Jin’s POV
Jin has a sense of déjà vu. He felt that something similar has happened before. Instead of his classmates, though, the ones inside the okonomiyaki restaurant are his enemies.
The three Ryuuzaki siblings, Tatsuma, Mika and Miko, are all sitting in front of the counter. Standing behind the counter is a middle-aged man who’s wearing a chef’s uniform. No one else is inside the shop.
The shopkeeper notices Jin almost immediately.
“Welcome!” he shouts.
The siblings turn around at once. Great, now Jin can’t leave or he’ll be suspected. While letting out a really soft sigh, he enters the establishment.
“Look Gen-san~, your first customer of tonight who’s not us.” Miko tells the shopkeeper.
“I could do without the sad reminder, young lady.” he growls.
He looks at Jin again.
“Just sit anywhere you like.” the shopkeeper tells him.
“Thank you.”
Jin chose a seat that’s furthest away from the counter. This one and all the other ones have a grill right in front of them, along with the usual things one would find in shops like this, such as plates and sauce bottles. He picks up the menu while acting like he couldn’t sense Tatsuma’s stare.
Hmm, what to get, what to get? After looking for a while, he decides to ask the shopkeeper for the chef's recommendation.
“To be honest, all of them are my personal recommendation.” came the reply.
That’s not helping at all.
“How is that going to help him choose?” Tatsuma demands from the shopkeeper irritably.
“I can’t help it. All of the recipes were the results of my hard work. They’re like babies to me.”
“They’re all okonomiyaki. The only different thing is the topping.” Tatsuma points out.
“Hey, you can’t just leak out top secret information like that!”
Tstsuma lets out a sigh and turns around so that he can look at Jin.
“Get the seafood one. Most of the ingredients in it were freshly delivered just a few minutes ago, so it’s guaranteed to be nice.”
Now that he mentioned it, Jin does detect a faint smell of raw seafood.
“I’ll have one, then.”
“One seafood okonomiyaki, coming right up!”
Jin highly doubts that having only one is enough to fill his stomach. Even so, he had to make do since there’s no way he can have his meal in peace with the Ryuuzaki siblings around.
This restaurant is self-service where you’re supposed to cook your own okonomiyaki, so the shopkeeper went back behind the counter after he brought Jin the bowl containing the mixture of seafood, cabbages and other ingredients.
Jin gets cooking. He pours the mixture onto the hot grill and flattens it out with the given spatulas. He’s not used to using two spatulas at the same time, but he got the hang of it after a while. While he’s keeping himself busy, Tatsuma continues with his rant.
“I'm going to thrash him the next time we meet!”
“Even though you couldn’t even touch him just now?” Miko asks.
“Shut it! He got lucky, that’s all!”
“Sure, keep telling yourself that. I wonder what would have happened if Miko and I didn’t interfere.” Jin hears Mika say.
“Don’t even get me started with that! Why can’t you two just listen to what I say for once? I told you not to interrupt my fight with him, and what did you do? You interrupted anyway!”
“Did you really think we wanted to? Our father told us to protect you at all costs, remember?”
There was silence for a few seconds. Meanwhile, Jin flips over the okonomiyaki to cook its other side.
“...Thanks for the save.” Tatsuma eventually says in a normal tone.
“Seriously, why can’t you be more honest like this more often?” Mika demands.
“Because he won’t act like this unless our father was mentioned?” Miko asks.
“Oh, right.”
Jin hears the shopkeeper letting out a loud guffaw.
“You’re a father’s boy as usual, Tatsuma!” he laughs.
“Shut it, pops, and get me another beef okonomiyaki.” Tatsuma growls.
“Y’know, anyone would have thought that you’ll be ordering a seafood one right after the recommendation you gave to that boy over there..”
“And you would know by now that I only eat beef okonomiyaki.”
“Just like your father.”
“...Don’t make me repeat myself.”
“Fine, fine, no need to get so worked up. One beef okonomiyaki, coming right up.”
And Jin’s okonomiyaki is finally done. He scoops it up and place it on a plate.
“Here ya go. One beef okonomiyaki with extra cabbages and added red pickled ginger.”
Let’s see, some mayonnaise here, some okonomiyaki sauce-
“Can I interest you ladies with more okonomiyaki?” the shopkeeper asks.
“No, thanks. One’s more than enough~.” Jin hears Miko reply.
“Same here. I don’t want to eat too much for my dinner.” Mika says.
“A shame. Business has been bad, so I need all the revenue I can get.”
Some bonito flakes, some seaweed-
“Maybe you getting next to no customers has something to do with giving service to people from the yakuza.” Mika suggests pointedly.
Jin hears some sizzling sound coming from the counter. There are also the smell of beef and other food being cooked. It would seem that Tatsuma is starting to cook his okonomiyaki.
“Bah, you know I can’t chase you kids out. Not after what your father did for me.”
And Jin’s done with the toppings. Time to eat.
“If only the others are as grateful as you are…” Tatsuma mutters.
“Hey, you can’t really blame them. They want to run their business, you know? How are they supposed to do that if a yakuza leader like you are having a meal at their place?”
“And remember the last time you went to the ramen place?” Mika reminds.
“I told you a million times that it was an accident!” Tatsuma protests. “I swung that pepper bottle a bit too hard, and everyone made a big deal out of it!”
As Tatsuma has said, the assorted seafood inside the okonomiyaki is very fresh. As a result, they’re quite chewy and barely has the stinky smell that Jin hates. The cabbages are really fresh and crispy too. He can’t taste anything too special from the mixture itself, but overall it’s satisfactory.
“You’re the only person I know who shakes a pepper mill instead of, you know, turning it like you’re supposed to.”
“I didn’t know that’s how it works, okay? And who would use a Western-style pepper mill in a traditional ramen restaurant?”
“You really ought to broaden your knowledge, Tstsuma ma boy. I know you don’t go to school and stuff, but the internet is always around to wise you up.” the shopkeeper says.
“Didn’t we have this conversation before? My father’s teachings are all I need.” Tatsuma insists stubbornly.
“Did he teach you to charge headfirst into danger like what you did just now?”
Tatsuma went silent for a few seconds. His hands have also stopped as his okonomiyaki is being cooked on the grill.
“I was confident that I could win.” he eventually says.
“Against Silver Wolf? You can’t be serious.”
“Whose side are you on?”
“I’m telling you this from an objective point of view. Even a non-fighter like me could tell that he’s way above your league, and that’s just seeing all the things he managed to do from the footage I saw on the television. You made a dangerous enemy, lad, a real dangerous one.”
“We’re bound to cross paths one of these days, so it was inevitable.”
“You’re probably right, but you could have waited until you’re more skilled. You’ve got that power of yours, what, a month ago? You just had to be rash and expose yourself.”
“You expect me to stay quiet while some numbskulls are walking around and pretending that they’re part of the Ryuuzaki Group? No one is allowed to defile the group my father painstakingly created. No one.”
“Just give up, Gen-san~. You know how riled up he gets whenever things like this happen.” Miko tells the shopkeeper.
And Jin is done eating. Time to pay for the meal and leave.
“I would like to have the bill, please.” he tells the shopkeeper.
“That’ll be 450 yen. You can just leave it on the table if you have the exact change.”
Jin searches his wallet for coins. Turns out he did have the exact change. He takes out the required coins and puts them on the table.
“If you liked the food, make sure to recommend this place to your friends.” the shopkeeper tells him.
“I most definitely will.” Jin assures him.
“Thanks. At least you care. These two won’t do it no matter how many times I begged them.” the shopkeeper says as he’s nodding at the twins.
“And I think we’ve told you countless times that there’s no way the girls in our school will come here, of all places.” Mika says.
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“Yup yup~, the girls of Saijou High love high teas and macarons, not okonomiyakis.” Miko agrees.
Oh, no wonder their uniforms looked kind of familiar to Jin. Similar to Kitajoshi that the Graylock sisters go, Saihou High is another school that rich girls attend. And that’s it. Jin doesn’t know much about that school.
“As for Tatsuma here-”
The shopkeeper nods at the yakuza leader who’s eating his okonomiyaki quietly.
“-he doesn’t even go to school, so I can’t count on him to bring friends.”
“Hey, I do have friends!” Tatsuma protests.
“Just so you know, “friends” from your field of work don’t count.”
Tatsuma goes silent at once.
Jin gets up and bows at the shopkeeper. He figured that he needs to leave before things get too awkward.
“Thank you for the food.” he tells him.
The shopkeeper bows back.
“And thank you for your patronage. Do return sometimes if you ever feel like eating some okonomiyaki.”
With that, Jin leaves the restaurant. However, he has no plan on returning to his apartment. He heads to a quiet alleyway at the side of the restaurant and casts Eavesdropping Wind so that he could listen in to the conversation between the Ryuuzaki siblings and the shopkeeper.
“-his school is nice.” the shopkeeper said.
“School? Nice? Schools aren’t meant to be nice, they’re being used to torture defenseless children.” Tatsuma says.
Now that, Jin could agree.
“And there you go again with your prejudice.”
“Hey, don’t try to convince me that I’m wrong! I’ve talked to a few of my gang members who used to go to school. All of them agreed with me. Besides, I don’t have time to go to school. Especially not now. The UCI comes first.”
Ah, so that’s why he had been gathering ability users.
“You could have just asked Silver Wolf for help.” the shopkeeper suggests.
“I’m not going to ask him for help. Period.” Tatsuma says adamantly.
“Why are you so against it?”
“He’s the lapdog of the government! There’s no way I can trust him-”
Jin shakes his head. This misunderstanding is starting to annoy him.
“Not after-”
There was a few seconds of silence. Something tells Jin that this is a delicate subject.
“I’m not going to cooperate with him. End of story.” Tatsuma ends without finishing his previous statement.
They talk for a bit more before Tasuma and the twins say their farewell. A shame. Jin was expecting them to bring out some useful information, but none was mentioned.
Originally, Jin was planning to force Tatsuma into submission by beating the daylight out of him. There is also the alternative where there’s the same beating, and then Jin hands him over to the police so that they can do the job of taming him. However, he figured that the kid won’t give in that easily. In other words, the plan has to be scrapped. So Jin came up with a Plan B which involves getting Tatsuma to cooperate at least somewhat willingly. To do that, he needs to know two things. One, why is he planning to attack the UCI. Two, what happened in the past for him to hate civil servants so much. He takes out his phone to call Watanabe.
“Hello?”
“Sorry to call you out of the blue. How much do you know about Ryuuzaki Tatsuma?”
“Um, not much. I know he’s one year younger than us, and he doesn’t go to school, and… wait. Wait just a second.”
“Yeah?”
“I saw from a video posted on the internet that you just fought him. What on earth happened?”
Jin told her.
“Wow. You sure were busy.” she says after he was done.
“It’s all in a day’s work. Can you continue now?”
“Actually, that’s all I know. I want to find out more, but a certain someone forbade me from poking my nose in somewhere that it doesn’t belong, remember?”
“Oh, right. Man, I can’t believe that it’s already backfiring on me. Do you think your mother would know more?”
“She probably does. I don’t think I can ask her without her suspecting that something’s going on, though.”
“Well, I guess I can just visit your house and ask her myself if I have to. Is she still at work?”
“No, she just came back. Right now, she’s-”
There was a short pause.
“Hold on. You actually want to come over? Right now?”
“I would rather finish this up as soon as possible. Will I be inconveniencing you in any way?”
“No, not at all. It’s just that my house is kind of, well, messy.”
“I’m sure it’s not that bad.”
“Oh, you have no idea…” she mumbles. “Well, I guess you can come anyway if you really don’t mind. More importantly, are you going to reveal your identity to her?”
“It depends. I’ll try to come up with an excuse, but I won’t exclude the possibility.”
“All right. Just take your time to come here. I need to clean this mess up as much as I can while you do.”
“Sure, see you later.”
As per requested, Jin took his time to walk to Watanabe’s house. When he passes by the Wakaba’s house, he tries his best not to ring the doorbell just to see Estyshana. After he arrives at the front gate of the Watanabe house, he rings the doorbell. The front door opens a few seconds later, and Watanabe comes out.
“Are you done with the cleaning?” he asked her.
She shows a dejected expression.
“That’s a no.” he guessed.
“I’m sorry. I really am. It’s just that, mother has a talent of thrashing the place no matter how many times it got cleaned up. I just gave up at one point unless there were visitors.”
“Well, I can just stand if there isn’t even a place to sit. Is she free to talk right now?”
“Sure is. I told her that you’re coming over, and she agreed to give you some time.”
“How much did you tell her?”
“Almost nothing. I just told her that a classmate of mine wants to have a talk, and she’s fine with it.”
“Alright, then. Let’s go in.”
Her house is, as she has described it herself, messy. Documents and files are scattered all over the floor and on any spot that could place things. If this is the state it’s in if it was partially cleaned, Jin shudders to think what it would be like if it wasn’t.
Watanabe’s mother Chieko-san is dressed rather informally when she’s at her own house, to say the least. Right now, she’s wearing a loose shirt over a pair of woolen shorts, a pair of glasses that she never wears whenever she is on air, and her hair is tied up to a bun.
“Hello there.” She greets him in a friendly manner.
He bows at her.
“Good evening, ma’am.” he greets back. “My name is Minase- Jin. I am the classmate of your daughter Anri.”
“Oh, you don’t have to be so formal. Let’s just sit down and be comfortable.”
All of them sit down in front of the dining table. Right after they sit down, Chieko-san taps her forehead with her right palm.
“Silly me, I actually forgot to serve you refreshments. What would you like? Tea? Coffee?”
“No, thank you.” Jin declines politely.
“Well, just tell me if you changed your mind. Now then. To what honor do I owe for your visit?”
“I’m getting interested in the field of Criminal Psychology, you see.” he lies as best as he can. “To get started, I want to know the background of, well, certain individuals. I figured that you could tell me a lot.”
“Well, it depends on who you’re talking about.”
“Ryuuzaki Tatsuma, the leader of the Ryuuzaki Group.”
“Hmm, is that so? Yes, I do know his background.”
“Will you be so kind as to share it with me?”
“Of course I won’t mind. Still, your timing is rather odd.”
“How so?”
“I mean, Silver Wolf just fought Ryuuzaki-kun in what, less than an hour ago? And now here you are, asking about the young yakuza leader.”
“I’m sure it’s just a huge coincidence.”
Chieko-san narrows her eyes as if she’s not buying that at all. She then shrugs.
“It probably is. Well, let us begin. It all started when Tatsuma-kun’s father, Ryuuzaki Heizo was murdered by a police officer.”