Her own slightly scatterbrained clerk Miki often slacked off, but she wouldn’t suddenly disappear and swap with someone else, right?
“Um… um…”
Jiang Jian Yue did not use her ability immediately.
SAAC and the Management Department were watching this area.
If Jiang Jian Yue used her ability, no matter how stealthy she was, she would be discovered.
Let alone the fact that Yuki Asahi was looking over at this moment.
So, the “acting queen” Jiang Jian Yue instantly put on a panicked expression, wiping her hands randomly on her apron, and within a second, tears welled up in her eyes.
“S-sorry! Manager!”
Jiang Jian Yue bowed sharply at ninety degrees, showing her craftsmanship spirit, and said with a crying voice: “I’m Miki’s friend, Sato Ai.”
“Miki?” The manager was taken aback. That was the store clerk Miki’s real name. “Where is she?”
“Miki… she said she felt dizzy and unwell, like a hypoglycemia attack, so she went to the back warehouse to lie down for a while.”
Jiang Jian Yue looked up, her round-frame glasses hanging askew on her nose, looking a bit pitiful.
“She was worried the store would be unattended, so she called me to come cover for her… I’m not a bad person.”
Yuki Asahi looked back at the trembling Sato Ai, then at the dumbfounded manager.
‘Just a normal substitute…’ The last trace of doubt in Yuki Asahi’s mind dissipated.
Since it was the store’s private matter, there was no need to interfere.
Yuki Asahi pushed open the door, accompanied by the “ding-dong” welcome chime, and his figure disappeared into the night.
Only after Yuki Asahi completely left did Jiang Jian Yue breathe an almost imperceptible sigh of relief, but the feeling of being “watched” still lingered.
‘I have to see this act through to the end, can’t reveal my ability. Sato Ai’s persona is that of an ordinary person.’
“You said Miki passed out?”
The manager, too flustered to question this stranger wearing the employee uniform, rushed to the back warehouse.
Jiang Jian Yue followed closely behind.
In the warehouse, on an open space between shelves, Tanaka Miki was lying serenely on a pile of cat litter bags, snoring softly.
“Miki! Hey! Miki!”
The manager tapped her face, but Tanaka Miki slept like a log, completely unresponsive.
“This kid… why is she sleeping so heavily? Could it be poisoning? Or an acute illness?” The manager panicked.
“Um… Manager, should we send her to the hospital?”
Jiang Jian Yue weakly suggested from the side, “I think her complexion… doesn’t look too good.”
‘Actually, she’s perfectly fine, just forced to shut down.’
“Right! Right! The hospital!”
The manager lifted Tanaka Miki in one go. Though she looked slender, she was dead weight, causing the middle-aged manager to grimace.
He turned to look at Jiang Jian Yue. “Um… Miss Sato, right? Could I trouble you to watch the store for a while? I’ll take her to the ER and have my wife come to take over right away!”
“Yes! Leave it to me!”
Jiang Jian Yue nodded vigorously. “I’ll watch the store properly!”
“Please!”
The manager rushed out holding her, driving the car as if it were about to take off.
Watching the taillights disappear at the end of the street, the pet store fell silent again.
Jiang Jian Yue stood behind the counter and didn’t move.
She picked up a rag and began earnestly wiping the counter, her movements clumsy but earnest, as if she were really a diligent substitute friend.
She waited. Waited for that faint surveillance gaze to shift away.
After about ten minutes, the prickling sensation on her back finally disappeared.
“Phew…”
Jiang Jian Yue threw the rag aside, and the timid expression on her face instantly vanished, replaced by a sly smile.
“What a hassle, operating right under the police’s noses.”
She snapped her fingers.
Plasticine appeared out of thin air and surged, quickly forming a humanoid shape.
A substitute identical to “Sato Ai” appeared in front of the counter.
At the same time, Jiang Jian Yue had entered an invisible state, patted the puppet’s shoulder, and gave instructions.
She didn’t go home, but sped toward the direction the manager had gone—the nearby community hospital.
‘Since she had told a lie, she had to cover it up flawlessly.’
‘If Tanaka Miki denied knowing Sato Ai after waking up, that identity would be completely ruined.’
……
The ER at the community hospital was noisy and chaotic.
The manager was anxiously registering at the front desk, while Tanaka Miki lay on a bed in the infusion area, still unconscious.
The doctor examined her and besides “deep sleep”, found nothing wrong, so he just put her on a drip for observation.
A faint, imperceptible ripple appeared in the air.
Jiang Jian Yue, in her invisible state, silently approached the bedside.
She extended a finger and gently touched Tanaka Miki’s forehead.
A red light flashed and vanished.
The originally blank memory area was rapidly filled.
Sato Ai, a childhood friend from the countryside, together they had caught frogs in the fields, watched underground idol concerts in Tokyo, and even details like the same phone case they used were perfectly constructed.
“Hmm…”
Tanaka Miki frowned, as if she had been having a long dream.
She slowly opened her eyes and saw the manager rushing back.
“Miki! You’re awake? You scared me!” The manager wiped his sweat.
“Manager…?”
Tanaka Miki rubbed her still-swollen head. “What happened to me… Ah! I remember!”
She sat up abruptly. “I suddenly felt dizzy just now, and luckily my good friend Ai came to visit me, so I asked her to watch the store… Oh no! Ai just came to Tokyo, she doesn’t know how to use the cash register that well!”
“Oh, you’re still worried about the cash register!” The manager sighed in relief. “That Miss Sato is helping at the store, it’s really thanks to her.”
“Hehe, Ai is the most reliable.”
Tanaka Miki grinned foolishly, the image of that figure with round-frame glasses in her mind was incredibly clear and real.
Jiang Jian Yue, standing in the corner, saw this and nodded in satisfaction.
Now, the witnesses and evidence were all in place.
Plan successful.
……
Meanwhile.
Tokyo Metropolis, Chiyoda District.
The “Dark Crow Special Countermeasures Headquarters”, jointly established by the Management Department and SAAC, was brightly lit.
“Team Leader, the background check report on the contact personnel of the monitored target is out.”
A young intelligence officer pushed up his glasses and projected an electronic document onto the large screen.
His name was Nakamura Kusano, a rookie who had just joined this year, full of drive, responsible for the most tedious data screening work.
The team leader behind him stopped and asked, “Any anomalies?”
“The household registration data shows normal.” Nakamura Kusano pointed at a somewhat rustic ID photo on the screen.
“Sato Ai, 20 years old, from Akita Prefecture, parents are farmers, came to Tokyo to work after high school, currently staying at Fortune Village in Adachi Ward. Whether it’s birth certificates, school records, or transportation travel records, they are all verifiable in the Coalition Government’s database.”
The Coalition Government had barely managed to keep up with the times and established a unified citizen database.
The previous drawbacks of networked personal information were no longer an issue in the superpower era.
But this also gave Jiang Jian Yue the opportunity to create fake identities.
As long as they didn’t send an esper with targeted decryption capabilities to personally visit that remote small village in Akita Prefecture, they wouldn’t find any flaws.
“But…” After saying this, Nakamura Kusano frowned.
“But what?”
“I casually checked the social network of Tanaka Miki, the regular employee of that pet store.”
Nakamura Kusano brought up another chart.
“According to feedback from the field agents, Sato Ai claims to be Tanaka Miki’s friend. However, their digital footprints have no overlap.”
“No call records, no social media interactions, and they haven’t even appeared in the same photo.”
“Sato Ai’s claim of ‘calling her to come help’ is false.”
The team leader narrowed his eyes. “You mean, this Sato Ai’s identity is forged?”
“That possibility can’t be ruled out.”
“Maybe I’m overthinking it, maybe they only contact offline, or use encrypted communication software not monitored. But considering she came into contact with Yuki Asahi…”
“I think it’s necessary to send someone to the scene…”
Beep beep beep—
At that moment, a piercing red alarm suddenly sounded in the command room.
Everyone’s attention was instantly drawn to the main screen.
A world map unfolded, with red dots flashing wildly in the Southern Hemisphere.
“Urgent intelligence! From the Pacific Treaty South Pacific Division, the Australia Superpower Special Service Bureau reports.”
“A suspected Dark Crow member just attacked the Sydney University Superpower Research Institute, purpose unknown!”
The entire command room instantly erupted.
Compared to a small suspicious point at a Tokyo pet store, the fully armed main force of Dark Crow appearing in Australia was far more attention-grabbing.
“Quick! Contact the Australian Special Service Bureau! Request data sharing!”
“Notify the field team, prepare to depart at any time!”
Orders were passed down one after another.
Nakamura Kusano stood still, watching the “Sato Ai” file on the screen being instantly covered by countless new windows.
“Team Leader, the investigation into that Sato Ai…”
The team leader had already put on his earpiece. Hearing Nakamura Kusano’s voice, he waved his hand without turning around.
“Put that aside for now! If the household registration is fine, let it be. The current focus is Australia!”
“Yes…”
Nakamura Kusano bit his lip reluctantly.
Finally, he sighed, clicked “Defer”, and filed the Sato Ai dossier into a low-priority folder.
On the screen, the rustic girl’s photo with round-frame glasses flickered for a moment, then was drowned by the overwhelming Australian battle reports.
……
Jiang Jian Yue returned to the Unhappy Fortune Village, lay down on the tatami, and heard the young couple next door arguing again.
‘Arguing over trivial matters like daily necessities, how blissful…’
She rubbed her empty stomach, turned over wanting to lie on her stomach, then realized that with her current built-in armor, doing so would be uncomfortable.
‘Damn it…’
Feeling a bit lonely, Jiang Jian Yue took out her magical laptop and planned to check if there were any new episodes.
The sixth episode of Chantui Z was updated, starting with Jiang Jian Yue’s ultra-long-range projected cannonball at the end of the previous episode, and ending with the three little ones asking Yuki Asahi to help find someone.
Jiang Jian Yue still didn’t appear in this episode, not even leaving a hint of her “infiltration” into Japan.
It seemed the Insect family really wanted to give the audience a surprise.
‘And I didn’t expect the three little ones could investigate that far into the plot…’
‘Regarding the similarity between Sato Ai and Fuji Ao’s names, it’s purely a coincidence. She just thought Sato Ai was a very common name.’
‘But this episode also didn’t have her own role, like that Inferior Breed Mutual Aid Society.’
The Management Department still hadn’t figured out that the Sewer Home and the Human Spider Nest had connections to the Inferior Breed Mutual Aid Society.
Because the leaders of the Inferior Breed Mutual Aid Society were somewhat independent, often painting grandiose pictures like “We are all the same kind, we need to build our own underground network and help each other,” “We are all ghosts of the superpower society, not accepted by society, we are all the same…” In a sense, the organizational structure was like a feudal system.
This made the new antagonist organization seemingly a counterpart to the three little ones, rather than to the previous generation’s protagonist group.
If possible, before her own plan was completed, she could incidentally kick the Mutual Aid Society to death.
After all, Jiang Jian Yue was very free now.
‘But there were really no clues to dig up the Mutual Aid Society…’
She watched the shadow leader on the screen issuing orders to his subordinates to look for candidates, and a bold idea sprouted in her mind.
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