Chapter 461 - Scapegoat

Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio

This senior secretary was supposed to be at the Committee’s interrogation with Prime Minister Dou to explain the deletion of the footage. No one had expected that he would be “robbed and killed” the day before. The investigators at the Police Headquarters in Di Capital were furious as well. They could not even check the CCTVs along the streets. They weren’t even as powerful as B University.

Without footage, the best option would be to look for witnesses. However, witnesses were hard to find. They’d require time, energy, and resources working hand in hand. Prime Minister Dou was exasperated. He called Senior Speaker Long and General Ji personally. “Will you people be appeased only when I die?! First, it’s my secretary. I’ll be next!” With his men being murdered out of the blue, of course he had reason to fume.

Prime Minister Dou even went to the secretary’s funeral and gave a large pension to his parents. He also promised to let his younger brother work at the Prime Minister’s Office to fill the space. Suddenly, the secretary’s family felt that Prime Minister Dou was a good person and did not wish to pursue the matter further. They only hoped that the killer would be found soon so that their son could rest in peace.

The interrogation by the Committee and the Army was put on hold as well due to the secretary’s death. If this went on, Prime Minister Dou figured that his supporters, the Committee, and the Army would not be easy to handle.

After this incident, Prime Minister Dou trusted Yamaguchi Aiko’s words even more. A week later, Yamaguchi Aiko appeared at Prime Minister Dou’s mansion again. She did not appear as a cleaner this time around but as a personal assistant of the Prime Minister’s wife. She wore a huge pair of shades and stuck eyelid tape to her eyelids to enlarge her eyes. She looked extremely different. No one would have been able to recognize that she was the cleaner from the other day, unless the person had gone through special training.

“...Your resume looks good. Would you like to be my personal assistant?” The Prime Minister’s wife spoke kindly to Yamaguchi Aiko. It looked very much like a normal interview. “I’ll have to go to South East Asia with the Prime Minister to attend an ASEAN conference a week from now and will be in need of a personal assistant to take care of my look. Would you be up to the job?”

Yamaguchi Aiko used sign language to reply respectfully, “Not to worry, madam. I used to design looks for celebrities in Hollywood for a good number of years. Given how gorgeous you already are, you’re already a notch better than them! I’ll definitely do my best to tailor looks that will make you the most beautiful woman in the Huaxia Empire!”

Even though Mrs. Dou had no idea why Prime Minister Dou insisted she employ this average looking dumb lady to be her personal assistant, she was totally won over by the lady upon translation by her sign language translator. She felt that she might not be able to find one whom she liked so much even if she was to interview every single person in the country.

She requested that this lady come up with a couple of looks for her, including a look for formal events, another for a casual conversation, and another for opening or closing ceremonies. After dressing Mrs. Dou up with the fine jewelry and accessories that she selected and matching them with the makeup and hairdo, Mrs. Dou looked like a completely different person.

“You’re so skillful! Did you learn how to sew in the past?” Mrs. Dou looked at her reflection in the mirror, extremely impressed.

Yamaguchi Aiko felt insulted. She showed slight displeasure but recovered quickly. She smiled as she signed, “In order for me to learn how to style, I needed to know some form of clothing manufacturing as well. On top of that, I needed to know about makeup and hair, jewelry designing, and how to differentiate gems, too.”

“Nice. Move in immediately. We only have one week before we have to leave.” Mrs. Dou had made up her mind to employ this person as her personal assistant. According to the law, some of the Prime Minister’s wife’s personal assistants were salaried by the nation but were selected by the Prime Minister’s wife herself. They had to get their backgrounds checked, but those checks were done by the Prime Minister’s Office as well.

The background checks for the Prime Minister’s wife’s personal assistants were not strict, as the candidates were usually her relatives or friends. However, the people who worked at the Prime Minister’s office had to go through extremely strict background checks, including the candidate’s three prior generations and immediate relatives. Unbeknownst to Prime Minister Dou and his wife, his family had long been on the list of suspects. Therefore, the employment of this personal assistant raised an alarm in the investigation as well.

After the interview, Yamaguchi Aiko came out of the Prime Minister’s Office. As usual, she left many clues, causing the Secret Service to tail her. However, just like last time, she managed to get rid of those people after boarding the train. However, losing their target again after tailing her for a while did not cause them to lose ground this time around. After informing the headquarters of the update, they received news from the background-checking department at the Prime Minister’s Office. Upon comparison, they found a major lead.n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

“The background of this personal assistant is fake.”

“Pfff – it has been a long time since I’ve seen any fake documents so poorly done.” The secret service investigated the false identity of Yamaguchi Aiko–Satoshi Saito–and realized that she was the same person–the cleaner–whom they had lost the other time. This meant that she was none other than Yamaguchi Aiko, who was ax expert in disguise!

“The person in cahoots with Yamaguchi-gumi was indeed Prime Minister Dou!” The people from the Secret Service were angry and in shock. “How could he have done that?!”

“For the election, he would sell his soul to the devil. What misconceptions did you ever have with people who value power over lives like them?”

“Then what do we do? He’s our highest superior. Are we supposed to rebel against him? Isn’t that disrespectful?”

“Is he even fit to still be our superior after doing this?” Spit!

The people from the Secret Service weren’t people to offend, either. They evaluated the information from Prime Minister Dou and focused on the ASEAN conference set to happen the following week. They concluded that if Yamaguchi Aiko was desperate to escape, she’d use the opportunity to do so as Mrs. Dou’s personal assistant when they left the country for the conference.

...

A week later, the foreign affairs department for the ASEAN Southeast Asian multilateral conference led by Prime Minister Dou headed to Di Capital’s airport through the specialized tunnel. This tunnel avoided the stringent checks in the airport and also the eyes of the Special Forces and Secret Service.

The team had special authority to skip the checks in the airport because they had their own security officers, and they would be boarding private planes instead of commercial aircraft. However, when they arrived at the end of the tunnel, the security officers from the Secret Service greeted them.

They wore the black uniform of the Secret Service and armbands embroidered with golden shields. Hands behind their backs, they stood at attention at the end of the tunnel like tall trees in the forest, looking at Prime Minister Dou’s foreign affairs team. Seeing them in this posture, Prime Minister Dou shivered. His gaze instinctively went to his wife’s personal assistant.

“What is this that you’re doing? We’re the Department of Foreign Affairs and are on the way to a conference. We do not have to go through the security checks in the airport,” one of Prime Minister Dou’s men said firmly and waved his arm indicating to them to let the group pass.

One of the directors from the Secret Service came up front and bowed to the Prime Minister. “Prime Minister Dou, it’s important to us that you’re traveling, so we’re worried that there might be people who would hide among your people, posing a danger to your wife and yourself. Therefore, please proceed to the VIP room for a short time while we do a search of your team. We will let all of you pass the moment the check is done.”

“My team is fine.” Prime Minister Dou rejected him flatly. “I’m pressed for time. Please make way.” Prime Minister Dou had spoken. The people from the Secret Service did not dare to disobey orders, but they did not let him pass, either. The two groups of people just stood there, each refusing to give in, and they did not know what to do.

Prime Minister Dou was getting increasingly anxious. When he saw the people from the Secret Service calling other departments to ask what they could do next, in a moment of panic, he glared at his men and whispered, “Don’t worry about them. Let’s just go. Our plane is still waiting for us.”

“Yes, sir.” Since the Prime Minister had already given his orders, the subordinates were not afraid anymore. Pushing ahead, they managed to push the people from the Secret Service aside in no time.

The team going to the conference was a big one this time around, approximately 500 people. The Secret Service only had 20 odd men standing guard. However, they were well trained in terms of combat. Prime Minister Dou’s men were not their match.

No one saw who pushed the other first, nor who gave the first slap. Within moments, the two groups of people began fighting, and the scene was out of control in no time. Ten bodyguards in the middle protected Prime Minister Dou and his wife. Yamaguchi Aiko lowered her head and hid behind Mrs. Dou.

Just when the fight alerted the people in the VIP room, the sound of a gunshot was heard. The shot had been fired directly at the personal assistant behind Mrs. Dou. The person got hit right in the back and fell silently onto Mrs. Dou.

“What do you think you’re doing?!” Mrs. Dou turned around in anger. Instead, she saw the personal assistant she personally hired looking at her lifelessly. Instinctively, she pushed her away, only to realize that her hands were sticky and warm. Looking at her hands, she was appalled to find that it was blood!

The “personal assistant,” whom she had pushed away, had already fallen to the ground with a thud. “Murder! Murder! Someone murdered a person!” Mrs. Dou screamed hysterically and blacked out.

The people who were fighting stopped when they heard the scream. Upon seeing “Yamaguchi Aiko” fall dead, Prime Minister Dou secretly heaved a sigh of relief, but he did not show it. Instead, he hugged his wife and shouted, “Ambulance! Ambulance! My wife has heart disease. She can’t handle being frightened!”

The airport, which had initially been orderly, suddenly became a mess. All the security, Secret Service, and Special Forces in plain clothes were called to the scene to investigate the murder immediately.

Meanwhile, in one of the VIP rooms, Gu Yanran stood up gracefully, followed by a woman who was in her forties. They headed towards the boarding gate. The checks were much more lenient now. Gu Yanran brought the woman onto her private aircraft.

Five minutes later, her aircraft rose into the air and flew in the direction of South America. The middle-aged woman sitting in front of her removed her wig and shades and gave her a smile. “My dear Miss Gu, thank you so much for your help.” It was none other than Yamaguchi Aiko, who had just narrowly escaped.

“You’re still the smarter one, getting a dumb person as a substitute to be Mrs. Dou’s personal assistant.” Gu Yanran praised her. “I’m guessing that they had no idea that your scapegoat had been the Prime Minister all along?”