"Apparently Akui showed up," Hikari replied. "Also, don't go into the kitchen."
"Duly noted. I'm not gonna ask why." Shizuna muttered, "I don't understand how he managed to get in. I need to ramp up the security..." and she walked away, still muttering to herself under her breath.
Soon, most of the occupants of the manor were gathered in the living room.
"What do we do with the body?" Shizuna was standing in the living room, staring at Tsukiyama's body.
"How do you guys have absolutely no attachment to him?" Alina questioned, furrowing her eyebrows.
"He never did have the presence of a family member, just a stranger living in the same house." Rihito explained. "You can't feel the loss of a relationship that was never there."
"Yeah. So what do we do with the body?" Shizuna asked again.
No one answered.
"It's weird how there's no blood," Korū said. He crouched beside the body.
"Not really." Alina said. "There's many interesting ways to kill people."
"But Akui wouldn't go out of his way to make sure there wasn't blood. He'd have just slit the guy's throat."
He's got a point. Alina frowned and approached the body, looking for any clues. "There, it looks like he injected something." She was looking at a tiny red spot on his arm. She had almost missed it.
"You're sure it's not something else?" Rihito asked. Alina shrugged, "No way to be hundred percent sure."
Everyone else just stood at the sidelines, wondering how anyone could bring themselves to touch a dead body.
"Oi, Hikari, come look." Korū called. Hikari went over reluctantly, sniffing the body.
"Shizuna, can you identify whatever he used?" Linda asked.
The witch shrugged. "I can try. But this is disgusting."
Cayne went over, watching everything over Korū's very stiff shoulder. Hikari grinned at the sight, momentarily distracted from the body right in front of her.
"What happened to them?" Rihito asked, also observing the pair.
Cayne rested his chin on Korū's shoulder for a second, then jerked away when Korū almost shot up from the floor.
"Ah." Rihito said, "Nevermind. I don't want to know."
"Can you two kiss or something?" Hikari asked blatantly.
"Fuck off. No."
"I'll be waiting for Hikari to kiss Cole first, then." Alina muttered, almost silently, so only Linda could make out what she was saying.
The latter snickered and coughed to cover it up.
Korū heard "Hikari" and "first" and glanced at Alina weirdly, wondering what in the world she was thinking.
Alina thumped Linda's back like she did to Cayne a while ago, just for fun. "You're not dying, are you?" She asked Linda, an impish grin on her face.
"I'll die if you continue hitting me like that."
"This is the normal dynamic, isn't it?" Shizuna sighed, rubbing her face with her hands tiredly.
"You're not the one who spent most of yesterday with them." Rihito told her, also surveying the group of teenagers.
"Hey, have you gotten my brother to smile yet?" Hikari asked Cayne.
"Nah."
"Dang it."
Everyone else in the room except Tsukiyama and Korū were chortling at this point.
"It hasn't even been an hour," Cayne pointed out. "I'll get there."
Korū was actually gonna chuck the body at somebody's face if this continued.
"How do I go around doing this?" Shizuna mused. "Why does it have to be a dead body?"
"Can we get back to the damn body?" Korū growled.
"You're just embarras-"
Korū slapped Hikari on the shoulder.
"I'm trying to ask for advice here!" Shizuna told Korū indignantly.
"Not you!"
Ichika chose that moment to walk into the room, and instantly freaked out at the sight of the body.
"Oh, you're awake." Rihito commented nonchalantly. Now, if Akui could just come and finish her off too, his life would be easier.
Ichika just stared in horror at the body.
Korū stiffened even more when she entered, but said nothing.
Shizuna nudged her.
It was as if Ichika was trying to wake the dead. She screamed, killing everybody's eardrums in a second. Hikari grabbed her shoulders and dragged her out of the room, and she continued shrieking in the hallway.
"What's wrong with her?" Alina asked.
Shizuna just shrugged. "I think she's asked if she could be disowned."
"Shut the fuck up!" Korū yelled to her. "Screaming ain't gonna get you anywhere!"
She shut up.
"Did you kill her?" Linda frowned as the latter made her way back into the room, rubbing her hands together.
"Why would I?"
"I'm gonna ask again, how do you want to go about doing this? Because frankly, this disturbs me." Shizuna said.
"There's the window."
Shizuna looked at Korū exasperatedly. "We want to find out how he died. What Akui used might give us a clue as to where he's been and probably trace him."
"Fat chance, but worth a shot." Alina said.
"Drugs. Injected into Tsukiyama." Hikari had been studying the body. "Smells like Gray Death."
"Oh, that's the smell? I thought it was his body starting to rot." Alina said, scrunching up her nose. "How do you even know the smell?"
"His body won't rot so soon," Hikari said, ignoring her question. "Unless I'm remembering my lessons wrongly."
Alina shrugged. "I've never had to deal with any dead bodies before."
"I've had to get rid of dead bodies," Korū deadpanned. Cayne did a double take, but didn't say anything as he pursed his lips.
"Not surprised." Linda, Alina, Rihito and Shizuna said at the same time.
"I am honestly glad I never signed up to be an Eta." Hikari cringed.
"You have to deal with half-dead people who groan and flop all over the place. That's worse." Korū blinked. "I'd rather deal with dead people. They're less noisy."
"Okay okay. Too much info." Alina sang.
"So where could he have gotten Gray Death from?" Shizuna directed the question to Hikari.
"Not easily, obviously. It's a combination of opioids. If it really is Gray Death, can I ask why he didn't dump a stash in the room so we'll all die from an overdose?" Alina said.
"Maybe he didn't have time to get the stuff. It does smell like Gray Death, and I don't think I'm wrong this time." Hikari's fingers closed around the earring in her pocket. "At least Tsukiyama died quickly."
Shizuna sighed. "Why do I keep getting ignored?"
"I get ignored too," Shōhei offered.
"I know. Where do you think he could have gotten the poison? I'm getting tired of repeating myself."
"I don't know. Black market, maybe?" Shōhei suggested.
"What he said," Korū stated.
"Sounds easy. Let me go get some too." Alina said sarcastically.
Linda smacked her. "How's the black market like here?"
"I don't know," Hikari said. Korū and Shōhei shrugged very helpfully.
Alina coughed. "Let me uh… call someone…"