Chapter Fifteen: The Nuclear Power Plant

“The nuclear power plant job comes with strict confidentiality rules, so even I only caught bits and pieces when the old man complained over drinks. About three months ago, he started grumbling about abnormal instrument readings, insisting something was interfering with the plant’s operations. All these mishaps sent his workload skyrocketing.

After that, he began suffering from insomnia, agitation, hair loss... even bleeding. I spent two months persuading him before he finally agreed to take some time off for a hospital checkup. And then... he was diagnosed with bone cancer, and died two mornings ago.”

“Bone cancer? Fatal in just a few months? That has to be... radiation!” Haiteng caught the keywords and sprang up from the sofa, crying out in alarm, as if he wanted to bolt away then and there. But seeing Yagami still calmly seated beside him, he forced himself to stay, hands and feet awkwardly tangled.

It was all Taijie’s fault! After that frantic phone call from home, he’d panicked, heard they needed legal assistance, and begged them to rush over without even clarifying what was happening! Haiteng Masashi now inwardly cursed that meddling blond back at the Tokyo detective agency.

In the age of smartphones, everyone knows staying in heavily irradiated areas is dangerous!

Yagami, after his initial shock, regained composure. “Calm down, Haiteng. Tokyo Electric is a giant corporation—if they’ve handled this sort of thing eighty or a hundred times, they wouldn’t leave any hazards behind. And if even low-level thugs dare to loiter here, it probably means they’re sure it’s safe, right?”

Haiteng’s legs still trembled, but seeing Mrs. Zenaga nod to Yagami—and recalling that she still lived here—he gradually calmed down. “Y-yeah! Those thugs are cowards, they’d never risk causing trouble in a radiation zone. And when we knocked down that knife-wielding punk, I think some broken bits of an instrument fell out of his pocket! That must’ve been the legendary Geiger counter?”

“Probably. Afraid their bosses were keeping secrets, so the goons bought their own to check the safety before causing trouble,” Yagami soothed Haiteng, coaxing him back to the sofa, all the while observing Mrs. Zenaga’s expression. He noticed she wasn’t grieving.

Yagami wasn’t surprised. There are few marriages in this world where love survives the years unchanged. Whether as a lawyer or now as a detective, he’d long understood this truth. After all, it’s common knowledge that the most-searched phrase among Japanese women online is ‘how to kill your husband without leaving a trace.’

If a woman’s husband dies in old age, most housewives are likely to rejoice as if they’ve won the lottery.

But then again, it’s not as if having one’s husband die is reason enough for gangsters to block your door. So something else must have happened.

“I’m deeply sorry for your husband’s passing,” Yagami offered a formal condolence.

After Mrs. Zenaga’s polite reply, he continued, “Did Mr. Zenaga ever report these issues to upper management? This concerns the nuclear plant’s safety, after all.”

Mrs. Zenaga shook her head gently. “He complained to me that he’d raised the issue many times—privately and in meetings—but it was always brushed aside with, ‘The company’s executives are busy with other important matters right now.’”

Yagami nodded in understanding. “But according to procedure, you should receive compensation and pension, handle the death certificate, and arrange the funeral, right? Even if the workplace and cause of death involve such sensitive facilities, a giant like Tokyo Electric must have internal protocols?”

Mrs. Zenaga smiled bitterly. “There are rules, but what they gave me was nothing like what I heard about the compensation terms... They handed me this.”

She bent down and pulled a stack of contracts from the drawer under the table, laying them before the two men. “This is the reason I want you both to uncover the truth... Please take a look.”

Yagami and Haiteng leaned in and opened the documents.

“...Two billion yen in damages! Zenaga owes Tokyo Electric?! Are they planning to never have employees again?!”

Just from the first page, the astronomical sum—beyond ordinary comprehension—shocked Haiteng out of his seat once more.

Yagami, however, seemed to settle into his professional mode, flipping further through the contract as he spoke. “Of course they still need employees—why else would Mrs. Zenaga have learned about the usual compensation terms?”

He was well-versed in corporate scheming. Compensation for a single worker is peanuts compared to burying bad press about a nuclear plant—it’s practically pure profit!

If not for this incident, the sorrowful old woman before them would likely have taken her compensation and retirement payout and moved on.

It dawned on Yagami. Such an irregular contract—this was why they’d been summoned.

“It says here Mr. Zenaga’s operational error led to his exposure to radiation and caused economic losses to the company. Is that what they claim?”

Mrs. Zenaga shook her head in anger. “Two billion in damages—if there was an error this massive, the entire nuclear facility would have to be overhauled! But everyone I know at the plant is still working as usual. And since when does a company as big as Tokyo Electric resort to gangster tactics to force someone into a contract?”

Yagami fell silent. He knew the answer.

...It’s only when these giants are at fault that they use such underhanded methods.

~~~~~~

“Please, I beg you—find out the truth!”

With a voice trembling and on the verge of tears, Mrs. Zenaga earnestly pleaded as Yagami and Haiteng stepped out of the Zenaga home.

The two men stood in the shadow of the apartment entrance, faces wooden.

Haiteng scratched at his scruffy beard. “Hey, Aron. Two days ago, weren’t we investigating bullying in an elementary school?”

“Yeah.”

“And now, in just two days, we’re supposed to expose safety issues at a nuclear power plant?”

“...Yeah.”

“Sigh.” Haiteng lit a cigarette. “Maybe we should just go back and wring Taijie’s neck, pretend none of this ever happened.”

“......”

Yagami knew Haiteng was joking—that’s just how they interacted. But with an expression of resignation, he thumped his muscular chest beneath the floral shirt.

He was about to tease his fanboy “Taijie,” when his phone buzzed in his pocket.

He pulled it out—the caller ID showed ‘Hakudou Kyou.’

“This is Yagami,” he answered, as was his habit, even with familiar contacts.

Haiteng had seen the screen, too. Curious about the boy Yagami always praised, he sidled closer to listen, but Yagami’s voice suddenly rose in surprise.

“...You’re saying Tokyo Electric sent a hitman from the Wu clan after you?!”

“You said ‘also’? Are you dealing with something related to Tokyo Electric too?”

Haiteng finally heard the youth’s voice—clear and steady, just as he’d imagined.

But the content made his eyes widen.

The Wu clan? All assassins—black sclera, white pupils—monstrous in strength and fees alike, the infamous Wu clan?!

And after encountering them, you’re still alive and calling us?!

...Sixteen years old?!

Recalling his days running with the Matsukin gang in Tokyo, how their boss treated those black-eyed collectors with reverence, Haiteng hadn’t noticed his mouth was hanging open wide enough to fit a chicken egg.