Forty-four floors above them, Sabushi stood in a dark penthouse office lit by the blue glow of a dozen monitors. The cameras feeding those screens had been installed by men who would never come back to maintain them.
He watched Zero's squad clear the third floor in eleven rounds. Behind them, silk drapes in the wedding hall caught fire and burned against the walls.
Riku remained alive on the marble, still unconscious.
'Hina has truly changed, hasn't she?' He thought, drinking a glass of wine. 'She would've killed him if she were in her early days.'
Then, the feed switched to the casino.
Six strangers in matte armor surrounded Aiko's ruined body, and Sabushi expected the obvious ending. Instead, one of them opened a trauma kit and began stitching her wounds.
'So that is the famous Protocol 9, isn't it...?' He smirked. 'Very interesting. I've heard many stories about their non-existence, and yet... here they are. In my home.'
For the first time that night, Sabushi leaned closer to the screen.
He had spent twenty years teaching broken children the same lesson: survival had to be earned, in one way or another. His men's usefulness kept them alive, while failure made them disposable.
Yet these people had found one of his assassins bleeding out on the floor and saved her without being asked. That caught his attention.
They killed when they had to. They showed mercy when they didn't. Somehow, the contradiction hadn't torn them apart yet.
Sabushi wondered how long that would last.
'They caught Aiko in the end...' He sighed, putting the glass of wine away. 'Seems like a sacrifice is always needed.'
Rain struck the floor-to-ceiling windows behind him. Somewhere below, a city had just watched two helicopters and an army spotter drop from the sky over his building. Inside the tower, men he had trained were dead, others were defecting, and Hina was still climbing.
On the monitor, Zero's group disappeared into the stairwell.
Sabushi folded his hands behind his back. "Interesting." He said. "Nakamura built herself an army of monsters who apologize before they bite." He turned toward the windows. "In the end, the difference between evil and good is only the point of view. Protocol 9 is no different from us. Their killing is 'legal.'"
Through the rain, half a mile away, the unfinished tower was little more than a black shape against the city. A faint glow still clung to part of its scorched scaffolding.
The Kurotaka.
Officially, Emi Fujimoto's men still flew his old ally's banner. In practice, Emi had taken the syndicate from under three generations of men too proud to admit they no longer controlled it.
Now her people were shooting down police aircraft. Army aircraft.
They had turned Sabushi's tower into a sealed box and trapped everyone inside: his enemies, his remaining people, and those few he still cared about.
And the leader of the Kobayashi Dragons knew why Emi Fujimoto had done something like that.
'Attacking the police means attacking the government. And attacking the government means that the military will come here as soon as they can. So that's it, Fujimoto? Just like your father. Doing the bare minimum to leave the deepest impression so you won't have to dirty your hands more than necessary. I should've expected it.' He thought, staring out the window.
Even though he was being trapped by everyone, he didn't give any orders out of panic. Sabushi smiled.
"You've finally grown teeth, Emi. All this time of playing the part of the peaceful gangster," There was almost affection in his voice. "I always wondered when you would finally do something."
His attention then returned to the monitors.
The casino feed showed Aiko as a small shape against the carpet while Kagami worked over her wounds. Sabushi watched for several seconds without speaking.
"You're close, my daughter." The words were meant for someone forty floors below, someone who couldn't hear them. "So close. I have prepared a special comeback gift for you."
Then, the office door opened behind him without a knock.
Only one person in the building was allowed to do that.
"B-Boss." Lala stood in the doorway. Her voice carried its usual stammer, but her eyes were alert. "Zero's group... they're on the eleventh floor now. Climbing fast. Four left, not six. They'll reach you in..."
"I know, Lala." Sabushi turned back toward the windows. "Don't worry about it."
Rain crawled sideways across the glass, breaking the city lights into streaks.
A low chuckle escaped him.
"I have my own group of demons too."
Lala's eyes widened.
"B-Boss... you don't mean—" Her voice started shaking.
Sabushi turned his gaze back to her.
"I've already alerted them. They'll give our guests a very nice 'welcome' party. You can stay here to watch if you want."
"B-Boss... are you sure that they will obey the orders?" Lala asked. "Last time they tried to—"
Sabushi smiled. "Don't worry about it, Lala. I'm completely sure that they will listen to me," Sabushi then moved his gaze back to the monitors again.