IGTL Chapter 55

Chapter 55 – “It’s Fine, It’s Fine! I Quit My Job Recently Too, So I’m Unemployed!” “No, That Is So Not Fine!”

“…Uh, I think I’m good? I mean, I’m unemployed.”

“I’m unemployed.” It was the ultimate phrase for making people back off when they were trying to squeeze money out of you.

The instant I said it, one of the café staff gave me a look that practically said, “Uh, can you actually pay?”

No, that was not the reaction I’d been aiming for from the staff.

The one I’d wanted to scare off with that line was Kudo, sitting right in front of me.

But “I’m unemployed” had zero effect on him.

“It’s fine, it’s fine! I quit my job recently too, so I’m unemployed!”

“No, that is so not fine!”

It came out before I could stop myself.

More importantly, stop shouting that stuff out loud!

The staff was looking over here!

Like, really looking over here!!

“No, no, no, no, it’s totally fine!”

“No, what possible basis do you have for saying that!?”

“Huh? Because if you borrow money from a consumer finance lender and invest it, you get thirty percent of your investment back, every month!”

W-What the hell, Kudo!?

Kudo, you were completely neck-deep in a Ponzi scheme!

Everything coming out of your mouth was dangerous.

The way he was looking at me hurt too. It was like his eyes were saying, “You seriously don’t even understand that much?”

The staff and the other customers were all staring at us too!!

This was the first time in my life I’d ever attracted this many people’s attention in a café!

When I just sat there silently, saying nothing, Kudo rephrased it for me in an even more idiot-proof way.

“I’m telling you, it’s fine. If you borrow a million yen from a consumer finance lender and invest it, you get three hundred thousand yen back every month!”

No, I got it already!

Please stop!?

I’m begging you, zip your mouth shut and lock it!!

You had not said a single thing that didn’t sound like absolute trash for a while now!

An unemployed guy borrowing money from a consumer lender was seriously bad news!!

I was so dumbfounded by Kudo’s nonstop parade of insane remarks that I couldn’t even close my mouth.

While I stood there with a stunned expression, Kudo started looking at me with concern.

“Hey, hey, what’s wrong? You’re looking kind of pale. Was my explanation really that hard?”

No, I was just thinking, This guy has fallen for the most blatantly obvious investment scam imaginable.

Still, it was kind of amazing.

When someone looked at you that confidently, like, This really makes money, you know? Were you even listening? Is your head okay?, it did something weird to your brain. Even though I knew it was a scam, part of me almost started wondering if it was real after all.

My head was starting to hurt.

“…Uh, Kudo, how long have you been doing this Ponzi sch… no, I mean, this investment?”

“Heh heh heh, prepare to be amazed! This is my third month!”

“Y-Your third month…”

Wasn’t that basically late-stage Ponzi scheme territory…?

“A-And when’s the payout date? When’s the next payment supposed to come in?”

“Hm? Today.”

“I see. Today…”

Yeah, they were definitely running.

There was a one-hundred-percent chance he’d never recover the money now. Poor guy.

“Then I guess I’ll try it if the payment really hits your account today.”

“Seriously!? Man, you’ve always been such a worrier, Takahashi. Alright then, I’m gonna go check right now. I’ll message you later! You better answer!”

“O-Okay…”

After we exchanged LINE info, Kudo left those words behind, put his receipt on my table, and walked out of the café.

And I said nothing.

“I never knew this before. When there’s an unfortunate person right in front of you, people can become incredibly kind…”

I finished my coffee, returned the Nikkei newspaper to where it belonged, took Kudo’s receipt with me too, and went to pay.

“Thank you very much! Your total comes to 1,600 yen.”

“I’ll pay with e-money.”

“Yes, e-money. Would you like the receipt?”

“Oh, no, I’m good.”

After giving that answer and leaving the café, my smartphone started vibrating.

When I looked at the screen, it seemed to be LINE messages from Kudo.

Every time it vibrated, another message from him came in.

“There’s no deposit today…”

“I can’t get in touch with the senior I entrusted the investment to…”

“What do I do…”

“I borrowed two million yen, and I’ve only recovered 1.2 million so far…”

After blocking Kudo on LINE, I looked up at the sky.

“A twenty-three-year-old unemployed guy who believed in a Ponzi scheme, quit his job, and got saddled with 800,000 yen in debt from a consumer finance lender, huh…”

If I were his parent, I’d be crying. Borrowing two million yen from a consumer lender and still ending up eighty man in the hole was brutal.

That said, I wasn’t going to help Kudo.

Because we were barely even acquainted.

Honestly, even if we’d been close, this would still have been the kind of situation where you had no choice but to cut someone loose.

I did feel bad for him, though.

As I started walking away at an unhurried pace, I spotted Kudo running back into the café after about thirty steps.

That had been close.

Looks like getting out of there fast had been the right call.

If he’d asked me for money, I’d have been in serious trouble.

Pressing my hands together in silent prayer, I started walking toward Candeo Hotel.

Then a woman called out to me.

“Excuse me! If you have a moment, would you like to stop by a solo exhibition nearby?”

“No, I’m busy…”

I’d meant to refuse politely, but she circled around and blocked my path.

“Oh, come on, don’t say that. It’s a free exhibition. We even have paintings by famous artists on display, you know?”

Was today my unlucky day or something?

She was coming on way too strong…

“No, I’m really in a hurry…”

“Oh, don’t say that. Please?”

Then a man in a suit appeared too.

Something about his smile screamed shady as hell.

I let out a sigh and looked up at the sky.

Yeah, today really was my unlucky day. Officially confirmed.

Actually, more than that, I’d been feeling like my luck had been unbelievably bad lately.

“Ah, hang on a second. Let me check my schedule.”

I took out my smartphone and checked Capricorn’s fortune for the day.

My overall luck rating was one star.

Apparently, it said: “Today is a day when trouble will follow you wherever you go. In that case, why not go throw yourself into trouble instead? You might just end up having a wonderful day!?”

What a wildly half-assed horoscope.

Incidentally, the lucky item was “a kitchen knife.”

What the hell was I supposed to do with that?

Was the horoscope telling me to carve open my destiny with a knife?

That sounded less like fortune-telling and more like grounds for arrest.

As I clutched my head inwardly, the shady-looking man in the suit spoke up again with that same smile.

“…So, how does your schedule look?”

“Ah, yes. I’m meeting someone in an hour, so if I can make it in time for that, I’m fine.”

At that point, I just stopped caring.

That was the mood I was in when I decided to go along to the exhibition.

“Thank you very much. Then let me show you inside. Please watch your step.”

The moment I stepped into the exhibition hall, I saw several men viewing the paintings, each one accompanied by a woman.

“Come to think of it, I never asked your name. My name is Yamada, and I serve as the manager of this exhibition. If I may be so bold, could I ask your name as well?”

A name was personal information.

You couldn’t just hand that out carelessly.

“Tanaka.”

For today, I decided I was Tanaka Tarou.

Naturally, it was a fake name.

The moment I introduced myself that way, Yamada gave me a greasy smile.

“So it’s Mr. Tanaka. Tell me, Mr. Tanaka, our exhibition features many works created using a technique called silk-screen printing.”

“Silk-screen?”

“Yes. It’s a wonderful technique capable of extremely delicate expression. Which painting do you prefer, Mr. Tanaka?”

“Hmm, let’s see. I like paintings by Lassen, I guess. Though it doesn’t look like you’ve got any here.”

What they had here was stuff like paintings of Marilyn Monroe’s face, random landscape paintings I didn’t understand, and flashy modern art.

To be blunt, none of it appealed to me at all.

At this rate, I’d have been more interested in a jigsaw puzzle.

When I gave that offhand answer, Yamada’s cheek twitched.

“L-Lassen, you say… Yes, Lassen is nice. Unfortunately, we don’t have any on display here, but is there any other painting you like?”

“Any other painting? Hmm. Let’s see… maybe Hokusai’s wave?”

The moment I tossed that out just as casually, Yamada’s smile vanished for an instant.

He looked away, and when I looked again, he was back to wearing a full-blown grin.

“Now, now, Mr. Tanaka, you jest… Let’s say, purely hypothetically, that you had to choose one painting from among these. Which one would you pick?”

“Hmm. From these?”

With no real choice, I pointed at a random painting, and Manager Yamada smiled.

“As expected of you, Mr. Tanaka. To choose this one from all the paintings in the exhibition, you clearly have excellent taste! In fact, works by this artist have become extremely difficult to obtain lately.”

“Oh wow. Really?”

I listened while checking the time on my smartphone, and Yamada’s sales pitch only got more heated.

“Most people who purchase this painting are in their twenties. It’s very popular with people in the same generation as you, Mr. Tanaka. The silk-screen works we carry are given a special coating, so they are outstanding pieces that won’t deteriorate at all even after a hundred years…”

Fwaaah…

Oops. A yawn slipped out.

Did I seriously have to keep listening to this passionate speech?

He was the one who told me to pick one painting from the bunch, so I picked one. Why did that mean I had to sit through this old guy’s whole TED Talk now?

Thinking that, I stared blankly at the painting.

“…Ordinary silk-screen works are printed on paper, but this particular piece is printed directly onto canvas, and then finished by the artist himself using his own unique method.”

“Riiight…”

So in other words, it was just a mass-produced piece where they slapped some paint on top of a photo.

Yeah, yeah. Got it. I was full already.

“On top of that, works made using this technique are produced in fixed quantities, so only one hundred will ever be put on the market worldwide. Do you understand what that means? In other words, the more the works sell, the more their value rises!”

“Uh-huh… Is that so? I don’t really get it, but wow, that’s amazing.”

More than anything, his enthusiasm really was something.

But I was bored out of my mind. It was genuinely painful listening to someone passionately lecture me about paintings I had zero interest in.

When I gave that halfhearted response, Manager Yamada flashed me a huge smile.

“Oh, so you understand! In that case, right this way, please!”

“Huh?”

The next thing I knew, he’d led me to a seat in the back of the gallery, and a full-scale explanation of paintings I had absolutely no interest in began. And in the end…

“Ahh, I knew it. I could tell you’d understand the true essence of this painting, Mr. Tanaka. As for the price, how does one million yen sound? Normally this painting costs 1.5 million yen, but if it’s going to someone like you who truly understands its essence, Mr. Tanaka, then I’d be happy to discount it by 500,000 yen and let it go for one million. If you pay in installments, you can own this wonderful painting for only around 10,000 yen a month!”

“Oh wow, really? I’m good. Don’t need it.”

The moment I said that and tried to stand, a man behind me grabbed both my shoulders and forced me back down into the chair.