Chapter 70 – A Few Hundred Million for Mrs. Yukinoshita (Patreon)

The unfamiliar woman in the bank uniform looked down at the little boy she'd just knocked to the ground, her expression tinged with alarm.

"Are you okay?"

Her pretty face faintly flushed, she forced herself to ignore the strange sensations running through her body and helped the boy up.

"I'm fine... but, um, I think your stuff fell out, miss."

Kouma's gaze drifted toward the case of money that had spilled onto the ground nearby, his voice crisp.

At the same moment, his eyes caught sight of two men in black stepping out of a black sedan.

At the sight of those unmistakable black outfits, Kouma paused.

Then, as if something clicked, he turned his head to look at the woman in uniform.

A fine figure, delicate features. Though he didn't recognize her exactly, Kouma already had a vague guess about who she was.

"Akemi Miyano?"

"And those two in black... Gin and Vodka?"

With Kouma's eyesight, he could see it all in a single glance—Gin's wild mane of silver hair, and Vodka's blocky, square-jawed face.

Akemi Miyano had also spotted Gin and Vodka approaching. Her beautiful eyes contracted sharply.

"Aniki, looks like we've got a couple of little bugs."

Vodka, climbing out of the black sedan, noticed the two people Akemi had knocked down. Even behind his sunglasses, his square face showed a flicker of surprise.

"Civilians. We'll just kill them too," Gin said coldly.

"Got it."

As they spoke, the two men stepped up to the carry case.

Gin only gave it a cursory glance.

That little case could hold a few tens of millions at most.

That was a far cry from the one billion yen in cash their target was supposed to have stolen.

Gin's icy gaze fell on Akemi.

"Where's the rest of the money?"

Akemi slowly rose to her feet, positioning herself in front of Kouma and Saito Akemi. The expression on her refined face turned grim.

"Bring my sister here first."

"You said you'd let my sister leave the organization!"

Hearing those words, Kouma's guess about her identity was instantly confirmed.

Beside him, Akemi grabbed his hand, her expression tight with anxiety.

She hadn't expected to get accidentally tangled up in some kind of underworld deal—and with Kouma right there beside her, no less.

Both of Akemi's hands clung to Kouma's. Her eyes, full of tension, stayed fixed on the two men in black ahead of them.

If anything happened to Kouma here, she would never forgive herself.

After hearing Akemi's demand, Gin's lips curled into a mocking smirk.

"As far as the organization's concerned, your sister is far more useful than you."

Akemi's heart sank at those words.

It was clear he had no intention of letting her sister go.

"If you don't release my sister, you're never getting the rest of the money," Akemi threatened, her beautiful eyes locked on Gin.

His expression didn't change in the slightest.

"We know you stashed the money in that safe."

"Kill you, get the key—then we'll get the money naturally enough."

Gin's words were utterly merciless.

The moment he finished speaking, both he and Vodka drew their pistols.

"Aniki, leave these two unlucky bastards to me!"

Vodka laughed as the black maw of his gun barrel swung toward Kouma and Akemi.

Both Akemi and Akemi's faces changed instantly.

"They're just civilians—this has nothing to do with them!" Akemi said urgently.

"No. From the moment you ran into them, they became involved."

"If you want to blame someone, blame your own bad luck."

Vodka fixed his eyes on Kouma, grinning viciously.

Akemi drew a deep breath, then swiftly pulled a pistol from her waist and aimed it at Gin.

"Let them go!"

As she spoke, from an angle neither Gin nor Vodka could see, Akemi's other hand quietly unhooked a keyring from her belt and tossed it behind her to Kouma.

Kouma accepted it without the slightest hesitation.

After all, this was one billion yen.

You couldn't even get money this fast robbing a bank—no, wait, this was money from robbing a bank. But he wasn't the one who'd robbed it.

"Run, as soon as you can," Akemi whispered urgently.

But the words had barely left her mouth when a gunshot rang out.

Bang!

The bullet grazed past Akemi's scalp.

She sat on the ground, utterly bewildered.

In that split-second, something—someone—had yanked her down to the ground. Otherwise, that bullet would have already punched straight through her heart.

His shot having missed, Gin's narrow eyes narrowed even further.

He'd definitely been aiming for Akemi's heart.

But in the instant he'd pulled the trigger, her body had dropped to the ground without any warning—as if she'd suddenly sat down out of nowhere.

Almost like time itself had skipped.

"No... something's wrong here."

Gin's gaze snapped to Kouma, standing off to the side.

His instincts were screaming at him: this was no ordinary child.

This world was full of things that defied common sense. Gin had survived as long as he had precisely because he'd always trusted those extraordinary instincts of his.

"Vodka. Kill the brat first," Gin ordered without hesitation.

A flicker of surprise crossed Kouma's eyes.

Gin's judgment was impressively sharp—to identify the biggest threat in such a short time.

Too bad. It was already too late.

"Understood, Aniki."

Vodka's voice came, but this time it was utterly devoid of emotion. Behind his sunglasses, the light had gone out of his eyes.

Akemi squeezed her eyes shut and pulled Kouma tightly into her arms.

Akemi, too, positioned herself in front of the little boy.

And then, to her stunned disbelief, she watched Vodka slowly shift his gun barrel, pointing it at Gin.

Bang!

The gunshot rang out. Without so much as a reaction, Gin crashed heavily to the ground.

A mixture of blood and brain matter oozed from the back of his skull.

He didn't even have a moment to wonder why Vodka had betrayed him. He died on the spot.

"Onee-san, now—do it!"

The little boy's urgent voice came to her ears.

Seeing Vodka's gun barrel already swinging back toward them, Akemi's body reacted to those words on pure reflex. She raised her pistol and pulled the trigger at Vodka.

Bang—bang—bang!

Hit multiple times, Vodka collapsed limply to the ground. Blood slowly seeped out as his body gradually went cold.

"I... killed Aniki?"

For one brief moment, clarity returned to his eyes. Then, slowly, they lost focus entirely.

Staring at the two dead men, Akemi felt all the tension that had gripped her body finally release.

Weakly, she braced her palms against the ground and gasped for breath.

"Why did Vodka kill Gin...?"

Even now, thinking back, she still couldn't believe it.

There was absolutely no motive for Vodka to do something like that.

And how had she dodged that shot from Gin...?

"Was it him who did all of this?"

Almost unconsciously, she turned her head to look at the little boy beside her, deep confusion welling up inside her.

In contrast, Akemi simply wrapped her arms around Kouma and let out a heavy sigh of relief.

Whatever else—the fact that Kouma was unharmed was the best possible outcome.

But on Akemi's pretty face, the weight hadn't lifted at all.

"Gin and Vodka are dead. The Organization will never let me or Shiho go now..."

She murmured to herself, then turned to Akemi and Kouma, her expression full of apology.

"I'm so sorry for dragging you into this. There might be... not-insignificant trouble ahead."

Hearing that, Akemi immediately started to panic.

She was just the owner of an idol agency. She had absolutely no experience dealing with things like this.

This woman kept talking about "the Organization" and "trouble"—clearly, she was mixed up with some kind of massive criminal syndicate.

If it were just her alone, she could manage. Lay low, and it would blow over.

But with Kouma pulled in, there was even a chance Hoshino Ai might get caught up in the fallout...

Of the three, Kouma was by far the calmest.

The only two people in the whole damn winery who actually got anything done were both dead.

Everyone left was either a mole or a slacker. What threat could they possibly pose?

Still, he made sure his face showed a suitable degree of alarm.

"Then what do we do?"

As he spoke, Kouma turned his innocent eyes up at Akemi.

"You're so amazing, Onee-san—you won't just abandon us, right?"

Gazing into those hopeful yet timid eyes, Akemi felt an overwhelming wave of guilt. Letting a sweet, well-behaved boy like this get caught up in something so dangerous—it was a terrible sin.

"Don't worry, little guy. I'll take responsibility..."

Akemi's voice was thick with remorse.

"That's great. With Onee-san here, I'm sure everything will be fine."

Kouma's tone was perfectly reassured.

"Just now..."

Akemi looked at him, hesitating to speak.

Though this little boy gave her the impression of being soft and easily pushed around—his words and manner suggesting nothing more than an ordinary child—she couldn't shake the feeling that Kouma had been the one to save her. That something strange with Vodka... it was probably connected to him, too.

But her words had barely begun when Akemi cut in.

"Let's get out of here—now!"

"...Yeah."

In Akemi's car.

Akemi told the two of them everything she knew about the Black Organization.

But as someone on the organization's periphery, there wasn't much she'd been able to learn in terms of secrets.

She hadn't been able to offer much concrete intel on the Black Organization, but she'd certainly painted a vivid picture of a vast and terrifying transnational criminal syndicate.

The more Akemi listened, the tighter her brow furrowed.

"Don't worry, Akemi-san. I've already told Mrs. Yukinoshita about what happened."

Hearing this, Akemi turned to look at Kouma, worry etched on her face.

"Are you... sure that's okay?"

As far as she knew, Kouma was just an adopted child of the Yukinoshita family—and he'd only been taken in recently. No matter how deep the bond with his new family was, it couldn't be that deep.

Getting tangled up in trouble this big... it might very well cause the Yukinoshita family to sour on him.

Kouma smiled lightly.

"It'll be fine for sure. Mrs. Yukinoshita dotes on me."

Looking at the smile on Kouma's handsome face, Akemi felt a small pang in her heart.

She'd never met this Yukinoshita matriarch in person, but she'd vaguely heard the rumors—the cold, impartial queen of the Yukinoshita family.

A name, and the shadow it casts. She couldn't imagine a woman with that kind of reputation being easy to deal with.

"Kouma-kun must be suffering in silence at the Yukinoshita house..."

She finally understood how Hoshino Ai must have felt.

If she had the power to protect Kouma, he'd never have to endure the humiliation of staying with the Yukinoshitas.

Akemi watched Kouma typing out a message on his phone. Her slender fingers tightened on the steering wheel, her knuckles slowly going white.

"If I can get Mrs. Yukinoshita to step in, I should be able to secure the full billion..."

Kouma thought to himself, thoroughly pleased.

Mrs. Yukinoshita's money and his money—what was the difference, really?

If he asked, she'd fork over not just one billion, but ten billion, probably.

After all, he'd already invested who-knows-how-many hundreds of millions into Mrs. Yukinoshita...

And money sitting in his hands didn't do much good anyway. Put it in her hands instead, and she could directly mobilize the Yukinoshita family's resources to generate even more profit.

Now that was the path to wealth.

Besides—compared to that one billion—the real prizes here were the woman right in front of him, Akemi Miyano, and her sister Shiho Miyano, still inside the Black Organization.

When they arrived at the Yukinoshita residence, under Akemi's worried gaze, Kouma led Akemi inside.

Across the ocean.

Word of Gin and Vodka's deaths reached the winery.

The Boss was utterly enraged.

He never would have imagined that some peripheral member could take down two of his top operatives.

"Akemi Miyano..."

"Vermouth. Go over there and investigate thoroughly... and while you're at it, recover whatever pills Gin and the others hadn't used yet."

Beneath the night sky.

On a bridge.

A sultry woman in a tight leather bodysuit leaned against a motorcycle and removed her helmet.

Silver hair cascaded in the night breeze. Her flawless, exquisite face radiated mature feminine allure.

"Japan, huh..."

She held a slender woman's cigarette between her crimson lips, gazing out at the river reflecting the moonlight. Her pale-blue eyes took on a slightly distant, unfocused look.

"Boss... I'll get to the bottom of everything."

Coolly, she finished speaking and hung up the phone.

At the same time.

Shiho Miyano, still in the middle of developing APTX 4869, found herself placed under direct confinement—completely cut off from all contact with the outside world.

With no word from her sister, her anxiety grew by the day.

At that moment.

The Yukinoshita residence.

Akemi had the distinct feeling she was undergoing a rather unusual... job interview?

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