NIS Agents Tearing Up the Japanese Empire - Chapter 52



Only Krnovel

Wolf’s Den – 2

Ichiro woke up in a dark basement, damp and humid against his skin and the pungent smell of chemicals tickling his nostrils.

When he opened his eyes, the gazes of the numerous workers he had seen a moment ago were turned toward him.

“Ahhhhhh… You’re finally awake.”

“That’s why I told you not to take pictures of faces with a dog’s head.”

“Be quiet, just wake up and leave.”

“Hey! If that kid hadn’t gotten up, the boss would have gotten really angry and we might have gotten in trouble too!”

“That is… I’m sorry.”

“Hey, hey, let’s stop this and go and get the boss. You’ll hear the same thing later.”

After a worker climbed the stairs, a man came down from above after a while.

Looking at the bear-like physique that made one feel intimidated just by making eye contact and the man’s appearance that made one look like he could easily tear two or three people apart, Ichiro recalled the official document that had been handed down from the Black Dragon Society in the past, when the organization was in turmoil due to the events in Gyeongseong.

‘A bear-like size and an intimidating air.’

It was the ghost of Gyeongseong.

Although he certainly looked different from the menacing appearance he had seen in the official document, Ichiro thought he was the ghost of Gyeongseong just from the aura he gave off.

“Hey, the ghost of Gyeongseong···!”

“Tsk… Those Black Dragons still call me that? Really… You’re being stubborn over useless things.”

“Uh, how come the ghost of Gyeongseong and Inspector Sasaki and…?”

“Didn’t you know? He’s my spy.”

“!!!”

Ichiro opened his mouth wide in surprise.

The high-ranking detective at the Japanese Consulate General in Shanghai, in charge of intelligence in Shanghai, is the ghost spy who caused a stir in Gyeongseong!

It was information that was hard to believe even after hearing it with both ears.

“Don’t lie!”

“Oh, that’s right. That’s a lie.”

The words that came out of the ghost’s mouth were lies, but they actually gave him confidence.

“Where is Inspector Sasaki?”

“A place you don’t know.”

The ghost spoke calmly and looked over the various tools on the table one by one.

Hammers and chisels, nails and saws, sharp daggers, pointed awls and screwdrivers, pliers, nippers, etc. These were objects that could be used as tools or weapons depending on their purpose.

“Ichiro Yamada?”

“Yes, yes?”

Ichiro answered without realizing it.

And only after answering was he surprised to find out that the other person knew his name.

“Uh, how did you get my name···?”

“The other kids kept calling me.”

“What about other kids···?”

At that moment, Ichiro’s subordinates came to mind.

They must have been here somewhere since they were captured together, but they were nowhere to be seen.

“Hey, bring that.”

“yes!”

At the ghost’s command, the workers moved in unison and brought two chairs from afar.

There was a person tied to each chair, and they all had familiar faces.

“Sato! Inuyama!”

Ichiro desperately called out his subordinates’ names, but neither of them answered and avoided his eyes.

“Haha, you all look shy, right? Right?”

“······What did you do to my subordinates?”

“I just asked a few quick questions, okay, guys?”

In response to the ghost’s question, Ichiro’s two subordinates nodded enthusiastically in response, unlike how they had ignored him a moment ago.

“Look, they’re like that too.”

“······.”

For the first time in his life, Ichiro experienced the sensation of the tips of his hair standing on end and the strange feeling of all the blood draining from his body.

To put it simply, it meant that he was scared.

When Ichiro made eye contact with the ghost, he felt helpless, as if his whole body was tied up (it was actually tied up), unable to do anything.

“Ichiro Yamada.”

“······.”

“Focus, Yamada Ichiro.”

“······.”

Ichiro kept his mouth shut.

This was the best rebellion I could do at the time.

But he chose the wrong opponent.

“Um… I don’t think you’ll answer.”

The ghost nodded and stepped back.

Ichiro felt a sense of relief at the sight of the ghost stepping back as if it had no interest in him.

‘If I keep my mouth shut, even my own ghost won’t be able to do anything…’

-bang!

At that moment, a tingling pain from his fingertips traveled through the nerve bundles and reached Ichiro’s head.

“Ugh.”

He winced and looked for the source of the pain.

Then I noticed a finger crushed under a heavy wrench.

At the same time, like a valve that had been tightly closed opening and water pouring out, all the suppressed pain came rushing out at once.

“Kuaaaah!”

“Someone shut my mouth.”

“yep.”

The workers ahead of the ghost’s command covered Ichiro’s mouth, blocking his screams at the source.

“Are you still not willing to answer, Yamada Ichiro?”

“Eww··· Eww eww! Eww ew!! Eww ew ew!!!”

“Oh, it looks like some bad person has shut your mouth. It’s a shame… Don’t you think so??”

The workers who had been waiting behind the ghost’s question of regret answered with a big smile.

“Yes!”

The ghost raised the wrench over his head.

“If you really can’t stand it, then just relax. We’ll talk later.”

“!!!”

As soon as he finished speaking, the heavy wrench struck Ichiro’s fingers again.

******

“after···.”

After a long time, I sweated a lot and my whole body felt tired, as if I had just come out of a sauna.

I was wearing a pile of silicone that had eaten up functionality, so I started sweating profusely even with the slightest movement.

‘Should I just change into a mask while I’m at it?’

As outdoor activities increase, masks remain the same without any development, to the point where they are now becoming inconvenient even in daily life.

What was even more frustrating was that summer hadn’t even arrived yet.

‘I’m going to die from heat like this.’

At least for the summer, it seemed better to throw off this stuffy silicone leather and switch to a mask.

‘Can I take it off for a moment?’

As I was about to take off my mask with the intention of wiping away the sweat that was all over my body, I heard someone running from the hallway.

“Boss! Boss!”

“for a moment!”

As I hurriedly put my mask back on, Jaehwang was panting and turning the corner.

“Heh heh… Boss.”

“I told you not to run around in the house.”

“That’s because it’s so urgent.”

“Did Ichiro open his mouth?”

“Uh… That guy told me everything he knew five minutes ago and then passed out.”

“Was it like that?”

“Yes, I did.”

It seems that he had forgotten what had happened a little while ago because of the heat.

“Ahem… Then what’s going on?”

“Sasaki woke up a little while ago and looked for the boss. He said he had something to tell me about the Black Dragon Association…”

“Black Dragon Society?”

This was the first time Sasaki had directly mentioned the Black Dragon Society to me.

“Guide me.”

“yes···?”

Instead of answering, Jaehwang stared at me with a face full of questions.

“What are you doing now?”

“Oh, no, that’s not it···.”

“I asked what you were doing.”

“that···.”

Jaehwang hesitated for a moment, then carefully opened his mouth.

“Your mouth seemed a little crooked… I was checking to see if you were feeling unwell.”

“······.”

It seems that there was a slight mistake due to haste.

“Are you really feeling unwell?”

“Enough with the useless talk.”

“Yes, yes!”

Jaehwang took the lead and put on his mask again.

It seemed like it was getting more and more uncomfortable as the days went by, but it was better than having to sell my face and being uncomfortable to walk around, so for now I just had to endure it.

‘We really need to improve it later.’

You must have made a lot of money this time.

The idea was to buy an American company that was reasonably priced and had sufficient technological prowess, and either turn this stinky lump of silicon into something usable or turn it into something else entirely.

If things continued like this, it seemed like I would die of illness before achieving Korean independence.

‘Hmm… Now that I think about it, wouldn’t the Great Depression have hit sooner or later and American companies would have gone bankrupt one after another or had their value completely slashed?’

Of course, it would be about six years before the Great Depression broke out.

So, buying a company that was struggling financially was a very expensive undertaking.

Even some companies could have been hit hard by the Great Depression later on and even ruined if purchased now, so it would be right to handle investments with caution, as the captions on stock broadcasts always say.

‘But isn’t there at least one place where I can live?’

Now in my hands was knowledge of the future that people of this age did not possess.

To use an analogy, from my perspective, if there’s gold rolling around on the street, wouldn’t it be stupid not to pick it up?

It wasn’t like I was short on bullets.

Now, I had more than a few pennies in my possession, stolen from the Shanghai Bank vault.

To this extent, I could have exaggerated a bit and built another building of the Government-General of Korea currently under construction in Gyeongseong at my own expense.

‘I guess I’ll have to think about it later.’

Now that the capital has been secured, it would be better to diversify the funds by investing some of it rather than pouring it all into the independence movement.

“Teacher Lee!”

As I was thinking about this and that, I arrived at the living room where Sasaki was tied up.

“······You haven’t released it yet?”

“Yes, the boss didn’t say anything specifically.”

“······Let me go.”

“yes!”

Sasaki, freed from the pillar, sat down on the spot, as if his legs had lost their strength.

But Sasaki crawled towards me, moving his arms busily, and grabbed my trouser legs.

Then he spoke to me urgently.

“The Black Dragon sent someone to Shanghai! And now they’re chasing me! So right now, around my house….”

“I know.”

“What? How!”

Instead of answering, I waved my hand at Jaehwang and pointed to the basement.

Then Jaehwang nodded as if he understood and ran down to the basement.

Sasaki, unaware of the situation, asked me while pulling hard on my pants.

“How did you know?!”

“Just wait a minute. And when did we start talking?”

“Ahem···.”

Soon, Sasaki was shocked when he saw the Black Dragon members coming up from underground.

“So, you… Are you going to arrest civilians and torture them now?!”

“······I set off bombs, I shot some people, and I robbed banks sometimes, but I’m not that evil.”

“That, that’s right···.”

Sasaki’s eyes were trembling.

He seemed to think that soon he too would become like that.

“You really don’t know those guys?”

“I swear to His Majesty the Emperor that I am seeing you for the first time today.”

“hmm.”

It seems that Sasaki only knew that he was being followed, but he didn’t know exactly who was following him.

Then I have no choice but to tell you.

“Those guys are the ones sent by the Black Dragon Society.”

“Those guys···? But how···?”

“It was rummaging through the trash cans around the house like a wild cat, so I beat it up and caught it.”

“Hey, a stray cat?”

I smiled and asked Sasaki.

“Let me show you something fun.”

Then, he gently placed his hand on the shoulder of the one who looked the most intact among the Black Dragons who were tied to the chair.

Then···.

“I am Kazama Bunta from the Black Tiger Unit of the Tokyo Branch of the Black Dragon Association! I received the mission from my superiors to tail Inspector Sasaki of the Japanese Consulate General in Shanghai, and I went to Shanghai on the 21st of last month···.”

Even though he just raised his hand, the guy started spouting off all the information he knew.

It was truly a remarkable thing.

“How is it?”

“How is this···?”

“We’re friends, right, Masaru?”

“Yes, that’s right!”

Sasaki tilted his head and asked me.

“Masaru? Didn’t you say Bunta a little while ago?”

“Is that so?”

When I turned my head to look down at him, the Black Dragon member shouted in great panic.

“I, I am Masaru! I have long since forgotten my old name, Bunta! From now on, I am Masaru, and I will continue to be Masaru!”

“Is that so?”

“······?”

I walked over to Sasaki, who was sitting on the floor, put my hand on his shoulder and said.

“Inspector Sasaki, I will handle this quietly, so you can just go about your day as usual. Okay?”

“What do you plan to do? I’ll just return the Black Dragon’s money…”

“Oh, sir! I’ve never even seen any money from the Black Dragons or the Black Earthworms.”

“······.”

“Then let’s consider it that way and return to the consulate.”

Sasaki seemed to have a lot to say, but he was a man who knew how to weigh his curiosity against his life and take advantage of the situation.

“······See you next time.”

“Yes, I will come and visit you next time.”

After sending Sasaki away like that, I took out the Black Dragon Society’s securities and bearer bonds that had been sleeping in the safe in my room and laid them out on the floor.

“Hmm… This is something that is extremely important to those Black Dragons….”

I didn’t know if this meant that the Black Dragon Society’s financial difficulties had become that serious, or if it contained information that the Black Dragon Society could not afford to miss.

“Huh? What is this?”

As I was going through the items from the Black Dragon Society’s personal safe, something interesting suddenly popped out.