Raiden ran down the sidewalks of the busy streets. The hill structure of the city making it a lot smoother to go downwards then up, he continued moving through crowds left and right hoping Mamba was close to or behind him.
Mamba was flashing left and right, remnants of her father's technique. Mamba had created an entire fighting and moving style that revolved around "Soul Link", an ability that allowed her to link to others souls, which she could use to its fullest capability. When linked to others souls she could find where exactly they were, and the amount of energy output they were emitting, allowing her to instantly teleport to any location, since Mana exists in all living things. However, with her mothers help Mamba took the ability to the next level. She integrated it entirely into her everyday movement, to the point that people nicknamed her "The Pink Flash". It was rare that somebody ever saw Mamba running or walking anywhere because she would simply appear and disappear in a "Pink Flash" hence the nickname. It was nearly impossible for the average warrior to stop her in her tracks, especially given that she had received training from the strongest man alive and one of the strongest women alive. She flashed and spun around the civilians as it was a relatively nice day outside, packed to the brim with people walking and driving through the streets. The population of Ashina was relatively high. A large, and bumbling tourist destination for all that wanted a vacation or sight of some sort. "Let me know when we're there Raiden..I don't want to move and run around all day. I'm starving!"
Raiden continued quickly before coming to a stop about 10 feet away from the store, he looked towards the entrance and saw someone he was all too familiar with. "Yuki!"
Yuki Zenin, one of the profound twins of Noelle and Toshiro Zenin. Mamba and Raiden's cousin, Sat outside the store almost defeated as she stared at the closed sign. "NO! MY FAVORITE SHOP IN THIS DAMN CITY!"
"WHAT? WHAT?" Mamba had ended up making a commotion about the store, so much so that everybody started to crowd around to make sure she was alright. "W-What do you mean closed?! CLOSED?!..C-L-O-S-E-D...I'm hungry damn it!" She pouted and looked to the side moving her hair out her face. "Somebody did this..Somebody coordinated this all...me coming to the store, knowing I was hungry, then boom! Closed it down." She put it together in her head as people started to move away and continue with their normal lives, figuring out that it was just the shop that had been closed rather than Mamba's life.
A young man was sitting under an overpass. He was on his own for the most part, outside of a family of various birds he was currently feeding. He smiled weakly as he broke up a loaf of bread for them, throwing the pieces down for them to enjoy as he watched them peck away at the pieces, the birds hopping around him hoping to get more. He liked this overpass a lot, it had a nice draft to it and wasn't frequented regularly by people. He sighed and looked up at the sky, gazing at the clouds above as he fixed his coat. He looked back down at the birds, his smile went into a bit of a smirk.
"I don't know how you guys do it, honestly... makes me feel jealous."
He laughed to himself as he continued to feed the birds, he knew the sight of himself talking to a bunch of birds would be a little odd to passerbys so he chose to remain quiet after that, listening to the noises around him and the various chirps and caws of the birds.
The commotion from above caused the birds to scatter around the man, he tensed up and closed his eyes, letting out a groan once they had all flocked away. He stood up and peered, trying to make out what the commotion was even about. He rubbed his ears, they were ringing a little from how loud the person was being.
"I might as well go and see what happened, hopefully nothing too serious."
Kasaru made his way up the side of the overpass, reaching the upper inner streets as he came to the sight, he remained in the small crowd of people that had gathered. His facial expression changed to a mix between a grimace and confusion, normally when someone is screaming Bloody Mary like that, it's for a more valid reason.
Raiden took a step away from Mamba while she threw her fit about the store being closed, he looked around and signaled people to move along as he nervously laughed, a little embarrassed from Mamba's reactions.
Yuki dropped to her knees. She looked up at the sky as if she had just lost her closest friend and yelled out at the top of her lungs. "WHYYYYYYY?!!!"
Kasaru remained in what little crowd was left, he looked at the man signaling to move along, then back down at the girl. He rubbed his neck softly, scratching at it as he winced at the sight.
"She is very much overreacting..."
Yuki shot up, her ears quite easy to pick up on sound and such. She turned to the man and yelled out at him
"HUH?!OVERREACTING?!!"
She walked up to the young man. "I AM NOT OVERREACTING! THAT WAS THE BEST SWEETS SHOP IN THE CAPITAL!"
"I-I didn't mean any offense."
Kasaru put his hands up defensively, his expression changed to nervousness as he backed away from her slowly, wincing as his ears continued to ring from her yelling.
"P-Please, stop yelling!"
She looked at him, her spoiled personality was definitely shining through this interaction, she clenched her fist and raised it to the sky.
"YOU DAMN PEOPLE DONT UNDERSTAND HOW MUCH THIS MEANS TO ME!!!"
"Yuki! Relax!" Mamba tried to help the poor kid as she pulled her by the back of her collar, dragging her back from the Boy. She held her cousin back so that she wouldn't get to close to Kasaru. Mamba was extremely spoiled, but not in the same way that Yuki was. Toshiro and Noelle were not light on their children, but they pretty much gave them whatever they wished and allowed them to be whoever they wanted. "We'll get to the bottom of this..Leave the poor boy alone."
Yuki pouted and shook her shoulders to get Mamba off of her. "This isn't fair at all!!! How could they do this to me!!!"
Raiden walked up to the store and peeked inside through the glass window, he only saw empty counter tops and tables. His eyes shifted to the right and saw a broom that stood on the door to keep it locked. "Something's not right... we have to find a way in there and see what happened... there's no way they'd just up and leave their family business."
Mamba looked inside at the desolate environment that stood in front of them. "Hm. I could get inside..but that does count as trespassing..." Mamba shook her head. "I don't know..Isn't there another sweets shop around here?..Shouldn't we just go there?"
Raiden considered the option from Mamba but turned to her and said. "Well we can't just not know what happened... My parents never said anything about this or what might've happened... we have to find out somehow."
"I-I'm pretty sure they closed it this morning for renovations, most buildings on this side of town are on the older side. I heard from word of mouth."
Kasaru had actually overheard officials speaking about it from below the overpass he frequented, but he felt mentioning that would be a weird thing to say.
"That sounds reasonable to me..Raiden..What do you think?"
Raiden had already began turning the knob on the door to the establishment. Hearing a click he opened the door and walked into the shop not even considering everyone else's reasoning behind it. What Mamba had to say didn't matter anyways.
Yuki turned and saw Raiden enter the building, she pointed at him quickly. "HEY! YOU CANT TAKE ALL THE SWEETS WITHOUT ME!"
Kasaru gave a look of surprise as he saw the other boy just turn the knob on the door and step in, he was moreso surprised a building set for renovation wasn't locked at all. He debated but followed behind the group.
Raiden continued walking through the store looking at the torn down posters, empty countertops and tables. He looked into the office of the building and found stacks of papers. He looked at a few at the top. "It says on one of these letters that they had to evacuate the building and move to Shibuya within 30 days... from a Syngal Corporation?"
"Ah..that's too bad then..." Mamba looked down before looking up at Yuki. "So any other sweet shops around? Maybe not as good but it could be worth trying." Mamba had no intention of getting involved with Shibuya's antics currently. Not only was it far to dangerous for them, but there was another problem. Traveling into Shibuya was easy, but getting out was an entirely different process. There was a reason why people stayed there for 20...30...maybe even 40 years.
Yuki balled her fists as she ran after Raiden into the store's back rooms. "No one's going to take my sweets!" She had completely disregarded the legality of this action or what it would've meant to her, once again, showing her spoiled attitude.
Mamba once again grabbed Yuki by her hair and tugged her back. "There's nothing in here dumbass..You're running around for no reason."
Yuki winced and yelped as Mamba grabbed her hair and pulled her back, she yelled out while swinging her fists in the air. "I just want my Natagami Sweets! This isn't fair! None of this is fair! I hate this stupid city and these stupid people!"
Raiden folded up the paper and slipped it into his pocket before leaving the building, he pulled the door shut and looked at Mamba and Yuki. "There's another sweets shop but it's in the outer sanctum so it's a little bit of a jog. Mamba, it says some corporation made this business move to Shibuya... it's just like the girl when she randomly moved there."
"Who knows..I don't think it's any of our business to be honest. It's best we don't get involved right now.." Mamba dragged Yuki with her out of the store and shut the door letting her go. "We can jog I guess..I need a workout anyways.." She turned to Kasaru and smiled. "Thank you for your help. You can join us if you wish?"
Kasaru watched the two silently as Yuki was dragged out, he sighed and followed behind.
"What a piece of work..."
Raiden nodded as he hid the paper well enough to not be found, he started dashing towards the outer sanctum, but continued talking while they went down the streets. "Hey Mamba, if Shibuya is a dangerous place why is there corporations there?"
"They're taking advantage of the poverty and crime rate there. The higher the poverty rate the more the citizens need the resources of said companies. It's likely that they got moved for some kind of extortion or deal. They've seen an opportunity to make more money and that's what follows..but there's nothing we can really do about that at a surface level, and even at a higher position of power nothing can be done. The only person I can think who would or could help is my father..but he has his own things going on. He doesn't have time to meddle in our affairs which is why the student council is a large part of the city government."
In the world they knew, it was actually the younger adults who took charge and made most of the decisions regarding politics. The first generation rarely got involved at a local level like this, even if she asked her family it was likely that they wouldn't do anything since it was beneath them.
Yuki shook her head and began following the group just to get some sweets. Spoiled as always.
Kasaru followed behind the group at the back, he remained quiet as they moved. He was internally conflicted, feeling like he should probably keep out of this but... it wasn't like he was doing much else today.
Raiden continued dashing around the civilians to make his way down the hill "I never got to involved in all of that...I just wish we could find out if they were extorted or not... maybe it's best we don't go to Shibuya soon then."
"I would advise against it..Who knows what is and isn't going to happen to you if you do.."
Raiden nodded before continuing down to the Outer Sanctum Streets below. He thought about his friends but he thought that his older cousin was right. For now, he would focus on getting having some fun, which was the purpose of his day off in the first place.