Criminal psychology

"The killer did it deliberately?"

Chief Duke sounded puzzled.

But in truth, another word in Kallen's remarks had struck a chord with him: a work of art.

A young man,

actually describing a murder victim's body as a "work of art."

Although Chief Duke knew the young man before him was speaking from the killer's perspective, he couldn't help being surprised at how quickly and effortlessly Kallen had assumed that perspective and put such a description into words.

Still, he wanted to hear more from the young man, so he immediately asked, "How did you reach that conclusion?"

"Clearly, this wasn't a crime of passion."

"Mm." Chief Duke nodded.

A crime of passion, as opposed to premeditated murder, involved someone who originally had no intention of killing, but lost their reason and control under the victim's provocation, then killed them.

But with so much arrangement and decoration applied to this body, it had long since moved beyond a crime of passion. The killer had already carried out a whole series of procedures on the corpse.

Chief Duke turned his pipe in his hand and continued, "What did you base that judgment on? After all, we haven't conducted a detailed examination of the scene yet, have we?"

Kallen hesitated, then replied, "A feeling."

"A feeling?"

"Yes. The feeling I got when I saw the body."

"Solving cases by feeling?" Chief Duke raised a hand. "No, I'd like to hear about this feeling. Could you be more specific?"

"The killer hid the body beneath the stage..."

Chief Duke interjected, "So the killer was very familiar with this dance hall's layout. And if, as you said earlier, this accident wasn't an accident but something the killer deliberately caused, then the killer was either an employee here or, at the very least, a regular.

"Oh, sorry. I've interrupted you again. Please continue."

"I can only follow my instincts, Chief," Kallen explained again.

"That's fine. Go ahead."

"A dance hall is a lively place, crowded and noisy. Generally speaking, when a killer disposes of a body, the main purpose is to destroy the evidence. Here, it's completely different.

"The killer placed the body here and arranged it with such complexity and care because he intended to reveal it someday... today.

"Like a painter covering a finished painting with a red cloth, then pulling it away once all the guests have arrived to reveal the work.

"Also,

"I think placing it beneath the stage has another meaning."

"Another meaning?"

"Although this wasn't a crime of passion, the killer clearly harbored an extremely intense hatred."

"Don't worry about that. Once we've identified the deceased, we'll investigate his social connections, focusing on anyone who had conflicts with him or stood against him."

"No, no, you've misunderstood me. The hatred I'm talking about isn't the kind you're thinking of, Chief."

"It isn't?"

"It probably isn't resentment built up through friction with coworkers, relatives, neighbors, or friends in everyday life, which finally became a motive for murder.

"The hatred I'm talking about exists on another level.

"Look,

"The killer paid far too much attention to detail in his treatment of the body. There's not only a strong religious element, but also an expression of artistic emotion, like a sculptor's."

"I understand those words individually, but put together, I'm a little..."

"Please come with me."

By then, Uncle Mason had already led the others outside, carrying the gravely injured man. For the moment, only Kallen and Chief Duke remained inside.

Because neither Chief Duke nor Kallen had screamed upon discovering the body in the hole at the center of the stage, amid the earlier chaos, no one else had even noticed there was another corpse here that had nothing to do with this "accident."

Kallen stepped off the stage and headed toward the seating area. The dance hall's layout resembled a theater's. In fact, before it became a dance hall, it had been a theater in Rojia City.

Thus, the steps from the stage toward the "audience seating," or booth area, led upward. The farther back you went, the higher it rose, rather like an arena.

Kallen continued upward, stopping when he reached the middle.

Here stood tall little tables, so small they could hold only a few drinks, with no chairs beside them. Anyone who wanted to sit comfortably had to pay extra for a booth down front.

This area simply gave you somewhere to set your glass while chatting with friends. Of course, if you were a girl, you could freely join a table in the seating area ahead and have a drink.

Unlike Uncle Mason, who had long since left those days behind, Ron was a regular at this dance hall. This was his usual haunt, too, because there was no minimum spend.

A song lasted only three minutes, at five Lu Coins for those three minutes. Even though Ron earned a decent income, he had plenty of expenses, so he couldn't hire dancers as freely as he liked.

Most of the time, he held a purchased glass of beer, repeatedly wetting his lips with it while looking around at the beauties in their "tattered clothes."

He always waited until the prettiest woman, the one who appealed to him most, appeared before inviting her to dance for a song or two. Afterward, he immediately paid the dance girl, left the stage, and returned here to keep wetting his lips with that same beer, slowly savoring the experience while searching for his next dance partner.

Ron had told them all this himself on the drive over. He was proud of how he stretched his enjoyment to the limit at the lowest possible cost.

Kallen turned around. Chief Duke stood behind him.

"Chief, please turn around."

"All right."

Chief Duke turned, standing halfway up the room and facing the stage below.

Kallen's voice came from behind him.

"Please use your imagination, Chief. This is no longer a dance hall where the stage has just collapsed. Right now, it's open for business as usual.

"Listen. The music has started. It's the lively 'Rojia Sprite.'"

It was a cheerful tune, one Aunt Mary loved to play while working in her studio.

"Look. The lights have gradually dimmed. The customers have chosen their partners and stepped onto the stage.

"Look. In the middle of the stage, over a hundred couples are dancing in each other's arms.

"Around the edges, a few couples are earnestly ballroom dancing. Their movements aren't perfect, but they're proper enough.

"Farther in, the male customers are pressing themselves against the dance girls. Their hands slide to places they shouldn't be, rubbing without pause.

"Listen. The sound of hormones keeps crackling and surging across the stage.

"Look. Everything before you is a concentrated expression of humanity's primal desires. Everyone presses close, using each other's bodies as cover to strip away their disguises. They can even find pleasure in doing it in public.

"Now look up again.

"The glass stage above offers another vast expanse of titillating sights.

"Morality, ethics, restraint-all of it has been cast off the stage. Money and primal desire bare their fangs. What should have been hidden in shame becomes brazenly respectable here, on these two stages before your eyes."

As Kallen narrated,

Chief Duke seemed to see just such a scene unfold before him. Light and shadow began to mingle and shift.

"Now please lower your gaze to the stage, to its center, then slowly farther down. Take your time, until your eyes finally settle beneath the stage.

"Please tell me,

"what do you see?"

Chief Duke replied, "A body. A body with a Berry Church bible on its chest, arranged in a particular mocking pose."

"Then please tell me, what position is he in?"

"He's lying down."

"Oh, is he?"

"Isn't he?"

"Standing here, look carefully again. Is he... really lying down?"

Chief Duke's gaze sharpened. Because of the elevation, as his mental perspective shifted further, he couldn't help exclaiming:

"No, he isn't lying down. He's standing. And the people dancing on the stage-they're actually lying down!"

All at once,

Chief Duke clenched both fists,

because he had suddenly realized something.

This spot was an observer's vantage point. No, an appreciator's.

Chief Duke slowly turned his head to the left.

In his "vision," a dark figure seemed to appear, standing right there beside him, a smile on his lips as he admired the moving scene before him.

He... was the killer!

Chief Duke instinctively reached out to grab him.

But the instant his hand touched the dark figure, it dissolved. All the surrounding light and shadow vanished with it, restoring the scene to its real, wrecked state.

There were no other sounds anymore, either, apart from his own somewhat heavy breathing.

Chief Duke turned to Kallen and said, "He's someone who enjoys killing. He's admiring it."

Things had become serious.

No one could predict an accident. The deaths and injuries it caused brought grief to friends and family.

But a deranged serial killer was different. His existence could plunge all of Rojia City into panic.

"He doesn't actually think he's killing people. He's painting. He believes he's presenting a form of art."

"Then the Berry Church bible, the flowerpot on his stomach, the middle finger, the naked body, all of these..." Chief Duke frowned slightly. "They seem... seem..."

"Are you saying they all seem unimportant now, Chief?"

"I... do feel that way."

"Because the visual composition is already enough. No, more precisely, because all those arrangements are supporting elements, there to fill out the painting and give the image more character."

"So whether it's the flowerpot, the middle finger, or 'Song of the Soul,' investigating those things is actually pointless? They aren't deliberate statements by the killer, but things he casually put together?

"It's even possible that this corpse, whose identity I still don't know, wasn't a Berry Church believer at all?"

Kallen nodded, but still reminded him, "But the Berry Church aspires to nature, and nature is a kind of innate instinct."

Chief Duke said, "Yes. Some Berry Church followers like organizing orgies. They consider that behavior another way of getting close to nature, and that element happens to echo the scene on the stage.

"So the killer doesn't belong to the Berry Church, nor does he hate it. His hatred comes from that attitude. No, what he hates is opposed to what the Berry Church advocates."

"You're right, Chief. A work of art with no emotional release is merely an exquisite but empty assemblage. It can't bring its creator pleasure. Hatred can also be a kind of pleasure, and pleasure requires identification.

"This body isn't being punished here. He isn't the object of the killer's punishment, but a vessel the killer identifies with.

"When the killer stands here looking at all this, he can imagine himself standing there instead. And the men and women dancing obscenely on those two stages are the objects of his hatred and mockery.

"He stands while those men and women lie down. Like a god, he looks down on the filthy masses. This hatred goes beyond its ordinary meaning."

Chief Duke nodded, then shook his head. "I feel as though I've grasped something, but I still don't have much of a lead. The killer, identifying with him... Then there might not have been any enmity between the killer and the deceased. They might even have been very close, very intimate, because only then could the killer find..."

Kallen smiled. "Someone he could identify with."

Chief Duke tapped his own head with his pipe,

then gave two self-mocking laughs.

"Ha... ha..."

Afterward,

he let out a long breath and said, "I think everything you just said is completely unfounded, all imagination and fabrication. Yet somehow, I also think it makes a great deal of sense."

"I'm merely fulfilling my duty as a good citizen, preserving this city's decency and order."

"In the investigation, I'll pay particular attention to the people close to the deceased. The closer they were, the more attention I'll pay."

Kallen said nothing.

"You're from the Immerlis Family? What's your relationship to Mason?"

"I'm his nephew. He's my uncle."

"Oh, I knew it. You couldn't be someone his family hired. With a face that handsome, you wouldn't need to carry corpses to make money. You could simply stand here and wait for the ladies to pay to ask you to dance."

Having said that, Chief Duke laughed loudly, evidently finding himself very funny.

Kallen merely smiled along politely.

He had grown somewhat accustomed to it. This world always seemed to harbor a certain malice toward good-looking people.

"My name is Duke Mallory. You can call me Pipe Duke."

"Kallen Immoreles."

"Kallen, how old are you?"

"Fifteen."

"Well, Mason has quite a remarkable nephew. What just happened was a first for me in all my years investigating cases."

Just then, police officers began coming inside.

"If there's progress on the case... No, whether there's progress or not, I'll come see you again. Mink Street... number thirteen, right?"

"Yes, Chief."

Chief Duke turned and called to the officers who had just entered:

"There's a murder victim beneath the hole in the middle of the stage. Secure that scene, then contact the station and request more officers."

As he continued down the steps, his back to Kallen, he muttered under his breath:

A nephew who can resonate mentally with a deranged killer.

After taking only a few steps down, Chief Duke suddenly stopped again and looked back at Kallen.

"One more thing."

"Go ahead."

"When I examined the body earlier, I noticed it had undergone some preservation treatment. And since it's winter, it won't decompose as quickly. The killer could have continued enjoying that pleasure of identification, or hatred, if you want to call it that.

"Why did he choose to reveal the body... the work of art, this way?

"I understand his desire to display it, but I feel he could have played with it a little longer, couldn't he?"

Kallen looked at Chief Duke and replied, "Perhaps the killer grew tired of the old and wanted something new."

Chief Duke's pupils contracted slightly. "You mean the killer has already picked out a new target?"

"No."

"Oh." Chief Duke breathed a sigh of relief.

Kallen continued:

"The killer may already be admiring it right now."

Kallen walked out of the dance hall. Outside, he saw two ambulances already parked there, with quite a few injured people being carried into them. Some order had also returned to the earlier chaos.

But to Kallen's embarrassment, the Immerlis Family's converted Nut Shell hearse was gone.

Had Uncle Mason been so focused on transporting the "guest" that he hadn't noticed his nephew wasn't even in the vehicle?

With no other choice, Kallen decided to take a taxi home.

The reason he had volunteered to help Duke with criminal profiling earlier wasn't that he had been itching to play detective. Rather, he urgently needed to make connections outside the family. Although he didn't dare "run away from home" yet, that didn't stop him from preparing for the future by, for instance, getting to know more people.

There really was no need to hide his abilities. When his grandfather was constantly weighing whether to kill him, what was the point?

Just then, a taxi stopped in front of Kallen.

A man got out of the taxi. He wore a flat cap and had a hooked nose and a pointed chin.

After he got out,

Kallen naturally slid inside, only to discover a woman in a gray dress still sitting in the back seat, fast asleep with her head resting against the window.

The taxi driver turned around and called:

"Ma'am, ma'am, you've arrived."

The woman woke up. As she opened the door on her side and got out, she muttered with a trace of complaint:

"Honestly, boss, the police already said it was an accident. How could it possibly have anything to do with an Otherworldly Demon? But you just had to come take a look. Hey, boss, wait for me!"

"Sir, where are you going?"

"Sir?

Sir?"

"Ah, huh?" Kallen replied distractedly.

"Where are you going? You have to tell me the address before I can take you there."

"13 Mingke Street."

"All right."

The taxi pulled away.

In silence, Kallen slowly unclenched his left hand and looked at the cross-shaped burn scar on it.

Did she just say Otherworldly Demon?

At that moment,

Kallen suddenly felt a pang of guilt, along with a vague, uncertain fear.

The world outside his home,

didn't seem so wonderful either...