The Daily Life of a Salted Fish Assassin in Anime Crossovers

Mikoto Misumi also extended her hand and gently shook hands with Jiang Hang: "Eagle Eye Detective Jiang Hang, I've been hearing your name a lot lately, whether from Aso or the police from the Metropolitan Police Department."

"Although I'm a little embarrassed, in a recent autopsy case we handled, we found a victim whose death was staged as a suicide, and we also found a note wrapped in tin foil in the victim's stomach that was pleading for help." After a brief exchange of pleasantries, she got straight to the point of the case.

"Logically speaking, this kind of thing should be handled by the Metropolitan Police Department, but I heard that the Metropolitan Police Department wants to close the case as soon as possible. I heard Aso mention that you have some influence in the Metropolitan Police Department, so I thought of asking you to investigate this case."

After listening to Mikoto Misumi's explanation, Jiang Hang pondered for a moment and then nodded: "Tell me the specific case information and about that note."

"Judging from your expressions, since you specifically waited for me at the door instead of in the reception room, you probably already have some guesses, right?"

Mikoto Misumi nodded in amazement: "You truly are a renowned detective. You're right. I happen to have some ideas that I'm about to verify... Although I haven't been very hospitable, if it's alright, to save time, could I explain the details of this case to you in the car?"

Jiang Hang was quite impressed with the woman's strong execution skills. He nodded and then looked at Aso Shinji: "In that case, Aso, can you drive?"

After Asagi became the driver, Kube Rokuro sat in the passenger seat, while Jiang Hang and Misumi Mikoto sat in the back seat and talked about the case.

With the help of Mikoto Misumi and Rokuro Kube, Jiang Hang quickly learned the details of the case.

First, UDI was commissioned by the Metropolitan Police Department to conduct an autopsy on a case of mass charcoal burning suicide.

There were four dead at the scene. One of the deceased was the homeowner of the house where the crime occurred. The police found a suicide website on his computer and confirmed that the deceased was one of the other suicide victims recruited on that website and committed suicide.

According to their autopsies, three of the four bodies did indeed die from carbon monoxide poisoning, and the identities of these bodies had been confirmed by the police. However, when they examined the last unidentified body, they unexpectedly discovered that the cause of death was freezing, which was extremely similar to carbon monoxide poisoning.

Later, they found a piece of paper wrapped in tin foil in the deceased's stomach.

Unfortunately, the contents of this note seem to be incomplete. The text on it consists of "雪男的イ" written in katakana and the phrase "救救花".

Regarding the first sentence of the note, because there are too many words starting with "i", neither the police nor they have figured it out yet, but the second sentence, "Save the flower," is already in the works.

The Metropolitan Police Department quickly located another high school girl named Matsukura Hana who had gone missing a few days earlier. However, based on the judgment of her parents, they denied that the body was their daughter.

Ultimately, the police investigation only uncovered the place where the girl worked and that she used the name "Mike" at her workplace.

"In other words, could this woman, whose identity is still unclear, have been with Matsukura Hana, who is still missing, before she died?" Jiang Hang asked Misumi Mikoto.

Mikoto Misumi nodded in agreement: "That's how we submitted the report to the Metropolitan Police Department. However, the Metropolitan Police Department seems to have taken this note as a coincidence. They think that the deceased may be another girl named Hana, and they identify the murderer as the homeowner who posted the suicide appeal online. They believe that the homeowner worked in a cold storage facility before he froze the deceased to death and then moved the body into his house to die with him."

“But I don’t think so, because we tested the carbon monoxide concentration in the house, and the concentration was much lower than normal. After ruling out other possibilities, there is only one possibility: someone secretly entered the house after the victims committed suicide. I think that person is the real murderer.”

“I see. So that’s why you contacted me. I understand now.” Jiang Hang pressed his forehead with his hand. “However, the deceased didn’t delete his website information before he died, so it seems he was indeed filled with disappointment in reality.”

Anyone with even a sliver of hope for reality wouldn't want their web browsing history exposed to the world.

At least before he dies, Jiang Hang will definitely destroy all his electronic products, leaving no trace.

So where are we going now?

Mikoto Misumi took out a file: "We found some particles in the deceased's hair. After testing, they were found to be salt particles, and the concentration was more than twice that of seawater. In addition, meat with a glycogen level three times higher than that of beef was found in the deceased's stomach contents."

"Taking all these conditions together, I found a place that perfectly meets the above requirements."

Mikoto Misumi took out another promotional poster, which read in large, colorful letters, "Welcome to the Deer Town, Aru-no-Onsen."

"This is a hot spring town in the suburbs of Tokyo that has become quite famous in recent years. It has natural, high-concentration saline hot springs, and venison is also a local specialty. So it is very likely that this is the last place the deceased visited before his death."

Sensing the certainty in Misumi Mikoto's tone, Jiang Hang couldn't help but glance at her again: "Do you know Ms. Gunda Ikumi?"

Before Mikoto Misumi could answer, Asami Narumi answered for her: "It was Ms. Gunda who introduced me to UDI. They were senior and junior students at the same school."

Jiang Hang nodded slightly: "I think if Dr. Misumi became a detective, she would probably look like Ms. Gunda."

“I can’t be like Yumi. I think it’s good enough for me to continue being a forensic pathologist,” Mikoto Misumi quickly waved her hand. Of course, she knew that after resigning from her job as a forensic pathologist, Yumi Gunda was already a well-known and beautiful detective throughout Japan.

Because of her, the forensic medicine department has seen a significant increase in new students in recent years. Regardless of how many of them will persevere, this is certainly a contribution she has made to forensic medicine.

"You're welcome. You do have the potential to be a detective. After all, what you've uncovered is something many superficial detectives are completely unaware of," Jiang Hang praised Mikoto Misumi in a low voice, then took out a laptop. "Do you know the URL of that suicide website? I'll start my investigation from there."

After realizing that his hacking skills could be used in the case, Jiang Hang kept a high-performance laptop in his car to facilitate his investigation.

Mikoto Misumi quickly pulled out a memo saved on her phone and showed it to Jiang Hang.

Jiang Hang quickly logged onto the website.

Although the website administrator seemed to have noticed something was wrong recently and stopped running it last night, Jiang Hang's skills are more than enough to restore the website's data.

After that, under Mikoto Misumi's questioning gaze, Jiang Hang began to hack into the website's backend.

Mikoto Misumi had never seen such an operation with all sorts of codes displayed on the screen before. She couldn't help but let out a soft gasp, which made Rokuro Kube, who was sitting in the passenger seat, turn around nervously to check on Mikoto Misumi's condition.

"Is this the legendary hacking technique?" Mikoto Misumi looked at Jiang Hang with some amazement.

I heard that the other party is only in his early twenties, and is a famous detective with such amazing hacking skills. Dr. Zhongtang said that Jiang Hang is also quite proficient in anatomy, and could easily be an assistant. I really don't know how someone so old has mastered so many skills.

It took Jiang Hang about ten minutes to break through the website's backend defenses and obtain the data from before the website shut down.

This suicide website is actually just a forum-like site, and to be honest, it's a bit of a borderline site.

The website's homepage states, "This is a website for people who want to commit suicide to help each other, not a website that encourages suicide."

However, the posts inside are mostly from people with a pessimistic attitude towards life, venting their dissatisfaction with the world. In addition, the website interface itself uses a dark and depressing style, and even indicates how many people "voluntarily commit suicide" on the website every day.

Jiang Hang glanced at the statistics and found that the total number of people who voluntarily committed suicide on this website was close to 200 million.

Of course, such data is obviously fake to the average person, and it would be quite normal for it to be more than 99% inflated.

In addition, many scoundrels who use sweet talk to deceive others also frequent this website. If someone's psychological defenses are already weak, seeing so many people who "feel the same way" on this website, and being misled by these people's feigned kindness, will indeed make them more likely to go to extremes and end their own lives than under normal circumstances.

In at least this case, three of the four bodies did indeed see this website and communicate with it for a period of time before deciding to commit suicide together by burning charcoal.

"Hmm... We've found the website administrator's IP address. Here it is. I'll contact a police officer I know and ask him to check if this guy has run away."

Jiang Hang naturally contacted Inspector Megure, whom he was more familiar with.

Upon receiving Jiang Hang's information, Inspector Megure on the other end of the phone was in a dilemma. After all, he had heard a little about this case. Although it was under the jurisdiction of their First Investigation Division, it was not a case handled by their team. If they were to intervene rashly, it might have a negative impact on the Metropolitan Police Department.

However, after some hesitation, Inspector Megure ultimately agreed, as it was a matter of life and death. He only asked that the team in charge of the case inform the administrator of the suicide website before arresting him.

However, after overhearing Jiang Hang's conversation with Inspector Megure, Mikoto Misumi hesitated and asked Jiang Hang, "Should we go find the website administrator now? Maybe he's the culprit in this case?"

Jiang Hang shook his head and turned the computer screen to Mikoto Misumi for a look.

"I just looked through it and found a very important place."

"This user named MIKE should be the deceased. When she was venting her dissatisfaction with life, someone with the ID '雪' (yuki) replied and invited her to meet."

"You said that the note had the phrase 'Yuki-onna's XX' written on it. If Yuki-onna refers to this person, then he is the most likely culprit in this case."

Chapter 450: Chapter 446: You want to sell my information? You probably don't know the power of money!

After hearing Jiang Hang's explanation, Mikoto Misumi quickly took Jiang Hang's notebook and started flipping through it.

Sure enough, many of the replies under the discussion thread posted by miki were made by the person with the ID yuki.

Judging from the wording and style of these replies, this Yuki seems to be a girl of similar age to the deceased who also had suicidal thoughts.

As the two chatted, "Xiaoxue" even began to warmly invite Miki to visit her.

"Snowman...so you mean this Snowman is actually a man?"

Seeing this, Mikoto Misumi had fully realized what was going on.

This girl, Xiaoxue, pretended to be a woman online to deceive naive young girls, then lured them to her residence, murdered them one by one, and faked their suicides.

Just like this case.

If it weren't for UDI's intervention and its strong insistence that all bodies undergo autopsies, some less responsible forensic pathologists, after simply determining that the other victims did indeed die from carbon monoxide poisoning, might not have insisted on performing autopsies on all the bodies to increase their workload, thus allowing the real murderer to remain at large.

"In other words, Xiaoxue lured Sanmao and another girl named Xiaohua to his residence on a suicide website. In the end, Sanmao was killed by him first, but before she died, she wrote down a distress signal and ate it."

Although the information currently available cannot explain why the deceased died from freezing, nor can it be determined whether the girl was still alive two days after the incident, Mikoto Misumi will not give up as long as there is a glimmer of hope.

"So, where is Xiaoxue's address?"

This wasn't mentioned in the chat messages on the suicide website; it's likely that the group later used the website's private messaging function to communicate privately.

Mikoto Misumi looked at Jiang Hang with expectant eyes, hoping to get a positive answer from him.

At this point, Jiang Hang certainly wouldn't disappoint.

"I've already hacked into the website's backend and gained administrator privileges. Just by checking the other party's IP address, I can find out where they're accessing the internet. Although I haven't checked the specific address in detail, it's definitely in the Aru Onsen area, which is why I didn't let Aso stop the car first."

"Of course, besides checking the IP address, you should also be able to see their chat history by directly accessing their private messages."

Text is naturally much more intuitive than IP addresses.

Jiang Hang took back his laptop, fiddled with it for a while, and then pulled up their private messages. The message clearly recorded the location where Xiaoxue had invited the two girls to meet.

"Truly worthy of being called a famous detective..." Mikoto Misumi murmured in admiration.

She performed the autopsy on the deceased two days ago, and yesterday, with the help of the Metropolitan Police Department, she found out the deceased's identity. Then, by chance, she learned about the place called Arishika Onsen.

She's going to Aru Onsen just to try her luck and see if she can find people there who met the deceased before his death, and then try to find out the killer's identity from them.

Jiang Hang was called in for help for two reasons. First, Jiang Hang has connections in the Metropolitan Police Department, which can make the police pay more attention to the case. Second, it was also due to Asano Minoru's strong recommendation.

Mikoto Misumi didn't think those famous detectives who frequently appeared in the news were that great, but she witnessed Jiang Hang, after learning about the case, find the killer's traces on the suicide website that they had completely ignored in just a few strokes of his pen, and he also found out the killer's current address with almost no effort.

At that moment, Mikoto Misumi finally realized just how big the gap was between professionals and amateurs like herself.

"Actually, these are just some very basic computer technologies. I've only been learning for a short time, and my current level is barely at the beginner level. Compared to real hackers, I'm still far behind," Jiang Hang said modestly.

Who would have thought that Jiang Hang was telling the truth?

To be honest, Jiang Hang has only been learning hacking techniques for less than a month, and so far, he still doesn't have the "beginner hacker" skill mark on his skill panel. According to the system's evaluation, his current hacking level is indeed just at the beginner level.

Mikoto Misumi was unaware of these intricacies; she simply assumed Jiang Hang was being polite. After all, she was sitting in the back of the car, but having witnessed Jiang Hang's fingers flying across the keyboard, even if she hadn't encountered any skilled hackers, the ease with which Jiang Hang typed on the keyboard suggested he was at a beginner level.

Sitting in the passenger seat, Rokuro Kube spoke up at this moment: "Mr. Jiang Hang, don't be modest. I had some knowledge in this area a few years ago. In fact, I secretly investigated that suicide website these past two days, but I didn't find any useful information until the website stopped operating."

"Being able to retrieve the data from this website is something I can't do, let alone obtain website administrator privileges."

As Kube Rokuro said this, there was even a hint of envy in his tone, perhaps lamenting that he indeed lacked the talent in this area.

He didn't actually join UDI because of his own ideas. In fact, after years of retaking the college entrance exam and finally getting into a third-rate medical school, he already knew that he didn't have any commendable talent in medicine.

He wasted most of his time during his university years.

He could see the end of his life almost immediately if he couldn't get the credits and was expelled from school, or if he barely graduated and ended up working at a small rural clinic.

The turning point, however, occurred a few months ago.

At that time, he met a reporter from a gossip magazine. Under the reporter's encouragement, he was offered a generous reward in exchange for getting into the newly established UDI and finding a way to transmit valuable information from it. In this way, he became a recorder for UDI as a medical student.

Although it was only a third-rate medical school, he could still be considered a proper medical student. It was actually a bit shameful to give up a better-paying job as a doctor and instead go and hang out with a forensic doctor.

However, in order to make money, Kube Rokuro had no choice but to bow his head.