Shadow Falcon (シャドーファルコン Shadōfarukon), who also uses the disguise Dick Krugland (ディック・クルーグランド Dikku Kurūgurando), is a ninja-for-hire who appears in both Black Lagoon light novels Shaitane Badi and Ballad of the Sinful Wizard.
Appearance[]
Shadow Falcon is a tall Caucasian man with blue eyes, pale skin, and short blond hair.[1] He has a muscular body with very little excess fat, sturdy shoulders and thick pectorals, and all of his body is covered in black ninja clothing except for his eyes.[2] He also has a cleft chin.
Personality[]
Shadow Falcon, viewing himself as a trained ninja, acted calmly towards others as well as acting calm in battle. He has a gentle and polite personality and desires to do good for others. Despite his great fighting and stealth skills, he is socially aloof, on one occasion being unaware that a disguise he wore looked completely false to any person's eyes.[3] He is also easily fooled, as demonstrated by becoming a ninja due to a magazine advertisement[2] and Triad members pretending that his disguise worked. As a part of his exaggerated ninja persona, he also frequently states philosophical proverbs concerning people's character such as loyalty and maintaining one's calmness. Besides English, Falcon also has moderate familiarity with the Thai and Hokkien languages.[4] He furiously dislikes the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles franchise, viewing it as a mockery of the ninja path.[2]
Abilities[]
Falcon has great stamina and speed due to his muscular body and ninja training, being able to avoid bullets and the barrels of guns before people can shoot at him. His various weapons include a bagh nakh, caltrops, ball bearings, smoke bombs, a Japanese blowgun (fukiya) with nitrocellulose-soaked darts, shuriken, and a sword made of duralumin. He is also trained in virtually all ninja arts, including ongyou no jutsu (moving/hiding unseen in the shadows), utsusemi no jutsu (replacing oneself with a dummy to avoid fatal attacks), and suiton no jutsu (moving swiftly through water as if one was walking on land), although he is quite bad at genwaku no jutsu (changing the boundary between reality and lies).
Shaitane Badi history[]
Chapter 1[]
Shadow Falcon was hired by Jane along with several other people to assassinate Mister Chang on a Triad ship, the Zaltzman. The night of the attack, Falcon accompanied the other passengers onto the Black Lagoon, with the Lagoon Company unaware that the tanker that they planned to attack belonged to the Hong Kong Triad. When the attack began, the ninja allegedly left the cabin, and Dutch and Benny were surprised to learn about the enemy ship belonging to the Triad. In their bewilderment, Benny told Dutch to look out, and Dutch ducked to barely dodge Falcon's knife, making Dutch pull out his revolver to shoot. Quickly adapting, Falcon threw some smoke powder to conceal his whereabouts and confuse Dutch before he could shoot, with the Lagoon captain realizing that Falcon was hired to act as sabotage.
Backing away from the smoke, Dutch then heard the noises of the steering gear breaking due to Falcon in the smoke damaging the machinery. Although Dutch saw Falcon's shadow, his bullets did not hit the fast-moving silhouette. Immediately, Falcon left the room and pushed Rock down into the cabin as he fled, so Dutch told Benny to get grenades from the armory. Once getting the grenades, Dutch threw 4 grenades into the nearby water, causing great explosions. After the loud noise ceased, Dutch's crew saw a trail of red color and black cloth in the water, showing that the ninja disappeared. He wondered how the ninja was able to leave one of the Zodiac boats and swim and climb back aboard his ship, and Rock mentioned something about how a ninja could train to walk on water.[1]
Chapter 2[]
Once the enemy had to abort their attack, the Black Lagoon docked back in Roanapur and Mister Chang, Benny and Dutch disembarked as the latter two explained their innocence. As they left, it was revealed that Falcon stayed hidden in the engine room using the ninja art of ongyou no jutsu to conceal himself into his surroundings despite being in Benny's sight. He also used a dummy to fake his death and used red dye for blood, taking advantage of his time in the engine room to hear the Lagoon Company's plans and then slipping out of the boat after the Lagoon crew left.[5]
Chapter 3[]
When Revy and Shenhua attacked the mercenaries' hideout, Shenhua and the Albondigas brothers went to the back area to attack, but a shadow silently killed Uno and Tres of the Albondigas brothers, putting Shenhua on edge. Dos had his shotgun ready to strike, but Falcon jumped on him from above and kicked him off the catwalk, surviving the fall by using Dos' body to break the fall. As he quickly got up, he barely missed being cut by Shenhua's kukri and cut her dual-knife cord, making Shenhua's corded kukri useless. Falcon then stood in front of Shenhua in an unusual fighting stance, making Shenhua panic since the stance was so abnormal that Shenhua could not read his next attack, be it a counter or a strike. Thinking in a hurry, Shenhua threw a knife at him, but Falcon had already reached for his smoke bomb and threw it onto the ground, hopping back and blocking Shenhua's vision until she hopped backward out of the cloud as well. As she moved, she quickly dodged a shuriken and hid behind a pillar, frightenedly asking Falcon his name without receiving a reply.
Meanwhile, Jake was dueling with Revy elsewhere in the warehouse until Shadow Falcon appeared behind him, startling him. Falcon informed him that Stanislav Kandinsky had left the building and advised that he should leave too. Jake responded that he wanted to flee but he could not escape Revy, so Falcon volunteered to help him. As Revy ran toward the fleeing Jake, Falcon tossed some ball bearings and caltrops in front of her path before she could shoot, tripping her. Revy tried to use her other pistol, but Falcon fired a dart from his blowgun into the barrel, making Revy pause and letting Falcon flee. After the ninja fled, Revy saw that the dart in the barrel was soaked with a flammable material.[6]
Chapter 4[]
Later the next night when Rock went to a warehouse to move some stuff there, he exited the warehouse and realized that he lost his keys to lock up the warehouse. He then realized that the warehouse was already open when he arrived, making him realize something was wrong. Immediately, Rock looked behind him and saw the tall ninja dressed in all-black clothing. He screamed but was interrupted by Shadow Falcon reciting a ninja chant to hypnotize Rock, knocking him unconscious.
After abducting Rock, Falcon went to the Lafette Roanapur Hotel and climbed to the floor where his contractor Jane was staying, knocking on the balcony door. Jane let him inside, and he rested against a wall while Jake argued with Jane, and the former eventually quit after berating Jane for having a suspicious plan. Before leaving the room, Jake asked Falcon what he planned on doing, and Falcon replied that he would strike down Chang with his blade. After he left, Falcon then calmly told Jane that he would take down Chang on his own, with Jane subsequently responding that Falcon would not get paid if he did not follow her plan, but Falcon stated that he only followed the Mandate of Heaven, slipping out of the French window.
Waking up in a motel room, Rock saw Falcon repeating a chant next to a candle, the only source of light in the room. As he stared at Falcon and gathered his thoughts, he saw the ninja finishing stirring a bowl to make tea, respectfully presenting the tea to Rock, who hesitated but drank the cup. Becoming more awake from the tea's delicious taste, Rock asked the ninja who he was, and he replied that he was merely a shadow but people called him Shadow Falcon. Rock remained friendly but impatient since he wanted to return home, and he tried asking Falcon about his ninja life, and Falcon showed him a ninja booklet that he used to become a full-fledged ninja.
Rock then asked about the OMC logo on the book, and Falcon replied that he discovered the Oriental Mystic Collections' products through a kung fu magazine, making Rock realize that Falcon got scammed. Nonetheless, Rock noticed Falcon's well-toned body but was off-put by the ridiculousness of the pages in the booklet, which showed cheesy ninja moves and techniques. Rock then asked Falcon why he became a ninja, and Falcon replied that he wanted to stop being bullied at school and realized during his initial training that the heart was the primary force in fight before the sword, not vice versa.
Upon seeing Falcon's dull duralumin sword, Rock asked him if he was going to cut down Mister Chang, to which Falcon remarked that he had to use the ninja skill of genwaku no jutsu to sneak inside Chang's hideout. Falcon in turn asked Rock what his name was, and Rock replied with his full name. Raising his hand, Falcon told the Japanese man that he would disguise himself as Rock, promising that he would not tarnish Rock's reputation. An hour later after donning makeup and changing clothes, Falcon finished his disguise and looked into the mirror, admiring his own look but shocking Rock since the latter saw the horribly obvious nature of the disguise.[2]
Chapter 5[]
Leaving his motel with his "disguise" of Rock, he went to and stood in front of the Hot River Film Company building, soon entering the lobby. His disguise worked, as the guards greeted him and the receptionist recognized him, telling him that he could visit Chang by taking the elevator to the highest floor. Unknown to him, Chang earlier contacted his guards to let any suspicious individuals into the building and act like they were welcome. When Falcon got to the office, Chang's five bodyguards pointed their guns at him but then lowered their weapons, telling Chang on the intercom about his arrival. As Falcon walked through the building, the various employees laughed after he left each area due to his over-the-top ninja clothing. Immediately, Chang greeted the man as Rock, then quipping by stating his ninja name, shocking Falcon.
Falcon asked him how he knew his name, and Chang stated that he was a fellow ninja, showing Falcon a box with the OMC logo that was on Falcon's weapons. Awed by Chang's alleged master ninja rank as well as his ownership of a rare item, Falcon bowed deeply to Chang in respect. Accordingly, Chang commended him for being able to "sneak" past his guards and confront him, even forgiving him for attempting to kill him not knowing that he was a master ninja. Continuing his roleplay, Chang granted Falcon the title of Shadow Greater Ninja, exciting Falcon in addition to Chang giving him his new mission to go to Hong Kong and pledge his service to Chang's "master" there.
After Falcon left the office, Chang called the Triad leader Zhuang Dai-Long to inform him about Falcon's arrival and new membership in Hong Kong, adding that Falcon should not take any jobs involving disguise. When he hung up, Biu Yuyun asked Chang if he could send Falcon to Hong Kong in good faith, but the Triad boss replied that he could not let Shenhua kill Falcon, adding that it would be a while until Shenhua calmed down. Unknown to Falcon, OMC was a business run by the Triad's New York branch.[3]
Ballad of the Sinful Wizard history[]
Once arriving in Hong Kong, the Triad leaders there found Shadow Falcon's skills useful but found him difficult to deal with, so they sent him back to Mister Chang in Roanapur with a note telling him their reason.[7] Once returning to working for Chang, Falcon continues his work not only as an assassin but as a spy. At some point, Falcon disguised himself as an American man named Dick Krugland, who traveled around Asia for sex tourism using inheritance money from his parents.
Budaibang: Lu Tao[]
During his travels around Asia for 10 months, Krugland had learned some Thai and Hokkien and stayed in Roanapur as a guest, frequenting the Yellow Flag not only for the brothel upstairs but for buying drinks for everyone while singing the Star-Spangled Banner. Afterward, he made his way through the People's Republic of China in South China and arrived in Xiamen, where the Fujianese crime syndicate Budaibang is based. In Xiamen, he was robbed in the middle of a shop. Without his money, he was behind payments and as a result, Krugland became a lackey of Budaibang to pay off his high debt. Although the Budaibang members wanted to kill him for his lack of usefulness, the reputable Budaibang member Lu Tao decided to keep him alive, needing his language skills and familiarity with Roanapur, where Budaibang members had been for three months. In Roanapur, Krugland served as an informant for Lu Tao, as an interpreter for local usage of Thai, and as a guide for teaching the latter about Roanapur's layout, safehouses, and the territories of Roanapur's crime syndicates.
During his return to Roanapur, Krugland traveled around on his own without permission and frivolously spent money on prostitutes as well as buying rounds of alcohol at the Yellow Flag and using the brothel above the bar. Additionally, Krugland was told about the NSA intel given to Budaibang about Tricia O'Sullivan's whereabouts and allegedly leaked the info, angering Lu Tao. Subsequently, Krugland was brought to the cheap inn where Lu Tao took refuge and interrogated, and Krugland told the latter about the recent fight at the Yellow Flag. After Lu Tao went to the bar and got no information from Bao and saw the crime scene already cleaned up, he went back to the inn and berated Krugland for supposedly lying to him, but Krugland pleaded in English for his life, stating that Bao's service is clean and he had used the brothel many times for sexual intercourse and bought drinks for people. Grabbing Krugland's neck, Lu Tao threatened to kill him but clarified that the American still had usefulness in finding Tricia.
Asking if the NSA intel they had was accurate, Krugland wondered if Tricia was kidnapped by a human trafficker. Deciding to talk to a local informant instead, Lu Tao also learned from an "elder brother" that Tricia was spotted at the Sankan Palace Hotel with a silver-haired protector. Preparing to leave, Lu Tao demanded Krugland to tell him where the luxurious hotel was, so Krugland gave him the most ideal shortcut possible.[4]
Lu Tao: 2[]
At Sankan Palace Hotel, Lu Tao began a close-combat fight with Shenhua. During the fighting, he had not paid attention to her left hand, and her sword began to fly back toward him. As the sword began to enter his back, the large Krugland suddenly appeared and tackled him out of the way, decreasing the injury done to him and crashing them both through the balcony door glass. As Krugland continued to act as a shield, Shenhua and Frederica Sawyer used the opportunity to run away, annoying Lu Tao. Krugland then interrupted Lu Tao's disappointment by pointing to four silhouettes rushing down the emergency stairs escaping with Tricia. As Lu Tao could not make a clear shot, he ordered Krugland to follow him to the first floor to chase them down.[8]
Lu Tao: 3[]
Back in his motel after he finished a call with Zeng Kemin concerning Budaibang's new alliance with the Hong Kong Triad to find Tricia O'Sullivan, Lu Tao turned around to see Dick Krugland, scaring him. Krugland asked if their work was complete, but Lu Tao punched him in the stomach after he asked again. Threatening to cut out Krugland's tongue if he spoke to anyone about the phone call he just had with Kemin, Lu Tao was angered and was confused to see Krugland get back up. In English, Krugland stared at him with cold eyes and told him to not "lose sight on the greater righteousness at stake" by fixating on his own pride. Continuing, Krugland also told Lu Tao to be mindful of the fortune of having deeply loyal followers. Thinking that Krugland was telling him to shut up, Lu Tao punched the American in the stomach, but to his shock, hitting his stomach felt like hitting a hard log.
As he was bewildered, Krugland suddenly jabs Lu Tao's left shoulder, making his body's left side go numb. Looking down at Lu Tao on the floor, Krugland speaks to him in English that a sword's edge without the faithfulness of the heart is an unworthy weapon, once more confusing Lu Tao. Wondering how a white person could do kung fu, Lu Tao realized that Krugland's footsteps made no sound as the tall man left the motel room.[9]
A Certain Wizard: 4[]
Shadow Falcon fighting Lotton the Wizard
After disposing of his disguise as Krugland, Shadow Falcon continued his mission to retrieve Tricia on behalf of the Triad. Finding Lotton and Tricia trying to escape by climbing a crane arm, Falcon ran onto the derrick crane rapidly, surprising both the Triad members below and Lotton above. Consequently, Lotton ran to the middle of the crane arm as Falcon arrived at the crane arm's base, with Falcon bowing and drawing his samurai sword. Lotton, glad that he had a worthy opponent, pulls out his pistols and began fighting Falcon.[10]
Chang Wai-San: 2[]
As Shadow Falcon and Lotton, Mister Chang saw the fight from below and admitted to himself that he was impressed to see them fighting on a steel frame 70 meters above ground and surprised that Lotton could dodge Falcon's duralumin club. While fighting Lotton, who had not fired a single shot, Falcon did not make any progress since he could not focus on both his balance and Lotton's sights.[7]
Tricia O'Sullivan: 3[]
As the fighting continued, Lotton lost his balance but regained it, although Falcon used the opportunity to swing his katana forward. Lotton blocked and trapped the sword between his two pistols above his head. As Lotton blocked the sword, he fell onto his back, and soon both he and Falcon tangled with each other and fell down off the crane arm to everyone's surprise.[11]
Epilogue — Frederica Sawyer: 2[]
Shadow Falcon playing a video game with Lotton
Standing in a rain-filled ruin, Lotton and Shadow Falcon faced each other. They quietly looked at one another while changing their positions in an attempt to attack the other. Attacking first, Falcon used a series of fists and sword movements, which Lotton dodged while focusing on defense without panicking. Making an unexpected counter fist, Lotton managed to make a shallow upper cut through Falcon's consecutive attacks. Subsequently, Falcon retreated to regain his balance, giving Lotton the chance to perform a counterattack, delivering a roundhouse kick to Falcon's chest and knocking him back. At that moment, Falcon made himself disappear using his oboro bunshin no jutsu, reappearing behind Lotton and aiming his kick toward Lotton's head. Acting as if to expect the move, Lotton turned around and grabbed Falcon's foot, throwing him to the ground.
Countering once again, Falcon landed on his feet like a cat instead of receiving the slam. By using Lotton's energy from his throw, Falcon suddenly performed "Burning Oedo Daisharin Kotobuki," wrapping himself in crimson flames and charging at Lotton like a drill. Revealing that the match was just taking place in a video game at Shenhua's residence, Frederica Sawyer stated how Lotton's character throw was cheating but was amazed that he timed the Ultimate Shuriken command just right, adding that Lotton was improvising too much in vain. Seeing him masterfully, Sawyer commented that Shadow Falcon was a committed man given that he wore a ninja costume while using a ninja character to the video game to which he is addicted to playing with Lotton. Still wondering who Shadow Falcon was, Sawyer recalled that the previous night, Lotton and Falcon came to her place soaked from rain, and Sawyer asked Lotton how his search for a new pillow for Shenhua went.
Responding grandiosely, Lotton remarked how he talked with God on a mobile phone in a church, making Sawyer think that he was joking. After explaining his story, he and Falcon began playing video games with each other until dawn. Remembering that Shenhua happened to be away on business, Sawyer hoped that the two would finally settle their tied game victory before Shenhua returned home, although she doubted that the two would be done anytime soon. As the two continued gaming, Rock came by to drop off the new pillow per Lotton's request, and the Japanese man left without saying a word while confounded at seeing Lotton and Falcon game together. After losing to Lotton, Falcon was tied with him again and they continued to game to Sawyer's exhaustion, so she decided to clean her chainsaw as the two resumed their video game.[12]
Trivia[]
- Shadow Falcon is the only novel-exclusive character to appear in both Black Lagoon light novels.
- Falcon is referenced in Rei Hiroe's The Book of Venom (2009) doujinshi in an illustration of Lotton, Shenhua, and Sawyer in swimsuits.
References[]
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Black Lagoon: Shaitane Badi (Chapter 1)
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 Black Lagoon: Shaitane Badi (Chapter 4)
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Black Lagoon: Shaitane Badi (Chapter 5)
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Black Lagoon 2: Ballad of the Sinful Wizard (Budaibang: Lu Tao)
- ↑ Black Lagoon: Shaitane Badi (Chapter 2)
- ↑ Black Lagoon: Shaitane Badi (Chapter 3)
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 Black Lagoon 2: Ballad of the Sinful Wizard (Chang Wai-San: 2)
- ↑ Black Lagoon 2: Ballad of the Sinful Wizard (Lu Tao: 2)
- ↑ Black Lagoon 2: Ballad of the Sinful Wizard (Lu Tao: 3)
- ↑ Black Lagoon 2: Ballad of the Sinful Wizard (A Certain Wizard: 4)
- ↑ Black Lagoon 2: Ballad of the Sinful Wizard (Tricia O'Sullivan: 3)
- ↑ Black Lagoon 2: Ballad of the Sinful Wizard (Epilogue — Frederica Sawyer: 2)