Part 9
“What time do you plan to sleep to? Get up, kid.”
Kujou’s voice, along with his silent wrath, was engulfed by the atmosphere of the room emptily.
In the quiet room in which only the breathing of a sleeping person could be heard, Kujou’s facial expression turned into that of a demon silently.
And then that demon covered the sleeping Akira’s face, which was filled with so much happiness that made him seem like he was in a paradise, with a wet towel secretly.
Thirty seconds later.
“Hah, co… Co, cough… Buh… Buaaah–!!”
Blowing off the wet towel, Akira jumped up vigorously.
“Wh, What!? What have you done!?… Cough. Something went into my throat.”
Saying that, he discovered the towel, which was wet with water, lying beside him and opened his mouth widely.
“What… You are still alive…”
“This shows nothing but murderous intent! This towel!!”
Contrary to Akira’s will, his mind became sober because he had to comment fiercely on Kujou, who had an extremely regretful facial expression, from an early morning.
“Have you forgotten what we had discussed last night? That since I was back too late last night, everyone was going partic.i.p.ate in a meeting this morning.”
“Oh, right. Umm, eh? It’s already the time for that!?”
“Honestly… You’re such a carefree person. Come to the dining room after you change your clothes. Everyone is already here. Hurry up.”
After saying that to Akira, Kujou left the room swiftly.
A while after that, Akira came to the dining room hastily in a T-shirt and a pair of jeans.
“What!? Mr. Gen is already here?”
“A police officer is good at getting up early.”
Saying that, Genjirou yawned loudly.
Akira greeted Yui and sat onto the empty chair beside her.
“Mr. Gen, how are the recent actions of the police?”
In order to make the brains of all the people more active, Kujou poured some strong chai tea into shiny, white teacups for them, then asked.
“It has been several days since the fourth body was found, but we still don’t even have a picture of the offender. Since the crime scenes are mostly located in the Kanto region, every office is getting a special security system and reinforcing in vigilance during patrol. So, the headquarter has even fewer people and is busy with focusing on Twitter now.”
“Aren’t you being forestalled completely?”
Yui gave a surprised facial expression.
“The~re~fore. I need your help. By the way, I am now negotiating with the higher ups. If everything goes will, I will become part of the investigation headquarter.”
Smiling arrogantly, Genjirou drank the chai tea Kujou handed to him.
“Oh, by the way, it’s about Twitter. I feel like there has been nothing noticeable since then. The amount of fake tweets did not decrease as usual, as well as the number people who tried to dig the trees, but the real offender has not posted anything. ”
Receiving the report from Akira, Kujou drank the chai tea and spoke with a confident voice.
“About that… There won’t be any more corpses. That’s it.”
“Eh? Wh, wh, what!?”
The three turned their heads to Kujou at the same time.
“The offender of this case spent a period of two years to murder men and women who were eighteen years old one by one. In order to carry out his murderous intent behind this case, the offender laid a plan scrupulously. However, what caught my eye was the reason of him burying the items with the corpses. If he only wanted to murder them, he could have thrown away everything that could reveal the ident.i.ties of the corpses.”
“That means the offender wanted us to know the ident.i.ties of the corpses?”
Kujou nodded at Genjirou, who had a skeptical att.i.tude towards the offender.
“Then, let’s return to the topic. I have said ‘That’s it.’ I will explain it. Akira, bring me the piece of paper and the pen over there.”
Akira handed over the piece of paper and the pen placed on the table to Kujou as he had been told.
“The Tweets which indicate the locations of the corpses were all tweeted by accounts that have peculiar usernames.”
Hearing that, Akira wrote down the letters and numbers onto the paper, which were @ROK_1150, @ADO_1150, @SAGE_1150, and @GIA_1150.
“According to the inference before, the letters are initials and the number 1150 has other meanings. However, this is easier than we thought. The positions of the underscores are serving different purposes in the usernames.”
The four focused on the letters and numbers on the paper.
“The numbers after the underscores are just indicating that these accounts belong to the same offender. What’s noticeable are the letters before that.”
Encouraged by Kujou’s confident words, Akira wrote ROK, ADO, SAGE, and GIA without the numbers.
“ROKADOSAGEGIA… Rokadosagegia? ”
“That is such a model answer. I’m about to cry.”
“Wh!? Then, then, how should it be p.r.o.nounced?”
Realizing that he had been humiliated, Akira asked fiercely.
“The is the order the victims were found. It means nothing to the offender.”
“… I see. It’s the order of the actual murder”
“Pon,” Yui clapped her hands.
Hearing that, Akira wrote as what Yui had said in order to redeem his good name.
“The first one was Jedi, then Skull, Loveho, and Arieru. ADOGIASAGEROK… Adogiasagerok?”
“Even an idiot is worth respecting. Read it backwards.”
Hearing Kujou’s voice, which contained a sigh, Akira hastily read the letters backwards.
“KOREGASAIG.o.dA… This will be the last one?”
“Right. This is the message from the offender for sure.”
“That’s why you said ‘That’s it.’ Hah~ Amazing!”
Genjirou praised as if he was admiring Kujou from his heart.
“According to this, the offender did not choose the victims indiscriminately. There must be some meanings of choosing them.”
“I know!! It’s about shiny names!”
“Go die!!”
Kicking away Akira’s childish inference, Kujou squinted at the disheartened Akira, regained control and continued speaking.
“Since this offender has determined murderous intent, the action of murder must has meanings. That means, the action of revealing the ident.i.ties of the corpses must have meanings as well.”
“That means, the offender wanted the victims’ family members and friends to know that… But why? Is it because the offender had a sense of guilt after murdering the victims, so the offender wanted at least to send the corpses back to their parents? ”
Kuujou closed his eyes and sighed once at Genjirou’s question.
Silence dominated the room.
Every single person was waiting for Kujou’s next sentence.
And then, Kujou slightly opened his mouth.
“This offender… does not has that kind of compa.s.sion… What he has are only… hatred, murderous intent, and the desire of vengeance.”
“… The desire of vengeance?”
The word vengeance seemed to have triggered Yui’s thought.
“Yesterday, when I went to the family of Yamaguchi, the fourth victim, Mrs. Erika, Skull’s mother, had an odd reaction at the word ’Mrs. Maya.’”
“Umm? Who is Mrs. Maya?”
“Maya Aida. That is the name of Loveho Aida’s mother. However, at that time, when Mrs. Erika heard Mrs. Maya, she asked me if that was ‘Maya Urakawa.’”
“Maya Urakawa? Who is she? How does she relate to this case!?”
Both Genjirou and Akira became confused. The times for them to rack their brains increased.
“The cause and effect of the past… Thinking about that, I trapped Mrs. Erika. Her reaction was beyond my expectation. And then, after I arrived at this house last night, I searched up a lot of stuff on the Internet.”
“Then, what have you found out!?”
Kujou shook his head regretfully at Genjirou’s question, which was filled with expectations.
“There was nothing on the Internet about that from present to the past that it could be reached. However, that’s what I had expected. In the world around twenty years ago, the Internet barely spread among people. People obtain information mainly from news and magazines.”
“What!? Twenty years ago!?”
“Right. Because of something that happened about twenty years ago, the offender had to perform this series of murders.”
“Ex… Excuse me… Wait, Kyuu1. Although I finally understood what you were talking about earlier completely, I’m lost again.”
The face of Genjirou, who requested for a detailed explanation, was distorted due to bewilderment.
Speaking to Akira, he suddenly laid on the table and convulsed as the circuitry of his brain experienced a short out.
“Then, let’s talk about something else that relates to this. In this world, it is pretty difficult to publicly change the first name chosen by parents or the last name pa.s.sed down through generations. However, there are cases such as the entertainers using stage names for business. And then, I looked up the name ‘Maya Urakawa.’ A stage name or a professional name, it should be one of them… However, it was neither of them.”
Kujou’s confidence and persuasiveness increased in his voice as he was going to hit the point.
“There is a way to change a first name publicly… No, to change a last name. Especially for females.”
Having noticed what Kujou was about to say, Yui opened her eyes widely.
“I see! Getting married!!”
“That’s right. Miss Yui.”
“So, Maya Aida’s maiden name is Maya Urakawa!?”
“I think that’s correct.”
On another piece of paper placed on the table, Kujou wrote down Maya Urakawa, Erika Yamaguchi, the Shimizu family, and the Aoki family.
“From Mrs. Erika’s reaction, she probably knows Mrs. Maya. And then, from the relationship of this case, I think all the mothers know each other.”
“I see. If it’s about the husbands, since the names of the husbands wouldn’t change, the police would have probably obtained some information; however, since the wives’ name were totally changed, so the possibility of missing some information is high.”
Understanding Kujou’s thought, Yui added on.
“Then according to Kyuu’s inference, the case relating to the motivation of the offender happened around twenty years ago and it related to Maya Urakawa?”
“Yes, that’s right.”
There was no cloudiness on the face of Genjirou, who was very confident.
“The maiden names of the mothers… Well, it is actually a blind point. Okay, I’ll investigate Maya Urakawa in the police’s data. It will stand out if she had done anything. I’ll investigate the maiden name of the other three mothers as well.”
“I am counting on you. We should find the silhouette from the mothers of the four.”
“Of course. No problem. Then, I’ll investigate about it.”
Genjirou raised his hand as a response to Kujou, who bowed down deeply, and quickly walked out of the detective agency.
In the dining room, which became quiet since the meeting was over, Kujou and Yui squinted at Akira, whose brain was still experiencing a short out, and were waiting for the direct confrontation with the offender. Determination appeared on their faces again.
1. Kyuu – Kujou’s nickname. In j.a.panese, the Kanji of ku also has the p.r.o.nunciation of kyuu.