Chapter 48: The Truth About Kimura
Kana blurted out the question, a wrinkle of confusion on her brow. “But wait, if Kimura-san was at home the whole time, how would he even know the ‘Sleepwalker’ show was getting so popular?”
The moment she asked, she seemed to realize the flaw in her own question, a look of annoyance crossing her face. “Oh, right. Of course. Even if he was stuck at home, he could have easily gauged the show’s popularity from the level of online discussion, social media trends…”
With the premiere on June 11th and two new episodes airing each day, by the evening of the 13th, six episodes would have already been broadcast. It was perfectly reasonable for Kimura to have been aware of the buzz and adjusted his plan accordingly.
Takada ShÅji, having considered Ågami’s theory about Kimura’s motive, nodded in agreement. “Okay, thinking about it, that seems like the only logical explanation for why he added the whole ‘knowing the story brings misfortune’ curse. But… what about ItÅ and Fujita getting injured? How does that fit in? Are you saying Kimura did that to them?”
Kana’s eyes widened in shock. “ItÅ-san and Fujita-san’s injuries… Kimura-san was behind them? Why would he hurt his own friends?”
“It’s just a guess! A guess!” Takada exclaimed, rolling his eyes and emphasizing the point. “To make his ghost story more believable, maybe Kimura arranged for ItÅ and Fujita to have ‘accidents.’ That’s a possibility, isn’t it? If they were genuinely injured, then when Kimura invited them to the mountain, they’d be sure to agree, right? They’d be terrified!”
Hearing this, Ågami YÅsuke suddenly turned to his right, his gaze settling on the club’s silent president. “What are your thoughts on that theory, Senpai?”
Lately, during these heated discussions, Yomikawa Tsuko had remained a quiet, almost unnervingly still observer. Today, everyone had contributed, even Kana had been quite active. Only she had listened, her face an unreadable mask.
“Weren’t you the one assigned to present the results of the investigation, Ågami-kun?” Yomikawa Tsuko said, her expression perfectly calm, her tone even. “My thoughts? Well, if Kimura-kun’s motive was truly rooted in a desperate attempt to salvage his friendships, then it seems highly unlikely he would do anything to physically harm his friends. However, if his motives were less pure – if, for example, he simply wanted to be the center of attention, the subject of a dramatic story – then it is entirely possible he could have planned and even personally carried out the acts to injure them. But in that case,” she added, a hint of coldness in her voice, “one could hardly call them ‘friends’ anymore, could they?”
A flicker of surprise, of respect, crossed Ågami YÅsuke’s eyes. “Senpai, you’re as sharp as ever. Initially, my thoughts were quite similar to Takada-san’s. I suspected Kimura-san’s involvement was much deeper, which is precisely why I asked my police acquaintance to investigate ItÅ-san’s injury.”
“ItÅ-san himself said that his morning run route was relatively fixed. As his best friend, Kimura-san would certainly know this route. If he had laid in wait at a spot ItÅ-san was sure to pass, and then, at the precise moment, dropped the glass shards from above, making it look like a freak accident… on the surface, it seemed to be a plausible, if monstrous, theory.”
“But when I presented this scenario to Officer Kishida, he immediately dismissed it.” Ågami sighed, the memory of his own flawed logic clearly still fresh. “Officer Kishida explained that hitting a moving target with a falling object from a high place is not nearly as easy as it sounds. Because of variables like wind and air resistance, it’s virtually impossible for glass shards to fall in a perfectly straight line. And since ItÅ-san was jogging, moving much faster than a walking pace, the probability of being hit by a falling object becomes infinitesimally small.”
“However, at my repeated, and I must admit, rather insistent request, Officer Kishida did help me investigate. The results were exactly as he had predicted. They did indeed find the apartment unit with the broken window, and they had forensic experts examine the fracture patterns on the remaining glass. There was nothing out of the ordinary. No signs of tampering.”
Takada ShÅji frowned. “So, you’re saying it really was just a freak accident?”
“But for two such bizarre accidents to happen to Kimura-san’s two best friends at almost the exact same time… it still seemed too incredible to be a simple coincidence. So, I changed my approach. I abandoned the idea of malicious intent and started looking for a common, external cause. And this time,” Ågami said, a hint of triumph in his voice, “I finally figured it out.” He scratched his head. “The chandelier falling, the window breaking… they happened at almost the exact same moment. So, I started to think, was there any single, external event that could have caused both these accidents to occur simultaneously?”
“And when you frame the question that way, the answer becomes almost laughably obvious.”
Hearing this, Kana and Takada exchanged a look, their eyes widening as the same thought occurred to both of them.
“Don’t tell me… it was an earthquake?!”
“The only thing that could cause both those things to happen at once would be an earthquake, right?”
“But, but, but… was there an earthquake that morning? I didn’t feel a thing! And I didn’t hear anyone else talking about it either!” Kana’s face was a mask of utter disbelief. As a Japanese person, she was, of course, intimately familiar with earthquakes. It seemed impossible that one could have occurred without her noticing.
Ågami YÅsuke spread his hands in a gesture of finality. “There was indeed an earthquake that morning. I only found out later, after checking the national earthquake monitoring website. But it was a very, very minor tremor. If you were outdoors, you would have felt absolutely nothing. If you were indoors, perhaps on a high floor of a tall building, you might have felt a slight, almost imperceptible sway.”
“But there aren’t many high-rise buildings in our city, so the vast majority of people didn’t notice the minor earthquake that morning. And even if a few people did, it was so slight, and everyone here is so accustomed to earthquakes, that it wasn’t anything new or exciting to talk about. So, no one mentioned it.”
“After coming to this conclusion, I went to visit Fujita-san’s house. I met with the injured Fujita-san and his parents, and I explained my theory. To my surprise, Fujita-san’s father immediately confirmed it. When he’d hired a contractor to repair the chandelier, the worker had pointed out that the chain holding the heavy fixture to the ceiling showed clear, significant signs of aging and wear. He’d even recommended a new brand with more durable, modern materials.”
“So, in conclusion,” Ågami said, his voice firm, “a minor, unnoticed earthquake triggered two separate and entirely unrelated accidents. It just so happened, by a stroke of incredible, almost unbelievable bad luck, that the victims of these two accidents were ItÅ-san and Fujita-san. Although the probability is low, and it looked, on the surface, like it was deliberately arranged as part of some dark curse, if you dig deep enough, if you look at the facts… it was, in the end, just a coincidence.”
After hearing this, Takada was first stunned into silence, then let out a sigh of profound, almost comical boredom. “What? That’s it? Such a boring incident, and the grand finale is just… a coincidence? And here I was, thinking a real, honest-to-god urban legend was finally happening right here in our own school!”
At this, he seemed to remember something, and slapped his forehead with a triumphant smack. “Oh, right! Didn’t I say from the very beginning that I suspected this whole thing was just something that Kimura guy made up? So, the truth really was that simple, wasn’t it!”
“Yes, yes, you were right all along, Takada-san,” Junko said, her tone placating, almost dismissive. She then rested her chin on her hand and turned her adoring gaze back to Ågami YÅsuke. “I knew your reasoning would be flawless, YÅsuke-kun. But there’s one thing I still don’t understand. Kimura-san’s plan, his attempt to lure his friends back, it had clearly failed. With ItÅ-san and Fujita-san both injured, his little expedition to the mountain was off. So why didn’t he just… stop? Why did he continue the charade?”
“Calling it ‘reasoning’ is giving me far too much credit,” Ågami YÅsuke said, scratching his head with a touch of genuine humility before offering his final, and perhaps most insightful, analysis. “The reason Kimura-san didn’t stop his plan, the reason he didn’t just confess and return to his normal life, is, I believe, because he couldn’t stop. After telling everyone, his parents, his best friends, such an elaborate, terrifying lie, to suddenly turn around and confess the truth… that would be incredibly difficult. ‘Spilt water cannot be gathered up again,’ as the old saying goes. He knew, on some level, that what he was doing was wrong, but he was too afraid, too ashamed to face the reality of it. So, he chose to escape instead, to retreat deeper into his own fiction.”
“And, although it was not his intention, his two best friends, ItÅ-san and Fujita-san, were indeed injured, as if by his ‘curse.’ I think… I think he must feel an immense, crushing guilt about that. Perhaps, in his own twisted, lonely way, hiding in his room, refusing to come out, refusing to face the world… is his own way of punishing himself.”
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