Riku had just sliced off Touka Kirishima's arm. It looked like a clean cut, but inside, he was shocked. His netsu-bushidō (thermal katana) had met serious resistance.
In his mind, Touka Kirishima wasn't exactly a tank among kūshu (ghouls), but even so, his blade had struggled to cut through.
"Rc cells… they're something else," Riku muttered to himself, impressed.
He knew that resistance came from the high concentration of Rc cells in Touka's body, stored in her kakuhō (Rc sac). During combat, these cells could manifest as one of four types of kakuja (ghoul kagune). They also acted like a natural shield, making most weapons and firearms useless against ghouls—barely able to scratch the surface.
To take down a kūshu, you needed specialized gear like a Quinque, a weapon crafted from a ghoul's kagune, or mass-produced anti-ghoul rounds like the Q-Barrett. Those could handle low-tier kūshu just fine.
In short, Rc cells were the key to countering Rc cells—one reason ghouls could dominate regular humans so easily.
Of course, "invincible" wasn't absolute. Riku had just proven that by lopping off Touka's arm. But against stronger ghouls with tougher defenses, he wasn't so sure his thermal katana would cut it.
"He's not human anymore! Can't you see that?!" Touka shouted, her voice sharp as she shot back at Riku.
She didn't know what was up with that one-eyed guy, but she was dead certain he wasn't human. Otherwise, she wouldn't have forced him to eat. She wasn't some psycho who got a kick out of making humans experience a ghoul's hunger.
"And you're nothing like him! He smells like both human and kūshu, but you? You're neither! What are you?!" Touka demanded, her voice rising.
As she spoke, blood-red Rc cells erupted from her left shoulder, forming a single, gas-like wing—her ukaku (feather kagune).
Riku's words didn't convince her. His scent was completely different from the one-eyed guy's. To her, Riku smelled like some kind of wild beast—dangerous and unpredictable.
"Me and this kid? We were both human once, turned into this," Riku said, shaking his head. He sheathed his katana, lowering his guard but staying wary of Yoshimura Kōzen, who was watching from the shadows.
Touka was no slouch, but she wasn't a real threat to Riku. Her speed and explosiveness didn't outmatch his, and when it came to endurance, she was leagues behind. But Yoshimura Kōzen? That guy was a true ukaku monster. He could wipe the floor with rookies like Touka without breaking a sweat.
Sure, Yoshimura couldn't kill Riku, but he could definitely break through his subdermal armor—and good luck finding a place to repair that in this world.
"Turned from human to this?! What the hell does that mean?!" Touka froze, her mind reeling.
She didn't know the details, but she vaguely recalled that the one-eyed guy used to be a human customer at the café. The idea of a human being turned into a kūshu was beyond her comprehension.
"This kid got a ghoul's organs transplanted into him," Riku said, hoisting Kaneki Ken off the ground. The poor guy was practically drooling, looking half-starved and out of it.
Riku's words snapped Kaneki back to reality, confirming the suspicions that had been haunting him for days.
"The transplant… it's the organs," Kaneki muttered, clutching his stomach. A few days ago, an accident had left him critically injured, and some doctor had performed an unauthorized organ transplant.
"You're right. This kid had a kūshu's organs grafted into him," an elderly voice chimed in, drawing the attention of one ghoul, one half-ghoul, and one oni (demon).
It was an old man with white hair, dressed in a black-and-white striped vest and pants, a waiter's outfit complete with a coffee-colored apron tied around his waist. His eyes were squinted, his face sporting a gentle smile.
"Manager?!" Touka gasped, her kakuhe (ghoul eyes) fading as her gas-like wing retracted.
The manager's presence instantly eased her tension, the sense of mortal danger vanishing like it had never been there.
"Sir, could you return Touka's arm? She's got school tomorrow, and she doesn't mean any harm," Yoshimura Kōzen said, nodding to Touka with a warm, grandfatherly smile as he addressed Riku.
"Sure thing. I didn't mean any harm either—just got a bit heavy-handed in the heat of the moment," Riku replied, playing along. You don't swing at someone with a smile like that.
He sheathed his thermal katana, picked up Touka's severed arm from the ground, and tossed it to her.
Touka caught her right arm with her left hand, her mouth twitching. No malice, huh? Chopping off her arm was his idea of kindness? She pressed the arm to her severed wrist—reattaching it made recovery way easier than regrowing it from scratch.
Touka wasn't known for insane regeneration like some ghouls. Without her arm, she'd probably need a couple of days off to heal.
"Manager! What's wrong with my body?! Please, help me!" Kaneki pleaded, his voice desperate, like a drowning man grasping for a lifeline.
"This is the first time I've seen a case like yours, but there's no doubt—your body is more kūshu than human now," Yoshimura said slowly, glancing at Kaneki. He'd seen the news about the organ transplant a few days ago and pieced it together.
Two students had been crushed by falling steel beams. The doctor had taken the organs of the deceased female student—a ghoul named Rize Kamishiro—and transplanted them into the boy in front of him.
Kaneki stood there, stunned, as if Yoshimura's words were a death sentence. More ghoul than human—it was like his fate had been sealed. He'd never go back to a normal life.
"Sir! Sir! Is there a way to fix this?! Please, help me!" Kaneki turned to Riku, his eyes wild with hope. This strange guy, who looked like he was cosplaying some akuma (demon), had just said he had a choice!
"You said we're the same, right? That you went through this too? Please, tell me what to do!" Kaneki's voice broke, tears streaming down his face. He was just an 18-year-old kid, and this was too much for him to handle.
"No way. This is a ghoul's fate," Touka snapped, her patience wearing thin. She didn't buy that this guy had some magic fix.
"Nah, I don't believe in fate," Riku said, shaking his head, which made Kaneki's eyes light up with desperate hope.
"Ghouls can eat other ghouls. In fact, for a kūshu, eating another kūshu is the real power-up," Riku said boldly, dropping a bombshell right in front of two ghouls.
Kaneki froze, dumbfounded, while Touka's face darkened. Yoshimura, though, just stood there with his hands behind his back, his smile unchanged.
"What the hell are you saying?! That's cannibalism!" Touka snarled, glaring at Riku like he was insane.
"Oh, Touka-chan, you're adorable," Riku said, bursting into exaggerated laughter that left her fuming.
"You're a natural-born kūshu. He's not. After living as a human all these years, do you think he sees humans or ghouls as his kind?" Riku asked, yanking the still-stunned Kaneki closer and looking him dead in the eye.
"Tell me, kid. Are you human or kūshu?"
Kaneki's mouth opened, but no words came out. In his heart, in his sense of self, he was undeniably human.
"Humans or ghouls—which one would you choose to eat?" Riku pressed, hitting him with the next question.
Kaneki couldn't answer. His human instincts screamed kūshu, but his body—his new, ghoul-hungry body—craved human flesh.
I did my best!
(End of Chapter)