CHAPTER 6: The Red Storm
The main gates of Hakuho Academy no longer looked like a normal school entrance today.
It had become a border—a perimeter where crossing meant stepping straight into the jaws of death.
Akuro Yoshibe's 'Black Blazers' gang had completely captured the gate area.
The smell of cheap cigarette smoke and the arrogant murmurs of his men hung heavy in the air. Inside the canteen, their Boss was playing his psychotic game, while these thugs stood guard outside.
The afternoon was fading.
The sky was slowly bleeding into a deep, bruised orange.
Then, piercing through that quiet, terrifying atmosphere, came a sound.
Crunch.
Crunch.
Crunch.
The sound of calm, devastatingly confident footsteps crushing the gravel outside the gate.
A boy emerged from the dimming light and stopped dead center in front of the gate. He stood exactly 6 feet 1 inch tall.
His hair was
stark white and spiky,
catching the dying sunlight in a strange, almost ethereal way.
He wore a deep, blood-red hoodie.
Dead center on his chest was a raccoon logo with bold letters screaming:
"I HATE TOXIC".
Below the hoodie, he wore loose, black martial arts track pants.
His face held a deathly calm—an absolute cold expression that starkly contrasted with the violent, aggressive environment around him.
His cold, emotionless eyes held no anger, and absolutely no fear.
He walked as if he owned the very earth beneath his feet.
Raizen Kurotsuki
had arrived.
Two of Akuro's main guards at the gate immediately threw their cigarettes to the ground and blocked his path.
"Hey, stop right there!"
the first member barked, stepping forward aggressively.
"Nobody is allowed past this point."
The second member stepped up, looking Raizen up and down—taking in the white hair and the red hoodie—and let out a disgusting smirk.
"Hey, white hair, don't you know who's inside?
Can't you look at our black uniforms and figure out who we are?
You walked into the wrong neighborhood."
Raizen Kurotsuki didn't even look at them.
Not a single muscle in his face twitched.
He let their questions blow away in the wind as if they simply didn't exist.
Without stopping, without showing a single shred of emotion, he kept walking straight toward them with his calm, measured steps.
No unnecessary talking.
This cold dismissal ignited the thugs' egos like pouring gasoline on a fire.
"Where the hell do you think you're going, chicken?!"
the first member yelled, adjusting his collar.
His voice was laced with rising anger.
"Bastard,
are you deaf?
Can't you understand me the first time?"
"Are you here to die?"
the second member growled, pulling a switchblade from his pocket.
Raizen's footsteps suddenly stopped.
A gust of wind blew past, slightly rustling his red hoodie.
He slowly raised his head.
His cold, emotionless eyes fell upon the guards for the very first time.
"I didn't come here to die..."
Raizen's voice was incredibly low, deep, and ice-cold. "
...I came to set the fielding for all of you."
The first member went mad with rage.
The veins on his neck popped.
"If you're so eager to die,
take my punch! Bastard,
I'm not leaving you alive today!"
He threw his entire body weight into a heavy, telegraphed punch aimed straight at Raizen's jaw.
But Raizen's philosophy was simple:
"Control is everything.
"SWOOSH.
Raizen didn't step back a single inch.
He merely tilted his head slightly to the side.
The thug's punch sliced through the air, whistling right past his ear.
In the next millisecond, Raizen's hand—clad in a black fingerless combat glove—shot forward. He caught the attacker's wrist mid-air.
The thug's eyes widened in shock.
Without jerking, in one perfectly fluid Karate motion, Raizen used the man's own momentum against him.
He twisted the arm, bent his knees slightly, and with terrifying strength, lifted the heavy thug into the air and slammed him straight down onto the concrete pavement.
THUD!
The impact was so severe that a fountain of blood erupted from the thug's mouth.
He crumpled to the ground without making another sound.
The second member panicked entirely.
The switchblade in his trembling hand shook violently.
"You bastard! How dare you?!"
Raizen slowly stood up straight.
"If you want some too... come on."
"Take this, bastard!
Face my Overdrive Kick!"
The second thug screamed, sprinting forward.
He leaped high into the air, putting all his strength into a flying kick.
Raizen simply raised his left forearm, deflecting the kick at a precise angle.
The direction of the strike shifted, and the thug lost his balance mid-air.
BAM.
Raizen pivoted on the ground and delivered a lightning-fast
Ushiro Geri (Back Kick)
straight into the thug's stomach.
The impact was so brutal it knocked all the air and fluid out of his body.
Before the thug could even fall backward, Raizen spun like a wheel.
CRACK!
A devastating
Mawashi Geri (Roundhouse Kick)
slammed directly into his ribs.
The thug hunched forward, screaming in agony.
Raizen grabbed his shoulders and
THWACK!
THWACK!
delivered two consecutive
Hiza Geri (Knee Strikes)
straight to his chest.
Raizen looked down at the lifeless body on the pavement with cold eyes.
"How did that feel?"
The horrifying noise at the gate—the sound of shattering bones and agonized screams—reached the ears of the remaining 10 gang members smoking in the entry courtyard.
"What's going on out there?!"
"Someone attacked the gate!
Let's show this bastard his place!"
The sound of heavy, rushing footsteps echoed.
A second later, 10 more Black Blazers rushed through the dust and stood directly in front of Raizen.
This wasn't a normal group of high schoolers.
Some held heavy iron baseball bats, some wore thick brass knuckles, and others gripped solid iron rods.
Their eyes were bloodshot with rage as they looked down at their two brothers lying unconscious in pools of their own blood.
But Raizen, with his white spiky hair and red hoodie, remained exactly where he was.
There wasn't a single drop of fear on his face.
His gaze held a strange coldness, as if he wasn't looking at 10 men, but 10 insects.
Silent intimidation.
"Who the hell do you think you are?!"
the third member yelled angrily, swinging his baseball bat.
"Take this, idiot!
We're not letting you leave alive today!"
the fourth clashed his brass knuckles together.
All 10 men charged at Raizen simultaneously.
The game of death began.
Raizen took a deep breath.
His stance dropped.
His body entered a flawless flow state.
No wasted motion.
The First Wave:
A thug swung a baseball bat straight down at his head with terrifying speed.
A normal man would have been crushed.
But Raizen raised his arm and deflected the incoming trajectory of the bat at a slight angle.
The force of the swing slid off to the side.
In the next half-second, Raizen stepped completely inside the man's guard.
CRACK!
Raizen's
'Uraken Uchi ' (Backfist)
shot out like a bullet, connecting perfectly with the bridge of the thug's nose.
The horrifying sound of cartilage shattering echoed across the courtyard, and a spray of blood misted the air.
The man dropped his bat, clutching his face as he collapsed.
Immediately, a second thug attacked from the side with an iron rod, attempting to sweep Raizen's legs.
Raizen pivoted, shifting back slightly to let the rod whistle past, and instantly stepped forward, grabbing the thug's wrist.
With a brutal jerk,
he twisted it.
SNAP!
The wrist broke instantly.
Raizen followed up with a precise elbow strike straight to the man's throat.
The rod clattered to the ground as the thug gasped desperately for air.
The man with the brass knuckles tried to grab Raizen from behind.
Without even looking back, relying entirely on his sensory awareness, Raizen lifted a leg and executed a blind, heavy-impact
'Mawashi Geri' backward.
The thug's jaw dislocated completely, and he flew backward through the air, crashing hard into a concrete wall.
Seeing three of their men dismantled so brutally, the remaining seven thugs hesitated, their legs trembling.
The anger in their eyes was rapidly being replaced by pure terror.
"Attack him together!
Surround him!"
one of them screamed.
Four thugs charged from all directions at once.
But to Raizen, they were moving in slow motion.
Without shifting his feet, he unleashed his signature move on the man charging dead ahead: The
Zero Step Punch.
No wind-up. No pulling his shoulder back.
Just instant, explosive kinetic force.
BOOM!
The punch connected with the force of a shockwave.
The thug's ribs caved in, and he was launched ten feet backward, sliding across the pavement. Blood immediately spilled from his mouth.
A thug from the left swung an iron rod at Raizen's head. Raizen instantly shifted into his
Counter Frame stance.
He read the attack perfectly, blocked the heavy iron with the dense muscle of his forearm, and immediately countered with a devastating knife-hand strike (Shuto Uchi) straight to the man's face.
The thug's eyes rolled into the back of his head.
Two thugs on the right lunged to grapple him.
Raizen jumped slightly off the ground and delivered his terrifying
Ice Break Kick
(a fast, heavy-impact kick) straight into the first thug's femur.
CRAAACK.
The thick thigh bone snapped in half.
As the man collapsed with a blood-curdling scream, Raizen used the momentum to pivot mid-air, landing a spinning hook kick with his heel directly onto the second thug's temple, knocking him out cold.
Only 3 thugs remained.
Their weapons had slipped from their trembling hands.
Around them, 7 of their brothers lay twitching in pools of blood.
"He... he's not human! Run!"
one thug sobbed, turning around and sprinting desperately toward the canteen.
Raizen took his time.
He kicked a dropped baseball bat up from the ground, caught it smoothly in his hand, and hurled it at the fleeing thug's legs.
The heavy wood smashed directly into the back of his knees.
The thug stumbled and crashed face-first into the concrete.
Driven mad by fear and cornered with nowhere to run, the final two thugs charged blindly.
"Die, bastard!"
they screamed.
There was no fatigue in Raizen's movements.
He calmly parried both their wild punches.
He grabbed one thug's arm, spun him around, pulled him in, and violently slammed him into the second thug.
Their skulls collided with a sickening impact.
CRACK.
Both dropped to the floor, unconscious.
Just four minutes.
Within exactly four minutes, the dust settled.
On the entry grounds of Hakuho Academy, all 10 gang members lay utterly broken, covered in blood, crying and moaning in agony.
Limbs were broken; faces were shattered.
The courtyard had been turned into a slaughterhouse.
In the center stood Raizen alone.
His breathing was still perfectly normal.
There wasn't a single drop of sweat on his stark white hair, nor a speck of blood on his red hoodie.
He calmly tightened the straps on his black fingerless gloves.
He looked down at the thug whose knee he had shattered.
The man was desperately trying to crawl backward, his eyes wide with a terror reserved only for the devil himself.
"Who... who the hell are you...?"
the thug asked through trembling lips.
Raizen walked over slowly.
He grabbed the thug by the collar of his jacket and lifted him slightly off the ground.
Behind Raizen's calm expression, a dark, freezing aura radiated, burning into the thug's soul.
"Where is your Boss?"
Raizen asked, his voice sounding like death itself asking a question.
"Tell me quickly, or..."
The fear of death can make a man do anything.
Tears streamed down the thug's battered face.
"Please stop!
You've already beaten us enough, please calm down!"
he begged, pressing his hands together.
"Please don't hit me anymore...
Boss...
Boss went to the main canteen to crush some guy.
He's being beaten up right now.
But please don't tell him I told you, please!"
Raizen stared into his eyes for one second, confirmed the absolute terror, and dropped him back to the ground.
"Fine," Raizen said simply.
He turned and began walking toward the canteen with calm, measured steps.
Behind him, the courtyard was left with nothing but the sounds of agonized groans.
Inside the canteen, the atmosphere had mutated into pure nightmare fuel.
Akuro had just humiliated Kenchon, forcing him to drop his pants in front of everyone.
The tension in the air was so thick it was suffocating.
On the ground, Renjiro lay half-dead.
BANG!!!
The heavy oak double doors of the canteen were violently kicked open.
A brutally beaten gang member collapsed near the door frame, gasping desperately for air.
"BOSS!
BOSS!"
he screamed.
"Outside...
there's a guy outside beating up all our gang members!"
The crowd's cruel laughter died instantly.
Kenchon froze in his tracks.
Akuro's sweet, innocent smile suddenly warped into icy shock.
"Kenchon!
Did you call the Thunder Bulls?!"
Akuro demanded, his voice laced with venom.
"No, Boss!"
the bleeding member on the floor interrupted, sobbing.
"It's not the Thunder Bulls!
It's just one guy!
He has stark white hair...
he's wearing a bright red hoodie...
and he's destroying everyone!"
The moment the words 'white hair' and 'red hoodie' echoed through the room, Akuro's eyes widened. But it wasn't fear.
The psychopath hiding beneath his skin suddenly awakened.
A cold, wicked energy began to seep into the air around him.
"Oh my..."
Akuro's smile returned, stretching even wider, almost unnaturally so.
His body began to tremble with a strange, dark excitement.
"...I didn't know I was going to hit the jackpot today.
Another new toy?
I can't wait anymore!"
Toma Kagetsu stepped forward, deep concern in his dead eyes.
"Boss, we don't know who he is or why he's attacking us.
He could be dangerous."
Daizen Mori cracked his thick knuckles.
"Let him come in here.
I'll tear him apart piece by piece."
Akuro suddenly snapped his head around and glared at the two of them.
For a split second, every sound in the canteen ceased to exist.
"Shut up, both of you,"
Akuro hissed, his voice sounding like a venomous snake preparing to strike.
"I will fight him.
And listen to me very carefully...
if anyone, absolutely anyone of you, gets between me and him...
I will kill you right here.
Do you understand me?"
Toma and Daizen's souls shivered.
"Y-Yes, Boss...
he's all yours."
Akuro turned back toward the doors.
Today is going to be fun,
he thought to himself, his veins buzzing with adrenaline.
So many surprises in one place...
I can't wait any longer.
And at that exact moment—the dust settled at the kicked-open doors.
Raizen Kurotsuki,
with his stark white hair and his blood-red "I HATE TOXIC" hoodie, stepped into the canteen frame with perfectly calm footsteps.
His face bore that same Absolute Cold Expression.
When Akuro turned his neck and saw the white-haired boy standing at the door, an incredibly terrifying, evil, and devilish smile crept onto his face—a smile that would freeze the blood of anyone watching.
A Smiling Monster and a Red Storm were now standing directly face-to-face.