"Exactly!"
Another director from Chiba Industrial Bank slapped the table, laughing. "A prodigy of literature? Around here, that kid isn't worth one of President Anzai's fingers!"
"You're all too kind." Kensaku Anzai waved a hand in feigned modesty, but nothing could hide the flush spreading across his face, equal parts alcohol and vanity.
He savored every word of flattery. A man who supposedly commanded winds and summoned rain elsewhere, reduced to nothing more than a punchline at his table. The feeling was intoxicating. It made him feel like the true ruler of Chiba.
Then his phone rang again.
The same unknown Tokyo number glowed on the screen.
Laughter died mid-breath. The men glanced at one another, registering something peculiar in each other's eyes before their expressions curdled back into amusement.
"My, my," Hiroaki drawled, his voice pitched like a stage actor's. "Anzai-san, it seems our great author Fujiwara is nothing if not persistent. Could it be he's come crawling back to beg?"
"Almost certainly." Vice President Watanabe from Mitsubishi UFJ stroked his double chin, sneering. "Young men who've never been beaten down by the real world always carry these delusions about their own talent. They won't quit until they've smashed headfirst into a wall."
"Pick up! Pick it up, President Anzai!" A city councilman in the corner leaned forward, grinning like a spectator at a cockfight. "And put it on speaker! Let us all hear what new posture this great author has chosen for his groveling!"
The room erupted.
Under the weight of every eager gaze, Kensaku Anzai's brain, thoroughly saturated with alcohol and self-importance, made a decision he would spend the rest of his life chewing on in regret.
He slid his thumb across the screen. Tapped speaker.
"Fujiwara-san." His voice stretched long and lazy, dripping condescension. "Well? Have you come to your senses? Ready to apologize for that little display of rudeness earlier?"
"Apologize? No."
On the other end, Seiji Fujiwara's voice was perfectly level, as though the insult hadn't registered at all.
"I was simply curious..."
A brief pause. Then, unhurried and precise, he recited an address.
"President Anzai. That villa at number seventeen, Sansui Gardens, out in the suburbs. If I'm not mistaken, the name on the property deed belongs to your driver. A Mr. Yamamoto, yes?"
The atmosphere in the room seized up like a clenched fist.
Anzai's smile stiffened for half a second.
But then Seiji continued, and the tension in his chest unwound just as quickly.
"And I've also heard," Seiji's tone remained utterly flat, "that just last month, you received a consulting fee of three million yen through Yamamoto-san's account. From the Chiba Port Construction Fund, wasn't it?"
Three million yen.
The number landed, and Anzai let out a breath.
His rigid expression melted away, replaced by a burst of contemptuous laughter.
"Ha! Hahahaha!"
He doubled over. Hiroaki, Vice President Watanabe, every man in the room, after a beat of surprise, caught up instantly.
The laughter that followed was drenched in mockery.
"Good Lord... three million? Did I hear that right?!"
"A villa and three million yen? That's his trump card?!"
"I thought he was going to drop some earth-shattering bombshell. All that buildup for this?"
The noise threatened to lift the ceiling off the private room.
"Is that all..." Anzai wiped tears of laughter from the corners of his eyes, leaning toward the phone. "Fujiwara-san, have you been watching too many crime dramas? You really think you can threaten me with this... this nothing?"
Hiroaki shook his head beside him, his face a portrait of disappointment and disdain. "Too amateur, Fujiwara-sensei. Far too amateur. Your investigative skills are in no way proportional to your writing talent."
He paused, then adopted the tone of a man graciously dispensing wisdom to the uninitiated.
"Let me give you a free lesson, since you're clearly out of your depth. A property held under someone else's name? We have at least ten perfectly legal ways to explain the source of those funds. And that paltry three million in consulting fees? Please."
"You know what? That doesn't even meet the minimum threshold for the Special Investigation Division to open a case. Leverage like that, in Chiba, in our circles? We could make it disappear not just a hundred times, but a thousand."
"That's right, that's right," Watanabe chimed in, his voice oozing false sympathy. "Fujiwara-san, you're just too young. You don't understand how things work here. You think our world operates like one of your novels? Black and white, all about evidence and justice? Here, connections are the only hard currency. Relationships are the only passport that matters."
Anzai felt he'd seen straight through to the bottom of Seiji Fujiwara's hand. A young man armed with a bit of cleverness and some dirt that wouldn't survive daylight, thinking he could challenge an entrenched power structure?
He cleared his throat and spoke into the phone with the smug authority of an elder disciplining a child.
"Fujiwara-san, one last piece of advice. It's fine for a young man to have talent, but don't overreach. Hands that stretch too far have a tendency to snap."
"Go back to Tokyo. Stick to your entertainment empire and your bestselling novels. Stop meddling in the financial world."
"The waters of Chiba run deeper than you can imagine. You can't handle it."
He finished, then deliberately let silence hang for several seconds, savoring the anticipation of what was surely coming: a furious outburst, impotent rage, desperate profanity.
Instead, a quiet laugh drifted through the speaker.
"Is that so?"
"Well, since everyone finds this so amusing..."
"I sincerely hope you'll all still be laughing tomorrow morning."
The line went dead.
The flat tone of the disconnected call pulsed through the room, and the giddy air briefly went still.
It didn't last. The silence drowned beneath a fresh wave of ridicule.
"Bluffing! Pure bluff!"
"Tomorrow morning? Who does he think he is? God? Is he going to rain down divine punishment?"
"I think we rattled him so badly he lost his mind. Out of tricks and talking nonsense!"
Hiroaki drained his cup in one go, slammed it on the table, and laughed. "Come! Forget about the howling of a beaten dog! Let's drink! Consider this a toast in advance to the great author Fujiwara's total defeat, and to our imminent, absolute victory!"
"Cheers!"
"To our victory!"
Glasses clinked. The room refilled with reckless, euphoric noise.
...
...
In the study of Seiji Fujiwara's estate.
He listened to the dial tone in silence. The faintly amused expression on his face hadn't shifted by a fraction.
He picked up a second phone. Encrypted, satellite-linked.
His fingers punched in a number he knew by heart.
The call connected almost instantly. A voice on the other end, perfectly deferential.
"Sir."
"I'll be sending you a set of files." Seiji's voice carried no emotion whatsoever. "Target: Kensaku Anzai, along with every name on the list."
"Primary charges: bribery, dereliction of duty, insider trading. Additional charges at your discretion."
"I want the Chiba District Prosecutor's Special Investigation Division and the Prefectural Police Headquarters' Second Investigation Section to move simultaneously. Eight a.m. sharp tomorrow morning. Full arrest operation."
"Understood." No questions. No hesitation. Only immediate compliance.
Seiji hung up, rose from his chair, and walked to the floor-to-ceiling window. Below him, the sleeping city glittered beneath a wash of neon, scattered and bright as a fallen galaxy.
"I hope you enjoy the surprise I've prepared for you."
The words were barely a murmur. His lips curved into a smile that held nothing warm.
---
The next morning.
Sunlight slipped through the blinds, painting pale stripes across the expensive rosewood desk in the office of the Sumitomo Bank Chiba Branch Manager.
Kensaku Anzai lounged in his chair, cradling a cup of coffee his secretary had brewed with meticulous care.
He'd drunk heavily the night before, but slept like the dead. Every time he recalled Hiroaki's promises at the table, every time he replayed the moment that clueless Tokyo brat had been rendered speechless by a few choice words, a wave of pure satisfaction washed through him.
Hmph. Seiji Fujiwara...
He set his cup down with a crisp click.
Then he picked up the morning financial paper. Front page, above the fold: a report on how Yukinoshita Construction faced a critical cash-flow crisis and might file for bankruptcy protection within the week.
Every line brimmed with sympathy for the young woman at the company's helm, and grim forecasts for its future.
Silly girl. Thought she could go up against me?
A victor's grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. And as for Seiji Fujiwara... some nouveau riche kid who wrote a few bestsellers, dabbled in entertainment and pharmaceuticals, and thinks he can come to Chiba and throw his weight around? Laughable.
He could picture it so clearly: Seiji's face right now, seeing this headline. Furious, impotent, helpless.
Your name doesn't carry enough weight, Fujiwara-san.
The thought drifted through his mind, lazy and self-assured.
A knock at the door.
"Come in."
His personal secretary, a young woman with immaculate makeup and a figure she knew how to use, swayed into the office and placed a stack of documents on his desk.
"President Anzai," her voice was honey-thick, "these are the files that need your signature today. Also, Vice President Watanabe from Mitsubishi UFJ called just now. He'd like to invite you to Gekka tonight. Apparently... there are some promising new girls he'd like you to evaluate together."
"Oh?" Anzai's eyebrow arched, and a knowing smile spread across his face. "Tell him I'll be there on time."
He relished this. Power at his fingertips, life and death decided with a word. Money, authority, women... everything within arm's reach.
He picked up his pen, poised to sign the resolution that would permanently terminate all credit support to Yukinoshita Construction.
BANG.
The office door flew open from outside.
Both Anzai and his secretary flinched hard.
His brow knotted instantly. He lifted his head, face dark with the fury of a man interrupted.
"Who the hell?! What kind of manners is this?! What are the security guards even paid for?!"
But when he saw who stood in the doorway, the uglier words already climbing his throat lodged there and went no further.
Five or six men filled the entrance. Dark suits, sharp-edged expressions, eyes that cut like a hawk scanning open ground.
The one at the front was roughly forty, tall, with a jaw carved from granite. He radiated an aura that could only be cultivated through years inside the justice system: cold, precise, unyielding.
Their presence seemed to freeze the air solid.
"Who... who are you people?!" Anzai's heart lurched, but he forced himself upright, clinging to the authority of his title. "Who let you in here? Do you have any idea what this place is?!"
The lead prosecutor ignored the outburst entirely.
He walked, step by measured step, to Anzai's desk. Behind him, the others fanned out in smooth, practiced silence, sealing every exit.
The secretary had already pressed herself into the corner, hand clamped over her mouth, too terrified to breathe.
"Kensaku Anzai, correct?" The lead prosecutor spoke. His voice matched his face: ice without a trace of warmth.
"I'm Tanaka. Chiba District Public Prosecutors' Office, Special Investigation Division."
Chiba District Prosecutors' Office.
Special Investigation Division.
The words hit Anzai's skull like a sledgehammer. His brain whited out.
Of course he knew what the Special Investigation Division was. It was the sharpest blade in the prosecutor's arsenal, reserved exclusively for the investigation of politicians, senior bureaucrats, and executives of major corporations.
"The... the Special Investigation Division?" Anzai forced out a smile uglier than a grimace. "Prosecutor Tanaka, surely... surely there's been a mistake? I've always... I've always been a law-abiding citizen..."
"Whether there's been a mistake isn't for you to decide."
Tanaka cut him off without expression.
Then he reached into his jacket and produced a folded document. Slowly, deliberately, he unfolded it in front of Anzai's face.
A white, formatted sheet of official stationery.
The seal of the nation's highest judicial authority stamped across it, and below, printed in cold, clinical type, words that seared into his vision:
[Criminal Summons]
[Detention and Interrogation Authorization]
"Kensaku Anzai."
Tanaka spoke in the flat, emotionless cadence of a man reading a death sentence, each syllable measured and final.
"On suspicion of multiple counts of commercial bribery, dereliction of duty, and illegal misappropriation of public funds, I am here on behalf of the Chiba District Prosecutors' Office to formally summon you."
"During the investigation, to prevent collusion or destruction of evidence, and in accordance with relevant provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure, you will be held for questioning for a period not exceeding seventy-two hours."
"Now. Come with us."
Kensaku Anzai's mind went blank.
His eyes bulged. His mouth hung open. Disbelief and raw terror scrawled across every line of his face.
A bolt of ice shot from the base of his spine straight to the crown of his skull.
He tried to speak.
But his throat had clamped shut, as though an invisible hand had closed around it. No sound came out.
"Take him."
Tanaka wasted no more words. A single gesture.
Two officers stepped forward, flanking the man now sagging limp in his chair, and hauled him bodily to his feet.
Click.
Metal struck metal, clean and bright.
Handcuffs locked around Kensaku Anzai's wrists.
The cold bite of steel sent a tremor through his whole body, and jolted just enough awareness back into his short-circuited brain.
"No! You can't do this!"
He thrashed wildly. "On what grounds are you arresting me?! Where's the evidence?! I want my lawyer! I want to make a phone call!"
"Your lawyer will see you soon enough." Tanaka's voice was arctic. "As for a phone call... I'm afraid that from this moment, until the investigation concludes, you are not permitted any contact with the outside world."
"Move out."
At his command, the two officers dragged the shouting, flailing Kensaku Anzai toward the door.
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