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Kotaro did resist the hunger and didn't eat anything else for the whole night. But it was only the second day of his diet and there were still five days before the competition.
He has indeed lost weight and is now qualified to compete.
But everyone who has tried to lose weight knows that the most difficult part of losing weight through dieting is not the rapid weight loss in the first few days, but maintaining the weight afterwards.
Otherwise, the weight lost would be staggering, and the rebound would be even more staggering. He still had to endure it for five full days!
For the next few days, Kotaro was in very bad condition and even nearly had a car accident while on patrol.
"Hey Kotaro, what's going on with you these days? We've received more than one complaint from citizens, saying that someone drove the Uruf 777 like a circus car on the streets of Tokyo. Was it you who did it?"
"I'm sorry, Captain, I'm so sorry." Kotaro couldn't make any excuses except to apologize.
He was indeed the one driving the car. He was so hungry, dizzy, and weak that he almost crashed into a tree.
Everything looked like food to him now. Even Captain Asahina's head looked like a winter melon in his eyes. Inside was a delicious stew of ham and chicken.
That was the dish that Chef Komatsu made on TV yesterday, and it snatched a star from baker Dong Hema.
Although it was quite interesting that the bread made by Master Ma actually made the host Gintoki-san, who was eating it secretly, make horse noises.
"I have no objection to the boxing match, but it cannot affect work, understand?"
"clear."
Having said that, Kotaro was a little confused at this point.
Captain Asahina shook her head. This guy is good in everything except his stubborn temper. To put it nicely, he has perseverance, but in other words, he is stubborn. This is both an advantage and a disadvantage.
I hope no monsters come these days, otherwise it would be terrible if someone fails to deliver when danger comes.
Why couldn't Gaia come to the ZAT team? He assured that he knew nothing.
At this moment, ZAT's phone rang. Half a minute later, Team member Moriyama came over after answering the call.
Asahina had a bad feeling.
"Captain, the Metropolitan Police Department just called and said something strange happened at a bath center in Ginza."
"Strange thing? Is it a monster?"
"It's still unclear, but the bathing pool in the men's bathhouse of the bathing center was suddenly drilled through. It's very deep below, and it's said to lead to an underground river."
"Are they sure it's Ginza, not Mount Fuji?"
Because Mount Fuji is close to geothermal veins, some mountain villas are built next to underground hot springs. The underground river is very shallow, with a drop of only a few meters. It is not surprising that an earthquake collapses and leads to an underground river.
But in Ginza, if you want to reach the underground river, you have to dig down at least a hundred meters.
"It's definitely Ginza. So the Metropolitan Police Department suspected it was related to the monster and wanted us to investigate."
This really needs to be investigated. It looks like my bad hunch has come true.
"Kotaro... Never mind. Nanyuan, Kitajima, and Ueno, the three of you go investigate."
Chapter 377: Breaking Through the Ginza
When they arrived at the scene, Kitajima, Nanyuan and others found that the bathing area had turned into a small lake, and the water had flowed into the street, affecting traffic and causing a certain amount of congestion. Traffic police had already been directing vehicles to detour nearby.
"This is true. The amount of water in the underground river is not small. It seems that a water vein has really been dug out."
"This doesn't happen often." Ueno said. He stepped on the pond and tried to walk into it, but found that it was impossible.
It is true that the ZAT uniforms have waterproof rubber shoes, but if you walk further, the water will cover the top of the rubber shoes and even the knees, so it is useless to wear waterproof shoes.
Unless you row over here.
Don't mention it, Beidao actually found a boat. It was a small kayak that could only carry one person.
"Where did this ship come from?"
"Borrowed from next door."
"Next door?" Nanyuan looked back and saw a sporting goods store next door. The water in the store had already reached above his ankles.
"Boss, can I borrow a kayak?"
The owner of the store was standing on the stairs leading to the second floor. He didn't know if there were monsters here or whether he should seek shelter. After all, ZAT had not issued an evacuation order yet.
"Please, please feel free to use it. As long as we can drain this water quickly, I can give it to you. By the way, are there any monsters here?"
This kayak is not worth much money. The rubber boats used by amateurs only cost a few hundred thousand yuan, which is less than a day's turnover.
"That's hard to say. We're here to investigate. I suggest you seek shelter first."
Nanyuan said so, and the boss decided to run away first. No matter what, life is always the most important.
"Then I'm leaving it to you, but please don't let the monster destroy my store. You can use anything here if you need it. As for kayaking, the pre-inflated sample boat has been borrowed by the previous team member, so you'll have to inflate it yourselves." The boss pointed to the corner where there was an air pump.
Nanyuan had no choice but to take an air pump with Ueno to inflate the kayak.
Electric pumps were not yet popular in this era. But even if there were electric ones, no one would dare to turn on the switch unless they were not afraid of being electrocuted.
It was more than twenty minutes later when Nanyuan and Ueno arrived at the North Island in their kayaks.
"You guys are really slow."
"How dare you say that? You rowed away the only remaining boat. It took me more than ten minutes to pump it! Ah, you are still fishing here!"
Yes, Bei Dao took out his portable fishing rod again and was fishing leisurely while sitting in the kayak.
"But you think, sitting in a boat, you can't help but fish."
For Bei Dao, the mission can be forgotten, but fishing cannot be forgotten. And today he was lucky, in just 20 minutes, he had already caught two fish, this was the third one.
It's really fish, not some other messy thing.
"Wait a minute, Kitajima-senpai, did you catch this fish here?" Ueno interrupted. Given his age and the time he joined the team, anyone he called a senior was indeed a senior.
"Of course, you don't trust my fishing skills?"
"No, I'm just a little surprised. Are these fish all sea fish?"
"Ah? Well, it seems so." Bei Dao hadn't noticed this beforehand, but he could still recognize freshwater fish and saltwater fish if he looked carefully.
"In other words, the underground river that was drilled here has already led to the sea?"
Although Ginza is located along Tokyo Bay, it is still more than 20 kilometers away from the sea in a straight line. Could it be that the underground was dug through like this?
There is a subway underground in Ginza, and this is also the first place in the island country to open a subway. The first subway line was opened more than 1927 years ago, in 2. Although it is only a short kilometers, from Ueno Station to Asakusa Station, the symbolic significance is far greater than the practical significance.
It took nearly two years to dig a 2-kilometer subway line. And it would probably take several more years to dig a 2-kilometer underground tunnel with current human technology.
Obviously, the only ones who can do this in a short period of time are monsters.
"Senior Kitajima is really amazing!"
They actually used fishing to prove the existence of the monster. Otherwise, they would have to spend a lot of manpower and material resources for the investigation, and they might even encounter danger.
To be honest, Bei Dao was also surprised. But in this case, pride is the end of it.
He is truly amazing. In just twenty minutes, he caught three sea fish using simple fish hooks. He is truly a fishing master!
"So it really is a monster? It dug a hole from the bottom of Tokyo Bay, drilled all the way underground here, and then started to drill upwards and drilled through this bathhouse?"
"So, now the most important question is, where is the monster?"
The three of them looked at the bottom of the pool that had been drilled through, and there was an abyss below that was so deep that they could not see the bottom of it.
The monster could be anywhere in Tokyo's underground.
"Beidao, why don't you ask your magical fishing rod? It knows everything anyway." Nanyuan said.
Last time, too, the fishing rod caught the lost belongings of humans captured by the frog monster in the pond, which allowed them to confirm the existence of the monster.
"It was just a coincidence." Even with Bei Dao's confidence in his fishing skills, he knew it was just luck. But at this moment, his fishing rod was suddenly stressed. It almost slipped out of his hand, so he grabbed it.
If it was a ZAT gun, it might have been pulled away. But the fishing rod could not be lost, so Kitajima used all his strength.
A loud bang
The fishing line broke. His fishing line could bear more than 100 kilograms of weight without any problem, but the pull was obviously far more than 100 kilograms, so that Beidao's entire kayak was pulled forward quite far in just a moment.
Was that a big fish? Or maybe——
"Is it a monster? The monster didn't run far, it's right underneath!"
The fishing rod has done its job again.
An evacuation order was issued for a large area centered on Ginza.
"Kotaro, can you go out?"
"Of course, I'm fine!" Kotaro said, but it would have been more convincing if his body hadn't swayed around when he stood up.
Asahina took out two candies and placed them in Kotaro's hand.
"When you feel sick, eat some candy, it will make you feel better."
Sensing the sugar that can be ingested, the brain sent a signal to the stomach before making a subjective judgment. Then Kotaro's stomach made a loud gurgling sound, which lasted for more than five seconds. In fact, in Kotaro's perception, it was almost half a minute or more.
So shameful.
Araki, Moriyama, and the other female team members in the office all turned their heads silently, but the chuckles could not lie.
Kotaro knew that his body really needed this. He was probably suffering from hypoglycemia. After all, humans could not produce nutrients just by basking in the sun. However, if he really took in so much sugar directly, then all the hunger he had endured before might be in vain.
He represented his club in this city-level competition, and his place was given up by Morita from the same club. If he wins, he will be able to advance to the county competition and the national competition. For Kotaro, this is an important step in realizing his dream of becoming a boxer.
So, he hesitated for a while, suppressed his body's instinctive desire for sugar and did not open the candy wrapper, but stuffed the two candies into his pocket.
Asahina shook her head speechlessly.
"Araki, you make the battle plan. The monster is in the water. It's up to you to decide whether to use depth charges to force it out or to fight in the water."
Using depth charges is safer, but forcing the monster out of the water also means fighting the monster in the metropolis of Ginza. Even if the people are evacuated, the losses caused will definitely not be small.
The surrounding shops and shopping malls will suffer.
But if they fight in water, the only thing ZAT can have is the Pyrumida II. This underground tank had tortured them a lot in the previous battle with the frog monster.
"Captain, I think we should just go into the water and fight. It should be okay if we're careful. This is Ginza after all."
There have been cases where I fought monsters in the city center before, but that was out of necessity.
If there was a choice, Araki really didn't want to fight the monster in the streets of Ginza, Tokyo's most prosperous area. The damage was out of control and the losses were too great.
As for the Pyrumida II, the previous experience was not good, and it almost cost someone's life. Everyone knows the danger. But this is the choice of a ZAT team member, and it is their honor and responsibility.