"Don't let Vermouth bluff you," Vodka secretly reminded himself. "She was just shot several times by Uzo and forced to flee the country. She's still jumpy from it—people like that developing a bit of Persecutory Delusion is perfectly normal."
"Besides, even if Uzo really discovered something wrong with the surveillance, I still have another layer of protection."
Vodka adjusted his sunglasses, deeply grateful that he had actually studied diligently back in school and acquired some fairly impressive hacking skills:
"I checked long ago—Uzo has no background in computer science. Even if he gets hold of some puppet programmer, my skills are already top-tier. They won't be able to break through my defenses easily.
"Even if they do manage it, all they'll see is the fake IP address I created. That leads to Calvados's residence—as long as I watch for any activity over there, I'll know how far Uzo's counter-surveillance has progressed."
For now...
Vodka did some Peeping and found that Calvados was still in his depressed, muddling-along phase, searching everywhere for a gun. He had not suffered any attack from out of nowhere.
That eased Vodka's mind. Sure enough, Vermouth was just overthinking things.
Forget her. First, the surveillance footage!
Vodka pushed the screen farther away, placed a throw pillow between himself and it, then watched the next part with wary, careful attention.
Inside the electronics store.
Inspector Megure exchanged a few words with the officer on the other end of the phone, then hung up. His brows were tightly furrowed. "Takagi's car was bombed near an intersection, and now the explosion site has shifted to Haido Park..."
Officer Takagi considered the two locations, then suddenly understood. "From that intersection to Haido Park—that's the Tokyo Spirits' parade route!"
A voice came from beside him. "So the bomber's target this