The officials standing in front of Takayuki looked a little awkward.
They had all seen those reimbursent reports too.
Any normal person could tell just how many shady details were buried in them.
But at the end of the day, those expenses could still be labeled as rely unreasonable. For the sake of hosting the Olympics, the other two directors could very reasonably claim that everything they did was ant to showcase Japan’s national strength and artisan spirit.
Just as those officials had said, none of that money was coming out of Takayuki’s pocket, so on the surface it seed like he had no reason to interfere.
And indeed, Takayuki had no interest in how that money was spent, nor was it really his place to manage it.
This was only a pretext.
What he really needed was to kick those two people out.
To be honest, he’d wanted to do that for a long ti.
When three people jointly plan a massive event, what happens when disagreents arise?
Who do you listen to?
So might say: whoever puts in the most money.
But reality is more complicated.
The other two each had powerful interest groups backing them, with considerable influence.
In the end, the most likely outco was that none of the three would listen to the others.
And Gastar Electronic Entertainnt would actually be at a disadvantage.
Takayuki hated situations he couldn’t control.
He just hadn’t found a legitimate excuse before.
Those two were also well-known figures—removing them without proper justification would look bad.
But now...
"I’m not allowed to take these materials out, right?" Takayuki asked, looking at the younger officials.
"Yes, Mr. Takayuki. We’re very sorry, and we hope you can understand," the young officials replied apologetically.
"That’s fine," Takayuki said calmly. "You’re just following orders. In that case, go ahead and call the committee chairman and a few senior executives over."
"Ah? Th-this..."
"Or," Takayuki added lightly, "I can notify the Pri Minister myself and ask him to help call those chairn and executives. I have a pretty good relationship with him."
By "relationship," he ant professional cooperation.
But Gastar Electronic Entertainnt had always actively responded to the Japanese governnt’s initiatives, handling cultural promotion projects flawlessly whenever asked.
Takayuki had personally proposed initiatives like Cool Japan and several other plans that significantly boosted Japan’s economy, earning high public approval for the last two administrations.
On that basis alone, the Pri Minister held Takayuki in very high regard.
"Th-that won’t be necessary," one of the young officials said quickly. "I’ll go inform our superiors right away."
The young officials hurried out of the office to contact their bosses and the committee chairman.
Not long after they left, Takayuki’s personal phone rang.
He picked it up and saw that it was Bob.
"Hey Bob, what’s up?"
"Mr. Takayuki, I’ve followed your instructions and downgraded the recomndation priority for all Olympic-related news and content. On all of our platforms, it’s now very difficult to see anything Olympic-related unless users actively search for it. And even then, the top search results aren’t Olympic content. Is that okay?"
"That’s perfect," Takayuki replied. "Thanks for the trouble."
"No trouble at all. This was easy," Bob said, sounding a little flattered. Then he added, "But, Mr. Takayuki... I am a little curious."
"Curious why I’m targeting the Olympics?" Takayuki asked.
"Yeah. You sounded pretty urgent earlier, so I rushed to get things done. I’m just personally curious—of course, if you don’t want to explain, I won’t press."
"It’s nothing serious," Takayuki said. "This has nothing to do with the Olympic Committee or the Olympics themselves. It’s just that so people on the Japanese side went too far. As for the Olympic Committee... consider them collateral damage."
"Uh..."
Takayuki asked, "What, did soone ask you about this already?"
"Yes," Bob admitted. "Not long after we lowered the recomndations, people from the Olympic Committee noticed sothing was wrong and contacted us. I figured I had to give them so kind of explanation, so I told them it was a system issue."
"Then just tell them what I just told you."
"That’s okay?" Bob asked cautiously. "It won’t affect your plan?"
"This is part of the plan," Takayuki said. "They need to know roughly why they’re taking the fall. Otherwise, the pressure won’t reach the Japanese side."
"Got it. I’ll talk to them."
With Takayuki’s confirmation, Bob felt much more at ease.
The Olympic Committee was a global organization—not huge, but not small either—and offending them wasn’t ideal.
Even so, Bob couldn’t help feeling a bit sympathetic.
They were really taking the bla for sothing that wasn’t entirely their fault.
After hanging up, Bob took a few minutes to organize his words, then called his contact at the Olympic Committee.
The committee staff were already nursing a headache.
Bob had previously claid that a system and server issue caused Olympic-related content to have zero engagent.
Zero engagent ant zero promotion—no recomndations at all.
In an era where information had to be pushed directly to users to be seen, no recomndation ant effectively no visibility.
The Olympic Committee clearly couldn’t accept that explanation, but they also didn’t have any imdiate leverage.
"Call Bob again," soone said. "This ti, don’t let him brush us off. We need a reasonable explanation."
System and server issues?
That was obviously nonsense.
Why would only Olympic-related content have the lowest recomndation priority?
It was clearly being targeted.
The problem was, they had no idea who they’d offended.
Who had enough influence to make a tech giant like Facebook suppress Olympic discussions so thoroughly?
"I’ll—"
Beep. Beep.
The phone rang.
The Olympic Committee staff hurried to answer. Bob’s voice ca through the line.
"Hello? Is this Mr. Kaven from the Olympic Committee?"
"Yes, this is Kaven. Mr. Bob, why are you calling again?"
"Cough—well, I’m calling to apologize for what I told you earlier," Bob said."I lied. The recomndation downgrade was arranged by ."
Kaven froze.
So did the colleagues around him.
Bob had admitted it outright—no beating around the bush.
Then Bob continued, "I’m apologizing, but also clarifying sothing. I didn’t do this out of malice. You were simply affected as collateral. This is related to the Japanese Olympics—there are so unpleasant issues on that side. I don’t know the specifics, but to avoid broader fallout, I restricted the spread of Olympic-related content to minimize the potential impact of any scandals."
Reviews
All reviews (0)