The Raven Dark Hero 53

Chapter 53 : Partners

TL:SummerPeanut

Author’s Note:

Thanks for the wait!

This chapter is the highlight of the first half of the story, so there are a lot of battle scenes. I was very excited to write the story, so I hope you'll stay with me until the end!

The next day, in his room at the headquarters of Kuroyume.

Suou Kouki is dead. ...To be more precise, he is dead in the register.

Kouki had already overcome the shock of his existence being written off after he heard from Kiryu, the boss of Kuroyume, about their true purpose, and awakened a renewed sense of what he should be doing.

After the previous chaos, he fell into a deep sleep before finally waking up the next day.

He looked at his terminal device and saw that he had received a worrying text message from Teaser. In the content, she described her mixed feelings about the death of her dear friend who was involved in this incident.

(...probably about me…and I'm actually still alive~. I'll check with boss again, and if it looks okay, maybe I'll tell her who I am?)

It was not his intention to see Teaser's sad face. Not to mention that it wasn’t that long since he had been in contact with Rumi as Kouki, but she still took care of him like a good big sister.

Then, he looked at Kouki's phone. It seemed to be safe, and although there was not much battery left, it was still running normally.

(I guess I'll have to say goodbye to this phone too…)

In the call history, there were several calls from home….

(I really did the bad thing to mom and dad…. Sorry.)

He apologized to his parents, whom he can no longer meet in his heart. Kouki's funeral would probably be held in the near future. He could already imagine his mother and father grieving.

(No matter what... I can't go see them right now. But someday, for sure, if I changed this country, then...)

And one email came from Takahiko....

“Kouki. ...did you make sure to delete all the sexually explicit videos on your computer?”

“………do you think I could!!”

He involuntarily retorted to his phone. ...But when he thought about the feelings of Takahiko, who would have sent this email, Kouki felt once again how considerate Takahiko was.

(He must have known I was dead and made this joke...)

At that moment, his Kuroyume’s terminal rang. The caller was Kiryu.

"You should be up by now. Come to my room right away." …Kiryu hung up the phone after declaring so.

(Well… he's the boss…)

Remembering Line’s talk from yesterday, he smiled bitterly and started to get dressed.

When he went to Kiryu's room, he was urged to sit on the sofa as usual.

"Well then, since you have decided to live as Bright from now on, you won't have to hide your identity any longer. Since this is a good opportunity, why don't you get yourself a 'buddy partner' or something?"

"Partner? ...You mean a comrade?”

“That's right. That doesn't mean you have to always work together, though. It's rare to find two people like Skull and Joker who do everything together. Do you have someone in mind?”

A partner for him... he thought for a while. But no matter how much he thought about it, only one person came to mind for Kouki.

“I don't know anyone except Teaser. And maybe Jiren-san and Vendetta-san…”

At this moment, the negative consequences of ignoring all the invitation for joint mission emails surfaced. The previously mentioned names were all the members who had a certain amount of exchanges with him within Kuroyume.

“Jiren and Vendetta have their partner, and Teaser already has a partner. If you want to, you can request the other party to disband with their current partner... but as the boss, I don't want you to create unnecessary friction.”

(What? Teaser already has a partner? Then I don’t know anyone else though?)

"...Actually, there's a guy who wants to partner up with you. He's our number nine.”

Number 9.

Kuroyume has a group of people called "Numbers" who are recognized for their strength and gift.

The members of the Numbers currently known to Kouki are…

Number 1・Kiryu

Number 2・Jiren

Number 4・Vendetta

...those three only. By the way, Skull, Joker, and Teaser are all not Numbers. In other words, being chosen as a number one proves that you either are very strong or possess an incredible gift.

The number 9 of the Numbers wanted to partner up with Kouki. It was an honour for Kouki, but he was also worried because he didn't know him at all.

"...well, you've never met him in Kuroyume before, so go meet him once... maybe you'll be surprised. Come in.”

(Eh? He’s here!? ...Boss, come on, you already planned to have us partner up from the very beginning, didn’t you...?)

With Kiryu's call as the signal, a man came through the door.

"Excuse me~!”

The man who came in with a lighthearted smile was wearing a pitch-black hooded coat with a mask covering his mouth, so it wasn’t possible to see his whole face, but his tone was cheerful, so he could at least judge that he’s friendly.

“Yoo-hoo~!! Darkflash Bright! I am the man who monopolizes the eyes of God and Devil, the Twin-Eyed Evil God, Evil! Nice to meet you!”

Then, Evil pointed at Kouki as he struck a signature pose.

(..........oh boy, here comes a weirdo!)

“Hey, hey, can you not look at me like I'm some kind of freak within seconds of our fateful meeting?”

"Ah...pardon me. So, why do you want to partner with me, Jinma-san?”[1]

"That's what you call me!? ...Oh well. The reason is simple! It seems like you won't be able to see your friends on the surface anymore, so I thought I'd meet you here, Kouki…”

Evil called out Kouki's name. A name that only Kiryu and a small part of the organization knew.

Kouki's gaze on Evil grew wary.

“You… Who are you exactly?”

"Eh--? You can’t tell by my voice? I'm shocked…”

Evil slowly put his hand on his hood and then took off his mask to reveal his true face….

"...So, did you get rid of the pornographic videos on your computer? ...you probably wouldn’t, I guess?”

“...Ta, Takahiko!?”

Evil revealed his true face... and there was the familiar face of his best friend.

“Heheh, I finally get to reveal myself!”

“Wh-Why are you in Kuroyume!?”

“Just so you know, I've been a member of Kuroyume for at least three years now?”

"What, three years?! Doesn’t that mean you’ve been here since we first met in middle school? ...So you mean...... the boss knew about our relationship!?”

"Yeah. If anything, it was Evil who was tasked to do a background check on you. In the course of that investigation, I was surprised to learn that you and Evil were classmates.”

"That's that. The truth is... I knew that you manifested the gift itself at the earliest stage. But I was surprised when I found out that the mysterious person the boss brought in was actually you! I can't tell you how many times I almost spill out the truth at school~”

Let us layout the timeline again.

The day after Kouki manifested his gift, Takahiko realized what had happened to Kouki.

Kiryu asked Takahiko to investigate Kouki's background and soon found out that it was him.

With Kouki known to be dead by the public, Takahiko revealed himself. ...or so it goes.

Even though it was a coincidence that Evil who was tasked to do a background check on Kouki was Takahiko, both Kiryu and Takahiko were surprised to find out that Kouki was a friend of Takahiko's from school, and so was Kouki.

“I'm aware of the situation. As usual, it seems that Hiro couldn't control his jealousy of Kouki. ...You shouldn't have helped him.”

"Jealousy eh... Well, I do regret saving him a little. Don't worry, if I ever see him again, I'm going to beat the shit out of him and that bitch of female general too.”

“Eh? You mean the female major general? Could it be the captain of the Byakkotai? Eh? Can you even fight her?”

"Oh. Why? Is she that strong?”

Based on Takahiko's reaction, Kouki purely wondered whether or not the Major General was too strong for him to defeat. This was what he meant.

"Well.... it’s because she(Fuuka) is...but...hmm, nah, I suppose it doesn’t matter now...”

“What's that? That's a very suggestive way of putting a close to the talk. Is she really that strong? Or is there something else wrong with her?”

Takahiko was troubled, and…

“...... No, let's stop here. There are some things in life you're better off not knowing! I mean, I heard that Azusa and Haruka took a shot at the Nature Stranger after you died or something along that line?”

"...apparently, yeah. They must've gotten fed up with that bastard, huh?”

“Eh? Really? ...... Poor thing. I'm sure it was humiliating for Hiro. After all, he finally gained their affection by using you.”

"What? You, if you knew so much about Hiro, can’t you tell me!”

"I told you before, didn't I? Some things in life are better left unknown. What do you think would have happened if you had known the truth before your gift manifested?”

(What would have happened? I probably would have given him a taste of my fist. But back then, my fighting strength was simply lower than him, and since it was Hiro, he might have pretended to be the victim and tried to use my assault for his advantage... Hm? Then I would have become even more isolated…)

It was only an ‘if’ story, but as Takahiko had said, Kouki imagined that it would not have turned out well.

"...Yeah, well, that's okay. I certainly feel like it would have been better if I didn't know.”

“Right? Well... you've had the gift of denseness triggered in you from time to time. If it hadn't been for your eventful experience, you probably wouldn't have noticed.”

Kouki felt that it’s rude to be called dense all of a sudden. But he didn't argue with him, because he thought so too in some ways he is dense.

“Anyway putting aside the long talk, there’s no longer any need to tread carefully as Bright so why not you two go with a big mission.

I know you guys have just partnered up, but I'm going to need you guys to participate in an important battle.”

From Kouki's point of view, ‘huh?’ is the only response he could give. Although he hadn't officially agreed with the partner talk yet, he had no reason to refuse. To be honest, he was very happy to be able to work with Takahiko again, whom he thought he would never see again.

“The mission is scheduled for a week from now. In the meantime, you two are going to do a few missions together to see what you’re capable of as partners. Now that you don't have to go to school anymore, you can go on missions every day.

...now, the main topic.”

Kiryu took out a sheet of paper and placed it on the table. On it was the words ‘Special Mission’.

"...... prevents the NDF from destroying ‘Shiroyume’…. What's a Shiroyume?”

From the name Shiroyume, Kouki somehow guessed that it was a filths organization that was on friendly terms with Kuroyume.

“Shiroyume is the third largest organization in Japan, and is on friendly terms with Kuroyume.

This time, the NDF has embarked on a large-scale destruction of filths organization in order to make up for the failure at the Nerima branch. The culmination of those efforts will be this operation of theirs, the destruction of Shiroyume. But Kuroyume will intercept the NDF at the Shiroyume's headquarters in secret.”

“It seems like a big mission.... And with just me and Takahiko?”

“No, this time we'll have two from the Numbers, Jiren and Vendetta, join you. At any rate, the Nature Stranger was supposed to come with NDF originally. However, it's unclear at this point what's going to happen because of the previous incident, and there's a possibility that they will send stronger reinforcements with higher rank and combat strength…

However, the NDF doesn't know that Kuroyume and Shiroyume’s(our) side has information on their planned attack on Shiroyume’s HQ. So they'll be coming in with a small elite force.”

Nature Stranger. For Kouki, it had always been an existence that he had admired. And he had mercilessly killed two of the people he admired. Looking back, he felt that he had overdone it again. He could not control his urge to kill at that time. But he told himself that it was necessary now that he had a much bigger goal.

(......thinking about it now, in Kurosaki's, Saejima's, Lieutenant Iori's, and even in this case as well, right after the Revived Hunter is activated, my emotions were wrapped up with murderous intent. Could this be a limitation of Revived Hunter?)

It is true that after he came back to life, his emotions were always more violent. Furthermore, he had a much stronger urge to kill the person who killed him. He wondered if this is a reaction to the fact that Revived Hunter being activated….

...But no matter how much he thought about it, he couldn't seem to come up with an answer right away.

Author’s Note:

Takahiko appears! His true identity was a member of Kuroyume!

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TL’s note:

1. Kouki treated Twin-eyed Evil God(神魔の双眼)’s Evil God(神魔) as a name and read it as Jinma when our Takahiko obviously introduced his code name as Evil while that ‘twin-eyed evil god’ is supposedly his second name.