Chapter 167: Balancing The Scale (1/2)

Nasha followed behind Akira. She was looking at Akira’s back while walking through the street of the slum city. Akira did not look back at all as he kept walking forward.

It might be a good chance for her to run away. But Nasha did not harbour such thoughts, she had no wish to do so. Akira knew that she was not following him when they were back in Sheryl’s base even without looking back. That was why she thought that Akira must know whether or not she was following him at the moment and it might be futile to even try to run away in such a situation.

Nasha had already given up. Because of that, she did not have the will to fight back, she was only following behind Akira without saying anything.

Akira hopped on his vehicle that he parked close by and said.

“Get in.”

Nasha obediently climbed to the driver’s assistant seat. Akira then drove out from the slum and into the wasteland.

It had been a few minutes since Akira and Nasha left the city. Akira did not say anything, but he looked slightly annoyed as he was driving the vehicle. Looking at him, Nasha got even more confused.

Some Hunters would only kill people in the wasteland, so at first, Nasha thought that Akira might be bringing her out to the wasteland just to kill her. But it already had been a few minutes since they left the city. If Akira was planning to kill her and dump her body in the wasteland, they were already far enough from the city. Eventually, she could not hold back her curiosity.

“Where are we going?”

“Well, to Narahagaka city.”

“Narahagaka city?”

“You’ve never heard of it? It’s a city to the west of Kugamayama city. Although it’s not as big as Kugamayama city, it still has a wall protecting it. Well, you can think of it as a smaller version of Kugamayama city… Or so I heard. Though I asked you if you’ve ever heard of it, to be honest, I only came to know about it recently too. So I don’t know much about that city either, how about you?”

“…Uhh, I’ve heard that name before, but nothing more.”

“I see.”

Their conversation ended with that. Nasha got even more confused and stopped the conversation there. Silence returned back between them. With time, Nasha’s confusion pushed her to ask another question.

“Uhh, what are you planning to do with me once we arrive there?”

“Nothing. Ahh, that’s not right, I’m planning to take you there and leave you in that city.”

“Leave me…?”

“I’ll head back straight home after I drop you in that city. You might hate me for leaving you in a place that you know nothing about, but that’s just how it is, sorry about that. If I leave you somewhere nearby, I feel like it’ll only cause trouble later on after all. Or more like, that kind of thing has already happened once before.”

Akira casually pointed at the rucksack that he put in the back of his vehicle.

“And it’s not like I’m going to leave you in an unknown place so that you’ll starve to death. I’ll at least give you some money, a gun, and some clothes. You can take that rucksack with you. But that’s all I’ll do for you. Then you can do anything you want. So, sorry, but you’ll have to do everything by yourself after that.”

Nasha opened the rucksack and looked at its contents. It was true that there were some Hunter clothes and a gun inside.

“Even though I did tell you that you can do anything you want, I don’t recommend going back to Kugamayama city. Sheryl and her gang also have their reputation to maintain, so I’m sure that they won’t ignore you if they spot you and I have no plans to tell them to let you go just because I spared you.”

Nasha was surprised. She looked at Akira and at the rucksack alternately. She looked completely flabbergasted.

“You’re going to spare me? Why?”

Akira hesitated.

“…Well, it’s fine, isn’t it? It’s just out of a whim.”

Nasha seemed to be thinking hard, she then said with a rather stiff expression.

“Please tell me.”

“Is it really that important?”

“Yes, so please tell me.”

“Just think of it as a weird guy making a weird decision.”

“Please tell me.”

Akira looked at Nasha in the eyes and slightly squinted his eyes.

“…If you keep pushing your luck, I might change my mind, you know.”

Nasha replied while looking straight into Akira’s eyes.

“…It doesn’t matter, please tell me.”

Nasha still asked for an answer although Akira said that he might kill her if she kept pursuing that subject. Akira was a bit surprised by it. But he could feel that it was not something that he could just ignore, so he sighed and said as if he was confessing.

“It’s just balancing out the scale.”

Nasha did not expect such an answer at all, she tilted her head in confusion.

“What do you mean by that?”

“I killed your best friend. So to balance that out, I’ll spare your life.”

Nasha froze, she then said with a shaking voice.

“You killed Alna?”

“Yeah, I did.”

Nasha felt a storm of emotion struck her. Her best friend was killed and the person who killed her best friend was pitying her right now. It stirred her emotion even more.

“Are you saying that you feel guilty for killing Alna, but since you had no other choice but to kill her, you’ll spare me in her place? Is that what you mean when you said ‘it’s for balancing the scale’?”

“No. I did kill her because I wanted to and it’s not like I’m sparing you because I feel guilty for it.”

“Then why?!”

Nasha raised her voice. She looked at Akira with hatred and vengeance, but Akira was not surprised at all, as a matter of fact, he was completely calm. But that only served to stir her emotion even further.

With her emotions brimming, Nasha looked away from Akira for a split second, that was when her eyes wandered to the gun inside the rucksack. She immediately reached for that gun and released the safety trigger while glaring at Akira.

But even so, Akira did not show any reaction at all.

“I killed your best friend, so I won’t tell you not to hate me. But don’t think that I’ll just let you kill me. If you want to give it a try although you know the outcome, then be my guest.”

Akira pointed out the power gap between him and Nasha and stopped her. But his next sentence changed that.

“…And also, although it might be weird for me to say this, do you think that Alna wants you to go that far to avenge her death?”

Nasha’s anger welled up again. She was on the verge of pointing the gun in her hand at Akira as she screamed as hard as she could at him.

“You… You know nothing about Alna!!!”

“Yeah, that’s why I’m asking you since you must really know her well. You’re her best friend, right?”

Akira looked straight at Nasha, who was staring dagger at him, he was seriously asking Nasha a question there. Nasha was taken aback to the point that it erased all of her anger. She was baffled and was shaking while making a very confused face. Akira looked straight at Nasha without saying anything.

Nasha imagined Alna’s figure from all the memories that they had together. That Alna in her mind threw a sad smile at her and said something to her.

Nasha stopped shaking, she then pointed the gun in her hand at Akira with a pained face.

A gunshot echoed through the wasteland, the bullet went and vanished into the distance. Akira had slightly shifted Nasha’s hand right before she pulled the trigger.

Nasha lightly smiled, she somehow looked relieved. But even after that, Akira still did not do anything to her while having a flat expression. The smile vanished from Nasha’s face. She looked slightly confused and said with a pained voice.

“…Kill me already… Just kill me!! I shot at you, you know!? Are you still going to spare me!?”

Akira did not say anything as he shook his head.

“Sorry, but I’m already strong enough to know whether my life is in danger or not. If you want to kill yourself, you can do it on your own. And if you fail even after that, I’ll at least warn you not to do that again.”

Nasha fell on her knee. In the end, she could not save her best friend and she could not die in the same fashion as her best friend died, all kinds of feelings were mixed inside her heart as she started screaming and crying as if to vent her anger and sadness.

A few minutes later, they were still midway to Narahagaka city. Nasha had cried herself out to the point that she was too tired to keep crying. After venting all of her emotion through her tears and crying her eyes out, she finally calmed down and just sat there silently on the driver’s assistant seat.

Nasha once again looked at Akira and mumbled with a small voice.

“…What’s with that balancing the scale?”

“Before I answer that, I want to confirm something first. That Alna, your best friend, was she the kind of girl who would tell you to avenge her death, although it’s hopelessly impossible?”

Nasha shook her head.

“…No, it’s something that I did out of my own volition. I’m sure that she would tell me to just forget it. She might even get angry at me if she knew that I tried.”

“I see, she must have been a kind girl.”

“…Yes, she was.”

They then continued talking calmly.

“…About balancing the scale, huh? Well, it’s basically just about testing luck.”

“Testing luck?”

“Yeah, for some reason, it seems that I have very bad luck, you see. Thanks to that, I’ve gone through a lot in the past.”

Basically, it was as if Akira was taking a gamble. He then continued.

“It’s about that time when I killed Alna. There was someone really strong protecting her and he is also a kind person. Although he has no debt nor has been offered a reward for it, he gave his best to protect Alna. Since he even went that far, he and the girl he was protecting might as well be good people, but even so, I still killed Alna… If I kill a good person, it feels like it’ll bring some bad karma on me later. That might be the reason why I have very bad luck. As a matter of fact, I did encounter something really troublesome right after I killed her. I would have been able to evade it if I had given up on killing her. So, well, I guess I just reaped what I sow there.”

Nasha was really happy to hear that someone did that much to protect her best friend. But at the same time, it also made her feel sad knowing that Alna had done something so that someone would still want to kill her despite having someone like Katsuya protecting her.

“…Then why didn’t you spare her just like how you did to me?”

Akira felt that Nasha was not blaming him, she simply just wanted to know, so he answered her question honestly.

“…I couldn’t, it’s a matter of my personality. Even if you ask me why I couldn’t do that, I don’t think I can come up with anything that might convince you.”

“…I see.”

“It doesn’t matter how strong they are, people will die when they get unlucky. That’s what I believe. The reason why I’m sparing you is simply because I think it might improve my bad luck, even if it’s only by a bit. So basically, I am doing this for my own sake. Although I said it’s for balancing the scale, I don’t think this is anywhere near enough to accomplish it. But it’s still better than nothing. That’s all the reason I have, I don’t do this because of any other profound reasons or anything.”

It was an absurd reasoning. It might be true that Alna was killed because she was unlucky and Nasha was spared because she was lucky, but Nasha still felt something did not feel right.

“…Was there really no other way for Alna? Was killing her the only choice you had?”

“As I said, it’s a matter of my personality, so it’s not like I can do anything about it.”

“No, that isn’t what I meant. I mean like, if something else, no matter how small it is, if there was anything that could have been done to save her life.”

“…Hmmm, let’s see then…”

Akira tried to think of all kinds of scenarios where Alna might have been saved.

If only Alna did not aim for Akira that day, or Akira did not lower his guard, or Alna was not able to steal Akira’s wallet, or if Alna did not meet Katsuya, or Katsuya did not protect her that time, or if Katsuya did not push Akira back and triggered the domino effect which led to Alna’s death, if that failure did not spread out as a rumour that discredited Akira, if only that rumour did not cause the robbers to attack Sheryl’s base, or that Alna did not get kidnapped by Ezont family, or if Katsuya came sooner to save Alna.

Akira put out all the scenarios where Alna might be saved. After listening to everything, Nasha had a sad smile as she said.

“So, even with all of those possible scenarios, Alna still got killed, huh… That would mean she’s really unlucky… Do you know that Alna is a really good pickpocket?”

“No.”

“She’s really talented in stealing wallets. Because of that, all kinds of people tried to get their hands on her to make her steal for them. Alna was having it hard too. But, there’s nothing commendable about stealing others’ money, right… She might have gotten that bad luck because of all the bad things that she had done up until now… If only I had stopped her sooner, she might have got luckier, and she wouldn’t need to die…”

Nasha felt so frustrated by her inability to help, although she had already cried her eyes out, she started to tear up again.

Akira did not say if that was true or not, he just kept quiet.

Akira and Nasha reached Narahagaka city right around evening. He dropped Nasha in front of the Hunter Office near the city wall.

Nasha had already changed to the clothes that Akira gave her. It was rather shabby-looking Hunter clothing. It was a suitable cloth for someone who would visit that Hunter Office. It was rather good clothing for someone from the slum. Compared to her previous clothes, people would ridicule her less with that attire.

“So then, well, it might be weird to hear this from me, but be well.”

“Yes, Akira-san. You too.”

After they exchanged a rather formal-sounding good-byes, Nasha looked at Akira with a serious face and said.

“I… I think I hate you. You killed Alna, I might carry this grudge until I die.”

Just like Alna, who did all she did because of reasons, Akira also had his reasons for doing what he did. If a Hunter had a bad rumour spread which lowered his or her reputation, it might turn fatal for that Hunter. That was why Nasha understood that there were things that a Hunter like Akira could not back off from.

Although Nasha did not do it intentionally, she also helped spread such horrendous rumours about Akira. Not only did she use the money that Alna stole from Akira to join Sheryl’s gang, she also leaked the information about Akira to Alna to help Alna escape. Normally, it would not be strange if Akira wanted to kill her, but he still spared her life.

“But even so, thank you very much for sparing me.”

Nasha did shoot Akira, cried her eyes out, and talked all kinds of things with him. One good thing about it was that she was able to move on from her best friend’s death. Although it was not like all of her grudges were gone, at least it was enough to help her to stand back on her feet. She bowed deeply at Akira as thanks.

Akira did not expect to be thanked, so he was really surprised. After that, he looked slightly sad as he smiled and said to Nasha.