by Shin Towada
TOKYO GHOUL-SEKIJITSU- © 2014 by Sui Ishida, Shin Towada
All rights reserved.
First published in Japan in 2014 by SHUEISHA Inc., Tokyo.
English translation rights arranged by SHUEISHA Inc.
Design: Shawn Carrico
Translation: Morgan Giles
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Towada, Shin, author. | Ishida, Sui. | Giles, Morgan, translator.
Title: Tokyo ghoul (Tōkyō gūru. English) -- original story by Sui Ishida ; written by Shin Towada ; translated by Morgan Giles.
v. 1. Days -- v. 2. Void -- v. 3. Past
Description: San Francisco, CA : VIZ Media, LLC, [2016] | Series: Tokyo Ghoul light novels book series
Identifiers: LCCN 2016032597 | ISBN 9781421590578 (paperback)
Subjects: | BISAC: FICTION / Media Tie-In.
Classification: LCC PL876.O78 T65 2016 | DDC 895.63/6--dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016032597
No portion of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from the copyright holders.
Published by VIZ Media, LLC
P.O. Box 77010
San Francisco, CA 94107
Printed in the U.S.A.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
First printing, April 2017
001: DIFFERENT KIND
002: SOLITARY READING
003: FEMME FATALE
004: INSINCERITY
005: MATCHING
006: DEVIL APE
The road where I wished we’d always be together was the road where we parted ways.
The simple wish to live is a crime in this world.
We are overwhelmingly more powerful than humans, yet the only existence we’re allowed is one that must be hidden from their eyes.
We are Ghouls.
Each Ghoul experiences countless bitter interactions with people—some dramatic, some trifling—and Touka Kirishima was no exception.
When she was young, Touka’s family was betrayed by a human who had taken care of them, and the memory of being chased by an investigator from the Commission of Counter Ghoul, the agency that seeks to exterminate Ghouls, was still fresh in her mind. That is why she and her brother Ayato both lived with their backs turned to humanity.
“How stupid can these bastards be, fighting us when they’re so weak? Eh, sis?”
Dispassionately, Touka and Ayato looked down at the twitching body of a man on the pavement, splayed like a suicide who had jumped from the top floor of the building above.
“Shit … shit … you little punks! I’m a Futamaru leader, meant to control this area! I … can’t get killed by some brats!”
Ayato raised an eyebrow at the man, who still had enough life in him to groan in anger.
“Cool it, Ayato,” Touka cautioned him. “He’ll die soon. All this action’s got me hungry. Let’s go eat.”
Touka started walking away. Ayato seemed unconvinced, but he followed after Touka in resignation.
But then the man mustered his last bit of strength to get up.
“This’ll …”
He released his Kagune again.
“You little brats! Ah!”
His thought seemed to be to get them while their backs were turned.
But at the same time the siblings’ Kagune emerged from their backs, Rc cells surging through them. They fixed their red eyes on the man.
“You moron.”
“At least die like a grown-up.”
Their Kagune punched through him and, with one last cry, his life was snuffed out.
The world of Ghouls is eat or be eaten. With strength on your side, there are very simple structures that allow you to live without being trampled on by others. It is a very different world from the one humans live in, with their boring, stifling rules.
But there are some downsides.
The color started to return to Touka’s bloodred eyes. She looked up at a nearby apartment building. Light was pouring out of the windows of one apartment, and she heard joyous laughter. All these people are nothing but Ghoul bait, and somehow they go on living with no sense of crisis. She felt disgust welling up in her at their lack of awareness, and a scene from long ago came to mind.
It was of the three of them—Touka, Ayato, and their father, Arata—around the time when they were living under the pretense of being humans. And within this memory was the same sense of peace as the happy family behind those brightly lit windows …
But Touka shook her head, flinging those memories far away. Ghouls and humans are not the same. There’s no overlap, she told herself, and turned away from the light.
II
“ ‘Ghouls rule Tokyo?!’ huh …” Touka read the headline from the cover of a magazine that had been left on the apartment floor. Something he stole, I suppose. Touka set the magazine on the table and sighed.
It was already past noon. Ayato was perhaps still asleep, because he hadn’t come out of his room yet. Touka debated for a little bit before calling for him.
“Ayato,” she said, in the direction of his room.” I’m going over to Mr. Yoshimura’s place. What are you doing?”
No response. Either he’s asleep or he didn’t hear me.
“Ayato?” She tried again.
“Shut up. I’m not going …” His voice was full of irritation. The door jerked open and Ayato, who looked like he had just woken up, walked out into the living room. He ignored Touka as he combed his hair.
“What’s with the attitude?”
Touka sounded irritated too, and Ayato looked at her blankly. He looked away and sat down on the sofa, picked up the magazine that Touka had just set on the table and started flicking through it.
“Go whenever you want,” he said.
Before, he’d followed her everywhere she went, but now he only acted on his own whims. Everything Touka said seemed to rub him the wrong way. I never know what he’s thinking.
When she arrived at Anteiku—from outward appearances a normal coffee shop, but in actuality the headquarters for the Ghouls of the 20th Ward—the café was quiet, perhaps because it was after lunchtime. A few people were having coffee, but they all appeared to be Ghouls.
“Welcome …”
Yoshimura, the manager, was drying cups in the back of the shop. He noticed Touka and looked her way. He already seemed to know about the Ghoul that had died in the fight with Touka and Ayato. Preparing herself for the usual lecture, she took a seat at the counter and asked for a cup of coffee.
Yoshimura said nothing as he made the coffee and set it down in front of Touka. She had expected a warning from him, but his silence actually made her feel more uncomfortable. This was far crueler than she had anticipated. Feigning calm, Touka brought the coffee cup to her lips.
“Yomo dealt with his corpse for you, but if you keep this up the CCG will start asking questions.”
And there it is. He just jumped right in.
“This again,” Touka said and turned her head, still holding her coffee cup.
“The other side has ways of identifying Ghouls from the marks left by Kagune. They will find you if you get too cocky. And by ‘you,’ I don’t just mean you, Touka. I mean Ayato too—”
Just then the door chimed. A new customer had arrived—a human.
It was strictly forbidden to talk about things that would identify them as Ghouls in front of people. Yoshimura returned to his work as if nothing had been going on, and Touka closed her mouth too.
Another human customer came in, then another. Ayato preferred to shy away from Anteiku, and this strange environment was probably the reason. Human customers in a Ghoul café. A place where Ghouls and humans coexisted, albeit temporarily. This seemed to grate on Ayato’
s nerves.
“Ayato’s so young, but he has tremendous strength. I worry that that strength will take him in the wrong direction,” Yoshimura said, quietly, so that people could not hear him.
“What’s the wrong direction?”
“If you have power, you have a lot to lose.”
Yoshimura always came back to these vague lessons. Annoyed, Touka set her coffee cup down on its saucer roughly.
“Touka.”
Saying nothing, she walked straight out the door of the café and did not look back. As she walked away, she thought she could almost hear Yoshimura sigh.
With the sun shining and people bustling here and there, the city was full of life. But Touka’s heart was sinking. Go home, she whispered to herself, and started walking again, but time after time she came to a stop. Looking at her reflection in a store window, she saw an expression frozen on her face. I can’t go back looking like this.
After checking to make sure there was nobody around, Touka ascended to the roof of a nearby apartment building, using walls and low roofs as footholds. Up there she had a nice view, but it was windier than down below, and Touka’s black hair whipped around her.
I’ll just stay here until I calm down. Touka sat down on the edge of the roof, wrapped her arms around her knees, and closed her eyes.
But she soon heard someone crying somewhere. At first she tried to ignore it, but the sound continued, and she began to listen closely. The crying seemed to be coming from somewhere below the building. Touka looked down, searching for the owner of that voice.
“A kid …”
A boy, about five years old, was sitting there crying. Listening carefully, she heard him saying, “Mama.” He got separated from his mother, perhaps?
“Right, now, where is his mother?”
None of the people near him appeared to be his mother. Those passing by looked down at him wondering what was wrong, but they all walked by without saying anything. He was curled up in a little ball, sobbing, “Mama, mama.”
For some reason, Touka saw Ayato when he was little.
Clicking her tongue at herself, Touka came down from the roof in a way so as not to be noticed. Why do I always get involved with humans like this? she thought, then called out to the boy from behind.
“What’s wrong?”
The boy jumped with surprise, then turned to look. He stopped crying at once.
“Where’s your mother?” she took the opportunity to ask.
“Waaaaaah!”
The boy began to sob again, sparked by Touka’s question.
“Wait—”
Suddenly all the passersby looked at Touka. I must seem very suspicious right now.
“Oh, you idiot, come here,” she said, grabbing his hand and pulling him away from there.
The boy seemed to calm down as they walked. They went into a nearby park and sat down on some deserted swings. The boy started swinging happily.
“What—what’s going on?”
The thought suddenly came to her: Maybe I should just leave him and go.
As she considered her options, the boy said, “Thanks.”
“Huh?”
“Daddy told me I should say thank you when somebody helps me,” the boy told Touka, who was lost in confusion.
“But I haven’t helped you …”
Touka didn’t know what to say, but the boy kept swinging happily, seemingly satisfied now that he’d thanked her.
“Where’s your dad?”
When she’d asked about his mother, he’d started crying, so she decided to try asking about his father.
“At work!” he said, cheerfully. Suddenly he stopped swinging, crestfallen at the realization. “If I don’t go back to kindergarten, daddy’s gonna be mad.”
“Kindergarten?”
He must’ve run away.
“Then let’s take you back.”
The boy silently picked up a pebble from the ground near his feet and threw it toward the fence surrounding the park, sulking.
The easiest thing to do would be to take him to the nearest police station. But Touka was the right age to be in school, too, if she were human. If she took the boy to the police, they would likely start asking prying questions about why she wasn’t in school. I should’ve never gotten involved, she thought.
But then she heard a voice.
“Shota! Shota!”
Touka looked around and saw a man in a suit coming toward them.
“Daddy!”
Shota leapt down from the swing and ran toward him. I guess that’s his dad. His father gave Shota a rap on the head.
“You made me worried!”
“Oh, I’m sorry!”
I guess that’s that. All wrapped up now. Touka started to leave without saying anything, but she caught the boy’s father’s eye.
“You’re here with my son, aren’t you?”
“N-not really …” Touka stuttered.
The man smiled.” He ran away from his school, we’ve been looking for him all over. Thank you.” He was about the same age as Touka’s own father. She felt a twinge of nostalgia.
“I think he was looking for his mother,” she told him, meaning it in a kind way, but as soon as she said it, the expression on the boy’s face changed.
“I wasn’t! Don’t make stuff up!” Although she’d been looking after him until now, the boy started yelling. “She’s lying!”
Touka didn’t know what to do, but the man started rubbing his son’s back. “Of course,” he said in agreement. What a naughty boy.
After telling her she was mischievous, the father thanked her, saying, “I’m sorry,” and left the park with the boy in his arms.
Left alone in the park with a stupid expression on her face, Touka muttered to herself, “What was all that?” I went out of my way to help him and that’s the thanks I get? His parents must’ve spoiled him rotten.
I never should’ve gotten involved.
Touka kicked the ground in frustration, then left the park.
III
A week passed. Touka was off to Anteiku in search of coffee again. She’d asked Ayato if he wanted to come along, but he had shouted, “You don’t have to tell me every time you go out, you know! I don’t care!” and that was the end of that.
When Ayato went out without saying anything and didn’t come home for hours, Touka got worried that something had happened. So she told Ayato where she was going thinking he shared the same concern, but apparently he did not. And that difference made Touka’s heart hurt.
If I were a human would I have to suffer like this? She looked up and saw two boys around high school age.
“I got this album and the lyrics are just awesome, you gotta hear it!”
“Is this the one that’s all in English?”
“Yeah! I translated some of the songs so if you don’t understand it, I can just sing along!”
“Oh, uh, that’s cool, dude, but …”
Look at them, nothing but smooth sailing under sunny skies. Never had to struggle a day in their lives. Touka felt a deep envy and hatred in her heart.
“Hey, you’re the …”
Suddenly, someone called out to her. She looked and saw a man in a suit on his way back from work. She recognized him from somewhere. After a moment’s thought she realized that he was the father of the boy she’d found crying.
Once she recognized him, she became cautious. Touka remembered how he’d believed what his son said, and she wondered if he was going to try to have a word with her.
But the man did not seem hostile. In fact, he smiled broadly.
“I just wanted to say, I’m sorry about troubling you before. I got a call about Shota running away from school, so I went out looking for him with his teachers. Thanks for staying with him in the park.”
The conversation could have ended there. Just when they both should have said their goodbyes, the father said, “One more thing. You said he was calling out for his mother?”
Touka was s
till distrustful, but neither could she stand being completely misunderstood.
“He was sobbing and saying, ‘Mama, mama,’ ” she said bluntly.
“I see,” said the boy’s father, looking worried. His attitude seemed very different from before. “I guess he tries not to say anything in front of me, but he must be missing her.”
Touka frowned at these meaningful words, and the man forced a bright expression.
“My wife passed away six months ago.”
“… Oh.”
“He’s very good when he’s with me, but at school he’s starting to act out. He runs away, like he did this time, or he starts fights … He hates it when he hears people at school talking about their mothers.”
And here I thought he was living innocently and happily with his family. This unexpected confession brought to Touka’s mind an image of the boy crying for his mother. A shot of pain ran through her. When she’d seen him crying it had reminded her of Ayato when he was little, but suddenly Touka could see something of herself in him too.
When Touka had lost her mother, she’d cried like that. And her father had comforted her.
“But he’s still got to go to school.”
The man smiled sadly.
“He doesn’t want to cause me trouble, he wants everything to be ‘normal.’ It’s his own way of getting through it and fighting on …”
So that’s why he got angry when I told his father that he’d been crying for his mother—because he thought his father would be worried?
“Oh, I’m sorry. For telling you all this. But thank you. You’re very kind.”
Those last words were a phrase that Touka was not used to hearing. She raised her head in surprise. But the boy’s father didn’t notice. He checked his watch and suddenly looked hurried.
“Oh no, I said I’d be there early today, but I’m late now. I’ll see you around, I suppose. Thank you,” he said, and rushed off to pick up his son. Touka found herself unable to move from the spot for a while.
That’s why she didn’t notice.
With the incident with the boy and his father’s words echoing around her head, Touka went into Anteiku and, to her surprise, saw that Renji Yomo was there. Unlike Yoshimura, who generally accepted most things, Yomo’s mere presence made Touka feel tense. She felt slightly uneasy knowing that he’d had to clean up the evidence when she and Ayato had gotten sloppy recently.