Chuta Mitsui swallowed hard. He picked up a red pen and drew a jarring circle around General Manager Takano's name on the list.
"President, General Manager Takano is a veteran of two administrations. He fought alongside the Former President to build this company. If we investigate him directly now, the old bones on the Board of Directors are going to cause an uproar—"
"Bandai is about to become Nakayama's company! What Board of Directors?!" Makoto Yamashina slammed his hand onto the table, causing the coffee to splash out of his cup. "Do it! If you find any evidence, don't report back to me—hand it straight to the Metropolitan Police Department!"
Chuta Mitsui, shaken by the murderous intent, stammered his agreement.
He had planned to be the one to offer a "letter of allegiance" by betraying his own side, but Makoto Yamashina had beaten him to it.
Yamashina leaned back in his chair and took a sip of his coffee.
Sega's terms were clear: after the merger, Bandai would only retain its operational functions. All decision-making power had to be surrendered.
If Yamashina wanted to secure his position in the new regime and avoid being kicked aside by Takuya Nakayama, he needed to hold enough leverage in his hands.
The messy accounts held by these old bones were the perfect tribute for Makoto Yamashina to pledge his loyalty to Sega and secure his power.
The ambiguous, tacitly ignored messes of the past had now become the very blades Yamashina would use to strike.
Anyone who dared to obstruct the merger would be targeted with these old accounts and ruthlessly crushed. Even the slightest discrepancy would be immediately escalated, labeled as professional misconduct, and sent straight to prison.
Chuta Mitsui stepped out of the President's Office and immediately signaled to several burly security guards who had been waiting on standby.
"Go to the Planning Department," Mitsui commanded, his eyes gleaming with excitement as he borrowed the President's prestige. "Seize General Manager Ota's computer and all his paper documents. Send another team to the Overseas Business Department to keep a tight watch on Takano. He must not destroy a single thing!"
The security guards took their orders and charged off like hungry wolves.
The door to the General Manager's office in the Planning Department was kicked open with brutal force.
Tadashi Ota was on his knees, drenched in sweat, frantically stuffing a thick stack of documents into a paper shredder.
"Don't move!" Two security guards charged forward, grabbed his shoulders, and forcibly dragged him off the floor.
"What do you think you're doing?! How dare you! I am the General Manager! You low-level lapdogs dare to lay a hand on me?!" Ota struggled desperately. His once-immaculate hair fell in disarray, his tie was skewed, and his expensive suit was rumpled and wrinkled, leaving him a pathetic sight.
Chuta Mitsui strolled in leisurely, shot him a cold sneer, and bent down to unplug the shredder.
"General Manager Ota, don't lose your temper," Mitsui said, forcefully yanking a half-shredded document from the jammed blades. He waved it in the air. "President Yamashina suspects that the project proposal you approved three years ago—the one that lost twenty million—involved serious conflicts of interest. Now, this is evidence that will hold up in court."
Ota stared at the half-torn page, his face instantly turning as white as a sheet. His legs gave out, and he collapsed onto the floor like a heap of mud, unable to utter another word.
Meanwhile, in the Overseas Business Department.
Takano reacted instantly. He locked the office door, dragged a metal trash can into the room, dumped all the confidential documents from his drawer into it, and set them ablaze with a lighter.
Flames roared upward, and thick smoke instantly filled the room.
The smoke alarm on the ceiling shrieked, triggering the automatic sprinkler system. A torrent of icy water poured down, hissing as it struck the burning trash can and sending up plumes of choking white smoke.
Bang! Bang!
Heavy blows slammed against the door from outside.
Several security guards smashed the lock with fire extinguishers and burst inside.
Ignoring the smoke and water, they charged forward and pinned Takano to the ground. He was soaked to the bone and still trying to stomp out the flames with his feet.
"Let me go! I want to see Makoto Yamashina! He's discarding me like a used tool!" Takano roared hysterically, his face pressed against the filthy, wet carpet.
That night, at an upscale izakaya in Ginza.
The sliding door to the private room was shut tight, every gap sealed.
A few core figures of the conservative faction, who had narrowly escaped the purge, sat cross-legged on the tatami mats.
Expensive sashimi and sake sat untouched on the table.
"Makoto Yamashina has gone mad! He's completely lost it!" a fat executive hissed, slamming his fist onto the table. The impact sent the sake cups rattling. "Ota and Takano were dragged out of the building by security this afternoon with black bags over their heads! I heard they were taken straight to the Metropolitan Police Department!"
"He's trying to wipe us out completely," another man said, frantically dabbing cold sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief. "Sega is demanding a management purge, and Makoto Yamashina is using us as the sacrificial lambs! He's kicking us all out so he can present a clean slate to Takuya Nakayama and claim all the credit!"
"So what can we do?" the fat executive gritted his teeth, his eyes wide with terror. "The whole company is crawling with his people now. The rank-and-file are all just waiting for Sega to hand out bonuses—they won't listen to a word we say!"
"Are we just going to sit here and wait to be slaughtered?" someone snarled, slamming their cup onto the table. "Makoto Yamashina has plenty of skeletons in his own closet! How much did he pocket from those bankrupt toy factory acquisitions? If we have to, we'll file a joint report and drag him down with us!"
"What's the point of fighting?!" the fat executive threw a bucket of cold water on the idea in desperation. "He's holding the moral high ground of the merger! Sega's legal team and PricewaterhouseCoopers' auditors are coming in tomorrow—that's the power of the Nakayama Family! If we report him now, Sega will just help him throw us in jail first! What are we to Sega, with its hundreds of billions in market value? We're nothing!"
The private room fell into a dead silence.
The conservative bigwigs, who used to hold the Bandai's various powers and make decisions on funds of over a hundred million yuan, had all become lambs waiting for slaughter, only able to tremble in the dark.
The trend was lost, and there was no way to reverse it.
The next morning, at the first-floor lobby of Bandai Headquarters.
For the first time, a crowd gathered in front of the bulletin board, three layers deep, making it completely impassable.
A document stamped with the President's bright red seal was posted in the most conspicuous position.
Notice Regarding the Establishment of Bandai's Internal Asset and Disciplinary Review Special Committee.
Committee Director: Makoto Yamashina.
And below the notice was attached a long list of names.
It was a list of executives, all slated for immediate suspension and investigation.
Even those with minor infractions were escalated to the highest level of scrutiny, their actions branded as "serious disciplinary violations." Some names were even marked with the dreaded phrase: "Referred to judicial authorities."
A conservative Section Chief, who had just arrived for work, pushed his way through the crowd. When he saw his own name, stark and unmistakable on the list, his legs gave way. He collapsed with a heavy thud onto the polished marble floor.
His expensive leather briefcase tumbled beside him, spilling its contents across the floor.
The crowd of ordinary employees, the very same people who had bowed and scraped to him daily, now stood frozen. Not a single person stepped forward to help him up.
Instead, they shrank away, their eyes filled with undisguised scorn and mockery. They whispered and pointed.
"Serves him right," one sneered. "He was so smug when he was slashing our bonuses."
"Times have changed," another added. "Sega doesn't keep parasites like him on the payroll."
The heavens over Bandai had completely shifted.
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