CHAPTER 10
Shinji
What should’ve been a twenty minutes drive to Higashikurume ended up as forty minutes one because of the weather.
The car reached the quiet neighborhood where the castle was hidden.
Trees with rich green crowns tilted in the houses’ yards.
Since he was in his personal car, Shinji parked right in front of the storage building with white walls and plain double doors locked with a heavy padlock that housed the bubble dimension where the Onmyōryō castle hid.
The guard sat on a chair under the canopy, tapping on his phone.
He looked up at Shinji and checked his ID when Shinji handed it.
Just as he did that it occurred to Shinji that no Onmyōryō IDs had been found among the four victims’ belongings.
Supernaturals didn’t take their IDs with them unless they were coming to the HQ in order to avoid someone else finding them in case they lost them.
He’d hoped the Onmyōryō’s database would offer more details.
The guard used his energy to hide all of them before the storage building’s doors transformed into a karamon gate with an undulating black bargeboard and golden motifs of chrysanthemums and cranes in flight. Shinji stepped inside the yard after the doors opened.
“Couldn’t help but notice that your gate and this gate are similar,” Tamura said.
“That’s because the karamon gates were the point of inspiration when the Shinigami gates were created,” Shinji explained.
“The gates exude a feeling of power being so imposing and beautifully crafted. The Onmyōryō has control over the supernatural world while the Shinigami have control over spirits and veil that separates life and death.”
“Fascinating.” Tamura nodded.
“Gotta agree with him,” Keiko mumbled.
Tamura smiled at her, then looked at the castle. “Quite the structure,” he said. But something in his tone sounded a little mocking to Shinji.
The castle was beautiful, five stories high and stretching into the distance. Its walls were beige and the roofs were curled and black. The protective wards placed around shone golden.
“Difficult to keep warm during winter, though,” Tamura added.
“There are no seasons here,” Shinji said. “This is a bubble dimension with the same temperature every day of the year. The sky’s fake, too.” He pointed at the deep space sky hovering above them.
“Quite convenient. Could’ve used such a place to save some money. Everything is expensive nowadays.”
“Who is this passionate about economy when they’re dead?” Keiko growled under her breath.
Shinji chuckled because he had heard all sorts of things from ghosts over the years, so nothing surprised him.
He walked up the stairs, through another barrier of energy at the entrance of the double sliding doors.
He left Tamura and Keiko to admire the castle—much to Keiko’s disdain—and headed straight to the healing room on the castle’s first floor.
He dashed along the corridor, dodging people, getting a few curious looks, but he didn’t care.
He was on a mission to replenish his reiryoku fast, then get information about the victims and the extractions, and afterwards finally go home to Teruo.
He stopped in his tracks when his gaze fell on none other than Commissioner Horiuchi Shinobu.
What’s she doing here? Dumb question, he realized.
She was an Onmyōji. Of course she’d be around the castle.
But the problem was that she stood right in front of the healing room, speaking with a few people who were walking in and out, golden energy trailing all around them.
A dreadful feeling took over Shinji as he approached.
“Good evening, Commissioner.” Shinji bowed.
“Hello.” She smiled. “Sergeant Miyazaki, correct?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You’re here for the healing room?” She pointed to the chamber.
“Yes… May I?”
“Not possible right now. All healing rooms are out of service at the moment. They’re filling them up with healing energy.”
Shinji managed to choke out the words, “All of them?”
Her lips curved in a wide smile, looking rather creepy. “Yes. Is that a problem?”
“I… uh…” He made two steps back. “I’ll just look for a healer.”
“They’re all busy with the healing rooms. Surely you can let your energy replenish on its own, right?”
Shit. Shit. Shit. What the hell? Of all days, they had to do it today and all at the same time? He didn’t remember this ever happening. He almost wanted to blame Horiuchi, but that was ridiculous, wasn’t it?
“Right,” he muttered.
After offering a curt bow, Shinji turned on his heel and rushed away from her. Cold sweat dripped down his spine. No wonder Teruo disliked her so much. She gave off such a strange vibe.
It hit him that since Horiuchi was here, he could speak to her about the extractors, but he was too wound up right now, and decided to first do research on his own, then based on what he found, he’d approach her.
Since it didn’t make sense for all healing chambers to be closed down, he went to the reception area and inquired about the situation.
But the receptionist confirmed it. They really were closed down.
He’d have to go home drained, tired, and a danger to Teruo.
He’d lock himself up in the guest room. It was far enough from all the other rooms in the house to put a safe distance between them.
“Hey.” Keiko frowned when he reached her. “You don’t look healed.”
“No shit.” Shinji grunted. “Let’s go to the fucking database of this fucking—” He stopped and cleared his throat. “Just follow me. Where’s Mr. Tamura?”
“Hell if I know. Frolicking on the castle grounds, offering financial advice to dead people.”
Shinji waved a hand. “We’ll get him afterwards. I need to do research about the victims.”
“Okay…” She floated in front of him. “Why are you not healed?”
“All the healing rooms are out of service,” he replied through gritted teeth.
“All of them? In this huge ass castle?”
“You better believe it.”
“What about healers?”
“Busy.”
“All of them?” she repeated.
“Yes, Keiko, all of the fucking healers in this fucking huge ass castle.” His steps quickened. “Commissioner Horiuchi decided today is a good day to refill the healing chambers,” he whispered through gritted teeth.
Keiko scoffed, but didn’t press further, and quietly followed him to the elevator, then the second floor. He filled out a form to request access to the database, sat down while it was processed, his feet still drenched and cold from the rain, his body exhausted and his energy low.
After given permission to enter, he settled at a large monitor all the way at the back of the room, far from prying eyes. Most of the supernaturals in here were administrative workers, checking data, and walking back and forth between this room and others.
He put in his ID number, then searched for the companies that the Onmyōryō owned. The list was enormous, but he was concerned only about those pertaining to the case. Just as he reached the first one and clicked on the folder, a “classified” warning appeared on the screen.
“Oh crap…” Keiko said. “Already?”
“Yep. They know, so they classified them and I don’t have clearance.
” He clicked on the next one. “Also classified.” The TMPD’s list of companies related to the case had all been hidden away.
Out of curiosity, Shinji clicked on the one from which he received his payment.
It was accessible. He clicked on three more.
Accessible. This was obviously targeted.
“Fuck’s sake,” he whispered. “I anticipated this, but not so fast.” He checked when was the last time the database had been modified.
Someone made changes today, six hours before he arrived.
“Do you reckon she is responsible?” Keiko referred to Commissioner Horiuchi.
Shinji ran his hands over his face with a groan.
“Most likely, since everything the homicide unit investigates is within easy reach. I’m just not sure what the hell her angle is.
If she wanted to keep things under wraps, she could’ve taken the entire case away.
But she hasn’t. My guess is she’s fine if the TMPD knows of the companies’ existence, but not be able to dig deeper… ”
“So, she is controlling what sort of information you can or cannot know regarding the case.”
“Yep…”
Keiko put her hands on her hips. “Why not just tell you from the beginning? It just makes things even more suspicious, doesn’t it?”
“It does, but we can’t do anything about it besides run in circles since I can’t access the data base. She gave us a grain of rice so we wouldn’t complain, but kept the whole bowl to herself. On the other hand, I didn’t go to her from the very beginning either.”
“True, but she’s the one with access to classified information,” Keiko said. “She’s playing games…”
Shinji just sighed, lost for words.
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” Keiko asked. “If we can’t find out more…”
“We still have the victims. Let’s verify them.” Shinji started with the couple—Nishino Yumi and Shigeharu. The data base confirmed their names, marital status, their next of kin, and they were both shamans, but their jobs at the Onmyōryō were classified. “Are you kidding me?”
Shinji felt like throwing the keyboard out the window, except there were no windows around. He checked the timestamp. No one had accessed it for years, so this wasn’t a recent modification. He continued with Wada Toshio. Everything checked out and he was a healer, but his job was also classified.
“I don’t get what you’re doing,” Keiko said. “Aren’t ‘shaman’ and ‘healer’ their jobs?”
“Not quite. In my case, as a Shinigami, my nature and profession are the same. In their case, their nature—shamans or healers—and occupations are sometimes different. Shamans could be doing anything from putting wards and seals on supernatural dwellings, to working as convoy for elite supernaturals. Some supernaturals have two or three jobs at once because certain tasks within jobs aren’t very time consuming, so they opt to occupy their time with a second job. ”
Their occupations are classified, which means the Nishida couple and Wada Toshio had dangerous jobs.”
“What kinds of jobs are those?”
“Assassinations, for example. It’s what Kazuya does, among other things.”
“Oh…”
Shinji searched for the last victim, Morimoto Hiroyuki whose family Nakagawa couldn’t find. He was, indeed, a widower, but the database mentioned someone the TMPD hadn’t found: a son, sixteen years old.
“Gotcha.” Shinji quickly wrote the address in his phone, took a picture too, just for good measure. “We have to speak with his son.”
“That’s good, yes?” Keiko inquired, sounding concerned.
“Absolutely.”
She let out a relieved breath. “Okay, ‘cause I was getting worried for a second there with all this classified shit.”
“Me too.” Shinji then accessed a different part of the database, where extraction team members appeared.
They were usually low in number, therefore easy to research, and they couldn’t be classified for safety reasons. But he froze when his gaze fell on the name of the current leader of the extractors: none other than Commissioner Horiuchi Shinobu.