[Master K] The bad one next door

"The...brain of a capable person?"

Mami murmured and repeated, and suddenly realized the meaning of it.

"Isn't that... killing people?!"

Hirobe also reacted at this time.He jumped up in an instant, pointed at the calm little old man with trembling fingers, and was dumbfounded: "How could you do such a thing?! This is a crime!"

The little old man didn't even bother to return, he just sneered, and lazily picked out his ears: "What's the use of you talking nonsense to me as a staff member? I can manage the business you want with the client? ... So Say, can you still come in?"

The little old man looked calm, as if he didn't take this matter to heart at all.Shinya and Hirobe looked at each other, and they both saw surprise in each other's eyes.

While they were hesitating, the little old man had already entered the room first.Seeing his figure disappear behind the door, Hirobe took a deep breath, put his hand on Mami's shoulder, and said with a forced smile: "Shall we go in too?... Don't worry, that guy won't hurt us. "

Mami stared at him silently for a few seconds, then nodded.

She took two steps, then suddenly stopped as if remembering something, and said, "Mr. Guangbu seems to be very familiar with this old man... have you known him before?"

Hirobe was stunned, with a wry smile on his face: "Knowing... it's considered knowing. It's just that I never thought he would be like this."

His lost eyes were concentrated on a certain point in the air, slightly out of focus.

"—It's true, I didn't expect it at all."

……

When the two entered the house, they saw a spacious room with rows of shelves neatly arranged on both sides of the room, and all kinds of strange things were placed on the shelves.Maki cautiously took a closer look.A formalin-soaked lizard was staring at her wide-eyed, huge yellow-orange eyeballs with an icy gleam, and pupils bright and alive, as if it had been alive.

Mami couldn't help feeling a chill run down her spine, and hurriedly withdrew her gaze in a panic.

Hirobe had already rushed out first, and his exclamation kept coming from across the shelf: "Oh, what is this! Specimen? There are bones, plant seeds—even artificial skin! Is this old man a mechanical thing? Master, he is engaged in biological research!...Huh? This is—”

The boy's shouts stopped abruptly.Mami's heart tightened, and he ran over quickly: "Hirobe-kun? What's wrong?"

When Maki saw Hirobe, he was frowning, staring at a corner of the shelf in thought.Hearing her voice, he turned his head and hooked the corners of his mouth a little dullly: "...Ah, Yazawa-chan?" He turned sideways and motioned her to come over, "Here, take a look."

Mami walked up to him and took a look, and was shocked for an instant to hold her breath.

She murmured, "This is... a human brain?"

What appeared in front of the two of them was a whole row of shocking brains.

The brains floated in a slightly cloudy green solution in labeled jars.In the case of getting very close, Zhenya can even see the criss-crossing nerves and hideous ravines on them.This strong visual impact made her subconsciously take two steps back, her face turned slightly pale.

Hirobe patted her on the back reassuringly: "I'm sorry to let you see this kind of thing...but this is not what I want you to see."

He pointed to one of the empty jars: "Look, the name on this label."

Maya suppressed the discomfort and looked over.There is still residual green liquid in the empty jar, but the brain has been removed.The writing on the label of the empty jar caught her attention.

That's a line of English italics——

"Sakura Namiko."

"This is someone's name." Maki said, "But this name seems familiar..."

She paused and opened her eyes wide.

"Wait, wait, this isn't—"

"—Ah, that's what I told you before, the murder case that was investigated in my country's middle school." Hirobe looked solemn, and his fingernails lightly scratched the writing on the label, "The dead employee of the Qiuben Building, 'SakuraNamiko '—The accident case of Namiko Sakura."

He gritted his teeth hard.

"—Looking at it now, it was not an ordinary accident at all! Damn it!"

Looking at Hirobe who clenched his fists unwillingly, Maya couldn't help being stunned.

In her impression, Hirobe was always smiling, and she had never seen him look so angry and powerless.This left her at a loss as to how to comfort her.

"...It's okay, Hirobe-kun."

Mami was silent for a while, then said softly.

"Since we have come here, there must be something guiding us in the dark, let us tell Miss Namiko the truth. What happened back then is over, the important thing is not to repeat the same mistakes, isn't it?"

Hirobe turned his head and stared at her for a few seconds.After a long while, when Zhenya felt a little embarrassed by his staring, she burst into a "puchi" laugh, and reached out to pat her on the head helplessly: "Yes, Yazawa-chan is right."

Mami puffed up her cheeks in dissatisfaction: "What, don't talk in that kind of coaxing tone!"

"I know, I know. Don't worry, Yazawa-chan, I'm not someone who gets discouraged by a little blow."

Hirobe's blue eyes shone slightly.He stared at her for a while, and was about to say something, when he suddenly heard the little old man's displeased shout: "Hey——what are you doing, you brat! Don't touch my things! Get over here!"

"Huh? Yes, I'm sorry!"

Mami responded quickly, trotting forward a few steps, realizing that Hirobe hadn't followed, stopped halfway, and turned to look at him: "Hirobe-kun? Aren't you going?"

"Okay, come right away."

The silver-haired boy responded casually, and when he saw the black-haired girl running forward, he suppressed his smile, lowered his eyes slightly, and gently stroked one of the containers containing the "brain" with his fingertips.Staring at the name on the label for a while, he let out a breath, lowered his hands, turned around and ran towards the direction where Mami left.

Soon there was no one in front of the shelf.

In the empty aisle, there are only rows of containers containing "brains" quietly placed, and the glass surface reflects a dazzling arc of light.

The label touched by Hirobe's fingers just now faced the white wall, with black and white writing, cold and silent.

There is a name written on it in beautiful English characters:

"Orihara Ryoko."

——Ryoko Orihara.

……

The little old man was holding Zhenya's backpack, standing in front of the table, with an unhappy expression on his face: "You guys are so slow."

"Yes--I'm really sorry we are so slow."

Hirobe rolled his eyes indecently, and stretched out his hand: "So where's the new equipment?"

The little old man: "...you really think of me as an NPC." He sighed, ignored Hirobe's hand, and handed the backpack to Mami: "Here, these are modified weapons. It should be useful when we get to the third floor later."

"The third floor?" Maki asked curiously, "What's the third floor like?"

The little old man tilted his head and smiled slyly: "I won't tell you."

Maki: "..."

"Open the bag and take a look." The little old man pointed to the schoolbag, "The usage of these remodeled weapons is similar to before, but the power has increased, and they can be used to practice hands on the second floor——NO.B1 is a very good weapon." Good training object."

Mami paused when she unzipped her schoolbag.

She was silent for a moment, then said hesitantly, "Do you have to... kill her?"

Hearing what she called the robot, the little old man raised his eyebrows: "Of course, according to the program setting of NO.B1, it will not stop until all hostile targets are cleaned up. Unless its 'brain' is completely destroyed."

"But, she was also human before."

Mami bit her lower lip, and looked up at the little old man: "That NO.B1 is Sakura Namiko! Even if she is a robot now, she became like this after suffering an indiscriminate disaster! This kind of thing is no different from killing people." , I can't-"

"Yazawa-chan."

The little old man suddenly sighed heavily and interrupted her.

"Did I say that? This is a deal between Sakura and the Qiuben Group. There is no such thing as a random disaster. Sakura's 'brain' is just that she voluntarily That's the price to pay."

When Mami was stunned, he raised his head, looked at her seriously through the sunglasses, and said earnestly, "Yazawa-chan, you are Butei."

"—As a Butei, whether you like it or not, you will kill someone one day."

"This is the reality that you must face while gaining power."

Seeing the black-haired girl stunned for a moment, the little old man stopped persuading him, turned his face to Hirobe who was sulking because he was ignored, and said, "Oh, by the way, I almost forgot to remind you, the route you have taken so far It's all wrong."

"……what?"

Hirobe was taken aback, and was so surprised that he forgot to be angry for a moment: "How is it possible, that Tsunayoshi Sawada is leading the way? Are you old and demented?"

The veins on the little old man's forehead twitched, and a gritted smile appeared on his face: "...Of course not, you brat is really annoying."

He reached out and rubbed his forehead, and explained patiently: "It's like this. Every floor of this building has a fixed test subject, and these test subjects are the research subjects Qi Mulisa focuses on. Among them The test object on the second floor is Tsunayoshi Sawada, who mainly studies Vongola’s super-intuition.”

Hirobe was dumbfounded: "This can also be studied? How did you study it?"

The little old man smiled: "We are testing whether the environment, terrain, feng shui, time and magnetic field have any influence on Vengola's super-intuition."

Hirobe: "...then you guys are great."

The little old man ignored his hehe face, and continued: "In short, Peng Li's super straightness felt the influence of these factors to produce a deviation. The real power supply is actually next to the elevator. You just need to turn back and go. Moving forward is also fruitless."

Hirobe narrowed his eyes, and looked at him without smiling: "It's easy to say. But how do I know if you're cheating on us?"

The little old man also squinted his eyes and smiled, his eyes were meaningful: "You know best whether I will donate to you."

The two looked at each other for a few seconds, and in the end Hirobe was the first to lose.He scratched his head and sighed: "Okay, just trust you once. But you said that the second floor was tested by Sawada Tsunayoshi, what about the first floor?"

As soon as these words came out, the two paused at the same time, and then silently turned their gazes to Mami.As if just waking up, Zhenya met four strange eyes with a blank face: "What, what's wrong?"

"...No, nothing."

Hirobe's head was full of black lines, he smiled dryly and gently pushed her shoulders and walked out the door: "We should go....By the way, don't you really want to see Hatta? You will see him soon! Come on Come on, say goodbye to the old man before you go—”

"Huh? Wait a minute!"

Mami hurriedly grabbed the door frame, stopped, straightened up, and looked over Hirobe's shoulder at the smiling old man not far away: "Um... what should I call you?"

Hirobu panicked, increased the strength in his hands, and said loudly, "Huh? Why ask him this, anyway, he is a lowly little boss—"

The little old man raised his eyebrows, and replied calmly: "My name is Bai Yi, you can just call me Mr. Bai."

Hirobe's pushing and shoving movements froze suddenly when he heard the name.He subconsciously wanted to breathe a sigh of relief, but he choked on the saliva again, and coughed heart-piercingly in an instant.

"Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa!!"

"Hiro, Hirobe-kun?!"

Maki quickly patted him on the back to comfort him.While taking pictures, she turned her head, looked seriously at the little old man with a half-smile expression, and said softly, "Mr. Bai... Anyway, thank you."

The little old man was taken aback for a moment, unable to answer the words for a while.Hirobe managed to stop his coughing, hammered his chest hard, turned to look at him with tears in his eyes: "By the way, old man, that book..."

"Keep it." The little old man turned his face away and waved his hand, "Anyway, it's useless for me to hold it."

Shinya looked at Hirobe suspiciously: "What book?"

Hirobe answered very quickly: "Ah, it's the recently popular book "My Sister Is Teacher Luman"! That's right, it's the light novel from the manga series April! Because the old man also thinks that sisters and orthopedic patients Give it to me if it's the best. Yazawa-chan, do you want to see it?"

Maya Black Line: "...No, thank you."

The little old man patiently waited for the two of them to finish wrangling, and then said briskly: "Then you go, I will send a robot to send you up." He paused, then suddenly looked somewhere in the air, and smiled stand up.

"However, it seems that there are guests again."

After going out, Shinya heard the sound of fierce fighting coming from the hall from a long distance, mixed with the sound of explosions and heavy objects colliding from time to time.Miya held the gun in her hand vigilantly, maintaining a posture ready to shoot at any time, and walked forward cautiously and quickly along the corridor.

Hirobe who was following her asked nervously, "Why did an intruder suddenly appear? Didn't the old man say that the security here is very high?"

"We wouldn't be here if the security was high. ... No, it's not certain."

Thinking of the unusually familiar attitude of the little old man, Maki couldn't help but sigh.It was such a time, and she didn't know whether she and Hirobe fell into this mezzanine, whether it was an accident or the little old man did it on purpose.

"Speaking of which, Yazawa-chan, the intruder this time is..."

Maki frowned slightly: "Maybe it's a contestant, maybe it's a rescuer who came in from outside...but the chances of the former should be higher." She listened for a while, then murmured, "...this person is very strong. "

"Huh? Why?"

"Listen to the voice. The situation is obviously one-sided."

Maki pursed her lips, and seemed to feel that it was not good to put so much psychological pressure on herself, so she turned her head to comfort Hirobe and said, "Please don't worry, Hirobe-kun, I will try my best to protect you when the time comes to fight."

Hirobe couldn't laugh or cry: "Hey, although it may be true...but it's really complicated to be protected by a girl."

"Eh, is it?"

"Of course! I'm a man after all!"

While the two were talking, the sounds of explosions and fighting got closer, and the echoes in the empty corridor became louder and louder.Mami's body tensed a little bit, the muzzle of the gun gradually moved upwards, his index finger was firmly on the trigger, his eyes were fixed on the corner a few meters away, not daring to miss a single movement.

After a short burst of violent bombardment, the sound of the explosion gradually subsided with the ear-piercing sound of the iron sheet being pierced.After a moment of silence, the footsteps of the visitor resounded in the corridor.

"Da da da……"

——The sound of footsteps that were a little unstable due to injuries, but filled with a real sense of oppression, approached this direction little by little.

The familiar footsteps startled Miya.

- This person is...

The moment this thought flashed, a figure suddenly sprang out from the corner of the corridor.

It was a figure burning with scorching flames all over.

The boy's orange hair rose as he jumped, revealing a pair of blood-stained amber eyes under the forehead.He jumped high on a skateboard, staring blankly and fiercely at the suddenly stunned Miya with bloodshot eyes. The twisted and deformed baseball bat in his hand was surrounded by dazzling red flames, so hot that even the air was slightly heated by the high temperature. distortion.

Looking at the boy's familiar face, Mami's pupils shrank slightly, subconsciously wanting to call out his name: "Mei..."

However, before she could finish speaking, the baseball bat was swung down at her with lightning speed.