Chapter 196: Pulling the Surveillance Footage!
After eating dinner with Airi and Chabashira, it was already around 7:30 p.m.
It was about time for Yuto to leave the detached apartment and head to the chairman's office building.
Since Airi had only just been frightened earlier that day, Yuto asked Chabashira to stay and keep her company.
Normally, Chabashira would tactfully leave after dinner so Yuto and Airi could enjoy some time alone together.
This time, however, she readily agreed to Yuto's request and remained in the apartment after they finished eating.
With Chabashira there, Airi wouldn't feel nearly as uneasy even while Yuto was away.
In fact, Airi had started feeling nervous even inside the detached apartment, which she normally regarded as home.
One of the secretly taken photographs showed her entering the apartment together with Chabashira-sensei.
In other words, that disgusting employee from the after-sales service area had followed Airi all the way here while secretly photographing her.
Still, Yuto doubted the man believed Airi actually lived in this detached apartment.
Renting an apartment outside the student dormitories required an enormous amount of personal points. Normal students simply didn't have enough points for something like that.
Teachers were different.
Anyone employed to teach at this school received a generous salary in personal points.
So the stalker would most likely assume Chabashira had rented the apartment and that Airi had merely been invited over as a guest.
Yuto gently pinched Airi's smooth cheek.
"I'm heading out. Stay with Chabashira-sensei, Airi. By the time I come back, the person secretly photographing you will probably already be on his way out of this school."
"Mm."
Airi nodded obediently before softly reminding him, "Yuto, be careful."
"I'm not going to fight anyone. I'm just reporting a criminal to the school administration, so there's nothing dangerous about it."
"Just be careful anyway."
"Yes, yes."
Yuto smiled and looked at Chabashira Sae, who was crossing her arms beside him. This action of the thoroughly mature beauty homeroom teacher had squeezed her considerable cleavage into a breathtaking curve.
Truly beautiful.
"Chabashira-sensei, I'll leave it to you to keep Airi company."
Chabashira gave a slight nod.
"I'll stay with her. Don't worry, Shimizu."
Yuto said goodbye to both of them, took the secretly photographed pictures with him, and left the detached apartment for the chairman's building.
After he left, Chabashira tried to reassure Airi.
"Sakura, under the school's employee contract, an employee caught secretly photographing students can face a large financial penalty for breaching the agreement."
"If the violation is serious enough, they could even face criminal charges."
"It's that serious?" Airi asked in surprise.
Chabashira smiled.
"You should already know this school isn't like an ordinary school. It has extremely strong government backing."
"Otherwise, during the fifteen years since this school was established, its rules and internal systems wouldn't have remained almost completely unknown to the outside world."
Anyone seeking employment here had to sign numerous strict confidentiality agreements.
Employees who violated those contracts faced serious penalties depending on what they had done.
"I don't remember every detail of the employee contract, but the lightest punishment for the person who secretly photographed you would still be dismissal from the school."
"As long as he's removed from the school, that's enough..." Airi murmured.
She didn't care how heavily the stalker was punished.
As long as he was gone and could never bother her again, she would be satisfied.
...
Under the dim night sky, Yuto arrived alone at the chairman's building.
Because he had arranged the meeting with Chairman Sakayanagi in advance, the chairman's secretary was already waiting for him at the entrance.
"Shimizu-san, the chairman is waiting for you in his office. Please follow me."
"Okay."
The secretary led Yuto into Chairman Sakayanagi's office.
To his surprise, Sakayanagi Arisu was sitting on one of the sofas.
"Sakayanagi, why are you here?"
"Good evening, Shimizu-san. And why wouldn't I be here? You already know the chairman is my father," Arisu replied with a bright smile.
"..."
Yuto silently looked toward Chairman Sakayanagi behind the desk.
The chairman smiled awkwardly.
"Arisu was curious about what you wanted to discuss with me, so she followed me here."
"But what I'm about to show you can't be seen by a third party," Yuto said.
"Not even me?" Arisu asked with an exaggerated look of surprise.
It was obviously deliberate.
"No."
Yuto rejected her without hesitation.
Arisu was both an enemy and someone who enjoyed watching drama unfold.
Her personality wasn't exactly pleasant either.
There was no way Yuto intended to let her see the photographs that had been secretly taken of Airi.
If Arisu learned that Yuto had personally brought those pictures here, she would almost certainly start questioning his relationship with Airi.
Yuto had no desire to let this troublesome girl discover that relationship.
Who knew what kind of entertainment she might create for herself afterward?
"Shimizu, let's talk in the reception room," Chairman Sakayanagi suggested.
"Okay."
"Hmph~"
Arisu gave a quiet hum but didn't object further, allowing her father and Yuto to move into the reception room beside the office.
Chairman Sakayanagi and Yuto sat on the sofas while the secretary brought them two glasses of water.
The chairman chuckled.
"Drinking tea this late might interfere with your sleep, so water will have to do."
"You really are considerate toward your students, old man."
"Hm?"
Chairman Sakayanagi looked at Yuto strangely.
Shouldn't Yuto have said he was being considerate toward him?
What did students have to do with this?
He soon understood why Yuto had chosen those words.
Once the secretary left the reception room, Yuto pulled the photographs from his pocket.
"Since our chairman is so considerate toward his students, please take a very careful look at these photographs and the messages written on the back."
"Mm."
Chairman Sakayanagi accepted the stack.
When he saw Airi in the photographs, he glanced at Yuto in surprise.
Why was this brat showing him pictures of his girlfriend?
Chairman Sakayanagi knew Airi was Yuto's childhood friend.
He also knew she was his girlfriend.
What he didn't understand was why Yuto had brought these photographs to him.
He patiently continued looking through them and gradually noticed something strange.
In every picture, Airi's gaze was directed somewhere other than the camera.
That strongly suggested the photographs had been taken without her knowledge.
After roughly examining the entire stack, Chairman Sakayanagi turned the pictures over to read the messages Yuto had mentioned.
The black handwriting on the back carried an unsettling obsession.
His expression gradually became serious.
"Shimizu... was Sakura-san secretly photographed?"
"Exactly. And the person who did it is an employee hired by this school."
Yuto's voice turned cold.
Even Chairman Sakayanagi couldn't help breaking into a slight cold sweat.
Nobody understood better than him how furious Yuto could become when someone harmed Airi.
"This..."
"If you don't believe me, use the surveillance cameras around the first-year shoe-changing area and verify it yourself."
Yuto spoke slowly.
"Find out who slipped these photographs into Airi's shoe locker."
"All right. I'll get my work laptop."
Chairman Sakayanagi left the reception room and asked the secretary waiting outside to bring the laptop from his office desk.
It arrived shortly afterward.
Using the laptop and the chairman's administrative privileges, Chairman Sakayanagi could access footage from every surveillance camera in the school.
"Shimizu, what's the approximate time?"
"Sometime between the start of afternoon classes and the end of school today."
Airi had returned to the detached apartment during lunch.
At that time, there had been no envelope containing secret photographs inside her shoe locker.
She only discovered it after school.
That meant the stalker must have placed the envelope inside while everyone was attending afternoon classes.
There were only two afternoon periods, totaling less than two hours.
By increasing the playback speed, Yuto and Chairman Sakayanagi needed less than five minutes to find the person slipping a pink envelope into Airi's shoe locker.
It was already mid-June and the weather was hot.
Yet the person wore an outer coat and a hat, clearly trying to avoid recognition.
Chairman Sakayanagi frowned deeply.
"We can't see his face."
The footage clearly showed him placing the envelope into Airi's locker, but his clothing prevented the surveillance camera from capturing his features.
All they could really make out was his build.
"We don't need to see his face."
Yuto's voice was cold.
"The messages already reveal who he is. He's the employee responsible for after-sales service at Keyaki Mall."
"The employee from the after-sales service area?"
Chairman Sakayanagi immediately began searching through staff records.
"Wait a moment. I'll pull up the information for everyone working there so you can identify him."
Using his chairman-level access, he retrieved the profiles of the three employees assigned to after-sales service at Keyaki Mall.
Each profile included an upper-body photograph.
Yuto recognized the man instantly.
"That's him. Chiba Koki."
"Him?"
Chairman Sakayanagi opened Chiba's personnel file.
According to the records, he had become an employee of the school three years earlier.
His duties included handling after-sales service and occasionally traveling outside the campus to purchase supplies.
Because he regularly left the school to obtain supplies, Chiba had access to the outside internet and could browse Twitter.
Chairman Sakayanagi's frown deepened as he read further.
"This man has already received several complaints from female students."
"What were the complaints about?" Yuto asked.
"Most of them said he kept bothering them or repeatedly invited them to go see movies with him."
Yuto gave Chairman Sakayanagi a sideways look.
"Judging by those complaints, this guy was obviously trouble from the beginning. Why didn't your school just get rid of him?"
"Employee management isn't part of my usual responsibilities."
Chairman Sakayanagi's expression became completely serious.
"If I had known he already had this kind of record, I absolutely wouldn't have allowed him to remain employed here."
"So, old man, what are you planning to do with him?"
Chairman Sakayanagi looked at Yuto's cold expression.
He had the distinct feeling that if the school's response failed to satisfy him, Yuto might simply take Airi and leave the school altogether.
Other students coveted this school's perfect university admission and employment rates.
Chairman Sakayanagi knew Yuto didn't care about those things in the slightest.
After thinking for a moment, he answered, "If he truly committed secret photography and harassment against a student, then the school will handle him according to the employee contract he signed."
"First, he'll be dismissed."
"Second, he'll be required to pay compensation according to the severity of his contractual violations."
"If what he did reaches the level of a serious criminal offense, he may also face imprisonment."
"I think what he did is extremely serious. He should definitely go to prison," Yuto said.
"...Shimizu, we still need to summon Chiba Koki, question him, and establish exactly what happened before making a final judgment," Chairman Sakayanagi replied helplessly.
"There's no need to question him."
Yuto sneered.
"Search his living quarters, phone, and computer. You'll find evidence of him secretly photographing other people."
Chairman Sakayanagi looked at him.
"How do you know that?"
Yuto pointed toward the stack of photographs on the table.
"You can tell from the shooting angles that he's experienced at doing this."
"Every picture was taken from an angle that avoided Airi noticing the camera while still keeping her entire figure in frame."
"That level of photography isn't something someone achieves on a sudden impulse."
Airi loved photography, so Yuto had picked up some knowledge about it himself.
From the photographs alone, he could roughly judge the skill level of the person who had taken them.
…
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