Ran Mouri turned her head, suppressing her growing suspicions about Vermouth's true identity.
"Azusa-san, do you... also like Brother Yuu?"
"No!"
"I don't!"
"Don't talk nonsense!"
A panicked Vermouth fired off a triple denial.
Ran's lips quirked slightly; she already had her answer.
At that moment, the situation in the pool changed again.
The dolphins began jumping in crisscross patterns, pairing up in twos.
Their curved arcs formed perfect heart shapes in the air.
The silver-haired Curacao turned around in astonishment.
Looking up at the smiling Yuu Hoshimiya, she couldn't help but throw herself into his arms, embracing him tightly.
The audience in the stands erupted into thunderous applause and cheers at the romantic sight.
Watching Yuu and Curacao embrace through the frames of the dolphin-hearts was more than Vermouth could handle.
A low, guttural growl escaped her nose.
Her hands involuntarily tightened their grip on Ran's arm, her eyes burning with a jealousy so thick it was almost physical.
Ran felt her arm being pinched until it was red, which only confirmed her theory.
This fake Azusa Enomoto was definitely in love with Yuu Hoshimiya as well.
The staff at the large performance pool were in a complete frenzy.
They shouted through megaphones for Yuu to stop, terrified that an accident would occur.
Holding Curacao, Yuu ignored them entirely.
He steered the whale in a wide turn, heading toward the seal performance area in the side hall.
Little Ayumi cheered with delight.
"Auntie Yukiko, look! Brother Yuu and Big Sister Shiro are standing on top of the big fish!"
"Hey! Brother Yuu! We're over here!"
Hearing Ayumi's sweet voice, Yuu guided the Beluga closer and waved back.
However, he soon spotted Conan, who was currently feeding a seal with a fish.
A streak of mischief hit him, and Yuu activated his magic.
The previously docile seal in front of Conan suddenly lunged upward.
It flopped onto Conan's body, its fins delivering a rapid-fire succession of slaps to his face.
Conan was utterly bewildered.
His face was slapped several times before he even realized what was happening.
He tried to struggle, but a child's physique was no match for a full-grown seal.
The nearby trainer blew his whistle frantically, trying to restrain the seal, but to no avail.
After over twenty slaps, a soaking wet and swollen-faced Conan was finally rescued from beneath the animal.
He scrambled away on all fours toward the upper stands, never daring to go near the "vicious" creature again.
Watching Conan's terrified and unsettled expression, Yuu felt a wave of satisfaction.
Glancing at the staff members who were on the verge of a nervous breakdown, he finally steered Big White to the shore.
Up in the stands, the faces of Tooru Amuro and Shuichi Akai shifted drastically.
They immediately sprang into action.
The spot where Yuu landed was on the far side of the massive pool; it would take a long detour to catch up.
They were terrified that Yuu would take Curacao and give them the slip.
Back on shore, the staff grumbled and complained about the duo's reckless behavior.
Yuu offered a casual apology and led Curacao away by her small hand.
They took a route through the aquarium's "backstage" area.
This was a restricted zone intended only for trainers and staff.
Compared to the glitzy aquarium, the backstage was utilitarian—mostly concrete walls and exposed pipes—but it offered a much faster path.
It was also where close-contact animal feeding and care took place.
Yuu had already had Noah map the entire facility; he knew the layout like the back of his hand.
Curacao followed him obediently, her sky-blue eyes looking at everything with childlike curiosity.
Soon, they pushed open a set of heavy doors, and the temperature plummeted.
A vast expanse of white ice greeted them; Curacao's eyes lit up instantly.
They stepped onto the frozen landscape of the Polar Animal Zone, which was currently closed for maintenance.
Because it was closed, there were no tourists in the observation galleries and no staff in the back areas.
Only the arctic animals remained.
In the distance, a pack of a dozen white arctic wolves on an ice shelf stared at them with predatory eyes.
Nearby, groups of arctic foxes poked their heads out of caves, their gazes those of pure hunters.
Curacao seemed to sense the killing intent; her small face grew serious.
Yuu allowed a smirk to curl on his lips as he unleashed his magic once more.
A series of low whimpers filled the air.
The Alpha wolf on the ice shelf immediately lowered its head, its body trembling in fear.
The white foxes on the other side scrambled back into the depths of their caves.
Holding Curacao's hand, Yuu strolled across the ice as if he were taking a walk in a garden.
Amuro and Akai, who had been tracking them, searched for a long time before finding the glass walkway of the Polar Zone.
Through the glass, they finally spotted Yuu and Curacao inside the exhibit.
The two agents followed suit, breaking through the backstage doors and entering the frozen enclosure.
However, once Shuichi Akai stepped onto the ice, he could no longer hide his presence and was spotted by Amuro.
In his black attire, he was a stark contrast against the white ice.
Seeing his lifelong rival, Amuro couldn't resist a sneer.
"FBI... can you only follow me around like a rat, sniffing at my heels?"
Akai remained silent, his green eyes scanning the surroundings, his vigilance peaking.
He knew how difficult Yuu Hoshimiya was to deal with, but he had no choice; he had to take Curacao.
As for simply asking Yuu for her...
He had considered it, given that Yuu was technically associated with the FBI.
But he quickly abandoned that naive thought.
Akai didn't believe for a second that someone of Yuu's caliber hadn't figured out Curacao's true identity by now.
Since Yuu hadn't contacted the FBI, it meant he had no intention of handing her over to them.
And that was exactly Yuu's plan.
He would not let Curacao die, nor would he hand her to the "Red Side," and he certainly wouldn't let Vermouth take her back to the "Black Organization."
The first was his own desire.
The latter two were because Curacao knew far too much.
Returning to the Organization or being detained by the police would completely shatter the balance he had maintained for so long.
With the endgame approaching, Yuu wanted to keep the trajectory of fate on its established tracks.
Seeing Akai ignore him, Amuro grew even more irritated.
If the stolen spy list weren't so critical, he would have attacked Akai first. But capturing Curacao was the priority.
"AWOOOO!!!"
At that moment, a wolf's howl echoed.
From behind the ice shelf, over a dozen arctic wolves, led by their Alpha, swarmed toward them.
Amuro and Akai's expressions changed instantly. They both performed the same motion: drawing their handguns.
But after a split-second thought, both chose not to fire.
The gunshots would be too loud in the enclosed Polar Zone.
If they attracted tourists and staff, they wouldn't be able to escape easily, and being seen would be a massive headache.
Thus, the two agents were chased by the wolf pack, forced into a desperate sprint.
At the far end of the Polar Zone, Yuu Hoshimiya was leisurely stroking Curacao's silver hair.
Curacao sat on a bench carved from ice, looking as serene and beautiful as a maiden in an oil painting.
She held a tiny, adorable arctic fox in her arms, while another rubbed against her long legs.
Curacao let out occasional soft giggles; it was a scene of pure healing.
The white foxes were as docile as kittens. Curacao would occasionally hold them up to show Yuu, looking quite proud of her natural affinity with animals.
She had no idea it was Yuu's magic that had forced them into submission.
Yuu lightly stroked Curacao's smooth cheek, a smile on his face as he cooperatively acted amazed, leaving Curacao feeling thoroughly satisfied.
On the other side, Amuro and Akai were having a much rougher time.
Both of their trousers had been shredded by the snapping jaws of the pursuit wolves.
Their legs were bleeding, and their buttocks had taken a beating as well.
Wolves and dogs are experts at a particular hunting technique: "anal gouging."
Fortunately, they were fast; had they been caught properly, they might have met their end right there.
After sprinting two or three hundred meters past the ice shelf, the wolves finally stopped the chase, merely watching them from a distance.
Amuro and Akai finally let out breaths of relief.
But their faces froze when they saw the massive entity rising from the icy water.
It was the undisputed monarch of the natural world, the largest predator of the bear family: a full-grown Arctic Bear.
Yuu waited quite a while, thinking Amuro and Akai would finally resort to their guns, until the two silhouettes finally appeared at the mesh fence.
They were a pathetic sight.
Even with Akai's Jeet Kune Do and Amuro's impressive combat skills, those techniques were useless against a top-tier apex predator like a polar bear.
Luckily, this was the Conan world, and their constitutions were "Conan-logic" tough.
They were injured, but not in a life-threatening way.
If their lives had truly been on the line, they would have fired regardless of the consequences.
Akai's head had been swiped by a bear paw; his beanie was gone, and his brain was still buzzing beneath his messy black curls.
Amuro's T-shirt had been torn open by bear claws, leaving a gaping hole over his abdomen and five bloody gashes; he had been a hair's breadth away from being eviscerated.
Seeing the two men appear, flashes of memory sparked in Curacao's mind—it was the chase from last night.
In those flashes, Amuro was ramming her in his white Mazda, and Akai was aiming a sniper rifle to kill her.
Her expression turned cold and lethal. She stood up, her muscles tensing, her body crouching low in a stance of pure aggression.
The arctic fox on her lap sensed the danger and scrambled away.
At that moment, Yuu's broad, warm hand settled on Curacao's silver hair, and his gentle voice rang out.
"Shiro-chan, sit down. I've got this."
Curacao turned her head, her sky-blue eyes looking at Yuu with urgency, trying to explain.
"They... enemies!"
Yuu stepped closer, burying his face in the crook of Curacao's neck and inhaling her fragrance.
Curacao froze, her body instinctively relaxing.
His warm breath against her neck made her heart flutter wildly; she didn't know what was happening to her.
"Don't be afraid. I'll protect you from now on. Just sit down and let me handle this."
Yuu stroked her smooth face. "Be a good girl."
The words seemed to have a magical weight. Curacao blushed and obediently sat back down.
In the distance, Akai and Amuro frowned at the sight of their intimacy.
This was going to be difficult.
Yuu stepped forward, his face stern, radiating an immense aura of pressure.
He didn't beat around the bush. "FBI... and Public Security. What the hell are you two doing here?"
Hearing him expose their identities in one breath, Amuro's pupils contracted violently in total disbelief.
He considered his disguise skills to be top-tier; there shouldn't have been any flaws.
And Yuu Hoshimiya was an executive of the Organization himself—how did he dare speak so openly?
Akai ignored the shocked Amuro.
He knew Yuu had long since joined the FBI as a mole.
However, looking at the man who had given him two "green hats" and made off with his mother and sister, he found it hard to see him as an ally.
Akai spoke directly: "Yuu Hoshimiya, you arranged those wolves and that bear, didn't you?"
Yuu chuckled. "I just wanted to give whoever was tailing me a bit of a hard time. I didn't expect it to be you two. The big guy didn't hurt you too badly, did he?"
"But what I expected even less was for the FBI and Public Security to be working together. Tell me, what do you actually want?"
Amuro had no time to ask Yuu—the executive and Gin's protégé—how he knew his identity or why he seemed so familiar with the FBI.
In his mind, there was an 80% chance Yuu was also a mole inside the Organization.
As for how he knew about his Public Security status... wasn't there a Curacao right there who had stolen all the spy data?
In fact, Amuro hadn't seen that data himself, so he had no idea Yuu was currently "half-FBI."
Thoughts racing, Amuro knew the priority was securing Curacao. He said immediately: "Yuu-kun, since you know my identity, cooperating with Public Security is a citizen's duty. The woman behind you is extremely dangerous. Hand her over."
Akai interjected: "The FBI is claiming this one!"
Before Yuu could even respond, Amuro glared at Akai with fury.
"I'm afraid I cannot comply. Shiro-chan just helped me save a child; she's a good girl. She's an amnesiac right now, like a child herself. I have a duty to protect her."
"And frankly speaking, with the group of useless hacks in your Public Security and FBI, you couldn't possibly protect her. I'm not handing her over."
Yuu was telling the truth. In the movies, the Public Security and FBI were often incompetent, being played like fiddles by the Black Organization.
Handing Curacao to them would put her in real danger.
Then again, if they weren't so useless, the Organization—which was full of double agents anyway—would have been dismantled by the Red Side long ago.
Amuro roared: "Yuu Hoshimiya! Do you intend to make an enemy of Public Security?"
Yuu shook his head. "Furuya-kun, a lowly undercover agent like you can hardly represent the entirety of Public Security."
Hearing Yuu use his real name, Amuro's pupils contracted again.
As for Yuu's status as an Organization executive, there was no need to even ask anymore.
He was obviously a mole.
If Amuro actually asked, Akai would mock him for the rest of his life.
Akai, however, assumed a Jeet Kune Do starting stance. "Public Security, why bother talking to him? Let's team up, take him down, and then take the woman."
Amuro followed suit, taking an offensive posture with a cold smirk.
"In the end, we have to settle this with our fists."
Seeing the two of them prepare to attack Yuu, Curacao clutched her arctic fox and ran to Yuu's side.
"Two against two! We'll beat them!" she said indignantly.
Yuu reached out and flicked her forehead. "A girl shouldn't be so focused on fighting. Be more gentle."
"Wuu..." Curacao rubbed her head and stepped back.
"Just watch from the side. They're no match for me."
Seeing the two of them flirting as if they were invisible, Akai and Amuro felt their anger flare. With a roar, they charged.
The sound of breaking wind followed their swift movements, but in Yuu's eyes, they were as slow as turtles.
He blurred forward, his figure flashing past. His hands caught both of their trousers.
With a slight exertion of force, he manipulated their momentum and shifted their positions.
By the time Akai and Amuro realized what was happening, it was too late to stop.
Akai's hand-blade struck Amuro's forehead, while Amuro's fist buried itself in Akai's chest.
A mutual blow. Both men were sent flying back, but their wrists were instantly snatched from the air.
Yuu didn't play games. With one in each hand, he hoisted the two grown men up like pair of kittens.
Then, he swung them around, playing a game of "Major Collision."
BAM! BAM! BAM!!!
Amuro felt like he was about to vomit blood. Looking at his enemy Akai being slammed into him repeatedly, his body felt like it was falling apart.
Akai was in a similar state of pure madness.
He never could have imagined that this guy who betrayed the Organization to join the FBI would be this powerful. Even teaming up with Amuro, they couldn't last a single round.
Beside them, Curacao—still holding her fox—found the scene hilarious and couldn't help but laugh out loud.
After a dozen collisions, seeing that both had lost their will to fight, Yuu tossed them onto the ice.
"I told you both—Public Security and the FBI are useless. You didn't even touch a hair on my head. Where do you get the nerve to say you're taking someone?"
"I'm telling you now: Shiro-chan is under my protection. It doesn't matter who comes for her."
"As for your concerns, nothing will happen as long as I'm around. Understood?"
It was a harsh truth, but a truth nonetheless.
Good people are easier to manipulate, while ruthless villains are far more intimidating.
Yuu could talk to Amuro and Akai like this, but not to the Organization.
As long as he guaranteed to the Red Side that Curacao wouldn't leak the spy data, they would likely back off once they realized the task was impossible.
Given that Yuu was a spy himself, his word carried significant weight.
Or rather, they had no choice but to believe him.
Because they couldn't take Curacao away from him.
If the two, or rather the FBI and Public Security, chose to persist, Yuu wasn't afraid.
The worst-case scenario was simply moving his base to the Kingdom of Vespania early, stepping onto the international stage, and beginning his "Spiritual Energy Recovery" plan.
Watching Yuu lead Curacao away by the hand, the battered Amuro and Akai were powerless to stop them.
Stepping out of the Polar Zone, Curacao was still holding the arctic fox, her sky-blue eyes pleading with Yuu to let her take it with them.
Yuu shook his head. "Shiro-chan, as cute as this fox is, it only belongs in the polar world."
"If you take it out, the heat will kill it. Part of loving something is learning to let it go. Let the little guy go, Shiro-chan!"
Curacao froze for a second before obediently setting the fox down.
She even knelt to stroke its head, telling it to live a good life.
Seeing this, Yuu felt even more that Rum deserved to die.
Training a girl in her early twenties to be a killer was a grave sin.
The current Curacao was exactly as she should be.
"Goodbye! I'll come back to see you!"
Curacao waved farewell as the fox sprinted back toward its pack.
Once the fox vanished from sight, Curacao clung to Yuu's arm and followed him out of the backstage area.
The two returned to the public galleries and continued their tour of the Touto Aquarium.
The encounter with Amuro and Akai hadn't affected her mood at all; she was still smiling happily.
In the underwater hall, they watched divers perform as mermaids and mermen.
In the jellyfish corridor, they played with Moon Jellyfish. The transparent creatures clustered around Curacao's palms, refracting a thousand colors under the lights.
The two even sat on the back of a giant sea turtle for a photo. Curacao was so startled when the turtle moved its head that she dove straight into Yuu's arms.
Happy times always fly. It was nearly five in the evening when Yuu and Curacao finally appeared at the exit.