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"Don't rush into action yet." Shinomiya Kaguya held her left arm across her chest, "Know yourself and your enemy, and you will win a hundred battles. First, we need to gather information about the director."
"Kaguya is right." Amamiya Natsuki nodded, "There's still some time until the mission deadline, so it's better to be cautious."
"Everyone, stop talking." Kitagawa Marin put her right hand on her hip, "The guests outside are getting impatient. Let's attend to them first."
"..."
After the discussion, everyone got busy again.
"Natsuki-kun, let me handle the fish-killing?"
Mizuhara Chizuru volunteered, not going to the front restaurant, but staying in the back kitchen to help—an elementary school student who was only 1.2 meters tall, with short legs and short arms, letting her work in the front would be illegal child labor.
Amamiya Natsuki looked at Mizuhara Chizuru and said:
"Are you sure you're okay?"
"Don't worry." Mizuhara Chizuru smiled brightly, "I live alone and often cook for myself."
Amamiya Natsuki moved aside: "Then I'll leave it to you."
Miss Mizuhara didn't waste words. She tied on an apron and looked at the strange fish that had grown up drinking nuclear wastewater, without any fear on her face.
Slap!
She reached out and grabbed a strange fish, slapped it onto the cutting board, and neatly cut its belly. Her movements were quite skilled, clearly proving that her previous words were not a lie.
Amamiya Natsuki watched for a couple of seconds, then relaxed: "That's a relief."
"Don't be lazy, come and help." Juju put her right hand on her hip and said, "Shoko and I are going to die of exhaustion."
"As an office worker, doing your part is enough." Amamiya Natsuki looked at Juju, "Refuse unpaid overtime, starting with you and me, unless there's overtime pay."
"No overtime pay."
"Special rewards are also acceptable."
Juju narrowed her eyes: "What reward do you want?"
"..."
Amamiya Natsuki didn't speak, his gaze sliding down thirty centimeters.
Juju's small face quickly flushed red. She took half a step back, nervously covering her skirt, and glared at him angrily:
"Idiot, idiot, idiot, what are you looking at?!"
"Eh?" Mizuhara Chizuru, who had just finished dealing with a nuclear wastewater kaidan, turned her head and looked over, her tone puzzled, "What happened?"
"Nothing." Juju quickly shook her head, "I just don't want him to be lazy."
Of course, she didn't want anyone to know about the embarrassing fact of going commando under her skirt.
Mizuhara Chizuru blinked, her face still smiling normally:
"Then I'll continue working."
Amamiya Natsuki walked over to Juju's side, leaned close to her ear, and whispered:
"Juju, you don't want your secret to be discovered by others, do you?"
Juju: "..."
Amamiya Natsuki pointed to his cheek and continued:
"If you don't want it to be discovered, you know what to do, right?"
"Damn it!" Juju clenched her fists, unable to bear it any longer, "Get out of here right now!"
"Then I'm leaving."
Amamiya Natsuki turned around and left the kitchen.
Watching Amamiya Natsuki's back disappear, Juju frowned, feeling that something was off.
After pondering for a while, she suddenly realized: "Wait, Stupid Natsuki wouldn't have deliberately made me kick him out just to be lazy, would he?"
Komi nodded silently.
"...How annoying!"
Amamiya Natsuki left the kitchen and first went to check on the front restaurant.
The restaurant was in normal order—a security guard had come to consume earlier, and Shinomiya Kaguya directly waived all his expenses, then hired the security guard to maintain order. Incidents of dining and dashing wouldn't happen for a while.
In addition, a ticketing system had also been implemented, greatly reducing the service burden.
After exchanging a few words with the Sheltered Young Lady, Amamiya Natsuki left the restaurant and arrived at the door of an empty room.
Knock knock knock.
He raised his hand and knocked on the door. Amamiya Natsuki pushed the door open, "I'm coming in."
The rusty hinges creaked with a dull, harsh sound. When the door opened, inside was a thick, impenetrable darkness, oppressive and dead silent.
Clap.
There was no light in the room. Amamiya Natsuki took out a lighter and lit it gently.
In the dim, cold room, even the flame of the lighter turned into a cold, eerie green, as if it would go out at any second.
"Sadako-san?"
Amamiya Natsuki called out, doing a quick scan, but didn't see Sadako-san's figure.
"Hide-and-seek?" Amamiya Natsuki's face showed a slight smile, "Sadako-san, remember to hide well. I'm coming to find you."
"..."
The room was dead silent, with no one responding.
Amamiya Natsuki walked to the bed, squatted down, and looked under the bed:
"Tsk, not under the bed."
He walked around the bed and came to the wardrobe. Amamiya Natsuki extended a finger and gently tapped on the wardrobe door.
"Sadako-san, are you in there?"
"..."
He opened the wardrobe, but still saw no one.
"Could she be in the closet?" Amamiya Natsuki turned and walked to the closet, "Sadako-san, I'll give you ten seconds. If I catch you, there will be a punishment."
"Ten."
"Nine."
"Eight…"
Before the countdown finished, Amamiya Natsuki suddenly reached out and pulled open the closet door.
Whoosh.
In the eerie light of the lighter, a black-haired Sadako-san with her face covered trembled, seemingly shivering.
Liar!
What about the ten-second countdown? There wasn't that much time at all!
Noticing Sadako's resentful gaze through her hair, Amamiya Natsuki explained:
"If I counted all the way, there would be no anticipation… Aren't you surprised? Isn't this unexpected?"
"..."
Sadako-san indicated she didn't want to talk.
"Come out quickly." Amamiya Natsuki said, "I've prepared a limited-edition dish just for you. None of the other guests outside get it."
The food strategy was still ongoing.
This Sadako-san hadn't agreed to become an employee yet, so Amamiya Natsuki occasionally prepared limited-edition dishes for her to increase her favorability.
Hearing about the food, Sadako-san silently crawled out of the cabinet.
This human… is strange.
As a kaidan, her rule was fear. Those who saw her, as long as they harbored fear, could make her stronger.
The strange thing was that this human had no trace of fear, which made Sadako-san quite uncomfortable, always feeling at a loss.
But strange as it was, she would still eat the food, because it was indeed very good.
Sadako-san thought while reaching out her hands to take the food on the table.
"Wait a moment." Amamiya Natsuki held the food above his head, "You failed hide-and-seek, shouldn't you accept a punishment first?"
The reason Amamiya Natsuki wasn't afraid of Sadako-san was simple.
Because every time he saw Sadako-san, a strange prompt of "Meiji Milk" would appear before his eyes, and combined with having seen Sadako-san's true face before, he couldn't feel scared at all.
"The punishment is simple." Amamiya Natsuki looked at Sadako-san, "When you eat the food later, comb your hair up."
"No…"
Sadako-san quickly shook her head, her voice faint.
"Then call me Master." Amamiya Natsuki extended two fingers, "Two options, you choose the punishment yourself."
"Neither…" Sadako-san's voice was faint, "No punishment."
Amamiya Natsuki straightened his face: "A bet is a bet. It seems you want both punishments."
"I didn't… make a bet with you."
"..."
Miss Sadako didn't realize that she, who had been taciturn before, not to mention a single word, or even a single character, was now talking more and more without realizing it.
Feeding completed.
Estimating that the employee's favorability had increased a bit, Amamiya Natsuki packed up his things, said goodbye, and turned to the restaurant's underground storage warehouse.
Although it was called a storage warehouse, there were actually no supplies inside; it was empty enough to starve a mouse, but now there were many more people.
First, there were two fat chefs who cooked for the restaurant, then the corpulent restaurant manager, and later, a nurse who had lost contact was added.
To prevent these guys from escaping, ropes were chosen as the restraint method, mainly handled by Hayasaka Ai; as a versatile maid, Amamiya Natsuki even thought that Hayasaka might even be very skilled in rope bondage.
A rotten, moldy smell assailed him.
Amamiya Natsuki rubbed his nose, put on a mask, and came before the nurse.
"We meet again."
"Ugh…"
The nurse's voice was a whimper.
"Ah, I apologize." Amamiya Natsuki took the rope out of the nurse's mouth, then said, "I have a few questions I want to ask you, please answer them seriously."
"Bah!"
The nurse, confined in the basement, had a fierce look in her eyes, as if she would break free at any moment.
However, the ropes tied by Hayasaka Ai were exceptionally secure and could not be broken free from at all.
Amamiya Natsuki sighed, took out a silver-white hollow sphere from his pocket, with black straps on both sides, looking strangely familiar, and then said:
"Nurse, you don't want your mouth to be ruined, do you?"
"..."
Facing the threat, the nurse calmed down slightly and said hoarsely:
"What do you want to ask?"
"First question." Amamiya Natsuki extended a finger, "Who is the director of the Hospital? And where is the office?"
Hearing this question, the nurse's eyes suddenly widened, and she said in disbelief:
"What are you going to do? Do you still want to target the director?"
"That's my business." Amamiya Natsuki's expression was calm, "You just need to answer my questions."
Nurse: "I will never betray the director!"
"Then the punishment is not strong enough."
Amamiya Natsuki spoke while putting the item in his hand to use.
A moment later.
"I'll answer you…" The nurse's voice was muffled, "Quickly take it off!"
"So, wouldn't it have been better to cooperate from the beginning?" Amamiya Natsuki shrugged and asked again, "Is the director male or female?"
"The director is a man."
Tsk. A beautiful female director only exists in comics, indeed.
Amamiya Natsuki asked again:
"What about the director's age?"
"Probably forty or fifty years old."
He's actually a greasy middle-aged uncle, that's too real!
Amamiya Natsuki then said, "And the director's office?"
"It seems to be in the administration building, but the specific location is unknown."
Amamiya Natsuki continued:
"What is the director's weakness?"
The nurse's tone was particularly resentful: "I'm just an ordinary nurse, how could I know such a thing?"
"Makes sense." Amamiya Natsuki nodded, and re-gagged the nurse with the rope, "You've worked hard, continue to rest."
"Ugh—"
Interrogation completed.
Amamiya Natsuki left the underground storage room.
"Natsuki-kun, how are things?" Fujiwara Chika came up to him.
"I got some information, but it's incomplete, and I can't distinguish its authenticity." Amamiya Natsuki said, "I still need to find someone to verify it."
Hayasaka Ai extended a finger and suggested:
"How about Tsubame-senpai's attending physician?"
"Excellent, she's the one."
To be safe, Amamiya Natsuki still acted with Hayasaka and Chika; the three-person tactical team could now be said to be invincible.
"I'll go too."
Mizuhara Chizuru heard the news and ran out from the back kitchen, wanting to act with Amamiya Natsuki and the two girls.
"Chizuru-nee doesn't need to go." Fujiwara Chika put her hand on her hip, "The three of us are enough."
Hayasaka Ai nodded and said, "Miss Mizuhara, please go back to the back kitchen. Leave the task to us; please rest assured."
Mizuhara Chizuru: "..."
It was her own task, yet now she didn't have to do anything, only wait quietly.
Is this the power of a large team?
"Let's go."
After greeting the others, Amamiya Natsuki and Chika and Hayasaka left the restaurant again, first finding Tsubame's psychiatrist.
"Where is my daughter?"
As soon as she saw Amamiya Natsuki, the female doctor became agitated.
"Please rest assured, your daughter is doing very well now."
Words alone were not enough; to gain the other party's trust, Amamiya Natsuki took out a Blind Box-produced recording pen and placed it on the table, which soon played the elementary schooler's sweet, childish voice.
"Mom, I'm very happy, Doctor Sato is a good person."
Needless to say, the voice in the recording pen was naturally recorded by Hayasaka Ai in advance.
This Hayasaka, known as a versatile maid, had nothing she couldn't do.
Whoosh—
The female doctor snatched the recording pen and hugged it tightly.
Amamiya Natsuki didn't care; a small item like a recording pen wasn't actually worth much. He lightly tapped the table with his finger and said:
"If you don't want your daughter to get hurt, please answer a few questions for me."
The female doctor carefully put away the recording pen, looked up, and resumed her cold expression, saying:
"Ask away."
Amamiya Natsuki quickly threw out the first question: "Is the director of the Hospital male or female?"
The female doctor's reaction was identical to the nurse's earlier, she said in shock:
"What do you want to do?"
"It's none of your business." Amamiya Natsuki said, "Please answer my question."
The female doctor quickly calmed down and said coldly:
"The director is a man."
"And his age?"
"About forty or fifty years old."
"..."
The question-and-answer game picked up speed, with Hayasaka Ai and Fujiwara Chika responsible for recording the information. They soon discovered that the previous nurse had been quite cooperative and hadn't provided any false information to mislead them.
"Please tell us the location of the director's office." Fujiwara Chika whispered, "And also, what about the director's weakness?"
"I don't know." The female doctor shook her head, "I've only seen the director from afar, but the director is very scary."
Nonsense, a director who can manage a large private Hospital certainly isn't some ordinary vengeful spirit; it's normal for him to be scary, but as long as he's not at the Ice Queen level, he's not that dangerous.
In the face of the official Seize and Eliminate Evil campaign, all dark forces are paper tigers.
"Information collection complete." Hayasaka Ai pushed up the glasses on her nose, "It's time to meet the director."
join p atreon.com/KeyofStars and become a Sequence 9: Reader for dozens of advance chapters for over a dozen fics | Every 100 powerstones = 1 extra chapter