Shuto Legend - Vol. 1

Act 1: Searching

The seemingly infinite rows of street lights quickly turn into a blinding blur. Every car on the road stands still, despite also moving at a hundred kilometers an hour. Those on the opposite road whizz by in a stream of amber. The roads bob and weave, yet I effortlessly carve through them. The needle is already pointing at two hundred twenty and still steadily climbing. I push on, pressing harder on the gas. The RPMs rise higher, the engine roars louder, and the car lurches further forward.

Thirty.

Forty. 

Fifty. 

Now sixty. Everything passes by faster, mixing into an incomprehensible haze. The other cars appear frozen in time as the speedometer climbs higher.

Seventy.

Eighty.

Ninety.

Three hundred. A speed that many only ever dreamed of reaching here. It feels like I'm in my own world, a different plane of existence from all those around me. In this world of transcendent speed, it's only me, my car, and the road ahead. I'm left in the perfect zone to pursue the answer to the question I have always had.

I want to see. I want to see what pulled him in but never spit him back out, and I felt that somewhere, perhaps beyond three hundred, there lied the definitive answer. 

However, before I could reach that answer, I suddenly found myself in a much more familiar place. Normally, I tend to forget about what happens in my dreams the moment I get up, but for some reason, this one stuck around in my head. Why did I have a dream like that? Is it a sign? Divine intervention? Or perhaps a lingering thought in the very back of my mind, which had  somehow remained there ever since that day. It couldn't be, right? It's been five years already. I've long since moved on to living a normal life. I'm just your average high school student living alone in an apartment. There's nothing more to it, no way, no how. Off to school now.

Am I escaping the past by ignoring it for the sake of my present life? Perhaps, and although my life isn't particularly extraordinary or fulfilling, it doesn't have to be. I still feel satisifed with how everything's going. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. I don't plan on revisting the past. If that dream was indeed a sign from God above, I'd like to tell him that I'll be zooming right past it.

Which is what I would say if it weren't for a familiar car pulling up in front of the apartment, right as I locked the door behind me, and a familiar face was in the driver's seat.

"Kyo! Hurry! Get in!"

I had no time to question it, and since there were only ten minutes until the start of school anyway, I quickly got into the passenger seat. Although I had never seen it in five years, I still recognized the blue R31 from back then, obviously a bit more worn down now, but it was definitely the same one.

"What's wrong, Kyo? You look incredibly tired, and it's morning... so that's really concerning."

"Oh, it's nothing. I just had a weird dream."

"Hmmm... what was it about?"

"... I've already forgotten..."

"Idiot."

Obviously I hadn't forgotten, I just didn't feel like talking about it. Somehow, not even to Kanako, who I've known for several years.

"So... this car..."

"Yeah! I got my license, and I wanted to drive, and this car just so happened to be lying around."

"You're saying it like you stole it."

"I did not! This was the old company car. It wasn't being used for that anymore, so they let me take it."

"Ah, I see."