magicChapter 45  : Frozen to death

After Seiji finished eating the desserts and drinking tea, it was time for the main topic of conversation.

"Approximately two weeks ago, in our group’s territory, something strange occurred," Michirou Juumonji began to calmly narrate a story to Seiji, "somebody… froze to death."

"Froze to death?" Seiji furrowed his eyebrows.

It was currently late autumn, so two weeks ago would count as mid-late autumn. The temperature at that time meant that it impossible for someone to freeze to death.

The only exception Seiji could think of was if the person was homeless and in a truly terrible situation. This, in combination with absolutely awful weather, and the person in question coincidentally possessing a weak constitution… But, even so, it still seemed uncanny.

"Yes, he froze to death in a corner of the street." Michirou clapped his hands three times as he spoke.

A man in a black suit entered the room and bowed respectfully towards them before he placed an envelope onto the table and left the room.

‘…Just how many people were standing outside the door awaiting orders?’ Seiji’s curiosity was roused, but he decided to look at the envelope’s contents first.

Michirou Juumonji removed several pictures from the envelope and slowly placed the first one on the pile in front of Seiji.

The photograph depicted a young man with a punk-like hairstyle. He wore a leather jacket, jeans and was curled up into a ball in the corner of some obscure alleyway. He was hugging himself tightly; his face was ashen-white, his eyes were wide open, and his expression was filled with terror.

"This was the first one to be discovered, and as you can probably tell, he wasn’t a homeless person, nor was he an old person with a weak body—he was merely an ordinary lowlife scumbag," Michirou informed Seiji.

‘Hearing a mafia boss say the words lowlife scumbag, what a strange feeling…’

"Indeed, he doesn’t look like someone that would have been reduced to freezing to death in an alleyway." Seiji nodded in agreement.

"However, it’s indisputable that the cause of his death was freezing to death… My organization was looking for him for a certain reason, but when we found him, he was already in this terrible condition. His body was completely rigid and icy cold—just like a solid cube of ice," Michirou spoke in a calm tone. "My subordinates reported the incident to me as they felt the situation was abnormal. According to my judgement, it wasn’t something we should meddle with, so I anonymously reported his death to the police. But we learned later from our sources within the police that this abnormal body wasn’t even forensically inspected and ended up immediately cremated! No investigation, no deeper analysis of what happened, nothing!"

Seiji frowned. "What about the deceased’s family members?"

"No idea. This guy came to our city about one year ago, and nobody cared about his past or family members, nor did he have any close friends… He’s the type of scum that nobody would care about even if he died." Michirou’s tone of voice remained unchanged

‘Scum… When a mafia boss uses such a word, there’s no condescension in his voice at all—he’s merely stating a fact. This person died with nobody caring about him at all—a worthless person to others. There are a surprising number of such people in society.’ Since Seiji had thirty years of experience from his previous life, he understood that the world had its dark places, so he wasn’t surprised by this at all.

However, what Michirou Juumonji saw was the boy in front of him remaining calm and steady in front of such a situation, which he interpreted as the education that Seiji’s family must have given him.

"This is only the first one." Michirou picked up another photograph and placed it in front of Seiji.

This picture seemed even more abnormal. It showed an almost naked middle-aged man with messy hair and an unshaven appearance plastered spread-eagled against a wall with the same terrified expression while clenching his teeth.

"This is the second one… My group was looking for him for a certain reason as well, and they discovered him in the same condition as the first one. Just like the previous person, the cause of his death was freezing; his entire body was ice cold and frozen solid to the point where his flesh had connected with the wall behind him as if he had melded with it." As always, Michirou’s voice remained calm.

Seiji rubbed his chin. "If my guess is correct, this guy is another…"

"He’s another scumbag, as well as a wanted criminal. He’s another person that nobody would miss upon his death."

"The same as the last one… the same type of person, the same kind of death…"

Michirou Juumonji nodded before he silently handed the remaining pictures to Seiji.

In total, there were five people, five corpses, and although each of them died in slightly different positions, they all shared the same terrified expression, and their bodies were all contorted strangely.

"These are all that we’ve discovered… They’re all scumbags that froze to death in alleyways and other such places that people usually don’t go to, and if it wasn’t for the fact that my group was looking for each of them, who knows when each of them would have been discovered."

"Why were you guys looking for them?" Seiji inquired.

"Because of… a specific type of ‘medication.’" Michirou lowered his head slightly.

Seiji raised his eyebrows. A mafia group looking for ‘medication…’ This probably referred to illegal drugs.

"This ‘medication’ you speak of… they sell it? Is it ‘high quality,’ or ‘low price?’"

Michirou remained silent for a moment, before he slowly spoke up, "This ‘medication’ they were selling, although nobody from our organization was able to obtain a sample, based on reports, there was something odd about it. It was something half-solid and half-liquid—a small, soft, mushy lump that would shake by itself if you placed it on the palm of your hand. After ingestion, you could feel it moving in your stomach, then your entire body would heat up, and finally… you’d feel like you were visiting another world. Those observing a drug user reported that the user would enter a near-death state for almost an hour. Their breathing would shallow, and their body temperature would also drop precipitously. But the user would wake up eventually and recover to normal in about half an hour."

Seiji furrowed his eyebrows. "Your group… has never seen this ‘medication’ for yourselves?"

"That’s right, we’ve never seen it," Michirou agreed strongly. "It’s only natural that we would want to find out more about such a thing appearing in our own territory."

"But all the suppliers you found ended up dying in such an unusual fashion?"

"That’s correct, and we haven’t been able to find out anything useful on their possible cause of death. There are no clues whatsoever."

"Are the police just ignoring all these deaths?"

"Yep, all the corpses have been ignored and cremated with no investigations done on any of them."

"What price were they selling this at? And who were they selling to?"

"They were selling the ‘medication’ for one-third the street price of other similar ‘medications,’ and selling mostly to young people… to be more specific, to people younger than twenty-five."

There was a momentary silence.

"There are too many inexplicable things about this situation… The police are ignoring whatever’s happening, so you believe that this may have something to do with a mystical ability user?" Seiji asked calmly.

Michirou nodded. "That was the only possibility I could think of… That’s why I desperately wanted to seek out another mystical ability user and learn just what exactly has been happening here in our Juumonji group’s territory… Or what’s still currently happening…"

The mafia boss sighed at the situation. "Since the situation is one where even the police are remaining silent about, it’s probably not one that underground folks like us can hope to unravel… But, even if it means I’m old-fashioned and stubborn, I believe that since our group lives in this city, we should know exactly what’s going on. Only if we know what’s happening can we think about how to protect ourselves as well as… everything else we want to protect! Haruta-sama… we’re the mafia; we’re an existence that’s far beneath those on the top, but just like how ants have their own order in ant society, we have our honor as well, and there are certain things we simply cannot back down from."

After Michirou Juumonji slowly finished his statement, he backed away once more while remaining seated opposite from Seiji and kowtowed again. "I respectfully request you to aid us… Please untangle this mystery!"

‘Even if you beg me, I have no clue what’s going on, uncle!!’ Seiji thought inwardly. Although his outward expression remained unfazed, he mentally broke out into a cold sweat.