In the next few days, Luke continued to lay out a long line to catch a big fish. He silently monitored the high school boy, Ueno, as the latter snuck out to look for people at night.
His interrogation of the two monsters had also progressed significantly, and he now had a rough idea of their origin.
Reportedly, they had come to Earth during the Leo meteor shower, and the ‘scouts’ had been on one of the Life Foundation’s deep-space probes that had returned safely.
The name this species called themselves was a strange sound; clearly, there was no equivalent word for it on Earth.
Luke simply called them Parasites.
However, they were different from actual parasite bugs.
The Parasites were quite intelligent and also had a societal structure.
Their king had discovered the deep-space probe, which was clearly manmade.
As per their usual practice, this king sent a bunch of baby Parasites to Earth on the probe.
Ueno hadn’t been lying about the hundreds of thousands.
The special meteorite shell which the baby beasts were launched out in could ensure that they remained in hibernation for a very long time.
Whether or not they ran into any sort of danger, like a meteorite, a laser blast or a black hole, would depend on their luck.
Because of the harsh travel environment, the Parasites, like many animals, would launch a large number of baby beasts every time to ensure their survival.
In any case, the baby beasts were similar to 10cm centipedes – it didn’t cost much to produce them, and they could be wasted.
From this point of view, the baby beasts that were launched were similar to Gold Nugget in that they were just cannon fodder for reconnaissance.
The difference was that the Parasites were similar to insects; sending out their young was like bees or ants breaking off to form new colonies; it was a way to carry on the species
Thus, these Parasites weren’t like the symbiotes, and wouldn’t send out Earth’s coordinates if they got the chance.
They had no way to do so, nor would they think to, since Earth was ‘new territory’ for these Parasites.
…
Luke sorted out the first batch of intelligence and sent it to the team.
He also sent it to Tony and Phil to alert them.
Tony himself was a big backer. Naturally, the Avengers didn’t lack anything, and their strength was increasing steadily.
Phil controlled the new SHIELD and had bought a lot of equipment and supplies from the bigshot who sold everything.
Although the new SHIELD wasn’t as big as the previous SHIELD, it still had a certain amount of power.
Forget Nick Fury; who knew where this guy was hiding and digging pits for other people.
Both parties soon replied, saying that they would keep an eye out for relevant information and that they would share whatever they found with Luke.
Luke relaxed and finished up for the day.
Just as he was about to call Selina, who was working on the side, to come out for supper, a message appeared on the team channel. “The pachinko machines in Japan are like our slot machines.”
Luke: ??? Why was Damon letting Mindy play with those?
It was a small matter if Mindy lost, but it would be troublesome if she smashed up the store.
Even with the slot machines in Las Vegas, a person had to rely on mathematics and probability to make money.
Luke looked at Mindy’s coordinates and saw that she was also in Sapporo, along with four other teammates, while her father, Damon, was in a hotel a kilometer away.
Without doubt, she had met up with her four turtle lackeys that night, and had gone out to play.
Luke: …Forget it. There was both a father and a teacher. The bunch would be taught a good lesson if they caused trouble.
An hour later, in a chicken yakitori shop, Luke had just tricked Selina into tasting chicken butt.
Selina took a bite, chewed for a moment, then spat it out.
She decisively tossed the rest of the chicken butt to Gold Nugget, who didn’t mind at all.
Luke hurriedly gave her a grilled chicken yakitori skewer. “It doesn’t taste good? Hm, have this.”
Selina asked, “What the hell is that? Why is it so smelly?”
Even though the glands in the chicken butt had been removed beforehand, the smell couldn’t escape her keen sense of taste.
Luke shrugged innocently. “The boss recommended it. He said it’s a specialty here.”
Selina didn’t cook, so she had no impression of chicken butt.
Although she felt that something wasn’t right, she accepted Luke’s explanation when she saw that someone else was indeed eating the chicken butt.
It was very normal to run into locals enjoying ‘local specialties’ which outsiders couldn’t take.
After that, the chicken liver, wings, and neck were served up, and Selina forgot about the butt.
Luke, on the other hand, looked at the photo of her eating the chicken butt on the virtual screen and chuckled inwardly. He had more material for memes now!
At that moment, Mindy suddenly sent a message on the virtual screen. “Um, it seems we found some clues about the Parasites.”
Luke was stunned. “Where?”
Mindy said, “We ran into a guy in a 24-hour mart on the outskirts of Sapporo. His head suddenly turned into sharp tentacles and he stabbed Mikey.”
Luke felt that something wasn’t right. “Are any of you hurt? What’s the situation?”
Mindy said, “We’re fine. That guy’s tentacle stabbed the armor on Mikey’s back. However, the mart and the pachinko store next door were wrecked. Does that count as a situation?”
Luke: …I knew it.
Actually, this couldn’t be considered their fault.
Mindy had reached Sapporo that night, ditched her father, and arranged to go out and play with the four little turtles.
When the five of them arrived outside the pachinko store, they thought they were some sort of arcade machines.
Everyone decided to go in and take a look.
After losing a bit of money, Mindy was a little unhappy.
Donnie, the tech turtle, quickly comforted her and said that the machine had definitely been rigged; it was normal to lose.
Mindy immediately felt like she had been tricked, and it had been in front of her gang to boot.
She asked Donnie if he had a way to “fix” it, and Donnie patted his chest and promised that it was a small matter.
Getting his three brothers to hide him, he quickly used nanotechnology to adjust the pachinko machine so that there was a high chance that it would give the winning pattern.
After Donnie was done, Mindy immediately continued playing and never stopped winning.
It was a simple and crude method. However, pachinko stores weren’t opened by upstanding people.
The little turtles already looked very suspicious to begin with, and it was even more suspicious now when they were clustered together. The gang members who were monitoring the place came to interrogate them.
After exchanging a few words, Mindy deliberately picked a fight and both parties instantly started a brawl.
