Chapter 80
Douma actually has no sense of reality about his sudden wealth.
The astronomical numbers of countless zeros on the several hidden overseas accounts that Vermouth handed over did not change Douma's daily life at all. He still had to slack off at work every day, and even the joy of being a salary thief became negligible.
In short, Douma fell into the Sage Time because of his sudden wealth. He lost interest in everything and even wanted to resign from the port mafia and go it alone.
After all, Douma's original intention of joining the Port Mafia was to use the power of the Port Mafia's subordinates to help him find the blue spider lily, but now he no longer needs them.
The Japanese government promised to send a special agent team with special powers to find the "book" for him, and the black organization he had just joined was not idle either, and had already begun searching the world for information related to the blue spider lily. In comparison, the necessity of the Port Mafia to him was not worth considering.
But the reason why people are people is that many things cannot be measured solely from the perspective of interests. The Port Mafia was where Douma stayed when he first traveled through time. After a few years, there were too many people in there that Douma couldn't let go.
If he leaves alone or takes only a few people with him, Morio will probably pretend to be blind to everything because Douma is a transcendent, but if he takes all those people away at once and sets up a new sect, it would be too much.
If Douma really did that, it wouldn't be considered as breaking up the relationship. He was just stepping on Mori Ouga's face and rubbing it madly.
Moreover, Douma seriously suspected that even if he did not express the intention to take his subordinates away, those cultists who read "subordinates" and "followers" would stick to him like an indelible plaster and leave the port mafia with him.
This ominous premonition made Douma determined to continue staying in the port mafia as his salary thief, rather than saving money for Morio!
Douma: Well, I definitely don’t feel guilty because if I leave, there’s a high probability that I’ll take away most of the port mafia in one go. Absolutely not! (Very loud)
Guilty (crossed out) After receiving the call from Mori Ougai, the dedicated Douma arrived at the executive meeting room in the main building early, which was unusual for him. When he arrived, the other two people had not arrived yet.
Today, the five-member cadre system of the Port Mafia is almost in name only, because the only remaining cadres are Ozaki Kouyo and Douma, and it is currently in an awkward situation of missing three of the five.
The original three executives have died one after another for various reasons, so the only ones who are qualified to enter and exit this executive-only meeting room are Ozaki Koyo, Douma, and the leader Mori Ogai.
Here you need to light a candle for each of the two officers who died at the hands of Douma due to rebellion, and the colonel officer who died at the hands of Shibuzawa Ryuhiko in the Dragon War.
Without letting Douma wait any longer, Ozaki Kouyo, who was already on standby at the Ganghei Building, quickly opened the door. She walked in slowly and took a glance at the situation inside without making a sound.
There was a huge conference room with an extra-large and long conference table in the middle. In addition to the seat belonging to the leader, there were five chairs that were obviously specially provided for the cadres and were irregularly distributed on both sides of the table. Douma, who arrived at the conference room first, sat in the first chair on the right side of the boss's seat.
Seeing this, Ozaki Koyo unfolded the folding fan in her hand, gracefully covering the lower half of her face. Her red lips hidden under the fan curled up in satisfaction, revealing a bright and charming smile.
Since ancient times, Japan has respected the left, and Douma's behavior of taking the initiative to sit on the right side obviously pleased Sister Momiji, who was proud in her heart and did not feel inferior because of her being a woman.
You have to know that in the previous period, even though Ozaki Koyo's fighting power and work ability were among the best among the cadres, the others were ranked according to their respective abilities, but only she, because she was a woman, was tacitly accepted by everyone as being worthy of sitting at the last position.
In the open and secret struggles for the successor boss before Mori Ogai joined the game, no one had ever taken Ozaki Kouyo seriously, and she was never on the list of possible candidates to inherit the Port Mafia.
When Douma saw Ozaki Momiji coming in, he stood up and called out, "Sister Momiji."
"Please sit down, Douma-kun." Ozaki Koiyo closed the fan in her hand, made a gesture to Douma to sit down calmly, and smiled happily: "There is no need to be polite between you and me."
"Yes." Douma nodded obediently, but did not sit down immediately. He waited until Ozaki Koyo sat opposite him before sitting back in his chair. His respect was evident in his words.
The curve of Ozaki Kouyo's mouth widened slightly, and she thought that it was not her fault that she chose to support Douma-kun over Dr. Mori, it was just that Douma-kun was too likable.
As expected of her personally selected subordinates, Douma-kun and Chuuya are both good kids. Ozaki Koiyo, who is actually a few years older than Douma and Nakahara Chuuya, sighed in her heart that she was not very elder sister-like.
"Sister Momiji, Mr. Mori convened an executive meeting today to..." Douma asked Ozaki Momiji in a perfunctory manner. It seemed that nothing major had happened recently and everything was fine and calm in the port mafia.
Ozaki Kouyo had no intention of hiding the fact that Douma was classified as one of her own. She revealed her guess: "Mr. Mori specifically called us here to discuss the specific candidates for promotion to the cadre level. Currently, three out of the five cadre-level positions are vacant. If the vacancies are left for too long, it will not be conducive to maintaining the stability of the organization."
Douma acted as if he had suddenly realized something, then he counted on his fingers and realized that he had traveled to this world for several years without realizing it. Dazai Osamu would soon be 17 years old, and it was indeed almost the time when he became an executive in the original novel.
While the two were talking, the door to the conference room opened again. Shanshan, who was late, showed a slightly apologetic smile on his face. His humble and gentle personality remained unchanged: "I'm sorry I'm late. I kept you waiting for a long time."
The two people facing Mori Ou's performance were not very interested. Ozaki Koiyo smiled with a vague smile, but she also walked up the stairs: "It's okay, we just arrived not long ago."
Douma pursed his lips without comment, and nodded along with Ozaki Koyo's words, in a perfunctory manner.
Sen Ouwai felt unhappy at the disrespectful look, but he could do nothing about it.
It is easy to invite a god but difficult to send him away. Douma, the great Buddha, knows that he cannot send him away, so he can only endure it silently. Moreover, he is reluctant to give away the dividends that Douma left in the port mafia. The happiness that the government has given them the green light all the way is overwhelming. There is no other problem except that the funds are consumed too quickly.
A lot of the 500 billion that he had just received two months ago had already been spent by Sen Ou. It wasn't that he had been living an extremely poor and extravagant life recently. All the money was spent on the right things without wasting a penny.
The full purchase of cargo ships alone would cost hundreds of billions of yen each, not to mention the cost of rebuilding the docks destroyed in the Dragon War, the new guns and ammunition smuggled from the United States, and pensions for subordinates, all of which were necessary expenses that could not be saved.
Taking advantage of the recent momentum of the development of the Port Mafia and the fact that the power of the two major competing organizations, the Takase-kai and the GSS, was at its lowest point, Mori Ogai frantically planned for the future of the Port Mafia, and huge amounts of funds were spent like water, which made Mori Ogai, whose pockets had just been filled, extremely painful.
The funding problem was not the main point to be solved today. Mori Ogai sat at the head of the table, gathered his wandering thoughts and returned to the main topic of the day. He nodded to the two people at the bottom of the table and said, "Douma-kun, Momiji-kun, I think you two have already guessed the topic of today's meeting, right?"
Although this sentence seems to be a question, Mori Ogai's tone characterizes it as an affirmative sentence. Obviously, he thinks that such a small matter could not be hidden from smart people like Ozaki Kouyo and Douma.
All thanks to Sister Momiji for giving us the spoiler in advance. Douma: …I’m sorry, I lowered the average level of this conference room.
Of course, it was impossible for him to feel guilty, so he could only look back with indignation. Anyway, his sealed but reflective window of the soul was particularly reliable in deceiving others.
It's so funny. The script crew of the original novel couldn't see through his mutated shell, okay?
Mori Ogai's heart trembled when Douma made eye contact. He subconsciously touched the pocket containing the scalpel, and tried hard to restrain the urge to take out the scalpel. He thought to himself: After not seeing Douma-kun for many days, his eyes have become even more terrifying.
Moriogai thought carefully about whether he had offended Douma-kun recently.
The answer is of course yes. He had deliberately spread the rumor not long ago to draw the attention of the Black Organization, which was like a thorn in the flesh, to Douma. Could it be that Douma-kun had already guessed that he was the one who secretly planned the whole thing?
Mori Ogai, who was as cunning as a sieve, couldn't help but think more and more deeply. He imagined the plot of about dozens of episodes in his mind, which was a suspense TV series, with Douma's eyes no different from usual.
Although he suspected that Douma had seen through his secret plan, Morio's thick skin (crossed out) level of thick black studies naturally did not have any reaction such as blushing. He continued as if nothing had happened: "The positions of the five major cadres have been vacant for a long time. It's time to fill them with new people. As for who will fill the positions of cadres, I have two candidates in mind."
"The candidates that the leader has in mind are Dazai-kun and the pianist, right?" Ozaki Kouyo pursed her lips and smiled, her eyes full of a smile: "Is my guess correct?"
"Mr. Hongye is extremely intelligent." Mori Ogai complimented him casually, then he looked at Douma who did not express his opinion and asked politely, "Do you have any objections to these two candidates, Douma?"
Douma was originally surprised that Dazai Osamu was the only one who got promoted this time, but why did he bring the pianist along this time?
After a little thought, Douma remembered that the pianist in the original work was the young generation most likely to become a cadre. For the pianist who had not unfortunately been calculated by Mori Ogai to die young, promotion to the cadre level was a natural development.
Thinking of this, Douma shook his head: "I have no objection."
Mori Ogai sighed in his heart. Whether it was the pianist or Dazai Osamu, he didn't want them to become cadres so quickly, but their contributions had already accumulated to the point where they could no longer be suppressed.