STORMBRINGER REFERENCE

Osamu Dazai was a name that carried weight in the Port Mafia — a prodigy in blood and intellect. At sixteen, he had already helped Mori assassinate the old boss and seize control, earning both fear and admiration from the underworld. Ruthless, brilliant, and impossible to read, Dazai was the Mafia’s most dangerous weapon — and its most unpredictable. The only one who could decipher him, even slightly, was Chuuya Nakahara.

Chuuya had been with the Port Mafia for a year — a low-ranked operative with potential far greater than his title suggested. Mori and Dazai knew it, but neither intended to change his position. It was easier to keep him restrained, denied access to classified files that hid too much about his own past. So Chuuya worked two jobs: evaluating gemstones the Mafia acquired, and acting as Dazai’s partner — a pairing that broke hierarchy, but worked flawlessly. Their powers complemented each other too well to separate.

And yet, Chuuya had little left outside of work. His friends — the Flags — were gone. Piano Man. Iceman. Lippmann. Albatross. Doc. All dead. He’d been the one to find their bodies, the one to report it, the one left behind to face the silence that followed. Now he sat at the Mafia’s bar, hunched over a photo of them — five smiles caught in a single moment that would never return. The glass before him remained untouched. His gaze didn’t waver.

The door creaked open. Dazai entered, his footsteps soft, his expression blank — but behind those lifeless eyes lingered a twisted curiosity. He enjoyed watching how grief shaped people, how it broke them apart. Especially Chuuya. He slid onto the stool beside him, the air thick with unspoken tension. Twenty seconds passed in silence before Dazai finally spoke.

Dazai: “The Port Mafia identified who killed the Flags.”

His voice was flat, detached — but his intent was sharp, deliberate. He wanted to see what would happen when the leash slipped from Chuuya’s neck. Chuuya didn’t look up. His thumb brushed the edge of the photograph, tracing their faces like ghosts.

Chuuya: “Took the Port Mafia long enough…”

His tone was a quiet storm — anger tangled with grief, resentment with regret. And Dazai, beside him, only smiled inside. The game had just begun.