Chapter 70
《Good morning, everyone! And I hope you have a good afternoon, evening, and night! This is your radio-tower guardian, Doble-Doble, bringing you the latest news from Area 49 in real time!》
《Yes! Doble-Doble subscribers must have been very surprised by this sudden broadcast alert! “This bastard has finally come to his senses!” Well, that’s half right and half wrong. In any case, the reason I suddenly turned on the broadcast is, of course, for all of you subscribers!》
《I was personally enjoying some quality time with a beautiful woman with gorgeous chrome skin! So let’s get straight to the point!》
《But hold on! Hol◎Paradise has gone under, so here’s the super-premium outcall servi─, oh, right. This isn’t a regular broadcast! What a shame, but we’ll put the advertisements on hold for now~.》
《Anyway! The reason Doble-Doble suddenly turned on a broadcast, despite it being completely out of character!》
《All you experienced and professional residents of Area 49 must have seen the corporate aircraft flying overhead a few hours ago! Yes, aircraft, plural!》
《If you’ve properly maintained your visual implants as usual, you’ll also have noticed that the emblem engraved on those aircraft belonged to “Beltech International Solutions”…. The corporate bastards whose name is frightening even to say! For the record, I can do this because I’m working in business collaboration with the White Web Spider group Black Hornet, so ordinary subscribers, don’t try this yourselves.》
《Now then, why did corporate AVs appear in the skies over Old Town, where there isn’t even a proper aircraft landing pad?》
《It seems Beltech is quietly searching for the thief who robbed one of its warehouses and escaped!》
《The name of that remarkable fellow is Marcus Vogel, an elite who used to work as a contract mercenary for Beltech. Let’s see…. I can even confirm his impressive record of participating in the corporate war between food companies, otherwise known as the Cola War. Wow.》
《To help you subscribers be extra careful, I’ll send Marcus Vogel’s personal information and mug shot, registered in the city database, to you by text message.》
《You still haven’t signed up for a regular subscription? Honestly. Do you think some of us run businesses by digging up the ground─ static.》
《In any case, the situation in Area 49 is going to get much worse for the time being. I hear the streets of Old Town have become unusually safe lately, to the point that they no longer suit the name Special Administrative District, so this must be pretty bad news for those of you living nearby.》
《I’ll return during my regular broadcast hours next time with a topic related to this. Thank you to everyone who listened. This was your radio-tower guardian, Doble-Doble!》
Click.
The voice of the private radio coming through the terminal cut off.
Unfortunately, since I wasn’t a Doble-Doble subscriber, I couldn’t check the mug shot of that heinous criminal.
The last time I checked how much it cost…
It was something like $11.99 a week.
It was a ridiculously cheap amount—cheap enough that even in Unified Korea, which had actually succeeded in developing superconductors and whose exchange rate was approaching 500 won, it would be hard to get even Ku○’s Rocket Delivery service, but…
Since the city I lived in wasn’t Unified Korea but Risk City,
I decided I’d rather save that money and buy six hot dogs.
Beep.
As I inserted the bills I’d received from the mafia family into the register and scanned the hot dog’s barcode, the ninja who had been silently standing behind me like a life-size mannequin awkwardly opened his mouth.
“May I ask you one question?”
“Hmm.”
The runaway ninja from Hakuagumi Village—whose name I really wished he would change—more commonly known as Cat, folded his arms with a solemn air.
The prosthetic arm Walter had replaced with a brand-new one seemed to be functioning fairly well.
“All the food in this grocery store belongs to Hot Dog Man personally, does it not? Why, then, do you scan each item individually….”
“What kind of weird nonsense is that?”
Come to think of it, this ninja hadn’t joined our side very long ago, so he might not know.
I pointed my thumb at myself with a flourish.
“Dude, I’m such a hard-working grocery store employee. Didn’t I tell you that last time?”
“…Wasn’t that just a joke?”
“What do you mean, a joke?”
A customer might come in even now, so I had to keep watch at the counter like this.
Cat had kept his face hidden behind a mask consistently, then and now, leaving barely more than his eyes visible.
A bewildered emotion surfaced in his sharp eyes.
And then.
“…Indeed, you are thorough in maintaining your persona.”
Judging by that look, he seemed to be misunderstanding something weird again.
I’d better correct him quickly.
“No, I’m serious.”
“I understand.”
Should I just punch him once and be done with it?
It would be easy to misunderstand, since he often saw me drinking hot dogs without scanning their barcodes.
But all that meant was that I disposed of expired products in my stomach instead of a trash can.
No matter what he thought, what Michael nagged me about, or whether the vacant lot behind the grocery store kept transforming into some indescribably bizarre shape,
I was, in the end, nothing more than an ordinary grocery store employee.
Just as I was about to begin with, “You have to respect me. I’m the greatest part-timer of all time, someone who never stopped arranging the shelves even with my arms and legs broken, and….”
Jingle-jingle.
The bell hanging on the front door rang noisily.
My gaze naturally shifted in that direction.
This time, too, I assumed it would be a familiar face, like Michael, Rivera, Nova, Walter, or one of the homeless people who had picked up something strange outside.
But then.
“This place is actually open for business?”
“Yes. I even confirmed that, despite being a store located inside the Special Administrative District, it has uniquely been issued a business license.”
“Does he run a business as a hobby or something…. Well, good for him. Since we’re here, I might as well buy a few things to eat.”
A face I had never seen around here before.
I greeted him first in a trembling voice.
“…Welcome.”
Seeing those familiar footsteps wandering back and forth among the grocery store shelves,
my past self, heading to the convenience store at dawn because I craved ramen, flashed before me like a panorama.
Was he really a customer…?
However, Cat remained silent, apparently tense after seeing their peculiar appearance.
“……That sentence.”
Well, the citizens of Risk City had been dressing distinctively for years, so I didn’t pay much attention.
“Wow, but you’ve actually got decent merchandise here, too. This one’s been caught up in a shortage lately, so it’s hard to find even online.”
Apparently, people in this world still muttered things like “Brr, it’s cold” upon entering a convenience store. The man busily gathered a huge armful of snacks, muttering something no one answered, and then…
set the products he had brought down on the counter, almost spilling them all out.
“Please ring these up.”
“…Uh, just a moment, please.”
The long-awaited work of the grocery store.
It was a truly moving moment.
The man was dressed in a neat suit, rare to see on the streets of Old Town, but…
As I began entering each product’s barcode with unaccustomed movements, he casually spoke to the people who had come in with him.
“Places where people live really are all the same. Then again, I suppose humans being cheaper than machines makes it inevitable?”
“Team Leader. We didn’t come here to sightsee….”
The other people, wearing masks that looked like thick metal plates over their faces, answered him.
A round emblem that looked familiar was set into each mask.
“I know, I know.”
Judging roughly by their gait, they all seemed to be quite heavy.
In other words, all of them had replaced their entire bodies with cybernetic prostheses.
But the corporate man addressed as ‘Team Leader’ was considerably lighter by contrast.
The feeling was similar to that of the megacorp employee I had happened to meet before─.
“……”
My hand, which had been scanning the barcodes, paused for a moment.
I remembered.
The logo emblazoned on their clothes.
‘…Was it Beltech?’
It was exactly the same as the one emblazoned on the truck driven by the megacorp employee I’d met at Black Square.
I could recall it even more quickly because I’d just heard Doble-Doble’s radio broadcast.
Fortunately, I didn’t pause for long.
Beep, beep, beep….
I continued ringing them up calmly.
The gaze of the team leader from Beltech turned toward Cat behind me.
“But is that person a guard? His outfit is rather distinctive for a store guard….”
“…Ah.”
I’d known this would happen eventually ever since that guy kept dressing like that.
Black shinobi garb, a thick mask, and a red scarf.
It was an outfit more suited to a different universe.
Can’t be helped.
I’d have to cover for him to some extent.
“That guy? He likes the country of Japan so much that it’s basically ninja cosplay.”
“…?!”
I turned him into a Japanophile on the spot.
Cat visibly showed great consternation at my answer, but he didn’t open his mouth to make excuses.
“Hoh….”
The team leader from Beltech looked interested after hearing my answer.
Unlike his subordinates, he wasn’t wearing a mask, so his expression was fully visible.
“I see. Hmm…….”
He took a small device from his suit pocket and placed it on the counter with a thud.
When he touched the device’s screen, a hologram shaped like a human face suddenly appeared in midair.
“We’re currently looking for a criminal within the company. His name is Marcus Vogel. A nasty, filthy bastard who plundered our company’s property and fled.”
I almost flinched, but the team leader from Beltech didn’t detect anything strange about me and continued explaining.
“This is his face. And as I understand it, the area around this store is a hot spot where all sorts of vagrants gather….”
A mechanical smile settled over his face.
“Could you put an end to the ‘ninja cosplay’ for a moment and take off your mask?”
At the same time, clanking sounds rang out from the bodies of the subordinates standing beside him.
A suggestion delivered in a gentle tone.
Its substance was practically a threat.
But….
I glanced at Cat over my shoulder.
I remembered how he had refused to remove his mask when we went to Walter for repairs last time, saying that what was underneath might be ‘quite unpleasant to look at.’
“I’m sorry, but there are extenuating circumstances….”
“Plastic surgery requires more preparation than you might think. It’s also a simple way to verify his identity. You needn’t worry that seeing an unusual face might cause me to misunderstand anything.”
Inside those narrow, slit-like eyes,
pupils without a visible focus stared at me.
Had it been anyone else, I might have dragged Cat out in front of them and handed him over on the spot, but…
he was still one of my people.
“As I said, there are extenuating circumstances.”
“Haha, this is troublesome. I came here for work, so I can’t simply let it slide….”
He must have been displeased by my words, but his expression didn’t change at all, as though he had put on another kind of mask.
His smile only deepened around the eyes.
“Is that so?”
My answer hadn’t changed, though.
“This is my job, too.”
Protecting the grocery store (and the people associated with it).
Uncomfortable silence settled heavily across the counter.
Just as the atmosphere was about to turn hostile,
“Everyone, stop.”
Cat slowly began removing his mask.
“Thank you for your consideration, but I don’t think we need to go so far as to start an unnecessary quarrel.”
“Ah, thank you. If only things could always be this easy….”
The employee’s voice gradually died down.
Because he had seen Cat’s face.
“Will that do?”
An old scar that looked as though several years had passed.
Parts of his actual face had been ‘shaved away’ as well, making it difficult to claim it was special-effects makeup.
I think I understood why Cat hadn’t wanted to remove his mask.
The atmosphere grew awkward in an instant.
The corporate team leader lowered his head sheepishly.
“…I’m sorry about this.”
“It’s all right.”
Apparently, such cases did exist.
His honest apology loosened the tension in my body as well.
When Cat put his mask back on and stepped away, he casually handed the bagged snacks to a subordinate.
“In any case, it’s certain that this criminal is in Area 49. The sighting is fresh—only a few days old. Please be careful.”
“…We’ll do that.”
“And….”
Before leaving, he looked at me and gave a small chuckle.
Unlike before, the feeling was considerably lighter.
“You look like the store manager. I understand that you care about your subordinate, but if someone from another team had come here instead of me, things could have gotten quite serious. Be more careful about that.”
Apparently, he hadn’t been looking for an answer to his warning, because the team leader from Beltech simply left the grocery store with his subordinates.
Jingle-jingle.
The door closed.
Cat’s deeply moved gaze turned toward me.
“…I was deeply moved by the way you regard me. I knew choosing to serve Hot Dog Man was the right─.”
“Fuck.”
“?”
But Cat’s thanks never reached my ears.
The ‘man’s face,’ rendered as a translucent hologram, had thrown my thoughts into complete turmoil.
- So…. What are you?
- Kids these days have no sense of romance. Say something. It’s not like I fiddled with your brain or welded your mouth shut to maintain security.
- Now, fingers or toes. Which shall we start with?
Marcus Vogel.
No wonder there seemed to be so much overlap between ‘Beltech International Solutions,’ ‘corporate property,’ ‘criminal,’ and ‘Black Square.’
He really was alive.
‘And now that bastard is wandering around Area 49.’
Once my thoughts had sorted themselves out that far,
I couldn’t help muttering again.
“I’m fucked…!”