"Hello, excuse me, but did a nurse just deliver something here?"
"Huh? Ah, they brought a fruit basket... What is it? Is there a problem?"
The patient sitting on the bed stared blankly as Shuichi Akai calmly pushed open the door and entered. For a moment, he did not understand why he had answered the question so naturally—or why he had unconsciously used such formal language.
"My apologies. We're hospital security. Due to the large volume of visitors earlier, some packages were not thoroughly inspected." Shuichi Akai calmly made up the excuse, naturally taking the basket from the man's hands. "Was this fruit basket sent by someone named Rikimichi Kusuda?"
"Uh, I think it was..." The man offered no resistance as Shuichi Akai took the basket and rummaged through it right in front of him. He hurriedly added, "I was wondering about it too. I've been trying to remember whether that was the name of a client or someone I worked with."
Perhaps it was Shuichi Akai's face, or perhaps it was his presence. Though he looked quite young, his bearing was immensely commanding.
So even though nothing about Shuichi Akai's clothes or behavior suggested he was hospital security, the conversation proceeded with remarkable naturalness.
Even when Shuichi Akai pulled a mechanical device in a plastic case from the bottom of the basket, the patient was not confused. Instead, he looked enlightened.
"Oh, oh, it's a bug or something, right? Thank you for going to the trouble."
Shuichi Akai, who had been preparing an excuse, choked for a moment. Pinching the faintly flickering LCD-screened object between his fingers, he gave the patient a subtle look. "That's right. We received a similar report, so we came to inspect it. How did you know about this?"
"Oh, the whole ward has been