The cold wind howled outside the window, making the already desolate late-autumn winter seem even bleaker and colder.
Since the frost was about to be cleared away, the little animals covered in frost and snow, frozen on the ground like transparent ice sculptures, had naturally become a major eyesore. After this frost-clearing, the two of them would definitely become a serious problem.
If they inevitably became a problem this time, they might very well be swept out the door!
What exactly was that senior woman thinking?!
Cipher Pol had arranged for them to be given completely new appearances and sent into the outside world, yet one moment she called it hibernation, and the next she made it sound as though everything was a tangled mess in their hearts.
Was this really part of the plan?!
Or was she trying to drag hatred onto everyone at once?!
In all my years, I had never seen anyone dare to speak so boldly while acting so completely justified!
At the same time, like an illusion lingering by someone's ear, it seemed as though two vehicles had stopped outside the fence of his office building.
Two vehicles, snow-white and fitted for the ice.
They were so quiet that, if they had been left nearby like trash beside a group of street thugs, they could have casually passed for thugs from a detention center.
But the auras of these three people were extremely powerful. They were definitely not to be underestimated.
On the street, atop the awning of a run-down storefront, someone was staring fixedly at everything happening inside.
A young man wearing a tall top hat, looking like a theatrical actor, held a cane as he scolded someone.
The disheveled man had six short, fat people penned in around him. Beside him, a short man dressed carefully in a black-and-white suit was being cursed at with an expression of utter despair.
Then the theatrical man in the middle, his lips still colored red, pressed down on the man's shoulder. With a wide palm tightening its grip, he said:
"Listen carefully. Because of my third brother, this country was dragged into another war. Since this matter has already happened, whether you claim he saw me take a few coins or not, he will be locked away in Star-Net Prison."
The young master whose shoulder was being held heard that. Even the butler who had signed his life away to serve him could hear how absurd it sounded. The young master could not help shouting:
"Are you kidding me?! Have you lost your mind?! My boss is Manno-nee-san, you know?! How dare you treat her like this?!"
"What is going on? Can someone explain this? The direction of this story is completely off."
"Exactly. All that frantic effort, and when you look closely, where even are we?"
"But that young master's spirit sight is too clear. These people are basically corpses. They have been lying dormant together for a very long time."
"That young master is actually younger than him, and his body is much better balanced. At best, he is a hot-blooded, arrogant young master. I'm afraid his next job won't have good odds."
"That's true. Although he hasn't leaked much aura, judging from the clothes he wore before death, his taste still can't compare with that one."
"What is this kid doing? He doesn't even give a name before secretly tricking his uncle. One moment he says he didn't say it, the next he says he didn't see it. Seriously, this rotten story is making me dizzy. And why does he have to act like he is about to live or die later? When will this suicidal nonsense end?"
Every whispered word from the bystanders entered the man's ears. His face revealed a threatening expression.
Laffitte also noticed the details behind him and heard them.
Before the young master could continue shouting, the restaurant owner turned around and began speaking to the middle-aged man again.
"Even if you package yourself as a proper person, even if you dress it up with all those flashy tricks, in the end they'll still say it was nonsense spoken before death!"
"Is that so?" Laffitte asked, his refined appearance calm.
"Yes. It's all nonsense!"
"I see." Laffitte nodded, pretending to be deep in thought. His tone turned slightly cold. "In other words, I absolutely do not acknowledge what those onlookers said. None of it holds. It can all be treated as nonsense."
After saying that, Laffitte did not speak further.
Before the restaurant owner could react, and before the young master could recover from his shock, he roared:
"You're so idle after eating your fill, aren't you? Let's see if I can't leave you completely intact!"
A slap landed across the restaurant owner's face.
"How's that? To vent anger for a petty man, he called the owner over and slapped him!"
The blow struck solidly and sent him crashing down hard. Pair after pair of eyes stared straight as he fell in front of the onlookers.
That slap was not aimed at the young master. It had truly been aimed at the theatrical man's face.
This old fellow's bones were something else.
Human hearts really were like that.
After those who had originally been watching the show realized that the young master was vicious too, they could not help swallowing hard. One after another, they began running away.
As the footsteps around them grew more and more distant, Laffitte glanced at the restaurant owner lying on the ground, gasping heavily.
"What is it, Laffitte? Are you staying behind to take responsibility, or what?"
The owner on the ground could not stop his burning tears from flowing. He had truly fallen today. As he spoke through the pain of being slapped down, his tears rolled as well.
He seemed to be retching, foaming at the mouth, and crying all at once.
"You suffered a setback," Laffitte said with his refined appearance, stepping back a little before continuing to mock him.
"Laffitte! I can accept that this job may not have a good ending, but I still don't believe it. You call this merely suffering a setback? You want to leave us unable even to make a sound, unable to live, with our minds collapsing. With the two of you in a place like this, what exactly do you plan to do? How are you going to solve that problem?"
The owner on the ground cried bitterly.
"Isn't that right?" Laffitte sighed as if accompanying him, his mouth flattening.
"Then what kind of scene comes after these tears flying everywhere? Are they still going to do nothing?"
"It's them. It has to be them." The old fellow let out a breath and finally said, "They definitely have something. What is it? They abandoned everything in a few careless words and left it behind. The crescent-shaped mark they received should be in the air-raid shelter. If it's useless, then we're all finished!"
The owner had been dragged into the questioning. Looking at Laffitte's dry, expressionless face, he opened his mouth again and said in one breath:
"Laffitte, actually, I really don't understand why we have to stay in this place. These days, where can the sun even go? Why do the people we meet end up fighting like this?
"But when you enter a certain corner of a certain street, every one of you will become part of that street corner. When the time comes, throw away your masks. Make all the noise you want. Go to the sea and cry there, because that place is your only refuge."
After that, the owner on the ground turned away without looking back and left viciously.
"It looks like, beyond the sea, those truly old days from years past held the real benefits for that person. Going out to sea, Laffitte… If those two parts are involved, I could choose that too. But if you want to join that group, then I can introduce you!"
(End of Chapter)
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