Young People

"Bōsōzoku... just as I thought..." Shiraishi thought to himself. Just a bunch of young punks!

"Also... Chief, I suspect Ujihara Ayano may have deliberately facilitated the kidnapping. Those Bōsōzoku probably don't know her real identity," Kuroki said hesitantly.

"What?" Shiraishi froze at that.

Kanzaki was still off to the side, reminding Kuroki not to make such arbitrary claims without evidence...

"We just went to the Ujihara home and found that her father had been disabled in a workplace accident, with inadequate compensation, leaving the family in financial hardship. That was why she had started working to support them at seventeen... I noticed the words [Suzuki Heavy Industries] on a photo of his work uniform. That should be a company under the Suzuki Conglomerate."

Kuroki voiced his speculation...

If that was taken into account, Ujihara Ayano had every motive to seek revenge against the Suzuki family!

But...

This revenge plan was clearly brainless—what were the odds of successfully impersonating Suzuki Sonoko without being discovered?

Still, considering she was only seventeen, it was perfectly normal for someone that age to do things that did not stand up to scrutiny!

Those Bōsōzoku could not all be complete idiots, so... they must have genuinely believed the girl with them was "the eldest daughter of the Suzuki family."

Suzuki was such a common surname that it was hard to connect it to the Suzuki Conglomerate. Most likely, Ujihara Ayano had revealed her identity herself and cooperated with them in this Hostage Taking.

Probably...

Those Bōsōzoku even thought the eldest daughter of the Suzuki family wanted to use this chance to swindle some spending money from her family?

"I understand. Send me all the photos... Then come to the Beika Aquarium too! The kidnappers and Ujihara Ayano should both be here." As Shiraishi spoke, he had already entered the aquarium.

"We're at the west entrance! This kid Kanzaki actually picked up the sound of waves during the call." Kuroki made a point of praising his new partner.

Though in Kuroki's eyes, this new partner was terribly nagging!

"Fine. Go ask the aquarium staff for the surveillance footage and narrow down the location. I'll go in and search directly," Shiraishi said decisively.

There were quite a lot of people here today...

After all, it was Sports Day, effectively a holiday. Many people had brought their children out to see marine life, while plenty of young couples liked dating in places this dark.

"Children's voices, and dolphin sounds..." Shiraishi muttered inwardly. Then he found a staff member and asked, "Excuse me, where are the dolphins?"

"Dolphins... uh... There are dolphins in the pool by the underwater tunnel, and also... in the dolphin show hall." When the staff member saw Shiraishi's build, he jumped in fright, even briefly wondering, Is this guy here to hunt dolphins?

Shiraishi looked at the aquarium map. The show hall and the underwater tunnel were in completely different directions.

"The show hall is unlikely... It should be too noisy... No, that's not right... There are lots of people in the underwater tunnel too!" Shiraishi was puzzled as well.

Even if the hostage had been cooperating with the kidnapping, she could not have made a phone call somewhere with so many tourists, could she?

"Section Chief Kunikida, please send me the processed background audio." Shiraishi contacted Kunikida, preparing to judge it himself.

Though Kunikida did not know much about Shiraishi's style and felt confused and somewhat dissatisfied by the "chief personally going to the front lines," he still immediately sent over the requested file.

Eee, eee, eee—

Splash, splash—

Shiraishi: ...

After listening, Shiraishi immediately said, "No! Those aren't children playing and dolphins. That's... the call of an orca!"

Shiraishi was once again speechless at the Forensics Unit's competence—they had handled technical work like filtering noise and amplifying background sounds just fine, but...

Couldn't they have been more thorough when comparing sound patterns?

It sounded like a dolphin, so they decided it was a dolphin? Giving a provisional report like that was understandable, but why had they not verified it afterward?

"Wait... there's also the sound of rippling water... It's at the feeding pool!" As Shiraishi spoke, he immediately ran toward the Whale Shark Pool by the underwater tunnel.

Inside the aquarium, the areas open to visitors were all separated by glass walls. However... the upper portions were naturally open, for oxygen supply and feeding.

But visitors were forbidden from entering those openings above!

At that moment, Shiraishi specifically searched for the staff passage...

"Sir! This area isn't—"

"Police! Is the feeding entrance for the underwater tunnel this way?"

"Uh... yes..."

"Lead the way!"

Meanwhile, above the feeding pool in the Whale Shark viewing area of the underwater tunnel...

Since it was not open to the public, the place looked extremely crude. Steel bars were exposed everywhere, and the broad water surface was only crossed by haphazard walkways.

Yet it was quite "lively" at the moment!

One of the Bōsōzoku kidnappers was an aquarium employee, so they had hidden here.

Tomoko had also followed the text instructions and found her way over...

"You people, let that child go!" Tomoko shouted at the kidnappers from across the water.

"As expected of the one in charge of the Suzuki family—you really came... Hm? Wait, what did you just call your daughter?" Something felt off to the kidnapper.

Tomoko stiffened at his words and immediately corrected herself. "So-Sonoko, are you all right?"

Tomoko had now seen the bound girl as well. She did indeed look about Sonoko's age. One of them had an arm locked around her neck, and though she seemed to want to say something, she could not get the words out.

The reason Tomoko had come here...

Was also because Shiraishi had provoked her. That damned brat had practically called the Suzuki family "people who see no one else" and "heartless capitalists" during their earlier conflict.

That had triggered her stubborn streak!

Mmph, mmph, mmph—

The bound girl looked frantic.

"Enough. Let her go. It's only three hundred million. Take it!" Tomoko waved a hand grandly.

"Straightforward! Then we'll... exchange the money for the person!" The masked Bōsōzoku said as he held Ayano hostage and walked along the raised walkway toward the middle of the pool.

Seeing this, Tomoko dragged the bag they had prepared and stepped onto the walkway as well.

If Tomoko had known how old these masked brats were, she definitely would not have acted so rashly now...

In her view, no matter how vicious or hardened criminals they were, they would not dare harm her under these circumstances. That was why she remained so composed.

But...

A bunch of little punks in their twenties, some not even twenty yet, would not assess the situation!

"Ah—"

Just then, the kidnapper holding the hostage suddenly cried out in pain. "Damn it, you..."

"Ms. Tomoko, run! They're going to kill you!" After taking the chance to bite him, Ayano hurriedly shouted.

At first, Ayano truly had childishly wanted to use this loophole-ridden Hostage Taking to "take revenge" on the Suzuki family.

But halfway through, she discovered that these punks actually intended to kill whoever came with the money, and they wanted Ayano to cooperate with them. That led to a conflict—or rather, it merely "arose," because there was no chance for it to erupt. She was subdued immediately.

Only then did she realize just how childish her earlier thoughts had been.

She also understood that since Suzuki Tomoko had already seen her, Tomoko must have recognized that she was not her daughter. Yet Tomoko still wanted to save her, so...

Ayano hurriedly warned her!

"You... go die!" The kidnapper had originally intended to silence Tomoko, then have "Miss Suzuki" cooperate in lying for them. Now, however, he flew into a rage and kicked "Miss Suzuki" into the pool.

At the same time, just as Tomoko was about to stop him, a diver surfaced and snatched away the bag of money dragging along the ground.

Tomoko was pulled down along with it and fell into the water...

"Hold her under!" The kidnapper leader still was not satisfied, shouting at the diver.

"Too late... I didn't feed this pool today!"

"Don't move! Police!"

As Suzuki Tomoko struggled on the water's surface and Ujihara Ayano was already sinking, Shiraishi kicked open the locked door to this place...