“Whew…,” I sighed as I entered the living room.
Breakfast was ready for me on the kitchen table.
“You’re awake? I heard you had quite a day yesterday.”
My dad motioned toward the living room TV with his eyes. They were already talking about it on the news.
The female newscaster and the male expert were sitting next to each other.
“We have received a report from the police that, last night, Phantom Thief Red successfully stole the Blue Star. The security team, found asleep at the scene, had the thief’s signature card in their pockets. Authorities have confirmed that the gemstone was a previously stolen item,” said the lady.
“Yes, as stated during the police press conference, it was stolen from the WQ Museum,” added the expert.
“That being said, we’ve yet to hear word from its rightful owner that the gemstone has been returned.”
“Yes. Normally, when Phantom Thief Red goes up against criminals, they leave the details written on their card. Or when they retrieve stolen goods, they either find their way to the police or their original owner. This time, while Phantom Thief Red did leave their calling card behind, it has been over half a day with no sign of the Blue Star…”
Argh! This is all their fault! They pinned the blame on us again!
I turned off the TV.
“Let’s not get too upset now,” my dad said, turning to me. “You met the fakes, right? What were they like?”
“They were a couple of goofs! They were telling jokes to each other in a Kansai accent the entire time…”
“Which was why you let your guard down.”
Oof… My dad’s on the mark, but I can’t say anything back.
I fell right into their trap. Kei even tried to stop me, but I didn’t listen.
If I hadn’t fallen for their trick, maybe I would’ve been able to trail them more…
Thanks to Kei’s navigation, I’d been able to escape from the building, but it was really close.
“They used your hotheadedness against you, I feel like. You’ve never met them before, have you?”
Of course not!
“Good…morning…” Kei dragged himself over to the living room with a blank look on his face.
He’s always such a zombie in the mornings. But that’s not important right now!
“Kei! How could you get any sleep last night?! I got tricked, and I almost got caught by the police!”
“But you didn’t…so there’s no problem.”
“Well, yeah, thanks to you, I guess. But the bad guys still got away!”
“We’ll have…another chance…”
“Oh?”
Kei picked up the newspaper and flipped through some pages before handing it over to me.
You want me to read the paper?
I curiously cocked my head to the side a bit as I took the newspaper, looking down at the page Kei had opened it to.
Uh……………?
I stared blankly at the contents with my mouth wide-open. There was giant font glaring back at me that said:
I CHALLENGE PHANTOM THIEF RED
The enormous words took up an entire page in the newspaper.
Wh-what is this?! Who would do that…?
“It says on the bottom of the page,” Kei said, and I glanced down toward the bottom of the page.
The name, TONY Kiyose Museum, was written there.
“You’ve heard of TONY, right? They’re one of the largest electrical appliance companies in Japan and globally. Kiyose is the name of the head of TONY—and it should ring a bell.”
“Kiyose”…?
“It’s Rio!”
Right, Rio’s last name was Kiyose.
Wait, did she do this?!
I took another look at the newspaper page. Under the large font that said, I CHALLENGE PHANTOM THIEF RED, there was an explanation of what the challenge would be.
“It says here that the TONY Kiyose Museum will be displaying one of the world’s most expensive rubies, the Red-Hot Crown, for two days. ‘If Red can steal it before the time is up, then you may have it’… Wait, they’re doing what?!”
Why would they do something like this…?
“They’re trying to bait us out.”
“B-but! Red would never accept a challenge like this.”
“Yup. We wouldn’t, but the only ones who know that are you and me. The fake Red stole for themselves once, and they aren’t returning the Blue Star, either. It’s all over the news, so the world thinks we only works for ourselves now.”
That’s not true, though!
But even it did make the news, and no matter what people thought, we had no reason to accept the challenge.
We didn’t have a reason to steal that jewel.
No matter what the world thought, we were a righteous thief—definitely not the type to get baited by some challenge and steal out of anger.
But…what about the fake Red? They just might do it.
What would happen if the fake Red went and stole the Red-Hot Crown? If they succeeded, it would tell the world that Red stole to be selfish.
And if they failed, it would mean Red failed.
I don’t like either of those!
The duo might even get caught, which would make it look like they’d been the real Red the entire time. They’d already fooled the police, after all.
We were the only ones who could prove they weren’t the real Red, but it’s not like we could up and say, “We’re Red,” to the world.
Argh! What are we gonna do?!