Chapter 36 Thirty-six Ghosts Behind

It was 10:30 pm on the first day of the voyage. The nearest port to them was in Shizuoka. Even if the police came by helicopter immediately, it would take at least half an hour.

During this half hour, Date Airlines was obliged to protect the scene and conduct initial evidence collection and investigation.

"From the color and coagulation of the blood on the ground, we can tentatively confirm that the time of death was half an hour to an hour ago." After the ship's doctor and staff arrived, Ida Kou, who had checked the scene in advance, stated his own inference, "This was a premeditated case, not a murder in the heat of the moment."

"There were no signs of struggle on the deceased's body, and his expression was very peaceful. He did not seem to be in pain from being stabbed in the chest, and there were no injuries to his head. This suggests that the murderer may have knocked him down with drugs before killing him."

There was a dark stain on the carpet not far from the body, but it was not a blood stain. Idahang initially judged that it was the drug used by the murderer to knock the victim down.

As he spoke, the young police officer's sharp eyes swept over the man with the earrings who was called over: "So the murderer is likely hiding among us."

Either the murderer entered the victim's room and drugged him, watching him pass out before him before taking action; or he sneaked into the room and drugged him in advance, and then used the room card to open the door after the drug took effect.

Judging from the motive and time of the crime, there are three suspects, namely Kitada Rei's pursuer, the man with earrings, and her colleagues Black Sweater and Natalie. As for Date Kou, who was a policeman and only met her for the first time, he had contact with the waiters on the ship during the time of the crime and had a reliable alibi.

"Please tell me what you were doing at the time of the incident." Ida Ko nodded and said to the man with the earrings.

The man with the earrings looked dazed and couldn't believe Kitada Rei's death. He answered subconsciously, "I was preparing in my room at the time..."

"What preparations?" asked the crew member next to him.

The expressions of the few people present who knew about this all became a little embarrassed - they couldn't say that they were preparing to "violate ship regulations to go on an adventure", right?

Perhaps he was worried that he would be suspected if he remained silent for too long, so the man with the earrings lowered his head and reluctantly told the truth.

Several crew members did not show any reaction to his attempt to violate ship rules, which made Ida Kou feel a little strange.

"It's normal. Every time we sail, there are always a few tourists who want to explore the strange stories of the cruise ship." The crew explained, "But basically no one has successfully entered the lower three floors. Even we are curious, let alone the tourists."

Yi Dahang's heart skipped a beat.

He knew that Toru Amuro's target was the lower three floors. By this time, the other party might have already started to act... I hope there won't be any accidents.

"An hour ago, I was chatting with Rei in her room. After I left, I went to the theater and then returned to my room." It was Natalie's turn to tell the story. After she finished speaking, she looked hesitant and asked the man with the earrings, "Didn't Miyamura-san come with you?"

Ida Kou also realized at this time that more than ten minutes had passed since they found the body, but the man in the black sweater had never appeared!

"That guy said half an hour ago that he couldn't wait any longer and had to go, uh, explore," said the man with the earrings. "When I came over, I didn't see anyone in his room."

Half an hour ago - ten minutes before the body was found.

Date Kou felt something was wrong. Did the man in the black sweater really go to the third floor? Oh no! With the time difference, there was a high possibility that he would run into Amuro Toru!

"That……"

Before the police officer could finish his words, a deafening explosion suddenly rang in everyone's ears, and then the floor beneath their feet began to shake violently.

—

In the file room.

Toru Amuro looked at Nazuki Akae, and Nazuki Akae looked at the ceiling.

After a while, the spirit behind him felt like he was being stared at, and he surrendered, head down and pulled Amuro Toru's arm to hang himself on it, mumbling unconvincedly: "It was all eight years ago anyway..."

Looking at it this way, even Chijiang Nayue felt a little bit guilty.

"If I tell you now whether there is any destroyed data on the ship, will you not come?" Amuro Toru, who has seen through everything, asked back calmly.

There was no need to think too much about the answer; they both knew it: no.

Chijiang Nayue will come, no matter which Chijiang Nayue, no matter what time, he will come and then take the initiative to welcome death as if it were fate.

Toru Amuro never told Akae Nazuki that he had actually been having a strange feeling in his heart for some time.

He always felt that things shouldn't have developed this way. Chi Jiang Na Yue shouldn't have died at the age of eighteen, and he shouldn't have met Chi Jiang Na Yue who returned to the world as a ghost eight years later.

But, he couldn't figure out why he felt that way, and besides, miracles are miracles because they achieve things that shouldn't be achieved. "Okay, you can leave now," Chi Jiang Na Yue urged, "We've found everything we need to find. If someone finds out that the brown-haired guy is knocked unconscious, you're done for."

Toru Amuro looked at the boy suspiciously, and the desire to complain in his heart became stronger again: Will you really give others a chance to discover the brown-haired man?

Come to think of it, at least he didn't say it directly, but turned around and left the file room very cooperatively.

Although it would be a good thing for the public security if they could get the information here, it is impossible for Toru Amuro to move all the information away at will. Now, he can only note the location of the archive room and prepare to contact the public security to collect the information after docking.

What he didn't know was that while he was thinking about what reason he could use to ask the police to search the cruise ship so that Gin would not suspect him, the spirit behind him had already begun to look up at the sky with guilt.

Akae Nazuki would indeed tell Amuro Toru everything he wanted to know, but if he didn't ask, then you can't blame him for not telling you proactively, right?

for example……

'Boom!'

The sound of an explosion rushed into his mind, and Toru Amuro's feet were suddenly shaken and he fell heavily to the side. Thanks to his quick reaction and timely support of his arm in front of his forehead, he was not knocked unconscious. However, his vision was still blackened by the impact.

Amuro Toru struggled to stand up by holding onto the ground, calming his disordered breathing: "What happened?"

No one knew where the explosion occurred. The surrounding lights dimmed instantly and it was pitch dark in the corridor.

Therefore, Toru Amuro did not notice that Akae Natsuki's face darkened at the moment of the explosion, and the smile disappeared from his face. Obviously, he seemed to know something.

"Let's go. I'll explain it later." The spirit behind him spoke quickly. While speaking, he flew to the corner in front of the corridor and looked around to make sure that all the researchers were locked in the laboratory without exception. "There are other explosives. It's not safe here."

The research institute is located on the lower three floors of the cruise ship, which is also the most difficult place to escape. If the bottom of the ship is blown up, this will be the first place to be sucked into the underwater whirlpool.

Chijiang Nayue quickly simulated the internal structure of the cruise ship in her mind and guessed where the explosives were placed.

"Did you know there were explosives on the ship?" Toru Amuro suddenly asked.

He did not stop while talking, and entered the escape passage at the end of the corridor. For a moment, only Amuro Toru's voice echoed in the empty stairwell. "Yes." Akane Nayue's tone did not change, calm and rational, "I know."

"It was the Russian cube who did it. He instigated a few other people to come out last night to install bombs on the ship to conceal their whereabouts." He spoke slowly as he explained, but his tone was serious. "I know he wanted to blow up this research institute."

By now, Toru Amuro had already run out of the pure white corridor of the research institute and successfully returned to the cabin above. The light above his head flashed and then lit up again - it was the backup power supply on the ship.

He leaned against the wall and suddenly felt a pain in his left leg, perhaps because he had hit something when he fell during the explosion.

Toru Amuro didn't care. He just slowed down his pace as he walked out, and most of his attention was focused on listening carefully to what Akae Nazuki said.

In fact, just by looking at the man in the black sweater's behavior last night when he learned that he was commissioned, Amuro Toru could guess without a second thought that the man had ulterior motives for boarding the ship, and was heading to the third floor just like him.

But why did they suddenly attack here? Unless the man in black wanted to die together with them, he should have known that if he detonated the bomb while they were still in the vast ocean, everyone would be buried in the belly of the fish.

The lower three levels will not leave the ship. Since the black hood has already installed the bomb, he can just detonate it after docking safely.

"I'm afraid he heard your conversation with Gin this morning." Akae Natsuki could see Amuro Toru's confusion, and he pointed out, "There are many people in the theater, and even if you lower your voices, there will still be interference from the stage. Anyone who is interested will be able to hear what you said."

Even Akae Nayue's main attention at that time was focused on the memories that were restored by Gin's words, so he didn't take this matter to heart.

They all knew that they didn't actually say anything outrageous, nor were they part of the group chat, they were just 'chatting' for a few minutes.

"But Gin called you by your code name. He called you Bourbon."

Chi Jiang Na Yue didn't even turn around and said gloomily, "It's obvious that the guy has a grudge against the institute."

"The experimental subjects used in this kind of research are usually low-level members who have failed in their missions, or the homeless people you can see everywhere on the streets. If nothing unexpected happens, Tetris became enemies with the organization because of the former. In that case, it's normal for him to know that the code-named members of the organization are all named after wine."

What he didn't say was that the man in the black sweater was more likely to have recognized Gin and guessed that Toru Amuro was also a member of the organization.

The other party probably felt that revenge was risky, and in order to prevent the revenge plan from going to waste, they had to choose this exact time to detonate the bomb in advance.

Chi Jiang Na Yue didn't say it before because he knew that the Black Sweater just wanted revenge on the organization and had no intention of dying together.

Similar to himself eight years ago in this world, yet different.

Of course he knew that the public security might need the information in the archives, but in fact they didn't need it that much. After all, these so-called research data that embodied Sake's hard work were backed by mountains of lives. If this kind of data leaked out, who could guarantee that no one would copy it?

Even if Toru Amuro and Heibei Kuroda can't do it, most of the public security officers can't do it.

But the upper echelons will, some people will.

In Akae Nayue's life of less than thirty years, he was bound in the chain of immortality for fourteen years. He was once Karasuma Renya's greatest reliance in his quest to turn back time and gain a new life.

In order to satisfy Karasuma Renya's greed, he lost the qualification to live in the light and lost the two people who loved him most in the world.

No one knows better than Akae Nayue how much greed can be aroused by the things that sake studies, just as no one knows better than him that one cannot pin their hopes on the group of old oranges at the top having a conscience and not pursuing immortality.

"The archive room must be blown up." Akajyo Natsuki said, "I wanted to do this eight years ago, so I won't stop it now."

He sighed: "But I'm sorry, I didn't expect him to detonate the bomb early."

Amuro Toru stepped onto the deck, took a deep breath of the fresh air outside, then turned to look at the young man behind him who had stopped in front of the corridor, and tried to make his tone sound lighter: "Well, I didn't see anything tonight."

The boy's eyes lit up.