Tokyo is a dangerous place.
This is true for the few citizens who have seen the danger. This is true for the ignorant citizens who are still sleeping soundly without realizing it. This is true for the police officers who are chasing the police cadets. This is even more true for the police cadets who are fleeing in panic.
Yokosu Daichi cowered in the narrow, deep darkness.
Like a mouse that sneaks into the kitchen halfway for food but hears a human waking up and jumps into the cramped area in panic, he pricked up his ears and listened fearfully to what was going on downstairs.
Downstairs, the owner of the villa, who should have had a comfortable night's sleep and a quiet morning, is now left with a mess of footprints and a simple negotiation.
The police officers finished their negotiations with the owner, collected their papers and quickly dispersed to try to find some traces of the criminal in the villa.
There were seven or eight police officers in total, with a margin of error of maybe one or two, ten at the most and six at the least, which wasn't really a large force to pursue, but it was early in the morning, and to be able to pull out so many police officers in the wee hours of the morning immediately made it seem as if Yokosu Daichi was a criminal of great wrath.
As he listened to the sound of the search getting closer and closer to his room, he became more and more anxious, and gripping his cell phone tightly, he couldn't help but double-check his assigned identity.
[Your current identity is: thief.]
[Three days ago, you broke into a rich man's house and stole a vase.]
It's just a burglar, that's all! A vase, really!
Downstairs, the sound of footsteps spread through all the rooms and converged again in the living room, pausing for a minute before dispersing again, but this time on the second floor.
The sound of rummaging came again, and a number of police officers were scrupulously searching every possible hiding place, rummaging through boxes and cupboards.
In the midst of the rummaging, there was also the sound of casual whispering. Yokosu Daichi couldn't hear exactly what they were talking about, but he could definitely hear the sound of a human whispering from time to time.
He wasn't sure if it was the same person whispering, but he was sure that the voices were getting closer, and closer, and a footstep stopped at the door.
The door was kicked in.
The crackling sound of rummaging and human whispers resumed.
Yokosu Daichi stared at a crack in the closet door, his eyes widening as he tried to catch a glimpse of the police officer searching outside.
He saw the police officer.
With a dull crash, the police officer was being strangled from behind, struggling helplessly and trying to grow his mouth, trying to make some kind of cry, but he could only make a thin voice that sounded like a low, conversational voice, "You, help..."
The assailant was unmoved.
He struck while the police officer was opening the door, his guard and attention focused on the back of the door, strangling his hand into the other man's neck and slamming his knee into the crook of his leg, breaking half of the other man's counterattack and sliding forward with the force of it.
Together they crashed into the closet, knocking the slightly open doors of the closet off their hinges.
There was a small threshold below the closet, and Yokosu Daichi in the closet only had to look down a little to see the police officer who had hit the threshold, still strangled, his face reddened, and he could not even make any human-like whispers but only hissing noises.
After a few hisses, his pupils dilated, and his hands became weaker and weaker as he tried to free his neck, eventually dropping down.
The threshold of the closet was like a coffin, making him look like a corpse lying in a coffin.
But the assailant suddenly let go.
He let go of the police officer, pushed open the door of the closet, and casually put his hand on the threshold of the closet, somewhat curious: "Why are you hiding in the closet, don't you think you look like a rat like that?"
"Mr. Police Cat who will be responsible for catching mice in five months, huh?"
Bright lights poured in through the open doorway, and a horrified Yokosu Daichi saw the assailant who had attacked the police officers.
It was a dark-haired young man who looked to be about his age, his black hair that was a few inches long was a bit frizzy and messy, but it didn't cover his dark red eyes, his face was in a good mood, even his upturned mouth was just pressed down, this person was, was...
"Kujō-san!"
Yokosu Daichi blurted out, his shock and horror vanishing in an instant, "You came to my rescue!"
Almost in tears, he unconsciously ignored the police officers collapsed by the closet, and leapt out from the depths of the closet, clutching Ichijō Mirai's hand that was in the closet, "You really came to save me!"
"I knew Kujō-san wouldn't let us fall into danger."
This is the behavior of a tortured villager who sees a brave man who can defeat a dragon.
It's a savior's face.
Ichijō Mirai stared at Yokosu Daichi's hand, the smile on his face paused for a moment, then quickly smiled again, "I see you trust me."
He stood up and forcefully yanked Yokosu Daichi to his feet before smoothly shrugging off his hand, "Get up."
"I heard a rumor that the police were on a huge manhunt for criminals, I wasn't sure if it was my classmates, but I was worried about accidents, so I came over to take a look."
Yokosu Daichi didn't realize that he was being shunted away, after seven or eight hours of fear, wandering and breaking down, the feeling of suddenly seeing a backbone was too much of a sense of security, he wiped his face, held the door of his locker and walked out of the closet, whimpering and complaining about the police.
"I've never seen the police out in the wee hours of the morning! To catch me! All I was assigned was a thief!"
Still not caring about the police officer by the closet, he simply ignored it, stepped on it accidentally as he stepped out of the closet, glanced down at the wrong touch under his feet, then looked up again without a care in the world, and continued to look at his savior with hot tears in his eyes, "I'm so glad you're here to save me!"
The officer on the ground stirred, still unconscious, but his body instinctively curled up from the pain.
Ichijō Mirai: "...The officer is still alive."
"Oh, oh, oh," Yokosu Daichi didn't understand why Ichijō Mirai reminded him of that, but nodded his head repeatedly, and immediately tensed up as his brain, which had been turned into complete mush by the barrage of shocks, turned painstakingly, "Are you okay, Kujō-san?"
"I think you hit your knee on the closet!"
The image of the police officer's wide-eyed crash into the closet was so powerful, so much like some kind of ghost who opens a wardrobe to kill people out of the blue, that Yokosu Daichi was so shocked that he was only now slightly refreshed and caught the memory of Ichijō Mirai's knee hitting the door of the wardrobe.
He looked toward the door, then toward the closet, which was initially estimated to be four or five meters, and grew more and more nervous, "Are you still able to walk normally?!"
When he looked at Ichijō Mirai carefully, he was even more shocked: Ichijō Mirai's calves, abdomen, arms, almost everywhere he could see, there were large and small friction and messy marks, which looked like he had just gone through a violent fight.
"It's nothing serious, the officer blocked it for me," Ichijō Mirai paused again before smiling, "It's just that the officer hit his head on the closet by accident."
Yokosu Daichi breathed a sigh of relief, "That's good that's good."
He looked trustingly to Ichijō Mirai, taking the initiative to follow without being told, not like a police cat about to officially go on duty to catch a mouse, but like a wild dog with wet eyes, "Kujō-san, how are we going to escape?!"
Ichijō Mirai: "…"