It was a hateful… and sad incident, wasn’t it? Someone jumped in front of a dump truck in Shibuya, causing a tanker truck behind him to overturn and explode violently! Many young people in Shibuya were blown away, but he himself managed to survive and shamelessly claimed, “I was chosen by God!” Outraged, the bereaved family’s wife stabbed him in the back with a sashimi knife, killing him. He was nominated for a Darwin Award.
Ah, that’s the guy. Why, you know a lot about him.
Of course, I also followed that incident closely. I should know quite a bit!
Getting run over by a dump truck while walking and using a smartphone was practically suicide from the start. And the fact that he caused such a massive accident, coupled with his utter foolishness and spectacular end, made him an overnight sensation online. But because his life was so utterly insignificant, a mere extra, he was quickly forgotten… a truly pathetic individual.
That accident, aside from the “bastard scum,” caused the deaths of many innocent, promising young people. It pained me deeply, so I drew commemorative art and wrote an episode, trying to expose the darkness of that incident so the deaths of those young people wouldn’t be in vain. That’s why I remember it so well.
After all, the self-proclaimed bereaved family member who stabbed Kazuma was actually not related to any bereaved family at all. They were simply someone whose delusions had run wild. They were acquitted with a speed trial that was almost unnatural, and despite the online investigative teams’ efforts to track them down, they became so elusive that they might as well have been a figment of imagination, with no further trace found.
Apparently, they tried to locate their home from the court records and rushed there, only to find it had been a ruin for years and was completely empty. From the abandoned belongings, it was determined that the elderly woman was one of the family members who had lived there.
They managed to identify that much, but the entire family was missing…
It seems they were being chased by loan sharks, and the family was separated… everything is shrouded in darkness… a true modern mystery!
Regarding that incident, no matter how you looked into it, that’s how it ended. As for the profile of the scum, there was nothing worth noting.
He was apparently an employee of some black company, living on-site and working about 16 hours a day, but there was nothing remarkable about that either… being called a piece of trash was understandable.
But that black company also went out of business at some point… and there was no information about Kazuma’s relatives or siblings whatsoever.
In short, it was as if their existence itself had been erased, and at that point, I felt something was incredibly unnatural.
For me, such an interesting story… it would be a lie not to pursue it. So, through the internet, I independently organized a pursuit team, providing funds and direction anonymously.
Rather, were they a pure pest… a special operative sent to eliminate Kazuma from this world? That’s what I inferred!
After all, despite causing such devastation, Kazuma had only broken the law by running a red light. He himself admitted to sacrificing a high school girl who tried to help him to survive. Yet, under the legal defense of “necessity,” he couldn’t even be prosecuted for that… such an injustice was being allowed to prevail, and my dissatisfaction with Japan’s judiciary and police was about to explode.
Therefore, by creating an assassin who couldn’t be brought to justice through legal means, I believed that evil would face karmic retribution!
And… to teach a lesson to the wickedness that brazenly thrives under the guise of the law…
I think that’s what that incident was about.
Well, simply put, evil always perishes eventually… that’s the rule!
However, in the end, the darkness of that incident couldn’t be exposed through legitimate means. And the prevailing opinion at the time was that the scum Kazuma deserved to die. The darkness behind his death was too profound… therefore, I decided to give up on it quickly.
I see, come to think of it, “Detective Drake” also had a similar story! So it was based on a true story after all…
As expected of you, Mr. Takakura, who claims to be my number one fan.
It’s amazing you knew about it, considering it was serialized in Shonen Satellite under the pen name “Akakuma Goun.”
That was a very busy period for me. I was simultaneously doing weekly serialization in three of the four major shonen manga magazines: “Dragon Shooter” in Sōei Shuppan’s Shonen Jabion, “Detective Drake” in Minmei-kan’s Shonen Satellite, and “Miracle☆Spirits Shonen Dan” in Mei-bun-dō’s Shonen Bamboo.”
Well, the common element in all of them was a young boy protagonist.
Stories of justice and righteousness featuring young male protagonists appeal to people of all ages and genders… that’s a little secret!
Essentially, it was a kind of social experiment for me.
Each of these one-shot stories I sent out lightheartedly became huge hits, leading to requests for serialization! And the result was an unprecedented simultaneous serialization in three weekly shonen magazines!
But, of course, it was quite amusing to see editors from rival companies bump into each other while waiting for manuscripts and have that “Wait, what… what is this?” look on their faces.
I was also approached by Kodensha, one of the four major shonen manga magazines, and their “Shonen Magic,” with a request for serialization. However, already being serialized in three weekly magazines, even I had reached my physical limits, and besides, I detested Kodensha, so I declined.
The reason was that Kodensha had previously handed over my artistic works to the police, covered them entirely in black ink, and then banned them along with the serialization magazine. I hadn’t forgotten that humiliation!
Up until then, they were positioned as the second-best in the industry, just behind Shonen Jabion.
However, by not benefiting from my produced works like the other three magazines, their sales plummeted… and I heard that they are now having trouble being carried even in convenience stores.
By the way, “Detective Drake” is about a young elementary school boy… Kobayashi-shonen, who constantly gets caught up in incidents. When in trouble, he injects the muscle-enhancing drug he stole from a mysterious organization, and with a “ZUGYAAN!” he transforms into a muscular tough guy, solving numerous cases with his brute force masquerading as deduction.
However, the truth is that the heroine, a young girl, is the actual protagonist. Each time she gets involved with Kobayashi-shonen, she diligently investigates the case. But because she’s a child, she falls into a pinch facing retaliation from the culprit! That’s when Kobayashi-shonen, the muscle detective Drake Zappa, solves everything with his strength! That’s more or less the story.
Of course, whether it was the trick, the conspiracy, or even bullets, everything was resolved with muscle! He’d sometimes get comments like “Deduce something for once,” but I never claimed it was a mystery, so he had no right to complain.
However, the core of this series was that I, using my own investigative reporting and my internet friends, would base the stories on past unsolved cases I’d investigated. I would then “solve” famous cases like the 300 million yen robbery and the Glico-Morinaga incident with my own interpretation. For some reason, this was incredibly popular!
I’d also feature villains modeled after the current obnoxious politicians and comedians, having them get their jaws broken with a “METAAAH!” or their necks spun 360 degrees with a single slap. The gore was also plentiful, leading to complaints from the PTA and the people I modeled the villains after. But when you say criminals have rights, criminals will never decrease.
Of course, the resolution parts were so ridiculously absurd that the actual people involved would shed tears of blood. And I depicted the police’s incompetence to an extreme degree, so they completely hated me, and I was always turned away when I tried to interview police officials!
But looking back now, even when I was arrested for being a copycat criminal, the detective in charge seemed to be concerned about the various suspicious cases I had dug up and used as material. And regarding that “Kazuma stabbing incident,” it seemed like the police and hospital staff both knew Kazuma was going to be stabbed.
Even though the people present at the scene at the time all kept their mouths shut, one of them showed me a video of the moment Kazuma was stabbed in exchange for a considerable information fee. The “crazy wife”… who was posing as a nurse, seemed to have blended in with the hospital staff who were seeing him off.
When she walked forward alone, a nurse tried to stop her, but the hospital director next to her grabbed her shoulder and held her back… The police officials unnaturally created a human wall in front of the onlookers at just the right moment…
And most importantly, the informant wanted me to stop the leakage of the video, and planned to flee overseas with the information fee. It seemed like they were under both tangible and intangible pressure.
In other words, a government assassination! That’s what I assumed and used as material!
I portrayed the scum Kazuma as such a terrible character that he deserved to die. And the culprit who played that Kazuma character met their end with my signature move, “I will judge true evil with power!” – a super-deductive horizontal chop that shattered their cervical vertebrae, declaring, “Fall into hell!”, and it received an avalanche of praise.
Well, since he was already dead anyway, and a character with no bereaved family, I could mock him endlessly. Personally, if he had to be killed, I would be the one to do it… I was that angry.
But for that scum Kazuma to be alive, transfer to another world… and then turn out to be the great emperor Kazmaier, the root of all evil in this world, is something you can definitely say “Are you kidding me?!” to.
Kazmaier’s actions in this world are truly the absolute scum of scums! Thousands of lives were lost because of that one person alone…
And then, to discover he was merely a pawn being manipulated, and the true mastermind… the shadow of Demon God Roa flickers?
Certainly, if I have to punch someone, it’s more satisfying to punch a handsome god than a plump slime emperor!
