1.3

Uprush

My insane drive to risk my own life lasted only as long as it took to slip the mask over my face. The second I did the reality of what I had planned hit me like another truck. Was I really, actually going to risk my life here?

No, I shouldn't. My apparent death wish notwithstanding, these people deserved an actual hero, not a child who was just going to get herself killed. I'd stay until they got here then. Make sure everyone got out okay without risking my life. My mind finally made up, I reached across the desk and picked up the phone to call in the big guns.

Only to realise I didn't even know how.

I stared at the receiver in my hand, the numbers looking back at me as if mocking my ignorance. How could I not know the freaking emergency number? I checked the whole room, every book paper and pamphlet, but nope. Why would you write down an emergency number when everyone should know it?

Everyone except me.

I covered my face with my hands and groaned. I was such an idiot. Why hadn't I thought about this before?

My mind flashed back to the window where I'd distributed my stats. Sure I had all the knowledge from my previous life, but as I'd discovered, my body was wholly 14 again. And that meant my brain was as well. Back to its underdeveloped, prepubescent state. If my mental stat governed my brain, and thus my decision making…

I quickly opened up the points menu again and dropped my remaining 2 points into my mental stat, bringing it to 11. It wasn't as good as I'd like, doing some quick math, I figured that the average adult would be somewhere around 15, but at the same time it was better than having little to no decision making ability.

I took another deep, shuddering breath, and thought over the situation before me. I didn't know the emergency number, that was the main problem right now. I couldn't let anyone figure out what I'd done to Takahashi either, at least until I got the police to show up, which had to be before the "dispatch" tomorrow morning. I thought back to when I'd first arrived- there had been a young woman working at the counter, Takahashi had told her to mind the shop.

If anything, she'd know the emergency number. I could ask her to call the police for me, and explain what was really going on when they got here, no violence necessary. That was certainly a better plan than trying to go full daredevil on a superhuman human trafficker's ass.

I nodded to myself, decided. Go talk to the counter girl, get the emergency number, explain the situation.

Easy peasy.

It seemed that the system agreed with me this time, as another quest window opened in front of me.

QUEST: Human Trafficking Jam!

Now that you're done trying to be batman, call the police and bust this ring wide open.

REWARDS:

Learn the emergency number

Unlock ?

50 EXP

BONUS:

?

?

FAILURE:

Capture

Eventual Painful Death

ACCEPT?

Y/N

I accepted the quest with a tap. "Guess my plan earlier really wasn't the best, huh system?"

It was not.

...

Don't fail user.

A small smile grew on my face and I nodded. Finally ready, I glanced at the bottom desk drawer- there was just one other thing I had to take care of first.

[(ง •̀_•́)ง]

I considered the gun in front of me with a critical eye. Observe had told me that it was a 9mm Glock 17, and very, very illegal to own in Japan. I didn't even know how to shoot it, let alone hit someone with the bullet that came out. I should just leave it here.

I picked up the handgun by the barrel, avoiding the trigger like I'd heard hundreds of times before. It was just about the only thing I knew about gun safety- right behind never pointing a loaded gun at someone you weren't ready to shoot. It felt heavy and unnatural in my hands, the metal cold and harsh.

I should leave it here, but when I thought about what was coming, at least, what I remembered from the manga… Even an inexperienced shooter at point blank range could do some real damage, and I didn't think you could regenerate around a bullet.

Now, if this functioned like a normal game…

"System...show me how to open my inventory please."

The window opened without a word, grayed out boxes where I assumed stored items would appear lining its surface. I tapped the window with the butt of the gun and it dissolved into light, reappearing in my inventory with little fanfare. I followed the gun with the two boxes of bullets, and then the zip ties. You never knew when these things would be useful. I'd do some more experimenting with the inventory once I was safely out of this mess.

"Thanks system."

Before I left the room I made an attempt at dragging Takahashi into a less suspicious position. Once I'd gotten him situated under the desk, I left the room the way we'd come, finding myself back in the main room of the establishment. The place was relatively empty, only one lone patron sitting at a table in the corner. The young woman was, thankfully, still standing at the counter, wiping it down with a small rag.

"Um, excuse me, miss?"

She jumped like my words had burned her, scrambling to adjust her apron.

"Y-yes? How can I help you?" I took another deep, shuddering breath, trying to make sure I still looked as innocent as possible. I forced my eyes to tear up- a trick I hadn't used since I was last in middle school.

"C-Can you call the police? S-something happened-Mr. Takahashi just fell over and I-" I scrubbed my face with my sleeve, "I just don't know what to do! What if he's hurt?" Jeez, I hoped I wasn't laying it on too thick.

It seemed I didn't have any reason to worry, however, as the woman flew towards me and started trying to calm me down. Huh. Guess I was still small enough to activate the mother hen instinct. Out of the corner of my eye I saw another window informing me that deception had leveled up again, but I ignored it for now.

"O-of course! Shh, don't cry- we'll get this all sorted out, don't worry." She patted me on the shoulders and turned back to the counter for the phone. As she did so I activated observe and nearly punched myself in the face when I read the resulting window.

Aiko Shinomaki

Level 11

A low level yakuza member, Shinomaki runs one of Takahashi's many tea shops while he is away or otherwise indisposed. Her quirk proved her to be an extremely valuable resource when she was first recruited, and has allowed her to move up the ranks of young women working for Takahashi relatively quickly.

Wow, I was even more screwed. If I could've sworn aloud I would've. Instead, I mentally cursed at myself for not observing her first. As Shinomaki tapped out numbers on the phone pad in front of her I quickly re-assessed the situation.

There was no way she was actually calling the police. I'd bet everything I had on it. Instead, she was probably calling in more of her yakuza buddies or some kind of crooked doctor to check out what had happened, which was the absolute last thing I'd need right now. As I stood there, watching her call in my doom, however, I noticed something peeking out of her pocket- a cellphone.

I didn't question why she had it, or why she wasn't using it to make the call. Instead I darted forwards and grabbed it out of her pocket before I booked it to the back rooms I'd come from.

While I probably could've made it to the door and outside, I needed to keep everyone in the building, in the building. Otherwise they would probably scatter once they realized I knew what was going on behind the scenes. Better to keep them here, looking for me, than risk them getting away.

Eventually I found myself in a broom closet- the door closed and shut tight behind my back as I powered on the phone. Every smartphone that I knew of, at least in america, had some way of contacting emergency services without needing the passcode. I just hoped it'd be the same here.

To my relief it was, the small white "emergency" button glowing at the bottom of the screen. I hit it with probably way more force than necessary, and sat there, on the floor of the broom closet, nearly rocking back and forth as the call connected.

"Hello this is Musutafu Emergency Services what is your emergency?"A female voice rang through the speaker. I sighed in relief.

"Hi, um, I," I was suddenly at a loss for words- what did you even say in this kind of situation? I took another deep breath. "I was almost kidnapped by human traffickers and I need the police to get here as soon as possible-" I covered my mouth as I heard a set of footsteps race past in the hall behind me. "-please they're going to hurt so many girls."

"And where are you right now ma'am?"

I blanked before a window opened in front of me with the map of Musutafu clearly displayed, my position highlighted in bright blue.

"It's called Takahashi's Tea Room, about halfway up Ichiba Street." The woman on the line hmmed and tapped a few keys on her keyboard.

"Alright, Police will be with you as soon as possible. Please sit tight and remain on the line. Are you in a safe position right now?"

I nodded before I remembered she couldn't see me. "Yeah, I'm in the broom closet right now." I could feel the tension drain from my body as she spoke, her voice washing all the anxiety from my thoughts, keeping me calm. "Does your quirk- are you making me calm down right now?"

"That's good. Now, just stay on the line with me okay?" I mumbled and okay but repeated my question- there was no way the calm I could feel right now was normal. The woman on the other end sighed.

"Yes, you're right, my quirk allows my voice to soothe those who hear it." I thanked her for explaining and looked around the room.

I was too afraid to turn the light on for fear of someone seeing, but even without it I could see the various cleaning supplies and jugs of chemicals sitting on shelves and lining the floor. Bleach, dish soap, floor wax… I only realised I was distracting myself when I started counting the individual containers.

I'd been in the closet for about 12 minutes when I heard another two sets of footsteps start down the hallway to my hiding place. Heavy and foreboding, these weren't Shinomaki's footsteps, instead, they were probably the yakuza who'd called Takahashi about the other young women. Thinking quickly I realised that if they were to try and open the door to my hiding place they'd quickly discover it for what it was. Praying I wasn't about to seriously harm myself, I turned to one of the shelving units and started to climb.

[(ง •̀_•́)ง]

Komeda Muremaru had been in the business for a long time. So long, in fact, that his teenage daughter had been born after he'd gotten involved. He'd seen everything, the scum of the earth that inhabited this city, all the things they were willing to do, the things they'd try to hide. Throw quirks into the mix and you could go from seeing a man with two heads trying to barter for drugs to watching a girl with a snake tail choke out a john for stiffing her on her last job. In this business, you saw everything.

Which made it all the more easy for him to track down the little girl Shinomaki had called him about.

He'd already been on his way to the shop when he'd gotten the call that something had happened to Takahashi. Apparently a young girl- one of his prospects, probably -had asked her to call the police because he'd passed out in front of her. Shinomaki said the kid looked too young to be a hero, or even in hero school, but Muremaru wouldn't put it past some hero with a de-aging quirk to try and go undercover at the shop.

Either way, the kid had apparently realized Shinomaki wasn't calling the police, snatched her phone, and booked it. Not out of the shop to the busy street, but back into the bowels of the shop for some reason. Shinomaki said she had gone and looked for her, but she didn't have any luck- instead she'd found Takahashi lying on the ground behind his desk, hands zip-tied behind his back and by all consideration dead to the world.

Shinomaki was still with him now. She'd gone and closed up the shop first, but returned to sit by his side with a bucket of ice and a rag. She trusted Muremaru to sort out the issue.

So, once he'd arrived, he'd gotten the girls situated in the back room, locked the door, told his boys to keep watch, and gone hunting, the two antennae on his forehead waving back and forth with every step he took. It wasn't hard to track the girl, the scent of her fear had saturated Takahashi's office and clung to Shinomaki's apron like glue, and he followed it down the twisting hallway until he came to a stop in front of the small broom closet.

Typical.

The door was locked, but offered little resistance to Muremaru's quick, and one sharp jerk forced it open. An explosion of dust greeted him as he looked into the small, dark closet. He stepped inside, antennae twitching wildly, and scanned the floor. The girl's scent was so concentrated in the small area that it was hard to discern her position. He checked behind a few stacks of boxes, growing increasingly annoyed, until a small sound from behind him drew his attention.

He turned, eyes looking up to find the girl- slight frame, long brown hair- perched atop one of the shelving units, hidden amongst the chemicals. He smiled.

"Found you."

He took two steps in her direction, arms coming up in an attempt to try and pull her down. He'd barely gotten his hands around her when pain blossomed across his face and his vision went black. He screamed, hands coming to scrub at his face as the smell of chemicals filled his senses, and doubled over, not even noticing the girl slip off of the shelving unit and back out the door he'd entered.

[(ง •̀_•́)ง]

I shut the door behind me as fast as I could, jamming a broomstick through the handle to keep it shut. On the phone, the emergency operator was asking me what had happened. I did my best to explain, through slowly steadying breaths, how I had dumped a full bottle of bleach on the man who'd come after me, and requested that they send an ambulance as well as the police.

"Alright, kiddo- we'll send out an ambulance. I'm gonna need you to breathe for me, okay? In and out, yes, just like that." I followed her instructions and let the feeling of her quirk wash over me as I started finding a new place to hide.

As I walked I went over the windows that had popped up while I was in the closet. First I went over the observation summary that the system had given me on that last guy one more time, just to make sure he wasn't about to get up again and come after me.

Bullet Ant

Komeda Muremaru

Level 16

A mid level yakuza in the same family as Takahashi and Shinomaki, Komeda acts as the muscle and coordinator for most resource shipments in Musutafu, along with his "swarm" of underlings. Armed with his quirk, Komeda moonlights as the low-level street villain "Bullet Ant".

The assessment had scared me a lot when he had entered the room, and when he'd grabbed me, I'd done the first thing I thought of: grab the bottle next to me, and pour it on his face.

On some level I knew that this was the best result. As much as I'd like to wish that the bottle had simply been full of soap or water, I knew that that wouldn't have kept him down, let alone let me escape without getting hurt.

I examined the next couple results with a more critical eye.

You've gained a skill: Stealth!

Stealth Level 1: Channel your inner ninja and become one with the shadows. Increased skill with hiding and moving undetected.

Sense Danger has leveled up! Sense Danger is now level 3. Range: 15 feet.

+290 EXP

440/200 EXP

You've Leveled Up! +1 To all stats, +5 Stat Points.

I dismissed the skill level ups with a flick of my hand and opened up the points menu, immediately dropping three points into mental to bring myself up to what I expected the average adult in this world would have. I considered the other two points for I moment longer before I shrugged and added them to my mental stat as well, bringing it to 17. I briefly thought about the other stats, mainly my physical one, and decided that I'd go track down a gym membership or something once I got out of this mess.

With that taken care of, I made my way to the women's restroom by the entrance and hunkered down to await the arrival of the police.

"Um, Operator-san, how long until the cops get here?"

[(ง •̀_•́)ง]

I nearly cried in relief when the police showed up half an hour later, their strong voices and heavy steps like music to my ears. I thanked the emergency operator for her time, and hung up the phone before I left the bathroom with my hands up.

One of the officers spotted me rather quickly. He introduced himself as Officer Miturashi.

While he wasn't anyone I recognized from the anime or manga, he seemed nice, with short blonde hair and green eyes. He was also really tall, to the point where I had to crane my neck back as far as I could to even see his face.

He pulled out a chair at one of the many tables and sat down, making his domineering height a little less imposing, and gestured at the chair across from him.

"You're the young lady who called us here today?" He asked me, his voice a lot higher than I expected. I nodded and took a seat in the indicated chair, still looking at all the different police officers entering and exiting the building. I even recognized one of them, with an orange cat's head, from the anime. "What's your name, little miss?"

"Katsuki Touko, officer."

"Well, Katsuki-chan, why don't you explain what happened here tonight? Just so we can understand what went down."

I took a deep breath and nodded again, deception don't fail me now.

"Well it all started when the owner- I think his name was Takahashi?- brought me back into his office to talk about getting a job. While we were in there someone called the speaker on his desk and started talking about delivering girls so I got worried and…"

I explained the day's events the best I could without revealing my ability, making sure that they knew I had only done the things I did out of self defence. I even managed to turn the tears on when I was talking about Komeda and the bleach I'd spilled on him. Not that it was hard, I really did feel guilty about that.

When I had finally finished my story Officer Miturashi nodded and placed his hands on the table, pushing himself up and out of the chair. "Well Katsuki-chan, I don't see why we can't let you go home for now. Just make sure you swing by the station in the next couple days so we can get all the paperwork sorted, okay?"

I nodded and thanked the officer for his help before getting up and walking out of the tea shop. Next time I applied for a job I'd make sure to be more careful.