I'm the heroine of a love game in a comic book

(This chapter is written in the first person)

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Ten years after Tsukishiro Yukimi's death, Akutagawa Ryunosuke was thirty years old.

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I didn't expect that I am already thirty years old, an age I never dreamed of reaching when I was a teenager.

Maybe it's because I've had too many troubles in recent years, both domestic and foreign, open and covert, ghosts from the underworld, and visitors from parallel worlds. I've dealt with them one by one, and I've reached this age.

It was not until three years ago that Yokohama was able to completely clear off the haze and start anew. I finally had the time to pick up my pen and write about the countless fantasies that flowed through my hands when I was young.

Where should I start?

In fact, during the two years when my work was the heaviest, I never put down my pen, just as a pastime, and I actually achieved some success. Rashomon pushed my reputation as a writer to the peak. During that time, whether it was my superiors, friends, enemies or sisters, they would shout "the great writer is here" when they saw me, which made me feel ashamed and angry.

Now that I finally have some free time, I don’t know what to write, so I’ll just write about what happened in the past few years.

My teacher, the person I respect most in my life, committed suicide by drowning with his wife two years ago. They had made all the necessary preparations. The sacks tied around their waists and ankles alone weighed nearly ten pounds.

My junior fellow apprentice and I - I really don't want to call him that, but that's the only name that suits him best at the moment - organized their funeral, and Mr. Toyoshima was the master of ceremonies.

——Through my introduction, the teacher and Mr. Toyoshima hit it off right away, and in the following years they could almost be called close friends.

Besides members of our two companies, the only people who attended the funeral were representatives sent by the government.

I heard that when the teacher was young, this rigorous representative was also his friend.

My junior fellow apprentice and I watched our teacher's funeral together, and after everyone had left, we had a good fight.

From dusk to nightfall, until the stars set, I finally stopped.

"Akutagawa, your Rashomon is still so sharp."

"Tsk, Man-Tiger, your claws are not bad either."

We say this.

I don't know since when we haven't had such a good fight.

In the past, we had too many reasons to fight, including the positions of both sides, the conflicts of interests, the clash of ideas and the eyes of the teachers.

Later, there were too many reasons not to let us fight, such as the enemy's attack, the exchange of interests, the teacher's request, and the souls that gradually became sympathetic to each other.

One day when he fell dying in front of me, I suddenly realized that the number of people with whom I shared memories was dwindling to the point where they could be counted on one hand.

So this is our first fight in five years and hopefully not the last.

My junior and I stood back to back against our teacher's tombstone. I stroked the words on the tombstone:

"The tomb of the respected teacher Dazai Osamu and his wife Dazai Hideyoshi, disciples Akutagawa Ryunosuke and Nakajima Atsushi stood in tears"

The craftsman took a lot of effort to carve this long sentence.

On the right side of the joint tomb is the tomb of a man named Oda Sakunosuke. I heard that he was the teacher's best friend, so we chose this place on purpose. With a wife and friends by our side, we won't feel lonely on the road to the underworld.

"Akutagawa, Akutagawa, I want to ask you a question."

"What are you calling me, you human tiger?" I asked impatiently.

"What will you do from now on, now that Yokohama is at peace."

"What else can we do? We carry on with business as usual." Yokohama may be at peace, but the Mafia will never have to worry about food.

"I'm a little confused. There will be fewer and fewer places where we can be used in the future. Then the detective agency will have no meaning to exist. I'm not saying that peace is bad, I'm saying what should I do without the detective agency? No, I don't want to leave the detective agency, that's not right..."

This kid is starting to act up again.

I took a deep breath and punched him hard on the head. "Renhu, the person who can guide you is no longer here. You have to walk your own path from now on."

He was stunned, and after a moment of silence, he burst into tears like a lost child. In the lonely night, in the cemetery with thousands of lonely graves, he finally found the right time and place to vent his panic during this period, if I hadn't been there.

...It's so embarrassing.

I let out a loud sigh and moved my feet again and again, unwilling to leave.

The brothers are here after all the calamities, and they forget their grudges with a smile when they meet.

I finally understood the meaning of this poem.

*

What else.

My younger sister is getting married this year. Five years ago, her left hand was broken during an operation where the tendons and bones were picked out. Someone who was not my brother-in-law at that time cried louder than a duck in the hospital. The next day, the group of people who hurt my sister, from the eldest to the youngest, were pierced from the forehead to the genitals with a metal toothpick and bled to death.

I recognized him.

My sister has suffered a lot with me.

Fortunately, I don’t have to suffer anymore from now on.

My stepsister followed my junior brother into seclusion, which I was not very happy about. She was gentle and kind, and my junior brother, that idiot, was really not worthy of her, so I found an excuse to have another fight with him.

The female superior prepared the tea and watched us make it. She held my sister's hand and gave her earnest instructions, tears streaming down her face.

Year after year, the female subordinates who followed me also set up their own teams and became new captains. The new boys would peek at her with red faces, but she would not look away. Wherever she went, everyone respected her and was fearless. She was majestic and imposing.

Of course, I was promoted to the head of the cadre and a part-time writer.

*

The boss of the company I worked for officially retired and passed the position to my immediate superior, Mr. Hat. Everyone was celebrating and telling each other, "Finally, the reputation of all employees won't be affected by the boss's fetish for nymphomaniacs."

But then he heard that his former boss had opened an orphanage. His boss was horrified and went over to persuade him earnestly not to do such a shameful thing, saying that no one would be able to protect him if he left the company.

Then he was kicked out.

Also kicked out along with him was the secretary. Over the years, the secretary had always been able to plan everything for us and had become something like a military strategist. However, she seemed to have a mysterious love for the position of secretary and refused to be promoted to a cadre, so her boss had no choice but to let her do as she pleased.

It was the secretary who instigated us to go to the orphanage this time. She can be quite malicious sometimes.

I went to watch it to join in the fun. The daughter of my former boss was chasing after her boss and the secretary with a large syringe. He and I looked at each other and smiled, but remained silent.

Many times, I saw him silent in his office in the tallest building in Yokohama.

The young ladies around him would often suddenly grow taller, their soft and shiny blonde hair would turn into black hair with dry and yellow ends, their limbs would be thin and fragile, and they would wear little dresses of various styles, and then they would say to him, Mr. Mori, you can't die.

Or in other words, good, very good.

Every time this happened, I would deliberately make some noise and watch him hurriedly change the little lady back to her original appearance, and then sign the documents I brought to him.

When their eyes met, they were as silent as they are now.

*

I thought I had long forgotten the lady's voice, appearance and smile. After all, I had only known her for six months. With the mundane affairs coming one after another, I had no time to think about her.

But now that I pick up the pen, the past rushes into my mind like Red Hare Galloping.

But the first thing that comes to my mind is not the annoyance we had when we first played the role of the eldest daughter and the cold subordinate, nor the dependence and cuddling we had when we were in love later.

But her profile and back.

The side profile and back view that I have watched countless times when I was a subordinate and fell half a step behind.

Many readers have written to ask whether Wen Qiuxishi and the young lady are the same person. I think only a blind person would not be able to see such a clear answer.

There was only one person who led me to the path of literature from beginning to end.

I am extremely grateful to her and I respect her so much for saving me from the deep hell and pointing me to a new and bright path.

My teacher took me out of the slums and gave me the meaning of survival, and the lady used her literature to tell me what the value of living is.

I am very pleased that even today people still mention her and her works, and call her a pioneer of Yokohama literature alongside Mr. Toyoshima's wife Emi Toyoshima. I am very happy.

If one day I am lucky enough to die young, or the misfortunes brought by my work damage my brain, someone will still remember her.

Speaking of this, I'm going to buy a bunch of rape flowers to see her. Today is the lady's death anniversary.

When I came over, there were already people there.

Mr. Mori was wearing a white coat which was very worn out, with the corners and cuffs patched. He didn't look like the former leader of Yokohama, and was extremely low-key.

There was a bunch of jasmine in front of the tombstone, and I placed my rape flowers there.

"The lady likes Jasmine."

"But she'll like what I give her."

We were silent again.

As a subordinate, I have never guessed the deeper meaning of my former boss's words and actions, but when it comes to the young lady, I have chewed over the context, dialogue, expressions and actions of their past over and over again, but I still can't figure it out.

The only certain thing is that Mr. Mori misses her too.

That day, Mr. Mori and I faced each other with a wound between us. He didn't say anything, but only asked me if I felt that I was in a particularly good condition and could fight a hundred people alone.

I never expected him to ask this, and nodded subconsciously.

Then Mr. Sen's expression suddenly turned cold. He glanced at the ground casually, took the young lady's hand and left in the car.

Because of this look, I hated him for a long time.

I touched my chest. In my chest pocket were two photos of me and the lady. After I felt the rough edges of the photos, I put my hand down and looked at her quietly.

Those six months seemed like a long vacation in an old movie, a beautiful dream woven just for me.

This feeling can be treated as a recollection, but it was lost at the time.

When we were young, we came and went in a hurry, thinking that we would always have time to stay together, or that I would fall into eternal sleep instead. It was not until that day when the weather turned around that I realized that when I was confused, she had already made up her mind.

The lady once told me to forget her, and I thought I could forget her.

Maybe it’s because it’s love from youth, so it’s particularly different.

The love of youth is like the dew in the early morning, which evaporates when the sun rises. But unexpectedly, the dew drops on the soil and gathers into streams, nourishing the heart.

Alas, I am too young after all.

Mr. Mori was leaving and I bowed and said goodbye.

The end of an era is never an elegant exit like after the performance of Swan Lake, but a panicked escape after being run over by cars. Mr. Mori is already a leader among the great men, and no one knows how to retreat while the going is good better than him.

I stood there quietly, touching the photo on my chest again and again.

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The above is the preface I wrote for my new work "The Life of a Fool", which is for readers' reading.

When Mr. Toyoshima asked me to write a preface, I was reluctant. Everything that needed to be said was already said in the book, so why should I write it or not? But Mr. Toyoshima insisted that everyone wanted to know the stories behind the heroes who defended Yokohama, so he asked me to write it. I was surprised that the Mafia could become heroes one day, but Mr. Toyoshima seized the opportunity and lobbied me hard, so I had to bite the bullet and write 2,000 words at random.

I believe you can all guess who the teachers, junior students, companies, superiors and bosses mentioned in the article refer to, so I will not explain them in order to avoid attracting government workers from a certain department to accuse me of misleading the people and promoting evil forces. I am too lazy to pay attention to them.

After this article, I will no longer recount the stories of my old friends.

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Note: This article is the preface to Mr. Akutagawa Ryunosuke's posthumous work "The Life of a Fool". It was found by Ms. Higuchi Ichiyo, Mr. Akutagawa's former assistant, when she was sorting out Mr. Akutagawa's belongings. She mailed it to our company and we would like to express our special gratitude.

The teachers, junior students, companies, superiors and bosses mentioned in the article all have real prototypes. In order to avoid causing unnecessary trouble, Mr. Akutagawa chose to use related positions as pronouns. Readers are also requested not to make inquiries and disturb the relevant people.

Mr. Akutagawa Ryunosuke is the leader of the Yokohama School of Literature. Since the publication of his debut work "Old Age", he has gained a large number of readers and attracted countless aspiring people to devote themselves to literature. Even "Rashomon" and "Hell Transformation" caused a sensation in Japan. At the same time, he was also a warrior who protected Yokohama.

On July 7, which was the anniversary of the death of the late writer, Mr. Akutagawa Ryunosuke was found dead at home. Our company would like to express our sincere condolences.

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(The following is not related to the main text, so you don’t need to read it)

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Some boring notes:

1. Yamazaki Akei's name comes from the lover of the literary giant Dazai Osamu, Yamazaki Tomoyoshi, who committed suicide by drowning with Dazai Osamu. Yamazaki Akei's ability "As I have heard" comes from Dazai Osamu's work "As I have heard".

2. Toyoshima Kazushio and Dazai Osamu were close friends. He presided over Dazai Osamu's funeral, so he will also preside over the funeral of Dazai and the player here.

3. Ryunosuke Akutagawa's debut work and last work were "Old Age" and "The Life of a Fool" respectively. He died on July 7.