Chapter 373: Chapter 372.

Chapter 372. Operation: Brainjack, Phase 1; War of Attrition Day 1 (4/6)

“Tsk, you could have given me some more time.”

I ignored her and removed the wedge from under the door.

On the other side, Rosa was lazing about in her chair.

“It’s about time you open the door for me. The gate at the back was blocked off with a truck so I couldn’t get out.”

So they really had done that. I really hadn’t thought of this possibility. Meaning, if Yuna was here, Malory planned to block off the back exit so she could trap her inside and prevent her any chance of slipping away again. If Yuna really was here, or she verified I was the one in the mascot costume, Swastika would have definitely acted without care for Faceless’ presence here. 

But another reason they wouldn’t get violent here unless they 100% confirmed my or Yuna’s presence here, is to avoid the situation where the media picks up on it. If their targets saw such a report in the news while in hiding, it would raise their guards further and scare them into hiding themselves away for even longer. The best way to draw them out was to make them think Swastika wasn’t after them.

To keep their distance while staking this store out and her apartment. The two places they may find her at. Then there was also now Faceless they’d be keeping their eye on as well. But Yuna was blending in amidst their group. Hiding a needle in a haystack. They wouldn’t easily find her.

The one with the highest probability of being found right now is none other than me. I really had to thank the Owner, these mascot costumes were godsends. If we didn’t have them, there’s no way my plan would be possible.

Well, I actually have to thank everyone. This plan had probably made use of over 90% of the connections I’d made. If even one of them was missing, I couldn’t do this.

Seriously, the power of human resources, using the right people for the right job was pretty overpowered.

I can’t let my guard down yet though. It’s only day one of this war of attrition. Who will be hunted first in this little game of hide-and-seek? Me, or all of you? Who is the better hider? Them who lurk in the shadows of the underground or the little convenience store worker hiding right in plain sight?

Hahaha. Somehow, I was strangely excited despite my life being in danger. If I could look in a mirror right now, I wonder what sort of expression I’d have. I’m sure it was an unimaginable hideous grin with truly rotten eyes.

After that, the two of us returned to behind the counter and continued with the rest of our shift. Rosa bought a drink for Lea, it was her thanks for dropping by at her request and getting rid of Malory.

Malory didn’t enter the store again after that. No members of Swastika had. Customers started to show up again after she left. They’d only prevented customers from getting near the store while Malory was inside.

A few minutes before our shift ended and it was time for us to swap out with our coworker, a customer entered the store.

They had black hair, blue eyes, were on the larger side with a pretty wide waistline, and were sweating quite a bit. They were a little over six feet tall, a bit taller than me. They walked up and down a few of the aisles until it was 9:00 PM.

Our coworker appeared from the back room and swapped out with us behind the counter when our shift was over.

On our way to the backroom, the customer who’d entered a few minutes ago suddenly approached us.

“They’re done for the night, if you need some help I can help you.”

“It’s fine, I don’t mind helping him out,” Rosa interjected.

“Uh… okay, if you really want to.”

“Were you having some trouble finding what you were looking for?”

“Yes, the item I was looking for is out of stock on the shelf. I paid for it online through your website a few minutes ago and it said it was in stock. Do you have any available in the back?” He pointed to the empty shelf not too far away and showed us the order on his phone. 

Our convenience store had recently implemented an in-store pickup option after the website became more popular among customers. It was in response to the growing lineup problem with customers at certain times throughout the day. It was quite useful for retaining the customers who weren’t desperate and there to chat with the pretty girls. This way, those customers weren’t impacted by the lineups that resulted from the girl’s fan clubs. It was my responsibility to put together those orders as they came in.

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Owner had found a way to make full use of me throughout my shift. The mascot costume when not advertising could walk around the store or be in the back putting together orders for customers. There was an express line for those in-store pickup orders by the back room. Whenever someone entered the backroom line, I’d head over to the back room and get their order. This was also the only exception where customers were permitted to enter the back; when they were accompanied by a worker. If they had no order, they were not allowed in even if accompanied by an employee.

This had been another responsibility dumped on me by the Owner in addition to wearing the mascot costumes for advertisement purposes. Online in-store pickup orders closed at 9:00 PM. Any orders for in-store pick up were prepared the following day by the full-time day staff.

“Sure no problem, I can help you with that, follow me. For future reference, for online pick-up orders made before 9:00 PM, you just need to line up back here and someone will be right over to help you.” Rosa responded amicably more than willing to help.

“Oh? Really? Sorry, I didn’t know that. I thought I could just pick up the item and show the order to the cashier.”

“No, we do prepare them so they’re ready when you show up. That way you can skip any line.”

“I see. That makes sense. I’m new to this whole online ordering, in-store pickup thing.”

The three of us entered the back room together without any problems. Everyone had already been informed that Yuna and I had both resigned. This way, if Malory came in and pestered other employees for information later, they’d give her the same story.

Now that the three of us were alone in the back, the customer said, “How was it? Did I do okay?”

I gave him a thumbs up. It was perfect.

He placed his hand on his head then pulled on his hair and raised it up. What was revealed beneath was brown hair.

Yes, the true identity of this customer was Jass wearing the wig I’d borrowed for Izora. He also had one of the two fat suits we’d acquired from the school on beneath his clothes. The reason he’d been sweating was because of wearing it.

When he started to remove his clothes from over the fat suit, I pulled down the mascot costume’s zipper on my back and started to also remove it.

“Whoa man, you seriously went all out and dyed your hair to look like me?”

“Yeah, I did.”

After I removed the costume, I retrieved my backpack from the locker and removed a plastic bag from inside. I also took out a few other things as well to fill the plastic bag up. Next, I removed the set of clothes I came to work in earlier in the day along with a towel and tossed them over to Jass.

He handed the fat suit, black wig, and the clothes he’d entered the store wearing over the fat suit to me in exchange. I put the fat suit on over my head then fastened the straps around my sides to secure it to my body. I then pulled up the baggy pants Jass had worn and secured the belt over my waist before I put the large shirt on over the fat suit.

The wig I’d provided Jass with didn’t have any of the pink highlights it used to and was now fully black. I’d used some black hair dye on the few highlighted regions to thoroughly hide the pink. It could be washed out later on as well.

I could have used a more vibrant hair color, far away from my own such as blond, but I didn’t want to risk anyone figuring out the hair was dyed. The more hair to dye, the greater the chance of messing up. I didn’t have much spare time to do everything between last night leading up to my shift at work today, so I opted to minimize the risk of botching the job by dying the entire wig a completely different color. 

I was cautious because they could be on the lookout for people with dyed hair who might match our physical description, so wigs were a better choice. Since we were operating at night when it was dark out, darker hair colors were ideal to stand out the least at night. As for my own dyed brown hair to match Jass’s, it mixed well with my natural black hair and wasn’t easily noticeable compared to colors that heavily contrasted against it.

Were the odds of them seeing through dyed hair low? Yes. They were pretty low. But the high risk that came with being caught was enough for me to care. Being caught meant the entire plan fell through. It would also mean death.

But being caught with dyed hair would only happen at night when it was dark out and Swastika members would move about more freely with the dark of night as their cover. As such, all of my concerns were only for the case when it was night. When it came to daytime, when the sun was out, their movements and actions were greatly restricted. 

They were a bunch of wanted rapists and murderers after all. They weren’t the same as the Faceless gang. Faceless was more like a gathering of misfit punks who might get in a little bit of trouble with the police every now and then. Though they would get in trouble with the law, they could still move around during the day.

As such, the approach I adopted was a much bolder one. One specifically to draw their eyes and make them question someone who entered the store but never exited.

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