I apologize for the very late update. I'll be honest. I'm starting to get into newer anime and manga like Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Tokyo Ghoul, and I'm not as obsessed with Beelzebub as I used to be, sadly (ah, I miss the good old days). That's why I'm trying to wrap up this story as quickly as I can before I write for a different fandom. That being said, this is the second-to-last chapter. Enjoy.
Disclaimer: Beelzebub belongs to Ryuuhei Tamura, not me.
Chapter 13- Cistern
Right then, I remember that I have to tell them something else. By now, we've managed to reach a quiet place to talk. Specifically, at a half-empty café, where there aren't any other customers.
"I saw Airi-chan's ghost today again," I say, getting everyone's attention. "I managed to find out that she's a lower-class demon."
Hecadoth frowns. "I knew it," he says. "I had a hunch that she was either a Konketsuji or a lower-class demon. How were you able to find out, Yumi?"
"When I saw her ghost in the hallway, I asked her," I explain. "I even called her 'Airi-chan' because I thought that if I addressed her as if she were a friend, then she would probably explain herself more."
"Is that so?" Quetzalcoatl asks.
I nod. "Also, there's something else that's been bothering me," I admit. "It's about Mantha, that demon that attacked us."
"Yeah?"
"Like, I highly doubt that this attack was just a random attack," I say. "Think about it. That guy is the one who murdered those three people. He had the weapon that killed them, and he had personal items that belonged to them as trophies."
Furuichi nods. "Yeah, I agree," he adds. "Something about that Mantha guy really doesn't sit with me. The attack on us doesn't feel like a random attack at all. It seems like it was planned from the beginning, especially considering how he separated us from the real world to make sure we couldn't escape."
"That's true," Izuma says. "The fact that he had us separated from the physical world clearly shows that he had this planned from the beginning. But even then, why would he want to kill us?"
"It's not like we did anything to personally offend him, right?" Shizuka asks.
"He's probably only doing it for shits and giggles," Toujou guesses.
"You're wrong about that," Quetzalcoatl says. "I also had Furcas do a little search into Mantha just to be sure. And you know what? He found that Mantha was a hitman."
My eyes widen in shock. "A hitman?"
Quetzalcoatl gives a small nod. "He wouldn't kill those three humans, or Shibuya Airi, or even attempt to kill us unless he had received orders to do so," he says.
Oga looks very confused. "The fuck? Which demon has such a big problem with us that he sent that bastard to kill us?" he demands.
"Yeah, I agree," Furuichi adds. "It's not like we did anything to get on a demon's bad side, did we? And even if we did, what did we do, and who got offended?"
"I have a feeling that Mantha was a contracted demon," I mention.
Hecadoth turns to Quetzalcoatl. "Have you checked through the contract history?" he asks.
"I've already asked Furcas to do so, but it'll take a while to get some results, most likely a couple of days," Quetzalcoatl tells him.
"How come?" Furuichi asks.
"Contracting with demons goes a long way back," Hilda explains. "This goes back as far as to the beginning of human civilization. It'll take days, sometimes weeks, occasionally months, or even a whole year before anything comes up."
"For now, let's assume that Mantha was contracted to a human," Izuma starts. "Is it possible that this human was involved in the murder of Shibuya Airi?"
I think for a moment. Most likely, they would be. But still, what could be the motives for killing her? From the state that her body was found in, it seems like it could be a hate crime, that the human hated demons and wanted her dead. However, that makes no sense, because if the human hated demons, then why would they be contracted to Mantha?
Right then, we see Shizuka raising her hand. "I just remembered something," she says.
We all turn to her as she starts speaking.
"I had a look at one of the newspapers from the year of Shibuya-san's death, and I remember reading something quite odd in there," she starts. "Shibuya-san's body was stolen shortly after the autopsy was made. That happened a few days after her death."
I look at her in surprise. "Her body was stolen?" I repeat.
Shizuka nods. "No one knows who stole it," she says. "But that was one of the main reasons why her case was such a mystery. It only became worse after Kamiya Yuu died while investigating her death. People began claiming that when she died, she placed a curse in the hopes that her murderer would die soon."
I purse my lips. No doubt, Mantha probably stole Airi-chan's body from the crime lab and disposed of it somehow. But where did he dispose her body?
"Before we start speculating again, I think we should go home for the night," Quetzalcoatl suggests. "It's getting a little late, and I suppose that you're all tired. We'll probably be able to do a lot better if we get some rest tonight."
"That's a good idea," Oga yawns. "I'm tired…"
"Dabu…" Baby Beel agrees.
We all part ways and leave the café to make our way home. As Hecadoth and I walk home, I feel an uneasiness in my gut. I feel like there's so much more to this case than what it seems, and things are really taking a dark turn as we discover more and more mysteries. The fact that Airi-chan's body had been stolen really doesn't make things better.
There's another thing that's bothering me. If we do find the murderer of Airi-chan, what are we supposed to do to him? Does she expect us to kill them on her behalf? Because she's a lower-class demon, I highly doubt that she'll be satisfied with him being arrested. She wants revenge, which means murdering the murderer. The main problem with that, though, is that it's a crime. Unless we can find a way to justify killing him, how the hell are we going to explain this to the cops?
"What are you thinking about?" Hecadoth asks me.
"I just have a really bad feeling right now," I tell him. "Something's really off about this whole case. The way Airi-chan was found, it appears like it could be a hate crime. However, if the murderer really hated demons, then why would they form a contract with a demon?"
"Maybe they hate lower-class demons," Hecadoth suggests.
"Also… I was wondering how we're going to help Airi-chan get revenge," I continue. "She's a lower-class demon, and she definitely wants revenge. I don't think she'll be satisfied if we simply turn the murderer into the police."
Hecadoth nods. "You're right about that," he tells me. "Demons love bloody revenge, they won't be satisfied with just a simple arrest."
"But there's no way we can kill someone as revenge in the Human World," I tell him. "It's a crime, and it'll affect us for the rest of our lives. We could get arrested and put in jail for something like that."
"That's true," he says. "However, would it work if we were able to send evidence to the police?"
"I don't think so," I respond. "Even if we tried, we'd still face a lot of charges with murdering someone. It'd be a miracle if we're able to avoid prison, and even then, we'd probably be torn apart by the media and the public."
"Maybe we should discuss this a little later when everyone else is present," Hecadoth suggests. "That way, everyone else can provide their opinions on this and maybe offer some suggestions."
I nod. That's a pretty good idea. It would be best to discuss this with everyone else and see what they think. Who knows, maybe we'll find a better suggestion from them. But for now, we have to figure the rest of this case out, and that includes finding out what happened to Airi-chan's body.
As we near my house, we see a rather large crowd of neighbours. "What the…?" Hecadoth trails off.
Upon seeing them, I also feel slightly suspicious. In my gut, I feel a premonition of something bad that's about to come.
"What's going on over there?" Hecadoth asks.
I shrug. "I have no idea," I say. "Let's go there and find out."
We make our way to the crowd and I tap on one of the neighbours' shoulder, getting her attention. "What's happening?" I ask.
"You're Tanaka-san's daughter, right?" she asks.
I nod, and that's when I see Mom and Dad outside.
"Mom! Dad!" I call, getting their attention. "What happened here?"
Both Mom and Dad look rather serious. "Take a look," Mom says, pointing at the house.
I turn towards our house, but then my eyes widen in shock. Our house has been vandalized with large graffiti, reading: 'Know your place, Konketsuji'. As I read it, I feel a dread slowly building up within me. This is clearly a threat directed at me, and it's most likely because of what I know about Airi-chan.
"Wha… When did this happen?!" I ask, turning to Mom and Dad.
"We have no idea," Dad says. "I only saw this after work when I came home."
Hecadoth is also looking at the building in astonishment. "Who the hell did this?" he demands, looking rather furious.
"That's also what we don't know," Mom tells him. "We're just trying to calm everyone else down so that we can clean this up."
Eventually, once everyone leaves, Hecadoth and I help Mom and Dad in cleaning up the graffiti. However, this is still stuck in my mind, and it continues to trouble me for the rest of the evening. Did the others receive a threat like this as well? I'll have to find out tomorrow.
I look around in confusion. It's nighttime and I'm in front of the entrance of an older building. I recognize this to be the old St. Ishiyama school building, but what am I doing here?
As if an invisible force is controlling me, I find myself walking into the building. It's dark and rather chilly inside, and it's quite clear that all the years of abandonment have started to wear down the interiors. I look around, feeling a slight shiver running through my spine. It's pretty creepy inside here.
Before I realize, I'm standing before a stone staircase that leads downstairs somewhere. Again, the invisible force makes me walk down the stairs, where I can sense a slightly damp smell. On the walls, I see the faint reflection of rippling water, which makes me raise my eyebrows in bemusement. What's going on?
I soon find my answer when I reach the bottom of the stairs. This staircase leads to a stony room with a large rectangular pool in the centre. I realize that this is a cistern. I never realized that there was a cistern at the bottom of the old St. Ishiyama school building!
Suddenly, I hear some footsteps, making me hide behind the wall near the doorway. Right then, I see two males step out from the shadows of the cistern. My eyes widen in shock as I stare at the male on the right. That guy… it's Mantha!
He looks no different from when he had attacked us. In his arms is none other than the corpse of Shibuya Airi. On his right is another guy, a male student in the St. Ishiyama uniform, holding a coil of rope and some weights. Upon seeing him, I frown slightly. Who is that guy? I get the feeling that I've seen him before.
"I told you that we should've disposed the body after you killed her!" the student tells Mantha in a pissed off voice.
"It doesn't matter now," Mantha tells him, sneering slightly. "Once we've gotten rid of her body, no one will know that you were responsible."
Mantha takes the rope and weights from the student and ties it around Airi-chan's corpse before attaching the weights to the rope. I watch in shock and horror as they gracelessly dump her body into the cistern. She falls in with a splash and does not resurface. As if she could. They attached weights and tied up her corpse! So this is where she was disposed of!
But who the hell was that student? How did he know Mantha? In fact, what the hell is going on now?
My eyes fly open and I look around me. I'm back in my room, in my bed. However, that dream really made me unnerved. I know I have to tell the others about this immediately, that Airi-chan's body was disposed of in a cistern. But will they believe me if I tell them I saw it in a dream? No. This is something that they all need to know.
"Yumi…?" Hecadoth's sleepy voice brings me out of my thoughts. I turn around to face him. Ever since that night, he's started sleeping next to me in my bed.
"S-Sorry…" I apologize, moving closer to him. "I just had a bizarre dream."
Hecadoth rubs my back before caressing my face. "Want to talk about it?" he asks.
I decide to tell him about it. I should tell at least one person about the dream.
"I… I saw where Airi-chan's body was disposed of," I tell him.
His eyes are momentarily confused and laced with sleep as he registers what I just said. And then, I see him become more serious.
"What do you mean?" he asks me.
"Mantha and some male student I'd never seen before… I saw them in my dream…" I explain. "They had taken Airi-chan's body to a cistern in the bottom of the old St. Ishiyama building. I saw them tie up her body and attach weights before dumping it into the pool."
Hecadoth looks at me in surprise. "Seriously?" he asks.
I nod. "Tomorrow after school, I want to get the others and show them this cistern," I tell him. "So can you tell Quetzalcoatl and Furuichi about this?"
He nods. "Of course."
As I try to go back to sleep in his arms, I can't help but feel anxious. We might be nearing the end of the mystery, but I'm still feeling rather nervous about this. Something is truly not right about it. What exactly it is, I don't know. But my intuition is telling me that there's something else that's going on.
The school day seems to go by so slowly, as I'm very anxious to show the cistern to everyone else. I told Izuma and Shizuka about the dream I had last night and they seem to believe me. In fact, the both of them are aware of the existence of the cistern in the old school building. According to them, the old school building used to be a convent a long time ago before it got turned into a school building, and the cistern was their main source of water. However, it's still being maintained to this day, much to my surprise. I wonder why it's being maintained.
Eventually, school finishes for the day and right now, I'm standing in front of the entrance of the current building, waiting for everyone else to come. Once everyone shows up, I tell them a little bit about where we're going.
"Hold on, Tanaka," Furuichi asks me as we walk to the old school building. "What exactly is so significant about the cistern in the old school building?"
I look down, wondering if they'd believe me. "In my dream last night, I saw Mantha with someone else in the cistern chamber, the both of them tying up and dumping Airi-chan's body into the pool," I tell him.
Hilda looks a little puzzled. "Why does the old school building have a cistern?" she asks.
"Long before it became a school building, it was a convent," Shizuka explains. "The cistern was the main source for water, and even after it became a school, it continued being maintained. In fact, it's still maintained today."
We walk into the building, trying to ignore the evening chill that's hanging in the air. Remembering my dream, I lead the way, walking to the staircase that leads to the chamber below. "It's this way," I tell them.
Hecadoth looks around the building. "This building seems like it's been well-preserved," he observes.
"It plays an important part in the history of St. Ishiyama," Izuma tells him. "That's why it's still standing."
Just like in my dream, the reflection of the gentle ripples from the pool dance against the wall. We finally reach the chamber. Once again, I'm surprised, but this time, it's because the pool is still very much filled with murky water, the reflection of its gentle rippling reflecting on the ceiling. "This is it," I say.
"You say that her body was dumped in the cistern pool?" Quetzalcoatl asks me.
I nod. "Yeah. But it'd be impossible to try and recover it from there," I tell them. "We don't know how deep that pool is and besides, her body's been in there for over twenty years. Who knows whether it's still there?"
"Also, we don't know what's in the water," Shizuka adds. "It could contain some toxic elements that could infect us."
Right then, Hecadoth turns to me. "You said that you saw Mantha and another male student, right? Do you know who the student was?" he asks me.
I shake my head. "I don't know," I admit. "I feel like I've seen him somewhere, but I just don't know where."
"Dah! Dabadah!" Right then, Baby Beel starts blabbering.
Oga glances at him. "Oi, Beel, what's wr-" That's when we sense it. The demonic energy.
A chilly breeze blows through the chamber and we hear a soft and eerie sigh echoing from the walls. We turn to the entrance and to our shock, it's Airi-chan's ghost. She stands in the entranceway, an unreadable expression on her face as she stares intensely.
"Shibuya… Airi…" Shizuka trails off, looking stunned.
"What's wrong?" I ask.
She ignores me and starts to walk towards the pool. Right then, when she stands before it, the water starts to ripple unnaturally.
"What the-?!" Furuichi says in surprise.
"She's trying to show us something!" Hilda realizes.
Sure enough, in the cistern pool is a vision of the fateful night from twenty years ago, so we all silently watch the scene play out. It displays the third floor hallway of St. Ishiyama, and we see Shibuya Airi walking down the empty halls. Suddenly, there's some sort of noise coming from one of the classrooms, causing her to stop and look to see what's going on.
Through a crack in the door, we notice the same older male student in the vision, his pants unbuttoned and his belt loose, and we can hear faint whimpers in the classroom. Immediately, the pieces fit together in my head as to what was happening in that room from the grunts and gasps that sound from there. Airi-chan opens the door a little bit more before staring in shock at the scene.
But then, the guy looks up and notices Airi-chan by the door, causing her to stiffen up.
"Dammit!" she curses under her breath as she turns to leave the area while footsteps slowly grow louder from the classroom. However, she's stopped when a hand grabs her wrist and the guy emerges from the classroom, looking quite pissed.
"What the fuck are you doing here, Shibuya?" he demands, his voice quiet yet unmistakably angry.
Airi-chan doesn't answer. She slowly backs away from him, trying her best to not look afraid. "What were you doing?" she counters.
This only pisses the guy off even more. "Don't try and dodge the question," he snarls through gritted teeth. "What. Are. You. Doing. Here?"
Again, Airi-chan doesn't answer. By now, the guy is beyond pissed and he suddenly shoves Airi-chan into a wall. However, he pushes her with an unusually large amount of strength, which could've only come from a demon.
She collides into the wall and we hear a sickening thud as her head hits the surface. Her eyes glaze over and her mouth forms into a slight 'o' shape as she collapses to the ground, blood starting to drip down the side of her head.
The guy barely flinches, instead, only looking slightly irritated. "Che. I told you not to overdo it, Mantha," he scolds as we see a demon materializing next to him. Sure enough, it's none other than Mantha.
Rather than looking troubled, Mantha only smiles wryly. "My apologies, Kazushi-kun," he says, not sounding the least bit sorry. "I assumed you'd want to get rid of her before she says anything."
The guy, now known as Kazushi, just glances at Airi-chan's twitching and shivering body. The head injury has gotten worse, and there is more blood around the side of her head. "Well, what are we going to do?" he demands. "We can't just leave her here!"
Mantha simply pulls out a knife from his robes. "I'll take care of it." He walks up to her body and then, brings it down on her.
We watch in shock and disgust as Mantha starts to stab Airi-chan's body over and over again, the revolting sound ringing through our ears. So this is what happened that night. Airi-chan was dying of a head injury and he just mercilessly stabbed her over and over again. By the time he's done, her body is soaked in a pool of blood, and is no longer shivering. And then, the vision goes black.
Shizuka shakes her head in disbelief. "Oh my gosh…" she whispers.
"But who is that Kazushi guy?" I ask. "I have a feeling that we've seen him before."
Before anyone can say anything else, we see another vision appearing in the pool. Much to my surprise, it's the same dream that I had last night. However, we're able to get a better look at Mantha and Kazushi as they carry Airi-chan's corpse to the cistern.
"What are they doing?" Toujou asks.
"They're disposing of it," I recall.
We all watch as Mantha and Kazushi tie the ropes around Airi-chan's body before attaching weights to it. It's playing out almost exactly like the nightmare that I had last night.
"So, this happened shortly after the autopsy was done on Shibuya-san's body?" Hilda asks me.
I nod. "Yes," I say. "They stole her body and dumped it here to try and hinder the rest of the investigation."
Before anyone else can say any more, we hear Mantha speaking from the vision.
"There," he says, sounding triumphant. "No one will even suspect you, Satou Kazushi."
The vision fades away and the water is now still again. Oga looks confused. "Who is this guy?" he asks.
However, Izuma, Shizuka, and I look at each other in shock. This name… it can't be…
"What is it?" Quetzalcoatl asks upon noticing us. "Do you have any idea as to who this person may be?"
"We know this person, actually," Izuma tells him. "He's-"
Before he can say anything else, we're interrupted by Baby Beel. "Dah! Dabu! Dabu!" he panics.
Oga looks at him in surprise. "What's up?" But that's when we see it.
A strange gray mist starts to pour into the chamber, and the strange smell it has doesn't escape my notice. It's a sleeping gas!
"Let's get out of here!" Quetzalcoatl urges, covering his mouth. "Cover your noses and mouths, do not breathe it in!"
Like everyone else, I clap my hand over my mouth and nose to avoid breathing it in. However, the room is practically filled with the strange gas, and we cannot find the way out. What the hell? We can't see a single thing!
Unfortunately, I feel my legs growing weak as drowsiness and lethargy take over me. "No…" I whisper as my eyes grow heavy. It's not just me, though. Everyone else is starting to be overcome by the sleeping gas as they slowly fall to the ground, unconscious.
Eventually, I also collapse onto the ground. The last thing I see is a pair of feet within the fog. Then, everything goes black.