Chapter 261.1
On his way to Morimoto Academy, Liu Xing’s mind was preoccupied with a question: how did Honda Tetsuya die?!
Firstly, Liu Xing was certain that Honda Tetsuya couldn’t have been killed by the Deep Sea Gospel Society, given his faith in Honda Tetsuya’s abilities.
Moreover, if one were to believe the words of that earthy live streamer, Honda Tetsuya would have jumped into the swimming pool and committed suicide immediately after sending himself a text message.
Are you kidding me?!
Liu Xing didn’t think Honda Tetsuya would do something as absurd as killing himself for no reason.
So, Liu Xing suspected that Honda Tetsuya might not be dead, or at least, the identity of "Honda Tetsuya" had died.
To put it simply, Honda Tetsuya had used the "golden cicada shedding its shell" tactic to extricate himself from the situation.
After all, if Honda Tetsuya could send Ling Ishikawa to an alternate dimension, he must have the ability to create a fake corpse and make it seem like he had died.
Of course, Honda Tetsuya’s actions were clearly aimed at the Deep Sea Gospel Society, which probably still thought Honda Tetsuya was an ordinary person who had betrayed their grand plan.
So, the Deep Sea Gospel Society would definitely take action, waiting for the right moment to strike and kill Honda Tetsuya.
Honda Tetsuya must have been aware of this, so the question was, how would he face the Deep Sea Gospel Society’s attack?
Firstly, Honda Tetsuya would definitely not let the Deep Sea Gospel Society succeed, as Wozki Sod had once said, "When a person is killed, they die, and mythical creatures are no exception, except for the Great Old Ones."
So, even if Honda Tetsuya was a mythical creature, he wouldn’t dare to take risks unless he was a certain Nyarlathotep in disguise.
Thinking of this, Liu Xing nodded silently. If Honda Tetsuya was indeed Nyarlathotep’s incarnation, everything would make sense...
However, Liu Xing was still over 80% certain that Honda Tetsuya was not Nyarlathotep’s incarnation. After all, Nyarlathotep, although a high-frequency character in the Cthulhu RPG game, was unlikely to appear in person in this real-life Cthulhu RPG game. Even Aughra, whom Liu Xing was familiar with, had appeared as a game master, not as an NPC.
Even if Nyarlathotep’s incarnation were to join the game as an NPC, it would be unlikely to appear in the Shoggoth Region’s "small drama troupe," given the players’ combined inability to afford Nyarlathotep’s "appearance fee."
So, Liu Xing dared to be certain that Honda Tetsuya was not Nyarlathotep’s incarnation, but rather a powerful wizard, who had created a substitute to replace himself and even left a "full corpse" behind, showing his confidence in his creation.
Therefore, the only ones capable of doing this, aside from wizards, were high-tech mythical creatures like Yis People and Mi Ge.
Here, Liu Xing was still entangled in the possibility that Honda Tetsuya might be Mi Ge, as mentioned in Miguel’s story.
However, Mi Ge was currently in Zhang Jingxu’s drama troupe and was unlikely to make a guest appearance in this module, especially since Mi Ge should not have the ability to send Ling Ishikawa to an alternate dimension without disturbing others, unless Mi Ge had already researched a miniature time-space traversing machine.
So, Liu Xing thought Honda Tetsuya was more like a wizard, who might have received help from Mi Ge for a brain transplant.
"At the time, Honda sensei was very frightened. I asked him what he was afraid of, and he said he saw the legendary Red-Clothed Female Ghost the day before Suzuki Ryu’s incident and showed us the ghost’s handprint on his chest. He was worried that he would be the next to die, so we comforted him, but unfortunately, he still died..."
OkoHayato furrowed his brow, looking puzzled, and said, "Is it possible that there are really ghosts in this world? However, according to Suzuki Ryu and Honda Tetsuya’s accounts before they died, those who saw the Red-Clothed Female Ghost the day before would be the next to die. Since yesterday was a holiday at Morimoto Academy, only the security guards should have been able to see the ghost."
Liu Xing nodded, reasoning that only the security guards should have been able to enter the Old Teaching Building area yesterday, making them the only ones who could have seen the Red-Clothed Female Ghost.
However, Liu Xing shook his head inwardly, as he had concluded from previous information that everything was part of the Deep Sea Gospel Society’s ritual ceremony. The Red-Clothed Female Ghost’s appearance a day in advance was to warn the victims and hope they could find something to free her, allowing her to help the victims.
So, even if OkoHayato inquired about the security guards, they all claimed not to have seen any students or the Red-Clothed Female Ghost yesterday.
OkoHayato looked frustrated, scratching his head, and said, "Could it be that some live streamer sneaked into Morimoto Academy yesterday and was targeted by the Red-Clothed Female Ghost?"
Liu Xing chuckled, knowing that no one had seen the Red-Clothed Female Ghost yesterday, as Honda Tetsuya’s sudden "suicide" had disrupted the Deep Sea Gospel Society’s plans. According to their previous pattern, they wouldn’t have targeted Honda Tetsuya for another ten days or so.
Liu Xing looked at Fujiwara Hiroshi with a profound gaze, wondering what he was thinking and how he would make up for this mistake.
At this time, OkoHayato asked Liu Xing, "Do you know why Honda Tetsuya was demoted to the Archives Room? I looked at his file before coming here and found that he suddenly became a ordinary archivist from being a homeroom teacher, which is quite suspicious."
Liu Xing nodded and told OkoHayato about the Yueshihao incident, which made OkoHayato’s brow furrow even more.
It was clear that OkoHayato had realized something.
Liu Xing continued, "Oko officer, I have another lead to share with you. Before the Yueshihao incident, Honda sensei had a relationship with Fujiwara’s daughter, Yuko, and they even got to the point of discussing marriage. However, after the incident, Honda sensei was mysteriously demoted to the Archives Room and broke up with Yuko."
OkoHayato listened to Liu Xing’s account and thought for a while before saying, "Ryuusei, you mean Honda Tetsuya chose to commit suicide due to the double blow of his career and love life?"
Liu Xing could see that OkoHayato was pretending to be stupid.
So, Liu Xing directly said, "Oko officer, let’s not beat around the bush. Honda sensei definitely didn’t commit suicide, as he wasn’t that kind of person. Moreover, his death doesn’t look like suicide at all. If someone wanted to commit suicide, they could jump off a building, cut their wrists, or turn on the gas. Why would they fill an abandoned swimming pool with hundreds of tons of water?"
OkoHayato was speechless, only able to nod and say, "You’re right, Honda Tetsuya’s death doesn’t look like suicide, but who would kill him like that? As you said, it’s not easy to fill this swimming pool with hundreds of tons of water."
Liu Xing chuckled and said, "Oko officer, you should know about the Five Elements theory. The ones who killed Honda sensei, as well as Suzuki Ryu and Jin Ziyuan, followed the Five Elements theory."
"Metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. Jin Ziyuan died from a metal weapon, Suzuki Ryu died from a tree branch, and Honda Tetsuya died in the water. Their names also contain the characters for metal, wood, water, fire, and earth, which indeed follows the Five Elements theory." OkoHayato’s face turned serious.
Liu Xing nodded, glancing at Fujiwara Hiroshi, and said, "Oko officer, you should know that during the Yueshihao incident, some of the arrested cult members were from our school’s faculty. I suspect there’s more than one cult member in our school."
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