PROLOGUE – Edo Shadows
Snow falls silently on Edo-period Japan. The camera glides across a wasteland of broken spears, blood-slick banners, and frozen corpses. It looks less like a battlefield and more like a graveyard of an entire generation. The snow is too pure, too beautiful, falling gently across a canvas painted in red.
At the heart of the carnage, one figure still stands. Minizawa Hukitaske Murakaze. His eyes burn, his lips cracked with exhaustion, his breaths ragged in the winter air. In each hand he wields a katana—twin swords shimmering unnaturally under the pale moonlight.
One blade glows faint emerald and blue, its steel polished with tinctures of healing herbs. Every slash with it seals wounds, mends skin, and mends broken bones. The other gleams green, edges hissing with acidic residue. That blade rots flesh in darkness, corrodes armor, and kills with grotesque precision. Together, they are The Pharmaceutical Twin Blades of Murakaze.
Enemies swarm him—dozens, maybe hundreds, pouring across the snow. Minizawa's body is cut, bloodied, collapsing under the weight of wounds, but his arms move with desperate mastery. He fights not for survival, but for legacy. For fate itself.
And then, knowing he cannot outlast the horde, Minizawa drives both swords into the earth within a ring of engraved stones. He chants, a voice that trembles with pain but burns with conviction.
The blades ignite. Blue and green light flare into the heavens, a chemical storm that sears the snow to glass. The ground shakes violently as a terrible power—something darker than war itself—is bound away forever.
Minizawa's body collapses, dissolving into the snowstorm. His last words hang on the wind:
"These blades do not only cut flesh. They cut fate. And fate always demands a price."
The screen shatters like glass. Edo dissolves into Tokyo neon.
ACT I – The Phantom Notice - The Letter
The Mizunashi District of Tokyo—where skyscrapers strangle shrines, where neon floods cobbled streets. The Murakaze estate still stands, ancient wood and iron, dwarfed by the glittering towers surrounding it.
Inside, Michikawa Uni, head of the Yazu Murakaze family, kneels before his ancestors' altar. Candle flames dance across his face, deepening the lines of age and sorrow etched into his skin. He has protected the family legacy all his life. Tonight, that weight doubles.
A servant enters silently. He kneels, presenting a black envelope sealed in crimson wax, pressed with the mark of a fox mask.
Uni cracks the seal. The paper within is heavy, expensive, but the words cut deeper than any blade:
"On the night of the new moon, I shall claim the Twin Swords of Murakaze.
Do not resist.
—The Phantom Analyst."
Uni's breath catches. The servant stares, trembling. Around them, the old walls creak. It feels as though even the house has heard the threat.
Uni folds the letter slowly, whispering to himself:
"The shadow returns, but now for my treassures. The famous Phantom Analyst..."
Inspector Sheriff Takiuna
Tokyo Police Headquarters. Cigarette smoke chokes the room. Inspector Sheriff Takiuna leans over his desk, walls plastered with photos of fox masks, crime scene clippings, and maps stitched together by red string. He's gaunt, unshaven, and his eyes are hollow from years of obsession.
He reads the Murakaze letter aloud to his officers. His voice is low, gravelly, but laced with fury.
"Every time this Phantom mocks us. Every time he vanishes into smoke. But this time... he chooses swords, not jewels. History, not vanity. There's something more. And I'll rip the truth out of him with my bare hands if I must."
His men exchange nervous glances. None dare interrupt. Takiuna is a figure unhinged, consumed by his quarry. To him, Phantom isn't just a thief. He's a shadow that has humiliated Tokyo's law for a decade.
The Tournament
The Pharmaceutical Knowledge Tournament begins in Mizunashi, a bizarre spectacle where ancient tradition collides with modern showmanship. Thousands gather in a stadium glowing with screens and smoke. Scientists duel with concoctions that erupt like fireworks, healers race against each other to mend injured volunteers, while martial artists wield blades dipped in glowing vials.
Crowds roar. Camera drones swarm the air. Neon banners flash the names of competitors.
In the crowd, Akio Hukitaske walks with his "Pharmacy Family." He does not belong here. His coat is simple, his eyes heavy. He hates being called "Pharmacist Hero," but whispers of that name chase him everywhere.
Beside him, each of his companions shows their distinct color:
Hikata Yakasuke jokes loudly, pointing at the contestants and pretending to commentate like a TV show. His laugh breaks tension, though he's quick to throw hands if someone mouths off when needed.
Raka Grundane, broad-shouldered and dressed in Gucci and Nike, towers like a bodyguard. She's eighty, but every flex of her arms shows muscle honed through decades of wrestling. She sips an energy drink like it's nothing.
Rumane observes quietly, eyes sharp, mind already analyzing the tournament. She doesn't waste words—her calmness is strategy itself.
Riki Amade watches like a hawk. His hands twitch, as though itching for a fight. Once a delinquent, then a cop, now a man trying to walk the line of control. His history with Akio runs deep.
Akazuchi, the youngest, stays close to Raka. A fifteen-year-old coding prodigy, awkward and shy, his glasses fog whenever he's nervous, and when there actually on him for when he's coding. He clutches a small tablet, always coding, always hiding behind screens.
They aren't warriors. Not soldiers. But they are Akio's chosen family.
Mizuna Appears
The gates hush when Mizuna Murakaze arrives. A university student, brilliant and proud, with the air of someone born to carry legacy. She dazzles with her speech about pharmaceutical heritage, earning applause from the crowd.
But when her eyes find Akio, the façade breaks. She approaches him, voice hushed, urgent.
"You're Akio Hukitaske, aren't you? The... pharmacist hero?"
Akio grimaces at the title but nods.
Mizuna leans closer. "You must come to the showcase tonight. The swords will be displayed. And I think..." Her voice trembles despite her composure. "...I think they were meant for you to see."
The Showcase
Night falls. The Murakaze warehouse looms under harsh floodlights. Inside, bulletproof glass cases hold the Twin Blades, gleaming in sterile light. Guards patrol every corner, weapons at the ready. Police, including Inspector Takiuna, watch with twitching nerves.
Akio stands near Mizuna, his Pharmacy Family close behind. The crowd murmurs in awe, whispers rising about curses and legends.
Akio stares at the blades, and for a moment, the air around him hums. His ancestor's whisper crawls through his skull: "They cut fate." He knows he's connected to the blades through blood but never worries about it since he's not aloud to touch them anyways, not being royal blood of the palace and all.
And then—darkness.
Every light dies at once. The crowd screams. Sirens shriek. A laugh echoes through the black: soft, mocking, playful.
From the rafters, The Phantom Analyst descends, fox mask gleaming. His coat flows like liquid shadow. He moves with impossible grace, slipping through bullets, dismantling guards, leaving trails of blood and broken bones in his wake.
Akio shouts, lunges. His vials ignite, chemicals bursting with flame and smoke. The warehouse erupts into chaos. Phantom dances through it like a ghost, weaving between the carnage.
Rooftop Duel
Akio pursues Phantom onto the rain-slick rooftops of Mizunashi. Neon lights blaze below, thunder cracks above. Their duel is ferocious—vials explode, glass shatters, steel clashes in sparks.
Phantom laughs with every strike, taunting Akio. Then, during a slip of the mask, the truth cuts deeper than any blade.
The face beneath is Akio's twin front folded.
"Kenji Hukitaske," Phantom sneers. "Your brother. The shadow you abandoned. And now—I take back the fate you wasted."
Akio falters, disbelief tearing through him. In that moment, Phantom seizes one of the Twin Blades, its green glow searing through the storm, and vanishes into the night.
The Blood Price
Dawn. The Murakaze estate is silent. Guards crowd the study door. Inside lies Michikawa Uni, gut carved open in a precise, surgical cross. Blood pools beneath him, a fox mask painted in it across his skin.
Mizuna screams. The family collapses in grief. Takiuna rages, smashing his fist into the wall.
Akio stares at the body, trembling. His brother is alive. His brother is Phantom. His brother is a killer.
The curse of the blades has returned.
And this time, fate demands blood.
🔻 End of Act I — The Rise of The Phantom Analyst arrives... 🔻