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The victim this time was found in a little-traveled alleyway. It was the first time one of the bodies had been found outside.
The stiff was a man in his twenties. Hans Cutel and the community watch were examining the body, and Yukinari asked that he and his companions be allowed to join in. Of course, Hans was not about to refuse a request from Friedland’s guardian deity.
Still, whatever they might have known about science, forensic investigation as such was still new to Yukinari and Dasa. For the most part, they observed from the sidelines as Hans and the watch did their work.
The corpse had already been brought in from the street and set on a cart. Part of Yukinari felt the scene should have been preserved, but it seemed the watch was unwilling to leave the body where it lay. It was only understandable that they should want to bury it as soon as possible.
“One stab through the heart, just like the others,” Yukinari said.
“From directly in front of him, no less,” Hans said, looking at the corpse’s bloody shirt.
“Do we know what weapon was used?”
“A rapier of some description, most likely.”
“A rapier...? Not a dagger or some kind of sharpened stick?”
“Well, there’s an exit wound, meaning the weapon had to be fairly long. And on the wall behind the body, there are some marks that we believe were left by the point of the weapon. A sort of distorted diamond shape. It suggests a thin sword of some type.”
Hans went on to explain that without being at least as long as a grown man’s arm—about 60 centimeters, Yukinari supposed—it wouldn’t have been possible to leave a mark on the wall.
“It’s very strange,” Yukinari said.
“What is?” Fiona asked.
“All these deaths, all the warnings from us, even the townspeople on edge. Don’t you think people would be careful not to get too close to anyone walking around with a sword? And I assume that alleyway is narrow. It wouldn’t be easy to stab someone there.”
“You... might be right about that.”
“Any signs of a struggle?” Yukinari asked.
“None,” Hans replied.
Yukinari figured that the alley where the murder was believed to have taken place was just a little more than one meter wide. Enough for two people to pass by each other, but rather tight for someone to draw a sword and bring it to bear. If you weren’t careful, it would simply hit the wall.
“That at least is a commonality,” Hans went on. “The victims didn’t fight back.”
All the other victims had been found indoors. It obviously hadn’t been possible to glean too much from the heavily decomposed corpse of the first victim, but all of the bodies found after that had been examined, and none of them showed any sign of a fight. They had been taken completely unawares by their murderer.
“There have been no reports of shouts or screams in any of the cases thus far.”
“In other words, they didn’t know what was happening until the moment they were killed,” Yukinari said, crossing his arms. “If all of these murders have been committed by the same person, how are they getting close to their victims? Every single one of these people was killed when they seemed to least expect it.”
“Maybe they’re... invisible?” Dasa said.
“How?” Yukinari asked. “People can’t just disappear whenever they want, can they?”
Admittedly, in his previous life Yukinari had seen a movie about aliens from outer space who used invisibility technology to attack humans. But he very much doubted such devices existed in this world. Even alchemy wasn’t that powerful.
“Maybe they use smoke...”
In other words, they didn’t turn themselves invisible, but hid themselves long enough to commit a crime. It was possible.
“I don’t know. That might work outside, but I don’t think it would be feasible indoors.”
Wouldn’t smoke make people think fire, and wouldn’t fire make them call out or try to run? They wouldn’t just wait around for the killer to get close to them.
“Mn,” Dasa grunted, and frowned.
“It would make the most sense if the killer was someone they already knew... Is there any single person known to all of the victims? Someone they wouldn’t suspect?”
Fiona and Hans looked at each other. Then they both looked at Yukinari.
“What?” he asked. “Think of someone?”
“There is someone who might fit the description,” Fiona said.
“Who?” he pressed her.
She hesitated for a moment, then replied, “You, Yukinari.”
Yukinari said nothing, lost for words. Now that he thought about it, she was right. Just about everyone in Friedland knew his face. And they certainly would never expect him to harm them in any way.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Fiona said. “Trust me, I’m not suggesting you’re the culprit. I said ‘someone’ fits that description, but the same is true of me and Ulrike.”
“I guess you’re right,” Yukinari said. Fiona and Ulrike were also both well known to the people of Friedland. And, again, unlikely to be suspected of any malicious intent.
“Yukinari,” a voice called, drawing closer to the cart. It was Ulrike herself.
“Ulrike. Find anything?”
“We familiars are patrolling the area on the assumption that the ne’er-do-well may yet be nearby.”
“Have you seen anyone suspicious?”
“Mm. We attempted to ask the villagers if they’d seen anyone unfamiliar or strange lately... But we were told, ‘I would have to say you’re pretty strange.’”
“I guess they’re not wrong...”
Ulrike, who was so frequently seen with Yukinari, might be an exception, but the other familiars didn’t usually appear in town. The people of Friedland could see them as strangers, obviously unusual creatures. It was understandable if the villagers considered the familiars bizarre.
“I am sorry,” Ulrike said.
“No, it’s all right,” Yukinari answered, looking around and climbing down off the cart. He thought there might be more to learn from investigating the scene of the crime than the body itself. “Keep the other familiars watching the area for the time being.”
Yggdra’s familiars might not be able to catch the criminal outright, but their presence in town was hard to miss. With them around, maybe the killer would feel compelled to lie low. That, Yukinari hoped, might at least keep the immediate area—which included the orphanage—safe.
“I do not know how much good it will do,” Ulrike was saying, “but we will try.”
“Yeah, please d—”
Yukinari stopped in midsentence as he came out into the street. Something utterly unexpected filled his vision. He stood there, frozen—yet he was the only one who noticed it.
“Yuki...?” Dasa came up to him, no doubt having seen that he seemed upset. “What’s wr...ong?”
Yukinari couldn’t answer. He simply couldn’t find the words.
This is unbelievable...
Dasa followed Yukinari’s gaze. But even when she saw it, she could only blink in incomprehension. She didn’t know what it was that had shocked Yukinari so much.
Of course she didn’t. She couldn’t.
Was this... carved with the tip of a sword?
Hans had said there was some sort of scoring on the wall that appeared to have been left by a rapier. A series of spidering lines all connected together in a very small space. Up, down, sideways. There didn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason at first glance, but in fact there was a logic to the scratches. They formed four kanji characters.
Had the criminal done this? If so, this could be a hugely important clue, but it was the clue itself, the four characters, that had pinned Yukinari in place. They said:
Amano Yukinari.
It was his own name, written in four Japanese kanji.
Nothing else. No other words or explanation. But this was obviously not a matter of chance. This was Yukinari’s name as it had been in his previous world. Other than he himself, no one in this world should have known how to write it.