Destined

Pin-drop silence, twinkling stars and a perfect moon.

“Six months..”

The azure hue of a night scenery is lonely without a single trace of people. Engines of the few cars passing by leave a modicum of life.

“SIX MONTHS in Yokohama.”

A deep sigh reverberates in the hushed street. How to begin? There is nothing to talk about. The fight with some skill-users last week was the only riveting venture in this dream world.

Because that’s when the ability tied its pyric thread of fate to its master’s middle finger.

Since then, everything is like watching paint dry. Prayers, training, perusal and consociation, all goes in loop. A place that can be called home nestles in the quiet residential zone, just ten minutes away from the Motomachi Shopping District.

“..It’s been a long time.”

A wide, soundful yawn topples the lazy silence.

"Augh...it’s so boring!"

“One more character, God, Please...”

Leaves rustle in the wind. They are concealing a chuckle. Light cannot reach a few parts of the street. These tenebrous stretches might deceive your eyes. However, if you can sense properly, darkness is a predictable event.

Even when it spurs, and takes the form of a sharp dagger.

🅱🅴🅴🅿

The surge of signals warn about the upcoming danger. Muscle stiffen. Thorny tentacles ambush, but are eluded by a seamless leap.

"As expected."

First comes his voice, then the sound of his footsteps. He is an apparition of the darkness.

"Greetings. I’m Akutagawa Ryuunosuke, one of Port Mafia’s dogs." says the young man in a black overcoat.

Standing in front is the person in charge of the commando unit of Yokohama underground criminal organization. The Cerberus of the Port Mafia. His hair turns white at the tips, complimenting the empty look in his eyes.

The Port Mafia’s hellhound is right before the raven eyes—Should his sight grace a smile on your lips?

“Great! That’s more like it!”

"Nice to meet you, Akutagawa-san! Mosmi here."

MOMENTS AGO

I had embarked a mission.

My objective was to find an ability-user, or a thief, I would say. An abhorrent adolescent who had dared to meddle in one of our jobs. Our estimates report that she beat a strong ability user of the low-level enemy organization in a fight and pillaged the ability of our prey.

The location was right before my eyes. An unobtrusive white house with no light emerging out from its windows. Before I took a step, I heard a vulgar bellow grating on my ears.

“Augh...it’s so boring!”

A foolish decision to excurse alone in the darkness. And a convenient opportunity for myself. Without a delay, I aimed my Rashomon straight for her head.

We are the Port Mafia. A fool has sinned to interrupt our business. Whether unintentional or planned; anyone who dares to come our way shall suffer a certain agonizing death.

However, today’s case is recherche.

My ambush was simply a test. As I had suspected, she jumped off and dodged it with a precognitive ease. Either her reverie was ostensible, or she holds an instinctive prowess.

“𝐴𝑘𝑢𝑡𝑎𝑔𝑎𝑤𝑎-𝑘𝑢𝑛. 𝐼 𝑤𝑎𝑛𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑡𝑜 𝑐𝑎𝑝𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑔 𝑙𝑎𝑑𝑦 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑏𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑒𝑟 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒.”

Bring her here? We are the Port Mafia. We silence the defiant instantly.

“𝑈𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑠𝑡𝑜𝑜𝑑.”

There must have been a reason for this. I wanted to affirm it. The way she carried herself didn’t show a slightest hint of surprise or caution. It was a perfect façade to fool almost anyone.

“As expected.”

I see. Boss was right.

“Greetings. I’m Akutagawa Ryuunosuke, one of Port Mafia’s dogs.”

“Nice to meet you, Akutagawa-san! Mosmi here.”

NOW

This is the first time an ordinary person has been audacious enough to smile and speak to him like it’s nothing.

Not much of a person either, just a brat. No fear, no pleads, no rage, but a casual greeting one would give to a friend. Even the most ignorant could’ve taken a hint in this case.

Akutagawa’s voice cuts cold as ice, ”By inheriting an ability from the prey of the mafia, you have committed a grave sin."

“Oh, is he talking about Akaashi?”

Mosmi speaks in an unnecessarily cheery tone, ”So? What are you implying?"

🅱🅴🅴🅿

Once again, she shifts her weight to a side, effortlessly dodging his attack.

"While defeating an ability user might be just a coincidence," His coat wiggles on its own, ”you will still get to carve that into your tombstone." A furious black beast, shaped from the coat, hovers ferociously behind him. "But you should be aware. A clever bird doesn’t sing in a cage."

The air around him grows heavy. His black robe materializes and sprouts into razor-sharp blades. They lash out at her with surprising speed. Mosmi doesn’t move an inch, not out of fear but due to the knowledge. Her eyebrows crinkle at corners as her danger sense doesn’t give a beep.

Mosmi, however, didn’t move an inch—not out of fear, but from the knowledge. Her eyebrows crinkled at corners.

“The danger sense? Where’s the beep?”

The blades miss her by a few millimeters.

"You missed that on purpose, didn’t you?"

"Of course. I’m told to bring you alive. Resistance will face instant consequences."

"Oh my, I’m scared." Mosmi’s pert smile revels a situation bound to expectations.

She cracks her knuckles as she speaks in her mind.

“Kuro, you up?”

“An ability never sleeps.”

An orange rim light from fire outlines her form. Intense red flames hurtle towards Akutagawa. Raw, untamed energy roars with an all-consuming intensity. The heat radiates like an invisible threat.

Akutagawa doesn’t even blink. Rashomon, his exceptional Orthrus, engulfs the flames remarkably.

"Fight me, Akutagawa-san."

Mosmi holds nary a trace of fear. Her voice is sweet as a child asking her brother to play. Such pristine smile amidst the promise of demise is hardly a common reaction. In all Akutagawa’s lifetime, at least, he has never seen any kid smile at him while being faced against. Not when the kid seems to know what is going to happen to her.

He gives a cold smile. ”Fight you?"

Her confidence makes him bear it in his mind. You could feel it in the way his voice levels. "Do you have any idea on who I am?"

"Doesn’t matter." Mosmi attacks again.

In face of another wall of fire, Akutagawa manipulates his cloak into a dragonesque entity. It grows in size, engulfing its vicinity to form an impervious barrier. All flames are repelled in an adept motion. None can reach him.

"Excellent."He smirks even at the sight of her failed attempt. Mosmi cannot help but give a rueful smile.

"Do you think that even daring to fight you is admirable?"

"Surpass the back of beyond to get such praise."

Once again, a belt of flames streaks towards Akutagawa. Another swoops in from the other side. This would corner him in the crossfire. Smoke from the flames would hinder visibility and cause breathing problems. Stepping back to seek cover, he would find himself surrounded by yet another fire whip. Akutagawa is closed off from all directions.

However, he is used to tight spots.

Rashomon’s shield is just a call away. Flames encircling him are walled off completely. The obsidian beast attacks in a swift motion. Everything in its path gets ravaged. Mosmi is helplessly amazed by his precision. Her mind buzzes with intermittent beeps that aid her actions. She ought to keep moving to avoid getting hurt by his honed attacks. Holding her ground is slowly draining her.

Fighting Akutagawa is expected to be difficult, but it’s worse when experienced firsthand. Slashes tear through her limbs. Pain coils through her veins like a snake of burning acid.

🅱🅴🅴🅿

Rashomon carves another sharp gash into her leg, sending a jolt of agony. Mosmi hears her heart call out to her, begging her to escape or cry or double down.

🅱🅴🅴🅿

Danger sense surges in her mind. Danger sense is one of her wishes the book has fulfilled: To sense upcoming threats. Mosmi’s ability creates a desperate buckler. She staggers away. To buy some time, she speaks, ”..You’re not enjoying this, Akutagawa-san."

"Don’t get full of yourself." He replies. She laughs through the tip of her nose, her smile twisting in pain.

Akutagawa holds a relaxed posture. ”You might be able to dodge these, but it is incontestably scant." He covers his mouth to cough, while the monster continues to clash with her ability. ”No matter how much you jump, you will ultimately die. That’s how it works.

Because you’re a weakling. A puerile big-head."

Killing Mosmi would be a waste of her ability. And a waste of his time. Akutagawa could’ve killed her long ago if he wanted to. However, it is this direct order from the Boss. And as if anticipating his instincts, Akutagawa has been strictly prohibited from killing.

Not that he will let her know that. Akutagawa will only capture her if she is worthy enough.

"The Port Mafia is a place that values strength. Power determines your worth. I can offer you both power and purpose."

He looks so firm and composed. The words roll off his tongue without a shred of hesitation. This is the confidence one gets when one becomes so capable. It’s badass, Mosmi sighs. However, offer her a purpose? Akutagawa shouldn’t have said that.

"Hf, what makes you think," Mosmi drags her feet up, never discarding that wry smile. ”that I haven’t got any purpose?"

Then comes an explosion.

A raging inferno propels towards Akutagawa, encompassing him whole. Rashomon is summoned at the last possible moment. The barrier itself, faces barriers to protect its master. Eruptions and blazes chop up any effort of holding the guard. They do not just deflect, but defy the sole idea of offering her a purpose.

Mosmi’s insanity is their fuel.

The area roars with a fury of flames. Some flog him, others blur his vision. Some are decoys, others are just a nuisance. Yet everyone serves a purpose: To defeat him.

To defeat his conjecture.

To defeat his passivity.

Akutagawa’s training has been cut out just for this. He had felt something was bereft.

The oblivion in his eyes gets replaced with a zeal resonating her vibrance. It is just what he wanted; why wouldn’t his lips curl up?

Attacks intensify. Mosmi appears to be giving her best, landing kicks and punches to crack his momentum. Her moves are as refined as Akutagawa’s. Her ability doesn’t let any flaws show. Akutagawa cannot close the distance.

Mosmi played the trick. She'd breakthrough his barrier just like Atsushi had done in the anime- I know it. It was shown in the anime. I just have to breakthrough, and not give him enough time-

"The fallacy of assuming self-aptitude," He roots his legs to the ground, ”will cause your downfall.”

Numerous daggers are unleashed, while his voice makes blood run cold. Mosmi evades the processions desperately. Taking advantage of the distraction, another band slithers from behind her without making any sound.

🅱🅴🅴🅿

Mosmi tries to move, but her body cannot keep up. The beast coils around her with a vile energy, its malevolent force hurling her backwards like a baseball. Her breath gets knocked out of her lungs, back slammed against an inner wall of an alleyway.

Her heart pounds in her ears. Akutagawa stands in front of the alley. There is no escape now. Mosmi is trapped. His footsteps reach the alley’s quiet core. Not long ago, invigorating roars had charged this space with a spark of hope. And now it is just a void.

Akutagawa’s pupils are darker than the shadows consuming the alley. He speaks like he is citing an unalterable truth known to him for years.

"You aren’t entirely vain, but don’t presume that anyone would care about your feelings. No one’s concerned about your past or your bleak future."

Mosmi raises her eyes to look at him. Her mind is still flogged with the sting from the injuries.

"There's a lot more strength left in her. Why hold it back?" He thinks.

"The weak fall. The strong decide the fate of those who remain."

Akutagawa looks at her unreadable guise, a stillness that gives nothing away. "If she listens, this might work."

"A tree without roots can’t stand tall.

The Port Mafia will give you the opportunity to stand atop. We don’t waste time on obstacles, much less on the weak."

Mosmi had nudged mafia’s operations. Now, she has to take her pick. A miserable fate chaining her to become a corpse, or the opportunity to delay death by a few more days. Akutagawa gives her a chance to speak, but no words leave her mouth.

"Giving up before she tries." He lowers his eyes to watch her without a change in his expression. She has done this to herself.

"This is the end."

The end of her life.

The end of her hope.

The end of her fun days and dreams.

Dream.

"No."

Her voice echoes in a surprising firmness with a strength you wouldn’t expect from a child who’s supposed to be teetering by now. Her voice is not clogged, and her face shows no signs of a person who would start groveling for mercy.

Akutagawa squints his eyes.

"What do you think that might do?"

🅱🅴🅴🅿

Mosmi pivots her body on one side. Pain and exhaustion make her fall to her knees. His dingy cloth launches towards her once more. Because Mosmi reacts again, it can only seize her by her leg.

"You’ve already lost."

“..You know..."

"People who generally give all that talk about power...Deep down, they’re just...terrified of being called weak."

...

This is the first day in Mosmi’s life, when she has dared to say so much. And the first day of Akutagawa’s life, when he gets to hear that from a thwarted target.

Congratulations, both of you.

🅱🅴🅴🅿

The cloth around her leg tightens its grip. Every inch of her body screams in pain. Only her heart has the energy to keep going.

"Is this what you are implying?" Akutagawa dismisses her with an equal indifference.

"You don’t get to decide who has what value, and who’s weak...!!!"Mosmi’s voice rings through the walls of stillness around him, even through the noise from injuries.

Something stirs in him. A fleeting memory flashes across his mind. And with it wells up disdain, from deep within his soul.

"..You don’t get to decide... whether someone’s.. worthy of being alive or not!!"

Akutagawa’s eyes pierce at her with a chilling hatred. Those familiar words strike a cord in him.

"The world doesn’t operate on ideals like that." Agitation craves in his intonation. He replies with the rage of someone who thinks that letting her belief slide would be the end of his ambitions. The wriggling cloth crushes her bones. Her eyes fill with tears. She shuts them close and winces. Her shrieks get suppressed by the cloth covering her mouth.

"At least you were lucky enough to be offered for your own upliftment. If there were any wits about you, you’d have accepted it instantly."

"Oh... really?" The piece around her mouth is calcined, but it takes almost all of her strength.

This will kill me. But the least of what I can do is try it in my way.

The girl has long abandoned her self-preservation.

"You know what? People... need to be told they’re worthy of being alive by someone else.. or they can’t go on."

“𝑆ℎ𝑒‘𝑑 𝑏𝑒 𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑦 𝑠𝑡𝑢𝑏𝑏𝑜𝑟𝑛, 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑚𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡 𝑡𝑟𝑦 𝑡𝑜 𝑔𝑒𝑡 𝑜𝑛 𝑦𝑜𝑢𝑟 𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑒𝑠. 𝐵𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑠ℎ𝑎𝑙𝑙 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑘𝑖𝑙𝑙 ℎ𝑒𝑟. 𝑌𝑜𝑢’𝑟𝑒 𝑔𝑖𝑣𝑒𝑛 𝑎 𝑑𝑖𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑡 𝑜𝑟𝑑𝑒𝑟 𝑡𝑜 𝑏𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 ℎ𝑒𝑟 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑎𝑛𝑦 𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑤𝑎𝑦 𝑝𝑜𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑏𝑙𝑒.”

Akutagawa hangs his head in frustration.

Is this what the Boss meant?That she would be so hell-bent, and wouldn’t care if she gets killed-

"You have power and status. You fight just so people fear you."

🅱🅴🅴🅿

Swoosh comes a blade.

And another.

Yet another, cutting through precision, charging at her in a lightning rage.

Mosmi barely scrapes by. Her astonishment soon turns into a smile, from the satisfaction of expecting the expected. The calm before the storm, the stillness before the tempest.

“Hook,”

"Oho! Did I hit the spot?~"

“Line,”

"Who..."

"..WHO ARE YOU TO TELL ME THAT?!"

“And sinker.”

Akutagawa’s aura, hatred, resentment, it is all on blast.

"People like you. Are. Utter Disappointment. RASHOMON! BUDDING BRACKEN!"

Numerous thorny vines grow out of the ground and charge up at great heights.

"Early Blooming Sakura!"

Akutagawa’s cloak lifts Mosmi even higher, enveloping her completely. More thorns grow from it. Everything inside it is crushed like a tomato. Mosmi has a strong ability, but it is unrefined. How could she stand tall when the roots, the training, weren’t binding her to success?

Blood spilling in a pool, spine-wrecking wails, is what Akutagawa expects.

He doesn’t expect a plain silence after his vehement outburst. No trace of blood. No screams. No sign of flesh torn apart.

...

“...She dodged that?!”

The instant he realizes it, he takes a fighting stance and scans the place. Mosmi’s voice suddenly dawns upon from his opposite direction.

"A tree grows as high as its branches reach."

A vicious blow to the jaw sends Akutagawa flying. Before he can balance, she plunges on him and casts her deranged attacks.

"Devoured space!"

Akutagawa has hardly managed to make it work this time. Mosmi goes on in a full throttle. Every assault and flare comes off more explosive than the previous. Like a rhythm increasing per beat.

"I don’t need anyone to tell me, I know what I’m doing!"She speaks in a finality.

Akutagawa gives an anticipative smile.

"Great. Burn out. Don't hold back.

Tire yourself and smolder away."

He is forced to fight to defend himself. His eyes dilate in the zest of the match. Suddenly, a sharp pain singes in his chest. His breath gets caught. The shield cracks at last. Another powerful kick shatters it completely.

Mosmi bends her body and places her hands on the ground. With a push kick on his vulnerable body, she sends him crashing against a wall. Akutagawa coughes up blood, pain aching his sides. The surrounding structures crumble into dust and debris. The charred walls camouflage in the dark. Smoke from the smoldering debris raises the flag of victory in the air.

Akutagawa keeps himself awake. Mosmi is standing triumphant while he leans against the wall. Neither of them appear to have the stamina to continue fighting.

Now this is the end.

Akutagawa wipes off the blood from his mouth. His eyes hold a glint of acknowledgement, but before he can say anything, Mosmi collapses on the ground. A slow blink registers the scene. He limps towards her, glimpsing at the traces of a smile on her battered face.

His mission is completed. And yet he is defeated.