Tokyo: The Player Behind the Scenes

"Open the door, please, please open the door! My father is still outside, please open it for a moment."

People instinctively avoided his gaze, while others looked at the attacker with strange expressions.

"What? Why are you looking at me?! I'm doing this for you! Do you really want to open the door and let everyone in? There's no room for that many people here, and the more people there are, the more monsters will be attracted. If there's no one outside, who will buy us time to wait for rescue?!"

The man argued, his face flushed, waving a chair in his hand. Someone nearby accidentally bumped into him but didn't dare say anything and silently took two steps back.

Those people lowered their eyes again and stopped looking at him.

"We're all in this together now, we have to stick together! Those who want to open the door are our enemies! Get rid of them—we have to get rid of them!" The man seemed to have gone mad, grabbing a stool and approaching the injured shopkeeper's son, who couldn't even get up.

People backed away, probably not wanting to get splattered with blood.

Just as his blood-stained chair was raised high, a bowl of ramen flew out from nowhere and landed precisely on his face, scalding him so much that he started to breakdance, yelling a few times before tripping over the blood on the floor and falling to the ground.

"If we let him keep making noise, we'll only attract monsters in."

Someone said that, and everyone's eyes changed.

"Shut up, shut him up!"

"Gag him!"

"Stop barking."

Soon, the man's mouth was gagged tightly, and the ramen shop fell silent, though the screams outside could be clearly heard.

The shop owner's son huddled in a corner, sobbing, one hand covering his wound and the other covering his mouth.

"Muramasa, it's the ninth Muramasa!"

A sudden, excited shout came from outside, making the people inside the shop look up in surprise.

Immediately following were more and more shouts of joy, as if they had been saved from a desperate situation.

Finally, someone couldn't resist moving aside the clutter in the window and opening a crack to nervously observe what was happening outside.

"It's alright! The monsters are all dead! I saw Muramasa Kyushiro kill them all! Hooray! Hooray!"

The man excitedly opened the window and eagerly jumped out.

The people in the shop gradually regained their composure and worked together to move the things blocking the door. They left the ramen shop in a relatively orderly and careful manner, with some even politely righting the chairs that had fallen to the ground.

In the commercial street, after Takii finished off yet another mindless monster, she didn't linger. She swung her grappling hook, leaped across rooftops, and chased after the only remaining fleeing monster, disappearing into the building complex.

The ramen shop returned to calm. The owner's son slowly and unsteadily got to his feet, walked over the mess, and stood blankly at the door.

His blood-stained gaze could see not far from the doorway, on an apron also stained with blood, bearing the name of his noodle shop.

Takatsukasa Tadashi stood beside him, also silently watching the mutilated corpse.

"Thank you for just now," the shop owner's son suddenly spoke, his voice suppressed. "Soy sauce pork ramen, extra spicy, only you and your father would order that."

"..." Takatsukasa Tadashi didn't say anything, but turned around and glanced at the plaque.

He still remembers that the first meal his father took him to eat after adopting him was ramen from here.

It's a pity we didn't get to eat the last meal; it's a bit of a waste.

But now, the same flavor can no longer be made.

"He just wanted to be a good person, why did this happen?"

The shopkeeper's son knelt down, unable to move, his head touching the ground, a gesture similar to that of other excited people celebrating their survival.

Takatsukasa Tadashi stood there for a while, then placed the suitcase beside him, glanced around without a trace of sorrow in his eyes, and left, stepping on the blood.

When the shopkeeper's son finally clenched his fist, made up his mind, and prepared to turn around and grab the knife, he saw the man who had stopped him in the shop earlier lying on the ground with his eyes wide open, a clear bloodstain on his neck that had pooled into a pool of blood. He had been dead for some time.

But he didn't seem to be dead before he came out.

On the shopping street, Tadashi Takatsuya casually tossed the kitchen knife into a nearby trash can, walked to the parking lot, and drove home.

"Won't you like to browse around a bit more?"

Takatsukasa Tetsutsugu was watching the news at home, and even though he was sitting down, you could tell that he seemed to have grown quite a bit taller.

"That's enough. What do you need me to do tomorrow, Father?"

Takatsukasa Tetsuto didn't turn around: "Tomorrow I will force a meeting at the headquarters hotel. After nine o'clock, I don't want anyone to come in or leave."

“I understand.” Takatsukasa Tadashi said without hesitation, “I will do it.”

"At any cost."

Chapter 186: Will Evil Have Consequences?

"The president is so heartless, making us come to a meeting at a time like this."

"It seems like anyone who doesn't come today will be fired."

"I heard it's about retirement handover?"

"I'm not sure, but it's always safer to stay in a hotel, right?"

The employees at the Eagle Hotel headquarters, who had arrived on tenterhooks, were quite resentful.

The monster disturbances that occurred throughout Kyoto yesterday continued until the afternoon before the situation was brought under control, but small groups of monsters are still roaming around.

The authorities issued a notice advising all residents to stay home and forcibly closed schools.

However, companies do not mandate holidays.

For safety reasons, many companies have adopted the work-from-home model. It is rare for companies like the Takatsukasa Group to not only not give holidays but also hold large meetings.

They really should install streetlights.

The employees made a wish that the president would be hanged by the supernatural as soon as possible.

"A meeting at this hour?"

In the hotel lobby, as she listened to the staff's complaints, Genji frowned slightly while checking in.

She didn't come here simply to stay; more importantly, the Takatsukasa Group is now one of the suspects, which is why she came to gather intelligence.

Despite the fact that the Extraordinary Countermeasures Department seems to wield absolute power and can execute anyone they suspect, it still cannot sever the complexities of human relationships and social interactions.

Even though the Kanto Group is currently dominant, it does not mean that the Kansai Group has no say.

In particular, many of the suspects identified in this investigation are high-ranking officials and tycoons within the Kansai Group, so a surprise arrest of these individuals would face considerable resistance.

Not to mention that the Extraordinary Countermeasures Department and Muramasa Takii are just cooperating partners.

If it is enforced, and if the Kansai side also gains control of some supernatural power in the future, does that mean they can also enforce it against the Kanto Group? If that happens, everyone will be in danger, the upper order will be in chaos, and no one wants to suffer such treatment.

A high-ranking official should not be punished!

This is a tacit political inertia that stubbornly persists even as the world begins to move towards the extraordinary.

On a deeper level, the Kansai Group might not see this as a bad thing. If that unknown supernatural being is indeed one of their people, then it would be a perfect counterbalance to the Kanto Group, which nominally possesses supernatural power, so as to prevent them from gradually losing their already limited influence.

They planned to find out the person's identity first through the Extraordinary Countermeasures Department and try to win him over to their side.

It was just a few civilians and police officers who died; compared to the extraordinary, what is that?

Even the local police system is dragging its feet and unwilling to cooperate actively.

Therefore, Genji only brought one assistant to the other party's headquarters to conduct investigations and surveillance. As long as further evidence is found, even if the Kansai side is unwilling, they cannot object.

There were quite a few investigators arranged in this way, which basically covered the entire list of suspects.

"Please keep your room key safe. We are having an internal celebration today, and to thank you for your support, the restaurant on the seventh floor will be offering complimentary à la carte service from 9:00 to 11:00. Please be sure to attend."

"What kind of celebration is it about?"

"It's President Takatsukasa's retirement and the appointment of a new president."

"Okay, thank you."

Genjiko told her assistant to stay in the lobby while she went inside the hotel to take a look.

"I just checked, and it really is all free, even the drinks are free."

"Is it really that exaggerated? Then you must be making a profit from that meal, right?"

"Definitely, I'll invite more friends over."

Inside the elevator, several guests were talking excitedly, feeling quite lucky.

Stepping out of the elevator, Genji pressed her earpiece: "Has anything unusual happened in Kyoto?"

"No, there are just a few escaped monsters that haven't been caught yet. Those areas have been sealed off, so we should have results soon."

Genjiko didn't say anything and prepared to explore all the open areas of the hotel.

Eight fifty.

Tadashi Takatsuya suddenly appeared in the hotel's security room, covered in sweat and looking slightly flustered.

"Close the gates immediately! No one is allowed to enter. We've just received word that a monster has appeared nearby!"

Upon hearing this, the security guards panicked and immediately complied, closing the hotel's iron gate.

"No one needs to stay here. Grab your equipment and everyone follow me. Arrange for everyone else to take refuge on the upper floors of the hotel. No one is allowed to stay on the floors below the second floor."

"Yes, Minister!"

The guards didn't doubt Takatsukasa Tadaya's words at all. After all, he was the president's son and the head of the security department. How could he lie to them?

"What?! A monster is coming this way!"

"Please move to higher floors as soon as possible. We will seal off the area below to ensure that monsters cannot enter. Please rest assured!"

"Top floor! Let's go to the top floor!"

"Wait, I didn't receive any information about any monsters nearby!"

Genji's assistant sensed something was wrong. If a monster appeared nearby, she would receive an alert within a minute. The fact that everything was calm now could only mean that the other party was lying.

She couldn't possibly distrust her own people and trust a stranger.

"Can you afford the consequences if any casualties occur? Seize her, take her into custody—"

Takatsukasa Tadaya stopped speaking. The other person clearly wanted to pull something out. Was this a policeman?

He immediately lunged forward, grabbed her hands, pinned her down, and threw a gun at her.

"I've got her under control! This person might have been possessed by a monster! Quickly, have two people escort the guest to a safe floor!"

"Yes Yes!"

Everyone was surprised; compared to staying here, it was clearly more reassuring to enter the intricate interior of the hotel.

Zhong also covered her mouth, took off her hidden earphones, and put them in his own ears.

“...Mingli? Mingli! I’m coming down now. If there’s any danger, you can listen to him for now. Please don’t hurt her. We’re just ordinary people.” In the second half, Genji had already guessed that the earpiece had been discovered, and immediately changed her tone.

So they really are police officers.

Zhong did not believe the nonsense spouted by the other party, who was just an ordinary person.

"Lock all the emergency exits and entrances from the inside." Tadashi took off his earpiece, crushed it, and ordered the remaining guards.

I turned to look at the elevator and saw that we had reached the top floor. So I patted my chest, where there was a button hidden. After pressing it, the elevator immediately stopped.

They tied the woman up with something and gagged her.

"Minister, everything is locked!" Several security guards came running up, panting, to report.

"Okay, give me the key. Thank you."

Taking the key, Zhongye indifferently pulled out his pistol and fired in a split second, hitting them in the abdomen with precision, much to their astonishment.

"Ah, Minister!"

"Help! Spare me! Spare me, Minister!"

Zhong ignored the injured men, picked up the gun that originally belonged to the woman from the ground, and fired two shots at her leg.

"Woo!"

Blood stained her dress, and Mingli was in so much pain that her face turned deathly pale and her body trembled.

In this way, the hotel's lockdown is now complete.

I glanced at the time; it was 9:05.