The Yakuza have good taste. They drink 1000 dollar bottles of whisky and eat food fit for royalty. Rooster, the Yakuza in the Italian shades is an underboss. He explains the makeup of their family. They are 悪魔暴力団 The Akuma Bōryokudan Family, meaning the Devil Mafia. They share power in a fragile alliance with the 人食い巨人”Hito kui Kyojin” Cannibal Giant Gang, The 悪霊会ゴーストマフィア Akuryō-kai Evil Spirit Ancient Shinto Priests, 野獣組 The “Yajū-gumi” Beast Clan, とりつかれた風俗 The “Toritsukareta Buzoku” Possessed Men Tribe and “Kyūketsuki doho-dan” Vampire Clan that were once organized crime but now control the Police and Government. Regular criminals and deviants were referred to as Monstrosities or Yokai, who have no standing with the Yakuza and were expected to keep their crimes from interfering with their rackets.

While they are talking ravishingly beautiful hostesses join them, Rikki and Machiko. Rooster tells Furyo to take his pick so he cozy’s up to Machi. Rooster is called away and tosses Furyo keys to his house and tells him to keep both the girls. Only Machi speaks English but they are both alluring, they are ex models. The girls smile as they sip their drinks like rabid nymphos. Furyo has seen hookers before and these look expensive. He has never had to pay for sex and isn’t going to start now. The girls are so worldly and wise, they speak about current events in the world, esoteric genres of music and places they have travelled. Lives free of the heavy burden of years in prison.

He lets his guard down as it gets late, Furyo is escorted to a waiting car with the girls. They arrive at a non-descript house on a hill surrounded by a high wall and thick hedges. The girls have been here before so they know the way. Coming up some stairs to the main room, Furyo can all the lights of Tokyo glimmering from a floor to ceiling window. Before he can sit down or mix a drink the girls have his clothes off and are trying to get him erect. Starting their mouths and racing into every possible hole and combination of depraved activity in full view of the city bellow.

Furyo is worn out by dawn. He wakes up alone with a phone number written on his chest in lipstick. The house is empty but Furyo looks around. Checking out the mansion. The dining room has another floor to ceiling window, this one facing a garden with a pond, fruit trees and roses. Beyond the garden is a low wall that overlooks a million dollar view of Tokyo bay. The bathroom is marble with a separate shower and bath tub, a glass toilet and sink made of a single carved stone that shines in the light. The kitchen is huge and full of bottles of expensive French wine and Irish Whisky. In all there were a half dozen rooms and offices. The house is missing any personal touches like pictures or the clutter you expect from a lived in home.

Furyo smells like sex so he takes a shower. The water felt good on his face but turns into sharp pain as it gets into the stab wounds in his ribs and back. Looking at the dozens of wounds in the mirror, he can see some of them are leaking blood while others aren’t as bad. Half the bandages fall off in the water so he peals the rest he can reach off. The wounds are pretty ghastly. In all he probably has over a thousand stitches and a couple hundred staples. He wonders what his mother would think of her abandoned son on the other side of the world getting stabbed half to death by Yakuza. Furyo keeps getting a whiff of something strange like blood and gunpowder masked by floral smelling cleaning chemicals. Looking around he is shocked to see a man and woman’s corpses, hands tied behind their back and shot in the head submerged in the party sized bathtub. Around the corner in a second shower behind a glass brick wall where two more bodies much smaller than the others and heads covered in black plastic.

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Furyo puts on some of Rooster’s expensive designer suits and comes outside to find his car has been brought to him and washed. As he goes to get in his car, two Yakuza who don’t speak English prevent him from getting in his car. They instead usher him to the same black car from the night before. Furyo feels kind of weak as his wounds have started bleeding through his shirt. He spends about an hour in the car. Driving on the freeway away from the city. They come to another grand house surrounded by a gate with a courtyard full of a fleet of black cars and their attending Yakuza drivers. In the corner of the yard he can see workers in yellow rubber hazmat suits throwing bodies in a grave behind the rose bushes. Furyo has been around death and crime before, but he draws the line at innocent people. He will need to confront Rooster about corpses in the house. The last thing he needs is to be framed for murder.

Rooster is coming down the stairs with the Bosses and representatives of several major crime families. Rooster brushes past Furyo but winks at him. Furyo watches as Rooster walks them to their cars and bows as they pull out. Furyo cant believe his eyes as some of the dignitaries look otherworldly, some like bloated corpses, others translucent like ghosts and one who looked like a 12 foot tall ogre. Turning to Furyo, Rooster says. “Putting out fires.” introduces Furyo to the guys in the courtyard. The stern faced Yakuza don’t speak English and Furyo doesn’t pretend to memorize their names. The Yakuza give slight bows while looking at him like an insect. They don’t look interested in making new friends either.

The procession of mobsters bring him into the house that might as well be a castle. Expressionless Yakuza stand at attention as they open a paper sliding door into an attending conference hall were all the new recruits kneel before an elevated platform where the boss sits. He is wearing a mask like that of a Noh play with wild red hair coming off it like a lions mane. The boss wears a beige kimono covered in gold leafing and purple silk flowers. Furyo sits in the back of the room off to the side. All around him new members whisper and shift as they sit uncomfortable on the floor and every one looks nervous.

Every one else is wearing black or blue kimonos but no one seems to notice the disparity in his outfit. Before long a speech is given in Japanese, a tycho war drum is banged and older women come in placing sake plates in front of each man. Every one in the room raises the plate reverently in front of them and Furyo does his best to mimic the movements of the ceremony. Furyo doesn’t mimic the oath that is being chanted but when it’s time to drink he does. The sake is hot and not like any he has had before. It has a salty tint to it like soy sauce or blood. Once the ceremony is over each man is handed a small sword, like those used for ritual suicide in the movies. Running his finger along its blade, it instantly digs in like it has a mind of its own and thirst for blood.

Rooster comes into the room and congratulates Furyo on becoming a brother in the Yakuza. Furyo doesn’t realize that was what was happening but doesn’t make a fuss. He feels kind of good. In the highs and lows of his life, he has gone from sleeping under bridges to being treated like an honored guest. Everything is moving so fast he does have the time to weigh the pros and cons of his choices. He is now obligated to defend people who were jamming knives into his body only a few days ago. Furyo looks to the Master of the Akuma Bōryokudan Family, still sitting at the head of the room like Lucifer in Paradise Lost. Furyo feels uncomfortable at the whole thing. Now he has to learn the rules of a whole new world that has opened to him. Furyo asks about the bodies in the bathroom and Rooster laughs it off. “Part of this life is not asking questions or having conflicting sympathies during a regime change. By the way, if it’s to your liking that house is available for you.” Furyo thinks about it and tells Rooster he would prefer a place with out the former owners buried in the bushes.