I became Hokage in Tokyo

Chapters 124 and 126: The Corpse is Speaking (4k)

Seeing the two acting suspiciously, Naruto Uchiha stroked his chin, wondering if they were thieves.

Hospitals have always been hotspots for thieves and scammers. This is not only because of the large flow of people, but also because patients' families often carry cash, leaving patients in a precarious situation with anxiety, making them vulnerable to being taken advantage of by bad people.

But why would someone steal from a morgue? They dare to touch the property of the dead; they're incredibly audacious.

One of the short, stout men was wearing a hospital security guard uniform and had a morgue key on him. Could he be stealing from the morgue?

Uchiha Naruto pondered for a moment, and then slipped inside discreetly while the two were opening the door.

Hospitals are already cold enough, but in order to preserve the bodies, the air conditioning in the morgue is turned up to the maximum without any hesitation. As soon as you enter the morgue, you feel a chill all over your body, and the hairs on the back of your neck stand on end.

The thought that countless corpses lie inside sends chills down one's spine.

"Sasaki, you need to hurry! I was only able to temporarily cut off the morgue's surveillance because my colleague is missing, but if it goes on any longer, people might notice something's wrong," the short, stout security guard urged anxiously.

"Okay, I understand. Thank you so much this time, Ito."

The other person to enter the morgue was a thin, middle-aged man in a black trench coat. He paced around the large morgue before asking with a puzzled look:

"Hmm, Ito, where are the bodies transported from the oncology department kept?"

"How would I know? This is a morgue. We security guards don't come here unless absolutely necessary. Even when we patrol, we come in groups," the short, stout security guard said, his face pale.

The morgue is located on the lowest floor of the entire hospital, so the cold and gloomy atmosphere is naturally the strongest. Just think about how many bodies have been taken out of the morgue since the hospital was built, and how many bodies are currently stored there. The psychological pressure this puts on the two of them is immense.

"Damn it, if that's the case, then we'll have to open each cubicle one by one to find the target." Sasaki was also horrified.

There are over a hundred cubicles in the morgue. Opening them one by one and searching for the target's body is like opening a blind box. Who knows what kind of "surprise" you'll find!

Perhaps if you opened the cubicle, you would find a mutilated or gigantic body, which would probably leave you with a psychological trauma for the rest of your life.

"Ito, come help. You start looking in the east-facing cubicles, I'll start in the west. Let's search together and get this over with quickly!"

"I won't do that. This isn't what we agreed on. I'm risking losing my job by letting you in." The short, fat security guard shook his head and refused without even thinking.

"I'll add more money! I'll give you an extra 100,000 yen on top of the original payment!"

Seeing that the short, stout security guard seemed slightly tempted, Sasaki gritted his teeth and said:

"Add 200,000 yen! Do you think I don't know? This is your last month working at the Medical University Affiliated Hospital. If you don't make a killing now, you won't have this opportunity again."

"All right."

Money can move people's hearts, and after some hesitation, the short, stout security guard finally agreed.

Sasaki took a photo out from inside his trench coat and handed it to the short, stout security guard.

"This is a photo of the target. If you find his body in the quarantine cabinet, notify me immediately."

"Sasaki, aren't you a private investigator? I always thought private investigators only did trivial things like catching adulterers and cheating, and handling divorces and property disputes. When did you start doing this kind of thing?" the short, fat security guard asked curiously.

"Actually, this is also a dispute over family property," Detective Sasaki said with a shake of his head and a sigh.

"My employer is the target's lover and has a child. This commission is to collect DNA samples such as hair and blood from the target in order to fight for the inheritance."

In Japan, "爱人" (àirén) means mistress.

Private detectives in Japan are not as glamorous as they are portrayed in TV dramas and anime, where they are constantly embroiled in major criminal cases. While the Japanese police may be incompetent, they are not so destitute as to rely on private detectives as saviors.

Private investigators often operate on the fringes of the law, and secretly filming, stalking, and trespassing are commonplace for them. However, this time, breaking into a morgue has caused quite a stir.

"They're really rich; even in death they cause a disturbance."

After exchanging a few words, the two went their separate ways, each on one side, and began to open the isolation cabinets to examine the bodies inside.

The short, stout security guard went to the east side, opened the topmost compartment, and found that the corpse in the first compartment had a relatively normal face, but was not in a particularly gruesome state. He immediately breathed a sigh of relief, silently uttered "Amitabha," pushed it back, and then prepared to open the next compartment.

Then, a faint sobbing sound was heard coming from the cubicle:

"Alas, alas, alas—"

"My God! It's haunted!"

The short, stout security guard's face turned deathly pale in an instant. His mind went completely blank, and he immediately screamed and scrambled backward.

"What are you yelling for? Are you trying to provoke someone?"

Detective Sasaki heard the short, stout security guard scream and rushed over. He then saw the guard huddled in a corner, pointing a trembling finger at the isolation room, his teeth chattering.

"The corpse, the corpse is crying..."

Detective Sasaki's expression changed. He also heard a faint sobbing sound, and his scalp tingled instantly. But he still mustered his courage, stepped forward, and pulled open the isolation room door.

A male corpse lay in the isolation ward, his mouth slightly open, and faint sobs could be heard coming from it.

Detective Sasaki scrutinized him for a while, his nose twitched slightly, and he made a face as if he was about to vomit.

But the stench gave him a sense of security. He took out gloves and a mask from his trench coat pocket, put them on, and then covered the corpse's mouth with his hand, abruptly stopping the wailing.

"Don't worry, it's not a ghost. It's just the sound of gas being expelled from the mouth as the enzymes in the digestive organs continue to break down food residue after death."

Detective Sasaki immediately offered a scientific and reasonable explanation, and he comforted the short, stout security guard.

"But……"

Even with a reasonable explanation, the terrifying noise still made the short, stout security guard's legs go weak, and he couldn't even stand up.

"Hurry up and find it! If we can't find the target's body, we won't get any more money, not even the agreed-upon 500,000 yen!"

Lured by the money, the short, stout security guard overcame his fear of the corpses and bravely continued to open the isolation cabinet.

Detective Sasaki searched the westernmost rows of isolation cabinets but found nothing.

At that moment, he noticed a corpse covered with a white sheet lying on a stainless steel bed against the west wall.

Detective Sasaki stepped forward, about to remove the white sheet covering the corpse.

His hand was still outstretched in mid-air when the corpse sat up on the spot!

Detective Sasaki froze instantly, his entire body like a rusted robot, his expression frozen in a flash.

Although Detective Sasaki knew that fresh corpses sometimes twitch and move their limbs, it was impossible for them to make such a big commotion!

The previous cries from the corpse could be explained by the expulsion of gas from its mouth, but how do you explain the corpse suddenly sitting up? No matter how much gas it expelled, it couldn't possibly support a human body, could it?

"vomit!"

The corpse didn't jump off the stainless steel bed; instead, it turned to its side and began vomiting violently.

Seeing this lifelike reaction, Detective Sasaki regained a little of his senses and looked closely. He noticed that the corpse was still wearing a security guard uniform.

This is not a case of a corpse rising from the dead; it's a perfectly healthy person hiding in the morgue, fast asleep.

After the unidentified security guard removed the white sheet covering him, a strong smell of hangover hit Sasaki's nose. After vomiting, the guard lay back down on the bed and fell fast asleep.

"Ito, do you know this drunkard?"

Detective Sasaki wiped the cold sweat from his forehead and said in a somewhat stiff tone.

He wouldn't admit that he was genuinely terrified for a moment and almost ran away.

"It's Xiaofeng from the monitoring room. I was wondering where he'd gone. He reeks of alcohol; how much did he drink? He's been hiding in the morgue, slacking off. He's a real pay thief!"

The short, stout security guard walked over, looked at the sleeping guard, and said indignantly.

The short, stout security guard seemed to have completely forgotten the fact that he had betrayed his own people and brought outsiders into the morgue.

"Forget it, let's hurry up and look for it, lest things get complicated."

Detective Sasaki shook his head. The feeling of being in the morgue was really unpleasant; he felt like his heart was about to jump out of his chest from all the sudden shocks.

The two split up again to search for the target's body. This time, it took them five minutes to search from both sides toward the middle. Just as Detective Sasaki opened a partition, another unexpected incident occurred.

A commotion erupted at the entrance to the morgue, followed by the clattering of keys and the sound of a key opening the door.

It looks like someone's coming!

Detective Sasaki looked around and found that the morgue was very empty, with no place to hide anyone.

With a determined effort, he crawled into the isolation room where the corpses were kept, and whispered to the short, stout security guard:

"Quickly, push the isolation ward up!"

The short, stout security guard was immediately thrown into a panic and hurriedly pushed the isolation room up.

In the blink of an eye, the morgue door opened the moment the isolation room was pushed up, and two nurses pulled a gurney one after the other, on which lay a body covered with a white sheet.

"Are you a security guard? What are you doing here?"

One of the older nurses looked at the short, stout security guard with suspicion.

The short, stout security guard's eyes darted around, and he pointed to the guard still fast asleep on the stainless steel bed inside the morgue. He quickly came up with a plan:

"I came here looking for him. I didn't see him during working hours, so I searched floor by floor until I found him sleeping in the morgue."

"Why are you sleeping here? If someone were to see you unexpectedly, they would be scared half to death."

The nurse looked at the security guard lying inside with a disgusted expression. Her attention was diverted, and she didn't investigate further.

"Could you please help us put this body into the isolation room?"

The short, stout security guard and two nurses worked together to place the remains into the isolation room.

"Please take your colleagues out. The morgue is not a place for you to sleep."

"Yes, yes, yes!"

The short, stout security guard, feeling guilty, quickly nodded and bowed.

After the two nurses left, the short, stout security guard quickly returned to his original position and opened the isolation room.

"The person is gone, you can come out now."

Detective Sasaki climbed out of the isolation room. Besides him, there was a male corpse in the isolation room. Seeing this, the short, fat security guard couldn't help but admire him. Sasaki was really audacious to dare to crawl in and huddle in a small, dark isolation room with a corpse. An ordinary person would never do such a thing.

Detective Sasaki was also pale-faced. Being in the same room face to face with a cold corpse like this was clearly not a pleasant memory.

"Sasaki, isn't this the target we've been looking for?" The short, stout security guard said with delight, pulling out a photo to compare.

"That's him!"

Although there were some minor hiccups, everything turned out alright, and we finally found our target, thus securing the two million yen.

Detective Sasaki took out a small camera and took several photos of the deceased's face.

Then he plucked a few strands of hair from the target and carefully put them into the evidence bag. Next, he took out a lancet and deeply inserted it into the target's finger.

Because the target's blood had long since dried up, Detective Sasaki had to expend a great deal of effort to collect a blood sample from the body.

"Okay, all done!"

"Then I'll go and move that drunk Xiaofeng out. If there's nothing else, let's leave. I can't stay in this morgue any longer."

Taking advantage of the short, stout security guard turning his back, Detective Sasaki's eyes flashed, and with lightning speed, he took off the platinum wedding ring on the target's right hand and stuffed it into his pocket.

"In the end, it'll just benefit the crematorium anyway, so I might as well benefit myself."

Before Detective Sasaki arrived, he had done his research. The crematorium that cooperated with the medical university hospital would extract precious metals such as gold and silver from the ashes.

Cremated remains contain precious metals from treated teeth, artificial joints, pacemakers, and other materials. Extracting and refining these precious metals from cremated remains is a lucrative business in Japan.

According to the Kyoto City government, which has already taken this measure, their annual revenue could increase by 120 million yen.

Since the government was profiting from the dead, Detective Sasaki felt no pressure and waited to leave the morgue with the short, fat security guard.

"Knock, knock, knock!"

Just then, a knocking sound came from inside the morgue.

The dull, strange knocking sound was like a pre-set alarm clock, rigidly and inflexibly ringing at a fixed frequency.

"Knock, knock, knock!"

Detective Sasaki looked in the direction of the sound, his scalp tingling, and goosebumps instantly covering his entire body.

Because the knocking came from the very isolation room where he had previously been.

"What's that sound? Is it the sound of a gas leak again?"

The short, stout security guard carried the drunkard over. He had also heard the strange knocking and looked at Detective Sasaki with suspicion.

"Never mind that, let's hurry up and go!"

Detective Sasaki's face turned pale. He swallowed hard and slowly took two steps back, his body stiff.

The previous isolation room was pushed open from the inside out, and a man with a pale face and lividity sat up straight, his gray eyes staring blankly and lifelessly at Detective Sasaki:

"Give it back to me—"

(End of this chapter)