Chapter 76 Twenty-seven Shotas

Zhu Fu Gao Ming was only surprised for a few seconds at first, but soon calmed down. After all, he had a hunch that Jing Guang might be nearby when he saw Bourbon. Now his expectation was just coming true, and his expression changed so quickly that no one around him could react.

Except for Scotland himself, who was still some distance away.

In fact, after calming down, Zhu Fu Gaoming's attention shifted from the rare encounter with his brother to how to help his brother hide his identity.

Zhu Fu Gaoming himself knew that he had removed the picture of his brother from his desk since he guessed that his brother might become an undercover policeman after graduation. In addition, he was preparing for the promotion examination for police chief at that time, so even though it was very easy, he deliberately gave people around him the illusion that he was very busy.

Therefore, he actually didn't have to put in much effort to blur the image of his brother in the minds of his colleagues.

Up to now, Morofu Takaaki has been the inspector for several years. The young subordinates he leads basically don't know his family situation. There are only a few people in the entire Nagano headquarters who still remember this incident, and none of them are here now.

After quickly sorting out this information in his mind, Zhu Fu Gao Ming also breathed a sigh of relief.

He could see that his brother and his childhood friend didn't want him to recognize them, so he pretended not to know to avoid any accidents.

However, even if Zhu Fu Gaoming was sure that the person who knew that he had a younger brother was not here, his and Scotland's appearance would not make people doubt their blood relationship when put together.

Well, it seems that it is not yet time for these brothers to sit down and have a good chat.

On the other side, Scotland took longer to calm down than his brother, but it only took a blink of an eye.

He adjusted his breathing rate as quickly as possible. At least on the surface, he looked fine. Bourbon and Zhufu Gao were probably the only ones present who knew how fast Scotland's heart was beating.

Not only was I happy to see you again after so many years, but I was also nervous.

Scotch tugged at the black mask on his face uncomfortably to make sure it wouldn't fall off, then walked up to Bourbon and the other man and greeted them nonchalantly.

He also knew that his identity was very close to being exposed when he entered Nagano, so Scotland had been carefully covering himself up. He was sure that no one here could see his face except his brother. "Midoka, why are you here?" Bourbon asked Scotland first.

Scotland was silent for a moment, and suddenly he remembered who he was chasing here. For a moment, his expression became a little subtle.

Granty...why did you bring him here? It couldn't be that you wanted to expose his identity to Lei, right?

It shouldn't be possible.

Although they have now revealed their cards to Lei and know each other's undercover identities, their true identities are still a hurdle that the three cannot overcome in a short period of time.

Whether it is Scottish Bourbon or Ley, they will not allow their true identities to be known by more people at this time. Otherwise, if something happens to them, their relatives and friends will be the first to be retaliated by the organization.

Moreover, they just found out yesterday that the whole group is undercover. Isn't it normal that they haven't changed their mindset all of a sudden?

Scotland pursed his lips behind his mask and answered casually, "I ran into someone I knew and chased after him... But it looks like I was just seeing things."

Both Rye and Bourbon perked up a little.

They didn't come to Nagano for real tourism. Now that they knew the target of the mission had been killed, and it happened to be most likely done by Granty, Scotland, who was now split up to look for news about Granty, told them directly that he had met "someone he knew", which meant that they must also know this person, so...

I guess I met Granty.

Lei thought a little more. He guessed that Scotland probably saw the young man Granty whom he had met in the cake shop before.

Since Bourbon and the other man were originally standing next to the police car, and Zhu Fugaoming had not yet gotten in the car because he was talking to them, Zhu Fugaoming heard everything Scotland said clearly.

However, he did not ask much, and simply asked Bourbon in a casual acquaintance tone: "Amuro-kun, is this your other companion?"

As the police officer in charge of this case, it was reasonable for Zhu Fu Gao Ming to ask this question, and those around him who were not aware of the situation did not think there was anything wrong.

Only Scotland trembled the fingers in his pockets, raised his eyes and exchanged glances with Zhu Fu Gao Ming, and then quickly shifted his gaze to the police car lights.

"Yes, my name is Hikaru Midorikawa, and I came to Nagano for a tour with Amuro and the others." Scotland finally said this, and both his gentle and polite tone and his narrowed eyes showed no flaws.

He put his fist to his lips through the mask, coughed twice, and briefly explained his mask: "Excuse me, I caught a cold in Niigata a few days ago, so I can only talk to the police officer like this..."

The police officer with a mustache and eyes was silent for a moment, then shook his head to indicate that it was not a big deal, and also gave a brief self-introduction.

He then turned to Bourbon and said, "Since Amuro-kun and Moroboshi-kun's companions are here, we will leave first and contact them later if there is any situation."

When Zhu Fu Gao Ming turned around, Scotland subconsciously took a step in that direction, but quickly restrained himself.

Zhu Fu Gao Ming, who should not have seen what was happening behind the scenes, did not say much. Just before the police car was about to leave, he, who was driving alone, looked through the window of the driver's seat and said to Scotland, who was very close, as if sighing: "... Then, please take care of yourself, Guangjun."

The "Mitsu" in Morobushi Kagemitsu's name is obviously different from the "Hikaru" in Midorikawa Hikaru's pseudonym, but when Scotland heard this title, the first thing that came to his mind was his own name.

Ley was pulled into the car by Bourbon, and it was time for him to leave immediately, so Scotland just nodded solemnly and did not say anything more.

Zhu Fu Gaoming did not want Scotland's answer.

The current situation is that he cannot express his longing for his brother, but in fact, Zhu Fu Gao Ming himself is not the type to show his emotions. As long as he can confirm that his brother is still alive and well, that's enough.

They didn't need to talk much because they trusted each other enough.

The car window was rolled up, and the dark anti-seepage film blocked the two people's sight. Scotland turned and left, but behind him, the police car stopped for a while before turning around and driving away.

[I still don't quite understand, Xiaohong, why did you deliberately guide Scotland and Zhufu Gaoming to meet? ] A clear voice in someone's mind asked curiously.

If Scotland looked up at this moment, he would see a boy sitting by the window on a higher floor, just like before, still swinging his legs nonchalantly and responding calmly in a childish voice.

"There's not so many reasons. I just think that after Scotland, as a younger brother, rediscovers the meaning of the word brother to them, he will also have a deeper understanding of the bond between Granty and A."

"Brothers, family, they are all things that have nothing to do with clones - but what if they are related?"

He said, "You see, humans are always ten times more moved by the emotions they have in non-human things, even if it's just a script. I knew this long before I became a real human, but I didn't fully understand it until I returned to Tokyo from Yokohama."

Chi Jiang Na Yue rubbed his knuckles, and his nonchalant sighs made [Shu] unable to tell which of his words were jokes and which were sincere.

"Human emotions... are truly the most difficult things in this world to understand."

"So maybe it's just because I felt it was not good for Scotland to not see his brother for a long time, so I created an opportunity for the brothers to reassure each other?" He covered his lips and yawned, then changed the subject and said lazily, "After all, if I didn't intervene, no one would know about this until Scotland died many years ago."

In the original world line, the brothers never saw each other again until Scot died in the line of duty. Zhu Fu Gaoming even learned about the death of his only relative through the relics sent by Bourbon.

After talking about the "book" that still doesn't understand humans, Akajinazuki curled her lips slightly and said, "Forget it, just think of it as me not liking regrets."

[Book] This guy has been born for more than ten years, and he is always being fought over by people with special abilities. He has even followed Mr. Dazai for so long, but he is very good at using language traps, but he has not made any progress in humanity.

The people below were of course unaware of the above conversation. Before they could really look over, Chijiang Nayue had disappeared from her current position.

This street is not far from the primary school that Scotland wants to go to. The three of them will probably choose to go to the back mountain first to find the notebook that Scotland is looking for, and then go back to the hotel to find poor little A who they have collectively forgotten.

It doesn’t matter, but poor little A thinks so.

After all, the clues that the Whiskey Trio are looking for were laid by him, the victim of the case was pretended by him, the murderer was pretended by him, and the memories of the relevant people were blurred by him through hypnosis...

As for causing trouble, poor A felt that he had gotten his revenge pretty well.

—

"That case from 20 years ago was probably done by someone from the organization, or more accurately, by Granti."

Rye said this after Bourbon briefly explained the details of the case in the cake shop to Scotland.

The other two looked at him with a hint of surprise.

Bourbon and Scotland had almost come to the same conclusion based on the information they had, but they did not expect that Ley would be the first to speak out about it.

If Lei could hear their thoughts, he would be speechless for a while - you two guys from the same organization have already excluded me from the circle of intelligence sharing. If I don't make this information clear first, do you dare to say that you will take the initiative to tell me later?

Of course he knew that Scotland and Bourbon were still wary of him, and Ley was the same as them in this respect. But in order to cooperate, Ley had to take the initiative, otherwise the other two would never tell him some things.

He could understand it. After all, the FBI did not leave a good impression on other countries. Even for Ley himself, if it were not for the convenience of studying in the United States, and the FBI had more information on his father's case, he would have been more likely to join MI6 if both his parents were British agents.

When Bourbon first learned about this yesterday, he complained about the FBI's usual image, saying that there was no room for them to decline, and why they didn't show any sign of paying more attention to the existence of such an organization.

Lei didn't want to answer this question.

In short, since the three of them have reached a temporary cooperation due to the existence of A, and they are unable to contact the FBI/Public Security Bureau recently to prevent any surprise attacks, they have no choice but to share intelligence as much as possible to ensure that the cooperation can proceed normally.

Ley was still thinking too much. Even if he didn't take the initiative, Bourbon might deliberately keep it a secret for a while to make fun of him. In fact, Scotland would still tell him the important things on the basis of guaranteeing cooperation.

"Why do you say that?" Bourbon was the first to speak, asking even though he knew the answer.

Lei sighed inwardly.

Well, just consider it as a sincere gesture of cooperation. Someone has to take the step of being honest.

"The man who died 20 years ago was an FBI informant." Lei calmly dropped a bombshell, "We did lose contact 20 years ago, but we reconnected a few years ago. Until last month, we were still able to receive unilateral contact from the informant."

Neither Bourbon nor Scotland were stupid. After hearing what Ley said, and hearing Ley specifically mention Granty earlier, the most likely outcome immediately came to their minds.

Therefore, even Bourbon became serious: "Do you suspect that the man who died 20 years ago faked his death?"

Scotland, who had read the diary, didn't think so. He was very sure that Xiao Shi must have really killed someone twenty years ago, which was why he was so scared after being seen by Mr. Zhufu.

Otherwise, given the genius of these clones, they would definitely be able to find an excuse to cover up the past... No, they could even just tell Mr. Zhufu directly that he had not done anything wrong.

Because Teacher Zhu Fu would believe Xiao Shi, Xiao Shi probably knew this himself, so he collapsed and ran away without even a second to defend himself.

After all, he really killed that man, it wasn't a fake death.

"No." Scotland tightened his grip on the steering wheel. "The more likely scenario is that the informant is really dead."

"No matter what, he is also an informant of your FBI, right? If his death was faked, even if it wasn't the FBI who helped him fake his death, at least he would have leaked some information to his former employer after so many years, instead of disappearing for many years and then providing information again as if nothing happened. I think you probably verified his identity and confirmed that it was correct."

Scotland pondered: "Then, is it possible that Granty and his gang are using the identities of the dead FBI informants to continue to pass on information about the organization to you?"

This was obviously the one Lei thought was most likely, but it was too...

How did the Grantis deceive the FBI?

As this happened, Bourbon's face began to darken.

Ley glanced at Bourbon in the rearview mirror and continued calmly, "That's what I think. And, if that's true, I suspect that Granty is not the only informant in the FBI."

In other words, the police, FBI, CIA and other organizations may have had informants or undercover agents become Granti without them knowing.

At this serious moment, Lei had a vision of another scene in his mind.

Two days ago when he was in Tokyo, he woke up in the middle of the night to find that his child was not in bed. He thought something unexpected had happened, so he was extra vigilant.

As a result, the child was found curled up and sleeping on the window sill behind the curtain.

As the one who has the most daily contact with children among the three, Lei has actually picked up A in strange places more than once.

Sometimes he would open the hatch of the washing machine in the morning and find an A curled up inside; sometimes, Scotch and Bourbon were not at home, and he was in charge of cooking... or in charge of buying food outside, and when he opened the drawer to take out his wallet, he found an A hidden under the table; sometimes, he was even getting ready to take a bath, and before he opened the shower curtain, he felt something was wrong, and then he calmly picked up an A from the bathtub.

Lei got used to the absurd fact that he could find A anywhere at a rocket speed. Perhaps it was because he was calm no matter what he saw that A was so relaxed in front of him.

The child who didn't like being alone in the room because of his past actually liked hiding in the small closet, and Lei guessed that this gave A some sense of security.

Or maybe A was just bored for too long and wanted to experience the fun of being able to find things no matter where they were hidden?

He was still happy to cooperate since it wasn't a big deal anyway.

...But, it's not good when it comes to the current situation.

Lei didn't want to find out one day that his informants and undercover colleagues in the same organization had all turned into A's of different ages.

That's too scary.

Bourbon and Scotland had no idea what Ley was thinking, but after hearing that sentence, they quickly understood what Ley actually meant.

Bourbon didn't want to admit it, but he also knew that Ley was probably right this time.

Since Granty could replace the FBI informant who was ordered to be killed by the organization without anyone noticing, why couldn't he use this method to replace other identities and expose people who were killed by the organization?

Rather, this can better explain one thing.

Explain why A said this was the best opportunity that he and the Grantis had been waiting for for twenty years.

The atmosphere in the car suddenly became heavy.

"Speaking of which, where are we going now?" Bourbon suddenly asked Scotland.

"Ah, this." Scotland remembered what he had originally planned to tell them. Taking advantage of the red light, he took out a few diary papers from his bag and carefully handed them over. "I found something."

To Scotland, those were pieces of paper from twenty years ago. He was afraid that something might go wrong, so he packed them in a small bag he carried with him before leaving his parents' bedroom.

As Bourbon and Ley read, Scotland explained what it was: "Bourbon told me that when you encountered the case twenty years ago, I happened to investigate in that area. This seems to be the diary of the witness at that time. The other family members of the witness no longer live in that house, so I was able to get these fragments."

Bourbon certainly knew that this was not the case, and Ley could also tell that Scotland was hiding something, but the three of them tacitly agreed not to say anything more about it.

Just like Scotland only took out three diaries and hid the fourth one.

By the time they finished reading the diary, the other two had experienced complex changes in their emotions.

They recognized that the Little Ten in the diary was Granty, but the existence of the diary showed them a side of Granty that was unknown to others.

In Bourbon and Lei's previous understanding, since the Grantis were clones produced in batches and were not treated as human beings by the researchers, they probably did not have many human emotions and were just held in the hands of the boss like weapons.

Only now did they realize how powerless the existence of these children was.

The smart and cute boy in the diary actually only has seven days to live. The brother to whom the boy cried and said he was sorry was imprisoned and studied by the organization for twenty years. Thousands of his future younger brothers fell into the abyss of desire that the boss could not fill.

Only now did they realize: it turned out that the Grantis were not just clones, they were also living people.

What is the difference between humans and clones?

Perhaps the notebook mentioned in the diary will give them the answer.

"That place, I guess it's the hill behind the elementary school they went to together earlier." Scotland, who was driving, stepped on the brakes and turned to look at the two of them. "We're here. It's right here."

Outside the car window, a few large golden characters were flying on the black marble: [Xiaozhu Municipal Elementary School].

…

On the top of the mountain where the three Scottish people were about to go, a teenager named Granty was sitting on a big rock. A brand new red ribbon was tied to the branch next to him, which seemed to be tied by him just now. There was a not-so-shallow pit at his feet, and the soil was piled under the rock.

The young boy, Granty, was wearing a simple white shirt and black overalls whose texture could not be seen. He was about thirteen or fourteen years old. There was no trace of muscle on his slender legs. No one knew that under this pale shell was the strength to kick a stone pillar to pieces.

On his lap was a cleanly wiped wooden box, and in his hand was a brown-covered notebook.

Akae Nazuki was earnestly playing the role with an inexplicably long prefix, 'Granty, who arrived ahead of everyone else to check the notes as a routine'.

"It's so slow." The Savior sighed, "I'm almost sunburned."

[…Isn’t it dusk now?]

Really? That's not important.

The important thing is——

"The show is about to begin." He closed his notebook and said with a smile.