The next day.
After spending a day tailing an infidelity case, Fujino hurried to the filming location of "The Threat in the Hidden Smile."
Originally, Fujino had intended to turn down this sort of job.
But when Yoko Okino mentioned that the commission fee this time was 300,000 yen, along with accommodation at a Japanese-style hotel...
He immediately changed his mind.
A 300,000-yen commission fee was not much, but it was still a month's salary for a reasonably high-performing Japanese office worker.
Only an idiot would turn down a job where he could make money just by pointing things out.
Actually, money or fancy Japanese-style hotels did not matter much to him.
What really moved him was Yoko Okino's "sincere heart"!
At the shrine bathed in twilight, the mournful cries of crows drifted over from afar.
The crimson glow of the setting sun shone over Yoko Okino's fair face, which had been mottled with blood-red stains.
She stood before the shrine, clutching a bloodstained fruit knife in her hand. Her vacant eyes stared at the man lying on the ground before her, while the blue dress she wore had long been soaked in blood.
The man wore a short-sleeved casual outfit and lay spread-eagled on the stone path leading to the shrine.
Blood continuously flowed from the knife wound in his chest, staining the stone slabs around him red beneath the setting sun.
A moment later, Yoko Okino gradually came back to her senses. The fruit knife dropped from her hand, and a startled expression appeared on her face.
"How could this happen? I clearly never meant to kill him..."
Muttering, she collapsed weakly onto the ground. A tear flew from her eye, followed moments later by a heart-wrenching wail.
"Cut!"
Just as Yoko Okino let out that heart-rending cry,