Avez-vous besoin d'acheter un cercueil

Chapitre 67

Aoki shook his head as well.

"But Raiko knows them. And not only has she heard of these words, she understands their meanings perfectly. As I mentioned earlier, I asked Kiba to ask her classmates about these words because I was worried that they might have been taught at school. But her classmates didn't know either. So, if you ask why Raiko knows these words that are generally difficult to encounter—"

I have a bad feeling. I've only seen those three words recently, and several times in fact.

Sure enough, Kyogoku-do pulled out several copies of "Modern Literature and Art".

"This is Master Sekiguchi's 'The Rebirth of the Celestial Maiden,' published last spring. One section of it details the five signs of decay in celestial beings. Next, this is 'Dancing Wonderland,' published last autumn. Ascension to immortality and the corpse-dissolving immortality are both mentioned in this article. Raiko and Kanako will definitely read this when they read 'Modern Literature.' She is one of Sekiguchi Tatsumi's few loyal readers, and there should be no doubt about that."

But,

"Perhaps it really is as you said, that Lai Zi bought 'Modern Literature' and may have even read my 'Dizziness,' but,"

But I still refuse to accept it.

"Just because of that, she—no, how could that be?"

"She—Kusumoto Yoriko—didn't suddenly recall her past memories because of this. Rather, it was after half a month of agonizing and repeated contemplation that she finally came up with this idea. It was after encountering <Dazzling>. So, the 'man in black' that Yoriko mentioned refers to me, and initially, the culprit was just a man wearing 'black clothes,' but after Kiba's more specific questioning, it was upgraded to 'a man wearing gloves.' Because the author of <Dazzling> didn't give this 'killer' any other characteristics. No glasses, no white hair, neither fat nor thin. And Yoriko couldn't possibly describe him as a scholar or a monk, could she?"

Aoki listened, still bewildered.

"But even if this is just Raiko's imagination, then Kanako really did commit suicide? But why would she lie? It wouldn't do Raiko any good—wouldn't it?"

"Benefits? Of course there are. I originally thought it would be better not to mention this—"

"I think the culprit who pushed Kanako was Raiko."

As everyone present tried to decipher the meaning of the sentence in turn, their initial understanding turning into confusion, only Xia Mujin spoke in a cheerful voice:

"Oh, so that's how it is?"

“But Master Chuzenji, this is a bit much,”

Aoki frowned.

"I always felt that this was the case—no, it's not that serious. But when I calmed down and thought about it carefully, it was actually the most obvious conclusion I could come to—it just felt so reasonable that it sounded rather unbelievable."

Bird Mouth continued:

"If this were a detective novel, the author would have been sacked and beaten up long ago."

Kyogoku-do replied with obvious helplessness:

"No ending is unexpected. Only things that are possible exist, and only things that are possible happen. Since there were only two people at the crime scene, and one was killed, the other is naturally the culprit. The police initially concluded that Kanako committed suicide because they couldn't confirm who entered or left the scene, right?"

"Yes, that's exactly right. The station attendant at the ticket gate said that although his memory was a bit hazy, he remembered that no one had passed through the ticket gate between the time of the accident and the arrival of the railway police. Several people did pass through before the police stopped them, but they were all women and elderly people, and they didn't enter through the ticket gate, so they were passengers from the tram that caused the accident. That's why the police concluded it was suicide. There were only six other passengers waiting for the downbound tram, and their identities were all confirmed; the same was true for the nine passengers waiting for the upbound tram. These people stayed only out of curiosity, to join in the fun. The perpetrator couldn't have stayed to watch the excitement—although this is my preconceived notion, common sense dictates—"

"But it's also problematic to treat it as suicide because of that. Why didn't the police suspect Lai Zi?"

"The reason is that Lai Zi doesn't seem to have a motive. She didn't flee the scene, and she also said a lot. Judging from her testimony..."

"I've heard about these things from Grandpa Kiba, and you've probably heard them too, right?"

“Yes, I’ve heard a lot just now. But Kyogoku-do, from what you just said, it seems that Kusumoto Yoriko really liked Kanako—isn’t that right? So why did she have to be killed?”

"From what I've heard so far, you all seem to be motivation-first thinkers, right? There's no point in considering these motivations anyway."

Kyogoku-do made this arbitrary statement.

"Why? If there's no motive, neither the police nor the public can accept it."

"Yes, motive is merely a facade to gain public acceptance. So-called crimes—especially serious crimes like murder—are all convulsive acts. It's foolish to arrange motives as if they were real and gleefully explain crimes. The more widespread the explanation, the more credible the crime, the more serious the circumstances, and the more the public will accept it. But this is just an illusion. People in the world always hope that criminals will only commit such immoral acts in special circumstances and under special mental states. That is, they want to remove crime from their daily lives and banish it to the extraordinary world. This is tantamount to indirectly proving that they are averse to crime. Therefore, the easier the reasons for crime are to understand and the further away from daily life, the better. Inheritance, resentment, revenge, romantic entanglements, jealousy, self-preservation, maintaining reputation, self-defense—each of these is easy to understand and not something that happens easily in the lives of ordinary people. But if you ask why they are easy to understand, it's because these things, though seemingly difficult to happen, are actually of the same nature as the emotions that often occur in their hearts, only differing in scale."

I remember hearing this passage when I was lost on my way to the Asami Masaka Research Institute.

“I’ve already heard Atsuko explain your theory. It’s not that I can’t understand it, but I still think it’s too arbitrary. Ignoring the process of reaching the crime is tantamount to confusing intent with negligence.”

“Negligence is an accident, but there is also so-called indirect intent. The distinction between the two must be handled very carefully. It is just very difficult.”

“But, Kyogoku-do, this will make it impossible to maintain social order. A crime is a crime not only because the act itself is not recognized by society, but also because of the invisible aspects of morality and ethics. If we ignore the motive, we won’t even have room for discretionary sentencing.”

"But if even morality and ethics are restricted by law, that becomes a politics of terror. Shouldn't thoughts and beliefs remain free, independent of the law? The law should only be effective for actions. If merely thinking makes one a sinner, then almost everyone is a sinner. Everyone has motives; no, everyone has planned murders, they just haven't carried them out. Neither ethics nor morality are created by law, but rather by a giant monster called society that inexplicably created something—it's an illusion."

I understand perfectly well that arguing with him is pointless.

"—So, does that mean that a criminal's confession—is always made in order to gain acceptance from those around them?"

"Leaving aside statements regarding the facts, I believe confessions are not admissible as evidence. The motive only came to mind later when questioned. But at that point, the perpetrator, like everyone else, was in the position of a bystander. To return to normalcy, they desperately tried to come up with a reason they could accept—that was the motive. Whether this was true or not, not only could a third party not determine it, but the perpetrator himself could not confirm it. Don't you think that discussing this is meaningless, and that pretending to be fully knowledgeable and talking at length about the crime is an extremely foolish act?"

Aoki had no way to refute it; it was only natural.

Yes, the only one who could shatter Kyogoku-do's opinion is probably Kiba.

Reasoning with him is useless.

"Moreover, when neither the individual nor those around them can find a credible motive, it is judged as a lack of social responsibility. I think this is a form of escapism. Everyone thinks that as long as they throw things they don't understand into a black box called mental illness or neurosis, that's enough. This is the opportunism that the world excels at. But for the real neurotics or mental patients who are treated as dumping grounds, it's just a huge problem. And just being labeled with this label is equivalent to being acquitted and exiled from society, banished to the wilderness. Isn't it putting the cart before the horse to discriminate against criminals and let them go free? How foolish!"

"Then what attitude should we take towards crime? I don't understand."

Aoki seemed very hesitant.

"So what I'm trying to say is that demanding too much of a motivation is no different from encouraging prejudice-based discrimination; both are attempts to expel the abhorrent filth called crime from everyday life. Moreover, judging crime as a personal problem is a one-sided act of violence; criminal behavior cannot be reduced to an individual's aptitude. You wouldn't happen to be followers of Lombroso (Note 1) or Kretschmer (Note 2), would you?"

Note 1: Cesare Lombroso (1835-1909) was an Italian criminologist who advocated the theory of innate criminality. He believed that some people are born with criminal traits, while others could be inherited across generations. He also proposed that criminals could be identified through certain physiological characteristics.

Note 2: Emst Kretschmer (1888-1969) was a German psychiatrist who attempted to link the onset of mental illness with certain physical characteristics. He also believed that some mental illnesses were easily detected in specific body types.

I don't think anyone has heard of this, not even a question about it.

"Perhaps the field of criminal biology should be reformed and promoted in the future, but discussing inferior genetic traits or physical characteristics now would be strongly condemned. However, the so-called motivation for crime is gradually becoming indistinguishable from the concept of innate criminality—the idea that a criminal's criminal qualities are inherent. As long as it's labeled with something like 'that person committed this crime because of this and that,' everyone will accept it—it's just a disguised form of innate criminality. But this tendency will likely continue to grow in the future. I've heard of a rare, incredibly stupid scholar who advocates that personality can be determined by blood type, which is also no different from innate criminality. This kind of hidden discrimination is most prevalent in societies where it's impossible to openly discriminate against 'outsiders' and 'outcasts.'"

"Are you suggesting that attributing a crime to a motive is a discriminatory act that excludes the offender? But if you remove the motive from the crime, what's left?"

What was the original meaning of Kyogoku-do?

"Crime is actually a product of society. In the last era, it was a legal form of killing for revenge; now it has become a case of retaliatory killing. I don't know which society is correct, but undoubtedly, different societies will have completely different legal norms for the same behavior."

"You mean—crime is not caused by individuals, but by society?"

"There is such a view. That is, that crime is a group phenomenon, merely a function of the social and economic conditions at the time the behavior occurs. It is believed that criminals are products of the social and economic environment. However, this view requires a statistical approach to crime, taking averages, most frequent values, medians, and other numerical values, imagining an 'average person' that does not actually exist, and regarding those who deviate from this average person as criminals. But this also has problems, because this so-called monster of an average person does not exist, and saying that one deviates from it is utter nonsense. My view is that crime is like a passing demon that suddenly appears and then suddenly disappears."

"Passing Demon" is the name of a type of yokai (supernatural monster), I've heard of it before. Kyogoku-do once said that the so-called "passing evil spirits" originally referred to this type of yokai.

"I think the most accurate description of Kusumoto Yoriko's behavior at the time is that she was possessed by a passing demon."

"Huh?"

"I'm saying, on a quiet platform late at night, a girl is standing on the edge of the platform, a train is about to pull into the station, and you're standing behind her. There probably won't be any witnesses if you act now. Sekiguchi, what would you do in this situation?"

this--

I also considered this issue while I was in the car.

"You only get one chance. Just before the trolley stops—going too fast or too slow is not an option; missing the window even slightly can lead to an irreparable mistake, and the trolley is getting closer and closer. Okay, so what would you do?"

If it were me—

Generally speaking—

From behind her, forcefully—

“Normally, we wouldn’t do such a thing; we can suppress most impulses. But—there are times when we can’t suppress them. In an instant, a mere fraction of a second. In that extremely short moment, the demon slipped past her. Therefore, when she pushed Kanako from behind, she felt no hatred, resentment, or other dark, human emotions—”

After Kyogoku finished speaking, he raised both hands.

"She just found pimples on Kanako's back."

pimples

On the neck of the vegetable.

"I see—what Brother Xia saw was..."

"It's acne."

"While Natsu's hallucination isn't enough to prove anything, the pimple he saw was a little lower on his neck. I heard that the new uniform for Takaba Girls' Academy is a suit style, and Yuzuki Kanako isn't wearing a sailor uniform or a one-piece dress with a hole in the back. It's impossible for Raiko to be standing more than a meter away from Kiba as she described and still be able to see that pimple. Listen carefully, if there really was a pimple in the location Natsu pointed out on Sekiguchi's body, it wouldn't be visible unless it was almost right next to his back and you were peering down into his collar."

"Hmm, I see—"

Aoki had already witnessed Natsuki's abilities firsthand in the previous incident. Toriguchi, on the other hand, although he had heard the explanation, seemed unable to understand and gaped in surprise.

“Raiko testified to Kiba that the prisoner pushed Kanako Shun down, and the reaction force of his escape also pushed her down. But that’s impossible. If they were standing very close together, they would have to be pushed down together; if Raiko had been pushed aside first and then Kanako down, the train would have missed its arrival. Besides, Kanako and Raiko are about the same height, have the same hairstyle and uniform, and would probably look very similar from behind in the dark. I don’t think the prisoner could tell them apart under those circumstances.”

"That's true."

"Conversely, if Lai Zi were to push Kanako down at extremely close range, he would also fall backward due to the reaction force, which would result in him slumping down near the telephone pole—this is my guess. However, I haven't been to the site to test it, so I can't say much more."

"Kyogoku is right."

"Natsukizu said."

"But—how could such a close friend do such a thing—"

Aoki seemed to be greatly shocked.

"Aoki, if you're so keen on finding a motive for the crime, I can offer a few interesting explanations for your consideration. However, I don't want you to directly link them to the crime, and I also don't want to see you develop a prejudiced view of the Kusumoto mother and daughter after hearing these explanations—"

Kyogoku-do seemed unable to bear seeing Aoki's distress any longer. After stating the above premise, he then turned his gaze toward me for some reason.

“Kusumoto Yoriko seems to have a rather strong Ajatasatru complex.”

"What is that? What kind of sea sand aquatic fish (Note 1)?"

Note 1: A homophone for "乌口" (Wu Kou). The pronunciation of "海沙利水鱼" (Hai Sha Li Shui Yu) is slightly similar to "阿阇世" (Ajashi). "海沙利水鱼" originates from the famous crosstalk story "寿限无" (Shou Xian Wu). The story of "寿限无" is roughly as follows: A man hoped his child would live to be a hundred years old, so he consulted with a learned monk and finally chose an extremely long name: "寿限无寿限无五劫互磨海沙利水鱼之水行未云来末虱来末食处睡处与住处结实累累的薮柑子白宝白宝白宝之修林刚修林刚之古林泰古林泰之朋朋可比之朋朋可那之长久命之长助" (Shou Xian Wu Shou Xian Wu Wu Jie Hu Mo Hai Sha Li Shui Yu Zhi Shui Xing Wei Yun Lai Mo Shi Lai Mo Shi Chu Shui Chu Yu Zhu Chu Jie Shi Li Li De Shou Gan Zi Bai Bao Bai Bao Bai Bao Zhi Xiu Lin Gang Xiu Lin Gang Zhi Gu Lin Tai Gu Lin Tai Zhi Peng Peng Ke Bi Zhi Peng Peng Ke Na Zhi Chang Jiu Ming Zhi Chang Zhu). However, because the name was so long, the children who came to play nearby would only call his name a few times before it got dark.

"Toriguchi asked. Kyogoku-do's gaze just now was probably indicating that he wanted me to answer."

"The Ajatasatru complex is probably the emotional complex mentioned by Dr. Furusawa (Note 2) in his book 'Two Kinds of Sinful Consciousness.' If so, let me think... a tendency to have the desire to kill one's mother because of love for her—hey, Kyogoku-do! What exactly are you trying to do..."

Note 2: A Japanese psychiatrist. 1896-1968. Founder of the Japan Psychoanalytic Society.

"Dr. Furusawa combined the Ajatasatru complex with oral sadism. It's a contradictory mindset where pleasure and destructive desire coexist. Based on affection and coquetry, it generates hatred and aggression arising from alienation. After experiencing aggression, forgiveness and guilt follow, leading back to a sense of unity—in short, a cycle of the above psychological process. This complex combination of elements forms the Ajatasatru complex. This concept is often compared to Freud's Oedipus complex. I believe the Ajatasatru complex is an indispensable theory for understanding Japanese emotions. It's just that Dr. Furusawa himself doesn't talk about this theory much publicly."

To put it more simply...

Natsume said with dissatisfaction.

"This is a feeling of alienation, hatred, and contempt that arises from excessive love for one's mother. It is especially easy to develop after witnessing the sexual behavior of both parents during adolescence. The children discover that they were born under such indecent and sordid behavior, which leads to an unventable sense of contradiction. It seems that this is the case with Kusumoto Yoriko."

Kimie's testimony does indeed support Kyogoku-do's statement.

Lai Zi had spied on Jun Zhi and her second husband's intimate moments in their bedroom.

Lai Zi,

Lai Zi hates me.

No, it's hatred.