112. Six on Thirteen
two days later.
Room 405, 105, Namseo Apartment, Namseo-dong.
I said hi to In-cheol’s mother, and In-cheol entered the room.
“Hey! It’s been a really long time here. Almost a year? Everything is the same, but it feels a bit strange. haha–!”
Incheol laughed at my words and said.
“Is not it? I also went on vacation a few days ago and it felt weird coming into my room.”
There were a lot of books on Incheol’s desk, and one of them caught my eye.
＜SCUBA DIVING: FROM BASIS TO PRACTICE>
I picked up the book and said.
“What is this?”
In-cheol said he was going on a trip with Ji-eun this coming weekend.
I smiled and continued speaking.
“I went to Gangneung with Ji-eun, are you going to scuba dive there? But it’s still April, so it must be very cold to go into the sea… .”
“ah… ! I’m not doing this right now… .”
“Then what?”
Incheol, who hesitated for a moment at my question, opened his mouth.
“Do you remember the story I told you before?”
“What story?”
Incheol lowered his voice and said.
“There is a story about a treasure ship. 39 tons of gold bars!”
I checked the books and documents on Incheol’s desk again.
Scuba diving, sonar, interior drawings of small cargo ships, even charts showing currents and depths… .
“OMG… what? Are you really preparing for this?”
“Isn’t it natural? Because it’s 400 billion, 400 billion! This number is too big, I think you have no sense, but this is not a jackpot. It turns your life around.”
It’s not that I don’t have a sense of humor, it’s because of the huge number of 400 billion won, In-cheol can’t make rational decisions.
read at noblemtl.com
No matter how much you think about it, 39 tons of gold… It literally doesn’t make sense at all.
I smiled and opened my mouth.
“In-cheol, do you have that serial number?”
It is referring to ＜Hwanggeme-0267-39103>.
Incheol nodded, and I continued.
“At that time, after I checked the ＜Metals Manager> you mentioned at the Hankuk University Library, I thought seriously. By the way… .”
I continued with a short sigh.
“No matter how I think about it, I don’t think it’s a gold bar. In 1942, it was the end of the Japanese colonial era. It must have been a situation in which Japan had sucked up everything it had been sucking for nearly 40 years… It doesn’t make sense that there were 39 tons of gold.”
Instead of answering my words, Incheol smiled and turned on the computer.
Incheol logged into the account [email protected] and opened an email.
The email was written in English, and it was received on March 21, a month ago.
And the sender of the email was Robert.
+ +
To Leah Kim:
After much research over the past four months, I have come to the conclusion that I have been completely deceived by you.
But if you hadn’t deceived me like that, last September… I would have been left with a cold corpse in Dandong, China.
So I am sending this email to say thank you.
Good luck in finding the gold bars.
If you find all 39,000 gold bars, I’ll be treated to a nice meal later, right?
from Robert.
P.s.
Come to think of it, I owe you another debt.
I was promoted because I solved the Kim Katsran spy case. 🙂
Hoping to be able to pay off this debt someday… .
+ +
“Who the hell is Robert who sent me this e-mail?”
In-cheol answered my question with a proud expression.
“CIA agent. Robert is… He’s the one who found the golden serial number. That’s what I ordered. haha–!”
“what? You gave the CIA agent an order?”
Incheol nodded and said in a low voice.
“When the CIA issues top secret orders to agents, they use the code SCI… .”
I cut Incheol’s words and said.
“SCI? What does that mean?”
Incheol shrugged and said.
“Well… . Hmm… … . Super… Cool… Instruction?”
I said, holding back a laugh.
“How do you know it’s a top-secret command code without knowing what it stands for?”
“The SCI code is an RSA cipher, and the N value has 1230 digits.”
A decimal number with 1230 digits is roughly 4000 bits.
In other words, it means that it is a 4096-bit RSA encryption system, and this is a top-secret encryption.
uh… ! By the way… wait… … !
“You are this child… . Was this the value of the rejected function you asked me to find at that time?”
At my question, Incheol opened his mouth with an awkward smile.
“haha–! right. At that time, I was really thankful, Jeongho. ha ha ha–!”
I checked the monitor’s email again.
But the name Robert… .
I don’t know if it’s a coincidence, but it was a name that appeared frequently in the CW report that I’m currently working on deciphering.
If Robert is a real CIA agent, it means that the CIA is also interpreting ＜Hwanggeum-0267-39103> as 39 tons of gold ingots.
I mean, this really is a treasure ship… OMG… !
Great… ! 4 billion… !
Without realizing it, a smile began to spread across my face.
I smiled and said to Incheol.
“Incheol-ah, I found all the rejected function values, isn’t it a bit unfair to divide by 4 to 6?”
“what?”
Checking my expression, Incheol smiled and continued.
“then… How about we do exactly half and half? Five to five?”
“Okay, Cole!”
In-cheol opened his mouth to my answer.
“Jungho, but I have one question… .”
“… ?”
“RSA is what you use to enter passwords on the Internet. But why is the CIA using it?”
RSA is an asymmetric cryptography system, in which the locking key and the unlocking key are different.
Since command information between agents and intelligence agencies such as the CIA only flows in one direction, the use of asymmetric encryption is safer in many ways.
At this time, the agent only has the unlocking key, and has no knowledge of the locking key.
So, even if the RSA encryption key is exposed to the enemy due to the agent’s betrayal or other reasons, the locking key information is kept safe.
At my explanation, Incheol tilted his head and said.
“Is it so important that the locking key stays secure?”
“Of course it doesn’t matter.”
“why?”
Let’s take an example of a symmetric cipher.
The V19 codebook ciphers I’m cracking these days are symmetric ciphers.
That is, the same V19 random number table is used in both cases when converting (locking) commands to ciphertext and deciphering ciphertext into plaintext.
So, if I finish deciphering the V19 random number table, the NIS can use this random number table to give orders to the North Korean spies who have left the South.
＜Tomorrow at midnight, gather all the spies on the playground of Namseo Middle School.>
After sending these instructions on a shortwave radio, it becomes possible to arrest the spies gathered at Namseo Middle School the next day at once.
However, if RSA cipher, which is an asymmetric cipher, is used, it will be difficult to reverse the enemy’s cipher system in this way.
At my explanation, Incheol raised his thumb and said.
“nice—! Also! It’s clear!”
“Let me ask you one thing.”
“What?”
“How did you find that treasure ship in the first place?”
“ah… ! it?”
Incheol said as he moved the mouse to open the image file.
“This is a Korean coastal chart made by the Japanese.”
Incheol enlarged the image and continued speaking by pointing the mouse cursor at the equilateral triangle mark.
“Look here. This is the sinking sign.”
“It just says Shigemitsu… Are you sure that’s a sinking sign?”
In-cheol answered my question.
“Are you sure. This is what I personally checked at the Tokyo University Library. It is a mark used by the Japanese Navy during World War II. When a ship is completely floating, it is an inverted triangle, and a sunken ship is an equilateral triangle.”
I nodded, and Incheol continued.
“And if you look at the numbers here, you can see that this ship departed from Incheon Port on April 29, 1942, and is due to arrive at Osaka Port the next day.”
“Did you know that this is a treasure ship?”
Incheol nodded and said.
“If you look closely here… .”
Where In-cheol pointed out, it was written 250 tons.
“This is the capacity of a sunken ship, and 250 tons is really small for a military cargo ship. Marking here the location where this small cargo ship sank means that the cargo aboard the cargo ship is not an ordinary object.”
“… !”
“So I ordered Robert to find out what was on there. And in fact… .”
Incheol continued speaking with a serious expression.
“The moment I saw this for the first time, I was blown away! I came. My whole body was tingling. Even now, when I look at the charts here, my heart is pounding and I feel something.”
I wanted to tell him to stop talking nonsense, but I couldn’t.
It was because In-cheol’s expression with both hands on his chest was so serious as he spoke.
I had dinner at In-cheol’s house, and while In-cheol was eating, In-cheol said to me.
“Looking at that… Jung-ho, do you speak a little Japanese?”
“I just know the basics, okay?”
“OK! Then eat and help me before I go.”
“What? You said you were going to meet Youngmi at 6 o’clock.”
“Don’t worry, ma’am! It will be over in just five minutes.”
After eating, I returned to In-cheol’s room, and In-cheol put an old cassette player on his desk.
When Incheol turned on the power and pressed the play button, a voice talking in Japanese came out.
“What is this?”
In response to my question, Incheol put his index finger to his mouth and said in a low voice.
“Shh! Be quiet and just listen.”
It was a conversation between two Japanese about an incident.
One person inquired about the specific situation of the accident, and the other person answered the other person’s question, and the conversation continued. As a result, it was a very uncooperative atmosphere.
If I had to guess…
It was like a conversation between the interrogating police and the suspect.
In a moment, Incheol stopped the cassette player and said to me.
“Jeong-ho, listen carefully.”
Incheol is big! He straightened his voice, and soon began to speak in Japanese.
What In-cheol said was exactly what the answering man said during the conversation played on the cassette player a while ago.
What is it? This fat calf situation?
After speaking in Japanese, Incheol asked me.
“How are you?”
“what?”
Incheol said while pointing to the cassette player.
“Is the voice from here similar to what I said?”
“ah… ! So, have you done vocal imitation now?”
“Yes! right. Do you have the same voice?”
Incheol’s expression was full of anticipation.
“Well… It sounds similar, but I don’t know for sure because it’s the voice coming from the cassette player.”
At my words, In-cheol became in tears and said.
“Is not it? OMG—! Also that was the problem. What about this?”
I don’t know what this is, but it seemed to be a very important event, judging from In-cheol’s expression.
After thinking for a while, I opened my mouth.
“Isn’t it possible to first record your vocal imitations on tape, and then compare your recorded voice with the voices on the tape here?”
In-cheol’s expression brightened at my words.
“Wow! There really was such a way! Also, Chae Jung-ho! After all, you are a genius!”
I said with a smirk.
“But what the hell is this doing?”
The moment Incheol was about to answer my question, the phone rang, and I took the phone out of my pocket and checked the time.
5:45 p.m.
Youngmi’s private tutoring job ended a little early today!
I opened the phone with pleasure, but it was not the voice of Yeong-mi I was expecting… A familiar male voice was heard.
-Jeongho-ya, I’m the deputy platoon commander.
The voice of the deputy platoon commander across the phone was low and serious.