Fate: Hammer Time

Chapter 44: The Trials Part 2

It had taken a liberal application of Hypnotism, a few faked resumes, and several well-placed lies, but in the end, Rin had kept her word and had gotten Sakura, Ayako, and herself into Kaneshiro Yoko's office.

And yes, every bit of deception and trickery had been necessary to make that happen. When Sakura had stated that Kaneshiro Yoko was the owner of a large shipping company, she had been speaking the truth, but she had also been massively understating it.

A shipping company? More like a shipping empire! Kaneshiro's company had thousands of boats and tankers spread out over more than a hundred countries, she had branches and daughter companies everywhere in the world, and her corporation took care of nearly five percent of the world's total shipping trade, earning her billions upon billions of American dollars every year.

And she didn't limit herself to 'just' the shipping trade either. She was also involved in numerous agricultural companies in Eastern Asia, a dozen or so car manufacturing plants in Japan, and she even owned several research complexes in the United States that focused on developing medicine.

Kaneshiro Yoko was an insanely successful woman, which meant she was also insanely busy. Under normal circumstances, the girls wouldn't have stood a snowball's chance in hell of ever meeting her.

Rin's Hypnosis and talent at fraud had managed to get them inside however. They were in Kaneshiro's office now, having ensured that they had about an hour to interrogate the woman in private, and Ayako was all primed to bring her the bad news about Paris-san's death.

Likely, the woman would be devastated, like judge Koyama and the idol Nagao, but Ayako was prepared for that. She had numerous comforting words ready on the tip of her tongue, and she'd taken a pack of tissues with her.

She was completely prepared for any kind of emotional reaction.

But then she laid eyes on Kaneshiro herself, and all words remained stuck in her throat.

"And who might you be?"

The question was asked in a voice that was surprisingly low for a woman, almost ridiculously so.

"I don't recall having an appointment with teenagers today."

The owner of the voice slowly got up from behind her desk, keeping a close eye on the girls, studying them carefully to find any sign of a wicked motive.

"The guards should have stopped you long before you got anywhere near here. That's what I pay them for. How did you manage to get past them?"

Kaneshiro Yoko fired off the questions one by one, but Ayako didn't answer to any of them. She was too busy gawking at the woman.

Not because she was beautiful, or particularly exotic, or strangely dressed, but because she was huge.

Kaneshiro Yoko was massive! Almost gigantic even, to a degree Ayako had never seen before, in men or in women.

Standing over two metres tall, with legs like tree trunks and arms as big as Sakura's waist, clad in a specifically tailored suit, Kaneshiro Yoko cut a very intimidating figure. Her eyes were black, her hair was cropped very short, and three deep, white scars ran vertically over her left eye.

Her presence was dominating, her glare bone-chilling, and Ayako suddenly found herself incredibly grateful that they had Rin with them. If things got violent, her Magecraft might be the only advantage they had.

Not that she was even remotely planning on doing anything violent, but one never knew. Kaneshiro really was an intimidating woman.

"How we got past the guards is not important." Sakura eventually replied, smiling her beautiful smile, thoroughly impressing Ayako by how composed she was in front of this giantess. "We are here because we want to inform you of Carlton Paris' death."