Chapter 81: One Side Job After Another

TL: LittlePeach

-...A few days ago, a Shanyuan Society hideout that had been set up in Dandong was raided by some unidentified person.

The low silence held for only a moment before a thin breath drifted through from the other end of the phone, as if to clear the air.

-Zhang Hai, the boss of the Shanyuan Society, came over to Dandong to see the scene for himself. You don't happen to know anything about that Shanyuan Society hideout in Dandong, do you?

What was there to say?

I was the one who'd smashed that hideout to smithereens, after all.

It was a good thing we weren't talking face to face.

Because that sudden game of truth had made me lose control of my expression for a moment there.

'Zhang Hai. One way or another, that guy's got a long thread of life.'

Before I offered my answer, I let my mind wander first.

I'd assumed he'd gotten swept up somehow and killed in all that chaos while the Shanyuan Society and the Hongmen Society were tearing into each other, but who'd have thought he was over in Dandong around that time.

First, I calmly steadied my breathing.

"Was there something like that in Dandong? This is the first I'm hearing of it."

-You've never once been to Dandong?

"Never."

-....

At my instant reply, a strange silence began on the other end of the line.

There was no way she could know I'd spent a few days in Dandong.

'What's this?'

The silence stung.

Setting aside the vaguely uneasy feeling I couldn't put my finger on, it felt as though, had she been standing right beside me, Yang Mi-ryeong would have been staring me down.

For a while, a dead remained between the two of us.

"Is that all you called about?"

-...Hardly. Well, fine. I'm in no position to interrogate you anyway, and I called to ask a favor of you.

I made a deliberate effort to change the subject.

Yang Mi-ryeong went along with it readily enough.

In a noticeably lighter tone, she got straight to the point.

-Can you come to Taiwan right now?

"...Just like that, out of nowhere?"

-You promised you'd grant me one favor in return for the Hongmen Society intel I handed over last time, didn't you?

"That's true, but...."

Taiwan, of all places.

The request was as out of the blue as the timing of the call it rode in on.

"I did. I did say that, but...."

-A man doesn't go back on his word, does he?

"Could I ask first how many days this'll take?"

-It'll be over in two days.

At that soft voice, coaxing me along, I dragged a hand down my face for a moment.

I was on leave anyway, so the schedule itself was no problem, and Taiwan was only a four-hour flight away, so it wouldn't be much trouble either.

She'd promised me monetary compensation on top of it, so it wasn't exactly a losing deal.

-Let me give you a quick rundown of the situation first. You remember Jin Hao?

"Of course. I remember him."

-Ever since the day you handed him over to me, he's been held at our Kowloon Hotel this whole time.

"Hmm."

Jin Hao, the Chongqing Society's Dandong branch chief and the second son of the Chongqing Society's boss.

Our bond, which had begun the day the North Korean assassination squad attacked, when I knocked his jaw sideways at the Dandong hideout, had only grown deeper over a full day spent making the rounds of the casino together.

I could only hope I wasn't the only one who saw it that way.

-But the day after tomorrow just happens to be the Chongqing Society boss's birthday. He's famous for inviting every major Triad figure every year and throwing a lavish banquet that runs three days and nights straight.

"Ah."

-And I've received a formal invitation to that banquet in my capacity as the Kowloon Society's Dandong branch chief.

Now I thought I understood how things stood.

"You want me to handle your security, in Taiwan?"

-That's right.

She could've just said so from the start.

Except, if that was the case, the security Yang Mi-ryeong had in mind wouldn't be the run-of-the-mill kind.

"Can't you just turn the invitation down?"

-How often in a lifetime does the chance come to attend something like the Chongqing Society boss's birthday banquet as a Kowloon Society branch chief? It's a perfect opportunity to make myself known to the Triads' key executives.

"Honestly...."

Say what you will, there was probably no other reason Yang Mi-ryeong had seized the Kowloon Society's Dandong branch chief post at such a young age.

Such unhesitating confidence, for a post where she might well have to stake her life.

-I'll tell you the details in person in Taiwan.

"Well, all right. Where should I go?"

-Call me the moment you land at Taiwan's Taoyuan Airport. I'll come out to meet you.

"Sure. I'll see you in Taiwan."

-Thank you, for doing me this favor.

"Don't mention it."

Click.

The call cut off cleanly, leaving nothing behind but the business at hand.

Just then, I caught sight of some bikini-clad tourists, the kind that snag every man's eye, shrieking with laughter as they leaped into the sea.

"...Right. Back to work."

It seemed I'd have to leave all this wealth and splendor behind and rush off to work once again.

Slurrrrp.

I finished off what was left of my mango juice and smacked my lips.

*****

Now that all our business in Sihanoukville was finished, we'd made our way back to Phnom Penh.

"Oh, right, Frank mentioned this. Those Irobuchi-kai bastards are holed up inside New Bilibid Prison in the Philippines, cranking out product."

"How is that even possible, inside a prison?"

"Word is they bought off the prison guards."

"Honestly...."

"When I head to the Philippines later, I'll dig into it more, so for now just keep it in mind and leave it be."

"We'll do that."

The Cambodia dispatch squad's agents, each having finished a quick cleanup, sat huddled together in the hideout.

As I gave them a brief handover, I set the backpack I'd brought onto the table.

"This is the allowance Frank left us in cash."

I pulled the bundles of cash out one by one and slid them across in front of each of them.

Thump, thump.

Every last one of their eyes went wide at the bundles of cash stacking up neatly.

"Here, twenty-five thousand dollars apiece. Take your share."

"Hgk.... Wh-why are you giving this to us?"

"You did practically all the work on this one yourself, team leader, so why on earth would you...."

"Whoa. Dollars."

The agents looked dumbfounded at the bonus that had suddenly dropped in front of them.

Their looks all asked why I'd hand over such a big sum to them so freely.

I gave a calm shrug.

"I've always split whatever allowance comes my way with my team members, way back. I set aside my own cut too, so don't feel too indebted."

This had always been my way.

In a line of work where a stray bullet could bury itself in the back of a man's skull anytime, anywhere, what was the point of piling up stacks of cash that became nothing but worthless scraps of paper once he was dead?

So it amounted to handing my team members their travel money for the afterlife in advance; I scattered the allowance around lavishly so that none of us would have any regrets, no matter when death came.

Thanks to that, my old team's morale had been head and shoulders above every other team's at every turn, and even when we were thrown into brutal operations, we boasted a miraculous survival rate every single time.

It was my own art of handling men, built on hard experience.

"Oh, good grief...."

"Still, even so...."

"Team leaderrr...."

Of course, the Cambodia dispatch squad's agents, with no way of knowing the calculating thoughts behind it, were busy getting all misty-eyed and sparkling with deep emotion.

Whatever their heartwarming sentiments, I went on to lay out the next matter in a flat tone.

"I'm thinking of slipping off for a little trip nearby, some time off. Now that the Mango Farm job's wrapped up, the rest of you should relax and get some good rest for a while too."

I was actually planning a two-day trip to Taiwan at Yang Mi-ryeong's request, but that was my official story for public consumption.

At my words, Owl No. 11 raised a hand and asked cautiously.

"So, team leader. Are you planning to file a separate report on this Mango Farm business with HQ, by any chance?"

"No. I won't bother reporting it. I figure we can just report it loosely as an outfit supplying product to Australia and leave it at that."

"Ah, hmm."

Bringing up that we'd gotten tangled up with an Australian Secret Intelligence Service agent would only complicate the paperwork for nothing.

With everyone having pocketed an allowance on top of it, reporting the whole thing exactly as it happened and then getting grilled about this and that down the line would be a headache too.

"It's not like this was an official operation to begin with anyway; we just ran a little side job among ourselves, didn't we?"

"Mm-hm."

"I figure we can just wrap it up loosely along the lines of, we took custody of an abducted South Korean national from an Australian Secret Intelligence Service agent we happened to know, sent them to the embassy, and had them repatriated."

"That's a truly excellent idea."

The two veteran agents each let out a deep sigh of relief.

Perhaps struck by the fact that they felt the same way I did, they both stole glances at me with odd looks on their faces.

"It's just strange how nothing you say ever sounds the least bit like a Sparrow, team leader."

"Right? You seem awfully used to handling things this way."

"That's, well.... Back when I was in Dandong, I ran quite a few side jobs like this too. Did a bit of brokering for North Korean defectors there, took jobs from the CIA."

"Oooh."

"Is that so?"

"Whoa...."

Among black agents like us, side jobs were an everyday affair, weren't they?

With another side job in Taiwan waiting right around the corner, I grinned and gave a shrug.

*****

The day of Boss Jin Yao's birthday dawned.

Still wearing the suit I'd hastily bought in Cambodia, I rushed onto a plane and landed at Taoyuan Airport.

Brrrring. Click.

The call connected right away.

-Hello?

"It's me. I'm out front of the terminal, at the taxi stand."

-Good timing. I'll be right there.

Click.

The call ended before we could exchange another word.

I must have been standing there a good while, leaning at a slant against a terminal pillar.

Before long, a jet-black limousine glided smoothly into view from the distance.

It was elegant enough that the crowds lined up at the taxi stand murmured and stared.

'No way, is that the one?'

And then, sure enough, the car came to a natural stop right in front of me.

As I stood watching, half in doubt, the window slid down.

And there beyond it was Yang Mi-ryeong, greeting me with an elegant nod of her eyes.

"Get in."

"Well, now.... Live long enough and you get to enjoy luxuries like this."

"Feeling ready to turn and become a Crow agent now, at last?"

"Not a chance."

Once I climbed inside, the ceiling was taller and the space roomier than in most sedans.

While I sized up the car's dimensions, I thought of the van I'd recently blown to bits.

'This could hold a good fifty more gas canisters.'

As I took a quick look around the lavish interior, I planted myself in the seat across from Yang Mi-ryeong.

Naturally, this left the two of us facing each other, one on one.

"The suit suits you well."

"Thank you. You too."

She was in an off-the-shoulder dress that left her shoulders fully bared, much like the one I'd seen before.

It was a design that seemed to balance cunningly on the razor's edge between elegance and allure.

"Come over here. You've tied your necktie wrong."

"Ah."

She abruptly grabbed my wrist and pulled me down into the seat beside her.

Sliiip.

She mercilessly undid the necktie I'd taken such pains to knot properly, then, with a gentle touch, brushed the nape of my neck and began tying a new knot.

The line of her bare, snow-white shoulders drew right up close before my eyes.

And because of the alluring cleavage plunging just below it, I had no choice but to raise my eyes and pretend to be lost in thought, staring off into empty space.

"Now that I think of it, where are all your other people?"

"I've gathered them at a hotel near the airport. I'm only allowed to bring one bodyguard into Boss Jin Yao's mansion, and you're the most capable of everyone I brought along."

Just like that, Yang Mi-ryeong tossed out a line that made me flush for no good reason.

Though the look in her eyes as she said it was, for whatever reason, rather prim.

Doing my best to dodge that sharp gaze clinging stubbornly to me, I smacked my lips first.

"I flew in, so I didn't bring a thing with me. You don't happen to have a weapon or something set aside for me, do you?"

"...I think you're seriously misunderstanding something. The kind of predictable business you're imagining isn't going to happen at this event."

"And what makes you think you know what I'm imagining?"

Yang Mi-ryeong let out a scoff and gave my shoulder a light smack.

The necktie knot, finished before I knew it, was tied neat and firm.

"Shall I guess? Right now, you're picturing yourself getting surrounded by gun barrels on all sides and forcibly abducted the moment you arrive at the Chongqing Society's home turf, aren't you?"

"Oh."

She'd hit it exactly right.

Yang Mi-ryeong was the Kowloon Society's Dandong branch chief, and she was holding Jin Hao, the son of the Chongqing Society's boss, at her own hotel.

With someone like her waltzing right into Taiwan's inner sanctum on her own two feet, wouldn't the Chongqing Society naturally try to detain her and make her a hostage to get Jin Hao back?

"Don't worry. The Chongqing Society itself isn't hostile toward me."

"What? Even though you're holding the boss's son hostage?"

"Yes. Boss Jin Yao wants his second son, Jin Hao, to stay on as a hostage at our hotel."

To put my obvious worries to rest, Yang Mi-ryeong gave a light smile.

Then she gently lifted a glass of champagne set beside her.

To think a car came stocked with something like that. A limousine indeed.

"Remember Boss Ruixing, the one you ran into at the casino the day you left our Kowloon Hotel a while back?"

Of course I remembered.

The gold-leaf business card and the contact number I'd received back then were still lodged intact in my memory.

The physical card itself, of course, had long since evaporated without a trace, caught up in a few explosions since then.

"That day, Jin Yao, the boss of the Chongqing Society, sent me a secret letter directly through Boss Ruixing. He said that, to protect Jin Hao, he wanted to leave him with the Kowloon Society as a hostage for a good long while."

"Hmm."

"So tonight, we'll be staying at Boss Ruixing's home as well."

A hostage was, since ancient times, a common device for guaranteeing mutual trust.

And deliberately sending one's child into enemy territory as a hostage to shield them from unstable circumstances within one's own organization was, historically, not all that rare either.

Which left me with a fresh question, out of nowhere.

"So then, who exactly is the one I need to watch out for this time?"

If the boss himself had no intention of attacking Yang Mi-ryeong, then who was I supposed to be protecting her from?

"It's a man named Jin Weiliang, Boss Jin Yao's eldest son. At this birthday banquet, he's going to try to abduct me and trade me for his own younger brother, Jin Hao."

Yang Mi-ryeong drained the last of her champagne in a sip and twisted her lips into a smirk.

"And he means to kill the Jin Hao he gets back with his own two hands."

*****

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