Chapter 44
Of Course You Would
***
Ga-on, who had turned his head toward Fernandez, opened his mouth.
“What’s with suddenly watching sothing like that? Did you catch a late-life fever or sothing?”
To Ga-on, it was stale bait that had long gone cold, but trends always ca back around, and in this era that kind of format was starting to gain popularity again.
Even if Fernandez had hopped onto that wave, it wouldn’t have been strange.
However, the one who answered wasn’t Fernandez but a man who had approached from behind.
“My apologies. It happens to be an interest of mine, so I asked for your understanding and changed the channel. I hope I haven’t caused any offense?”
“If that’s the case, it’s fine. I was just curious, that’s all.”
As the man bowed politely, Ga-on waved his hand dismissively. That was when Fernandez interjected at just the right mont.
“He’s a client. You seem like the right person for the job. Interested?”
“Is that so?”
Only then did the man’s appearance co clearly into view.
His styling was so refined that it strongly conveyed the sense of soone from the current generation. The gold-rimd glasses resting on his nose might have seed excessive, yet they suited him well.
Perhaps he possessed so unusual talent; a faint scent brushed past Ga-on’s nose. Of course, what lingered more strongly than that was the sll of money.
He had the model-student sort of impression—soone who looked more likely to report sothing to the Public Enforcent Corps than to skulk around back alleys.
“Let’s at least hear what kind of request it is.”
***
Inside a reception room prepared on one side of Columbus, the man took out a plastic business card and held it out.
“It’s a bit embarrassing, but this is who I am.”
When I checked the recognition tag engraved on it, the relevant information surfaced.
“Orpheus, General Producer of Production Team 3, Raju Sable? At your age, you’ve already secured a position like that. Should I call that success?”
“You flatter .”
The man, Raju, scratched his head awkwardly. But I didn’t take appearances at face value.
Orpheus.
One of the entertainnt agencies under the gacorp Marstop, it was a massive corporation with a market capitalization of 11 trillion. It alone had produced eight hit girl groups. As for singers and actors, there was no need to even ntion them.
Looking at its history, it wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say it had captivated citizens’ eyes since the ti Mars was first colonized.
Perhaps it was best described as one of the companies leading culture.
Holding a position there ant, whether one liked it or not, that he was adept at politics.
“What do you think about idols, Mr. Ga-on?”
It was practically a Zen riddle.
“Is there even anything to evaluate?”
As an outsider who knew nothing about the industry, that was the best answer I could give.
But Raju accepted my words as they were and nodded vigorously.
“That’s right. There’s nothing to evaluate. They undergo plastic surgery to match the appearance preferred by the public, enhance their vocalization and harmonies with artificial vocal cords, and fill in their lacking knowledge with a Second Brain.”
If necessary, it was an industry that would even shave down bone structure to insert implants and support fras.
An idol that converged into a single form.
Individuality or ego had no place there.
“That does seem to be the trend.”
It wasn’t for nothing that I had been impressed by the girl busking on the street.
“Technology takes the lead, and humans rely follow behind. Should I say they’re closer to products than to people?”
Raju added with a self-deprecating smile.
“You may already know this, but the amount of money required to reach that point is no small sum. It’s not sothing trainees, who know nothing, could ever afford on their own.”
“I heard the company provides separate support depending on individual performance or achievents.”
“They call it an investnt on paper, but in essence, it’s debt. If they debut and gain popularity, they can pay it off quickly. But most disappear quietly before that ever happens.”
“Like that girl nad Sakuya we saw earlier?”
“That’s right.”
No wonder he had been watching the program so intently. As soone working in the industry, he must have been unconsciously absorbed in it.
After taking a deep breath, Raju spoke in a low voice.
“Trainees project themselves onto those figures and want to succeed as soon as possible. So of them don’t care about the ans.”
It was a vague preface, but with such a lengthy background explanation, it wasn’t difficult to grasp the situation.
“Are you saying they receive sponsorship offers?”
“Yes. The child I was in charge of was one of them.”
It was then that Raju, who had been speaking smoothly until just monts ago, fell silent.
He seed to glare at his own reflection in the teacup before continuing.
“From so point on, she started changing little by little—her singing, her dancing. At first, I didn’t notice. I believed the passion she had poured in all this ti was finally bearing fruit, so I even encouraged her.”
Without knowing what kind of burden she was carrying.
Though Raju muttered the last part as if letting it slip, it wasn’t hard to guess that in the process of receiving sponsorship, the girl had paid an impure price.
Of course, that didn’t change my answer.
“It’s unfortunate, but that falls under the jurisdiction of the Public Enforcent Corps. And even if she’s young, problems that arise from falling for sweet talk are her own responsibility.”
“That’s true. In fact, the girl said the sa. She asked to help her, saying she would expose everything.”
So this was a request related to that case, I thought, about to respond—
“But the very next day, she disappeared.”
At those words, I changed my response.
“That’s an astonishing coincidence.”
“Yes. Soone who had contact with her must have noticed sothing.”
“Did you file a missing person report?”
“I did, but they said the evidence was insufficient and that they couldn’t help. What choice did I have? I had to step in myself.”
In truth, the very notion of a disappearance in modern society was absurd. Since people carried implanted devices connected to their entire nervous system, tracking those alone made it easy to determine their location.
However, to do so required a warrant to be issued. And that, too, had to go through a complicated process.
It wasn’t a system enacted for innocent citizens.
Rather, it was the opposite.
It served as a safeguard for those in power and influential figures. If devices could be conveniently tracked, then the mont negative allegations surfaced, their movents would be laid bare.
Unlike in the past, it was impossible to simply throw away a smartphone and feign ignorance.
The mont one was caught, social annihilation was the natural course.
That was why device tracking was rarely permitted unless soone, like Joshua Müver, set fire to the Public Enforcent Corps.
They boasted to the public that it was a reinforced asure to protect personal information, but everyone knew that claim was hollow.
“Even so, isn’t it excessive for you to co all the way here just because you’re her producer? What about the girl’s family?”
“I am her family.”
Raju stroked the ring on his left ring finger and smiled bitterly.
“We had promised to marry. She would retire and beco an ordinary housewife, and I would go independent and start my own agency. That was the dream we shared. Now, it’s all aningless.”
The two had intended to settle their debts and make a fresh start, but the world was not so lenient. It did not permit them to erase the black stains and beco happy.
There was nothing left for Raju.
No—there was one thing.
The settlent of all karma.
Having set his life’s goal, he had co to sit here.
“I want those connected to her disappearance to suffer. Not so half-hearted punishnt, but sothing real and direct. The broker who arranged it, the sponsor who proposed it, and even the associates who went along with it. All of them.”
“And the compensation?”
“I’ll give you the entire 1 billion Pia I set aside to start my agency.”
Having finally put a period to the long conversation, Raju smiled with a face that could not cry.
***
After Raju left, the reception room felt strangely empty.
Fernandez scratched his chin.
“I thought you wouldn’t take it.”
“I told you not to make comnts that sound like you’re probing my true intentions.”
“My apologies. It’s beco a habit. Still, I genuinely an that it’s unexpected. You heard it yourself—this is going to be an outrageously difficult request. The price might not even match the work.”
“True, 1 billion Pia might not be enough. Still, that’s not sothing you should be saying when you’re the one who deliberately brings cases like this.”
When I understood Raju’s circumstances in full, I could see what Fernandez was thinking.
“Last ti and this ti as well—it seems you’re quite interested in delivering justice?”
“There are problems that can’t be solved in the light. Even if everyone agrees they’re wrong. You must have felt it yourself. That the law in this world isn’t so perfect. No—rather, that it’s increasingly unable to keep up.”
The era when the public could participate and change the tide had ended. The institutions that were ant to correct themselves had ceased to function. In a way, it was only natural.
Even if countless regulations were written into the law books, the ones who directed and enforced them were ultimately human.
A promise was only a promise; it could not beco an absolute proposition.
What if the organization entrusted with authority by its mbers chose not to uphold it? Chose to ignore it? Chose to revise it at will?
Before technology advanced, enraged citizens might have taken up hoes and sickles, pressing their numbers against the powerful—but now that was nothing more than a hollow fantasy. The mainstream establishnt held all rights in one hand.
At the first sign of rebellion, they would wipe it out with the push of a button.
And then they would move on as if nothing had happened.
Just like the girl who had tried to expose the truth of the industry and then disappeared.
In a sense, the ergence of the profession known as a fixer was a reflection of the tis.
“If you’re going to call yourself a broker, shouldn’t you take on requests that only a broker can handle?”
“Soone might think you’re the one running around doing the work.”
“Isn’t that precisely why I personally recruited talent like you? So I wouldn’t have to run around myself.”
“Of course you would.”
Rising from my seat, I left Columbus. Then, to escape the biting winter wind, I blended into the crowd.
The na of the girl with whom Producer Raju had promised a future was Abigail Connor.
I had neither seen nor heard of her before, yet her face was familiar. I had found her in the list obtained from the Pier Gang’s base last ti.
Yes, on the list of those whose devices had been extracted.
It wasn’t difficult to guess what had happened to Abigail.
Fernandez must have noticed it as well and subtly guided Raju to visit Columbus.
The underworld was a place that starkly revealed how dangerous unrestrained human nature could be. Here, there was no such thing as justification or lingering affection.
They did it because they wanted to.
That was all.
In that case, what were the ones who kidnapped the very person trying to expose them, cleanly erased her, and even extracted her device thinking?
There was no need to ask.
At the foundation of it all was malice that sought to exploit humans to the extre. The fact that they no longer saw others as their own kind but treated them as a kind of resource made that self-evident.
Fernandez’s concern was not unreasonable.
To follow Abigail’s trail ant inevitably standing against people like that.
Even so, I wanted to see it for myself.
Just who had orchestrated it.
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