Tokyo Detective Chronicles

Earlier.

Fushimi Iori carried the little girl in one arm and dragged the unconscious Miyazawa Rin with the other, moving forward through the narrow passage.

The sensation underfoot is changing.

Knee-high weeds had grown on the tiled floor at some point. The grass blades were long and tough, making a rustling sound when they brushed against Fushimi's trouser legs.

The road behind us is changing at a speed visible to the naked eye.

As Fushimi delved deeper into the mundane world, each time he looked back...

You will find that space is reorganizing itself.

When Fushimi turned around for the third time, he discovered that the corridor wall about thirty meters away was no longer white tile, but had turned into a dark red fleshy texture, with fine vascular patterns covering the surface.

It was throbbing gently in a rhythm like a heartbeat.

It's as if this eternal world itself is alive.

Fushimi wasn't even sure if he could find his way back if he returned now.

But the little girl in his arms seemed used to it.

She nestled in Fushimi's arms, her dirty little hands clutching his shirt.

Whenever she encounters a fork in the road, she always points in a certain direction without hesitation, whether it's left or right, or sometimes even a seemingly impenetrable wall.

As Fushimi proceeds in the direction she points, the wall ripples like water the moment he gets close, revealing a new passage.

Another detail that surprised Fushimi was that, along the way, the little girl's choices almost perfectly avoided all the places where monsters might appear.

Once, she suddenly patted Fushimi's shoulder hard, pointed to a fork in the road on the right with her little finger, and shook her head frantically.

Fushimi stopped in his tracks and activated his spiritual vision.

A few seconds later, from the depths of the passage on the left that she had prevented him from choosing, came a dense crawling sound, as if dozens of deformed monsters were gathering there.

Later, the girl looked troubled, as if there was danger on either side... She glanced at Fushimi, then hesitantly pointed to one side.

As Fushimi walked through the passageway, the girl kept patting him, signaling him to hurry up.

But it was too late.

The next moment, the tiles peeled off the wall, revealing a dense network of honeycomb-like holes underneath.

Dozens of grayish-white, deformed arms stretched out from the hole, scratching haphazardly in the air.

In this situation, axes are clearly not enough.

He raised his left hand and activated the Tengu's ability. A tiny vortex of air condensed in his palm and grew larger and larger, causing the wind to howl sharply in the narrow space.

With a casual wave of his hand.

The cyclone transformed into tangible blades, turning the entire passageway into the interior of a meat grinder, slicing along the walls and splattering black blood.

This can no longer be a coincidence...

Fushimi looked down at the little girl in his arms.

She was staring intently ahead, her dirty little face expressionless, except for her incredibly bright eyes and her tiny nose twitching gently.

A thought surfaced in Fushimi's mind.

Perhaps when she first saw him, she turned and ran away not because she was afraid of him.

Instead, they sensed that a horde of monsters was about to surge in from that direction.

This child, in this ordinary world, possesses a kind of precognitive ability.

……

After turning another corner, they arrived at the end of a passageway covered with tiles on the walls.

Beyond that, the once spacious corridor suddenly shrank into a narrow path that could only allow two people to pass side by side.

On both sides of the road are clear pools of water with unfathomable depths.

In the pool, two huge Buddha statues stand on the left and right... Only their heads are above the water, while their bodies are completely submerged.

Judging from the size of the Buddha's head alone, the depth of this pool is at least over sixty meters.

The Buddha on the left is crying.

Clear tears streamed from its eyes, sliding down its cheeks and into the pool. Its mouth turned down, its entire face shrouded in an unspeakable grief.

The Buddha on the right is smiling.

His mouth was stretched to a degree that no human could possibly do, almost reaching his ears, and water seeped from it. His eye sockets were empty, just two bottomless black holes, yet strangely enough, they gave the impression that they were gazing at something.

One cry, one laugh; one sorrow, one joy.

Even within this generally bizarre and mortal world, it appears quite strange.

Just as Fushimi was lost in thought, the little girl excitedly patted his chest, bringing him back to reality, and pointed to the end of the passage.

Fushimi stared intently at the door, which appeared to be a solitary, isolated structure.

"Is that your home?"

"Mmm!" the little girl laughed happily.

Fushimi nodded.

He glanced at Miyazawa Rin in his other hand. The woman was still unconscious, her wet hair stuck to her face. Her breathing had become slightly more steady, but the abnormal flush on her face had not subsided.

Before setting off, Fushimi had already given her a rough treatment of her wounds.

However, the infection was already quite severe, and we needed to go to a relatively safe place for further cleaning, medication, and bandaging...

Fushimi stepped onto that narrow road.

The ground beneath my feet was like the surface of an outdoor swimming pool, somewhat slippery. If I wasn't careful, I would fall into the water on either side and never be able to climb out again...

As for what lies beneath that pool of water... nobody knows.

So, under the watchful eyes of the two Buddha statues, he walked steadily along the way, occasionally glancing at the pools on either side to see if any danger might arise.

But... there was something swimming, not a fish, but something bigger and slower.

Finally, Fushimi stepped onto the platform at the end of the passage and breathed a sigh of relief.

He gently placed Miyazawa Rin on the ground, then put down the little girl in his arms.

The little girl immediately ran to the dark red wooden door, stood on tiptoe, and laboriously inserted the key and turned the doorknob.

"Click".

The door opened.

The scene in the room surprised Fushimi.

The room was messy, but it was still relatively clean.

Completely different from what he had initially envisioned as a cult stronghold, this place was merely a small space that could only accommodate two or three people at most.

It looks like an abandoned office, about forty square meters, with old-fashioned beige wallpaper on all four walls, some of which has peeled off, revealing the moldy cement underneath.

In the center of the room stood a huge wooden desk, its surface piled high with various odds and ends.

On the other side of the room, there were traces of the little girl's life.

A simple bed made of hay, rags and a few old clothes, covered with a thick piece of cloth that looked like it had been torn from a curtain as a sheet.

Several empty cans were placed next to the bed, with some food scraps still inside.

There were signs of a fire on the ground...

Fushimi did not delay any longer.

He first moved the clutter away, cleaned off most of the dust with a cloth, and then gently placed Miyazawa Rin on the old desk. Although it wasn't exactly a pleasant environment, it was still better than the ground.

Then he took the first aid kit out of the shadows.

"Please fetch some water for me," he said to the little girl.

The little girl immediately picked up a broken iron bucket with a rope tied around it in the corner and ran towards the door with a "clattering" sound.

Fushimi then noticed that there was a water collection point at the edge of the platform, where the pool water formed a small backflow area.

While they were there, Fushimi began to treat Miyazawa Rin's wounds.

He first took off her black stockings, which were so tattered they were unrecognizable.

The fabric clung to the festering wound, and as it was torn, the unconscious woman let out a muffled groan of pain. Her brows furrowed on her flushed face, and her lips pressed together unconsciously.

Fushimi, however, softened his movements.

As the alcohol swab touched her skin, Miyazawa Rin's body trembled slightly.

Fushimi used tweezers to pry open the skin and flesh at the edge of the wound, and it was more serious than he had expected; the edges had already turned black and necrotic.

The wound must be cleaned.

He took out a scalpel.

When the little girl returned carrying the bucket, she saw Fushimi using the tip of his knife to scrape away the necrotic tissue.

Dark red pus and blood flowed down the woman's thighs, dripping onto the table and pooling into a small puddle.

The little girl stared wide-eyed, moved closer, gripped the edge of the table with both hands, stood on tiptoe, and watched Fushimi's every move intently.

There was no fear in his eyes, only curiosity.

Fushimi glanced at her, said nothing, and continued with his work.

Miyazawa Rin, who was unconscious, was tense, with suppressed sobs coming from her throat and fine beads of cold sweat on her forehead.

Clean the wound, disinfect, and rinse.

After the last piece of necrotic tissue was removed, Fushimi took out a talisman and gently placed it on the wound.

The moment the talisman touched flesh, it emitted a soft glow, and then it was soaked in blood, but the runes on it were still clearly visible.

Fushimi raised his hand, and a shadow rose from the ground, wrapping around the wound like a black bandage and securing it firmly.

After doing all this, he straightened up and let out a long breath.

The little girl then handed over a relatively clean piece of rag, which must have been torn from an old piece of clothing.

Fushimi took it and wiped the blood off his hands.

Then he looked at the other soaked clothes on Miyazawa Rin's body.

The white shirt clung to her body, the semi-transparent fabric revealing the contours of her skin and the outline of her underwear. The hem of her trench coat was still dripping water, forming a small puddle on the ground.

Even if the wound is treated properly, her condition may worsen again due to hypothermia or infection.

Fushimi remained silent for two seconds.

Then he turned to the little girl: "Help her take off her wet clothes and dry her off."

The little girl blinked, seemingly not quite understanding.

Fushimi had no choice but to demonstrate himself. He unbuttoned Miyazawa Rin's clothes and pulled her out from under her soaked trench coat, shirt, and skirt, leaving her only in her underwear.

Then he carried her to the bed.

He turned to the little girl and made a wiping motion on her skin.

The little girl finally understood.

She nodded vigorously, took the other piece of cloth from Fushimi, and began clumsily to help Miyazawa Rin take off her remaining clothes, then carefully wiped and washed her body with water.

They even used a blanket to half-cover her to prevent her from getting too cold.

Fushimi turned his back and walked towards the filing cabinet in the other corner of the room.

He also had many questions to ask about Miyazawa Rin.

However, all of this will only be known once she wakes up. We should be able to learn a lot of information from her that is only known within the Special Affairs Department.

The most urgent matter is this room.

Fushimi's gaze fell on the cabinet in the corner of the room. It was an old-fashioned metal filing cabinet with most of the gray-white paint peeling off, revealing the rusty iron underneath.

The cabinet was unlocked, the door was ajar, and inside were piles of tapes, books, and notebooks.

From the moment Fushimi stepped into the room, he had been very concerned about these things.

He turned on his flashlight.

The notebook was mostly filled with symbols he couldn't understand, which didn't match his impression of any language or writing system; they looked more like some kind of totem...

After recording the entire thing with his phone, he checked the books, which were some common world classics. Fushimi flipped through them and found that there were no annotations or intercalary pages; they were just ordinary old books.

Basically no gain...

Finally, his gaze fell on the pile of tapes.

There were about twenty plates, each labeled with a number from "001" to "023".

There was no other information on the label.

Fushimi picked up a cassette tape numbered "001". There was also a cassette tape recorder in the cabinet. It was an old model, probably from the 1990s.

The machine was covered in dust, and the headphone wires were tangled together.

He tried pressing the power button.

No response... it must be out of power.

Fortunately, he had a universal battery among his other tools... He removed it and put it into the tape recorder.

Press the power button again.

The indicator light on the tape recorder lit up with a faint red light.

"There's hope," Fushimi said in a low voice.

He inserted the tape into the machine, closed the lid, and pressed play.

The magnetic tape started spinning.

"Sizzle... sizzle..." First came a burst of static; unsurprisingly, the tape was somewhat damaged.

Fortunately, voices soon followed...

"..."

It was a man's voice, very young, with an uncontrollable tremor in his voice:

"Buy! I can buy them. I have connections to buy death row inmates from prisons. If Yingzhou can't do it, I can buy them from abroad—Africa, North America, Southeast Asia…"

"Please wait a moment... I can definitely do it..."

The man's voice trembled, almost as if he were crying out.

Then there was another burst of static.

A few seconds later, another sound rang out, mixed with the noise of the pachinko parlor and the clanging of steel balls inside the machine.

"...You should know that what the Lord needs is a clean soul..."

Prajapati?

Fushimi frowned.

"But, but, haven't I already obtained so many fetal souls...?" The man's voice became even more panicked.

"It's not enough... the souls of those fetuses are too weak..."

The calm voice said, "I remember there's an orphanage near your house, isn't there?"

silence.

A silence that lasted ten seconds.

The only sound was the "shush" of the videotape spinning.

Then, accompanied by the upbeat electronic music of winning the grand prize on the pachinko machine, came the man's calm and composed final announcement...

"Think of a way, spend some money, we can always get it done..."

The recording abruptly ended there.

Fushimi stood still for a long time.

He only came to his senses when a sudden burst of flames erupted behind him.

It turned out that the little girl had already cleaned Miyazawa Rin's body and lit a campfire nearby, using charcoal and hay that were readily available in the room.

The fire wasn't big, but it was enough to warm the room.

Miyazawa Rin was still unconscious on the bed, but her breathing had become much more stable, and the redness on her face had faded somewhat. The little girl was squatting by the fire, already somewhat sleepy, her little head nodding slightly, her eyes half-closed.

Fushimi took a deep breath and opened another cassette tape...