Chapter 2: New Day
A whole month passed, and a fragile routine settled over Azazel's life. The sharp edges of his new world had begun to wear down, becoming almost familiar.
He was sitting in class, dutifully copying notes from the board, when the lunch bell finally rang. As he snapped his textbook shut, Ruyi turned in her seat.
"Azazel,want to eat lunch with me?"
"Okay,"he said. "But I'm going to the roof."
"The roof it is,"she replied with a small smile.
This had become their ritual. Over the past few weeks, Azazel had made a few surface-level friends in the kendo club, but his only real connection was Ruyi. On the rooftop, she immediately pulled out her phone.
"Hey, Azazel, look at this cat video I found!"
She showed him a clip of a kitten chasing its tail,then scrolled through her feed—a mix of VTubers, breathtaking landscapes, and fashion highlights. Azazel listened, offering grunts of acknowledgment. It was mundane, but for the first time in a long time, it was peacefull.
When the final bell signaled the end of the school day, Azazel caught Ruyi as she packed her bag.
"What's up,Azazel?"
"Hey,I heard some of the guys talking about a new cat cafe. They said there's a black cat with a patch of white fur that looks like a crescent moon. I want to check it out, but not alone. So, what do you say?"
Ruyi raised an eyebrow,a playful smirk on her lips. "Are you asking me out on a date?"
"Those are your words,not mine,"
he deflected, shoving his hands in his pockets."Don't you have kendo today?"
"No.That's why I'm asking."
"Cool,"she said. "Let's go."
At the cafe, they found the cat almost immediately. "Hey, Azazel, is that the one?" Ruyi whispered, pointing to a sleek black cat napping in a beam of sunlight, the distinctive white moon shining on its flank.
"Yeah,that's it," Azazel said. He reached out, and to his surprise, the cat purred and butted its head against his hand. For the next hour, the pressures of his past felt a million miles away.
"Let's go to the arcade!" Ruyi suggested as they left the cafe, her enthusiasm infectious.
"Ya,sure," Azazel agreed, caught up in the novelty of a normal day.
They spent the next hour battling it out in rhythm games and racing simulators. When they finally parted ways, with Ruyi heading home, the good mood lingered for about as long as it took for her to disappear from view. The quiet was suddenly heavy. The normalcy felt like a costume that was getting too tight.
Without a second thought, he pulled out his phone and scrolled to a specific contact. It rang twice.
"Yeah?"a gruff voice answered.
"It's me.I'm in the market for a car. You know a guy who sells cars."
"Meet me at the usual spot.Don't be late."
An hour later, Azazel was in the passenger seat of a nondescript sedan, winding through the industrial district of Kabukicho. They pulled up to a rusting warehouse, and his contact led him inside.
The dealer,a man with a scar where his eyebrow should be, looked Azazel up and down.
"Hey, kid. You ever get the money to even buy a car?"
"You know I got the money,"Azazel said, his voice flat.
"Okay,kid. Your funeral."
The warehouse door creaked open, revealing a cavernous space filled with the silhouettes of powerful machines. Another man emerged from the shadows.
"You the buyer?"
"I am."
"Pick your poison."
Azazel's eyes scanned the room, dismissing modern sports cars. Then he saw it, tucked in a corner like a forgotten relic: a classic Datsun 240Z, its lines sleek and predatory even under a layer of dust. His heart thumped once, a feeling he recognized—the thrill of the hunt.
"I'm buying this one.How much?"
The man didn't even blink."¥7,390,000."
Without a word,Azazel swung his bag off his shoulder, unzipped it, and handed over a thick stack of bills. The dealer counted it quickly, then tossed Azazel the keys.
"Later, dude. I'll call you," Azazel said to his contact as he slid into the driver's seat. The interior smelled of old leather and gasoline.
"Sure.Just don't get in any trouble," the man replied, already walking away.
Azazel ignored him. The engine roared to life with a guttural growl that vibrated through his very bones. He didn't go home. He pointed the car toward the legendary Daikoku Parking Area in Yokohama.
Pulling into the packed lot was like coming home. The air was thick with the smell of burning rubber and high-octane fuel. He leaned against the fender of his Datsun, watching, listening. It didn't take long. A group of guys were huddled, talking in low, excited tones about the race tonight.
Azazel walked over,the confidence of his old life sliding back into place.
"I'm in."
One of them,a guy with a bleached-blond mohawk, looked him and his car over. A wide grin spread across his face. "The more the merrier, my dude."
As night fell, the energy at the starting line became electric. Headlights cut through the darkness, engines revving like caged beasts. A woman stepped into the middle of the road, a flare burning bright in each hand. She raised them high, her voice cutting through the noise.
"Are you boys ready?!"she screamed.
Azazel gripped the steering wheel,his knuckles white. The familiar calm of impending chaos settled over him.
"ONE...TWO... THREE... GO!"
The flares dropped. Tires screeched. And Azazel was gone, a ghost from a past life screaming back into the present.
---
The world narrowed to a tunnel of asphalt and light. The woman with the flares, the cheering crowd, the other cars—it all vanished in the rearview mirror, replaced by the raw scream of his Datsun's 240z engine and the frantic needle of the tachometer.
Azazel's hands were extensions of the machine, his movements a fluid dance of clutch, shift, and steering. The first turn approached, a tight hairpin that threatened to send the unprepared into the guardrail. He downshifted, the engine barking in protest, and feathered the brake before swinging the car into a controlled, four-wheel drift. The rear end kicked out, but he held it, feeling the precise moment the tires found grip again and he could stomp on the accelerator. A grin, sharp and feral, cut across his face. This. This is what was missing.
He wasn't in the lead. A modified Nissan Skyline, its turbo whistling like a teakettle, was half a car length ahead, its driver using brute power on the straights. But Azazel knew roads like these were won in the corners. He studied the Skyline's rhythm, its driver's slight hesitation before braking. He waited, biding his time, his mind calculating vectors and friction points like the computer he'd pretended to be.
On a series of tight S-curves, he made his move. He stayed in a higher gear than the Skyline expected, carrying more speed into the first bend. As the other car slowed, Azazel swung inside, his fender nearly kissing the Skyline's door. For a heart-stopping second, they were side-by-side, the roar of their engines dueling. Then, Azazel was past, cutting back into the lane and leaving the Skyline eating his dust.
The rest of the race was a formality. He crossed the makeshift finish line—a pair of headlights shining on an empty stretch of road—a full two seconds ahead of the pack. He didn't stop to celebrate. He slowed, accepted a few nods of respect from other drivers, and pocketed the thick envelope of cash that was handed to him through his window without a word.
The drive back to his apartment was a slow, winding descent back to reality. The adrenaline faded, leaving behind a bone-deep weariness and the smell of burnt rubber clinging to his clothes. He parked the Datsun in a secluded, paid lot a few blocks from his building—no need to announce his new acquisition to his handler.
Back in the sterile silence of his apartment, the thrill of the race felt like a dream. He stood under a scalding shower, washing the scent of the underworld from his skin. As he lay in the dark, staring at the ceiling, the image of Ruyi's smile at the cat cafe flashed in his mind, followed immediately by the triumphant sneer on his own face as he'd passed the Skyline.
Two lives, colliding in the space of a single day.
He had school in a few hours. He had to be Azazel the transfer student, the kendo club newbie, the quiet guy who liked cat videos. He closed his eyes, the ghost of the steering wheel still firm in his hands.
Sleep, when it finally came, was filled with the scream of engines and the unsettling feeling that his clean slate was already cracking, stained black by tire marks.
---