Chapter 53 Section 16

"This little injury is okay... I accidentally got it when I was playing with my dog..." I explained to Morino who was going downstairs with a black schoolbag in one hand. After school on December 4th, Morino and I walked out of the classroom together, chatting while walking.Passing the landing of the stairs, she pointed to the red scratch on my neck and asked what happened to the wound. "Ah? So that's how it is. It must have wanted to kill you back then." "The dog is trying to kill me?" "That's right." She nodded reassuringly.In fact, these are the scars left in the ruins of the hospital last night. There are several other wounds from the fight on other parts of my body, but they are hidden by the school uniform I am wearing so I can’t see them.

"By the way, I've been collecting relevant information for the past few days in order to make a newspaper clipping book about Hiroko Kitazawa's murder." She kept getting all kinds of information from people she met in the library.I asked her the person's name a few days ago, but she didn't tell me.I had planned to investigate the details of that person, but then I gave up. "Has all the information been collected?" "It's not close. If I interview the murderer myself, I think it will be perfect." We walked out of the school building towards the school gate. As she walked, she explained to me that the case was actually far more curious and weird than the police announced.The sun was already setting, and the cold wind kept blowing on our faces.From the school building to the school gate, there is a spacious boulevard lined with trees on both sides, and now only a few people are walking on the road sporadically.There was silence all around, only the white plastic bags fluttering freely in the wind.

As we walked out of the school gate and were about to cross the road, I spotted Kitazawa Natsumi in a convenience store across the road.Just like when we met again a few days ago, she was standing in front of the magazines in the convenience store, looking at me through the glass window of the convenience store. I stopped in front of the convenience store, and Morino, who was walking beside me, also stopped. Standing in the store, Kitazawa Natsumi put down the book in his hand, and even when he put the book down, he didn't take his eyes off me.She went through the store door and went outside.

There is a small parking lot in front of the store that can barely park a few cars, and she and I are standing on the opposite side of the parking lot.The fluorescent lamps in the store let out a few rays of light, which just illuminated the two of us. Last night, I killed someone beside her.At that time, she was squatting on the ground holding the tape recorder.The dagger, which has been lonely for a long time, no longer makes an annoying sound because of thirst. However, I didn't have time to pay attention to her at all, and finally left her there alone, and then left the ruins alone.She didn't pay attention to the vicious fight that was happening beside her at that time, presumably she didn't know how much blood she had shed before she saw me walk out of the school gate!

When I was about to say hello to Kitazawa Natsumi, Morino who was standing beside me spoke first.She kept staring at Kitazawa Natsumi's face. "Are you Miss Kitazawa Natsumi?" "……yes." "As expected, you and your sister look alike in the newspaper photos." "It's a photo when the hairstyle hasn't changed..." "Yes. I'm investigating the incident about your sister out of curiosity. I haven't seen a picture of you, so when I saw you standing here two days ago, I just thought you look too much alike." "Are you investigating my sister?"

Kitazawa Natsumi looked exhausted, and cast doubtful eyes on me. "It seems that someone revealed relevant information to her, but she didn't tell me in detail..." I add this.Suddenly, Kitazawa Natsumi showed a complicated expression on his face. Morino turned to look at me.Although she still looked expressionless, her voice was filled with curiosity and excitement. "Kamiyama, what is the relationship between you and Ms. Kitazawa..." I didn't make any answer, just took out the change from my pocket and handed it to Morino.Morino looked at the coin and asked me: What is this?I told her softly: there is a soda machine about 100 meters ahead, please go and buy me a bottle of juice.

"Although there is a convenience store right in front of us, I just want to drink the juice from the soda machine, so...of course I didn't push you away to prevent you from hearing our conversation." Morino looked at me, then at Kitazawa Natsumi, hesitating for a moment.Still, she turned around and walked toward the soda machine. "It seems that she didn't find anything, including the fact that she herself was once regarded as the next target..." After listening to Kitazawa Natsumi's words, I nodded slightly. Kitazawa Natsumi and I watched Morino's shrinking back closely.The sky gradually darkened, and Morino's back seemed to have been swallowed up by the darkness.Whenever a vehicle passed by, under the flashing lights of the car, her short back appeared in the night.

"...A few days ago, someone gave her a photo of Hiroko's dead body." "Pictures of dead bodies?" "Yes. I don't know who stuffed her with that photo that hasn't been released anywhere else. The photo is indeed Hiroko. The hairstyle is the same as the photo hung at the funeral..." "So, once you know..." "That photo may have been taken by the murderer. Even I half-believe it, but if this is the case, then the murderer who killed Hiroko was deliberately approaching her. In other words, the murderer may choose her as the next target..."

"It seems that you guessed half right... But the murderer was not Morino, but me..." "Since the last time I saw you standing in this convenience store, I had a hunch that the murderer might start to move again. Because your expression was really strange at that time, so I wondered if you met the murderer..." "Oh... so that's why... that's why you sneaked into my house to find relevant evidence, right..." "If not, I'm afraid you wouldn't tell me even if I asked you directly!" A few rays of light from the convenience store cast the shadows of Kitazawa Natsumi and me onto the asphalt in the parking lot, like silhouettes of two people.She looked at the shadow on the ground, nodded slightly, and whispered: "Yes."

"But, Ashu, I really didn't expect you to be such an unusual person..." "You are as different from ordinary people as I am." "I was worried about you last night...you suddenly disappeared...I called you after dawn, but I didn't get through." "My phone broke last night when I was fighting that guy." I used to be in the same class as the murderer of Hiroko Kitazawa.We were not on good terms, and if I had known him a little better then, perhaps I would have discovered that he was different. "Then... what happened between you two?"

I buried his body in the weeds beside the ruins.His savage soul had been subdued by that silvery dagger.Of course, this is just my own imagination.When the dagger pierced deeply into his chest and saw him spitting out blood and moaning softly, I immediately felt a burst of satisfaction in the hand holding the knife handle, which was more shocking than the experience of burying a person in the ground. He seemed to have expected that he would have today.He has always been resigned to his fate, staring at his own blood stains on the ground, kneeling on the ground, presumably he accepted his own death as easily as taking the life of Hiroko Kitazawa!After a while, he looked up at me and said, That's a really good dagger, so he stopped moving. "Is that so... Do you want to call the police?" "You can do whatever you want, but I don't like trouble, can you keep my affairs a secret? I've broken into your house once, too."