit the situation, and Miria nodded firmly.

The pair’s thoughts seemed to be as vague as usual, but there was an unusual hint of unease in their expressions. In their own way, they were shaken.

To Isaac, Ladd was an important pal who’d looked out for him in Alcatraz, while to Miria, Chané was a precious friend who’d encouraged her when she’d been crying her eyes out over Isaac’s imprisonment.

They’d clung to the bear, and then Ladd had suddenly started rampaging in Central Park. When Chané had come along, it had turned into a knife-and-fistfight, and the peculiar sight had left the two very confused.

As they tried desperately to figure out what was going on, Isaac came up with a deduction that was part wishful thinking. “…What if it isn’t a fight?”

“What do you mean, Isaac?”

“Neither of them is hurt. They might be practicing for a show.”

As a matter of fact, although the two were clashing fiercely, their only “injuries” were that the tip of Chané’s nose was red, and that Ladd had a shallow cut on his throat that was bleeding slightly. From Isaac and Miria’s vantage point, they couldn’t even see it.

More than anything, neither of the combatants was making any wasted moves, which made the fight an extraordinarily beautiful thing to watch.

“Come to think of it…all these other people look like they belong to the circus, don’t they?!” Miria was surveying the members of Larva.

This seemed to give Isaac confidence in his own theory. He nodded firmly. “Don’t they?! Maybe that noise back there signaled the start of the show. That’s why this bear came to rejoin his circus companions!”

“Are Ladd and Chané going to be in the circus, too, then?”

“Yeah! I bet this is Romeo and Juliet’s duel scene or something! They changed up the story! It’s an opera where Romeo and Juliet fight with boxing and knives, and now there’s even a circus! That has to be it!”

“Yes, it’s Romeo versus Juliet!”

As Isaac shouted from the bear’s back, most of the surrounding crowd ignored him. Meanwhile, Graham and Christopher started fantasizing about how Romeo Versus Juliet would go. The only direct reaction came from Ladd, who was right in the middle of the fight.

“Ha-ha! Those two don’t change, huh! They’re saying our fight to the death is a show!”

“……”

“Well, sure, why not?! Let’s make the world watch us! All the world’s a show anyway. Even Huey Laforet’s terrorist revolution or whatever is just a stale performance to bring a little spice to the lives of faraway people through their newspapers! If we’re supporting characters, then let’s twirl and twist the world around until the whole planet is a mangled mess! Are ya with me, sister?!”

“……”

Wordlessly, Chané slashed at him. Knocking her blade away, Ladd asked a question that had been on his mind. “…Hey, so are you pals with Isaac and his girl?”

“……”

Chané didn’t hear what Ladd had said.

She hadn’t heard Isaac and Miria, either. She hadn’t even noticed they were nearby.

Chané had become a system that existed only to slaughter Ladd, and she wouldn’t stop until she was utterly exhausted or Ladd was dead.

For Ladd’s part, watching that system near completion gave him a sense of twisted delight. He wanted to see the moment she realized the determination and resolution that had built it were all in vain, and his own engine kicked into high gear.

Even as he raised a ruckus, Ladd was also transforming into a machine meant to destroy his opponent.

Enraptured with the fight, Graham murmured to himself, “It’s beautiful…”

He’d spent long years wrecking cars, and to him, Chané and Ladd’s fight looked like beautifully assembled auto components, even though their mechanisms were completely different.

They were gears that meshed perfectly, rotating in opposite directions locked together, the strength of their convictions being the sole determining factor for which direction they spun. As he witnessed their exquisite balance, Graham was deeply moved, and yet the question of which way the gears would ultimately turn made him nervous.

Like Graham, Christopher was muttering, “That’s pretty…”

As an unnatural being, Christopher had always respected nature. Right now, though, the man-made clash of knives and prosthetic hand struck him as a truly beautiful “natural sight.”

It was like a volcano that had suddenly erupted in the middle of a plain where snow was falling. The view in his mind’s eye was unbalanced, yet strangely harmonized, and it made him emotional as well.

Although their thoughts weren’t as specific as those of the other two, the rest of the group was beginning to think the pair’s clash was something sacred that must not be disturbed. It was as if, in a different sense of the word, the fight had passed into territory that was out of their reach.

There was no one who could butt in.

There couldn’t possibly be.

And yet…they abruptly slashed through the harmony.

“……?”

The first one to register the change was the girl in the stocking cap. She was a Larva member who specialized in spreading poison.

This smell…

Since she handled gases and powders, her nose had been adjusted by Salomé and the rest of the Rhythm team to be twice as sharp as the average person’s.

The girl was a lab rat as well as a homunculus, and her nostrils had caught a scent they rarely picked up among the members of Larva.

Something smells…boozy?

Just as Chané and Ladd were about to unleash their next attacks on each other—

“Wha—?”

“……!”

—they both lost their balance and passed each other, spinning forward.

As they did so, they registered something.

Just as they were about to connect with their opponent, some other force had abruptly been exerted on them.

What they’d just seen left the onlookers dumbstruck.

After all, they’d assumed no one could interrupt Chané and Ladd, but a red-faced old man had appeared out of nowhere and cut in—and when he touched the combatants lightly, they’d seemed to leap forward of their own accord.

Ladd and Chané had been set spinning without warning, but although they were disoriented, their exceptional reflexes let them get by with just falling to one knee.

As they started to get back up, they heard an old man’s drawling voice. “Hic… Are you kids drunk? Ish shtill afternoon…”

Chané didn’t recognize the man, while Ladd had only met him a few days before. “Geezer… What was your name again, bastard? Alkie?” Frowning, Ladd glared at his elderly coworker. “What’re you getting in the way for? Huh? Are you lit? …You always are, though.”

Alkie took a gulp from his hip flask. “We were s’posed to cut loose after we figgered out who th’ enemy was…hic…”

“Oh, well, that’s a cakewalk. This doll has ties to Huey Laforet. Ties to the Runorata Family. There’s no need to size her up. She’s been an enemy this whole time. As a matter of fact, she’s my archnemesis, geezer.”

“I see. In that cashe…”

Ladd was looking at the old man, but out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Chané had recovered a moment faster and was heading his way.

Ladd tried to meet her—but another figure cut in, distracting him with a flash of silver quite a bit longer than Chané’s knives.

“Don’t end her on yer own,” the old man was saying. “We’ll gang up on her and make shure.”

And a sharp metallic clang echoed through Central Park.

“!”

“Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Long time no see, amiga! How’ve you been?”

Chané had caught the twin katana that had swung at her out of nowhere with her knives.

Her attacker was a striking contrast to herself: a brown-skinned hired killer who was all dolled up in a gaudy saloon girl costume. She and Chané had once crossed blades at Jacuzzi’s base, Eve Genoard’s second residence.

“It’s been ages since I got to fight with you like this, amiga! And we kept getting interrupted last time…”

“……”

A step away, Chané leveled her knives, and the katana-wielding saloon girl beamed.

“Will you finish the dance with me this time?”

“Maria…Barcelito…!”

“Wait, Adele. Don’t you go.”

On seeing Maria, Adele had leveled her cross-shaped spear and tensed, preparing to lunge at the other woman. Tim clapped a hand onto her shoulder, firmly holding her back.

“But, Tim…”

She looked from Tim to Maria and back with obvious reluctance, but her boss slowly shook his head. “I know how you feel, but hang back for now.”

At the beginning of the uproar, Tim had worked his way over to a spot that was as far from the noise as was practical, and he had been monitoring the situation. The moment he saw Maria, someone they had some ugly history with, he knew he’d made the right call.

“It’s like some tornado out there right now. You might call me a wannabe psychic for saying so, but I’ve got a bad feeling about all that swirling energy over there. If you mess with it, you’ll get dragged in.”

“That isn’t a logical answer, but…your instincts are usually right, Tim.” Adele lowered her spear, resigned to watching over the fight from a distance.

As a matter of fact, Tim’s prophecy would prove to be correct.

The chaotic vortex had begun to pull in the most troublesome individual around.

A few minutes earlierIn a car stopped beside Central Park

“I can go, right? Even if you say no, I’m going. They’ve found Cookie, and most of all, Chané’s here.”

“…I suppose there’s no help for it.”

The back seat of the car held a compact wireless set developed by Rhythm, and the voice that issued from it belonged to Melvi Dormentaire. The man who’d been in the back seat opened the door and got out without switching the wireless off.

The driver reached over and replied, “Are you sure, Mr. Melvi?”

“I don’t think we have a choice. We can’t have Rhythm and the local thugs taking each other out here.”

“Are those Ladd and Graham fellas that dangerous?”

“Yes. I’ve seen them fight once, at Firo Prochainezo’s casino. I doubt the members of Larva will be able to do a thing,” Melvi said, with conviction.

The driver’s voice grew tense. “They’re really that bad…? That guy headed over there empty-handed. You think he’ll be okay?”

“Don’t worry.

“At that casino, Ladd and Graham couldn’t do a thing about him.”

“Oh… Oh, proclaim the end of the world of man as beasts swagger about upon it. Yet the trumpet of the end has not sounded, and the Revelation sneers at us… ‘O mankind, mankind! Fools! Thou art incapable even of death! Thou cannot even pray!’ It calls to us… Grasp it. Grasp it. The tragic remnants of faith and enlightenment, now living corpses, eat away at our words, clutching at their entrails…”

The Poet, who was watching the situation from a distance, spun an elaborate speech in an attempt to communicate the thought This has gotten completely out of hand. However, Sickle was facing off with Graham, and with no one nearby to shut him down, the Poet’s one-man show had dragged on and on.

Even so, while there may have been no one to stop him, someone appeared right next to him and egged him on. “Keh-keh-keh… Don’t you worry. No doubt the chaos will be swallowed up by even deeper lunacy soon. Did you know? Actual chaos takes the form of a person, and the trumpet of the end is shaped like a gun. I’ll be the one to ring the funeral bell. I’m no angel, but as Death’s messenger, you could say my ringing it is a natural law of this insane world.”

“What’s this…? He intends to sing! Sing a requiem that shaves off the inverse scale of the gods, incurring their wrath, and tells of the old world’s passing and a new world’s advent! He is both fool and hero! The people who sob, fearful of the coming of chaos and order, will surely press him for his name! Enraged death agonies! Birth-cries filled with rejoicing! Everyone inquires! Curses upon his name! Blessings upon his name!”

“Heh… I’m not important enough to introduce myself, and there’s no point in names. Still, as a guidepost to lead you through a world filled with insanity, I’ll at least scratch it on a gravestone… My name is Smith. Gunmeister Smith. Remember that name and the sound of my guns and be proud whenever you’re afraid. Also, be grateful. Grateful for the fact that you aren’t yet insane.”

Mark Wilmens, the boy who’d been listening to the pair, murmured impassively to himself, “…How are these people managing to hold a conversation like it’s normal?”

Huh? What, that idiot Smith’s here? Hearing the distant voice, Ladd gave a mildly irritated smile. That guy really is dumb. I’ll deck him later.

He didn’t have any attention to waste on him right now, though.

First, he’d crush Chané, who was currently messing around with the saloon girl. He’d smash her arms and legs, then toss her at Huey’s feet.

With that ominous thought in mind, Ladd stepped deeper into the fight.

Hmm?

Just then, he felt a strange sizzling sensation on the back of his head.

He had a weird hunch that something dangerous was closing in.

But was it a good hunch or a bad one? Until the moment came, he wasn’t able to make that call.

Granted, as far as Ladd Russo was concerned, it was both good news and bad news.

“Hey.”

Sauntering onto the scene, the man came to stand behind Salomé.

“Wha—?! You’re…” Salomé was astounded.

Wearing a smile that could technically be called “innocent,” the man made a request.

“’Scuse me. Could I borrow that for a minute?”

He was pointing at Salomé’s portable loudspeaker.

“There, you see, Miria?! I bet it really is a circus rehearsal.”

“You’re right! That girl did magic tricks at Jacuzzi’s house, too, that one time!”

Even as Isaac and Miria chatted, the whirlpool of chaos was expanding.

“Ah-ha-ha! Amazing, incredible! Your moves are even sharper than they were last time we fought, amiga!”

Maria slashed at Chané over and over, fighting with a sword in each hand, while Chané countered with two knives of her own.

Their blades locked tentatively, and then they both stepped in close, each trying to slash their opponent’s vital spots as they slipped behind the other’s back.

Their movements were synchronized so well that they might have been twins. As they dodged their opponent’s blades, leaping into the air, they really did look as if they were performing a fierce sword dance.

“Hey, Saloon Girl. Butt out. Things were just getting good,” Ladd grumbled, but since he’d never been the type to insist on fighting one-on-one, he didn’t fly off the handle. That said, he seemed to feel as if his prey had been stolen; he sounded a little grumpy.

Maria was completely unfazed. “That’s no good, amigo. You’re part of our team right now. We aren’t supposed to act without permission, but hogging the enemy all to yourself is even worse!” She grinned.

So did a Gandor put her up to this? Ladd looked around. In the distance, he spotted a figure walking toward them through the trees.

It was his current employer, Luck Gandor. The man seemed to be watching him gravely.

I see. So he’s using this to advertise that we’re squaring off against the Runorata Family, no holds barred?

Well, that’s fine. It means we can all thrash Chané and make an example of her, then see how that Huey gink and the Runoratas react.

And that was the plan anyway.

Just as a vicious grin began to spread across his face, the surrounding situation began to move again. The members of Larva had seen Maria crash the fight, and they all grabbed their weapons and rushed her and the boozy old man next to her.

Up until now, they’d been overwhelmed by Chané and Ladd’s duel. Deep down, their instincts had told them there was no way they could break into that.

Then, right under their noses, the old man and the saloon girl had cut in.

What had passed through their minds? Shame? Or envy?

In an attempt to overwrite their past selves, as if a dam had burst, a variety of violent types stormed into the vortex.

Frank was looking flustered, Tim was watching the situation unfold, Sickle was going toe to toe with Graham, and the Poet was conversing with a mystery man—but they were the exceptions. Most of the group rushed the people who seemed to be Chané’s enemies.

“Let’s see… It would really spice things up if somebody died right about now…,” someone murmured in the midst of the uproar, but unfortunately, nobody heard.

After all…

BOOM!

The roar that blasted through Central Park made it seem as if the earth and air themselves were trembling.

The mutterings of the mystery man, the shouts of the group, the grizzly’s howls, and every other noise was blotted out. It felt as if all the moisture in their bodies was quivering.

This was nothing like the bear’s earlier roar.

The sound was basically its own form of assault. It was a shock wave of noise, and the individuals who’d taken it directly couldn’t even open their eyes, not to mention hear anything.

How many seconds did it last?

They’d all left themselves wide open, but both allies and enemies were paralyzed.

The grizzly had also been badly startled, and he rose to his hind legs.

“Waugh?!”

“Eeeeek!”

For the second time that day, Isaac and Miria tumbled off the bear’s back.

The bear looked around, searching for the source of the sound.

He didn’t immediately take to his heels. Part of the reason was that he was relatively used to loud noises because of the human cannon during his circus days—but his nose had picked up a clear scent in the vibrating atmosphere.

The scent of an old friend.

Then the grizzly’s eyes found him.

The red-haired man who’d spent all those years in the circus with him.

“Testing, testing. Can you hear me? Huh, this thing’s pretty loud even when you’re using it the regular way.”

With Salomé’s portable speakers dangling from his right hand, the redhead sent his half-impressed, half-annoyed voice echoing through the loudspeaker.

“Damn, that’s half-strength? What’s your name? Salomé. Were you trying to use this on me at full power the other day? You should give a little thought to everybody else.”

Their eardrums hadn’t recovered yet, and most of them couldn’t hear the amplified voice with any clarity. The shock to their ears had even made some people dizzy.

Still, Chané immediately understood what had happened. And she hated that she did.

Please, no.

She hated the fact that it had only taken her a moment to process the situation. Her heart constricted with self-loathing; she hadn’t been able to entirely get rid of what she’d thought she’d discarded.

Even as warm emotions welled up in her heart, her brain was frantically rejecting them. She begged.

Please stay away.

Just this once, don’t save me.

However, the moment she saw that flame-red hair, the wall of ice she’d built in her heart melted away.

If you show up, I’ll feel relieved.

My drive to kill…is fading.

“Don’t worry. You’re fine just the way you are, Chané.”

As if he’d heard her request and had embraced her anyway, the redhead spoke through the loudspeaker.

“I love you no matter what, and for better or for worse, I doubt your dad can change his attitude, either.”

The next one to understand the situation was Ladd Russo.

The hunch that had been scorching the back of his head for the past minute or so had been right on the money.

“Gingeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeer!”

Even though his eardrums hadn’t completely recovered yet, he screamed until the veins were standing out on his face.

“You sonuva— Are you trying to reenact that shit from before? Did you time this? Were you trying to swoop in and save the day when that twist’s back was against the wall? One wrong step and she woulda been dead, but you just knew there’s no way your timing could be off? Huh?!”

The redhead—Claire Stanfield, aka Felix—grinned with overflowing self-confidence and spoke through the loudspeaker. “You nailed it. My timing’s never off. I started moving the second I saw Chané, though, all right? The world must have worked with me, adjusting fate so I’d be right on time.”

Inside Ladd, something snapped. Was it blood vessels, or had he gone so tense that he was tearing muscle fibers?

Ladd felt the pain, but he converted it into anger. He braced to take a run at Claire, but—

“Hold up, Ladd Russo.”

“……”

—the abrupt sound of his full name froze Ladd in his tracks.

It wasn’t because he was scared. He’d just gotten curious about what sort of crap the other guy was about to spout. He was pretty sure it would only make him angrier.

“I’m also sending this out to anyone who opposes Huey Laforet, Melvi Dormentaire, or the Runorata Family.”

“……?”

Gabriel and Juliano, members of the Runorata Family, looked at each other.

“What could he be planning to say, I?”

“No clue. Forget about that; it’s still hard to hear, Me.”

They knew this was Melvi’s guard, but they didn’t know him well enough to guess what he’d say in this situation.

Without waiting for the man to speak, Cookie the grizzly ran up to Claire.

Claire gave him a signal, and Cookie crouched so that he’d have an easier time climbing onto his back.

Straddling the big grizzly, Claire pointed toward the sky.

“It all goes down tomorrow.”

“?”

Everyone’s eyes were on him.

“At the Ra’s Lance party tomorrow, my employer, Melvi Dormentaire, is having a big showdown against Firo Prochainezo of the Martillo Family. I’ll be outside, guarding the door, to make sure nobody interrupts them.”

Impassively divulging top-secret information in a park a few blocks over from Broadway, Claire spoke so eloquently he seemed about to burst into song.

“So listen up, supporting characters of my life. If you want to try humiliating me and killing me, just stop by to interrupt that match. If you’re too scared, don’t come near that building tomorrow. Simple rules, right?”

His words were completely unclouded.

They might be intended as a taunt, but as far as he was concerned, what he was saying was perfectly accurate.

“I won’t run or hide. I’ll just strike back with everything I’ve got.”

“Hey, bastard…,” Ladd growled as if he were about to drop dead of rage.

Claire glanced at him, then said something that really was just a taunt. “Well, you could raise a little hell here, attract the cops, and get your elbows checked. That would work, too.”

“…Huh?”

“It would be a good excuse to run away from me. I won’t stop you or anything. Frankly, I’d recommend it.”

“”

Ladd’s overflowing fury had spiked past his capacity to express in words.

Letting that anger burst from the roots of his limbs down to their very tips, Ladd lunged at his opponent. He’d even forgotten that the guy was straddling an enormous bear.

It was a superhuman leap.

His leg muscles screamed as he pushed them past their limit, but Ladd didn’t care. With a wordless yell, he tried to slam his steel prosthetic into his enemy.

As far as he was concerned, even a ten-foot grizzly wasn’t enough of an obstacle to pose a threat.

However, a bear was still a bear.

“!”

Ladd went sailing through the air thanks to a powerful sideswipe.

“………?!”

He hadn’t taken major damage, but he knew some sort of force had deflected his charge.

Meanwhile, the people who’d been watching that charge had seen everything.

Recognizing the approaching danger, the bear had snapped out its paw like the spring mechanism on a mousetrap and knocked him sideways.

Since he was Cazze’s pet bear, his nails had all been blunted, but the true terror of a large bear isn’t in their claws or fangs. To humans, their physical strength is more than enough of a threat by itself.

People said that a full-strength swipe from the hand-sized paw pads of a bear over six feet tall was pretty likely to kill you.

The impact alone would snap your neck or your spine.

The bear was used to this, too. Right before its paw connected, it had eased up and shoved Ladd out of the way, rather than trying to smash him.

For some reason, the circus had had a lot of enemies, and they’d been attacked by roughnecks quite a few times. His trainer, an individual by the name of Parrot, had taught the bear how to neutralize an enemy without killing them as one of his tricks.

“Whoa there, Cookie. I’m fine. Don’t worry about me.” Shutting off the loudspeaker, Claire patted the bear’s head, grinning. “Sorry about that. This guy’s got a habit of swatting away folks who rush him with murder on the brain.”

Explaining that he’d been trained to do it was apparently too much work, so Claire fudged it by calling it “a habit.”

Ladd got to his feet. His temples were twitching. “Is that right…? Well, I’ve got nothing against the bear. I bet animals are desperate to live, anyhow. He’s done nothing wrong.”

“Good. So no problems, then.”

“Except…that means the owners should take responsibility, yeah? If you’re keeping a dangerous bear as a pet, you must not have the tiniest suspicion that you could die. In that case, I’d better discipline the owner instead, right? You get me?”

Ladd seemed to have decided that Claire was the bear’s owner. Cracking his neck, he started forward again, but he found himself held at gunpoint from both sides.

“That’s enough of that.”

“You don’t want your head blown off, do ya?”

Somewhere in there, Gabriel and Juliano had circled around and put Ladd between them.

“…? What the hell are you?” Ladd scowled.

“If you intend to harm that bear or its owner, then you are an enemy of the Runorata Family. Our enemy. In your position, I’m sure you understand what that means.”

“We’re saying we’ll let you off the hook if you stop now, so get lost.”

When he heard those two remarks—one superficially polite, the other not so much—the corners of Ladd’s lips rose.

“Well, ain’t that somethin’. That means we’ve been enemies this whole time.”

He was pinned between two guns. Naturally, these two weren’t amateurs; they wouldn’t hit each other if he moved. They were standing slightly behind him and off to either side.

Even so, Ladd’s composure didn’t slip. “This is great. I’m just living how I want, and these stomach-churning enemies keep showing up, one after another. If I was Holmes, it’s like I got a different Moriarty showing up every day. It don’t get better than that! Yeah! My life’s coming up red, red roses! I’m about to dye it that bright-red color, see…?”

He swayed menacingly, then began shuffling like a boxer.

“With your blood!”

And then—a gunshot rang out.

It hadn’t come from either twin, but instead from behind Ladd.

Ladd put distance between himself and the twins, then looked toward the noise.

A bespectacled man in ragged clothes was standing there.

It was the man who’d been at the clinic, the type of guy Ladd hated.

Victor Talbot had been pointing his gun at the ground. Now he raised it toward the sky, bellowing at the whole group.

“That’s enough, you bastards! Don’t you dare throw your weight around like that in front of an agent from the Division of Investigation!”

The Division of Investigation.

When they heard that, several people exchanged looks, but most of the group just seemed perplexed.

What’s a DOI guy doing here?

Why are his clothes so torn up?

To the people who’d gathered in Central Park, the DOI was an enemy they’d prefer not to mess with, but a lone agent didn’t seem like much of a threat.

Still, that gunshot had been a problem.

They assumed Central Park had been closed off, due to maneuvering by either the Runoratas or Huey. However, if anyone had heard that gunshot, the police who’d been gearing up to capture the bear might flood in.

And indeed, they’d begun to catch glimpses of police uniforms in the crowd that was watching from a distance, at the park’s entrance.

“Whoops. I completely didn’t notice; we’ve got a Division of Investigation agent here? That’s not good, huh, Cookie. You’d better settle down or he’ll shoot you dead.”

Maybe the grizzly understood: He moved his head in what looked like a nod, then crouched on the spot.

Once the bear was settled, Claire called to the surrounding group again.

“We’re a little jumbled right now, but it’s pretty simple, right? Me, plus everyone else who’s with Huey and the Runoratas, versus everyone who’s not.”

Even before he said that, the two camps had begun to form on their own.

The twins and Chané stood near the bear, and the members of Larva gathered around them, ready to defend.

Ladd, Graham, and the hitmen hired by the Gandors lined up in opposition.

The only ones who didn’t belong to either camp were Lua and Shaft in the car, Isaac and Miria, and a beet-red Victor.

“I wonder what they’re talking about. They said they’re splitting into camps; are they going to hold the Olympics or something?”

“Yes, Los Angeles! Lake Placid!”

“Or maybe this means the circus actually performs tomorrow, Miria.”

“I bet that’s it! Remember? They said that would be the last day of the casino party, too!”

As if in response, the last neutral individual walked over to them. “That’s right! Tomorrow’s going to be a party! They’ll have all sorts of people there: stage magicians and flimflam artists, sorcerers, and clowns! There’s going to be one hell of a romp in New York!”

“Really?! Oh, that’s right—you’re a magician. Will you be doing something there, too?”

“Yaaay! I can’t wait, Isaac!”

The couple’s eyes shone, and the man they’d called a magician grinned, nodding.

“Yeah, I plan to enjoy it to the fullest. I hope you have a blast tomorrow, too.”

Then the man—Christopher Shaldred—and Ricardo slowly headed over to Ladd’s camp.

“Huh?”

The members of Larva looked uneasy. Christopher beamed at them…and let them know that their fears were well-founded.

“I’ll be on this side. Keep it in mind if we run into each other tomorrow, okay?”

“Wha…?”

The others were speechless. Ignoring them, Christopher dropped a fist lightly into his palm, then pointed at the man who was up on the bear’s back. “Oh, that’s right! Members of Larva! About that redhead: We fought once, and he won. He thrashed me pretty good. So good I couldn’t recover. That’s pretty amazing, so you should all compliment him for it.”

Claire’s eyes lit up, and he looked around at the Larva group. “There, see?! I wasn’t lying! Go on! Tell me all you want how great I am!”

The tattooed woman responded sharply, without even glancing at him. “Later.”

“Later, huh? …Well, the situation is what it is, I guess. I’ll wait for a little bit. After all, I’m the type who can read a room.”

While more than half of the people present fought back the urge to scream You liar! confusion spread through the ranks of Larva.

“…Are you turning against us because this fella’s on our side, Chris?” Sickle asked, speaking for the group.

Christopher shook his head slightly. “No. It doesn’t matter whether he’s there or not.”

“Then why?! Are you betraying Master Huey?!”

“No, not at all. It’s just that I’m on vacation right now.” He grinned like a mischievous kid, then shrugged lightly. “It’s sort of like, I can’t turn down a request from a friend? Oh, just so you know, Rail’s probably going to be on this side, too.”

“What’s this about?!”

“Well, personally, I’d rather not think about anything as barbaric as fighting you to the death, either. But see, Sickle and Chi and Adele, and also Leeza, who’s listening in remotely… You all knew what I’m like, didn’t you?” Then, as if he felt he’d just had a genius idea, Christopher’s eyes lit up. “I know! Why don’t all of you come join me over here?! That would fix everything!”

“Don’t screw with us! That would mean opposing Master Huey, and you know it!”

“…I’m not so sure about that.” Christopher’s smile abruptly vanished.

Sickle’s eyebrows drew together. “What?”

“At the moment, my enemy is this guy named Melvi. That’s why I’m going against that redhead over there. He’s Melvi’s guard… Actually, never mind. It looks like I don’t have time to explain.”

A horde of policemen was sprinting toward them.

“…Pull out!” Salomé ordered, and the members of Larva evacuated rapidly, sending forlorn glances at Christopher as they left.

Frank seemed particularly concerned, but Christopher reassured him: “You don’t have to worry. Rail’s fine.” Relieved, Frank disappeared at a speed that didn’t seem possible for his huge frame.

“Tch… What the hell? It’s just the cops. Gutless chumps.”

“What should we do, Ladd?”

“Those cops are the real deal; they’re braced to fight a bear. Going up against them would be a yawn.”

Then Ladd set off, too, running toward the car where Lua waited.

As he went, he shot a glance over his shoulder at the bear’s rider. A vast desire to kill seethed inside him.

“…Perfect. Bring it on. I’ll take you up on that challenge.”

Claire, the target of that homicidal intent, held a hand out to Chané. “Let’s go, Chané.”

“……”

Chané gave him a sharp, wordless glare. It wasn’t exactly murderous, but there was clear hostility in it. She apparently had no intention of climbing onto the bear, but when Claire gave a signal, Cookie dexterously tossed her onto his back.

“?!”

Then the grizzly broke into a run.

The twins took off after them on their motorbikes.

“Can we say this ended well, Me?”

“That’s an excellent question. If his taunt has succeeded, it would probably be best not to summon young Master Cazze to the casino tomorrow evening… For goodness’ sake. Intentionally telling our opponents the schedule of the individual he’s protecting. What a terrible guard, I.”

The enormous bear was running as fast as a car, but thanks to her experience, Chané managed to stay on its back without losing her balance.

“……”

She was still glaring, and Claire apologized meekly. “Sorry about getting in your way. You were trying to retake your old self, right?”

“……!”

“Listen, I don’t think your dad wants you to be exactly the same as before. He wants the version of you who’s changed here and there. I get the feeling he likes experiments and changes and stuff.”

“……”

Not only had he guessed her exact thoughts, he’d mildly explained why they were wrong. Chané was clearly flustered—but Claire nodded at her, wearing a smile that brimmed over with confidence. “Don’t worry. I like all the versions of you there are, Chané.”

“……” Chané sulked, but her hostility had faded quite a bit.

She’s cute this way, too, Claire thought. Then something occurred to him, and he said it aloud. “You know, you really do look just like your parents.”

“……?”

Chané didn’t know her mother, so the remark struck her as extremely odd. However, since she wasn’t ready to share her thoughts with Claire, she let it slide this time.

She had no idea that her mother was currently here in New York City.

“Uh… Erm, you okay, Assistant Director?”

Victor Talbot, who was still dressed in tatters, had been arrested by the NYPD as a “suspicious gun-wielding character.”

Shooting a glare at Bill and Donald, who’d only just arrived, Victor tsked in irritation. “What the hell do you think? My body’s just fine, but do you think I’ve got any pride left after that, you idiots?”

“Oh… I know how you feel.”

“Then get moving already. Prepare to coordinate with the police. Make sure they know they owe us for the false arrest, too.”

“Assistant Director, what are you planning?” Donald asked.

Behind Victor’s cracked glasses, there was a sharp light in his eyes. “Tomorrow, all the criminals are gonna gather in one place for us. That’s probably where Huey will make his move, too. No matter what, the police and the DOI are going to settle the score once and for all.”

After issuing that order, Victor added a word of warning.

It was about the man who, in a way, might be the incident’s biggest dark horse.

“…Don’t let Senator Beriam catch on. If that neat freak’s trying to clean up this town, there’s no telling what he’ll do.”

EveningThe Martillos’ underground casino

“Well…I guess I’d better get ready.”

The second night of the Ra’s Lance casino party would begin in a few hours.

Firo was running a gambling den, and he wanted to get there early to set up.

He was really there for the showdown with Melvi the next day, but he didn’t even know exactly what their showdown would consist of. Until then, he’d do his best at the casino party and try not to disgrace the Martillo Family.

His biggest objective was rescuing Ennis. He hadn’t forgotten that for a moment. But he also knew there was nothing he could do right now, though, and that any careless attempts might put her in danger.

“Okay. Let’s see if I’ll get a clearer picture of what he’s up to today…”

Frankly, the thought that Ennis was still locked up nearly drove him out of his mind.

He still had a vivid memory of being abducted and held captive by a pedophile once, when he was a kid.

If Keith and Pa Gandor had been just a little later rescuing me, I woulda been…

The incident had been traumatic. Ordinarily, summoning any more details of the memory would have made him go pale, but now it actually focused his mind.

If you’ve put Ennis through something like that…then I don’t give a damn who you are, Melvi Dormentaire.

With a heart as calm as still water, he mentally sharpened a blade that existed solely to skewer his enemy where it would hurt the most.

Firo gradually honed a fury that was the exact opposite of Ladd’s.

As he worked, an old memory surfaced.

That takes me back. I haven’t felt this raw since the time the Phantom Father kidnapped Keith, way back when.

A murderer who claimed to have “steel stakes for the bad, candy for the good” had appeared in New York and kidnapped Keith for being a mafia boss, the symbol of evil.

We managed to corner the guy, thanks to Claire, but he got away.

Come to think of it…could that priest have been an immortal?

No, hold it.

I’ve got…that guy’s memories? His own memories…?!

The memory had been like a key in a lock, and information about the “Phantom Father” flooded into his mind from a part of him he hadn’t been aware of.

He’s…in Szilard’s memories… Dammit! What the hell?! So that priest really did have ties to Szilard?!

At the same time, the murdering priest’s memories flowed into him as well.

……

When he killed people, he really did believe he was saving the world…

These memories from an enemy whose face he’d half forgotten, and the knowledge of how he’d ended, left Firo feeling very strange.

It made him wonder whether Melvi might actually have a legitimate reason for resenting him.

Even so.

Firo wasn’t self-sacrificing enough for that to make him hesitate.

I don’t care if he kidnapped Ennis for the sake of world peace… That’s its own thing. It’s no reason to forgive him.

Well, I’ll feel better about getting rid of him if he’s an asshole, but that’s just me being selfish.

Smiling wryly, Firo grabbed a nearby chair and sat down, getting the contents of his bag in order.

Just then, he heard the door at the top of the stairs open.

Is that Christopher and Ricardo?

Firo got up, planning to give them instructions for Jacuzzi’s group.

However, the figure who’d appeared at the top of the stairs wasn’t Christopher or Ricardo. It wasn’t even a member of the Martillo Family.

“You’re…”

The newcomer spoke to Firo, and the current of fate shifted again.

The Runorata villaMelvi’s room

“You’ve certainly done it now.” When his guard told him what had happened, Melvi sighed. “Why would you do a thing like that?”

“Had to. I did it to protect you.”

“…Excuse me?”

“It’ll be better to get the enemy all in one place, or as close as we can manage. There’s only one of me, after all. It’ll be easier to have me take them all on together than dealing with them scattered around, right?”

The man spoke as if this was only natural. How arrogant is this guy? Melvi thought with disgust. However, since he did know what his guard was capable of, he couldn’t completely reject the idea.

“This job isn’t about guarding just one person,” Claire continued. “You seem to think this is a personal fight between you and Firo, but if it was, you shoulda jumped him in an alley on a dark night or something.”

“……”

“You wanted to thrash him in front of an audience, I know. You wanted to show him what you could really do. So here we are. I just streamlined it for you.” With no hesitation, Claire declared that he was the one in the right, and Melvi frowned. “I’m concerned about you, see. I’m not actually sure you’ll survive until the day after tomorrow.”

“…? It’s your job to keep me alive, isn’t it?”

“Not quite. My job is to get rid of anyone who gets in your way so that you can do what you’re here to do. What you’re here for is that match with Firo. If he snuffs you out in the middle of it, that’s not my problem.” The casual note vanished from Claire’s voice, and his expression turned serious. “Don’t think I’m playing favorites because he’s an old pal of mine. If you really wanted me to protect you from him, I wouldn’t take you to wherever this showdown’s supposed to be. I’d go rescue his girl and lock you away somewhere in Alaska until Firo’s cooled down. And yes, I said ‘you.’”

“You may not be playing favorites, but don’t you think you’re overestimating him a bit? Are you saying I’m inferior to Firo?”

“Yeah. Wait, was that not obvious? I just figured you were a go-getter who liked to fight above his weight class.”

Claire had responded without missing a beat, and Melvi’s face went taut. “What makes you think a nobody rotting on the vine in some wretched little syndicate is ‘above my weight class’?”

At that, all emotion vanished from Claire’s expression, and he faced the other man squarely. “Let’s get one thing straight.”

“……”

“The world’s mine, and I don’t think I’ll ever die. I’ve got no plans to lose to anyone, and I don’t back down when I think it’s right.” Melvi was bewildered by his bodyguard’s seemingly random claims about himself, but Claire ignored him, continuing. “That said, if I ever really lost my mind and tried to hurt Chané or the Gandors…I think Firo’s the only one who’d be able to stop me.”

“……”

Melvi hadn’t expected the conversation to go this way, and his confusion deepened.

This man was absolutely convinced he was the strongest one around, yet he’d considered the possibility that he might lose to someone. That was surprising enough, but on top of that, the “someone” in question was the immortal who had nothing but knife skills?

Not only that, but it was pretty likely that Claire didn’t even know Firo was immortal in the first place. That meant he thought an ordinary human might surpass him.

“What gives you such a high opinion of Firo Prochainezo?”

“Well, it’s something even he hasn’t picked up on. And I don’t owe you an explanation,” Claire replied flatly before getting to the bottom line. “But I’m contractually obligated to protect you, so consider yourself warned, all right? I may be perfect, but protecting a guy who chugs poison on purpose isn’t a job for a bodyguard. You should go to a doctor for that stuff.”

“I really don’t understand. You’ve had a high opinion of him and the Gandors this whole time, but if they’re truly that impressive, I can’t see it.”

“Well, call me biased if you want. Don’t forget, though—you’ve been warned.”

Claire said it one last time, just to make sure.

He wasn’t trying to harass Melvi in any way. He seriously considered this part of his job as a guard.

“Firo’s someone who might be able to take me down.”