The Hostage Is Too Big of a Shot (1)
The Hostage Is Too Big of a Shot (1)
The Five Stages of Accepting a Defection.
Stage 1. Denial.
"Haha, there's no way that could happen!"
"...Prime Minister?"
"Ms. Ninomiya is a patriot. There is no way she would vanish without a word. It is not as if we treated her poorly."
The Japanese government denied it.
They refused to believe that Aika—their obedient Strategic Nuke—could have defected from Japan.
"We have secured CCTV footage of her contact with S-rank No. 7, Võ Chí Công. Her passport is also missing from her residence, so the circumstances clearly indicate she departed aboard his private aircraft."
"Has she lost her mind!? We humored and placated that all-brawn gorilla, and this is how she betrays us!?"
Stage 2. Anger.
Once Aika's departure became a certainty, the bureaucrats could not contain their rage.
Drunk on arrogance, Aika had acted rashly!
She did not even appreciate the extraordinary treatment they had given her. How dare she!
The officials fumed with thoughts like these, but...
"Detain the Ninomiya family immediately...."
"P-Prime Minister, we cannot do that! If she so much as puts on a show of force—no, if she simply stops clearing S-rank Gates, Japan is finished!"
"......That's true."
Huh. What could we actually do?
S-rank No. 1, the walking Strategic Nuke, wanted to defect—and what could they do about it?
What could we even do?
The possibility that her blade might turn on them quickly brought the government back to its senses.
"What should we...."
"...She couldn't truly leave Japan. Hm."
"Pardon?"
"Even after returning from Korea, she said that Japan was more comfortable. More importantly, her family is here."
"But she left the country without saying a word to us."
"It must be a demonstration. She wants us to treat her even better. How greedy."
"Then, what shall you do?"
"Investigate what she wants and why she became dissatisfied with us."
And so, Stage 3. Bargaining.
The government tried to prepare terms for negotiation.
They wanted to change Aika's mind and ask her to become the sword that protected Japan once more.
......That was certainly their intention, but...
"Foreign Minister, was the contract requiring Ms. Ninomiya to wear a hakama not supposed to pay her one million yen per month?"
"Yes. The records show that the budget was consistently disbursed."
"Then why was only one hundred thousand yen deposited into her account—and only once?"
"Pardon?"
A surprise audit lasting half a day revealed something astonishing.
The deeper they dug, the more corruption surfaced.
One million yen per month in exchange for appearing in a hakama?
The company responsible for providing and laundering the clothing had embezzled the money.
After seeing how naïve Aika was immediately after returning to Japan, they had deceived and exploited her mother.
Further investigation uncovered even more.
Her compensation for clearing Gates had been undercut.
She had been forced to donate to funds for training awakeners, among other things.
Everyone around the walking moneybag had skimmed off a share.
Aika earned so much that she had not even noticed being shorted by tens of millions of yen. Still...
This was what they found in only half a day.
The Japanese government fell into grim silence.
"What do they think the people's tax money is for, allowing something like this to happen?"
"W-well, you know how it is. Matters related to Ninomiya are state secrets. It seems no audit ever reached them."
"Even so. How could such things happen in clean, upright Japan? It's no wonder Ninomiya became disillusioned."
They had wondered why she defected, but anyone would have done the same.
The fact she hadn't done it sooner only proved she was a patriot.
Stage 4: Depression began.
"No wonder she snapped at me every time we met. So it wasn't merely the hysteria of an unmarried old maid...!"
"What shall we do? Shall we draft a negotiation proposal?"
"Would she even listen? I would have become disillusioned with Japan too...!"
Heavy regret, despair, and obsession.
They desperately wanted her back, but they had no right to ask.
Yet they could not function without her.
The Prime Minister repeatedly clutched his head and groaned over the situation.
Eventually, they reached Stage 5: Acceptance...
"Prepare an announcement. We will expose the corruption, and all the ministers will prostrate themselves before the nation. Then perhaps she will come back..."
"......? Prime Minister. It seems Ninomiya is in Korea."
"What?"
Just before reaching Acceptance.
One suspicious piece of news came in.
"Isn't this an article about a Korean awakener named Seo Yujin? Why is this..."
"Here—look at this. Do you see the woman in the corner?"
"......What?"
It was an article about an A-rank Gate that had appeared in Korea.
A photo taken from a helicopter above Hangang Park...
Beside Seol Hayeon was the tiny figure of a robed woman.
The Prime Minister's eyes snapped wide open.
'Those absurdly huge breasts... Ninomiya?'
Seol Hayeon had positioned awakeners around the area, and Aika herself had suppressed her presence, allowing them to avoid direct media exposure.
However, they couldn't stop photographs from being taken from the air.
The Prime Minister recognized her at a glance.
No matter how tiny she appeared in the distance, or how thoroughly the robe concealed her body.
How many people in the world had breasts larger than their head?
At Aika's size, her chest was practically an identifying feature.
"A rumor is circulating among Korean awakeners that a robed woman helped Seol Hayeon destroy the barrier using power reminiscent of Ms. Ninomiya."
"......!!!!!"
A shocking realization followed.
A woman who looked like Aika had done something only Aika could do.
The realization was inescapable: it had to be Aika herself.
The Korean awakeners had dismissed the possibility, thinking, "Why would Aika come to Korea?" However...
Japan knew that she had gone AWOL.
There was no other interpretation but that she had fled to Korea.
The officials in the meeting grew gravely serious once more.
"Korea, of all places!"
"Yes. Another country might be one thing, but absolutely not Korea!!"
If it were another country, say America, that might be one thing.
But Korea? She had gone to the neighboring country with which Japan had such prickly diplomatic relations?
This truly could not be overlooked.
Depending on the situation...
"Severe diplomatic pressure, trade sanctions—everything at our disposal..."
"No. We must bring her back even if it means risking a localized war."
——They were willing to risk war itself.
Aika herself would find it absurd, but from Japan's perspective, it was a natural reaction.
It was as though their hostile neighbor had stolen their Strategic Nuke.
A walking calamity who could reduce their capital to ruins within an hour if she chose.
Naturally, some called for fighting back.
"Mobilize the Self-Defense Forces immedia—"
"Would that be wise? If Ms. Ninomiya sided with Korea, we would be outmatched in both justification and military strength."
"......."
However, they truly could not fight.
They had effectively exploited her at the national level, leaving them no diplomatic ground on which to object...
And Japan knew her power better than anyone.
The dispirited officials collapsed heavily into their seats.
After going in circles, they finally arrived at Stage 5: Acceptance.
"First, send a formal diplomatic letter to Korea... No, let us make contact quietly before that."
"Shall we contact the Japanese Ambassador to Korea?"
"No, I will go myself. If I prostrate myself before her, she may at least hear us out."
They wanted to cling even to the hem of the departing woman's hakama.
As a final desperate measure, the Prime Minister chose to go to Korea.
He prepared a forged passport and kept his escort to a minimum.
They disguised themselves as ordinary Japanese citizens.
A formal visit would have exposed Aika's defection to the public, so they had little choice...
They also needed to endure at least this much hardship to demonstrate Japan's sincerity.
They also calculated that, even if they failed to win her back, they could at least claim that they had done everything possible.
And so Suguru Nakanowatari, Prime Minister of Japan, arrived in Korea.
"Phew... Somehow, we entered the country without being detected."
"What shall you do?"
"We will go straight to the Pentagon. I can reason with Seol Hayeon, so if I explain the situation, she should at least arrange an audience."
They headed straight for the academy.
Judging by the photograph, Aika was under Seol Hayeon's protection.
Heading there was the only way to speak with Aika.
And, the moment they arrived near the academy...
"We'll have to walk from here. Let's see...."
—Kwaaaaaaaang!!!!!!!!!
"......!!!!!?"
——A deafening explosion suddenly slammed against their eardrums.
The startled Prime Minister and his entourage looked around wildly.
They tried to determine what was happening and whether their identities had somehow been exposed.
Before long...
Someone entered their field of vision.
Buildings burned in several places.
Someone raced across the asphalt, firing shells of ice in every direction...
A blue-haired girl.
-Swoosh.
"Get lost! All of you, get lost! If you don't want to die, get out of here! I'll keep this up until that bitch Seol Hayeon comes out!"
"Come out and talk to me before I start killing people by the dozen!"
The people around were too busy screaming and fleeing.
She was the terrifying villain who had attacked the academy only a few weeks earlier.
She was the Grade 1 Villain, Winterer.
In other words, it was a villain attack—the kind that occurred frequently in other countries.
But the Prime Minister couldn't bring himself to move.
"That is... a villain!?"
"A terrorist attack in Korea, the world's strongest awakener nation? Japan might be one thing, but how does this make any sense!?"
"Did she know we were coming...? No, we came in complete secrecy! How could a mere villain have known?"
Another country might be one thing, but wasn't this Korea?
The world's strongest awakener nation, which had suffered only one villain terrorist attack in the past ten years.
And now a terrorist attack happened at the exact moment they had entered the country illegally?
It was only natural to suspect it was no coincidence.
"Translate for me. What is she saying? What is she demanding of us?"
There was another reason they hadn't fled.
Most of them were Japanese.
They couldn't understand Winterer's Korean warning telling them to leave if they didn't want to die.
Had they understood, they would have quickly come to their senses and evacuated.
Of course, there was one person among them capable of Korean, but...
"......?"
'A villain told civilians to run? ...Did I mishear?'
He, too, was frozen in shock and couldn't move.
Instead of massacring civilians, a villain was warning them to run before they got caught up in the attack?
...Those sociopathic pleasure killers?
It made no sense.
Yet suppressing a villain's Murder Impulse was known to be dozens of times harder than a severely addicted person quitting drugs unaided.
Winterer was restraining her urge to kill and prioritizing meeting Seol Hayeon.
She was directly defying everything forty years of research had established about villain behavior.
"Are you fucking deaf? I told you to get lost if you don't want to die!"
"......!!! Sh-she's looking this way!?"
Then, seizing the opening...
Winterer spotted them from across the distance.
A path of ice materialized across the asphalt.
-Crackle.
"Well, my throat's starting to hurt anyway. Might as well grab a hostage, even if it's a baldie."
"Sh-she is coming this way...!"
And so,
-Grab.
"Seol Hayeooon! Get out here now unless you want to watch these old men die!"
"H-hiiiik!!!"
Grade 1 Villain Winterer had begun a terrorist attack and hostage situation.
The hostages: the Prime Minister of Japan, Suguru Nakanowatari, and four others.
-Cheujeut.
"For every ten minutes you're late, I'll pop one bastard's head!"
The curtain rose on a terrorist incident that placed the fates of both Korea and Japan at stake.