Simply put, first place meant top of their class, and second place meant runner-up.
For Kurona and Nashiro to claim both positions simultaneously—even without Byakuya's sudden appearance, that would have been difficult to achieve.
In other words, the Yasuhisa sisters were already under tremendous pressure. Byakuya's arrival had only multiplied it.
That explained their intense hostility toward him.
Now Byakuya finally understood the full picture. Just as he'd suspected—it was all connected to Kanou.
That man really did a number on these two sisters...
Byakuya murmured under his breath.
If Kanou had shown even the slightest consideration or care for Kurona and Nashiro, Byakuya wouldn't be saying this.
In the original story, Kanou had manipulated the Yasuhisa sisters into undergoing his artificial half-ghoul experiments. Using Rize's kakuhou and kagune, he'd transformed them into one-eyed ghouls just like Kaneki.
Later, when Kanou's underground laboratory was discovered, Aogiri Tree, the CCG, and Kaneki's squad all converged on the facility. Kurona and Nashiro, trying to protect their "father," encountered Suzuya—by then a Rank 2 investigator.
Even as one-eyed ghouls fighting together, the two sisters were no match for Suzuya.
Perhaps harboring resentment from the sisters' earlier coldness and disdain, Suzuya showed no mercy. He'd even taunted them, threatening to rip out their intestines and see whose were longer. He'd beaten them brutally.
Still, Suzuya hadn't gone for the kill. When Nashiro was critically wounded, he let Kurona escape.
Nashiro was dying from her injuries. Kurona desperately searched for their "father," hoping he would save them.
But Kanou had already allied with Aogiri Tree by then. They protected him from the CCG while he continued conducting half-ghoul experiments for them.
As for the critically wounded, dying Nashiro? Kanou completely ignored her. Even if there was virtually no hope of saving her, his attitude lacked any trace of human feeling.
Kurona feared Nashiro wouldn't last, so she absorbed Nashiro into her own body. She could only search alone for a way to save her sister.
In the end, of course, Nashiro couldn't be saved. She merged entirely with Kurona—no consciousness, no vital signs. Kanou had even dismissed Nashiro's faint remaining breath as nothing more than "passing gas."
In short, Kanou was an absolute villain. His disregard for human life surpassed even Rize's.
He was the type who could never be redeemed—yet simultaneously, he possessed a certain villainous charisma.
Until his final breath, he never regretted anything he'd done. His goal aligned with Furuta's: he believed the world was trapped in a twisted "birdcage," and he wanted to shatter it. Only a "one-eyed ghoul" could fulfill that purpose. He was willing to pay any price.
And he succeeded. Kaneki, his creation, achieved his vision.
The catalyst for all of it was his mother, who had died from an incurable illness. In Kanou's view, if ghouls could be used in medical research, they could surely develop treatments for such diseases.
After his mother's death, he changed. He came to believe this pitiful world needed to be remade. He knew full well how evil his actions were.
So as the new world dawned—believing someone like himself had no place in it—he chose to put a gun in his mouth. That was the ultimate expression of his cold rationality.
He died at his mother's grave. He surely had no regrets and believed he'd done nothing wrong.
Later, medical research into ghouls and "Dragon cells" rapidly conquered countless formerly incurable diseases. Even Shinohara, who'd been in a vegetative state for years, made a full recovery.
Now that they've lost Rize as an experimental subject, I wonder what Kanou and Furuta will do next...
Byakuya pondered this, completely oblivious to the various stares from surrounding passengers.
After all, two cute girls—twins, no less—were leaning on his shoulders, one on each side. It was quite the spectacle.
He couldn't exactly shake Kurona and Nashiro awake and tell them to move.
...
It was almost time for the Yasuhisa sisters' stop, but neither showed signs of waking.
Byakuya remembered this was their station, so he spoke up: "Kurona-san, Nashiro-san, this is your stop."
He also gently nudged them with his shoulders to wake them.
"Hmm...? We're here already?"
Kurona was still groggy from sleep. She raised her head and rubbed her eyes, not registering what she'd been doing.
Nashiro, however, snapped to awareness immediately. Embarrassment flooded her—she'd actually fallen asleep and leaned on Byakuya!
Face slightly flushed, Nashiro stood to exit, pretending nothing had happened.
Kurona still hadn't noticed anything amiss and followed her sister off the train.
Byakuya said nothing throughout, acting as if nothing had occurred.
After they'd disembarked, Nashiro noticed Kurona's expression was completely normal—as if the earlier incident had never happened at all.
But Nashiro had woken slightly before Kurona. She'd seen Kurona leaning on Byakuya too.
Did Kurona really not care?
Curious, Nashiro whispered to her sister: "Kurona... don't you realize what you were doing?"
"What was I doing?"
Kurona had no idea what Nashiro meant.
"You know... you accidentally fell asleep, and you were sleeping on Amaha Byakuya's shoulder..."
Nashiro briefly explained the situation.
"..."
It took Kurona a moment to process. Then her eyes went wide, pupils trembling slightly with disbelief. "I... I was sleeping on his shoulder?!"
Nashiro was relieved now. She'd thought she was the only one dying of embarrassment, but Kurona had simply been completely unaware.
But the most important thing was that Byakuya knew exactly what had happened. Thinking about that made Nashiro feel even more embarrassed and shy.