Chapter 137 – 137. Duke’s Eighth Disruption (11)

– One –

“Huh…?”

Everyone’s expression is questionable.

The person who suggested the opinion was not sure, but he did not look very confident.

Daniel accepts his opinion.

“Go ahead.”

“Yes. For now, let’s say it’s true that Regal is making an anti-racial identification device.”

“Yes.”

“And I will say that it is true that we are conducting a brutal research related to it.”

“Are you not going to expose them now?”

“Yes. Making it secondary and making Regal a vicious racist against sub-species.”

“So, let’s emphasize that the purpose of Regal’s experiment is to completely separate the sub-species before discriminating against them, rather than to induce criticism from the public for such human experiments themselves?”

“Yes. He did a brutal experiment, but if Regal protests that the purpose was to prevent the fall of the empire, his supporters will defend him saying it was unavoidable.”

“It’s very likely.”

“However, because Regal is a terribly pure-blooded purist and racist against sub-races, he came up with such a ridiculous bill, did not even try to have a wife and children, and now has created an anti-racial identification device and all sub-races They are misleading that they are trying to weed them out of the empire.”

“…”

A look of anger lingers on Johnny’s expression.

The moment he was about to scream,

“Uh, wait, wait a minute, Johnny.”

Daniel lifts his left arm to stop him.

“What’s going on?”

“… It’s understandable that you’re angry about hearing opinions that violate journalistic spirit and journalistic ethics. But that’s the case.”

Daniel’s eyes were burning red.

He was vomiting anger all over his body.

“The Regal bastard disregarded humanity, experimented with cutting people down, burned us to death, melted us with poison, and stoned us to death. Why should we abide by ethics toward that bastard?”

“…”

“Really, are we supposed to just get hurt and still keep good journalistic spirit and sound journalistic ethics?”

“… With this one shot, it may not end with only Regal. Once you get a taste for falsely concocted articles, you won’t be able to get out again. If you write just a few stimulating and easy-to-follow articles, you can increase the number of copies sold. If you fall for that drug, you’ll never be able to get out of it again…”

Everyone forgot

Only then could they recall.

In the days when Johnny was running around the field, all the imperial media suffered from a major measles due to false articles.

“Then, Johnny.”

“… Something?”

“How about a compromise?”

“What do you mean?”

“Not to label them as racist, but to the level of questioning whether or not they are racist.”

“… Just to the point of suspicion…?”

Johnny’s eyes tremble.

He seemed a little attracted to Daniel’s opinion.

“Yes. It’s not a conviction, it’s just a suspicion.”

“Hmm…”

“Anyway, the physical evidence we have has also been lost. Even if the human experiment itself on sub-species is difficult to be the target of attack, it would not be enough to annoy Regal in raising suspicion. Did you?”

“…He is like that too…”

“For this, think of it as a throwaway card to distract Regal. By constantly raising suspicions, Regal is distracted by explanations, taking time away from other activities.”

“Keuheum. Let’s do that, then.”

“Yes.”

Daniel looks back at everyone.

“Any other opinions?”

“No, Daniel.”

“Go ahead.”

They skipped meals and were burning all their passion to decorate the last meeting beautifully.

In order to avoid the terrible terror that the Regal operatives must have perpetrated, they will disappear after today.

It will operate only in the shadows, with a ghost group put forward, an agent unrelated to them to the fore.

No longer will I be able to publish an article under their name.

“As for the rebels…”

“I doubt who is behind them…”

“Tracking the flow of money from progressive organizations…”

Even if you work in the sun, you will not have anything to do as a journalist with their names on them.

So, they were all the more desperate to finish the last one given to them beautifully.

“A fire dragon near the northern unexplored land…”

“The sign of the country’s destruction…”

“That’s an overexaggeration…”

“In-depth coverage of the identity of the Fire Dragon…”

Numerous topics were discussed, and numerous articles on how they attacked Regal were compiled.

Fragmented and scattered information is gathered into one to complete the big picture.

Gathering their responses together, they forged a sharp bamboo spear that would blow at Regal.

Dozens or hundreds of pen nibs will become the blade of the bamboo spear.

They longed for that to happen.

“Finally, only the final agenda remains.”

“Ha… It’s been a long time since we had a meeting until dawn.”

“Heh heh… Until we met Mr. Jin, we stayed up all night holding meetings to overcome management difficulties.”

“Neither do we.”

“A benefactor, indeed a benefactor… Thanks to his advice, we can prepare in advance. Isn’t it all based on his opinion? If you ever meet him, you’ll definitely have to reciprocate. Of course, I will too. Hehe.”

Before the final agenda, they caught their breath for a moment.

Because it was a very important agenda, they all knew very well that it had been implicitly postponed to the very last agenda.

“We were tracking the truth about the mysterious deaths occurring across the empire, and we were continuing the reports while digging for commonalities between the incidents.”

“It was around this time that tailing and covert pressure turned into outright terrorism.”

“…I don’t think so. Knowingly or unknowingly, even before then, there were many journalists who went missing.”

A discussion of the timing of the incident follows.

However, since most of the records of the event have been lost and we had to rely solely on the memories of the attendees, it was difficult to pinpoint the exact time.

“Most of them returned quickly, but they left shortly thereafter.”

“…Have any of us ever been dragged away…?”

“Certainly not. Since the first follow-up was reported, everyone connected communications at least once a day to confirm the existence of each other.”

“… To even suspect the possibility that the survival confirmation could have been tampered with… Would be a bit miserable.”

Their faces are stained with frustration.

The exploits of the operatives and their notoriety make it hard for even one to trust the other.

“First of all, let’s consider following us, terrorism, and coverage of serial deaths as separate matters. I’m not going.”

“That’s true. From that point of view, it’s more reasonable to see it as retaliation for Regal’s failure to wield us as they please, rather than retaliation for the coverage.”

“You stupid bastard…”

Whatever the cause, such acts of retaliation cannot be justified.

After going through legal procedures, if they had at least a justification, hiding behind the curtain without any justification or responsibility, Regal delivered violence to them.

So, they had a clear object to protest, but they lost the way to protest.

There are no physical evidence, no witnesses, no eyewitnesses.

Between cause and effect, all processes have been omitted.

“If you recklessly bet a match with an uncertain hand and open up a loophole to the Regal side, there is a high possibility that they will persist and hang on to it. Instead of refuting the message, the deceptive strategy of attacking the messenger and avoiding an embarrassing situation is a tactic they have been using as usual.”

“Yes, it is really difficult for me to understand how the masses are incited to such routine deception.”

“Heh heh. Isn’t it like a cliché? It’s so obvious that anyone can predict it, but it works for everyone to some extent, so isn’t it a cliché? I guess. So it must have hardened like a custom. Hehe…”

“Okay…”

Everyone knows it so well that it sucks.

But I didn’t want it to end like this.

That’s because they were all natural rebels.

“Huh. To the scum that hides behind the lower ones and uses violence anonymously, shouldn’t we have no choice but to respond appropriately?”

Hehe. We should also disclose anonymously and remain ignorant. Ahh. Let’s get hit with the indiscriminate bombings that are done and seen by the media with no substance, without thinking behind them.”

“So, how far did everyone report, and how far did you cover?”

“So far, we have only reported the commonalities of the deaths. To be specific, the identities of the deceased were the marrow imperial aristocrats, their aides, or their family members, and there were no eyewitnesses at the time of death, or those who were presumed to be eyewitnesses. It was reported that they died together, and that they were all found to be accidental.”

Everyone nodded in agreement.

Even though the ideologies they advocate are different, they all have the same attitude to respond to dishonor and violence.

Of course, the fact that there was no disagreement about attacking Regal, since he was the common enemy of all of them, also helped.

“This is what I did further research on after that. I hope you all share it.”

Chin.

Jack takes the notebook out of his pocket and puts it on the table.

Starting with Johnny, the people in the conference table go through it in turn.

Before their review is even over, Jack begins to elaborate.

“The contents of the note are as follows. The fact that the on-site forensic results came out exceptionally early, that the investigators dispatched at the time of the incident ignored their jurisdiction, and that only investigators from one branch were dispatched. ), The fact that all of the people who accompanied him to the coffin were the same person, the fact that all of the bereaved families’ requests for reinvestigation were dismissed, and the fact that all the bodies of the victims were cremated regardless of the will of the bereaved family under the pretext of an infectious disease.”

“… Some of them are things we knew from our coverage, but this is a bit overwhelming.”

“By the way, Jack.”

Sinatra calls Jack.

“Are there any questions?”

“Yes. There’s a part about the coroner being the same person. In this notebook, it’s annotated that he’s the highest forensic authority in the empire, so I don’t know why it’s a problem that he did the autopsy.”

Jack chuckles.

He wanted to tell as much as possible to Sinatra, who is the youngest among them, but at the same time has the most sense of responsibility and mission as a journalist.

The fact that he had only one day left to do so made him feel so resentful and resentful.

“Authority does not guarantee truth.”

“Ah…”

“Notice his authority, but his unnaturalness. He is a researcher at the Imperial Central Research Institute. Even if he is a great scholar who majored in forensic science, he is not a coroner. Each and every district has a person in charge. Even so, he accompanies not only the system, but also the mysterious deaths throughout the empire? Even excluding the coroner in charge of the jurisdiction? Isn’t it too unnatural?”

“That’s right… It seems that he was deliberately attached to show off the fact that it was a very fair and accurate autopsy.”

“That’s right. Isn’t it a typical way of argument that appeals to authority. Ignoring the wishes of the bereaved family and being cremated, it seems to be in the same context. In order to block the refutation at the source, the evidence itself was destroyed in the first place, wouldn’t it?”

“…It’s dirty…”

Even if all of that is speculation, if Regal is behind it, it will be infinitely closer to the truth.

They were at war with Regal, and had collected every detail of his shady behavior, so they could be sure of that fact.

“Still, I can’t reveal it without haste. It’s still just heartbreak.”

“That’s right. Then, after reporting on the commonalities, which can be dismissed as an unfortunate coincidence, we will have no choice but to dig into the background of the investigator and coroner dispatched to the scene of this case and report on it.”

“That’s right. As if it’s a gossip, it’s judged that the priority is to report on common ground and plant doubts in the public.”

“Then, we should track the money flow of the people involved to see if they were paid in connection with this case, and if it is true, we should report it.

“It’s a good method. At the same time, whether they received any preferential treatment from the Regal or the Aristocrats, for example, received tax cuts or benefits related to business orders, or asked the Aristocrats or the Regal to clear up corruption or crimes. Whether there are any, we will have to investigate everything before and after the serial death case.”

“Yes. I’ll keep that in mind.”

Their main goal was to prove that the recent serial killings were actually a series of murders perpetrated by Regal operatives.

Other issues had small ripple effects, could not continue follow-up coverage due to various factors, or were related to articles that had already been exposed to a large extent.

However, reports related to this serial death case were not covered much in daily newspapers, and after it was properly reported, it was judged that the expected ripple effect was so huge that it was difficult to express it in words.

“And the part I need to dig into a little more…”

“But that’s too vague…”

“We have to gather the testimonies of those involved…”

“I don’t think it will be easy to contact…”

Above all, it was difficult to find a direct connection with other agendas related to Regal.

While it could be pointed out that he had wrought havoc on the entire empire for some reason, it was unclear what direct benefit the Regal would derive from what he had done.

It seems that it has something to do with the combination of the sub-race and the pure-race, but that too is only speculation.

But this case is different.

“The date for contacting the Marquis of Caymus is over. In a week or so, we’ll be able to secure a meaningful testimony through him.”

Daniel’s eyes light up.

“I hope so. It would be nice if Viscount Uweboll came along too…”

“They say they’ve lost contact, so it seems difficult. They don’t seem to be in a good situation either…”

This is because the person who had a partnership with them promised to directly complain of the damage and accuse Regal.

“If we can get a proper testimony from him, he might be able to unmask Regal.”

Hehe… It’s really surprising… That such trash is considered by the public to be the most honest and fair ruler.”

“Haa… I’m worried at the same time. Maybe the mask itself, which was recognized by the public, was the reins that prevented him from going out…”

“If that’s the case, if that’s really the case, wouldn’t it be like we’re unleashing demons into the world…?”

“…”

Silence hangs in the hall.

Even though they were fighting Regal with pen and paper, they were all afraid of Regal.

Hehe. Still, we have to fight. If his true face is revealed and he becomes tyrannical, won’t someone else appear who will destroy him someday? Aren’t we struggling like this to bring such people out of the world?”

“That’s right. And what if he’s a demon, and what if he’s a beast? If he gives up fighting because he’s afraid and runs away, in the end the world will only turn the way he wants. We have to fight. In the small for our media, in the big for the world. .”

Hehe. Everyone has become fighters for justice… The things that started to escape the financial pressure of Regal may be a starting point that will lead to social reform.

At Johnny’s words, some smile.

Some of them stiffen their faces and make up their minds, as if they feel a great sense of responsibility.

And the rest,

Cringe

“If you hit someone once, shouldn’t you be prepared to get hit yourself too, Commander-in-chief?”

“If you stay still after getting hit, you will only get caught.

Burned with anger

Johnny was pleased with the reactions of all of them.

It was because they felt that their final agenda was enough to decorate their last meeting by motivating them.

“Get up. Everyone has had a hard time, hehe.”

“Huh, Commander…”

Sinatra bursts into tears.

No, she wasn’t the only one.

They all had tears in their eyes.

“What. We’re not going to die, so why are we so dead? We’re just trying to hide under the eaves for a while to avoid the heavy rain.”

“Still…”

She blurted out her words, unable to hide her regret.

With Johnny hardening her face, she makes eye contact with them one by one.

“Are we all going to give up?”

“No, Chief.”

“Yes. We will continue to write against the world. So, if we both want to, can’t we always know each other’s well-being through writing?”

“… Yes…!”

“So let’s laugh.”

They cried and laughed.

They didn’t leave much to say goodbye, and everyone scattered along the way.

From that day on, the lights in the meeting room were never lit again.