As the adrenaline and the rush of power fade, I'm left standing in a tight alleyway, soaked in blood and with a corpse at my feet.
This doesn't look good. From Yuri's memories, it's clear that using your quirk for violence, even in self defense, is frowned upon. The use of quirks is highly regulated, so whatever this looks like to me, it'll probably look a million times worse to whoever would chance upon it.
This only means one thing. I gotta split.
"Hey, demon," I say to the sword still in my hand. It's heavier now that the rush of power is gone. "Can you turn into something less conspicuous?"
"Call me Shyaar," it says. "That is my name. You'd better learn it, vessel."
I kick the bulky sword. "I asked you a question, weapon."
"Not fond of my form?" It muses, a slight lilt to its voice as it bounces around my skull. "It took a great deal of power to change my form into this. But… since you are such a good vessel, I will do you the favor of showing you my abilities. So, make sure you don't look away."
The bulky sword morphs in my hand, twisting and churning, shrinking and smoldering until there is nothing left. A red shape crawls up my hand and wraps itself around my finger. It takes the form of an armor ring, eight jointed sections of small plating covering my index finger from base to nail.
"I am Shyaar, the Darkin Blade," it declares. "Like my siblings, my being was trapped inside the body of a weapon a long, long time ago. Some were trapped inside swords, others in scythes and fans and flails. I was trapped in molten steel, an unfinished weapon."
"Let me guess, that means you can transform into any weapon," I say with a sort of monotone that gets the weapon to react. It doesn't like my dismissal.
"Such an observant pupil," it rumbles. "I am many blades. You only need spill blood to change my form. You seem to have no problem doing that."
I look at the corpse in front of me. The sobering reality snaps me out of my daze. I just killed someone. Took their life. I mean, I wasn't a saint in my past life, but I never killed anyone on purpose.
Yes, the man did try to kill me and harvest my organs, but still, I ended his life with my own hands. I stumble back against the opposite wall.
"Don't get squeamish now!" the weapon barks.
I bite my lip and swallow my words down. In this world, this act would make me a villain.
I rummage through Yuri's memories as if flipping through a picture book. He has a family. A mother and an older sister. What would they think of this? That their son and brother isn't the same anymore. That he killed someone. Yuri is me and I an him, but I am more myself than I am him.
"It doesn't matter," I mutter as memories of what he, no I, had to go through. It's bullying, isolation. Years of it. They didn't stop at physical abuse, they threw me off a rooftop. Yuri would forgive. Me? Not so much. Suddenly this killing seems very insignificant when stacked against years of fear and paranoia.
But what then? I can't kill my bullies. I can't take revenge. They're just kids. Homicidal kids, but still kids. Yuri is still fifteen, and I shouldn't be killing his peers.
"But you want to fight, don't you?" the weapon says.
I do. I don't know why, but I want to fight. No, I know why. It's manipulating me. Using tricks. The crimson fog over my mind again.
"Fight who?" I scoff. "Teenagers? I'm technically twenty one, I know better."
"How about you find out who that man you killed sold organs to and kill them," it says.
Good suggestion. In this world of quirks, the crime rate is higher than in my world, the types of crime different too. Heroes are what fight against these villains. But if there are no heroes around, I suppose I could satiate this nagging blood thirst by killing villains.
Just as I crouch down to inspect the dead man's remains, something buzzes in my pocket. "Shit," I say, a familiar sense of panic flooding through my veins.
I pull the phone, the screen cracked from the fall, out of my pocket. "Shhiit," I groan, crouching next to the dead body, rubbing my face as I look at the caller ID. Three letters, a world of panic. 'Mom'.
*
I haul ass out of the alley and onto the main street, not caring about the looks pointed at me. I must look a harrowing sight. I had to abandon my blood soaked shirt and so I have to run through the crowded city streets shirtless and still blood soaked.
I barricade myself inside one of those fancy Japanese public toilets I read so much about in my previous life. Had this been America I would've been forced to barge into a Starbucks and use their bathroom. How convenient.
I grab a metric ton of paper towels and begin wiping the blood away.
I suppose, from Yuri's memories, this world is somewhat similar to my old one. All the countries I'm familiar with still exist, with the only major difference being the existence of quirks and heroes and such.
The sink runs constantly as I look at myself in the mirror. I'm covered in scars, an especially prominent one running across my throat. I guess the weapon doesn't heal perfectly. Another set of never scars runs down my shoulder where I hit the ground.
Yuri himself isn't bad looking. He's half Russian on his mother's side and he inherited her blonde hair and blue eyes. Only… my eyes aren't blue. Right now, they're red. And a pair of horns sticks out from my hair, jutting out from the sides of my head and curving towards my ears.
"How do I turn this off?" I ask.
"A mystery," the weapon replies in kind. "What sort of master would I be if I gave you all the answers?"
I can't go home looking like this. I'd get crucified.
I focus on the crimson fog at the edges of my mind, that nagging little desire for blood. It's small now, weaker. Because the weapon hasn't had blood yet, I realize.
I push it back, and it offers little resistance.
The horns on the sides of my forehead retract until there's no trace of them. My eyes shift back to their usual blue. The nasty scars also fade and smooth over, leaving only an unblemished face and body.
Without those bulky glasses, I actually look quite good, but there's no time to think about that.
"Whenever I feed you blood, I end up looking like that," I mutter to the ring on my index finger. "How hideous."
Shyaar laughs, the sound rattling my skull. "It is glorious. Sleek horns, red eyes, smooth scars. It's called a fear factor, dear pupil. Glorious and monstrous."
Now I know why that man was so afraid of me. I must've looked like death incarnate. A demon. Well, in this world, there's people whose quirk makes them look like little freaks, so maybe not.
After cleaning up, I'm left in a somewhat presentable state, albeit still shirtless. I run over to the nearest Don Quijote, fucking everywhere by the way, and grab a simple band shirt. I try to spend as little time in there as possible, trying to ignore the looks rhe cashiers were giving me.
The walk back home is short but feels even shorter. This moment can't stretch on for any longer. If possible, I'd like to just keep walking, going past my house and not stopping until I'm out of Musutafu and in the next city over.
But I can't. This is my family.
The apartment complex is tall, looming over me. I look at my phone and sigh. This is who I am now.
I take the long way up, opting to use the stairs, not the elevator. The stillness would've killed me. At least now I can focus on the burn in my legs as I scale up the eight floors up to my apartment.
Time to face the music. I can't leave my mother and sister. Yuri would've died today if I hadn't taken his body. I have all his memories, I know him like he knew himself. So… this is ok, right?
The weapon is quiet. "Coward."
My hand stops just short of knocking on the door. This is fine, isn't it? I am Yuri as much as Yuri was himself. But I am also me. That makes me different. I don't think the same way anymore, I don't like the same things anymore. Those things linger, but they're muted and distant.
What would they say if they knew?
As I pull my hand away as though burned, the door swings open. The woman on the other side is tall, her long blonde hair flowing past her shoulders. She's beautiful despite her age, no, maybe because of it. Her expression is soft when she locks eyes with me.
My throat tightens. I can't find the words. Mother.
"Too busy to come home on time?" She asks, crossing her arms. Her voice is still smooth and soft. "Do you know what time it is."
Another woman pops her head over my mom's shoulder. She's even taller, tall for a woman, so she has to bend down to rest her chin on our mother's shoulder. Her face is contorted into a permanent cat like smirk. "Since when did you like TOOL, asshole?" she asks, looking at my shirt.
I'm stuck. My words knot up and wither and die in my throat. There's a knot I can't untie. This isn't my family, I try telling myself, they're strangers. They're Yuri's family.
But as I look at my mother's soft yet stern face, at my sister's mocking gaze, at the way her straight jet black hair contrasts my mother's, I can't bring myself to believe any of that.
"Are you alright, Yuri?" My mother asks, stepping forward. When she hugs me, I freeze. "Yuki made dinner. We were just waiting. What happened?"
I can't bring myself to believe it. This is my family. I can't erase the feelings that linger. I fight tears. It's as if I'm only now seeing them for the first time in years.
I never had a family before. I've never been hugged by my mother before.
"I'm fine," I say with a shudder. "I missed you guys."
My sister spits. "Ugh. Sap. Talk to me when you're normal again," she says, turning on her heel.
My mother grabs my cheeks and squeezes. "Oversized baby," she says. "When did you get so tall? Go help your sister in the kitchen."
I nod.
I don't hate this.