A figure laid lifelessly along the edge of the river. Rain soon fell, washing a faint red liquid down the stone path. Everyone sought for shelter to avoid the precipitation.
Everyone except a certain redhead, who carried a thick paper umbrella and approached the said figure.
She took a closer view and realized that it was a dead man. With a piece of cloth in between as a makeshift glove, she lifted the man's limbs one by one and tilted his head. After a few minutes more of rain, the red liquid that ran down the path was clear again.
"Chris, Soon... we have another one."
The other two girls gasped as they stood a great distance from the redhead while sharing an umbrella. "Is it the same cause of death?" they asked.
"It's exactly the same. The killer used a sharp weapon to slice the victim's neck, wrists, and ankles—all where major blood vessels run. The killer wanted blood, which is why the runoff rainwater from this body is barely tinted when seen from your distance."
"What do we do now, Alice?"
The redhead took out a crude notepad from her coat pocket and wrote notes. "No one will investigate these murders because they're too complicated for them, but never too complicated for me." She counted the total number of entries she had recorded overall and sighed. "What I need is a miracle..."
-x-x-x-x-x-
A raven-haired youth focused his camera and captured a photo. A gust of wind blew, so he brushed his bangs aside. Unfortunately, the scene of the trees he wanted to capture was out of position because of the wind. The camera screen flashed a notification, saying that the memory card was full. The young man stood up and returned to his vehicle and turned on his laptop.
He connected the camera to his laptop via cable and transferred the photographs over. While waiting, his phone rang. "Hello?"
"Shun, how are you doing?"
The young man recognized the voice as his mother's. "Hi Mom. I'm fine, just photographing nature in my free time. I should be asking how you're doing. Why the sudden call?"
"I'm fine, Shun. Can't a mother call her son just to chat? I'm surprised that you have free time right now, despite your new job. Where are Dan and the others?"
"Joe has to obtain security clearance for a new archaeological site, so others and I are on break until approval." He checked the calendar on his laptop. "Mom, it's almost Mid-Autumn. I plan on coming home so we can go to your hometown."
"Shun, don't worry about me. Focus on work first. I can visit my hometown on my own."
"But I never miss Mid-Autumn." Shun's laptop beeped loudly, so he went to check what happened. "My group chat requests to video-call."
"See? I told you that you wouldn't have much free time. I'll talk to you later. Bye Shun!"
Shun sighed. "Bye Mom."
After hanging up, he activated video calling on his laptop. "I'm in the woods, where there's no Internet. Make it fast so that I don't waste my portable Wi-Fi. Dan, what are you laughing at?"
A brunette laughed uncontrollably, but eventually replied, "Dude, this is why you subscribe to an unlimited data cell phone plan!"
A mint-haired colleague groaned and smacked his head, "Dan, we don't have as much disposable income as you. Besides, Joe is the lead archaeologist, yet he still has the lowest plan offered by his phone company."
A young sandy blond man shook his head in response. "Can we not talk about this while on break, Ace? I just obtained clearance, which means you all need to be at the site within two hours."
Ace screamed at how quickly Joe responded. "All right, I get it! Fabia, can I carpool with you? My car broke down."
"Of course!" answered the navy-haired girl delightfully.
Joe wrapped up the conversation. "Since all of us know about the security clearance already, I expect none of you to be late. See you then!"
Everyone disconnected from the group chat until Shun noticed that Dan requested a private video chat. He answered it anyway and greeted with an unenthusiastic voice. "What now?"
"I've always wondered why you like doing photography during your free time."
"Because capturing memories is aesthetic. What do you want?"
"Are you sure you're not doing this because of someone else? I'm positive that a certain person at the recent archaeology conference mentioned that he or she 'likes blogs that post about nature photography'—"
"Dan, need I remind you that I starting photography in high school? If you have nothing more serious to talk about, then I'll hang up now."
"I'm just concerned that you're the only person in our group of top interns with no dating experience, and that this job might take up too much—"
"Good bye." Shun disconnected immediately and packed up all his stuff. He got into the driver's seat and drove away, but still thought about what Dan said. I'd rather endure hours of training with Grandpa than talk about irrelevant topics with Dan.
He entered the coordinates of the new archaeological site into his phone. The GPS application suggested a shortcut, which Shun took for not long, because broken tree branches fell from above and blocked the entire path. He hit the brakes immediately, breathing deeply at the sight of danger. Curse you, Dan. Your irrelevant video call made me late.
Shun parked, exited, and locked his vehicle before observing the mess in front of him. I can't drag this away by hand. He looked for tow cables in his back trunk, but found nothing. That's right. I lent Dan my tow cables for a camping trip that he took with his parents. This is Dan's fault again.
Just when Shun was about to board his vehicle, a large silver sports utility vehicle pulled up behind Shun. Two men wearing masks got off the vehicle, each holding a knife. "What do you want?" Shun asked.
Neither one of them spoke, and they simply ran toward Shun with their knives. Years of ninjutsu training helped Shun avoid every single attack, although he was disadvantaged due to lack of weapons. The two attackers cornered him to the pile of branches. With no other choice, Shun grabbed a twig and threw it at the silver-haired attacker. The twig hit the man's wrist, dropping the weapon.
Shun quickly grabbed the knife and made a cut on the other blond attacker. "I don't know who you are, or what I ever did to you, but you need to back off."
The silver-haired attacker who dropped the knife lunged at Shun, who elbowed the man in his chest strongly. He fell back and dropped something, all before using a hand sign to tell the blond attacker to return to the SUV. Without saying a word ever since they arrived, the two masked men drove away.
That was the most pointless experience ever. Shun approached the item that the first man dropped. A string of brown beads carried a translucent, amber-brown pendant in the shape of a phoenix figure in profile position. Did he drop this by accident or on purpose? This looks like a potential artifact, which means they might know that I'm on Joe's excavation team.
Shun placed the knife and pendant in his vehicle, and took a detour to the archaeological site. Now I'm late because of that altercation.
-x-x-x-x-x-
"On the count of three, we lift this casket!" ordered Joe. "One, two, three!"
The lead archaeologist and other colleagues lifted the casket from the dirt onto flat ground. Everyone else began dusting off dirt on the casket and other newly discovered artifacts. Shun arrived late and ran to Joe immediately. "We need to talk. It has to do with why I'm late."
"Um...sure?" He told others to continue working before walking Shun to another canopy. "Shun, I told you not to be late. What happened?"
"I was on my way here already, but tree branches blocked the path of the shortcut. An SUV came from nowhere, and two guys came to attack me with knives. I had no weapons on me, so fighting them off took time. One of them dropped this though." He took out the paper-wrapped phoenix pendant from his jacket pocket. "I don't know why they attacked me, or what this item is. Maybe you do."
"Unfortunately, I don't recall anything phoenix-shaped items mentioned in the artifacts that we found—"
"Professor Brown! We need your input on how to excavate this other item!" an intern screamed.
"I'll be there soon!" Joe then told Shun, "Put on your gear, and meet us over there. We'll talk about the phoenix pendant later."
"Understood." Shun put the phoenix pendant away and put on gloves. He approached the table, where Dan was dusting off small artifacts. "Need help?"
"Of course, I do! You're late! What happened?" Now it was Dan's turn to hear Shun's story. "Seriously? You have stalkers? That's not normal. What's even more not normal is the item you found."
"I told Joe, but he just got called off to—"
"Everyone, come and look!" Joe called everyone over to look at newly discovered artifacts. Unlike the vases, jewelry, furniture, or other items found earlier, he held up a metallic cube box with decorative decals all over. "This may be what we've been looking for the whole time."
Shun made his way through the crowd of colleagues and looked at the metal box. On the anterior face was a depressed slot of a familiar shape. "Joe, doesn't that shape look—"
"Run for your lives!" As a colleague's voice screamed, a silver SUV barged into the excavation site and ran over tents and tables. "Protect the artifacts!"
As everyone scurried to gather everything, a masked blond man got off the vehicle and stole the metallic box. "If you wish to see this box again, then bring me the pendant," he warned in a digitally-mixed voice before getting into the SUV again.
The raven-haired intern recognized the masked man and the vehicle. "They stole the box and want the pendant back. I'm going after them because I have the pendant."
"Shun, that's too dangerous! Come back!" Joe demanded.
It was too late. Shun already backed his vehicle out of the staff parking lot to chase after the SUV. Inside the SUV, a female passenger with short blue hair dialed a number on her phone. "Boss said that we need to get rid of the guy following us, not matter what."
The silver-haired driver smirked. "Perfect. Everyone, put your masks back on and show that punk how things are done."
After leading Shun on a long, faraway chase, the thieves parked the vehicle and got off. Shun got off as well. "First you block the shortcut, then you attack me, and now you steal an important artifact. I'm not over this."
In addition to the two attackers from before, the female passenger also got off the SUV. Shun carried the knife from earlier, bit his attackers now used large machetes. Not only do they have one more person, but they also have larger weapons. Shun used the knife as efficiently as possible, but he still couldn't overpower three attackers. One of them hit Shun in the abdomen, which sent him flying back and knocked pendant out of his pocket. "You're not getting that!"
The female attacker reached for the pendant, but Shun cut that hand quickly before grabbing the item. Suddenly, it glowed in his hand as Shun felt a bizarre surge of energy flowing through him. "What the...?"
The attackers stood at a distance before attacking Shun again, but he overpowered them easily this time, to the point of causing bleeding wounds on his attackers. While they were conscious, Shun grabbed the metal box from the SUV and brought it back to his own vehicle. The attackers quickly admitted defeat and drove off.
Shun observed the designs of the metal box before taking pictures with his phone. I wonder who made intricate designs like this. He compared the depressed slot to the phoenix pendant, and concluded that this was a match. Out of curiosity, he fitted the pendant into the slot. The entire box glowed yellow as the cover of the box lifted. Bright light from inside the box blinded Shun.
The next thing he noticed was that he was lying down on a dirt pavement, next to someone else. Where am I? Shun brushed the dirt off and tapped the person next to him. "Sorry to bother you. Can you tell me—wait, you're dead!"
A bystander heard Shun screaming and yelled, "Help! Someone got murdered!"
A group of patrol officers in bizarre clothing heard and saw what happened. The group leader ordered, "Did someone say 'murder'? Arrest that person next to the dead body right now!"
"Wait! I have nothing to do with this!" Shun tried fighting off the patrol officers, but they all subdued him with long metal swords. Although he didn't train with weapons often, Shun could tell that the swords were real. What is this place? Who still uses old weapons like these? And why is everyone wearing weird clothes?
As the patrol officers dragged Shun away, a redhead watched from a distance and shook her head. "They have this all wrong. He clearly has nothing to do with this."
A blonde girl asked the redhead, "Alice, how can you be so sure?"
"Chris, I know who the victim is. The person didn't die from exsanguination, so it has nothing to do with what I've been investigating privately. I do know someone else in the community who is a very like suspect."
"What will do you now?"
"Patrol officers arrive when the cases are easiest to solve. I need to visit the person that they just arrested."
-x-x-x-x-x-
As the thieves drove their vehicle away, they knocked over some important machinery, which short-circuited and set the site on fire. Joe and his interns stood far away as they watched the uncovered artifacts succumb to the flames. "This is bad..."
"What's taking Shun so long?" complained Dan while pacing around. "I can't just stand here and do nothing! Did you see those people who stole the box and blew up the site? Now we'll never get anything done!"
Ace nodded. "Dan's right. We're going to find Shun's vehicle using GPS. Dan, lead the way."
"Not you two as well!" Joe cried. "I don't want you getting lost like Shun!"
Dan and Ace ignored Joe's warning and boarded Dan's vehicle. "Ace, track Shun's GPS location on the company laptop and find the shortest path there."
"Got it."
After Ace located the location of Shun's vehicle, Dan drove off quickly while staying within speed limits. At their destination, nobody was in sight. Dan exited first and walked around. "This is Shun's vehicle, but there's nobody here."
"I see blood and skid marks." Ace noticed. "It's likely that the people who stole the metal box were here and escaped, but we don't know whose blood this is."
"There are too many faint blood splatters as well." The brunette approached Shun's vehicle and pointed to the metal box. "That's weird. If those thieves came to steal the box, then why is it still here? Where's Shun?"
"Hold on." Ace also approached Shun's vehicle and pointed to a dashcam inside. "Maybe this recorded what happened here. It looks like it's from the company. Maybe I can access the internal storage remotely."
"Good luck."
Ace entered commands into his laptop and accessed the dashcam's internal storage. "Found it! Watch this." He played a short video of the fight between Shun and the three attackers. "You all told me that Shun trained ninjutsu since childhood, but this altercation is epic."
"But all three attackers have masks, so that won't help," Dan complained. Ace increased the speed until they saw Shun take out the phoenix pendant. "What's he doing now?"
The mint-haired intern slowed down the clip, but after Shun placed the pendant into the slot, the video turned into fuzzy grayness. "That was anticlimactic! I wanted—"
"I have an incoming call." Dan took out and answered his phone. "What's up, Joe? Ace and I found Shun's car but not him- "
"You two need to come back now. I called the police over to report this incident, but they found find a heavily injured person near the premises."
"Injured person?! What if that's Shun?!"
"It's not. Just come back."
Dan hung up and pounded his fist into his other hand. "Ace, we have to go. Joe wants us to return because the police found a heavily injured person. Shun will have to wait."
"That's even worse than being anticlimactic..."
-x-x-x-x-x-
The patrol officers tied Shun's hands behind his back and left him in a prison cell. He tried to break loose, but the knots were too tight. This is still all Dan's fault. Each thing led to another.
He heard a prison guard talk to someone outside. "How may I help you?"
"I need to interrogate the prisoner on behalf of my grandfather," replied a female voice.
"Dr. Michael is on the case already? Well then, please come in. The limit is ten minutes, as always."
Who's visiting me? Or is she visiting someone else that's in here? Shun moved back against the stone wall and felt the phoenix pendant in his pocket. Did this happen because I put the pendant into the slot? Why did I even do that?
Footsteps echoed from the entrance until a redhead girl arrived on the basement floor. She approached Shun's prison cell and knelt so she was at eye level with Shun. "Hi. I hope you're not scared."
"Scared?" Shun mocked. "I arrive in the middle of nowhere and get accused of murder. How much more scared can I be?"
"I know you're not from here. I don't recognize you. I do know that you didn't kill the victim. I'm certain of that."
Taken aback by the girl's calm response to his sharp words, Shun relaxed and asked, "You trust me? Even though I'm not from here? Because of what?"
"I'll find the real killer, make that person confess, solve the case, and save you. I swear."
Shun had no idea what to think about this redhead girl in front of him, only that she was extremely self-confident and not afraid at all.