Violet looked as if she didn’t have a single care in the world despite the heavy words she had thrown at Yugai twice now. She had wielded them as if they were as light as a feather and that combined with her overwhelming presence, it was a whirlpool. You can’t escape from her no matter what you do, as long as she kept pulling in. Until she had her fun, there was no way of getting off her wild ride. The scent of wine was overpowering for Yugai, who had never drunk before today, it was intoxicating and weakening what little power he had left to resist her. It too was a carefully selected weapon.

She started humming to herself. No tune, in particular, she simply decided to make some noise as she waited for her answer. It was a tune filled with strength and a hopeful tone. It wormed its way into the brains of every person who could hear it. Unconsciously their bodies were moving in minor ways to the beat. The tapping of feet and fingers, some mimicry, and the bobbing of heads back and forth. The siren’s sign was calling out to all who can hear, and Yugai was given another attack on his senses that was damaging his ability to concentrate.

Kentarou was grimacing under his mask, his eyes were painted with concern for his student. He couldn’t stop himself from asking why she would do this, and after mulling the question for a whole minute it struck him like lightning. “She’s doing this because she can!” Despite the simplicity of the statement it actually carried a far deeper meaning. “So you finally realised it.” Salamandra had realised the same thing about a minute or two ago and began to explain.

“She’s doing this precisely because this situation is where she is strongest. As a hostess she’s always been catering to the emotional wants and needs of her customers, playing to their pace and anything she said about herself would be chipper to keep the mood. She’s dangerous in her field as is just playing that supporting role. However, on this rare occasion, she’s the customer, and the customer is always right. She can say anything she wants and get away with it. The person on the other end will be forcefully dragged into the tone and topic of her conversation, and be unable to retreat. She’s formidable as an employee but as a guest, she’s at full power. She can spread her wings and fly however fast and as far as she wants and take all those with her on a one-way trip to anywhere in the world! I’m truly impressed.”

Yugai had to focus. He took in a deep breath and sent it through to his heart which then relayed oxygen to the rest of his body. Then he grabbed his Ki and his Mana and held them tightly within. He was struggling to find and retain balance emotionally, so he fell back on the only source of confidence he had that was won in battle. His fighting instinct and a fierce determination to live the life he had been denying himself. The steel returned to his eye and now there was fire too. He was ready. His resolve had risen to the occasion. “I haven’t. I’m an orphan and always have been.” A simple fact fired, for him a common truth he internalised early in life and for most other people a disarming statement that strokes an instinctual desire to say how unfortunate such a person is. A normal person would anyway.

“Oh? How lucky for you.” Violet slapped away his comment like it was nothing. Kentarou’s mouth was wide open from witnessing that exchange. This wasn’t like her at all, but what shocked him even more than that was that Yugai’s expression in response. Not a single trace of surprise or weakness was on his face. It hadn’t moved at all. “I think so too.” He was going to play her game and win. That was what he had decided. “Oh, you must have known some people who have had harsh childhoods for you to say that so confidently.” Violet smiled with a hint of sadness as she took another sip of her drink and when she was done she laid it down on the table.

“My mother was a wonderful woman who was loving, caring, and always put up with my antics as a kid with a smile. She never once lost her patience with me. She was firm but fair, and the word kind doesn’t begin to describe the lengths she would go for to help not just her family but complete strangers. She never complained. My father was, well you’d think he was an abusive asshole but that wasn’t always the case. He loved her, he loved me, we meant the world to him. He was always really busy with work, but every moment he had spare, he used to spend it showering us with affection. The first nine years of my life were pure bliss.”

Violet smiled as she reminisced of a peaceful past, and she winded up for another blow to Yugai’s emotional core. He knew it was coming. He’d take it face on. For one reason or another, the hostess had chosen him as a target to vent her soul to, and he was going to face it head-on. “It was a rainy Friday. I had just come home from school and decided to do my homework as soon as I can so I could spend the rest of the day just watching TV. I then realised my bad was missing the folder that held my math book and of course my homework too. I had left it at school. So I told her, I’m sorry, I forgot. Mom smiled and sighed all at once but she didn’t look bothered. She told me to just stay home and stay warm. She’d get in the car, drive to school and come back with my homework in about thirty minutes or so.”

Violet told her tale without hesitation, there was almost a whimsical factor in her voice as she was preparing to tell a tragedy, her eyes were fixed on Yugai. Waiting for his reaction. “She didn’t come back. She never did. I waited until midnight and that was when my dad came home, covered in tears and rain. My mother had been hit in a car crash and died almost immediately upon impact. The police notified him first and he… well. He left work around the same time he usually did before coming home.

“I think he was trying to get on with his day, hoping the news was just a joke or a bad dream, that he fell asleep at his desk… that if he just continued his day as normal, that she’d be waiting for him when he got home the way she always did, but there was just me. Watching TV and staying up late. I was incredibly worried, but I think to him at that moment it looked like I didn’t have a care in the world. That probably made him very angry. He yelled at me to go to bed with a voice full of rage that I had never ever heard before. I started crying and ran to my room. He didn’t tell me what had happened until I woke up the next day.”

She was still smiling. Her eyes were still gleaming like diamonds. The strength to have weathered such a storm was clear in every fibre of her being and while Yugai could not say he feared it or was not sure if he should admire it, he could confidently say it was overwhelming. He was reminded of Hibari’s comment. “We’re like rockstars!” It set in. A legendary factor that draws everyone to you for good and ill. People who have climbed the stairs of adversity and hardship, and fought the whole way through hard work and unbreakable spirits. A normal is starstruck when they try to get close. Those who have heard and seen all sorts of brilliant bouts of passion and morbid tragedies, as well as everything in between. This isn’t something you can pick up or compete in just a day. He was not only outmatched but completely outclassed.

Violet picked up her glass again, gave it a sniff, then a sip. Her mouth moved a little to swirl the wine in her mouth before she swallowed it and let the glass return to the table. “Take another drink, Milo. You shouldn’t be sober when you listen to the rest of this.” It wasn’t phrased as a suggestion and Yugai nodded and complied to the command, hastily slurping a spoonful worth of red wine down his throat. He had heard from Kentarou that the effects would be mitigated by Lang’s magic but he still felt burning hotness from the liquid coursing through his body. Violet licked her lips as if she was about to bite deep into the softest and sweetest cut of a steak. She screwed the cap back on the bottle of wine.

“Now where was I? Ah, right. So my life obviously changed after that. Dad’s work schedule didn’t change much, except he came home early on Fridays, always waiting for me, with a can or bottle in hand, he would drink and stare at me without saying a word. As if judging me, or something, I can’t be sure. His mind was not in a good or stable place. Figuring him out is hard. Do you know what it’s like to have someone you loved with all your heart suddenly terrify you every time you even glanced at him? The sound of his footsteps threatening you with a small panic attack? It’s really… it felt like home had gone from a warm safe place to a cold and painful one that wanted to swallow you whole. I always tried to find excuses to not go home on Fridays until I had to go to bed.” She grabbed her glass and finished it, once again letting it rest on the table when she was done with it, this time though she shoved it a little harder and that detail did not escape Yugai’s notice.

“He scared me. He yelled at me, but he didn’t raise a hand on me… for a very long time. Once in a while, he’d say he was sorry when he was really drunk. The first time he hit me was... I was in my first year of junior high. We had a field trip and I was scared to ask my dad for permission, every time I got a chance, was only on Friday when he was drunk out of his mind, so of course, I just couldn’t. When my school called him up and asked why he didn’t sign the slip, he confronted me and the only words I could think of in response was…”

“I’m sorry, I forgot.” The words fell out of Yugai’s lips before they could come out of Violet’s. There’s a silence between them now. Kentarou cannot believe what he just heard, mainly that Yugai would choose to cut her off with the answer rather than let her finish. For the first time in their entire conversation, Violet looked like she was on the back foot. He had taken her by surprise. Yugai took his glass and downed it this time. He looked her straight in the eyes. He was waiting for the rest of the story. Steel in his eye. Her lips had a barely noticeable quiver to them.

“...Yeah. He got mad. He wasn’t there when I said those words to mom, but he knew about them. The day she died he asked me to tell him how and why. So he knew. When I said those exact words to him… he wasn’t thinking straight for a lot of reasons, but even so… he raised a fist against me and then… he...”

Violet closed her eyes. She grew quiet. Then her right hand latched unto the wine bottle. Her grip was reversed. She rose the bottle above her head as if it were a sword. Every gaze fell upon her. She swung it down with all the force her right arm could afford her. It shattered against the table and sent shards of darkness throughout the sky of golden lights. Scarlet liquid showered upon her face in streams of viciousness and soaked her dress in shadow. She dropped what was left of the bottle to the floor. Her eyes opened.

“Just like that.” She brought her right hand to her lips and licked the crimson drops away, and then turned her head upwards and smiled brightly and widely towards the whole crowd of employees and customers. “Oh, dear! It seems I’ve had far too much to drink tonight! I have to apologise for making such a scene! Let me make it up to you! I’ll replace my ruined wine with fresh wine for everyone! Waiter, a bottle of your finest for each and every table!” That was all it took for people to let out a cheer and go back to their business while the waiter ran over and scooped up the shards of glass into a dustpan with a brush. The hostess returned her attention to the man who was supposed to serve her. Yugai had lost his balance again.

“...From that day onwards I was obsessed with power. It started as just a whisper in my own heart at first. It was easier for him to hit me over the smallest things. The floodgate had been broken and he always looked for an excuse to blame me for everything that went wrong in his life. It dug its claws deep into me. Pierced my flesh, poisoned my mind, and tore at my soul. It grew louder and louder. It needed to be heard. I wanted the strength to fight back. So I sought it.”

She tightened her hand into a fist. “That was about the time I started to learn how to fight, and I also couldn’t stop picking them.” Her smile is smug and sombre all at once. Bittersweet memories are welled up in those fingers and knuckles. Memories that engraved themselves deep into the bone. “This is where the story really gets interesting.”