Collar x Malice – Takeru Sasazuka

Takeru (CV: Namikawa Daisuke) was part of the Metropolitan Police Cyber Crime Department so he’s very knowledgeable in hacking and decoding. He’s not really sociable and likes to test the knowledge of others to deem them useful to him.

If Ichika decides to investigate the August incident, it follows down Takeru’s path. It was due to the August incident that the “Shinjuku Quarantine” as well as the “The Shinjuku limited lifting of Swords and Firearms Control Law” was established. And so, another video is sent showing a man tied up with a timer shown on his chest with the words “help me” displayed. They found the crime site scene pretty quickly, but were not able to save him in time. Ichika writes up a report on this newest incident and the management officer of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police investigation section 1, Minegishi Seiji, takes a look at it. He wishes her luck with the case, as well as with Yanagi and the others. This shocks Ichika that he knows about them and her, and just then she gets a text from Takeru to come to their hideout after work.

She works for a while before Mochida suggests she goes home. But instead of go home of course, she meets Shiraishi who gets ready to pick her up and take her to the detective office. He asks what she decided to investigate, and she tells him the August incident. So on their way there, Ichika remembers what Sakuragawa said about using donuts to stay on Takeru’s good side. So she goes to a shop and buys donuts for him. When she arrives at the detective office, Takeru immediately notices the donuts and takes them from her and basically tells her Japanese sweets are a no-no for him. After living a abroad for a while, Takeru adapted to the food being more sweet. So he doesn’t like bitter tastes in his sweets. Ichika even asks if he likes sweet bean paste but he says he prefers chili beans lmao.

So they begin to discuss the incident that took place today. Takeru already found the video file sent to the police station. Ichika hadn’t seen it yet so he shows her the video. The victim’s name was Satoru Tanaka and he was shown with a countdown on his chest. He stated if the police came before the timer hit zero, he would be saved. Unfortunately the police did not make it in time. Apparently he was a developer of the same online game related tot he August X-Day incident. And after that incident, he left the company and moved away.

When he asks what case she chose to investigate, she tells him August and he immediately says there’s no we she can and she’d only get in the way. Yanagi speaks with her alone and tells her that he doesn’t think its a good idea for her to partner up with Takeru. He took on the August case in order to relieve the “Shinjuku firearms and sword control law” and will do whatever means necessary to reach his goal, even if it means putting her life in danger (especially due to his suspicions of her). Takeru is more of the solo type, but would be happy to allow her to work with him instead. But Ichika still wants to convince Takeru otherwise since she too wants to change Shinjuku back to the way it was.

So she again tries to convince him yo let her work with him. She says she wants the same thing he wants and pleads him to be partners with her. He ignores her for a while before saying “And how would you be useful?” unless she’s used as a pawn, he doesn’t believe she can prove useful to him. But she persists again until he finally gives in and asks what sort of special skill she has. She says cooking and he’s all “wtf be serious” so she says she’s good at shooting even though she’s never shot an actual person before. He still isn’t convinced, but she presses on and says she won’t give up. Takeru finally says he’ll test her knowledge to see if she can figure out why the victim was so close to getting caught.

The next day another incident happens and a video is uploaded with a fire erupting near the Shinjuku park. Hishino finally does some research on both incidents to figure out what Takeru was testing her on. Apparently an important witness had been caught. She realizes the keyword for the the shooting incident and August incident is “Online Game” and the fire and September incident is “Stalker”. Finally, after talking with Shiraishi, Ichika figures out the answer and heads to the detective office. But when she calls Takeru, he tells her to come tomorrow instead (lol automatic bad end if you go to the park). Once she gets home she sees her younger brother leave again to his friend’s housr and gets pissed off when Ichika gets worried about him saying she only acts like a older sister when its convenient to her.

The next day Ichika heads the detective office. She meets Takeru on the rooftop and tells him she found the answer. She believes the murder was a proxy murder (a murder by someone giving orders), and the witnesses taken into custody were suspects of the past incidents but were released because they had a perfect alibi at the time. But now, they have no alibi for this incident. So basically all the crimes “Adonis” makes are within the organization and so they can create the perect alibis for each other.

He gives her 75 points saying she missed a few points. Although, he’s surprised she managed to figure out this much, considering the idiot she is. She’s super stoked and he laughs saying she’s more like a dog than a cat and calls her an idot dog. Well, apparently her reward is a donut and he doesn’t give a donut to just anyone, so she should be honored LMAO. So she accepts the donut but he tells her to not misunderstand and he sees her more as a pawn rather than partner.

So they review what they went over. Basically, they still don’t know the true motive of the crime. But it’s highly likely the motive is “revenge” since in pass incidents, innocent people were involved. But its possible that “Adonis” want them to notice since Ichika has that collar on her neck and they may ne able to hear everything being said. In addition, they must uncover the truth before the end of December.

Before Ichika leaves, Takeru says he’s hungry so he tells her to come with him. So they walk downtown and Takeru basically forces Ichika to decide on what to eat. So as he starts to countdown, she finally decides on a place. Its the same tavern Ichika would often go to with Saeki. Ichika brings up how he and Sakuragwa were in America together, and apparently he hated school there and almost dropped out. He eventually got into a business and learned from his dad in IT about hacking and computers. Ichika asks why he became a police officer in Japan in the first place but he gets kinda grim over it so she changes the subject and asks if he thinks she can learn to hack too. He of course says that’d be impossible for someone like her.

After that, just as they’re about to leave, Ichika spots her brother with his friend, Akito, across the street. Takeru makes a shocked look when he sees them though, and tells her to wait and text her brother asking where he is instead. She sees him reply that he’s at his Akito’s house, which he’s clearly not. This makes Ichika wonder why he’d lie to her and what he’s been really doing when he’s said he’s been at his friend’s house. Takeru changes his mind and says he will escort her home. So they take a taxi to her place and he immediately goes to her apartment with her. He asks to see his brother’s room but Ichika demands an explanation beforehand. Apparently Kazuki’s friend, Akito, is one of the suspects of the June incident. So, they search her brother’s room for clues on that incident or Akito Sera.

They find weird written fan letters, depressing rebellious teenage music lyrics, a calendar with events and recordings planned, and a CD with a singer named Isshiki Yasuhiko, who was apparently also a suspect at one point. After searching, Ichika can barely comprehend the fact her brother could be in danger and the fact she really knew nothing about him. She’s overwhelmed to the point of collapsing on the ground, but Takeru catches her and tells her to calm down. He tells her to decide what she should do as a police officer, and as Kazuki’s sister. She finally calms down and decides that she’ll prove that he’s not involved in the incident, and if he is, she’ll stop him no matter what

Kazuki’s live performance takes place at 7 pm that night so she and Takeru decide to go to investigate and hopefully prove her brother’s innocence. When they finally arrive they see Hana (the girl who wrote the letter) go on about Hiro and Kazuki. When the performance starts, they both see Kazuki and Hiro on stage. Both Takeru and Ichika admit Kazuki guitar performance is really great and it brings Hsohino to tears. They suddenly spot Akito and talk to him outside.

He wonders why she’s here and Takeru explains that she was worried for her brother not coming home in days, so she searched his room and noticed the live performance was today. Akito realized she must of found out Kazuki was lying to her, and apologizes on his behalf saying that he was practicing in secret for this performance and was cheering him on. He tells her that Kazuki actually wants to be recognized by Ichika, but just comes off harshly. He says he knows more than anyone the pain of misunderstanding each other and knows they’d regret it later.

After this, Ichika finds it hard to believe a friend who believes in Kazuki like that could actually be a suspect. But Takeru points out that Akito’s sister, named Kanade, was actually a victim of bullying in that middle school that was bombed and killed herself because of it. Which gives Akito the motive to commit this crime, and it also explains why he was so understanding of Ichika and Kazuki’s relationship. So Takeru tells Ichika to keep an eye on Akito. That night at 11:00 pm, another video is shown of 3 people standing on the top of a roof ready for their “punishment” of resulting the death of a child, as stated by the voice in the video. They’re pushed off and it cuts to black as the sound of bodies hit the ground.

The next morning Kazuki comes home and is in a much better mood (probably due to his performance doing well). When Ichika goes to work, she writes up a report on the latest incident and gives it to Minegishi. After which he invites her and Takeru to talk. So they meet up at a fancy restaurant and Minegishi talks about how Takeru was personally scouted after winning a computer hacking contest. So Takeru finally asks him to get business and Minegishi says he knows he started his own investigation, but he wants him to come back to the police force. Apparently a suspect in custody named Souda Manabu, is soon to be released if no proof can be found. That’s why he wants Takeru’s help on the case, but he declines and leaves.

The next day Ichika texts Takeru after work but he doesn’t respond. So she heads over to the detective office as well and Mineo tells her he’s probably at home. So thanks to Minegishi giving her his address, she looks for his place and calls him telling him she’s headed there. He’s reluctant at first but tells her to pick up some food for him since he’s hungry lol. So she brings him so food to his place and he’s pleasantly pleased. Unfortunately, thanks to Minegishi tightening security, he’s no longer able to hack into the police’s emails or enter their network. This is obviously a way to convince him to join the police again, and so Ichika asks why he doesn’t want to come back and why he left in the first place. He again refuses to answer and goes to bed.

Ichika cleans up a bit and just before she leaves, she notices the door doesn’t lock on it’s own so she tries to wake Takeru up to lock the door. But he won’t wake up and suddenly he ends up grabbing Ichika in his sleep and uses her as his own body pillow lmao. She can’t escape though and ends up falling asleep herself. When she wakes up she flips out and apologizes for overstaying her welcome (well she did just sleep with her partner lmao) he teases her though and says he wouldn’t mind doing that again if she really wants to if ya know what I mean 😏. Anyway she finally leaves after he tells her to go already lmao.

That night Ichika texts Takeru that Kazuki invited Akito over for dinner. This is obviously a good opportunity to investigate him, so he agrees to join them. Ichika didn’t say she was inviting Takeru, but he says just to follow his lead and act normal as possible. So once they reach her place, when Kazuki asks who Takeru is, he says he’s Ichika’s boyfriend (I stg I knew he was gonna say that lmao). Ichika almost flips her lid and Kazuki is all “Wait why are you surprised?” but Takeru plays it out nicely and says she’s just shy about it and it’s nice to meet his otouto 😂. Soon Akito comes out as well and Takeru immediately greets him as Ichika’s boyfriend.

So while Ichika cooks dinner, Takeru and Kazuki fight over who sits where lmao. He also asks him to call him “onii-sama” if he likes and he’s all hell no. Soon Ichika finishes making dinner and they all gather around a small table together. Takeru and Kazuki immediately start bickering and Akito tries his hardest to intervene and change the topic. He mentions Kazuki’s guitar playing and gives Ichika CD of his live performance. Takeru then asks Ichika for more servings and Kazuki makes a comment that she doesn’t need to heed his every command like an domineering husband. Takeru is all lol what are you a siscon or something? LMAO. Cause he’s gonna treat his woman the way he wants. Akito then asks how they met and Akito says it was a work romance, but Takeru says he was a former police officer.

After dinner, Akito says he wants something sweet so he asks Akito to come with him. So Ichika convinces her brother to help clean up at home while they go out together. While they’re gone, Ichika finally has a proper talk with her brother about his dream. She never supported him with his dream of getting into the music industry, but she truly believes in him and will support him all the way.

As for Takeru and Akito, he already knew Takeru came in order to speak with him. So Akito tells him that he already knew Kazuki before the accident, so he being friends with him had nothing to do with the fact he has a sister who’s a police officer. He knows he still suspects him, asks him not to mention any of this to Kazuki since he doesn’t want to worry him. He asks to exchange numbers with him, leaving Takeru in high suspicions.

The next day Minegishi requests that Ichika questions the witness and suspect of the other incident, Souda Manabu. He goes on like a broken record for them to return his phone so he can log onto his game. So Ichika lets him borrow his phone and he flips out. He downloads his app and she asks for him to show it to him. He goes on about being God on this site, and when he returns the phone reluctantly, he yells at her to make sure she comes back to let him log in. After that, Ichika texts Takeru in a manner that makes it seem like she wants to ask him out or something LOL. So she explains the situation and he’s all wtf don’t be so confusing and hangs up. He texts her though to bring donuts on her way there.

So when she arrives there basically they have a discussion on what Souda was yammering about. Takeru explains about online games and how it’s an escapism on life, it’s mostly for people who have a hard time communicating with people in real life, and how cyberbulling is enacted via messages in virtual worlds (basically, if you ever played a MMO you’d completely understand where he’s getting at). So Okazaki suddenly bursts in and says he found Sera Akito but fled the moment they ambushed him. So this confirms that Akito is working with Adonis and leaves Ichika worried for her brother.

Next day, Kazuki is worried that Akito isn’t replying to his texts or answering his phone. Plus Ichika feels like shit having to lie to her brother. So Minegishi knows that Ichika’s brother is close to Akito and wants to ask him questions as a witness. But before that, Ichika decides to explain to Kazuki the truth about Akito. Kazuki is completely in denial at first, but both Akira and Ichika convince him that he’s most certainly involved in someway. So Kazuki finally agrees to provide a testimony but for Akito’s sake since he still believes in him. He leaves to be alone in his room while Okazaki stays over watch for him for protective purposes.

Ichika walks Akito outside to leave but still has a depressed look on her face. Akira asks what’s wrong with her but she just says she’s fine. He starts calling all the names he’d often call her like idiot cat, pooch, even deer in headlights lmao. Finally, he calls her by her first name, Ichiko, for the first time. She looks up at him and he holds her face asking why she’s crying. She apologizes but she just can’t stop. So he kisses her, much to her surprise lol. He tells her he’s here and it’s okay to rely on him since they’re partners. He wishes her a goodnight and leaves.

The next day, Kazuki is taken in for questioning about Akito. Meanwhile, while Akira and Ichika are in Minegishi’s office, suddenly there’s a X-Day incident. The Tokyo Metropolitan Government building had been blown up. And to make matters worse, their suspect Souda Manabu escaped because a event in his game was starting. So they conduct a plan to catch Souda Manabu and strip him of his “god” appearance. Takeru has a bug planted in the game (I think its essentially hacking) where items go missing and power is weakened and players have no control. They make it so Souma’s responsible of this so he loses all of his followers in his guild since they no longer believe him and start trashing his ass up on the chat room. And of course, this makes him lose his shit.

Back at the department, its reported Souma has a gun and is asking for “that woman” who is obviously Ichika since she was the one who lent him her phone. So he thinks she’s responsible for it. When they arrive where he is, he threatens Ichika immediately when he sees her. But Takeru intervenes and says he’s the one responsible and basically tells him to stop believing he’s some sort of god cause those followers of his left him easily and he needs to face reality. Just as he’s about to shoot, Ichika shoots him in the hand and the police arrest him. Takeru starts losing his shit though saying he doesn’t want to lose someone again and falls unconscious.

When he wakes up he’s back at the detective office. He goes up to the rooftop and explains to Ichika he’s weak to guns after a trauma with his mother’s death. When he was still living in America, Takeru got caught up in a street gang and a guy almost shot Takeru but his mother pushed him out of the way and got shot instead (lol only in america). The guy who did it was caught but since he was a minor, nothing came out of it. He actually had plans to kill him but didn’t go through with it. And that’s why he went back to Japan because unlike the shit control in the states, Japan has strict gun laws. Unfortunately, not long after enrolling in the police, that law was lifted and guns were used more than ever in Japan. So that’s why Takeru left, because his goal of being able use guns to protect basically backfired after the the new gun law.

Suddenly the voice comes out from Ichika’s collar. They heard their conversation and tell Takeru should join “Adonis” since they understand how he feels. How the police won’t give the justice they deserve so they have to take matters in their own hands. Takeru says he’s not interested though and the voice stops. The next day, Akira goes to the interrogation room to speak with Souda Manabu. Akira tries to rile him up and he gets pissed off, but suddenly he starts flipping out and starts yelling to not kill him and he falls to the ground. After that, he speaks as if he has no memory of where he is or what happened. Apparently there was a chip in his neck and that’s how he was given direct commands and that may have altered his memory. Although Takeru is pissed he could track the location of the person responsible from the chip.

That night, both Akira and Ichika drown their sorrows in drinking. Ichika, who clearly gets drunk easily, gets pretty drunk and Takeru has to tell her no more girl lol. So when Takeru starts saying some depressing things, a drunk Ichika tells him to stop being an idiot and stfu and never leave or she’ll cry lol. She ends up falling asleep on top of him and wakes up in bed with him again lmao.

So Takeru is sent by Akito a username and a time. And at 10:00 Takeru opens up a video chat of Akito. He tells him that he was responsible of the government bombing and then shows Takeru a surprising survalance clip. It shows the culprit of his mother’s murder (he was Japanese American), who apparently went back to Japan. Adonis is giving Takeru a chance at his revenge and that’s the message, Zero (Adonis’ leader), wanted to give Takeru.

This leaves Takeru frustrated and wants to be left alone. Thanks to what Ichika told him though about not leaving her or she’d be upset, he remains convinced to not let revenge overtake him. So over a span of a few days he manages to figure out Akira secretly mentioned a code to him. He asked Kazuki about anything Akito left behind for him and there was a music file called “atonement”, although it was actually a data file that Akira left for him to decipher.

So after receiving the other file from Isshiki, Takeru finally manages to crack the file and obtain a whole lot of data and shit on Adonis, and finally, a way to remove the collar on Ichika’s neck. After that, Takeru reports to the police department and they send out them to infiltrate Adonis’ hideout which was within the code Akira deciphered. They catch a lot of the “Adonis” members but a lot of their memories were wiped like Manabu Souda.

So a day before Christmas eve, Takeru invites Ichika out to a restaurant as a reward for her help. She feels like she didn’t help much, but Takeru tells her it’s thanks to her he didn’t take the chance for revenge like Adonis gave him because he didn’t want to see her cry. Ichika can hold back her feels no more and she hugs Takeru from behind and confesses she loves him. Takeru is all baakaaa you were mine for a while now lol. So he tells her he loves her too and I’m pretty sure they make love that night cause she didnt meet Kazuki’s so called curfew lmao. So the next day when Sakuragawa tries to get the deats, Takeru whisks her away and says she’s his so she doesn’t need to get weird about mentioning their relationship and kisses her.

In the epilogue, Ichika is writing up a report on the X-day incident and how Shinjuku is slowly but surely returning to the way it was. Akito is in a holding cell and still doesn’t remember anything or Kazuki when he visited. That night Ichika makes curry for him and sulks over being in different departments from him but Takeru says once her siscon brother moves away they’ll be able to live together someday.

In the tragic love end, I wouldn’t really call it “tragic” but basically it ends the same way as the normal end but Ichika and Takeru never recognize their feelings or confess their obvious feelings for each other. Takeru gives Ichika a necklace that he didn’t get to give her during Christmas (cause he was so busy) and they end up working separately from each other.

As for bad ends, there’s like 3 or 4 of them but most of them consist of Ichika getting killed randomly like when she goes to the park a little girl and her brother kill her. Or she’s put in a hostage situation and shot in the head with Takeru despairing.

Thoughts: Ahhh I surprisingly liked Takeru a lot more than I thought I would. He was sooooo cute actually ended up being my fave. Though he may look like a shota, don’t let your eyes deceive you, he’s no shota lmao. Though I get why people would think so cause he’s kinda shorter than everyone else and has a small face (like I sorta expected his voice to be higher). Anyways as for the route itself there was a lot of deciphering, questioning, and so much text. I think that’s why I ended up writing a lot cause there was just a lot to write about cause while there was some really sweet romance moments, there were a lot of other detective-solving moments. I was pretty immersed in his story though, and his past made you just wanna give him a hug. His route wasn’t full on action though, and much truth was left uncovered (this is probably to avoid spoilers for a major route like Aiji). But it was fun, he’s really just a lonely smartass tsun who calls you baka or baka-neko 1,000 times. (´～｀◦ ;)ヾ