The screen went dark, reflecting my face-crumbs of potato chips still clung to the corners of my mouth, but my eyes burned with a light even I found unfamiliar. The call with no number had ended, and the busy tone trembled through the small, quiet rented room like the lingering echo of something dangerous.
"Tch, trouble came knocking?" Ryuk's enormous body curled atop the pile of dirty clothes in the corner like a deformed crow. He gnawed on another rotten, blackened apple, juice dripping between his fingers and leaving sticky marks on the tiled floor. "Things were just getting interesting, and you're already about to get caught? Humans really have no patience."
His voice held the pure mockery of someone watching a fire from safely across the river.
I ignored him. My fingertips tapped lightly against the disposable phone's plastic casing.
False god.
The words still echoed in my ears. Not a terrified curse, not fanatical worship, but a precise assessment made with cold interest. An... opponent.
My heart pounded heavily in my chest, charged with excitement. Yes. Now this was more like it. If judgment only ever went one way, how was it different from crushing ants? That was too boring. I needed this. Needed someone who could lift their head, see the existence of a "god," and even try to reach out.
But the excitement lasted only an instant before cold reason poured over it.
They had found this phone. A phone I had used only once, to send four characters. How had they done it? Signal tracking? No, this was a prepaid SIM bought on the black market. I had deliberately taken a long detour to activate it in the old district, where there were no surveillance cameras. Had they worked backward through the victim's father's connections? Too little time, too broad a search.
Unless... they weren't ordinary police. Or rather, not all of them were.
L.
The shadow of that anime character flashed through my mind. But this was reality. Everyone knew Death Note; anyone could imitate it. Was the person on the other end another self-proclaimed "genius," or... a dedicated task force set up by the authorities? After all, two people had died, both in bizarre ways, with unmistakable targets and an explosive public impact. Those at the top couldn't possibly still be following routine procedures.
How much did they know? That the Death Note needed a name and a face? Probably. That was practically public knowledge. That shinigami existed? Not necessarily. That the notebook was in my hands? For now, they probably only suspected it and had narrowed things down to a general area, perhaps where the signal had last appeared. Otherwise, they wouldn't have called. They would have broken down my door.
"Rules..." I murmured, my gaze falling on the black notebook at the corner of the desk. It lay there quietly, yet radiated an invisible, unnerving pull.
"Rules are there to play with," Ryuk said indistinctly, crunching on the apple core. "Write a name, pick a death. Simple. But you humans always like to complicate things, piling on restrictions until you tie yourselves in knots. Boring as hell."
He was right, but not entirely.
Rules were shackles, but they were also weapons. Especially when your opponents thought they knew every rule.
I opened the notebook. On the faintly yellow pages, the two descriptions of death following the names "Liu Mingwei" and "Wang Yaoqing" looked like engraved epitaphs. My fingertips brushed over the writing, and that cold sense of absolute control spread through them once again.
I needed to test things. Test how far this world's "rules" differed from those in the anime. Test how far the people tracking me had gotten.
I also needed... another target. Someone who could keep driving fear and worship toward their peak, and force the person who had called me a "false god" to reveal more of themselves.
The cursor slid across the computer screen, passing countless discussion threads about the "Judge" and the "god of death," passing police notices, before finally stopping on a name.
Zhang Hongfu. Nicknamed "Zhang Million." A property developer who had made his fortune through forced demolitions, with several deaths on his hands, yet had always remained beyond the reach of the law. Three days earlier, his construction crew had carried out another violent demolition, crushing two elderly people who refused to leave. The news had been suppressed, the matter settled with compensation. Just last night, he had thrown a celebration at a luxury hotel, all smiles.
A perfect target. Evil enough, controversial enough, and... cautious enough. A man like him had plenty of enemies. His security would hardly be lax.
That was perfect.
A plan quickly took shape in my mind, laced with cold malice and a hint of mockery.
I picked up my pen.
[Zhang Hongfu]
Cause of death: suicide. He would jump from the rooftop of his own company's headquarters. Time: ten o'clock tomorrow morning, during the morning rush. Before dying, he had to use red paint to write "I am guilty" in three large characters on the floor-to-ceiling window of his office.
The instant I wrote those details, I could feel Ryuk casting an interested glance at me.
"Oh? Getting creative now?" His crimson eyes narrowed. "Making him write his own confession? Interesting. Much more fun than a straight heart attack."
"Rules," I said softly, tapping the pen against the paper, "aren't they meant to be used like this?"
Make them die at the most impossible time, in the most impossible place, in the most impossible way. Make death itself the loudest bell of judgment, and plunge anyone trying to find patterns in those deaths into utter confusion.
Nine fifty the next morning.
I sat at my computer, looking at a live thread on a popular gossip forum. Its title read-"Serious discussion: will Zhang Million get divine punishment today?" Thousands of replies had piled up beneath it, some eager, some mocking.
Ten o'clock sharp.
The live thread suddenly exploded with countless new replies!
[Holy shit!!! Look at the Hongfu Group building!!! Someone's about to jump!!] [Is that really Zhang Million?! Has he gone crazy?] [Livestream! Can anyone there start a livestream?!] [It's up! It's up! Link XXXX! It really is him! What's that expression on his face?!] [The glass! Look at the glass! What's he writing?!]
I clicked the link. A shaky camera pointed toward the top of the Hongfu Group building, towering into the clouds. An obese figure in an expensive suit stood at the edge of the rooftop, flailing his limbs with movements as stiff as a puppet's. His face combined utter terror with an eerie calm, twisted beyond recognition.
Then, amid the cries and phone cameras of countless pedestrians below, he abruptly turned and used his hands-the camera zoomed in, showing them covered in bright red, as though coated in paint-to scrape frantically across the enormous floor-to-ceiling window behind him.
One stroke, then another... crooked, but clear enough.
[I] [am] [guilty]
Three enormous blood-red characters, a horrifying sight.
After finishing the last character, he paused for a second, as though admiring his own "work." Then he leaped.
The camera shook wildly, and screams almost pierced the sky. His obese figure traced a brief arc through the air before disappearing into a blind spot at the foot of the building.
The livestream was cut off instantly.
But it was already too late.
The entire internet erupted again. This time, the shock far surpassed the previous two incidents. Suicide, writing, rush hour, a landmark building... every element struck precisely at the public's nerves.
The "Judge" was no longer an urban legend. He had become an omnipresent "being," uncanny in his methods and unwavering in the execution of his will.
My phone vibrated once. It was the sending record for that anonymous text.
Almost at the same moment, the disposable phone rang again.
Still no number appeared.
I stared at it, waiting a good ten seconds or more before leisurely picking it up.
I answered.
Silence.
The person on the other end seemed to be waiting too.
A few seconds later, the processed electronic voice sounded again. This time, the earlier chuckle was gone. The tone was flat, but carried greater weight.
"Hongfu Building. Red paint on the glass curtain wall. Zhang Hongfu's private security system was upgraded just three hours ago."
The voice paused, as though gauging my reaction.
"A splendid performance."
"But far too many flaws."
The call ended.
I held the phone, my fingertips faintly cold, but the corners of my mouth slowly rose.
Flaws?
That was bait I had left on purpose.
Looks like the fish had caught the scent.
Before you continue