After being elected as the governor of Tokyo, he will debut as a band!

While the tea master was selecting tea utensils, Aoyama quietly asked Ogikubo Yutaka a question:

"Ms. Ogikubo, don't you want to know what I've been busy with in my spare time these past few months?"

Ogikubo remained silent for a while before slowly speaking.

"I am the whip of the Shigure Party. My only responsibility is to ensure that members do not violate party discipline and act in accordance with the party's position. As for your secrets... you can leave them to the Special Department, which is responsible for keeping secrets."

The next day, Yutaka Ogikubo met privately with Hattori, the head of the Special Division of the Metropolitan Police Department, through an old friend in the National Police Agency, and gave him a photo of Mukashi Aoyama along with a handwritten letter from Kuniyoshi Maruyama.

After receiving the photo, Hattori immediately ordered his subordinates to investigate based on the information in the photo. Because the clues were so clear, they only needed half a day to find out the whole story.

After reading the investigation report, Minister Hattori was both shocked and disappointed. He was shocked because Aoyama Mukai was not doing a good job as the Governor of Tokyo, but instead disguised himself, wore a mask, and went to a small band to play drums, piano, and sing for money. Was this something a normal person would do? He was disappointed because he thought he could catch a big fish this time, but he caught a stinky rotten boot instead.

His trusted subordinate noticed his unease and tentatively suggested:

"Should we report this to the CIA or the police department?"

"What are you going to report? Are you going to let those people laugh at us?"

"And this report?"

"For anything unimportant, seal it up and hand it over to the Police History Compilation Office of the National Police Agency so they can handle it."

"Um, Minister, if the police history compilation office includes this in their book, we'll still be laughed at..."

"You don't need to worry about that. At the current rate at which the compilation office is compiling police history, they'll be lucky if they can even take out the files we send over today and copy them thirty years from now..."

Minister Hattori composed himself, recalling the values ​​of Japanese society thirty years ago, which were vastly different from those of today.

Who knows, thirty years from now, will it become fashionable in Japan for high-ranking officials to play in bands?

"Oh, right, go to the General Affairs Department's Supplies Section later. Tell them we want to buy the copyrights to a few songs, the ones by Tomoyuki Aoyama's band... the ones by a band called Sickhack."

"Eh? Minister, I don't think that's necessary. Sickhack's songs are all rock music, which doesn't match the solemn and dignified Asahi Shadow (neon police badge)."

"It doesn't matter if we don't work together. It's always good to have a good relationship with Governor Aoyama. Do you remember last month when Governor Aoyama allocated dozens of Hawaii vacation spots to the Metropolitan Police Department? Our Special Department didn't get a single one. But that's in the past. Who knows what will happen in the future? If Governor Aoyama sees that we support him, he might be more lenient with us when distributing benefits. If the benefits are better, won't everyone's work enthusiasm increase?"

……

Since meeting with Ogikubo, Aoyama has not been distracted by the Metropolitan Police Department's Special Division.

As the leader of the Shigure Party, Kuniyoshi Maruyama wields immense influence, and even the current Prime Minister Yoshihiro Endo needs to consult with him during the appointment of cabinet members.

Although the Shigure Party is currently on the defensive in the Diet, with its power concentrated on controlling local councils, it still holds the positions of Minister of Justice, Director of Cabinet Crisis Management, and Cabinet Secretariat Advisor. The current Director of Cabinet Crisis Management was formerly the Superintendent General of Police and has many former protégés and associates in the Metropolitan Police Department. Out of respect for this person, it is unlikely that Minister Hattori would want to go against Aoyama.

Today he met Toyokawa Shoko's grandfather, Toyokawa Sadaharu.

The Toyokawa Group suffered a loss of 168 billion yen due to a previous fraud incident, which severely damaged its financial health. Since then, the Toyokawa Group's shareholders have become somewhat wary and have been holding off Toyokawa Sadaharu, preventing him from getting involved in projects with uncertain prospects.

Just then, the Boso Peninsula development plan, overseen by Aoyama, began to be implemented. With the Tokyo Metropolitan Government's backing, the project's prospects were bright, and Toyokawa Sadaharu intended to participate. Based on the Boso Peninsula development plan's preference for specific areas, he aimed to increase the value of several plots of land held by the Toyokawa Group and successfully complete the transactions, thus recouping the losses for the Toyokawa Group.

However, there are many competitors for such promising projects. The Toyokawa Group's land holdings in Kamogawa and Chiba lack infrastructure, and only by increasing investment and expanding capital scale can they meet the requirements.

After pointing out the direction the Toyokawa Group should strive for, Aoyama had Yukino Yukinoshita give Nagasaki Saya's contact information to Toyokawa Sadaharu's secretary. Nagasaki Saya's company needed to acquire land, and the two sides could communicate first to see if a preliminary cooperation agreement could be reached. Nagasaki Saya's conglomerate would first help the Toyokawa Group stabilize shareholder confidence, and then the Toyokawa Group...

We will offer a more reasonable asset transfer price and expedite the construction of supporting facilities for the land plot according to the other party's requirements.

After seeing off Toyokawa Sadaharu, Aoyama met with a representative of the Nekyo Group.

The representative immediately bowed deeply to Aoyama, apologizing for the offense committed against him by a Toshima Ward official a few days earlier.

Of course, he wouldn't need to make a special trip to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building just to apologize; the main issue is the power struggle within the group, which requires Aoyama's help.

It turns out that the Neon Ring Group was not a monolithic entity. Not everyone was willing to support Aoyama and his "Literary Promotion Plan." After a period of struggle, the faction that opposed the "Literary Promotion Plan" and held an extreme attitude of expelling homeless people, foreigners, and sex workers gathered at the Toshima branch and formed a close-knit group, making it impossible for the Neon Ring Group headquarters to do anything about them.

Just then, an incident occurred in which the Toyoshima branch secretary attempted to attack Aoyama. They wondered if they could define the Toyoshima branch as a violent group, and then use the power of the Metropolitan Police Department to destroy and reabsorb it.

Their plan was wonderful, but the people in the Toyoshima branch of the Nekkyo Group weren't stupid. As soon as Noda, who "attacked" Aoyama, was arrested, the Toyoshima branch immediately distanced itself from him. They even described those who acted with Noda as "a temporary team that Noda gathered through deception and bribery," and said they had nothing to do with the Toyoshima branch.

The representative of the Neon Cleanup Group wondered if they could ask the two female victims who were present at the time, Hiroi Kikuri and Takamatsu Akari, to come forward as witnesses to prove that Noda's actions at the time were approved by the Toyoshima branch.

Aoyama still remembers what happened back then. In order to confirm the identities of the two bodyguards with him, Noda had his subordinates call the branch manager of the Toyoshima branch, so there must have been a close relationship between the two.

Isogachi Music Awards: 045 The Unconventional Neon Dance Troupe

The trial of Noda will take place in fifteen days. If the testimony of Hiroi Kikuri or Takamatsu Akari is accepted by the court, the Toyoshima branch of the Nekyo Group may become a co-defendant in the case.

Because the suspect was apprehended during the crime, there is virtually no possibility of overturning the verdict in this case.

The court may order the dissolution of the Toshima branch of the Nekomamushi Group. At that time, the Nekomamushi Group headquarters can rebuild a new branch—for example, by naming the branch after a town or street in Toshima Ward and recruiting reliable former members, so that the organizational structure can be restored quickly.

Aoyama didn't really want Takamatsu Akari and Hiroi Kikuri to get involved in this mess, especially Takamatsu Akari. If that kid were to stand on the witness stand in court and be yelled at by the opposing lawyer, she probably wouldn't be able to say a word.

Therefore, they planned to send someone directly to reject the request from the headquarters of the Neon Sect.

You're not my loyal followers. At most, you're only on my side temporarily to save yourselves. Once things calm down, there's a 90% chance you'll turn against me. I'm fine with not weakening you further, but you expect me to help you grow stronger.

Don't be fooled by the fact that the Toyoshima branch opposes me. They are still relatively weak, and even if they oppose me, they can't ruin my plans. So, rather than helping you deal with them, I'd rather support them to limit you.

Unfortunately, the person accompanying him to meet the representative of the Neon Group was Yukino Yukinoshita, who was bursting with a sense of justice.

When the representative of the Nijang group was there, she didn't say anything, but after they left, she lingered in the governor's office and kept pacing back and forth in front of Aoyama.

Aoyama glanced at the newspaper and saw that "a certain department head of the Metropolitan Police Department" was still being scolded. He silently said, "Oh dear, I'm so sorry," and then looked up at Yukinoshita.

"Miss Yukinoshita, is there anything else?"

Yukinoshita had been waiting for Aoyama to ask her a question, and upon hearing this, she immediately stopped and said solemnly:

“Your Excellency, if we tolerate the continued existence of organizations like the Nijangtuan Fengdao branch, which conducts arrests of ordinary citizens, it is highly likely to create a negative perception of the government's law enforcement authority among the public. I believe that the gentleman's suggestion is worth adopting. Uprooting them would be the most positive thing to do for society.”

"..."

Are you teaching me to do things?

Qingshan glanced at her but remained silent.

Japan's government system follows the British model, which separates civil servants from political officers. Political officers are responsible for decision-making, while civil servants are responsible for implementation.

In theory, civil servants only have the power to follow the rules. If they express their own opinions or clearly state their positions when political officers are making decisions, they will be considered extremely unprofessional and naive by their superiors or colleagues. Of course, the cunning civil service system has a set of tried and tested ways to interfere with the decisions of political officers, but a greenhorn like Yukinoshita obviously has not mastered this skill.

To put it bluntly, if Yukinoshita were to submit her remarks in writing to Aoyama, Aoyama would definitely rub his eyes hard and wonder if he had misread them.

As Sir Humphrey said, "The most brilliant medal in a civil servant’s resume is always the pure white silence."

"Ahem, Ms. Yukinoshita, if you don't have anything else to do, go and report to Secretary Arima. He's helping the Acquisition Committee sort out the complex internal and external property rights and creditor relationships of the local asset holders in Kamogawa today. They're short-staffed right now."

Aoyama tapped his pen lightly on the table twice, making a "click-click" sound, to express his displeasure at Yukino's actions that exceeded his authority.

If it were Utsunomiya Takuya, he would probably have already made a run for it and left long ago, given Aoyama's hint.

After all, they are just a lowly public institution; is it worth offending their superiors for the benefit of a group of people they have no connection with?

Yukino Yukinoshita, however, stubbornly refused to leave, and argued vehemently, "Your Excellency, I am a graduate of the Faculty of Letters at the University of Tokyo, and I am afraid I cannot provide Secretary Arima with the assistance he needs in sorting out property rights and debts. Therefore..."

“You’re overthinking it, Ms. Yukinoshita. I trust Secretary Ma Yang’s organizational and coordination skills; he’ll arrange a suitable job for you. In any case, going to him would be far more meaningful than standing here in front of me like this. Do I need to be more direct?”

Yukino's face quickly turned bright red, and she went out holding her breath.

Well, at least she still had the self-awareness of a civil servant and didn't slam the door shut. Otherwise, she might be sent to the Okutama Lake water supply station to check on the reservoir tomorrow because she stepped into the office with her left foot first.

After everyone in the office was gone, Aoyama was finally able to calm down and think about the problems of the Nekyo Group's Fengdao branch.

As mentioned earlier, the purpose of the Jeju Shrine is to help its backers profit. In recent months, due to its involvement in the Shimakaze Financial counterfeit currency case, it has focused more on self-preservation and acted more conservatively.

However, not all forces that funded the Nekoma group were involved in the distribution of counterfeit money by Shimakaze Financial. These forces were very dissatisfied with the Nekoma group's conservative approach over the past few months. A few forces that could not benefit from the "Tokyo Metropolitan Cultural Promotion Project" and the "Boso Peninsula Development" instructed their representatives in the Nekoma group to gather at the Toshima branch and oppose the headquarters.

However, the actions of the Toyoshima branch were indeed excessive. Even at the height of the Negei Rabjam's power, their actions against the homeless, illegal immigrants, and illegal sex workers were limited to...

Instead of driving them away, blocking them, and causing damage, they just arrested them without asking any questions and took them away for "education."

Not only that, the groups targeted by the Nei Jing group before were all people who made a living in the gray area, but now they're even arresting drunkards, who are at most law-abiding citizens with questionable character...

Were they doing this under the direction of some powerful force? What kind of conglomerate would do something so hateful and unprofitable?

After Qingshan sorted out his thoughts, he felt that something was wrong, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it.

It would be best to have someone investigate privately.

He took out his personal cell phone and called Suzumiya Hyakubi, asking him to contact Detective Yagami Takayuki to investigate the situation of the Toyoshima branch of the Nekomata Group.

Shortly after hanging up the phone, Utsunomiya Takuya came over to remind Aoyama Muto that he needed to head to the Prime Minister's Official Residence to attend a cabinet meeting to discuss economic security issues under the new circumstances.

After leaving the house, Aoyama ran into Toyokawa Sadaharu in the corridor. The old man, who was somewhat troubled by family affairs and internal strife within the group, was on the phone and arguing fiercely with the person on the other end.

Gogomachi Music Awards: 046 Shoko's Grandfather in Trouble

"what happened?"

Aoyama saw Yukino Yukinoshita standing not far away, seemingly sent by Arima Yo to check on Toyokawa Sadaharu's condition, and casually asked her a question.

"Mr. Toyokawa just now seemed to have taken a fancy to a seaside park consisting of eleven plots of land in the southwest of Chiba City. He immediately called and instructed the real estate development company under the TGW Group to quickly send a delegation to negotiate with the asset holders and finalize the articles of association regarding asset transfer, functional planning, joint development, and the establishment of a special subsidiary."

Yukino Yukinoshita watched Toyokawa Sadaharu's retreating figure with an arrogant expression that said, "I know everything."

However, thanks to the fact that Yukinoshita's face was quite pretty, she didn't look too infuriating, and Aoyama Xiang didn't bother to give her a hard time, letting her continue.

"But not long after the first call, the second call came in. It seemed that the TGW board of directors disagreed with his decision, or at least disagreed with Mr. Toyokawa's decision to take over these eleven plots of land on his own."

Upon hearing this, Aoyama immediately thought of Toyokawa Kiyoko's experience of being defrauded by a group last year.

This fraud incident resulted in a direct loss of 168 billion yen for Toyokawa Properties. The subsequent chain reaction caused the Toyokawa Group's stock to evaporate by billions of yen overnight. After a sharp drop of more than a week and a steady decline of half a month, tens of billions of yen were lost.

Strictly speaking, given TGW's size, a loss of 168 billion wouldn't be crippling. If you were making a normal investment in business and misjudged the situation, losing 168 billion wouldn't be a big deal; in business, gains and losses are normal. But you were defrauded of 168 billion. What's the difference between that and publicly shouting "I'm a scumbag"? Other companies might not rush to rip you off, but their willingness to cooperate with you will likely decrease significantly, and investors will lose trust in you.

The trust of partners and investors is a company's hidden asset. A loss of 168 billion is easy to deal with, but if trust is lost, it may take dozens of 168 billion to recover.

It took Toyokawa Sadaharu, the old leader, more than a year of maneuvering and patching up the situation before he finally brought it under control.

However, the operating mechanisms of several major profit-making companies under TGW were disrupted during this process, and their shareholding structures also changed. Toyokawa Sadaharu's influence on the TGW board of directors is not as strong as it used to be.

Furthermore, because Kiyoko Toyokawa was defrauded in real estate investment, TGW's entire decision-making team has a negative attitude towards new real estate development projects.

The Chiba City waterfront development project would require a conservative estimate of over 300 billion yen to acquire a single entity, nearly double the amount that Kiyotaka Toyokawa lost. Under such circumstances, it would be strange if the TGW board of directors approved his investment plan.

Moreover, this is part of the "Boso Peninsula Development Plan" led by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. From a macro perspective, the development area will inevitably attract a large amount of investment, and the investment prospects are excellent. Therefore, there are many conglomerates that want to acquire the land. If TGW cannot reach an agreement with the original owner in the next few days, the land may be acquired by someone else in a few days.

By then, if TGW still wants to acquire this land, the price it will have to pay will be even greater.

"Please put a complete copy of the information about that coastal park in my office. I need to look at it when I get back."

Aoyama turned his head and gave instructions to Utsunomiya Takuya, who was following behind him.

"If today's cabinet meeting takes too long and I can't get back tonight, then send me to my..."

Aoyama originally intended to send it to his personal office and give it to Nakamoto Itsuki.

But then he immediately remembered that he had a performance at RinG that night.

The performance was originally scheduled for two days ago, but Aoyama was in a hurry to resolve the "cucumber miso soup" incident, so he discussed it with Iwashita Shima and postponed it to today.

Originally, Sickhack was supposed to pay RinG a penalty for making such a temporary and unilateral change to the performance date. RinG would then have to use that money to hire a temporary band to fill in the shows that Sickhack had canceled.

However, RinG's former boss was Grandma Tsuzuki. She knew that Sickhack's breach of contract had a reason, and that Aoyama really couldn't spare the time, so she didn't take the money. Instead, she used her connections to call in a rock band called "Diamond Dust," whose popularity was so-so but whose style was somewhat similar to SH, to help out. Because the agency didn't think much of the band, they lent the money to Grandma Tsuzuki as a favor. After the performance, not only did they receive the temporary performance fee and ticket sales commission, but the band's manager didn't even take the hardship fee that Grandma Tsuzuki had prepared and took the four girls away. This made Grandma Tsuzuki sigh, "It reminds me of the hardship of adult musicians."

Not long after supporting this performance, Diamond Stardust's lead singer left the band, but that's another story.

In short, Aoyama will try his best not to stand up Grandma Tsuzuki for tonight's performance, unless something unexpected happens during the cabinet meeting. In that case, there's nothing he can do but ask Hiroi and the other two to hold on a little longer, since he still has to prioritize national affairs.

Well, after discussing national affairs with the Prime Minister (although I was just an observer, I still had to speak at the meeting), I turned around and went to play the drums on the stage of the livehouse. Life is getting more and more hopeful.

"Forget it, just send me the information about the Binhai Industrial Park via email. I'll take a look at it tonight."

……

As expected, the cabinet meeting was incredibly long and tedious.

At the meeting, Prime Minister Yoshihiro Endo spoke at length about the importance of establishing a "stable supply system to ensure the supply of specific essential materials," but he was vague about the specific areas where "specific essential materials" would be provided.

Aoyama speculated that the "specific important supplies" mentioned here probably did not include rice, given that rice prices in Japan have been soaring in the past two years, which is completely unrelated to the concept of "stable supply." Moreover, judging from the distracted state of the Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries during the meeting, it was clear that this topic was not relevant to him.

During the break and discussion session, Aoyama had a brief chat with the Minister of International Trade and Industry, and finally understood that "specifically important materials" mainly referred to various types of equipment necessary for key industries such as electricity, communications, transportation, and postal services, including hardware equipment, components, important minerals, bulk metal materials, and large-capacity materials.

These are batteries.

He didn't listen carefully to the rest of the meeting; it was just the same old stuff.

No matter how eloquently they speak, once Mi Lijian's big stick comes down, no policy works. Without a financial defense and without bargaining power over raw materials, talking about "stable supply" and "self-sufficiency" is just a joke.

In short, as soon as the cabinet meeting ended, Aoyama left Utsunomiya Takuya and the other permanent vice ministers to review the minutes and go through the preliminary procedures for submitting them to the parliament for discussion. He then went home by car under the protection of the police officers, changed into Hack's clothes, and went to the RinG showroom in Suzumiya Takumi's car.

Isokachi Music Awards: 047 Let's Become Penguins Together