Copyright
DURARARA!!, Volume 7
RYOHGO NARITA
ILLUSTRATION BY SUZUHITO YASUDA
Translation by Stephen Paul
Cover art by Suzuhito Yasuda
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
DURARARA!!
© RYOHGO NARITA 2010
All rights reserved.
Edited by ASCII MEDIA WORKS
First published in 2010 by KADOKAWA CORPORATION, Tokyo.
English translation rights arranged with KADOKAWA CORPORATION, Tokyo, through Tuttle-Mori Agency, Inc., Tokyo.
English translation © 2017 by Yen Press, LLC
Yen Press, LLC supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact the publisher. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Narita, Ryōgo, 1980– author. | Yasuda, Suzuhito, illustrator. | Paul, Stephen (Translator), translator.
Title: Durarara!! / Ryohgo Narita, Suzuhito Yasuda, translation by Stephen Paul.
Description: New York, NY : Yen ON, 2015–
Identifiers: LCCN 2015041320 | ISBN 9780316304740 (v. 1 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316304764 (v. 2 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316304771 (v. 3 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316304788 (v. 4 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316304795 (v. 5 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316304818 (v. 6 : pbk.) | ISBN 9780316439688 (v. 7 : pbk.)
Subjects: | CYAC: Tokyo (Japan)—Fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Science Fiction / Adventure.
Classification: LCC PZ7.1.N37 Du 2015 | DDC [Fic]—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015041320
ISBNs: 978-0-316-43968-8 (paperback)
978-0-316-47428-3 (ebook)
E3-20170620-JV-PC
I’ve written about the city’s holidays in a number of books before this.
Today, I’m going to change tacks and talk about human holidays.
A day of rest for a person is meant in a literal sense: to rest one’s body.
But in practice, it doesn’t work out that way.
During a holiday, people actually go out of their way to travel, to celebrate to the point of exhaustion, to throw themselves into their interests or otherwise expend their physical stamina.
Do you have personal experience with this?
You do, don’t you?
You don’t?
Fine. I lose.
I apologize.
I’m sorry.
I was ignorant of people.
I made assumptions about people.
Forgive me…! Forgive me!
……I suppose that’s enough apologizing for now. I’ll now continue speaking to those of you who answered my question in the affirmative.
It’s possible that those who use their holidays to tire themselves out are the ones who seek the extraordinary. While it might break from the dictionary definition of the word, a temporary break from the everyday schedule could be considered a form of “rest” for this type of person.
It’s not resting the body.
It’s not resting the mind.
It’s not the body or the mind that relaxes…but the entire “state” of everyday repetition.
By doing this, one is able to enjoy the flavor of ordinary life when it returns.
You know how it works.
It’s like taking a sip of water to cleanse the palate when eating good food.
So what do those who lead extraordinary lives do for their day off?
Do urban legends such as the Black Rider even have holidays?
It’s tough to answer.
Does someone who always eats extremely rich food take a holiday by drinking water, or do they chug even richer soy sauce instead? That was an example—don’t try that at home, or you’ll regret it.
You’ll…you know…die.
Perhaps those who truly submerge themselves in the extraordinary simply surpass that level and have a certain kind of death wish instead.
Do those folks actually have holidays, or is every day a holiday for them?
We can only learn the truth by asking them.
But the city itself does not differentiate between their ordinary or extraordinary lives, between work and holidays.
Ultimately, it’s human beings who view these things and judge them.
The city does not differentiate between its humans. It simply envelops all our actions.
If only it knew that, like soy sauce, it’s dangerous to drink too much.
But I suppose that a city’s stomach is much stronger than a person would imagine.
—Excerpt from the preface of Shinichi Tsukumoya, author of Media Wax’s Ikebukuro travel guide, Ikebukuro Strikes Back 3
Extraordinary α Hospitalization Polka
May 5, Tohoku region, hospital
“It’s time for your inspection, Mr. Orihara!” said the young nurse.
The pale hospital room smelled of a mix of chemicals and just a bit of something sweet—either flowers or fruit.
Given that this was a private room, the smell had to be from a gift to whatever patient was next door.
It was with that suspicion in mind that Izaya Orihara’s mind rose into wakefulness.
Oh, right. I’m in a hospital, he realized, looking at the unfamiliar woman in the room with him.
“What time is it, ma’am?”
“Let’s see—it’s nearly nine o’clock at night. Hang on, I’ll switch your drip feed.”
She promptly rolled back the blanket and the sleeve of his gown, checked the status of the needle in his arm, and then switched out the bag of liquid.
Suddenly, Izaya was aware of a strong pain in his stomach. He squinted, holding his breath against the sensation.
Finally, his wits were sharp again.
He recalled exactly what had happened to put him in this situation.
It had happened twenty-four hours earlier. Someone had stabbed him, and he’d collapsed on the street in a city in northern Japan. And now here he was, waking up in a hospital bed.
It was his third inspection. Or possibly the fourth.
The police had come before dawn, he recalled. Izaya remembered talking to the detectives, as he watched the nurse go about her business.
The detectives had asked him all sorts of questions, but he firmly maintained that something had bumped into him, hard, and then his stomach was bleeding. They asked him for more personal details, but the first greeting they’d given him was “Mr. Orihara,” so he knew they were probably at least aware of his address already, among other things.
What started as a solitary journey for enjoyment had ended with a stabbing at the hands of some lunatic, he told the detectives.
“Please,
officers, find whoever did this. If not for my sake, then for the peace of mind of the local residents,” he pleaded with a smile, though even he had to admit that the act was a bit much.
Izaya Orihara knew that his attacker was not just “some guy,” but a man named Jinnai Yodogiri. The man had told him as much on the phone, right before the attack.
But Izaya didn’t tell the detectives that.
He wanted to avoid revealing their connection and making things any bigger than they already were. Plus, he knew the police were unlikely to actually catch the man.
He could have made up some kind of description to tell the police, but Izaya didn’t know if the shopping area had security cameras and where they might have been or if there were witnesses to the attack—any of which could expose holes in his story.
Any careless lie at this point could come back to bite him, if it were proven false.
Could be too late for that. Izaya smirked to himself, recalling the way the officers had looked at him. Those weren’t gazes of sympathy for an attack victim. They were the searching gazes of hunters. I should assume that they already spotted the knife I keep in the hidden pocket of my coat.
The police didn’t mention it at all, but if they wanted to, they could haul him in for possession of a weapon. He was the victim in this case, but to the local police, he was also a suspicious outsider who might be up to no good.
I should get out of here overnight.
On the very first inspection, he heard about the condition of his wounds. Miraculously, there was hardly any damage to his interior organs. He had no way of knowing whether that had been Yodogiri’s intention or not.
Great, guess I’ll have to owe Shinra a favor again, he thought, snorting as he envisioned the face of his friend, a black market doctor. And you can never be certain what he’ll do, either…
Just then, the nurse finished up her task. “You’re all done. And looking pretty healthy, if you ask me, so it might not be too long before you’re discharged,” she said with a grin.
He returned it out of habit. “That’s too bad. I was just thinking that this hospital is so comfortable, I wouldn’t mind staying longer.”
“Are you imagining that flattery will get you something? Listen, you’re a young man, but even still, this is quite a healthy recovery. You’re practically ready to walk out the day after you got stabbed.”
“All thanks to the doctors and nurses here,” Izaya said. He wore a smile, but underneath it, darkness lurked.
Yes, the pain was a part of that, but more pressing was the image of a certain man’s face, which the nurse’s words had put into his head.
The thing is, I know a monster who can take a direct stab from a knife and only suffer a fraction of an inch cut, he thought, envisioning a man in a bartender’s outfit.
Izaya turned to the nurse and asked, “Do you suppose the newspapers and TV stations are talking about me getting attacked?”
“Hmm… Now that you mention it, I think TV King ran a segment on you in their Scooped! Morning Star program. They even mentioned your name. Why do you ask?”
“…Ah. I see. No, I just didn’t want my friends to worry.”
TV King, huh? That’s a local affiliate of the Daioh TV network.
And the show she mentioned was a news program that Daioh TV ran nationally. Assuming that word of the attack had reached Tokyo by now, one concern occurred to Izaya:
If the incident was aired as part of this morning’s news…
That’s about enough time for the quick-acting types to start reaching this hospital here.
May 6, 2:00 AM
The hospital was surprisingly quiet after dark.
Izaya silently waited in his bed.
Here we go. Will someone show up? Or will my guess be wrong?
He recalled all the bad karma he’d left behind up until the moment he was stabbed.
He’d fed the pair of Russians info and attempted to use them to eliminate two monsters who represented obstacles to him. He’d set up that animal in the bartender’s suit to run up against the Awakusu-kai and forced the girl who had fused with the cursed blade to exit the stage.
While these spontaneous plots moved along, he flapped his wings like a bat, hovering between yakuza groups like the Awakusu-kai and the Asuki-gumi. It was possible that his manipulation of the Awakusu head’s granddaughter had been exposed, too.
In addition to these things, an info broker tended to earn malice through his job. He had dirt on so many people that he couldn’t begin to guess their number.
In essence, Izaya created nothing.
The information agents that made their business by dealing with the police or criminal groups were typically barkers for cabaret clubs or bar bouncers. The line of work was a suitable side gig for those who had an ear close to stories on the street—managers who swept up runaway girls, hostesses at nightclubs, and so on.
But Izaya was different. He made connections with those “part-time brokers” and occasionally made use of their services so that he possessed an information network that spread throughout the city like a spiderweb.
When useful information washed into his web, he found a way to profit from it. He could manipulate the mood of the city itself.
He didn’t create anything.
He just found a way to make money.
Izaya understood what he was doing was deplorable, that he traded in rumors and stories and begged for cash in response.
But more importantly, he knew that even more deplorable types—who would happily fork over the money for that information for a chance to screw others over—were as numerous in society as grains of sand on a beach.
It was his personal business, but it was not the point of his life.
The point of Izaya Orihara’s life was to love humanity—in a way that only he could manage or understand.
So, who’s going to show up?
He couldn’t help but grin, sitting in absolute silence, the hospital room lit only by the faint glow of the dimmed hallway lights and the stars through the window.
If it’s him, he might have seen me on the news and run here on his own two feet, Izaya thought, his smile curling into a snarl at the thought of the bartender-vested monster. Maybe this time he’ll finally get the long prison sentence he deserves for rioting in a hospital… As long as I survive the incident, that is.
If not him, maybe Anri Sonohara. At this point, she might actually be able to carve me up into pieces.
What if it’s someone less expected, like Masaomi Kida or Namie Yagiri? Or perhaps those Russians.
And I can’t count out the possibility of an Awakusu hitman…
Maybe no one shows up at all. I wouldn’t mind. I could celebrate my own good fortune.
Sitting in his hospital bed, Izaya was full to the brim with excited expectation, like a child thinking about tomorrow’s school field trip.
The wound on his midriff throbbed with each anticipatory pulse, but by this point, even the pain was just a bit of spice to heighten the sensations of the moment.
An hour later, when the first inklings of sleep finally began to creep into Izaya’s brain, a fresh sound vibrated his eardrums.
Here we go.
This was not the pacing of the nurse on the night shift, but the careful, quiet steps of someone trying to hide their presence.
Not quiet enough, though. The sound echoed with a rhythm that Izaya’s ears found pleasing.
I wonder who it is. I doubt it’s him—he wouldn’t bother trying to sneak. And the Russians wouldn’t be sloppy enough to make any sound at all.
It was probably either an Awakusu-kai member or Masaomi, Izaya thought, right as the door to his room opened.
A shadow slid into the room.
“…?”
A young woman, her expression dark and foreboding.
But in contrast to her gloomy features, she glared at Izaya’s starlit face with searing intent.
“I finally…found you…”
<
br /> The note in her voice was complex: possibly hatred, possibly fierce joy at finding a fated rival.
“Uhhhh,” Izaya replied, totally baffled.
“…Who are you?”
Ordinary A: Rendezvous Bolero
May 5, morning, Shinjuku
“…So, he never came back,” the woman muttered as she watched the pot bubble away.
Through the rippling air above the pot, her hair shone, long and black.
Namie Yagiri stood in an apartment bordering Shinjuku’s central park, thinking about the absent owner of the residence…
But the moment only lasted a few seconds.
“This stew turned out better than I expected. If he’s not going to come back, I should take it to Seiji instead.”
She tasted the broth of the dish. Namie’s harsh expression softened and reddened a bit as she thought of herself and her lover Seiji hunched over the hot pot.
If judged solely on appearances, she would seem to be a woman with a childish side for her age.
But that was only if you didn’t know the truth: that she was thinking about her brother.
—And that she wasn’t thinking of familial love, but the carnal, lusty type instead.
Namie turned off the stove and reached for the TV remote.
She sat down on the sofa with graceful ease, stretching her legs and inadvertently exuding feminine beauty into the otherwise empty room.
On the TV, the morning news programs were just starting up.
What’s with this? The TV in here is way nicer than the one in his other apartment.
She proceeded to glare lazily around the interior of the room. While she might have been acting like she owned the place, as a matter of fact, she’d only been there for fifty hours.
Ordinarily, she worked as an assistant to an info broker, out of an apartment located in a different building in Shinjuku. Now that office was empty, though, due to present circumstances.
The info broker took out this apartment as a refuge in case a certain man who wore a bartending outfit came after him—and now he was even hiding from Namie, apparently.
He was supposed to contact her at night, and even that hadn’t happened.
Durarara!!, Vol. 7 Page 1