The meeting finally came to an end.
Kenjirou led the clan elders away in high spirits to "celebrate," as if the five billion yen had already turned into cold, hard cash in their pockets.
The annex instantly fell quiet and lonely.
At some point the rain had stopped. Dark clouds parted, and a beam of pale sunlight slanted through the window onto the long table, illuminating the cup of tea that had gone completely cold.
Shuichi remained seated in the head position, listening to the fading laughter echoing down the hallway. Only then did he slowly turn his head, his gaze falling on his daughter with a complex expression.
Satsuki did not rush to leave as usual. She stood quietly by the window, watching Uncle Kenjirou climb into the black sedan downstairs. The innocent smile she had worn moments ago had vanished, replaced by a calm composure far beyond her twelve years.
"Satsuki," Shuichi's voice came out raspy, "come here."
Satsuki turned and walked to the long table, still clutching her teddy bear.
"Those words earlier…" Shuichi stared intently into his daughter's eyes, searching for any trace of panic. "Were they unintentional… or deliberate?"
There was no spoiled acting, no denial.
Satsuki gently placed the teddy bear on a nearby chair, smoothed her skirt, and looked up, meeting her father's gaze directly.
In Shuichi's eyes, she was still his adorable daughter—yet something fundamental in her aura had changed.
"Does Father think it's a bad thing to leave that factory—the one that could explode at any moment—to Uncle?"
Her voice remained soft and sweet, her tone steady.
Shuichi's heart skipped a beat. She hadn't denied it!
So that fleeting eye contact earlier hadn't been his imagination.
"You knew it was 'going to explode at any moment'?" he pressed.
"I saw the reports in Father's study," Satsuki replied calmly. "Raw material costs are rising, and inventory backlogs in America are increasing too. Uncle only saw the flood of orders. He missed the risk clauses hidden behind them. Borrowing money to expand production right now isn't investing—it's gambling."
She paused, the faintest trace of mockery curling at the corner of her mouth. "Since Uncle wants to gamble so badly, let him use his own chips. If he wins, the Saionji family gains glory. If he loses, it becomes the branch family's problem. The fire won't reach the main house. This is called 'divestment,' right, Father?"
Shuichi drew in a sharp, cold breath.
A prickling chill ran across his scalp. This calm, cold-blooded, almost ruthless analysis had come from the mouth of his twelve-year-old daughter.
Yet he felt no fear—only a wild surge of joy.
In this dog-eat-dog business world, kindness was the greatest weakness. He had always worried that after his death, his fragile daughter would be devoured alive by these jackal-like relatives until not even bones remained. But now… this was no little white rabbit. This was a lion cub that had yet to fully grow.
"Who… taught you all this?" Shuichi's voice trembled slightly.
"No one taught me." Satsuki walked to his side and gently took her father's cold hand. "After Mother left, I realized I couldn't afford to stay ignorant anymore. Father is already so tired—dealing with the foxes in the House of Peers and the jackals at home. If I only knew how to cry, the Saionji family would truly be finished."
Those words shattered Shuichi's last psychological defenses.
He pulled his daughter into his arms, eyes growing moist. "Satsuki… you've suffered. I never expected that you…"
"Father," Satsuki gently broke free from the embrace, her expression turning serious, "now that the bomb of the factory has been thrown away, the money in our hands must become real bullets."
She pointed toward the study. "Let's go there to talk. There are some things I want to show Father."
…
Back in the main house study.
Shuichi dismissed all the servants and locked the door himself. He no longer treated Satsuki as a child, but as an "heir" he could consult with.
"What do you want to show me?" Shuichi sat in his large office chair, posture straighter than ever.
Satsuki said nothing at first. She pulled a thick original English book from the top shelf—the foreign-language section her father rarely touched—and took a notebook from her small schoolbag.
She opened it to reveal neat English notes and complex calculations.
"This is…" Shuichi stared in shock.
"Public data from the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, and the U.S. Department of Commerce over the past three months." Satsuki pointed to the lines marked in red. "I used a dictionary and managed to understand the main points."
(Of course, it was all fabricated. The data existed only in her head; the notes were merely to make her "genius" seem believable.)
Satsuki stood beside the giant antique globe like a little teacher.
"Father, look." She spun the globe and pressed her finger on Washington. "America right now is like a giant who is seriously ill. They owe huge debts (fiscal deficit) and keep buying far too many things (trade deficit). This is called a 'twin deficit.'"
Shuichi nodded. He had heard these terms in the news.
"If you were this giant—buried in debt while your creditors (Japan and Germany) kept stuffing more goods into your house every day—what would you do?" Satsuki asked.
"Default on the debt?" Shuichi answered instinctively.
"No, defaulting is too ugly. That's what thugs do." Satsuki shook her head, a hint of cunning flashing in her eyes. "As the world's hegemon, they will choose a more 'respectable' way—making money lose its value."
She picked up a red pen and drew a simple seesaw in the notebook.
"Right now, the U.S. dollar side is too heavy, and the yen side is too light. This imbalance is abnormal and cannot last. To save their own factories and keep their workers employed (and thus secure votes), the Americans must force the yen to become heavier."
Satsuki's voice was clear, her logic razor-sharp:
"This means that in the next year or two, the yen will appreciate. It might even… skyrocket."
Shuichi broke into a cold sweat. Although he had sensed it vaguely, he had never heard such clear data and reasoning from his own daughter before.
"If the yen skyrockets…" he muttered, "then any dollar assets we hold will shrink dramatically."
"Exactly. If we still cling to large amounts of dollars or export factories right now, we're simply waiting to die."
Satsuki suddenly raised her voice. She walked to the desk, planted her small hands on the surface, and her youthful face radiated a compelling aura.
"But, Father—the flip side of risk is opportunity."
"Since we know the dollar is going to fall, why don't we give it a push?"
Shuichi was stunned. "Give it a push?"
"Short it." Satsuki spoke the term, which still sounded radical in Japanese aristocratic circles at the time.
"We need to take all the yen we have, use collateral and financing to turn it into the maximum amount of cash, then borrow dollars on the international market and sell them. When the dollar drops to the value of scrap paper, we buy them back cheaply and return them."
"The profit from a single cycle…" Satsuki spread her hands, gesturing a large circle, "will be more than a factory making trousers could earn in a hundred years."
Shuichi fell into complete silence.
He looked at the daughter standing before him. She was still the twelve-year-old girl who should be wearing a sailor uniform, yet in his eyes, massive wings seemed to unfurl behind her, blotting out the sky.
This was no longer mere precocity. This was a monster. This was the "Qilin Child" heaven had bestowed upon the Saionji family.
If anyone else had suggested "going all-in on shorting the dollar," he would have thought them insane.
But these words came from his genius daughter—who had "studied desperately for the family's sake"—and every piece of logic was airtight.
Shuichi took a deep breath, tremblingly pulled a cigarette from the pack, and needed three tries before he could light it.
"Satsuki," he exhaled a long plume of smoke, his eyes growing firmer than ever, "tell Papa honestly—how certain are you?"
Satsuki did not answer right away.
She walked to the window and gazed at the clearing sky outside, where Tokyo Tower stood faintly visible in the distance.
"Father, do you believe in 'momentum'?"
With her back to him, she spoke softly:
"The Americans need the dollar to depreciate. The Japanese government doesn't want to, but they have to obey their American father. This is 'momentum.' Those who ride with it prosper; those who fight against it perish."
She turned around, a smile of absolute confidence on her face, and raised one finger.
"One hundred percent."
"As long as we dare to gamble, in this round the Saionji family will step over the corpses of countless bankrupt entities and ascend the throne of Tokyo."
Looking at his daughter's smile, Shuichi felt the blood in his veins begin to burn.
He was a man, after all, and he had ambitions. Watching the family decline year after year had pained him more than anyone.
Since his daughter had already paved the road this far…
"Fine!"
Shuichi abruptly stubbed out his cigarette and stood up. In that instant, he seemed to have shed ten years.
"I'll listen to you. Let's gamble!"
He picked up the encrypted phone on the desk. His hand no longer trembled—it was filled with strength.
"Connect me to Credit Suisse. I want to use the full credit line of the Saionji family."
While waiting for the call to connect, Shuichi covered the mouthpiece and looked at Satsuki, his eyes brimming with affection, pride, and the respect one gives an equal partner.
"Satsuki, only the two of us know about this. In public, you are still that young lady who knows nothing—understand?"
Satsuki blinked, instantly retracting all her sharp edges and transforming back into a well-behaved little girl.
"Of course, Father. How could Satsuki understand such 'adult matters'? Satsuki just likes reading fairy tale books in the study."
Shuichi smiled with relief.
The call went through.
"This is Saionji Shuichi. Establish a short position on the dollar for me immediately. Leverage? I want the highest possible. Yes—the current rate is 250? Sell it all!"
…
Watching her father bark orders into the phone, Satsuki quietly slipped out of the study.
In the hallway, she gently closed the door behind her.
There was no sigh of relief. Her expression remained as calm as still water.
Step one: complete.
By demonstrating "data-based genius," she had successfully secured real advisory power from her father. From today onward, she was no longer just a mascot—she was the shadow brain behind Saionji Shuichi.
She glanced down at the notebook in her hand, the one used purely for show.
In truth, besides a few real data points, the rest were nothing but English song lyrics and Shakespearean sonnets she had scribbled down.
"Father is really easy to fool."
Satsuki let out a soft chuckle, tore out the page, crumpled it into a ball, and tossed it into the trash can at the end of the hallway.
"But this is for the best. An obedient CEO with strong execution is a good CEO."
Humming a light tune, she walked toward her bedroom.
Now that the startup capital was secured, it was time to meet those so-called "noble friends." In the bubble era, information was money—and that elite girls' school, where the daughters of Japan's top financial magnates gathered, was the largest information exchange platform of all.