Long Wait

Kazuma and Chiyoko boarded the train to Sumitomo Construction Headquarters, which was situated in Shibuya District.

Chiyoko was still wearing the same sailor suit that she had put on in the morning, but she had already sewn back the top two buttons with the needle and thread that she had borrowed from the police station.

Chiyoko only took a few minutes to sew the buttons back, which impressed Kazuma.

There were not many people on the train. After all, it was past the morning rush hour and not the time for the afternoon rush hour yet.

However, dressed in school uniforms, the pair was quite eye-catching on the train.

All the passengers kept their distance from Kazuma and Chiyoko, probably treating them as delinquents who had skipped school.

By the way, Kazuma and Chiyoko were also carrying their bamboo swords. They'd brought them to the police station as evidence, but after confirming that they had not initiated the attack on purpose, the swords had been returned to the siblings.

But now, those bamboo swords wrapped in cloth made the Kiryuu siblings look more like delinquents.

Chiyoko looked out of the window and said, "There's construction everywhere."

"Right," Kazuma replied casually, still thinking about how to persuade the executive director later.

An executive director was considered to be the lowest-ranking among Japanese corporate executives, but even so, it was still way above all those workers on the real bottom levels.

They were the kind that Kazuma had to treat with the utmost respect in his previous life.

A "normal employee" without any background could only be promoted to department head at most.

If one were to be promoted to executive director, they had to be either a member of the upper class, born with a silver spoon in their mouth, or a graduate of a prestigious school.

In Japan, getting into a famous school would be a leap in social standing.

'Speaking of which, how did the Kiryuu family end up in today's miserable state?'

Kazuma could not help but ponder over this question.

Given the huge dojo under their name, the Kiryuu family must have had its glory days in the past. But now, the family members had all died out except for the young siblings with little savings left, which could not even last them until university graduation.

What happened exactly?

Kazuma began to search for clues in the host's memory.

At this moment, he suddenly felt something heavy on his shoulder. He turned around and saw that it was Chiyoko.

Chiyoko was leaning against his shoulder and had fallen asleep.

Kazuma looked at his sister and smiled slightly.

Since yesterday, this girl had first been beaten up by her brother Kazuma, and then she went head to head with an unscrupulous capitalist. She must be mentally and physically exhausted.

Recalling Chiyoko's behavior up until now, Kazuma exclaimed, "She must be the epitome of elegant Japanese ladies."

The train swayed gently as the wheels rolled over the tracks, clicking.

***

Meanwhile, Bandō, the underboss of the Nishikiyama Family, was sitting in the driver's seat of a van, tapping the steering wheel anxiously.

Since early this morning, he had been waiting here in the van with a few Nishikiyama Family lackeys.

He knew that Kiryuu Chiyoko would definitely walk past here on her way to the Koshikawa Girls' Junior High School. They wanted to kidnap Kiryuu Chiyoko before forcing Kiryuu Kazuma to sign the contract and sell the dojo.

In this era, the security in Japan was not as good as it was advertised. It was very common for the yakuza to kidnap someone.

The threats posed by the yakuza in Japan would not be resolved until the passing of the Anti-boryokudan Law during the Heisei Era.

In addition, it could be seen from the law that the yakuza has a huge influence in Japan. Since it was impossible to eliminate them fully, the government even listed a few "government-controlled syndicates" in its legislation.

Even though it's said that the government would increase surveillance over those syndicates, the law was actually saying, "Since we can't get rid of you but our voters need an explanation, we shall just legalize your action."

Yes, the yakuza's presence in Japan had been legal since 1992. Of course, it was only limited to large syndicates; small organizations had been cracked down completely.

In the Japanese entertainment industry, there were many actors who looked like yakuza bosses, and even those who usually starred as yakuza bosses in Japanese dramas and movies. In fact, they really were yakuza bosses…

1980 was the starting point of the yakuza's great prosperity. The yakuza of this era had sensitively smelled the scent of success. Hence, they actively fought against one another for fame and fortune.

Kidnapping a little girl was nothing to them.

However, the problem was that Kiryuu Chiyoko had not appeared at all.

It was almost that time in the afternoon when school ended, but no one in Bandō's group had seen Chiyoko.

Even someone as calm as Bandō could not help but feel anxious.

They still had to deal with the stubborn fools who refused to move out of the Nishikiyama Family's territory. Wasting a day just like that was a huge loss of money.

Meanwhile, the other organizations had been eyeing them greedily, ready to pounce on and swallow the weak Nishikiyama Family at any time.

"F*ck, why isn't she here yet? Ota! Take two men with you and go back to the dojo. Keep an eye on it. If you see her, do it immediately. Come back once you've tied her up."

"Of course!" Kyodai Ota patted the two young men next to him on their shoulders. "Come with me! Stop reading your f*cking comics! Are you really members of the yakuza?"

A kyodai was equivalent to a soldier in the yakuza. They were the lowest-ranking members in a syndicate.

When one had been promoted to kyodai, they would be allowed to wear the family emblem. People without the family emblem could not be counted as official members of the syndicate, and they were of an even lower rank than soldiers.

When Ota was about to leave with his two underlings, Bandō suddenly called out to him, "Wait! Idiot, you forgot to take the walkie-talkie!"

As he spoke, he picked up the walkie-talkie and threw it to Oda.

It took them a lot of effort to get this item from the American soldiers stationed in Japan.

In this era, communication was extremely difficult without a phone or a pager.

In order to adapt to the intense "peer competition," the yakuza had thought of all kinds of ways to obtain communication equipment.

When there was a conflict, they had to rely on this thing to call for help. It would definitely work better than firing smoke signals.

After Ota took the walkie-talkie and left with the two underlings, Bandō returned his gaze to the gate of Koshikawa Girls' Junior High School.

This kind of private school hired professional security personnel, so Bandō did not dare to get too close.

After all, even the yakuza would not dare to get into trouble with actual capitalists and other influential people.

Bandō knew that there'd been a commotion at the Kiryuu family's dojo this morning, but he was sure that Kiryuu Chiyoko would go to school like a good girl after leaving the police station.

'Could it be that they decided to skip school after leaving the police station?'

However, according to the intel that Bandō had obtained, Kiryuu Chiyoko was a model student who had not even missed a single day of school. She'd received the Diligence Award twice for attending every single lesson in the first two years of her junior high school. It was said that she was the only girl in the entire Koshikawa Girls' who had won this award for two consecutive years.

"Bandō-san," one of Bandō's lackeys said. "It's almost time for the Koshikawa Girls' Junior High to end school. Perhaps this Kiryuu Chiyoko won't be coming today…"

"Shut up. We will stay here and wait until the last student has left the school!" Bandō roared.

It's the underboss's main responsibility to scold his subordinates. Hence, Bandō could be considered to have done his duty.

However, he understood the impatience of his underlings.

After all, his patience had run out too.

'Boss will definitely be very angry if we spend all day waiting but still fail to take her back.'

Their boss might have a hannya mask tattooed on his back, but when he got angry, he would be a thousand times scarier than his demon face tattoo.

Bandō did not want to face his anger.

"Damn it, why isn't she here yet?" Bandō waited anxiously.