Asura of Tomorrow's Ark

"Okay, everyone has arrived. It seems that you have already gotten to know each other, so I won't say anything more."

Section Chief Ishii knocked on the car door and brought everyone's attention back to him, "Now I want to talk about this case. Just half an hour ago, someone found the 12th victim in Nakano Park. , the situation at the scene is very similar to before, and it is basically certain that it was committed by the same person or group."

"The victim this time was a 23-year-old female who was a salesperson in a nearby department store. According to her colleagues, after lunch, the deceased was going to go to the park to take a rest for a while, but after work hours, She didn’t come back, and her colleagues felt something was wrong and called the police.”

"The police from the nearby police station rushed to Nakano Park after receiving the report and found the body of the deceased there. It has only been half an hour since the death of the deceased. The murderer is most likely not far away. This is our opportunity! "

Section Chief Ishii's tone seemed a little heavy, "Previously, the murderers committed crimes outside the city or in some remote places. This time he actually reached into the city. We must not let him go!"

"Section Chief, I have a question," Kuta Mirai raised his hand and asked, "Shouldn't such dangerous criminals be handled by the special service team? Maybe we are not the murderer's opponent."

"The special service team has been dispatched and has cordoned off the area around Nakano Park and is conducting a blanket search there," explained Section Chief Ishii. "However, their manpower is somewhat insufficient and they need us to help maintain the cordon and conduct a search of the scene. survey."

"Of course, what you said makes sense. In order to avoid confronting the murderer directly, you two should be careful in groups. I don't know how many murderers came this time, but even if there is only one, they will not be an easy opponent to deal with. "

Section Chief Ishii assigned Li Ang and Oreki Yuhito to a group, Matsuo Taku and Kuda Miku to a group, and he acted alone.

"If we encounter it...I allow you to shoot, and I will bear the responsibility."

Following the order from Section Chief Ishii, the expressions on everyone's faces became a little solemn.

No one spoke casually during the rest of the journey. In a heavy atmosphere, the group passed through the blockade set up by the special service team and entered the closed Nakano Park.

Nakano Park is the largest park in Sagazaki City. The lush forest in the park covers an area of ​​more than [-] hectares.

When they arrived near their destination, Li Ang saw the dark woods in the distance through the car window.

It was midday at this time, and the sun had not yet passed over their heads, but even such fierce sunlight could not dispel the gloomy atmosphere shrouded in the forest.

The van stopped slowly. Section Chief Ishii rushed out of the van and shouted to everyone,

"Move faster!"

Chapter 35 Missing clues

Following Section Chief Ishii, the group of them stepped out of the police car one after another.

Almost the moment they stepped into the forest in the park, a cold air brushed against their backs, causing everyone to shiver in unison.

Matsuo Taku tightened his tight clothes and couldn't help but muttered, "Say, has this damn place ever been so cold before? Why do I feel like there's something wrong with the temperature here?"

"The temperature in the forest is much lower than outside. Stop talking nonsense." Hearing this, Miku Kuda couldn't help but roll his eyes at him.

"Okay, we are about to enter the crime scene, so don't chat here."

At this time, Oreki Yuhito lost his usual frivolity and looked very reliable.

"Yes, I understand."

Matsuo Taku responded absentmindedly, and then buttoned the top button of his clothes.

Following several of them, Li Ang passed through the blockade set up by the special service team and entered the crime scene.

But... just like Matsuo Taku said, Li Ang did feel that there was something wrong with the atmosphere in this forest. He didn't know how to use words to describe this feeling.

Although the atmosphere in a normal forest cannot be said to be noisy, it is definitely not close to tranquility. Birds chirping, insects chirping, the wind rustling the leaves... But this forest is different, except for the occasional sounds made by a few of them. Apart from that, all Li Ang could feel was depression and silence.

The information fed back in their perception gave them an indescribable feeling of nausea, as if they had entered the body of a huge creature, and everything around them was alive, and they were quietly observing in an unknown way. A group of them.

Fortunately, Li Ang's range of perception was limited. If he could directly observe the situation in the entire forest, he might have the urge to destroy it all.

Li Ang thought for a while, and then stopped in front of an ordinary tree.

He didn't know what kind of tree it was, but it didn't matter. Li Ang just wanted to confirm one thing.

Li Ang pulled out the police dagger and stabbed the tree fiercely. Under his powerful strength, the entire dagger was almost completely buried in the trunk.

After twisting the dagger hard and turning it twice, Li Ang pulled the dagger out of the tree trunk.

The dagger was covered with light yellow wood chips, and there was also some light green juice. It did not appear as Li Ang imagined.

"...Are you too worried? Or maybe the restriction of perception makes me feel a little uneasy."

No one can answer Li Ang's question, maybe not even himself.

At this time, Oreki Yuhito also discovered Leon who was lagging behind, and shouted loudly not far ahead, "Leon! What are you doing there? Come here quickly!"

"coming."

In response, Li Ang shook off the sawdust on the dagger, inserted it back into his waist, and then quickly caught up with the group of people not far ahead.

What Li Ang didn't notice was that when he left there, the wounds he left on the trees were gradually healing at a slow but visible speed.

Perhaps, Li Ang's guess was not wrong, but he tried a little too early, and the situation here has not yet developed to the extent he expected.

Li Ang caught up with the group of people walking in front. When he crossed an invisible dividing line, a strong smell of blood spread across the floor. Even the dim sunlight cast from the shadow of the woods seemed to be dyed by this smell. Dark red.

Section Chief Ishii chatted with the few members of the special service team who stayed here, and then they left the scene and continued searching deeper into the forest.

This area has been cordoned off by the SWAT team, and there is a high possibility that the murderer is still hiding in the forest. However, their mission is to protect the scene and investigate and collect evidence, so the possibility of contact with the murderer is low.

However, there is no guarantee that the murderer has some bad taste and will return to the scene after committing the crime.

The investigation and evidence collection work was carried out by the other three people. Li Ang was just a novice, he only needed to learn from the side and get started by the way.

"Tsk... so miserable."

When Li Ang saw the corpse with his own eyes, the tragic state of the corpse made him frown.

Just as Oreki Yuhito described before, the victim was lying in a pool of blood, and the soil under her body was soaked red with blood.

Her chest was completely cut open, and the edges of the wound showed irregular torn shapes. It looked like someone had torn it open directly with huge force. The original organs in her body had disappeared, and only the visible Some pieces of suspected debris.

Several ribs on the chest had also been broken, and they were casually thrown on the grass not far away. The shape of the cross section was uneven. If there was no accident, they should have been broken violently.

"How do you feel now?"

After preliminary evidence collection on the body, Oreki Hishito approached Li Ang.

His face was a little pale and he looked uncomfortable.

"If you really can't bear it, go and rest for a while. You have just started working and no one will laugh at you."

"...It's nothing, I'm not that fragile yet." Li Ang shook his head and said, "I'm just...not used to it."

"No matter how many times you see this kind of scene, you'll never get used to it," Oreki Yuhito said with a wry smile.

Perhaps because his eyesight has returned to normal, the impact of this scene on Li Ang is greater than imagined. It is obvious that Li Ang has done something similar to the cruelty of the scene before him, such as chopping a person into pieces from head to toe. Two halves or something.

"Don't hold on, it will look ugly when you spit it out." Oreki Yuhito comforted.

"Let's do this, I'll give you a task." He thought for a moment, then handed Li Ang a pair of gloves and several evidence bags, "Look around here to see if there are any missing clues. Bring me these bags."

"Ok."

Nodding, Li Ang did not refuse.

Li Ang knew that Oreki Yuhito was deliberately taking care of him as a newcomer, and he had no reason to refuse.

After handing the things to Li Ang, Oreki Yuhito endured the feeling of nausea and returned to the work of collecting evidence.

"Missing clues..."

Putting on the gloves, a smile appeared on the corner of Li Ang's mouth.

Maybe Oreki Yuhito didn't have any expectations for him, but Li Ang could indeed find a lot of clues that they missed.

Although the range of perception has been suppressed, its essence has not changed in any way. Li Ang can see many things that cannot be observed with the naked eye through perception.

such as……

The footprints left by the murderer.

Chapter 36 Bloodstains

The soil in the forest is not particularly soft. Even if they stand on it with heavy equipment on their backs, they can still only leave a shallow footprint, which is almost impossible to distinguish with the naked eye.

But what Li Ang observed through perception was not something as simple as footprints, but the remaining breath of the murderer.

The murderer had only escaped for less than an hour, and he still had a lot of aura left in the area.

On weekdays, Li Ang actively blocks this part of his ability to perceive. He doesn't want to feel like he is soaking in a large colorful dye vat every day. When Li Ang's conscious memory comes to perception, the black and white world in his mind overlaps with reality. Then something changed.

A smoke-like substance began to appear on the ground and in the air. Because these smokes were quite different from each other, they showed different colors in the perceived world.

If it is in a city, where the breaths of countless people are mixed together, the old breaths will soon be overwritten by new ones, and it is almost impossible to track them in this way.

But this is a relatively remote park, and few people come here. The smell left by human activities will remain for a long time.

The strongest auras are those left by the people currently active here. After excluding the auras of Oreki Yuhito, Matsuo Taku, Kuda Mirai and Section Chief Ishii from his perception, Li Ang can now sense that there are still five A breath.

Three of the breaths penetrated deep into the forest. One breath extended all the way from outside the park. It stayed here for a while and then turned back. The last breath was already quite thin and would probably disappear completely in another hour or two. .

If Li Angme guessed wrong, the returning breath was left by the patrolman who came here to check the situation after receiving the alarm, and the dissipating breath represented the deceased himself.

Among the three scents that penetrated into the forest, two were members of the special service team who went in to search. It was obvious who left the remaining ones.

As Li Ang eliminated the wrong options one by one, there was only one breath left in the sensory world, which outlined light blue footprints on the ground, extending all the way into the depths of the forest.

Looking at the size of the footprints, Li Ang raised his eyebrows in surprise, "A woman? Or a child?"

The size of this footprint is only about 36-37, so it doesn't look like it was left by an adult male.

There is only one murderer, and he is either a woman or a child.

This is also consistent with what Oreki Yuhito said about using paralyzing venom to commit crimes. If he is a strong adult male, he generally does not need such a troublesome thing.

As for children or women, if there is no conclusive evidence, they will not be easily listed as suspects by the police. It seems that the reason why the police found nothing after investigating for three months has been found.

Maybe... the murderer is still hiding in this forest.

Pulling out the pistol and dagger from his waist, Li Ang was alert and carefully followed the footprints into the depths of the forest.

Li Ang has a very high degree of control over his body. Within the range of perception, he can achieve precise aim without holding a gun with both hands. He can also handle some emergencies with a dagger in his other hand. After all, Li Ang doesn't want to use it. Use your fists to punch some weird things.

At this time, the people in the first search section were busy collecting evidence from the corpse, and did not even notice that Li Ang had walked out of their sight unknowingly.

But Li Ang didn't care. After he was out of everyone's sight, Li Ang accelerated his pace and chased the breath all the way deep into the forest.

When he was alone, Li Ang's foreign feeling in this forest became even stronger. The leaves of several trees around him seemed to have turned into eyes. Countless gazes fell on Li Ang, making him feel a little like a glow. On the back.

After chasing the breath for a distance of less than a kilometer, Li Ang suddenly stopped and a foreign object suddenly appeared at the edge of his perception range.

The breath extended to the woods not far ahead and then cut off. In that forest, there was a thin figure hiding, about 1.5 meters tall. It was impossible to determine the specific gender of the other person. Other than that, it was basically the same as The characteristics deduced by Li Ang are consistent.

Li Ang calmly approached the figure. The man actually showed no signs of escaping, and just hid quietly in the woods and silently observed Li Ang.

However, the other party was indeed very well hidden. Without perception, Li Ang would not have been able to discover the other party's whereabouts.

After getting close to a certain distance, Li Ang suddenly turned his gun towards the woods and shouted loudly, "Who is that?! Stand there and don't move!"

He also considered shooting without warning, but doing so might result in him being fired from the police station. What if the man hiding in the woods was innocent?Li Ang still needs this job now, so it's better to give him a reminder just to be on the safe side.

Almost at the same time that Li Ang's figure sounded, the thin figure in the shadows of the woods burst out at a speed that ordinary people could not match, and fled into the distance.

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

Seeing this, Li Ang fired three shots without hesitation.

The three bullets blocked all possible dodge directions for the figure. Li Ang did not want to kill the murderer directly, but just wanted to make him incapacitated.

However, like a mollusk without bones, the man twisted into an incredible posture in the air and dodged all the bullets that Li Ang stretched out.

I am afraid that even if Li Ang empties all the bullets in the magazine, he will not be able to pose any threat to that figure.

Li Ang immediately stopped hesitating and threw the dagger in his other hand.

The dagger flew out like a cannonball, hitting the side of the figure with a harsh whistle in the air.

A large amount of unknown light blue liquid spurted out from the wound on the figure's flank. With a muffled groan, the figure disappeared from Li Ang's perception very suddenly. Neither Li Ang's eyes nor his perception could be found again. The whereabouts of the other party cannot be found.

It's as if the other person never existed.

"...did you run away?"

Li Ang did not catch up, but waited for others to come over.

Although the sound made by this kind of hand gun when fired is not loud, it is still extremely harsh in a dead forest.

After standing there and waiting for less than 2 minutes, the people who searched the first class found Li Ang in the direction of the gunfire.

"What happened? Did you just shoot??"

The expression on the face of Section Chief Ishii was extremely complicated. Apart from being frightened and angry, there was also a trace of unnoticeable expectation.