Ryo Aoki (31 December 1976 – 2019), formerly known as Masato Arakawa and born Takeshi Sawashiro, was a Japanese LDP politician who served in the House of Councillors from 2010 to 2017 and as Governor of Tokyo from 2017 to 2019. The illegitimate child of yakuza Jo Sawashiro and the adoptive son of Omi Alliance officer Masumi Arakawa, he concealed his past and became a rising star in Japanese politics as the leader of the Bleach Japan political movement and as the populist governor of Tokyo. He was assassinated by the newly-elected representative Sota Kume in 2019 after his yakuza ties were exposed.
Biography[]
Masato Arakawa or Takeshi Sawashiro was born in Tokyo, Japan on 31 December 1976, the illegitimate son of Jo Sawashiro and his girlfriend Ikumi. He was delivered in the bathroom of a department store and was hidden in a coin locker at Shinjuku station before he was retrieved by Masumi Arakawa, who mistook him for his own child with Akane Kishida, who had hidden their baby Ichiban Kasuga in a coin locker in order to keep him safe from Hikawa Industries. The baby suffered from hypothermia, resulting in multiple organ failure, and he was confined to a wheelchair from a very young age. Sawashiro later joined the Arakawa-gumi to watch over his son, who believed Arakawa to be his father. Kasuga was later tasked with Masato's care after his introduction to the Arakawa Family.
On his 24th birthday, he murdered Sakaki-gumi officer Chikao Suzumori after Suzumori mistook Aoki for a vagrant trespasser and attacked him. Sawashiro persuaded and framed up Kasuga to take the fall for Masato the true murderer, and Masato was left with a hatred of the yakuza and its gray zones because of the Suzumori incident and his rejection by the hostess Yumeno. With the Arakawa-gumi's help, he faked his death and stole an identity to travel to America under the alias of "Ryo Aoki" and received a lung transplant that allowed his body to function properly.
Aoki majored in politics and economics at Harvard University, where he met Hajime Ogasawara. The two formed the Bleach Japan movement to purge Japan of its yakuza-controlled "gray zones" (gambling, prostitution, and other semi-illicit activities), and Aoki took Sota Kume under his wing. In 2010, Aoki was elected to the House of Councillors with the backing of the LDP. Seeking to carry out his vengeance against the yakuza, he established a corrupt partnership with TMPD Superintendent General Juro Horinouchi, who had gone on to marry Yumeno.
In 2017, with the backing of Bleach Japan and the Arakawa-gumi, Aoki was elected Governor of Tokyo. In that capacity, he enacted the Kabukicho 3K Plan (standing for "Keep them hungry, keep them poor, keep them out") to crack down on the Tojo-kai, denying yakuza employment, the patronage of businesses, and even access to public transportation and other daily necessities. The Tojo-kai was driven out of Kabukicho with Masumi Arakawa's help, as Aoki forced his father to leak intel that allowed the plan to succeed. At the same time, however, Arakawa and Tojo Chairman Daigo Dojima accepted that the end of the yakuza was nigh, and they secretly plotted to shepherd the plan through before announcing the joint dissolution of the Omi and the Tojo to deprive the political class of their underworld pawns.
In 2019, the Omi Alliance moved into Kabukicho, with Aoki intending to use them to further his ambitions. At the same time, he planned to rise to be Prime Minister of Japan, first through displacing Yutaka Ogikubo as LDP Chairman. He approved Akira Mabuchi's plan to kill Isao Nonomiya to find the connection between Ogikubo and Yokohama's Ijin Three syndicate, and the Bleach Japan offensive destroyed the Geomijul's intelligence network and its counterfeit money business. Afterward, Aoki had Ogasawara assassinated on realizing that he had given up confidential information while captured by Kasuga, whom Arakawa had manipulated into thwarting Aoki's plans. At Ogasawara's funeral, Aoki promoted Kume's campaign for the Kanagawa District 2 seat in the House of Representatives elections, only for Kasuga to approach Kume and humiliate him.
Not long after, the Tojo and Omi were dissolved in the "Great Dissolution," with Sawashiro rebelling and forming the Tokyo Omi Alliance splintergroup. Aoki ordered Sawashiro to kill Arakawa for assisting with the dissolution, and, while Sawashiro refused, he agreed to kill Seiryu-kai head Ryuhei Hoshino while Yosuke Tendo killed Arakawa. Sawashiro was arrested after Hoshino's murder, and Aoki's attempt to have Sawashiro murdered by Reiji Ishioda and Mirror Face failed. Tendo was then authorized to kill Kasuga with a bomb, but Kasuga faked his death before approaching Aoki in Kabukicho and claiming that Sawashiro had left an incriminating recording in the Millennium Tower. Tendo was sent to investigate while Aoki attended a conference, where Nick Ogata pressured Aoki to leave while issuing a fake criminal charge against him and revealing his real name in front of the press. Unable to contact Tendo, Aoki headed to the Millennium Tower himself, only to be confronted by Mirror Face (posing as Tendo) and reveal his plans to kill Kasuga as Kasuga recorded him from the next room over. The footage of the murder order was uploaded to the internet, destroying Aoki's reputation and exposing his past.
Kasuga then defeated Aoki in a fight and attempted to persuade his former friend to atone for his mistakes, only for a stubborn Aoki to escape while holding a policeman hostage. Aoki then retreated to the Shinjuku Station locker where he was born, and Kasuga met him there. Aoki contemplated suicide now that his life was in tatters, but Kasuga persuaded Aoki to turn himself in. Just as Aoki bade Kasuga farewell, an outraged Kume stabbed Aoki in the gut for Kasuga, mortally wounding him. Aoki gave words of encouragement to Kasuga while bleeding out, and, after his death, he was buried alongside Arakawa in Yokohama.