Haruka Sawamura looked over the note in her hand for the ten millionth time. The words practically etched into her mind.

If you want Yuta back-

Bring Haruto and yourself to the Champion District in Kamurocho.

You have 3 days to comply or you'll never get him back. You're free to bring anyone you like with you. As long as they're not the cops. Though I doubt you could get their help, Daughter of the Dragon. We'll know if you don't bring Haruto- so don't think of trying to pull the wool over our eyes.

Best regards.

K.

If it wasn't just the threatening note, Haruka would've been skeptical. No they added proof to their words as originally attached to the note was Yuta tied up and gagged. It was quite clear that he was knocked out by the looks of it as well, especially with all the wounds on his face. She wasn't stupid to not figure out that she was being targeted because of the man who raised her. They can't even leave his legacy alone long after he was reported dead. What's worse is that they didn't just want to target her, they targeted her loved ones to get to her.

As promised she brought Haruto and herself to Kamurocho. Specifically right now she and her son were in a new cafe that rested just at the beginning of Tenkaichi St. Nyu Cafe they call it. A weird pun meant to appeal to Japanese and English Speakers. Anyway the person she was waiting for simply popped into the cafe. He wore grey slacks, a black silk shirt, and maroon striped jacket. A gold watch rested on his wrist as he took his hand out of his pockets and waved over to Haruka.

"Sorry I'm late, Haruka-chan."

"It's not a problem, Akiyama-san."

Shun Akiyama was a longtime friend of both her and her adoptive father. A loan shark that was different from the rest. He runs a business called Sky Finance and does not charge interest nor collateral, but in return you must pass a test to borrow any funds from him. His posture was laid back as he waved to the cashier like they were buddies. Haruka wouldn't be surprised in the slightest if the cafe was here because of Akiyama. He's called the Lifeline of Kamurocho for a reason.

"Yo, Haruto. Looking like a handsome devil I see."

Haruto simply nodded. Akiyama smiled and looked over to Haruka.

"So he still can't speak?"

"There's nothing wrong with him. He's able to write sentences completely and neatly. And his teacher says he learns the fastest out of the whole class."

"Does he get bullied for it? I don't think so, but the teacher notes that he stays away from the rest of the class anyway. It's almost funny really. He speaks well at home, but when he goes out he clams up."

"Let him take his time. Don't want to rush things."

"I'm worried that he will get bullied sooner or later."

Haruka felt a tug at her jacket and Haruto simply putting his arms in an X formation shaking his head. He then put his fist forward quickly mimicking a punching motion.

Haruka sighed while Akiyama laughed, "Gotta wonder where he's getting that spunk? I bet his old man is showing him how?"

"I'm at fault here as well. Just a while earlier I defended myself against a group of loan sharks claiming I owe them money."

"They happen to be wearing all black suits with blue sunglasses?"

Haruke nodded.

"Yeah, they tried to do the same thing to me. You know how it is."

"They are persistent I'll give them that."

"Just another day in Kamurocho. What brings you here? I doubt that this is a simple meeting. You sounded a bit hurried over the phone?"

Haruka handed him the scrap of paper and waited a few moments for him to read it.

"I take it you haven't gone to the police yet?" Akiyama didn't need her answer as he continued, "Strange isn't it? They're not asking for money or anything else? Just you and Haruto?"

"That's what worries me. Why kidnap Yuta and ask for both me and Haruto? I don't have anything else to indicate they wanted something else either."

"When did you get this?"

"Two days ago. I just got back here last night. I spent the last two days convincing my bosses at work to let me have a few days off."

Akiyama raised a brow, "I take it they didn't react to kindly to suddenly asking for time off."

Haruka gave an incensed smile, "Let's just say that I probably won't have a job when I get back."

He whistled in an amused tone, "I bet it's hard to find a job after you pulled your stunt a few years ago. You can always ask me if you-"

"Hana-chan." It was all she needed to say to Akiyama really. She's heard the tales from the woman and she didn't need any confirmation of their truth. She knew why Hana stuck around, but Haruka didn't exactly feel like working for a lazy boss. She liked Akiyama as a person, but she could see why he would make a bad boss.

"I bet she does have more than a few things to say about me, huh?" Akiyama just silently accepted her denial and chuckled, "So I assume you need me to tag along? Couldn't get someone like Saejima to help?"

"You do know how he is with technology? Plus I couldn't find him without contacting the Tojo."

The Tojo clan were pretty good with their promise to leave her alone, but that doesn't stop them from pestering her about taking up the mantle her adoptive father left. They tried to explain it as continuing his legacy for generations to come. However, she did not want any of that. It could be explained that the Tojo kidnapped her husband, but she knew their M.O and this wasn't it. She had a feeling that they knew Yuta had been kidnapped and are just waiting for the call from her.

Akiyama put a hand behind his head, "Can't contact Shinada either, he's gone off the grid. It it wasn't for the fact Tanimura was a cop, he just disappeared altogether. Probably sent to a different city and all that. Damn, guess I'm actually the only one who can help you out?"

"Will you?"

"I haven't said yes, but I'd probably look like an asshole not helping out a longtime friend. Though just in case things don't turn out the way we want to I know a guy who can help. He's a detective that started out a couple of years ago. Even solved a major crime back in 2018."

"Oh?"

"He owes me a favor, so you won't have to pay for his usual fees. I'll go see what's he's up to." Akiyama got up from his seat, "Why don't you show little Haruto around the city? I'll try to see if he can help us out. Mind if I take this?" He held up the ransom paper.

Haruka nodded.

"Let's meet up at Kyushu NO. 1 Star. You know the place near Pink St?" Akiyama simply parted with those words and left the Cafe with Haruto and Haruka to do as they please.

Haruka looked at Haruto and sighed, "Still the same as ever."

…..

Haruka took her son to the Yoshida Batting Center. It was kind of the only place she could think of that involved something Haruto likes. Aside from the arcade of course, but she wanted to waste some time, not let the hours fly by. She's knows how enraptured one can get in video games firsthand.

Haruto actually had more than a few sets of baseball cards that Yuta managed to get from time to time. Well it was usually from the gatcha machines. They gave out individual cards and Yuta usually gets sets of them when it came to be Haruto's birthday. Haruto didn't obviously show it, but he was truly worried about his father. Though it amazed her that he wasn't freaking out and crying. Then again what was she talking about? She acted very similar to Haruto when she was younger and when it came to serious topics.

"You can do it, Haruto!"

She cheered on her son as he went up to the plate. The settings were adjusted to accommodate his size and the bat was small enough for him to carry. The pitcher shown on the projector was even changed from an adult man to a child. Haruto was to aim for getting the most balls hit in a single go. Helps with the practice for when points are to be earned. There were 10 minutes on the clock. She was thinking of just doing five minutes, but Haruto picked it.

The first pitch came and Haruto missed it completely. He swung a little too early. The second one came and he swung too late. On the next pitch the ball hit the bat, but merely did a pop up and fell immediately to the ground. The batting game did not count it as hitting the ball though.

"Focus on the ball, Haruto. Don't take your eyes off of it." She wasn't sure what else to tell Haruto. She's just reiterating what Uncle Kaz used to tell himself when he was batting for her amusement. She was sure someone like Shinada could give better advice to him. Haruto simply gave a nod as 9 minutes ran on the clock.

His next hit struck true and flew up in the air for a few moments before making its way back to the ground. He missed the one that came after it, but managed to strike the one after that. Haruka was clapping all the way though, she had to show all the support she could.

"Sir, I have to ask you to leave."

Haruka sighed as she knew what was to come. She looked over to see a group of hoodlums harassing an employee of the batting center. Their multiple hooded jackets fit loose around their bodies and all of them had their hoods on. More than likely gangster wannabes as they tried to look intimidating as they can.

One of the smaller ones of the group grabbed the employee by his neck collar and made the employee bend down to meet his face, "I'm sorry? Did you say something to me, couldn't hear you from down here!"

"Yo-you have to leave. You're banned from the- the establishment from last-"

"Oh? Do you know who I am? The names, Taiga Kira, in English that would be Tiger Killer. I live up to my name you know?"

"I- I don't care who you are! You're not welcome to this establish-"

The employee was slapped by Taiga, "I'm sorry what? You had my hand in your face?"

The employee instinctively pushed the man back, causing the man to overdramatically stumble backwards, "Well look at you, think you can just push me and not expect to be hit back?"

The little man raised his fist.

"Enough!"

Haruka made sure to note that little Haruto was distracted by the game. She had about 6 minutes before the game was done.

"Let me wrap this up, babe, I'll get to you later."

"Yeah you can have fun with me in the meantime."

She counted four of them, each of them had four different colored hoodies. Taiga had a red one, the one heading for her had a blue one, and the other two had yellow and white.

The yellow one tried to place a hand on her shoulder, but she simply swiped the hand away and approached Taiga. She placed a hand on his shoulder before he could go in for another punch at the employee, "When an employee tells you to leave, then you leave."

"Who the hell do you think you are, bitch?! Do you know who I-"

The man had placed both hands on Haruka's shoulders and shook them, unfortunately for him Haruka brought her face closer in a way that no one would like. The headbutt caused him to stumble backwards a bit and hit the door holding his nose. Yellow and white hoodies went to check up on him. Haruka was then placed in a sloppy chokehold by the man in blue. His arm went over her mouth.

"Don't move or I'll-"

The man let out a scream as Haruka bit his arm as hard as she could. When his grip loosened on her head she flipped the man over her shoulder.

As the man in blue was getting up, Taiga recovered and looked at Haruka with fierce eyes, "Fuckin bitch! You're dead!"

Hoodlums

The men in yellow and white imitated a crane and a grasshopper pose and charged her. She grabbed the hand of the yellow man as he tried to do a sloppy punch and kneed him in the stomach. She wasn't quite prepared for a flying kick from the man in white and was sent flying towards the ground as a result. She landed near one of the benches that filled the batting center. She quickly got up just in time for the man in white to come back and try the same move on her again.

She quickly bent backwards and went as low as she could. It worked as she saw the man in white fly over her. She was able to work quickly enough as to straighten herself back up and dodge a punch coming from Taiga. The men had taken up to simply surrounding her; unfortunately, it would work to their disadvantage.

Haruka grabbed one of the benches and swung it around knocking away all of them. She breathed in a bit somewhat realizing that the bench was heavier than it looked. An aura of pure white subtly surrounded her as she felt the heat of the battle rising. She once again swung the bench and hit the man in yellow who tried to close the distance.

She decided to take the offensive this time as she charged at the man in blue with the bench in tow. She let out a small shout as she hefted the bench and jumped with it towards him. The bench rammed right into the man's lower body, what didn't help was Haruka landing on the seat part of it. The bench rammed a bit further and broke under Haruka from the abuse it took, the man in blue ended up being knocked out from the fight all together from that hit.

She got back up from the broken bench and took the brunt of a full force punch from the man in yellow. She stumble a bit, but couldn't recover as the man in yellow picked her up and threw her towards Taiga.

She rolled on the floor after her short flight time and was right next to the man. He proceeded to stomp on her face twice, showing no restraint. By the third time she managed to grab his foot and pulled his other leg up. He fell to the ground and she gladly returned the favor by punching him in the crotch. She didn't give him time to clutch his crotch as she quickly punched him in the face and got back up. As Taiga laid on the ground in agony she decided to jump on his stomach as hard as she could. He couldn't let out a scream as he had the wind and the consciousness knocked out of him.

She heard two yells and turned around, the yellow and white hooded men were inspired by her use of the bench that they both decided to carry the same bench, probably to try and use it more effectively than her. They were going longways, she was right by the wall, so the use of the bench was obvious. It was too late to get out of the way anyhow.

Feel the Heat!

She had a second of clarity, but she knew exactly what she had to do. She jumped up and extended her feet outward. She grabbed the back of the bench with her arms and held herself up. The sudden weight caused the two of them to drop the bench and gave her a prime opportunity to attack.

She swung her body towards the man in yellow first and one of her hands let go of the bench to keep her momentum going. The kicks landed true and she saw the man in yellow crumble. She let her other hand go and landed on the bench. She immediately placed her hands behind her back and scrunched her legs towards her body. She flung herself towards the man in white and the two of them landed on the ground with Haruka mounting his chest. She pulled the man's hoodie which pulled his head towards her. She violently pushed the man's head back towards the ground as hard as she could.

She raised a fist to punch the man in the face, but he let out a terrified scream. Haruka took it as a sign that he was going to surrender and got off of him. The subtle white aura around her dissipated and she wiped the sweat off her brow. She rubbed her nose to see that a bit of blood ran down, but had stopped.

"Here."

She was handed a cleaning wipe from the employee from earlier, "Thank you."

"No, thank you. I think they were planning to do something worse before you interfered."

"Sorry about your benches."

"It's fine. You there."

The man in white let out a small shriek as the employee approached him, "You think I can rely on you to pay for damages to the property here? You and your friends?"

The man in white nodded his head furiously and looked at Haruka. She simply gave him a glare causing him to nod a bit harder.

"I suggest grabbing a bat for when they wake up."

One of the batting cages opened up to reveal Haruto had just finished. The sign above the door revealed he finished the game with 40 balls hit. Haruka sighed as the hoodlums made her miss her son batting. She smiled nonetheless, "That's impressive, Haruto. 40 balls hit, that's more than I could ever hit."

She approached her son and gave him a congratulatory hug,

"We should head to Kyushu now. I'm sure Akiyama-san is there waiting."

The employee had seemingly returned now brandishing a bat, "Thank you and please come again."

Haruka waved off to the employee as she and Haruto made their way to Kyushu NO. 1 Star.

….

Haruka and Haruto entered the small ramen restaurant to see Akiyama chatting with a man with a white undershirt, a black jacket, tight jeans, with an unconnected belt. The messy hair atop his head seemed to indicate that he doesn't usually take care of it much and let if flow around naturally.

Akiyama stopped talking to the man and motioned for him to get up with him as the two made their way to the two of them, "Thought you would get here first, Haruka-chan. This is Yagami-san. He's going to help us in case things don't go the way we think."

"Nice to meet you.. I'm Yagami Takayuki." His posture seemed to indicate a similar laid-backness to Akiyama. Perhaps that's why he knows him? However, the name sounded a bit familiar. OH!

"Are you the same Yagami-san who solved the AD9 incident in 2018?"

Yagami smiled, "Nice to see I haven't been forgotten, but now's not the time for that. We gotta head towards the Champion District correct?"

Haruka nodded

The four of them immediately headed out towards the Champion District, Yagami took the lead as he talked, "Alright, I've been to a few hostage negotiations myself. The main thing you want to make sure to do is show no fear and don't try to bargain with them. Just try to do what you can.. Well it usually ends with me beating up the kidnappers, but we'll see about this time."

"So how'd you meet Akiyama-san?"

"I was paid by a girl named Hana-chan to find him. I've seen Sky Finance in my walks around the city, but never been to it before. It sure would've helped in my earlier years of being a detective with no money. Get this, it just turns out that he just forgot to tell Hana-chan that he was going to a place for her birthday."

"Seriously, Akiyama-san? You should really work on that?"

Akiyama chuckled, "I was pretty sure I left the note in a good place. Guess she mistook it for one of the messy papers around the office. What have you been up to Haruka-chan?"

"Nothing too much really, mostly been taking care of Haruto."

The three of them chatted for a bit before making it down to the Champion District, specifically the little alleyway that leads to a deadend. Usually the perfect spot for meetings and all that since usually one side doesn't have a way out.

"Haruto, when they show up get behind me." Haruka told her son as the four of them waited for the kidnappers to show up, hopefully with Yuta in tow.

They waited and waited, but no one was showing up. Not even a random homeless person bothered to walk in.

"Strange." Yagami put a hand to his ears, "Something's up. I don't hear the sounds of the city?"

"Me neither." Akiyama did the same thing.

Before either of them decided to dash out of the alleyway they all heard a small chink hit the ground. A small oval shaped device was on the ground… before it exploded into pure white.

…

..

.

Akiyama was the first to awaken in the alleyway with the sun beating down upon his face. He could've sworn the buildings around them were a bit smaller than usual. Yagami, Haruto, and Haruka were still knocked out. Akiyama couldn't wake them up as he got groans in response.

"This is no time for a nap."

Akiyama made his way out of the alleyway to simply get his legs working again. He regretted it immediately as the surroundings around him were completely unfamiliar. Sure there were people walking around on what appeared to be the latest smartphones, but something appeared different about them. Well that wasn't discounting the fact that the area around him was completely different from the Champion District.

The alleyway was between a Chinese Restaurant and a nondescript building. There were no obvious neon signs that should be strewn about everywhere and a lot of the signs seemed to tell that the area wasn't the Champion District. He still couldn't get what was up with the people around him though, they seemed 'old fashioned, but not really?'

His distraction culminated in him bumping into a random woman. She seemed to be the most 'normal' to him as she wore what appeared to be a bartender's outfit, "Sorry about that. Do you happen to know what day it is today?"

The woman checked her extremely different phone, "It's XX X of Taisho 29."

Akiyama had to do a double take was she confused or something, "I'm sorry what?"

"Oh are you a foreigner? Herro, it is 1940 XX X and 10 in za mo-ning. Did I herpu?"

"Thank you." Akiyama somewhat said without raising his brows in confusion.

The woman nodded happily as she made her way past him.

"What the hell is going on?"

…..

Welp that's a wrap from me. These are mostly just pre-mature chapters before the English release of the game in Spring of 2020. I'm surprised I was able to get this outta my head and onto the screen.

Most of the action will take place on foot as the Yakuza side of the story takes in and adds some of its juice to the Sakura Wars world. I guess I should really let the story explain itself huh? But it's mostly to avoid immediately having all the protagonists just fall in with the other protagonists of course.

But yeah, there's going to be 5 main leads in this story. 3 from Yakuza series world and 2 from well Steampowered Sakura Wars world. Obviously Haruka, Yagami, Akiyama for Yakuza.

And Seijuro for Sakura Wars side- also an OC to fill in the inexperienced civilian being roped into things gap. Seijuro obviously won't be going around picking fights a lot compared to the others. I hope people stick around for this strange story idea.

See ya next time