"So, that guy was Binga?"
Watching Binga leave the cabin reluctantly, unable to get a word in despite repeatedly trying to speak and holding himself back, Tangze finally put away his aggressively confrontational attitude.
Seeing him finally shut up, Vodka rubbed his forehead, speechless for quite a while.
He knew that was where the problem lay.
It might have been a low-probability accident that he and Binga had mistaken someone for someone else, but given Kumeru's abilities, there was no way he could have been so easily kidnapped by the two of them if it were merely the "misunderstanding" they claimed it was.
No matter how he thought about it, Kumeru must have recognized the unfamiliar member's identity and deliberately allowed himself to be abducted in order to probe for something.
"Do whatever you want on your side, but don't interfere with our mission," Vodka said irritably. "What Binga is handling is at a critical stage. Don't provoke him until the matter has been successfully resolved."
The project engineer was already in their hands. Next, they only needed to make use of Binga's infiltration to preserve the backdoor program in the system and further consider how to utilize it.
As for Naomi Argento, whether they took her away and controlled her, making her disappear for good, or considered letting her go back after securing her cooperation, was not something a foot soldier like Vodka needed to think about.
But if the process of communication—or rather, coercion and inducement—went smoothly enough, and Naomi Argento was willing to cooperate with them and return to Pacific Buoy, then their next mission might be to push out Makino Yosuke and make her the system's true controller, further expanding the scope and ambition of their plans.
At that point, Binga's current identity would be the