Outside the ICU emergency room at Osaka General Hospital, a pale-faced Reiko waited anxiously, accompanied by a police officer.
Suddenly, the doors to the ICU emergency room opened, and a doctor emerged with blood still staining his white coat.
"Doctor, how is my daughter Mamiya?" Reiko asked frantically.
"Although the resuscitation was successful, the patient suffered severe head trauma, and her condition is not promising. The next two weeks will be critical. If she can pull through, perhaps..." The doctor shook his head, gave the nurse beside him a meaningful look, and hurried away.
"How could this happen? How could Mamiya have fallen out of a window?"
She had only just learned the whereabouts of Moribe Mamiya, who had run away from home, and now they might soon be parted by death. Reiko could not accept it, and her body swayed.
"It might not have been an accident."
The officer standing near Reiko spoke.
"Miss Moribe previously reported to the Dotonbori Police Station that someone had been following her recently. There were also signs of a struggle in her room. She may have panicked while resisting an assault and fallen out of the window while trying to escape."
"A stalker?!" Reiko paled in horror.
"Unfortunately, the surveillance cameras at Mutsuki Apartments have been malfunctioning recently."
The officer took out a printed surveillance image. "However, on the night before Miss Moribe fell, street cameras caught this man in glasses furtively following her. Do you recognize him?"
"It's him! He came to my house yesterday morning!"
Reiko still vividly remembered the young man who had shown up yesterday and declared, without prompting, that he was Moribe's high school classmate.
As though clutching at a lifeline, she recounted everything that had happened yesterday in full detail.
"Is that man the culprit?"
The officer