Dec 11th, 1986

[Start] Revengeance Fund: 1050¥

                I got up today and immediately sprung into action. I meditated in the dojo, preparing myself mentally for what I had to do today. I studied the map, tried my best to remember guard placements and routes, and committed it all to memory. I sparred with Fuku-san as a warm up, stomped his ass for fun.

                I went and fed the cat as per my usual routine. Naoyuki had the newest issue of jump so I got it off of him, I have no idea whats happening in my regular manga and it will take some time for me to catch up, but I’ll get over it. Today I’m meeting Chen, and I’m getting some answers God dammit.

                The day was otherwise uneventful. Played my home version of Space Harrier, called Nozomi. Did whatever would eat up time, and when I wasn’t doing that I was going over the map and the plan in my head again and again and again. Finally at about 430pm I made my way to the bus stop. Got down to the harbor about 530pm. Hung out and tried to look inconspicuous while hanging out down at the open harbor areas. While the guard shift may have changed, they may still have my description. So I needed to be careful. I waited until about 9pm when it was good and dark to make my move. The map served me well, as did my remembered guard routes, who knew a different batch of guards would take the same routes, but I won’t complain. I almost got caught twice, close calls both of them but I was able to duck into the shadows, and finally found it… Warehouse No. 8. I went in.

                The Warehouse was pretty big and was packed full of antiques and other junk that didn’t interest me. Upstairs next to the office door was a black board with the last half of Chen’s phone number on it, this was the place. Like an idiot I beat on the door asking if Chen was there, no response so I went down stairs to rifle through their things for something of value to compensate me for my time and all the trouble I went through. Found an antique plate, but wouldn’t you know it somebody had to call out and startle me and I dropped the dam thing.

                Gui Zhang is a big mother fucker, he dresses nice and has some broad square shoulders. I could probably whip his ass. But after he came down and we both took our fighting positions, ready to fuck this place up, a man in a red Chinese outfit called him off and descended the stairs, this was none other than Master Chen.

                Right off the bat he knew I was the one who had called the day before, I told him who I was and what business I had with him, he asked to see the Chinese letter, and confirmed its validity. No fight for Gui Zhang tonite. I told him of my father’s death at the hands of Lan Di, Chen told me he knew of Lan Di and gave me more information than I thought I’d find. Lan Di is  memer of the Triads, but he runs his own organization, and they are some bad mother fuckers, he is also notorious for using a unique style designed for max damage and killing blows. No doubt about it, this was the Lan Di who killed my father. A good thing too, I mean god forbid there are other men named Lan Di out there, I don’t want to kill the wrong one. Judah Lan Di is just sitting there on his couch watching cartoons, when all of a sudden an angry Japanese teen flies in through his window and crushes his wind pipe with a round house kick, no way, I’m not about that.

                Master Chen seemed interested in the thing Lan Di took from my father, a stone mirror with a dragon design. Chen described it to me perfectly. He said it was unfortunate that Lan Di took it, but he then asked me about the other mirror. I had no idea what he was talking about, and I told him as much. I was copying down whatever I could from him into my notebook for further study and review. Finally I asked about the mirrors, he said Dad and some Zhou character brought them back from china, and they were super valuable and important.

                So Dad in his youth, smuggled ancient Chinese artifacts of ridiculous value… the family bank account has got to be huge. Ine-san is definitely trying to rob me. Also we’ve been loaded this whole time, and Dad won’t budge for a bigger tv, a house with proper insulation and heating, or a goddam Famicom. I’m pretty pissed off about it, and I plan to do something about it. Even if petty, Dad’s ghost will dam sure know how pissed I am about all this.

                Master Chen told me that the second mirror, the ‘Phoenix Mirror’ is probably hidden somewhere in my house. I’m gonna find that fucker if it takes me the next week and a half to 2 weeks, any longer than that and it’s probably not there or already been sold by Ine-san for whatever nefarious plans she has for my family’s money… MY money. I’m gonna get that bitch.

                I was told to return as soon as I find it, but to call in advance before coming, I assume they’ll make arrangements with the guards to let me in if they know I’m coming from now on. They dam sure better, because I am not losing my allowance again over this shit. That’s crap! At least Master Chen and Gui Zhang gave me a ride home, made it home before 11, no scolding or punishment for me. Gonna tear this house apart tomorrow, gonna find this dam mirror.

                I have to say though, for a little over a week, I’ve mad surprising progress in my investigation. I’m pretty pleased with myself. I went from having nothing but a description of Lan Di, his name, and he was in a car… to knowing just who he is, who he works for, what he wants, and why he killed my father. With this Mirror, I might also have a method of getting to him. Now I just need to buy a gun. Or use that family sword, either way he’s gonna die before this is all over.
REVENGEANCE WILL BE MINE!! QAPLA!!

[End] Revengeance Fund: 820¥

Dec 10th, 1986

[Start] Revengeance Fund: 1050¥

                Today has been… a pain in the ass. I fed the cat, managed not to spend any money for the most part. I sparred with Fuku-san, I won, naturally, cause I’m a beast! And I went snooping around the house again, only to find… mother fuckers have been holding out on me AGAIN! While searching through Dad’s area of the house I find a secret move manuscript, and while searching Fuku-san’s room I find another. That dirty rat bastard has been studying moves in secret trying to get the one up on me. I’ll certainly show him. Also while going through his stuff I discovered a few magazines of his pornography, and I have to say, if Tom was here he’d say something to the extent of “This makes Jesus cry.” Wiggy shit.

                I called the number from the letter today, the letter belonging to Master Chen. I got a very dry voice that responded to me in a gibberish I didn’t quite catch right away. Brain storm suddenly made me remember it was the gibberish from the back of the Dad’s Chinese letter. So I responded with what it said on the back. Thank god I remembered, lord knows where I’d be if I hadn’t. He said “Father’s Heaven,” the response was “Nine Dragons.” Next was “Mothers Earth,” the response was “Comrades.” I remember seeing that somewhere in my house before but I can’t remember where. Anyways it turned out it was some kind of password, the voice told me “Warehouse Number Eight.” So I said, “Put Chen on the phone now or somebody dies!” I don’t know why they hung up. Okay maybe I didn’t say that exactly, but they did hang up on me when I asked about Master Chen.

                I now had a new bit of information, someone was waiting for me at Warehouse No. 8, and they had information I needed. Problem was in a city like Yokosuka, Warehouse NO. 8 doesn’t exactly narrow it down. I asked around and eventually was given the suggestion to call the information number to try and get some info on the number I called. So I dialed 104, and came up with nothing, operator told me to fuck off. Bitch. Nozomi wants an answer and to be in a relationship with me, but I ain’t got time to be dating, not this moment. She just wants to screw every now and again I’m down for that. But she ain’t that type of girl and I’m not asking or begging for it, so it is what it is.

                With no leads as to information on the number, I went to… the phone book. The area code for the number says its in Amihama. That gives me a hint to where the Warehouse is. So I asked around and found out that Amihama is the Harbor district. So warehouse at the harbor, where the Chinese Cartel has an operation… this is definitely what I needed. And there is a bus stop over by the smoke shop where the bus comes by every 30min on weekdays. So without further delay I made my way to Amihama.

                Bus fare was a bitch, but with about 1000¥ to my name what else can I do. When I got there found a few punks from my school, some delinquents I haven’t had the pleasure of stomping recently. They were shaking down some kid for his money when, and I’m not proud of this… I stepped up to them and shouted, “Hey… um… don’t you know that black mail is not cool!?” I feel like such a weenie. I might punch myself before bed for that remark. I gave each of them a free hit handicap, then proceeded to knock the shit out of them, twist arms, and kick ribs, as is my custom. And off they went, into the night. It’s good to be me sometimes.

                I asked around and found warehouse 8, snuck in ninja style, and started snooping around. After about 10 minutes of searching the place I discover that, oh joy… it’s the wrong Warehouse No. 8. Apparently there are 2 areas with warehouses in the harbor, separated by a fence and each one has a Warehouse No. 8. Well fuck. I get to where the old Warehouse No. 8 is, only to find its crawling with security guards. I tried my best to sneak in, but wound up losing my way and getting caught.

                Bastards ejected me, and called Ine-san to let her know I’d been ejected. Fuckers rummaged through my wallet and found my student ID. I have no idea why I even keep it on me, I don’t go to school. So I got fucked. On my way out I found a map of the old warehouse district along with the location of warehouse 8, copied it down real fast in my notebook and then started back home. Security would be to tense and alert to try again tonight. Have to go in tomorrow. Got home after 11, Ine-san was not pleased with me. I got scolded… by the old lady that I allow to live in MY house, and steal from me. I’m on to you bitch.

                My punishment is no allowance tomorrow. This bitch is going too far. One of these days I may have to end her, or locate Dad’s will so I can fire her and boot her ass out of my house. Her and Fuku-san.

                Gonna try for the warehouse again tomorrow. Going in at night, gonna spend the rest of the day studying the map I drew. I’m getting in there tomorrow night come hell or high water.

               

[End] Revengeance Fund: 820¥

Dec 9th, 1986

[Start]Revengeance Fund: 1570¥

                I needed today. For reals. I didn’t do a lot, but it felt so good. I went back to that antique store today. Bought a new instruction scroll, went at it for a couple of hours until I had the move down. I practiced all my sweet moves, didn’t get any phone numbers today. I assume it was because all the girls my age were at school, where I should probably be but we haven’t gotten any phone calls, truancy cops haven’t shown up, hell no concerned class mates have shown up to ask why I haven’t come back yet. Seems like because dad was killed I’m getting a free pass. Or everyone but Nozomi completely gave up on me, which I don’t give a fuck either way.

                I fed the cat, keepin the little bugger fed is still important. Also it rained today, like all day. And its starting to piss me off. Its rained every day since the day I met Charlie, like he’s some kind of fucking weather wizard and its seriously pissing me off. I own like 1 jacket, 4 pairs of jeans, and 10 tshirts, and most of them are soaked, and we don’t have a dryer. I blame dad.

                Speaking of blaming dad for shit, I went and said a prayer at the family shrine for dad. This I all his fault for not having that sword ready to go, or booby trapping the dojo with some pendulums, or bear traps, or paint cans on strings.

                I sat down and played Space Harrier in my living room. God it was so much fun. I remember when I used to do fun shit like this all the time. Just sit on ass, play games at Naoyuki’s house, read Jump, and as long as I stayed out of trouble in school, and kept my grades adequate, dad never gave me shit. Jesus its been like 2 weeks since my Dad died and my whole life has completely changed. I’m hell bent on killing a guy, I’m dropped out or auto-passed in school… something… Nozomi is in love with me, Fuku-san is Fuku-san, and Ine-san is stealing my money. Jesus fuck man.

                I’ve been on this quest 7 days now and I’m about to have a fucking break down. Me! A few days ago I was like the baddest mother fucker in the world, splitting heads, taking names, and beating up sailors. Now look at me… falling apart because I haven’t read Jump in 3 weeks. Naoyuki doesn’t keep his copies very long, Nozomi doesn’t read it, and Fuku-san I’m pretty sure doesn’t understand what reading is. I’m 3 weeks behind on all my manga, which means I have no idea what’s going on now, and it’ll be another month or 2 before they get collected and I get the tankoban.

                I’ve just been sitting here the last 2 hours, chilling, listening to my cassettes. Grooving on some of the music I’ve collected over the last week. And I’m feeling good now. I know I probably sounded like I was losing it or breaking down, but no, I’m good now. Maybe now is the time when the grief of losing Dad finally hits me. I’ve been holding in all this emotion, swallowing it and denying its even there because, well I’m a man. And now here it is, and I guess I gotta deal with it now.

                Yeah fuck that, emotions are dumb. Gonna go whip the shit out of Fuku-san one more time. He pays no rent, has no income, yet lives in MY house eating up all MY food. The least the goof ball can do to earn his keep is go a few rounds with me each day.

I’m gonna try and make a point to take a break every now and again, at least once a week. I can’t be Revenging all the time, otherwise I wind up wearing myself out like I did this week. Then I start thinking about emotions and shit, and I can’t deal with this right now. Gonna call Master Chen tomorrow, see where this goes. Probably nowhere. This is my last real lead… If this fails, fuck Ine-san I’m making this dojo into a ninja sex-assassin training camp and with my army of sex ninja’s I will find and kill Lan Di, it’ll just take longer, but it’ll probably be sexier. Yeah I wish I could do that, and I wasn’t just bullshitting myself.

[End]Revengeance Fund: 550¥

Dec 8th, 1986

[Start]Revengeance Fund: 3070¥

                Today has been a roller coaster of emotions. Like for real… and I don’t like tot alk about my feelings typically, being a man… a manly man who knows karate, and a total hard ass that busts heads at random cause I can. So this is kind of a big deal for me, but I’ll get to that when I get to that.

                I woke up this morning knowing that I would be meeting Charlie today and that it was probably a trap. At least he couldn’t surprise me, but I knew that I needed to be ready because the guy has contacts in the local underworld, when he jumps me it ain’t gonna be no easy fight. I went to the dojo and meditated on it briefly, visualizing my foot entering Charlie’s ass and kicking his teeth out from the back. Fuku-san came in and asked me about what I was doing, he knows I’m about to throw down, because I told him I was on a quest for vengeance, and because I’m a bad mother fucker and you can just tell.

                Anyways Fuku-san begs me not to go fight Charlie, because he’s afraid something bad might happen to me and he’d feel responsible if he didn’t try to stop me. Now I am touched by Fuku-san’s concern, don’t get me wrong, but this is the same guy, who not even 5 days ago begged me to take him with me on my quest of bad ass head busting Revenge. Fuku-san… somedays I don’t know about you. This didn’t stop me from kicking the shit out of him. Nothing like practicing my sweet moves off the back of his soft head.

                Well Ine-san heard what I was doing, my plans, me whipping FUku-san’s ass, everything. She begged me to give up my quest for revenge and instead run the dojo. Now I would be more than happy too, except that 1) you won’t give me more than 500¥ a day, 2) I have no access to family finance accounts or records, and 3) you already told me I’m not allowed to do what I want with MY dojo. Jokingly tell an old woman you want to train the country’s most elite team of all female ninja sex-assassins, and all of a sudden you can’t run a dojo you own unsupervised.

But she did give me a note that came for my father a few days after he died. If I read the post mark correctly it arrived the day my quest started, Dec 3^rd. Would’ve been nice to have then. The letter itself is written in Chinese, I know this because its clearly not Japanese Kanji, or any kana I’ve ever seen, and there aren’t enough straight lines and circles to be Korean. Also there is a customs stamp which says “Rush delivery from Hong Kong.” So kind of a big clue. I had to promise her I wouldn’t do anything that might get me hurt, I think she meant this to deter me from my quest for revenge… so in order to keep that promise I must only do the things that will definitely and more than likely get me hurt. Screw uncertainty, I promised Ine-san, so now I HAVE to go fight Charlie.

Ain’t I a Stinker?

                Well I was on my way to Dobuita to kill time until I met with Charlie, when a bunch of kids came at me, one of them crying out that a man in sunglasses had attacked him and wouldn’t give him back his soccer ball if he didn’t bring me to the construction site at Sakuragaoka. A bunch of assholes coming to me for their ass whippins? Bout dam time. Mind you this does reveal a startling fact that they probably know where I live, but I’ll unwisely choose to deal with that some other time. I went to Charlie and he had like 6 guys with him at the construction site. The kid got his soccer ball back and was supposed to run, instead he sat there and watched. Don’t blame him, I am a sight to behold.

                I kicked the shit out of all of Charlie’s buds except for one, when all of a sudden Charlie grabbed the little kid who hung out and threatened him if I did anything. I swear I didn’t plan this… awesome of this level just happens. I noticed the soccer ball on the ground in front of me, I kicked that son of a bitch as hard as I could and hit Charlie in the face, making him drop the kid. At the exact same time his buddy was coming up behind me with a knife or something, cat like reflexes kicked in, and I blocked the knife knocked it away, then did a flying round house kick and knocked this asshole the fuck out! BaZAAM! Charlie got away but he will rue the day… and him running away like that instead of taking his ass whippin like a man… he’s just begging me for more rue.

                The kid was grateful for my saving him, as well he should be. He was a new kid to the neighborhood. He’s Chinese, I forget his name, it had a lot of syllables. And with Charlie gone after the obvious trap that I had know was a trap turned out to be a, ‘gasp’ trap… my last 4 days of investigating had amounted to nothing. All I had left was a letter to dad that was written in a language I didn’t understand. Frustration, anger, I wish I had some High school punks to knock around right now.

                I went to Dobuita to see if anyone could read the dam letter, I started with Tao-san. That was a mistake. Tao-san explains that despite being Chinese, leader of the Dobuita Chinese Society who doesn’t know a lot of Chinese, and opening and operating a Chinese restaurant… he himself doesn’t understand the written language all that well. I would have banged my head on his wall again but… I don’t know what I was expecting. He mentioned his helper Wang-san was good with Kanji and to ask him, the squirrely little bastard owes me since I’ve bought him drinks twice when he had no money, so I went to look for him running deliveries on Dobuita Market Street.

                Between Wang-san, who was a pain in the ass to find by the way, Itoi-san, Maeda-san, and both Liu-sans, I was able to learn this much… it’s Chinese Kanji, but it’s kind of written weird and they can’t understand it. So I calmly went to the empty parking lot next to the smoke shop to kick the shit out of the air, my dad’s ghost if he was nearby, and just vent my frustrations while showing off my sweet moves. Not gonna lie, 3 girls gave me their phone numbers just from seeing what a bad ass I was.

                After I finished beating up the air, I ran into the Chinese kid I saved earlier. He told me that while he wasn’t good at reading Chinese, big surprise, his grandmother was. She runs a China (plates) shop over by Liu-san’s barbershop. I’ve passed it before but usually its closed. Well I decided that “Fuck it” and went to check it out, today the place was open. LUCKY.

                I went inside and the old woman inside was extremely polite and thankful that I saved her grandson from being murdered and probably molested by Charlie. As well she should… I asked her to translate the letter, and I half expected her to say “I don’t know what this is, you’ll have to go somewhere else,” instead she was like “Oh I know what this is, check this out senior badass-sama.” Yeah, she totally said that. Turns out the kanji wasn’t wonky or weird, just written mirrored, so it had to be read while being reflected in a mirror. Whoever wrote this thing is a clever son of a bitch, and I’d like to buy him a drink: grape soda, orange soda, or coffee… his pick.

                The note contained a warning to be careful of those seeking the Mirrors, and if in trouble to seek the aid of Master Chen. It also had some gibberish on the back that probably means nothing, even the old lady didn’t understand it, but there was a phone number on the letter, and its local. With the Charlie lead fizzled out, this letter about Master Chen is all I got right now. I decided not to call the number today. And I probably won’t call it tomorrow either. I’m so fucking tired right now. I’ve been in a fight every day for the last 4 days. I’ve probably killed 10 guys and injured a bunch more. I need a break before I lose my mind.

                Spent a lot of money today, found a newer cheaper food for the cat. And I discovered a store in Dobuita that sells instruction manuals for fighting techniques, so I went and bought some new sweet moves. There are more moves there to buy. So with the prospects of getting a job or earning money low to nothing, I’m gonna have to wait until Ine-san gives me enough money to get them. When I attacked Lan Di he threw me like I was nothing. I need some new bad ass moves, and to make my current moves even stronger if I ever hope to stand a chance against him. Or I could buy a gun, which would be equally effective against him if not more-so, still gotta have money to buy a gun. Tom is American, he can probably hook me up with one.

                When I got home, I got a call from Nozomi… this usually doesn’t happen so it raised a flag in my head. She asked to meet me at Sakuragaoka park, so I went. She seemed really bummed out. Which after the day I’ve had started bumming me out, and now I’m all over the place like a super ball made of emotions. She told me her parents want her to move back to Canada, but she doesn’t know when she’ll be leaving. She then pretty much tells me she doesn’t want to leave before she tells me that she’s in love with me. Again I’m all over the place today, so normally this is where I act all cool, and suave, and then I talk her into going to a Love Hotel so we can make sweet sweet love until the sun comes up. Instead I fucking choked and rambled something along the lines of “I don’t know how I feel yet, but when I figure it out I’ll tell you.” She accepted that response and went home. I’m such a loser.

                Went home and played Space Harrier until it was time for bed. I’m so fucking tired of all this shit.

               

[End]Revengeance Fund: 1050¥