New Identity

Asher took out Sophie's phone, not caring about the previous rules he set on himself.

"Come to the apartment where we met last night. A new member of ours will join us there."

He had finished reading through the stack of papers.

For a new member to join an Office, they simply needed to go to the Hana Association along with one of the founding members. Of course, there were other methods, but this was currently the easiest to do, seeing as 'Sophie' was unavailable.

Asher tried to find a bag to put Mei's body in before Pete and his friends arrived. But even after upturning the entire room, there were no bags that fit her body.

As Pete knocked on the door, Asher had a decision to make.

He moved his fan over his mouth, opening the door.

The three FIxers were greeted with a truly strange sight. A feminine figure, beautified with pink blush and white powder. A floral fan hid the figure's expression in such a way that they could only see its eyes curving upward in a smile.

"-!" Aiko stared at the stranger, as well as the unconscious woman draped on his shoulders.

In a split second, Mangchi identified the unconscious woman was his Captain's 'roommate', who Sophie was seemingly close to. He pulled out a pair of sickles from his jacket.

"Are you the new member? What are you doing to her?" Caught up in the flow, all three Fixers braced for battle. Even Aiko pulled out a rusty knife.

But when Asher lowered his fan, Pete and his friends let out a collective gasp. A familiar face, not a stranger's, lay almost unrecognizable through the feminine reconstruction and beautifying makeup.

Pete was the first to collect his senses.

"You were the one that- Wait, you know our Captain too? Where is she right now?"

Mangchi narrowed his eyes. Two of their saviors just happened to know each other? And how come the boy's appearance in front of them had changed so much from the last time they saw him?

The scent of cherries filled the room.

"Hum~ Yes, I was the one who saved you from the Sweepers, and I know your Captain as well. She is... busy. I am taking care of her roommate in her stead." The mysterious figure fanned itself, its tone delicate.

If their Captain was anyone other than Sophie, Pete and his friends would have long called Asher's bluff.

But having seen Sophie neutralize Sayako and the other Kurokumo with ease, the three Fixers could rest assured. Their Captain was not one to be threatened easily, or forced to send a message she did not want to send.

If Aiko stared closely, she would see a breathtaking, glossy-haired boy. If Pete or Mangchi stared closely, they would see a delicate, pale-skinned girl.

The ideal beauty.

Pete put his knife away.

"Okay, so you're the... guy? Girl?" The boy articulated his hands exaggeratedly as he stared at Asher.

"We've met before, haven't we? When I saved you from the Sweeper, what did I look like?"

Pete nodded in understanding, the light in his eyes dimming at the same time. The way Asher dressed with the kimono and sandals... Pete thought it looked-

The boy blushed.

Aiko smacked Pete on the back of his head.

"That's enough! So, did Sophie tell you how to join? Because... er, we have no idea what to do. We were just following Sophie."

Asher nodded his head, motioning them to follow him outside.

He opened the door to the neighbor's room, filled with trash and muck.

Like guardians, the two husks from yesterday stood in silence, their black, grainy skin crackling with residual terror and insanity.

Mangchi's breath hitched as Asher brushed past the two husks, moving them aside with his bare hands to reveal the stack of money beneath.

The three Fixers had a shared thought. This boy was incredibly close to their Captain. The strange figure probably knew everything that Sophie did. Maybe they were friends, or blood forged siblings like they were. Perhaps even real siblings, though that was unlikely.

And as Asher admired the husks staring down at him, Mangchi knew that this boy was just as much of a monster as Sophie.

Mangchi sighed in his mind. Of course, his Captain's allies would not be simple. Though his other friends hadn't realized that yet.

Pete and Aiko were still transfixed by the boy's delicate beauty, which made him even more wary.

"I don't recall telling you three my name... Asher. Grade 7." He giggled under his breath. Everything was just so funny.

So funny.

So funny that he felt like hurting something.

With the reveal of the boy's grade, the cobbled well of the City in grew even taller and even more terrifying in Mangchi's mind. Grade 7, a rank only two above his... were they all monsters like his Captain and this boy? Then what powers awaited above? Gods?

Mangchi already knew the answer, though. As he cried on the ground so many years ago, he knew the answer was yes.

The Nightmares, the Stars... Mangchi clawed at his chest as a searing brand glowed in his flesh, hidden by layers of clothing.

His thoughts were broken as the unconscious woman on Asher's back shifted.

Asher froze, slamming Mei's body onto the wall as she twitched awake. She let out an enraged snarl.

With a swish of his fan, the room was filled with a sweet, hallucinogenic scent. Mei flopped her arm once before she collapsed once again. Fifteen minutes had passed, and the previous trance's effect had begun to fade. Only to be replaced by another.

Asher turned back to them, sensing their suspicion. He sought to explain himself, but found that they had already drawn their weapons once again.

He spread his fan, letting out a haunted giggle.

"Kuhuhu~ You three seem to have some questions... I'll answer them, but you might not like the answer."

Aiko, the most sensitive of the three, asked her question first. She glared at Asher as the boy draped her Captain's roommate back on his shoulder.

"Captain did not say anything about that in her message. What are you doing to her roommate??"

"I am not happy about the situation either. But your Captain allowed me to do this. Mei must not awaken."

"But why-!?" She froze.

Asher cackled, a slight hint of insanity tinging his voice. As the three Fixers backed away, the air turned pink. They coughed as tendrils of something sinister invaded their lungs, coarse and sticky, unbearably sweet and disgustingly rotten at the same time.

Asher stared at them. The cherry blossoms gave him thousands of visions. Thousands of ways to slit their throats. Let their blood soak the ground. Feed the roots crawling beneath the earth.

"You wish to know? You wish to know what I know?!" He pulled Mei's eyes open.

"-!" Aiko stepped back as worms of blood pulsated in the woman's pupils, like fractals of light. They glowed faintly in the morning air.

The sheer fear in Aiko's eyes caused Asher to snap out of his insanity. He saved these people. He wanted to be a... good person.

Such a foreign word. Good? What good was this situation to him? So Mei was like this because he was a good person?

Still, he held back, the faint innocence left in him holding him back by a hair.

"Yesterday, Mei was parasitized by the Blood Red Night, the Star that caused the Midnight warning a few days ago. If she awakens, and I fail to stop her, we will all die."

Asher closed his fan with a snap as the three Fixers gulped in front of him.

This time, all of them could see the implications of Asher's words.

"S-So you subdued a Star?" Pete stammered, and Asher's gaze swung onto him.

"Very weakened, and I nearly died. But yes, the Blood Red Night. Which is why I must keep her sealed. I'll buy a bag that can hold her, so that I will be able to oversee you three while Sophie is away."

'Holy...' the three Fixers shared a look with each other. Although they knew little, having lived the life of the lowest scum in the Backstreets for nearly a decade, even they could wrap their minds around the power of the Stars.

After all, as the 'rats' of the Backstreets, they were well aware of the reputation of the Five Fingers, the five biggest Syndicates of the City. They were the five Stars that most criminals aspired to be a part of.

Asher tapped his palm with the base of his fan, preventing further questions.

"One hundred Ahn for each of you. Your Captain does not wish to see you suffer. Nor do I." 'Because we are the same person,' he nearly added.

Pete and Aiko's hearts warmed as Asher gave each of them a few bills. Both of their saviors, though each with their own eccentricities, were truly good people. Nobody, other than within their own group, had cared for them like this before with no malicious intention.

Mangchi, however, took the money with some hesitation. He had sensed the intent to kill them from earlier. Mangchi was different from the others. Before he had met Pete-

His memories abruptly cut off.

"Now, to buy a bag..." Asher also patted his pocket, where the knife that Yun gave him days ago rested on his skin.

Pete and his friends followed Asher down the steps as he walked into the Neon District. Mei slumped on his back as Asher carried her.

With Asher's delicate appearance, the three Fixers looked like bodyguards in the eyes of onlookers.

Which wasn't necessarily a good thing.

Mangchi shivered as he felt numerous gazes land on his back. A leather clad man peered at them from the side. A few goons that Pete and he were acquaintances with nodded their heads at him.

The intelligent ones backed off after seeing the mysterious figure in the middle.

The intelligent ones could see that the figure in the kimono was not being guarded, but the leader of the group

As for the unlucky few that stayed, enticed by Asher's feminine appearance...

Asher was feeling a bit under the weather today.

No... murderous would be the more correct term.

Killing intent was hidden behind his hollow expression, an effect the Cherry Blossoms had on his mind.

Coupled with the pain in his soul as Mei slumped limply on his back, Asher allowed the invasive feeling to fester inside of him.

He let it fester until he couldn't hold back a haunted giggle from escaping his throat as a group of thugs approached them.

Aiko yelped as she was shoved to the side. She cowered as a man's lecherous grin stared down at her before moving toward her Captain.

The group of men surrounding them whistled as Asher swished his fan open, covering his mouth as his eyes curved to a smile.

"Hahaha, you from the Nest, little lady? Make these guards fuck off, and I can play with you and that woman on your back for a bit~"

The leader, a man with an extensive burn mark covering his cheek, pointed at Mei lying on Asher's back. The air turned sweeter as Asher smiled even wider. Mei, the woman on his back? That was the wrong thing to say.

The blood on his lips mixed with the scent of cherries in the air.

The man shoved Pete to the ground as the boy rushed forward to save Asher and Mei.

Mangchi, being the more perceptive one, glanced at Asher instead. He knew these types of people, the insane ones. The ones that smile a bit too much.

He knew one; he used to be one. An orange seal glowed faintly, just above his heart.

Why was his Captain friends with this type of person?

Then he thought back to the husk incident. His Captain's head opening into an eldritch being's maw, and... The question he had earlier was answered quite easily. Two peas in a pod, really.

Now there was a crowd surrounding them, watching the commotion. No one moved forward to help. If those thugs happened to know someone high up, their lives could be ruined in an instant.

Even a Soldato was considered of high status. Proselytes and Soldatos already had the strength of a Grade 7 Fixer; in the eyes of the citizens, they were already considered professional killers. Most couldn't even fathom what lied above Grade 7.

Still, the bystanders lingered, unable to take their eyes off of the beautiful figure that would surely be defiled if things continued the way they were.

"It's fine~" Asher consoled the three Fixers, tittering as the man snatched his wrist. The scent of cherries filled the street as the man's confidence grew, mistaking the figure's smile as its consent.

The glint of a knife flashed behind Asher's fan.

"Stop!"

Asher froze in surprise as a new voice cut through the tension. A voice from what seemed like years ago.

"Yun, Grade 8! Drop your-" But it was too late. A swish of a fan, and the man's head dropped to the pavement.

The street fell silent as all eyes followed the decapitated head as it rolled to the ground. The onlookers wordlessly faded away, not wishing to partake in whatever bloodbath would follow. A few in the crowd took note of this new face. A crazed demon with a cherry etched fan.

"Shit, run!" The other thugs tried to flee, but Asher appeared behind them like a ghost. His hollow giggles chilled their souls as they realized they had poked the wrong beehive.

Asher's knife peeked through the edge of his fan. Each slash of his fan slit another man's throat.

As blood spattered onto his clothing, the kimono's threads became even more crimson and beautiful.

Delicate, like a cherry tree's blossoms.

...

Nine people lay dead on the ground as Asher's bloody dance finally ended. The bystanders had all fled.

Yun took out his shock gloves with a grave expression, donning them in a flash. He turned his attention away from the bodies below, focusing on the woman draped on the figure's back.

Hostage situation, Yun thought as his mouth chewed at a nonexistent cigarette.

Asher's head creaked toward him. It didn't seem like Yun remembered his appearance. After all, Asher did say that it was Sophie's disguise.

"Kuhuhu~"

How maddening. He smiled.

A hint of blood dripped on Asher's lips.