Chapter 214 The Rat's Friendship
◎Day 13 of the Highway Survival Game!◎
The relationship between the United States and Japan is common knowledge. Even if there are American moles within the Public Security Bureau, Bourbon should have anticipated this long ago. Why would he have any other suspicions?
Faced with Shuichi Akai's question, Bourbon sneered, opened his email on his phone, and forwarded the intelligence information he had gathered in the United States to Shuichi Akai via email, saying irritably, "Why? Take a look at this email first before asking me why!"
After he finished speaking, he ignored Shuichi Akai and quickly took out Amuro Tooru's personal phone and turned it on. He didn't care about the emails, messages, missed calls, and other prompts that appeared on the screen after the phone was turned on, which were definitely indications that the organization was trying to track his whereabouts.
He tried to call the number that Hagiwara and the others had used to call him last time, but unfortunately, probably because he had prepared a special phone for them last time, so they no longer used those randomly collected phones, the number could no longer be dialed.
Now it's uncertain which numbers Hagiwara and the others will use on those phones. If a call to one of those numbers happens to land on Hagiwara while he's talking to Gin, it will waste even more time.
Time was limited, and every second counted. Besides, after a year apart, he longed to hear his childhood friend's voice. Okay! This last reason was the most important, so Bourbon decided to just dial Hiro's number.
In this altered timeline, unsure of Hiro's fate in the earthquake, he simply kept paying for his phone, thus preserving the number.
So as long as Hiro still had the habit of carrying that phone with him, he should be able to get through. Sure enough, it connected immediately this time, ringing for only two seconds before being answered. Hearing the familiar voice coming from the other end of the phone, his voice immediately became relaxed: "Hiro!"
“…Bourbon!” Upon hearing the familiar name, Scotland almost blurted out his childhood friend’s nickname, but remembering that Hagiwara was on the phone with Gin and Zero was already at risk, he quickly changed the name he was about to use to his code name in the organization in order to avoid aggravating Gin’s suspicion.
Upon hearing Hiro's call, Bourbon coughed lightly, seemingly a little embarrassed, before speaking into the phone, "Scotland, why are you only arriving today?"
"Something unexpected happened. It seems the time loop is not working for Earth..." Scotland briefly replied, explaining that the time on the suspected Earth they discovered was not in a loop, but rather the Earthlings' time was.
Upon hearing this, Bourbon immediately frowned sharply: "So that's how it is. But our previous speculation about Earth's time loop might be related to the parallel worlds also experiencing the game's arrival, and Earth itself converging those weakened parallel Earths."
If Earth's own time doesn't cycle, would the reason for the time loop still be related to Earth's own convergence with parallel Earths? Or is it unrelated to parallel Earths at all, and the game simply looped Earth's human time for a few years for some purpose?
"This information is insufficient, so I can't answer you! However, the previous speculation that Earth would converge with parallel Earth was based on the premise that those Earths were weakened by the game, and this weakness does not refer to the destruction of Earth itself."
Rather, it is the game organizers who abused Earth's spacetime, creating survival highways in historical timelines and arbitrarily capturing Earthlings to participate in their game. The so-called weakness also refers to the chaos that the game has caused in Earth's spacetime.
The weakness resulting from massive population deaths and injuries during the game is unrelated to Earth's own mass, therefore it cannot be denied that Earth's time cycle is unrelated to parallel Earths. This is why Scotland insists on this view.
It was because during dinner yesterday and this morning when he was discussing the gains from yesterday's dungeon with Feng Xingshou, and those speculations about mental power, he discovered through some subtle linguistic traps that Feng Xingshou seemed quite certain that this road survival game was not being held for the first time.
Adding to the fact that during yesterday's instance, Gin and she communicated through their secret language, and her tone was quite firm in some places, he deduced that the Wind Star Guardian knew some secret information about the game that had to be kept confidential or that couldn't be told to them.
Regardless of what those secret intelligences were, since it was confirmed that this road survival game was not the first time it had been held, unless they had other civilized planets that could serve as venues for the game, it was most likely that it had been held on other parallel planets.
The game announcements use Chinese characters, the time display uses the Eastern calendar of the Central Plains, and the function operation display on the game panel uses the vertical script format of ancient Central Plains...etc.
Even if the game function displays and announcement text on the panel are in Chinese characters because the panel owner, Feng Sang, is Chinese, the game simply uses a function similar to automatic translation to display the game progress to the survivors in their native language.
But what about the vertical text format on the game panels and the Eastern calendar used in Zhongzhou from ancient times to the present? These all vaguely indicate that the game rules set by the organizers are related to the Eastern culture of Zhongzhou.
It's possible that the game designers were connected to the Eastern culture of Zhongzhou, or it's possible that the game organizers captured the most survivors on Earth's Zhongzhou, and adopted Eastern culture as part of the game rules for easier management.
If his second condition holds true, then since the survival road game that Feng Sang encountered was the first time it had been captured on their planet, it means that the game organizers must have conducted this kind of game on other planets.
.
Bourbon sensed his childhood friend's unwavering conviction about the time loop involving parallel planets, so he didn't elaborate on that. Instead, he said, "You're probably talking to Gin right now, right? Regarding the time loop, we can probably deduce that this year isn't the last year of the loop."
"Are you sure?" At the same time, Hagiwara and Gin's conversation also reached this point.
"Tch!" Gin scoffed coldly. "My nose is very sensitive to certain scents. Currently, regardless of the actions of various countries' governments, the activities of those guys you mentioned, and the atmosphere within the organization, it all indicates that nothing major that could overthrow the organization will happen in the short term."
"Tsk tsk! If it weren't for this year, it seems we'd have to see how things go next year. But if that's the case, how many times has our planet gone through the 2014-2015 cycle? This is the fifth time, isn't it?" Hagiwara thought about how many times his friends and family in the real world would have to go through this year, and he didn't know what to say.
On the bright side, their life experiences are ongoing, and the time loop indirectly extends their lifespan. But what about on the dark side? Those who are going to have children this year will experience the pain of childbirth several times, and children in their early childhood will not grow up for several years...
Thinking about it, there are so many frustrating things! o(╥﹏╥)o
Gin ignored Hagiwara's barrage of sarcastic remarks, instead asking with a hint of warning: "I heard Scottish voices? Bourbon turned off his phone after escaping, but now he's contacting him. Looks like they're on good terms! They have a deep 'rat bond'!"
As he said these words, he was unaware that Bourbon had only turned off Amuro Tooru's personal cell phone. He couldn't contact Bourbon, but the famous detective could contact this "King of Part-Time Jobs" at any time!
"Cough!" My future brother-in-law's ears are too sharp. He can hear the Scottish voice next to him even through the phone? Does he have perfect pitch or something?
It's also possible that he had his phone on speakerphone, and even though Scotland was keeping his distance, he could still hear him. Hagiwara looked at Scotland with a headache after hearing this and quickly made a few hand gestures that only they could understand.
Upon hearing this, Feng Xingshou immediately covered his mouth guiltily, fearing that he might have carelessly revealed some flaws, allowing his brother to confirm the identity of that Bourbon-san as an undercover agent and causing the death of Hagiwara's friend.
Scotland met Hagiwara's gaze. Although she took a few steps closer to Hagiwara because she saw that the caller ID was Zero, and she couldn't hear their conversation clearly because of the intermittent nature of the call, she still managed to deduce the general situation after seeing his gesture.
Despite her tense heart, she spoke to Hagiwara and the others in a seemingly calm tone: "It's Bourbon on the phone. He said he couldn't get through to you on your cell phone last time, so he guessed you had changed your phone and tried calling mine."
He needs your contact information. Ever since he confirmed I was still alive last year, just in case, he's kept my phone number. I'll send him your phone number now.
"Hmph! That's for the best." Gin, upon hearing Scotland's words, whether he believed them or not, snorted coldly and then asked irritably, "Ask him how he knew you were here today? And where you are now?"
“OK!” Hagiwara winked at Scotland.
Seeing this, Scotland understood. Before Hagiwara could ask, he walked over to Hagiwara and, with his phone on speakerphone, asked at a volume that could be clearly heard on the other end, "Bourbon, how did you know we were here? Where are we now?"
"Heh... I'm on the Ferris wheel right above you, preparing to rescue a member of the organization. You're talking to Gin, aren't you? Tell Gin I'll bring Curaçao to him and let her prove my innocence herself." Even though Bourbon couldn't see the specific actions of the people below from the height of the Ferris wheel.
He could also judge the situation from the tone of his childhood friend's voice based on the tacit understanding between friends, and immediately replied in a bourbon-like tone, while secretly rejoicing that he had realized that this was a conspiracy by the Public Security Headquarters against him.
Besides falsifying the background information of the undercover agent Bourbon, he also deliberately created a situation where he couldn't capture Curaçao. He ordered Kazami to capture Curaçao himself, and only took action when the situation developed to a point where they were chasing each other from a distance and their faces were no longer visible. Otherwise, there would have been no way to continue the previous plan with Curaçao's personal testimony.
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