Translator: Nyoi-Bo Studio Editor: Nyoi-Bo Studio
Gu Nianzhi was slightly unhappy upon seeing the search results. Ishihara Taro had published articles in those magazines before, and they included a simple biography as well.
For someone like Gu Nianzhi, who had a photographic memory, the moment she saw such a search result, the déjà vu of “Gu Xiangwen” immediately flashed across her mind. No matter at what age her father had attended university, gotten his master’s degree, or began to study for his doctorate, Ishihara Taro seemed to coincidentally be one year younger than those ages…
Gu Nianzhi could not explain why she had that strange feeling, but it gave her the creeps. She thought about it silently for a while before swiping her fingers on her phone and changing to another method for her search. This time, she utilized related searches. What she had gotten was not directly linked to the name “Ishihara Taro” per se, but everything that had a connection to this name would be shown in the search. In the end, the moment she utilized this method, the top result was “Ishihara Corporation.”
In the beginning, Gu Nianzhi had not felt that the Ishihara Corporation would be related to Ishihara Taro. In her opinion, it was just the same surname. For example, there was a billionaire whose surname was Ma. However, another person had the same surname as well. Could anyone deduce that they had some form of familial relationship?
However, after searching for a while, there was no other information that came up. Therefore, Gu Nianzhi decided to go all out and entered Japan’s government’s website and found their citizenship system. The citizenship system in Japan was the same as the Hua Xia Empire’s. In comparison, it had even more information than the Hua Xia Empire’s. There were pictures of the citizens, dates of birth, residential addresses, gender, and their relationship to the head of that family.
According to Japanese law, before a citizen turned 21 years old, he or she would not have citizenship on his or her own. His or her details could only be listed under the elders of his or her family.
The security for Japan’s citizenship system was nothing to Gu Nianzhi. It was only five minutes before she managed to crack the website’s code and successfully entered the back end of their citizenship system. They had mostly used SQL to manage the records, and therefore, if someone was familiar with that software, it would be a breeze for a hacker to search the vast amount of information within a short time.
Gu Nianzhi had only searched for Ishihara Taro’s Japanese name, “Shinishihara Taro,” and the results of the search appeared almost immediately. “Shinishihara Taro” was under the name “Ishihara Wakashi.” That would mean that Ishihara Wakashi would be the head of the family, and Ishihara Taro would be his… grandson.
Gu Nianzhi looked at the information for a while and even used translation software before she managed to make sense of the Katakana and Hiragana words. So who was Ishihara Wakashi? Gu Nianzhi looked through Japan’s citizenship system slowly, and a couple of people with the surname “Ishihara” popped up again. One of them was Ishihara Shiro, and he was from Chiyo Village in Chiba Ken.
There was a well-known identification that was tagged to Ishihara Shiro in the citizenship system. He was a lieutenant general in the Japanese army. He was also the head of the Kwantung Army Epidemic Prevention and Water Supply Department, which was also the notorious numbered unit in the army.
Gu Nianzhi’s eyes narrowed. This Ishihara Shiro was the father of Ishihara Wakashi, which would mean that he was Ishihara Taro’s great grandfather. Gu Nianzhi began frantically searching for information on Ishihara Shiro and found out that this person had been doing an experiment while researching a bacterial biological weapon. He even used the data figures of the blood and bacterial biology of the citizens of the Hua Xia Empire and had an under the table deal with America. Using that, they even managed to get away with the trial of leaking information in the international court!
Gu Nianzhi’s fingers almost trembled. She immediately remembered that Gu Yanran had a maternal great grandfather whose name was Kasahara. He was one of the main people from this notorious numbered unit as well…
Would there be a connection between these two families? Her fingers flew across the screen of her phone, changing her IP address and going into search engines again to search for information on Ishihara Shiro and Ishihara Wakashi. This time, the Ishihara Corporation appeared on her search results.
She opened her translation software and translated the Ishihara Corporation’s entire website. She realized, in a state of shock, that Ishihara Shiro was the founder of the Ishihara Corporation!
However, shortly after founding the corporation, Ishihara Shiro passed on due to cancer. His son, Ishihara Wakashi, took over his position. Ishihara Wakashi had a son. He was Ishihara Taro’s father, who was also a well-known physicist. However, he had committed suicide at a young age. Therefore, the Ishihara family that Ishihara Taro was from was the people who had founded the Ishihara Corporation!
Although Gu Nianzhi did not have much experience in society, she knew that the Ishihara Corporation was a big company. A criminal who had committed such a hideous war crime in the Hua Xia Empire returned to Japan to found the Ishihara Corporation and then returned to the Hua Xia Empire after the war had ended.
Sure, it was normal. There was no problem with this. If Gu Nianzhi was to believe that he had turned over a new leaf and wanted to contribute to the development of the Hua Xia Empire, she would rather start to believe that pigs were about to develop wings and fly.
So what connection would the Ishihara Corporation have with the Kasahara family? No matter what, both of them had contributed to the same army before and could be considered “comrades…”
Gu Nianzhi searched frantically for more information online, but she was unable to discover anything else. She had even managed to hack into the internal system of the Ishihara Corporation’s official website but still did not manage to find any information about or in relation to Gu Yanran (Kasahara). Could it be that these two families really did not have a connection?
Gu Nianzhi pondered it, and her fingers lingered over Huo Shaoheng’s number for a long time. Should she tell Huo Shaoheng about it and get him to check? He would definitely have more means and ways compared to her hacking skills. Therefore, his information would be way more complete. However, the moment she told Huo Shaoheng about it, would he discover what she had been doing?
Gu Nianzhi was in a dilemma for a long time, until she returned to her dormitory from the library, had her shower, and plopped herself onto her bed. However, she could not make up her mind. Just when she was about to give up, her phone rang. It was Huo Shaoheng’s personal ringtone.
Gu Nianzhi looked at her phone and smiled. Alright, she did not have to make a decision anymore. The phone had already made the decision for her. Gu Nianzhi unlocked her phone by sliding her thumb across the screen and sounded relaxed and happy. “Huo Shao?”
Huo Shaoheng had just finished his work and was on a night run with his Bluetooth earpiece. The winter in Di Capital was extremely cold, but Huo Shaoheng was only wearing a short sleeved military T-shirt and sports shorts as he jogged along the narrow pathway. “Not asleep yet?” Huo Shaoheng sounded relaxed as well. “Haven’t you completed your thesis?”
“Already completed it. I’m doing my final edit now.” Gu Nianzhi held onto her phone as she chatted with him, and the nervousness she had just been feeling evaporated into thin air. “However, I still have some core modules that have exams. I haven’t studied yet.”
Huo Shaoheng was not worried about Gu Nianzhi’s exams at all. He was only worried about her health. “Are you still in pain? Did you do the physiotherapy exercises?”
Gu Nianzhi was speechless. She hadn’t been feeling pain for a while now. She could do any exercises she wanted! “Huo Shao, I’m really okay now. Why don’t you believe me?” Gu Nianzhi flipped herself over and moaned comfortably as she snuggled into her quilt.
Huo Shaoheng noticed it. “You’re in bed already?”
“Yes. I was about to turn in when you called.”
“I’ll hang up then.” Huo Shaoheng did not wish to disturb her resting time, as he knew that she always had to stay up late. It was not good for health.
Gu Nianzhi quickly replied, “Don’t hang up. I have something to tell you.”
Huo Shaoheng remembered that Gu Nianzhi had tricked him the other time and warned her, “Don’t run around. Stay in school all the way until you graduate.”
Gu Nianzhi giggled and flipped over again. “Huo Shao, can you check if the Ishihara Corporation has any connections with the Kasahara family and if they have any connections with Gu Yanran’s side?”
Huo Shaoheng fell silent. “The Ishihara Corporation?”
“Yes. Can you check it out?”
“Why should we check them out?”
