The moment Raito slid into the driver's seat of his car, the door clicked shut like a sealed vault. The artificial calm of the parking garage did nothing to quell the storm in his chest, but his face remained unreadable—composed, quiet. His movements were efficient, methodical, almost mechanical.
Emi's absence echoed through the empty carrier strapped across his chest like a phantom weight.
He opened the glove box and retrieved a sleek, custom laptop—blacked-out casing, reinforced corners, no branding. Not something a simple insurance agent should own. He popped it open, the screen flickering to life with a low hum as it connected to an encrypted mobile hotspot hidden within the car's dash.
A few keystrokes later, Raito was inside a database that didn't technically exist.
Not government. Not police.
This was deeper. Older. Built by killers, for killers. A hidden digital warren of dossiers, debts, and death notices. Accessible only to the kind of people who never used their real names. The kind of people Raito used to work beside.
"Ahh, the assassin's favorite playground," Kurai cooed inside his mind. "Welcome back, Raito. It's been too long."
Raito ignored him. Focused.
He uploaded a still image from the security footage—cleaned up and enhanced through a tool he'd written himself years ago. The woman's profile side, minimal distortion. The program scanned it in seconds, cross-referencing it through countless ghost networks, facial databases, and underground social nodes.
Then—beep.
A hit.
MATCH FOUND.
Her face loaded beside her dossier. Real name, multiple aliases. Age: 29. Ex-courier for a black market intelligence ring. Known for asset extractions, smuggling, and high-level social engineering. No known affiliation recently—but the intel was current enough. Her last known residence blinked on the screen.
An address. Uptown. Not far.
"Oooh so basically a kidnapper and scammer… and she made it easy," Kurai purred. "Leaving breadcrumbs like a fool. You'd think someone with that resume would know better."
Raito's knuckles were white as he gripped the wheel.
"She didn't know who Emi belonged to," he muttered. "She will."
He slammed the laptop shut, dropped it beside the passenger seat, and turned the key. The car rumbled awake with a low growl, headlights cutting through the dark.
Raito shifted gears, eyes locked ahead. Cold. Focused.
The garage gate opened, flooding the space with daylight.
"Are we going to kill her?" Kurai asked, almost playfully.
"If Emi's unharmed," Raito said, voice tight, "I'll let her crawl away."
"And if she's not?"
The car accelerated onto the street, tires screeching as it merged into traffic like a predator loosed from its cage.
Raito didn't answer.
He didn't need to.
He already knew where she was.
And he was coming.