Sato Ryusuke

WARNING: Contains major spoilers for the webnovels Zero-100 (pending reboot) and WotW (completed).

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Born into an affluent family

Ryusuke's mother is a Hamada, just one branch away from the main line. The wealthy and affluent Hamadas founded and still control Hamada Motors, a luxury car brand known for their stylish and overtuned supercars. His mother inherited a generational ambition to curry favor with the main family and raise their already considerable social status.

His mother hurried to marry and have a child after Hamada Tsukiyo was born, hoping that her child would grow up alongside the heir of the family. Her schemes were ultimately successful, as Tsukiyo took a liking to Ryusuke.

The two cousins both developed an interest in professional racing, and eventually debutted as a rally team that was successful enough to be invited into the youth WRC circuit.

A Fateful UNIVERSITY Encounter

After securing a victory their first year at the youth WRC circuit, the pair was invited to the newly formed Team SJ-Alliance to debut at the WRC. Despite Ryusuke attending university, the two decided to take up this exciting opportunity.

That was also the year that Ryusuke met Choi Eunseok. Eunseok was a transfer student from Seoul that could barely speak Japanese. Ryusuke, who was fluent in Korean due to spending part of his childhood in Korea, helped Eunseok with his orientation, but crafty Eunseok modified much of his schedule to be in as many of the same classes as he could. Ryusuke initially found Eunseok to be quite annoying, but he was unable to shake off the new Korean student.

eunseok became curious about Ryu's constant mysterious disappearances, and eventually found out that Ryu was a professional driver in the WRC circuit (a fact that Ryu tried to keep on the down low). He begged Ryusuke to teach him how to drive, and the two bonded over their shared love of fast cars.

Ryu was well aware of Eunseok's sexual orientation, but he himself was a bit shy of coming out. Despite this, they ended up drunkenly making out at Eunseok's place one night while predrinking for a party. Eunseok drew away when he found out that Ryu wasn't yet out, but Ryusuke, who had already become quite attached to Eunseok's companionship, came out with Eunseok to their friends.

It was a good time for Ryu. He and Tsuki ended up winning the championship at WRC that year, and with Eunseok at his side, his social life was thriving.

A Terrible Accident

The good times hardly lasted. A malicious cousin found out about Eunseok and Ryu, and told Ryusuke's mother. In a fit a fear that these rumors would somehow affect her family's standing with the main family, she demanded Ryusuke to stop seeing Eunseok. When Ryusuke refused, she effectively cut him off, going no contact with him.

After graduating university without his parent's support, Ryusuke decided to follow Eunseok back to Korea. He was depressed about his family and their relationship struggled.

Eunseok's solution to this what to try to get him out of his shell by going to house parties. At one such party, they met Park Hoojin, a drug dealer who introduced Ryu to pot. As Ryu mellowed out, the pair became friends with Hoojin, who introduced them to his friend, Han Sungmin. Sungmin recognized Ryu and after some chatting, invited them to a car meet.

Not long after, Sungmin formed the Blue Tigers, an informal racing team, with Hoojin, Eunseok, and Ryusuke as the founding members. For some time, Ryusuke was cheered up having a tight friend group again and he took out much of his frustrations on the streets and made quite a name for himself on the Seoul racing circuit.

Good times came crashing down hard again when Lee Seunghyuk, Eunseok's ex from the past, showed up again. After he revealed to Ryu that Eunseok had cheated with him, Ryusuke broke up with Eunseok in a fit of anger and went away to stay with his cousin Tsuki.

He was so affected by the breakup and his frustrations with feeling like he couldn't trust anyone that he drove pretty recklessly on his second invitational WRC circuit. In Belgium, he lost control of the car on an icy road, and the resulting crash was devasting. He himself suffered a number of life threatening injuries. Tsukiyo did not survive.

His mother was horrified at the audio recordings retrieved from the crash, which showed Tsukiyo telling Ryusuke to stop and pull out of the race, and Ryusuke refusing. She and his father joined the rest of the Hamada family in effectively disowning him, abandoning him despite Ryu still being bedridden with extensive injuries.

Somewhat fortunately for him, Eunseok stepped up when everyone else left him, flying to Belgium to be at his side and even going so far as to sell his thriving P2P trading platform to help fund Ryusuke's medical bills.

Though Ryusuke initially tried to push him away, his fear of total abandonment was too powerful, and he was forced to let Eunseok stay and be there for him. In this way, Ryusuke felt like a captive to Eunseok, but neither did he want to be alone. However, Eunseok was extremely patient and understanding to Ryusuke as he was overwhelmed in that time, and eventuallly the two were able to reconcile.

As soon as Ryusuke could, the two returned to Seoul together, where Ryu continued to recover physically and emotionally from his ordeal in Europe. The Hamadas, a major sponsor of the WRC, blacklisted him from ever racing professionally again, but neither did he have the desire to race ever again.

The End of the Blue Tigers

The Blue Tigers unexpectedly gained a new member, Baek Jaehyun, a poor and indebted guy who was in hiding from both his older brother, an officer in the NIS, and (unknown to them) Han Sungmin's father's gang, the Seven Directions gang. Jaehyun, albeit being a talented racer, was ultimately the downfall of the Blue Tigers.

Initially Ryusuke was a good friend to Jaehyun. They both had a similar past of conflict with their families, and Ryusuke often encouraged Jaehyun to try to reconcile with them, especially his brother. However, when Jaehyun was able to pay off his debt to the Seven Directions gang, Jaehyun decided to leave the Blue Tigers to try to live a responsible and faultless life like his brother wanted. Ryusuke immediately withdrew from Jaehyun, cutting their friendship off instantly.

When Jaehyun's conflict with the Seven Directions gang came to a head, Ryusuke tipped off the police that Sungmin was taking Jaehyun to the Daegu. Thanks to his involvement, Sungmin and his father were arrested. In exchange, Sungmin was able to get in contact with Ryusuke's family, who was searching for him, in exchange for a good lawyer. Ryusuke and Eunseok had an argument where Eunseok vented his frustration with Ryusuke's destructive tendancies and how he had fucked over Sungmin and possibly Jaehyun. It was on this bad standing that Ryusuke's family reappeared and forcibly took him back to Japan.