The Dark Era

Ch.28 The Bad Student

"I want an explanation."

Dazai's deepened voice reverberates throughout a dimly lit underground room. Before him are the corpses of Mimic soldiers. Mafia operatives stood, lined up, behind the two of us. One of them bravely speaks up.

"As planned, we captured the Mimic vanguard using the incapacitating agent after they raided the casino. One soldier committed suicide, but we brought the remaining three here."

"We were planning to force information about their allies out of them. We also removed the pills lodged in their back teeth to prevent any more of them from killing themselves." another operative nervously explains.

Dazai, with his unchanging expression, responds in a cold manner.

"That I know... I was the one who planned the whole thing, after all. I wanna know what happened after that."

All the operatives looked extremely nervous. One continues, with apprehension in his voice.

"O-One of the soldiers woke up much earlier than we expected. Before we could get the handcuffs on him, he stole one of our guns. He shot his fellow soldiers, likely to keep them from talking, and then, he set his sights on us. That's when-"

"I took care of it." a voice interrupts.

A young man in a black overcoat takes over for the operative.

"Is there a problem?"

He walks towards Dazai and I as Dazai asked the question.

"Oh, I see. No, no problem at all. I'm sure you were just protecting your allies from a very determined and fearsome soldier, Akutagawa-kun. Fantastic. Jus wonderful. Without your ability, we couldn't have possibly taken down an all-powerful enemy like that. One good hit just wouldn't have been good enough, now would it?"

Akutagawa is clearly in the wrong. He should have knocked the soldier out instead of killing him. Dazai continues to speak, clearly upset in his cold tone.

"Exactly what I'd expect from another underling of mine. Thanks to your genius, all of the prisoners we captured are dead. You know, the ones we worked so hard to bring in alive by setting up all those traps. And now, we have no more leads..."

Akutagawa wasn't fazed by Dazai's cold words. But Dazai still continued to speak.

"Their headquarters, objectives, the names and identities of their commanders. Not to mention, the ability used to rule over the organization. If just one of them was still alive... We probably would've been able to dig up some valuable information."

"Information...? I can deal with those lowliv-"

Wrong answer.

Before Akutagawa can finish his sentence, Dazai throws a punch and hits him square in the face. The force of the strike propels Akutagawa backwards. He begins spitting up blood. Dazai walks towards him and speaks.