The Untold Origins of The Port Mafia

⚔ The Battlefield ⚔

~ 3 Months Later ~

Fukuzawa isn't good at this, playing toy soldiers with the lives of real men. (Not all good, but all real.)

Fukuzawa isn't a good fighter. He's an assassin. He doesn't fight, his victims don't get the chance. He moves with stealth, knowing his squad mates will cover him, and kills the enemy with one sweep. And maybe, just maybe the killing is becoming easier. Maybe, just maybe it doesn't matter so much anymore that another enemy has fallen, just that his blade has plunged through another heart or through another spine, another head falling to the ground, staining the ground a deeper shade of red.

Unfortunately, as the trees fill up with spent shells, becoming so bloated with them they cannot help but fall, the places to hide are running thin, and under a hail of bullets, stealth is far less than the second priority. The goal now is not to kill, but to hit anything you can and escape before being shot yourself.

Fukuzawa isn't a good soldier. He detests following orders. He knows they will lead him and his squad mates to a swift death. He detests the faces of the superiors as they send their men out to die, the pity. Fukuzawa detests pity.

Pity. That's the look on the face of the superiors as the squad captain dies, the blood spilling over Fukuchi as he tries to stop the bleeding using his hands, but eventually, the blood begins to spill through the cracks between his fingers, taking the captain's life with it. Another red stain on the ground. Another tally. Meaningless. Unknown as the scream from Fukuchi, cloaked by the sound of fired rounds. "Get up, get up, there's no time to mourn!" someone yells just before a bullet strikes their own arm.

'There should be time to mourn, there must be. We are not animals . . . yet. We shouldn't have to mourn, not like this, not on this scale.' This is Fukuzawa's thought as he carries the dead captain and soldier to the patch of scorched earth where they burn the bodies to mangled to send back to the mainland as anything other than ashes.

No, Fukuzawa isn't good at this, but he is good at War, and he's rising through the ranks.

Fukuzawa makes a good squad captain, the best in the division. His squad has the highest success rate in this godforsaken losing battle, especially given the few men left in it. A title that plants a seed of resentment in Fukuchi's heart, in the same place that drives him to maim and kill the enemy, the place that makes him burn with anger for the government officials leaving him and his comrades out to die.

The key to Fukuzawa's success isn't, of course, magically competent strategic advisors, it's Fukuzawa himself. Slowly he started to alter the squad's orders, forming his own strategies and plans to ensure success. And it did.

The squad, the only squad operating by Fukuzawa's orders, was often alone, away from the others, but still, they succeeded in bombing crucial enemy locations and eliminating many troops. And for a long time, a whole three months, nobody noticed.

Fukuzawa is just one of those types of people. You look at him, your eyes going not to the sword by his side but to his shining silver hair, tanned skin, and grey eyes and your own eyes slide right over. The personification of a silver tongue despite seldom opening his mouth. Why would you give someone so intimidating, so handsome any trouble?

When the successes became too frequent to attribute to good luck, Fukuchi questioned him. Fukuzawa came clean to his good friend, the only person he informed of his partial mutiny.

The seed of resentment begins to sprout. 'How can Fukuzawa lecture me about following orders when he refuses to do so himself? Coming up with these elaborate schemes that leave us alone and will eventually get us all killed!'