*

  Hoshi co-owns the ‘UnDerGrounD’ together with Saburo. Despite being in the slums, the place is rigged to handle the raw power of D-Grade Evolves, so it isn’t totally wack.

  Most Mercenary-Guards in this neighborhood frequent the gym, giving the owners a street rep that sits high. But like anyone with too many friends, they have just as many enemies—gangs, rivals, Enforcers, police... basically anyone with a problem with them or their ‘associates.’

  Though, the training services for Evolves are just a front.

  Their real business is the illegal craft of arcane weapons and the trade of Arcane materials. From Aggressor body parts like hearts (also called arcane-cores) to stones, plants, ores—anything from the Gates soaked in Arcane. All things we call ‘Elixir.’ Those of us who have run jobs for them know their fingers stick even deeper into the legit side shit of things.

  A couple of years back, I saw them dealing bio-materials to Corp agents and fixers from both the Silver and Conquest districts. I guess top-side folks come down here for cheaper stocks or to find the kind of ‘very’ illegal arcane materials that don't exist in their polite circles.

  Saburo and Hoshi's operation is small compared to others, but that’s by design (based on others' words. Not like I know any racketeers besides them). It keeps them off the radar of the government and, more importantly—the fuckin' Black Dragon Tower.

  They are the real top dogs. A paramilitary powerhouse that handles everything related to Evolves and Gates in Japan. They are the main movers and shakers; they can off anyone who fucks with them, and no one dares to ask questions. Proper mad OGs.

  I once heard about a time when some brass-necks in other Towers and a few politicians crossed 'em and got iced by Black Dragon agents. The story goes that they appeared like skin-peeling Onryō; blood-red smoke oozing from every gap in their pitch-black armor—suits made from the spiked hide of some demon-spawn Aggressor. They flattened everything and everyone in their path before disappearing as quickly as they arrived.

  The street word was - a thousand dead. That news flooded the streets for days, though the official narrative was different. There were no demonic assassins or insane body counts in the reports, but the core stayed the same: The Black Dragons killed some top-side ballers, and no one could do a damn thing about it.

  I’m yet to hear of a single Black Dragon staffer getting thrown in the can for it. Some police commissioner kept yapping on TV about how the massacre stood against the system and how he’d get justice. He kept saying no one was above the law.

  Years later, no one has heard a peep from him. I guess he finally realized those guys are the law. I mean even the bloody Enforcers are owned by the Black Dragon Tower; they only work for the government by extension.

  The Black Dragons keep their Enforcers in the Silver and Conquest districts—the sections of Osaka where the rich rats live with silver spoons up their asses. A stunt that leaves the rest of us in ghettos like Sumiyoshi are left to fend for ourselves when shit hits the fan.

  Keeping history aside, Hoshi was currently laughing with that Black Bird bastard like he’d just heard the funniest joke in the Japan. I steeled my nerves and approached, calling out respectfully.

  "Hoshi-san."

  He went quiet immediately. He took a few seconds before turning to look at me.

  This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

  "Ahh… Ratty…" he muttered, his voice dripping with indifference. He glanced at the empty cage in front of him, a hint of irritation in his eyes.

  "Who’s this fucker, Hoshi-san? I thought you muzzled all your bitches with a cock down their fuckin' throats?” the bird-forehead guy sneered. His eyes burned with a clear shimmer of craze. I got the immediate feeling he was just waiting for an excuse to tear me apart just for interrupting.

  I averted my gaze. I knew better than to irritate a psychopathic gangster. Everyone in this neighborhood had heard of this twisted fuck; the number of people he’d dropped just for annoying him could probably fit in a freaking train and people have seen what remains of his victims. It ain't pretty sight.

  "Ignore him, Kenzo-san, he’s just some runt… one of the boys that train in my gym," Hoshi said, not even glancing at me. He finally turned my way. "What do you want, Haiji?"

  I tried to sound as desperate as I felt. "I need to scrap. Please." But quietly.

  "Night’s over. There’s no fighter on your level here tonight," Hoshi replied, a flat rejection.

  But then the bastard next to him cut in.

  "Wait a moment, Hoshi-san. I’ve got a mutt… you’ve got a mutt… and they seem to be on the same Grade. Why not have a ‘dog fight’?" Kenzo suggested, pinning a cigarette between his ashen lips and lighting it.

  "Why not?" Hoshi acted like he was thinking it over before agreeing without my consent. That was the catch—I couldn’t back down from a fight he gave me.

  He gestured to a guy wearing shades on a janky wooden podium across the room. The guy hurried over, and Hoshi whispered in his ear.

  "Oi, call that mutt—Akio," Kenzo yelled, turning to a short man standing a few feet behind him. The man also wore a black suit and a bird tattoo on his forehead.

  The short man gave a quick nod and disappeared into the crowd.

  After a few moments, the short man emerged from the rowdy crowd with a guy about my age with a Mohawk and had same bird tattoo as the short guy and Kenzo.

  “This is my mutt” Kenzo sneered, flaunting his ‘possession’ to Hoshi as he roughly grabbed the guy by the back of his neck and the guy did nothing but remained utterly submissive, as he was pulled like an animal.

  Hoshi gave a slight nod of approval, then turned his attention toward the rickety podium and signaled the guy with the shades. The ‘shade-guy’ grabbed the mic and brought it close to his lips, his voice dripping with malicious glee.

  He blew a deep breath to the receiver of the mic, and from the speakers came an amplified version of the sound of his deep breath.

  The sound swept across the room with utter coldness and demand of undivided attention from every living-thing present and the crowd obeyed the unspoken command; momentarily hold their tongue and gave him most of their attention, the guy allow the silence to soak itself into the atmosphere, lasting for 5 second at least before opening his slacky mouth to speak.

  “What’s a scrap night without a little more b-l-o-o-d-b-a-t-h?!!!!

  What is it without seeing fuckin' dogs tryin' to tear each other - the fuck - apart for s-c-r-a-p-s?!!!...” the guy spoke with a spine-chilling voice of a creep, and seems to love stretching the last word of each of his sentences.

  He continued “Luckily, we got some dogs locked up in here to grant us such bloody sight... to grant us more fuckin' carnage to fill our fuckin' b-e-l-l-i-e-s!!!...ahhhh!! … a fight with no mercy, no breaks, no tap out, no bells, no K. f-u-c-k-i-n-g- O!!!…” He seized his talking; letting his words hang in the air as he paced around the podium and scratching his messed-up hair like voices were whispering into his ears.

  The crowd was electric because of his stupid theatrics; roaring and howling like wild deranged animals trying to burst out of a cage.

  All of a sudden, he raised his voice to the bloody roof, yelling like he aimed for the whole Sumiyoshi to hear “…I don’t know about you but I want more blood, more screams, more begging, more shattered bones, more tearing of fuckin' limb to limb!!!”. He yelled so much, everyone could his arteries popping of his forehead.

  Then he went silent again and stopped his ‘mad-man’ pacing around the podium.

  His face was all red and covered with sweat as he panted like he just ran from one end of the city to another, then opened his mouth to speak with more subtleness and calm, which I think is the normal tone of his voice “Now, let’s have some ….” The crowd refused to let him finish, hijacking what seem to be his last word that everyone knew to well and yelled wildly “Dog Fight, Dog Fight, Dog Fight…!” repeatedly and in near-perfect unison with wild excitement.

  The untamed behaviour of the crowd drew a wicked smile on the emcee’s croaked face.

  There I was, standing at the centre of the ravening of the mob and my soul had just one thing to tell me and the only words that came to mind is ‘I am fucked tonight’; something I felt to an intense degree, fearing of what might happen in the cage… to me specifically.

  Dog fight is literally a fight of slaves; it only ends when at least one of the owners; which presently is Hoshi and Psycho gangster says so; it doesn’t even end if one of the fighters die.

  The killer must continue to plummet attacks on the dead body of their opponent, until they are told to yield.

  It is a straight up bloody fight and anything goes; be it the use of melee, biting, poking, scratching, maiming, etc… even side arms (but ‘owners’ tend to strip glocks off their fighters before entering the ring, to make it last longer), it is basically to be as gruesome and violent as a man can be, with no concept of surrender.

  “To the dogs… Enter the fuckin' cage and try to tear each other apart” the Emcee uttered with a jolly, sadistic smirk.

  Our names and grades weren't announced. We were just property.

  Akio broke off the scathing sneer he’d been holding since he first saw me. He pulled off his worn-out singlet and cracked his neck before stepping into the cage. I followed suit, shedding my backpack, my "Rat" fur vest, and my patched-up hoodie. I kicked off my beat-up boots and entered the ring shirtless, directly opposite him.

  The crowd booed and cussed, but Akio’s eyes were locked on mine with murderous focus. We both knew the score: only one of us was walking out. Fear and a crazed will to survive flickered between us.