Evil Black Maria - Chapter 77. Intricate Fruit

They stared at him with round, wide-open eyes.

The other party’s reaction made Shizuru smile a little.

“Um….”

“…… You guys are being rude, for God’s sake. This is not your first time meeting someone.”

Sighing at the sight of his friends, Zack quietly chided them.

At first, he had a similar reaction, but nobody tried to point it out due to kindness.

“Oh……sorry…..but you  look just like  her …….”

“It’s…”

He looked at Shizuru, who was sitting across the table from him, and Izuru, who was sitting next to him, and muttered in surprise.

When Mary heard his words, her eyes turned fierce.

But before she came here, she was told by Shizuru to behave nicely.

She must not let her emotions get in the way of his work.

She gritted her teeth slightly, but somehow managed to keep it down.

Shizuru’s hand pats Mary on the head, as if sensing her frustration.

Immediately, the tension slips from her small shoulders and she begins to drink her cocoa in a good mood.

“First of all, let me say thank you, Shizuru-san. You’ve just met me, and I’m very grateful that you agreed to this rude request.”

Zack bowed deeply and said so.

Shizuru smiled softly and shook his head at the sincerity of his words.

“No need for that. It’s not like I had anything urgent to do.”

If there is anything he could do to help someone, then he would be happy to do so.

Izuru- looking at Shizuru, told him about how she was suffering from amnesia, then Zack bowed once again.

Then he pointed to each of the people present.

“Let me introduce you to them. This is Keith, Fafnir’s second-in-command.”

“Yo”

A burly skinhead raised his hand lightly.

From what he has just said and done, he is pretty much what he appears to be. He is a strong man and always in the lead.

He appeared to be very skilled.

“This is Roa, that’s Hawkeye”

“Nice to meet you!”

“……Yeah.”

One is a charming young man of small stature, the other a tall, thin man with a keen eye.

These two men also have a certain air of skillfulness about them.

“Clarissa.”

“Oh, um…..nice to meet you.”

A woman with long hair. Despite her docile impression, she was probably quite strong.

But her shyness was just as apparent as her appearance, and every time she made eye contact with Shizuru, her gaze shifted down.

Her cheeks are faintly red.

“And as I mentioned earlier, Izuru”

“….. Once again, my thanks.”

She looked at Sisel with a puzzled look in her eyes and bowed her head lightly.

Shizuru, too, had a slightly similar look on his face.

“I feel like I’m looking in a mirror. I never thought I’d see someone who looked so much like me.”

“By any chance, do you know her?

“No. Unfortunately I have never met her before today.”

Zack’s shoulders slump at Shizuru’s slow, exhaled response.

However, Shizuru, looking at her, continued.

“I know a bit about the black dots that she and I have in common.”

Shizuru then lightly traced the three black dots that lay below his right eye with his fingertips.

It’s hard to believe that it’s a mere coincidence that even the distinctive black dots look alike, if only in appearance.

“I don’t know much about it, but in some parts of the Far East island nation of Japone, it is customary to imprint these black tattoos on newborn children to ward off evil.”

So he mentioned it as a topic for conversation.

It’s just a bunch of nonsense with no basis whatsoever, presented as if it were true.

There are practically no diplomatic relations between Japone and the Kingdom of Si Levant.

It is easy to say that it is the custom of such a strange and foreign country, and it is usually accepted without suspicion.

“”Well……so you’re a Japonais too?”

“I’m not sure. I’ve been living in the Royal Capital for as long as I can remember, and I was an abandoned child.”

The fact that Sisel was running a clinic in Royal Capital and the lie that he had come to Labyrinthos on a short trip had already been told to Zack and Izuru through the light introduction he had given them at their first meeting.

The origin of his deception. When pretending to be something, it is best to avoid giving as many details as possible and leave some to the imagination.

Lies are kept to a minimum and no unnecessary truths are told.

This is the basis of all fraud.

“…… Japone. It’s worth a visit, isn’t it, Zack?”

“’Yes. Maybe we should look into it when this whole business settles down.”

Human beings are vulnerable to information that comes out of nowhere.

The Fafnirs looked at each other and each made a thoughtful gesture.

Inevitably, there was less and less talk, and soon there was a moment of silence.

Shizuru patted Mary on the back, signalling that now was the time to turn the tide.

“Un…Mother, more”

Mary, who was sitting on Shizuru’s lap, held out her empty cup to him.

Inevitably, everyone’s attention turns towards them.

“Mother ……?”

Who was it who murmured those words?

Zack wondered as Shizuru ordered another cup of cocoa.

“Shizuru-san, …… well, I don’t mean to be rude, but I want to ask you…… you’re a man, right?”

“Yes, I am a proven man.”

Sisel replies with a chuckle and an amused smile.

The smile is so seductive that it’s no surprise that he is actually a man.

“…… Mary is a girl I took in for a lot of reasons.”

The smile on his face was so thin and dark that the members of Fafnir, who were watching him closely, gasped.

He has a similar appearance to Izuru, but has different gestures and expressions.

He looks like Izuru, who is a beautiful woman, but his looks have been further refined to the extreme.

Zack and his friends were stunned by Shizuru when he showed them this from close range across the table.

“She has never known any other family. That’s why she thinks of me as her mother.”

The way in which he spoke of Mary’s upbringing was unavoidably imaginative.

Without realising it, the six Fafnirs’ curiosity about Shizuru had increased several fold.

–As he glanced around at them, Shizuru thought to himself.

“(Well, it’s is a good place to start.)”

By bringing up the subject of Mary herself before he was asked, he created an atmosphere in which he could move from being the recipient of the questions to being the sender.

The similar appearance to Izuru, and the triple black dots, which are unlikely to be a coincidence, can be explained by saying that they are from a distant foreign country, and can be covered up to a certain extent.

In fact, the so-called party in question, Izuru herself, had a look of acceptance on her face.

“Um, if you don’t mind, I’d like to hear more about yourself too.”

A change of topic.

It’s a bit forced, but if Mary doesn’t want to talk about her upbringing in detail in their presence, it’s perfectly natural.

“And maybe in the course of our conversation, we’ll discover something that will help us find out about her memory.”

Zack had originally asked him to join them at the table in the hope that Shizuru might be able to give them some insight into Izuru’s past.

There was no reason to refuse. He nodded happily and began to talk with the others about the events that had taken place in his and Izuru’s lives.

And – the longer the conversation goes on, the better everything goes. If he takes his time, Shizuru can make most people like him.

This is the key to Shizuru’s success as a skilled assassin.

The first stage was completed without a hitch.