Chapter 921

Kashiwagi Jin sat on the single sofa in the living room of the hotel suite, an open notebook spread before him, its pages filled with timelines and arrows. "Assuming it's some kind of heretical cult ritual?" Lao Ren listened to Professor Ken Tanaka's phone call, then heard Uesugi Muneyuki's request, fell silent for a few minutes, and then spoke.

Tanaka's speech was slower than usual, like someone stacking irregular stones, each step checking they wouldn't collapse.

Using deductive reasoning to analyze cult content is truly strange.

But Uesugi Muneyuki's view isn't without merit, as that extreme animal protection organization already resembles a cult.

"Three girls, each missing an organ. Kidney, spleen, lungs. The boy's organs are all present. The adult woman's heart was taken. These are five different organs. If we place the four children and Yamada Rinka's corpse together, they can be seen as a set of five collectibles. Yamada Rinka's heart. The eldest daughter's organs. The second daughter's organs. The third daughter's organs. The boy's organs intact."

Kashiwagi Jin's fingers lifted from the notebook: "Ahiru is the team doctor for the Seibu Lions. The Seibu Lions have many away games in Kansai, so he can travel with the team without raising suspicion. Within the team, he has permission to access players' schedules, personal data, and injury records. He can use this information to track Souda Sosuke, know Souda and Yamada Rinka's relationship, and know when to approach her without being discovered. He needs someone to take the fall. Souda Sosuke is the perfect scapegoat—famous, with motive, with an alibi that can be questioned." Kashiwagi Jin's gaze lifted from the notebook: "As for the collection order of those five organs..."

He drew a line under each of "heart," "kidney," "spleen," and "lung" with his pen tip: "Why these? Why start with Yamada Rinka? Why are the organs taken from the three girls different? The only explanation is that he's waiting. He's waiting for the 'correct' person to appear, for the 'correct' organ to be taken. He isn't choosing randomly; each organ belongs to someone, and he believes these things can help him achieve some goal."

"What goal, cult goal?" Eirina said curiously: "Five viscera and six bowels—is this some Indian medicine?"

"Indeed, Indian medicine." Uesugi Muneyuki nodded.

Thunder, wind, water, fire, earth, heart, liver, lung, spleen, kidney—these things essentially come from a logic transmitted from India.

In Journey to the West, this influence is deep, for example, Sun Wukong is often called the "Mind Monkey," and his image largely derives from the Indian divine monkey Hanuman, while Wukong's name comes from Xuanzang, and decades later, a monk named Wukong passed through the Tang Dynasty's Western Regions and reached India.

However, regarding this, Journey to the West and Sun Wukong also incorporated many native Chinese elements and stories, so we can only say there is some Indian cultural content, not that it's a direct copy.

For example, after Indian medicine spread east, thunder, wind, water, fire, earth became metal, wood, water, fire, earth—this is the localized theory. After the meridians and acupoints of Indian medicine were introduced, they too were localized, and what about yin and yang? They were simplified into "feeling cold" and "getting angry."

All writings under heaven are largely borrowed; strictly speaking, cultural exchange is mostly you have me and I have you.

"So I suggest immediately checking the adoption records of the Cat's Investigation Team to see if, in the past few years, there are any other cases of adopters going missing or dying. If so, how many of those cases resemble Yamada Rinka's situation—single women living alone, or single mothers with children? If so, open that list; it may already contain those who have been collected, or those still uncollected. Then you'll know how many pieces he's missing and how much time remains." Kashiwagi Jin said.

How much time?

Ahiru doesn't have much time left!

Once MIT releases the results, our side will deploy!

What else can Ahiru do?

Uesugi Muneyuki leaned by the window, hands in his coat pockets.

He looked at Kashiwagi Jin: "Do you think he'll strike again?"

"Otherwise?" Kashiwagi Jin closed the notebook: "Women's emotions are richer, more easily moved by his 'follow-up check.' Choosing single mothers is because having children nearby means she won't easily leave home, won't call police, won't draw too much attention. His target selection isn't random; it's screening. He's always screening. He's verifying whether those targets' organs meet his requirements."

"So I told you to hurry up, hurry up!" Lao Ren pounded the table impatiently.

Minami put her teacup back on the tray, the rim hitting the tray with a clear sound: "If his goal is collection, then three of the four children have already satisfied his needs. If he still needs a female organ, his collection isn't complete. That means another woman will die at his hands."

"What we're waiting for now is the test results." Uesugi Muneyuki pulled his hands from his coat pockets, turned, and walked toward the door: "I'll step out; you keep waiting for the call."

Night deepened, the Shosuke family's courtyard shrouded in winter night's thick fog.

The streetlight's light filtered through the mist, casting blurred shadows on the courtyard ground, fragmented by moisture into countless shards.

Shosuke Menou had already slept; the villa only had the night light at the hallway's end still on, light spreading across the wooden floor as a small warm oval. Footsteps in the wooden hallway made almost no sound, absorbed by the carpet, leaving only an extremely faint, cat-light touch. A black figure stopped at the door, tilted his ear, listened a moment, confirmed the even, long breathing from inside.

He pushed the door open, motion gentle, the door hinge made no sound.

He walked to the bedside, lowered his head to look at the sleeping figure on the bed, drew from his pocket that Zwilling kitchen knife, the blade flashing a cold, thin light under the night lamp's dim glow.

This is the last one!

Goodbye, all magical fish crystal warriors!

Goodbye, the omnipotent Uesugi Chief, your legend of solving every case, will end today!

Because I am about to evolve into a higher existence!

Sinai!!!!

However, at the moment the blade tip was about to fall, a hand shot out from the shadow beside the bed, accurately gripping his wrist. No extra motion, precisely clamped between the ulna and radius.

That figure's body stiffened, he lifted his head, face full of disbelief at the man before him!

He confirmed he'd checked this room, confirmed no one else was inside, confirmed his plan was flawless.

He tried to break free, but that hand's grip exceeded his expectation, as if it had long known he'd appear at that time and place, as if it had waited long for him to walk into this trap.

Uesugi Muneyuki stepped out from the shadow, the night light casting on his face a half-bright, half-profound outline. His other hand pressed the bedside switch; the room lights came on.

Shosuke Menou sat up on the bed, seeing the knife-wielding figure at the bedside, her body shrank back slightly, but she didn't scream, her lips pressed into a line.

She leaned against the headboard, fingers gripping the sheet's edge, watching Uesugi Muneyuki and that figure confront each other: "You……you how……" "Now, let me see your true face, no—or rather, as everyone knows, your true face." Uesugi Muneyuki reached out, pulled off the mask on his face.

Revealing Ahiru's face beneath the mask.

Former Olympic champion, Seibu Lions team doctor, forty-eight-year-old middle-aged man's face.

His eyes widened, pupils contracted slightly: "How could you be here?"

Uesugi Muneyuki looked at him: "Can't I be here? You deduced Souda Sosuke's movements; I deduced yours. You entered this villa; I entered too. You waited so long to act because you know the Shosuke family differs from other targets—it has security, guards, can't be stormed. You waited for her to be alone, waited a long time, didn't you?"

"Obviously, you've been monitoring our side, likely know MIT's results are coming soon, so you couldn't wait, so you came to harvest vegetables, right?" Uesugi Muneyuki said coldly.

"Impressive." Ahiru's gaze shifted from Uesugi Muneyuki's face to Shosuke Menou's face, then back to Uesugi Muneyuki's face, and he suddenly laughed.

That face bore a composed, as-if-everything-under-his-control, slightly upturned arc, with a hint of pathological enjoyment: "Uesugi Muneyuki. I know you, you're impressive!"

"But, you calculated everything, yet still missed one point!"

He raised his other hand, fingers tracing an arc in the air.

Uesugi Muneyuki: "?"

The room's lights began to flicker—once, then twice, three times, four times. The light grew dimmer and dimmer during the flickering until it went out completely.

Everything around turned pitch black.

Uesugi Muneyuki immediately shielded Shosuke Menou behind him, his face showing surprise.

Inner World!

When the light returned, the room was no longer a room.

They stood in a vast space, like the interior of a palace, the ceiling so high its end couldn't be seen, the walls covered with deep red drapes, the drapes embroidered with golden patterns, the patterns wriggling slowly like living things under the light. In the room's center stood a huge, round bed, draped with black velvet sheets, scattered with some utensils of unclear use.

Further away stood rows of shelves, holding glass jars, the jars containing organs soaked in formalin, rising and falling faintly with the heartbeat's rhythm. Each glass jar had a label beneath it, bearing a name and date.

Heart, kidney, spleen, lung.

Missing: Liver

At this time Ahiru stood in the distance, standing beside that round bed, with a satisfied smile on the corner of the mouth.

"Welcome to my domain!"

"I call this place, Desire Palace!"

"Come, Uesugi Muneyuki, let us tally your sins!"