24. Shounen Brave I

Shounen Brave I (少年ブレイヴI Shōnen Bureibu I) is the twenty-fourth chapter of the Kagerou Daze manga.

Summary

 * In a flashback set several years ago, Seto is seen running through a crowd in the city. Due to his eye ability going out of control, he is forced to listen to all of the negative thoughts the people in the crowd are thinking, even though he is trying to tune them out by listening to music on his earphones. He is overwhelmed by all of the noise, so he decides to go someplace where he would not have to hear them as much.


 * The scene changes to a forest where Seto is asleep and surrounded by forest animals. He slowly opens his eyes and gets scared by the group of animals watching him. As he wonders how he got into the forest, his eye ability activates again, and he starts hearing their thoughts. He is confused for a moment, but then remembers his strange power and how he was struggling to suppress it for the past two days. Despite his effort, it went out of control and caused him to be overwhelmed by everyone's negative thoughts.


 * Seto's thoughts are interrupted by some skittering to his right. It is coming from a naked mole-rat and Seto assumes that it got scared by him. He tries to reassure the creature that he has no intention of hurting him, reaching out his hand and introducing himself, but the mole-rat responds by calling him a snot-nosed brat. The animals get increasingly hostile towards Seto while he begins to tear up out of fear. He tries to convince them that he means no harm, but a tanuki growls and lunges at the boy in an attempt to attack him. Before he could do any harm to the boy, the tanuki is stopped by a voice that tells it to wait.


 * The animals begin to murmur that the chief has arrived, and a moose approaches the group. As the moose gets closer to Seto, he starts to shiver and swear that he just got lost and was not there to do anything bad. The chief notes that seeing a human in that part of the forest is rare and warns him that he will pay if he puts any of the animals in harm's way. Seto realizes that the chief of the forest is not the moose, but a hamster sitting on the moose's head. The chief notices Seto's red eyes, saying that he must be from "that monster clan" so it was not surprising that he has arrived in the forest. While Seto wonders what the chief meant by "monster clan", the hamster tells him to follow him and that he will guide him to where he belongs.


 * While he is following the chief of the forest, Seto wonders where they are going and if the hamster knows anything about him since it called him a monster. He also feels relaxed now that his mind is not overflowing with other people's thoughts and thinks that he will be in the forest for a while, even though he shouldn't. Before he could finish that thought, he steps on something squishy which ends up being an anaconda. It hisses at the boy, but the chief intervenes and manages to scare it away. The chief warns Seto to be more careful, as he is as much in the wrong as the anaconda and the boy admires how cool the chief is.


 * The sun begins to set and an exhausted Seto wonders how long it will take to reach their destination. The chief then says that they will be camping in a cave for the night. Inside the cave, Seto curls up next to the moose and thinks about his family which makes him tear up. While Seto is asleep, the chief thinks of the red eyes spoken in their traditions, hoping that it doesn't signify their doom. He looks up at the night sky and wonders where Azami is and what she is doing.

Trivia

 * This chapter was originally published without a numeral, but it was added in the volume.