A Twilight Promise

"Aghhh... That bat hit my head..." Ryujii thought, lying on the road, blood is flowing out from his head - he's being hit from behind. Ryujii couldn't keep his consciousness anymore, and he passed out.

3 years ago...

Ryujii was a normal boy, also an obedient child. He takes his home tutor lessons seriously, he always wanted to make his parents proud, that is how he was until he entered his middle school, he was being targeted by bullies.

Being bullied, he is forced to not to tell his parents about it, so he always makes excuses for what he didn't do at all. As a result, he always gets scolded by his mother. After all, he couldn't even concentrate on classes at all.

His grades dropped, to the point his tutor snapped. "What a stupid child you have there?" Of course, he heard it right in front of him. Those words gave a deep impact on him. "I thought I can be better if I studied harder... But I can't understand a thing... I hate studying... I don't want to study anymore." The tutor resigned, he threw a tantrum and refused to meet any more tutors.

One day, he passed by a park, the bullies are there, and obviously, they called him over. "Hey Ryujii, we just made you a pie, made of soil, take it!" A bully picked up dirt and stuffed it into Ryujii's mouth. He pushed one of them. "Woah... So you learned to fight back huh? Come on let's teach him a lesson."

10 minutes passed, there is only him lying on the floor, crying in anguish. "I hate everything. Everything." He thought. On that day, he remembers all the anguish and the taste of soil that was left in his mouth. He started to train, to become strong enough to protect himself.

He took long-distance jogs, muscle training, and even learned martial arts. He took 6 months to finally beat the three bullies up. One of the bullies told the teacher about Ryujii beat them, and then his mother showed up to complain about Ryujii.

Ryujii's mother was invited to the school, she listened to them quietly and only apologized. "Why would you have to apologize? You did nothing wrong... It's them who started the fight!" He told his mother. A cold gaze and a slap in the face is what she gave him. He felt despair, that is when he started hating this world. He felt that even god is ridiculing him.

He picked up a bat, the bullies have elder brothers who are delinquents, they attacked him. All Ryujii did was just defending himself... and fights back with an unexplainable rage. With his first real fight, with that bat and that scary expression, people started calling him a delinquent. That is how he became a delinquent. He hates everything, and thus he is also known as the hateful delinquent.

Back to the present, he wakes up in darkness, there is no light at all, all he hears are echoes of his own palpitations and heavy breathing. He is scared. "Help me, please... HELP ME!!!" He screamed as loud as he could, the echoes of his own voice makes him crazy.

"Hey! Ri-Yu-Ji-I-kun, calm down, if you wake up, let's look at the twilight together!" A girl's whisper echoed through his nightmare and reached him. The voice ends with running footsteps that fades away.

He calmed down and start searching his way out. He is blinded by a light, in which he slowly opened his eyes... It was night and dark, he sees a ceiling. A hospital? Or perhaps it's hell? His consciousness is barely hanging there... He collapsed and slept through the night.