CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR: Further Investigation

˚ ༘ ೀ⋆｡˚

- HAN YUNMI

yejun's mom

yejun's mom:
it seems a lot of people are figuring it out already which i'm happy about, i'm just wondering if you have too

yunmi:
i'm getting there
i'm going to talk to gyuvin's parents about it myself because nothing is adding up that quick

yejun's mom:
ahh okay
take your time
the truth is coming out already

yunmi:
wait
who knows who did it?

yejun's mom:
you have to find that out on your own

˚ ༘ ೀ⋆｡˚

The siblings sat in the empty room discussing the case again as they waited for the time to go by so they could meet Gyuvin's parents. They called the adults over after realising their sudden silence and how they've become less of suspects.

They've spent the past week ignoring everything and everyone just to find out what happened to Yejun. Although he was definitely a bad person and ruined everyone's lives, Yunmi still had the heart to care for him and let herself investigate for him.

A little bit of herself still hoped he would've taken his time hiding as a 'dead' person to improve himself and show her the good person he was during their relationship. Maybe he'd eventually change and open his heart to her like she wanted. It's all that she could think about.

But none of that would change; he was still the same guy, lying every second he could and created problems for everyone around him, even to the point he faked his death to avoid it. She would expect herself to be more shocked that he was alive and well, but she feels nothing.

Once she didn't feel that happy for him being alive, she knew the feelings were long gone. But still, she'd defend him in everything that he did.

Everyone thought that the four had done it together, forcing their completely incorrect opinions on the case everywhere on the internet for clout. It was so stereotypical that it just wasn't true. Maybe their friend group did change a lot during the time he was there, but no one could go as far as attempting murder. None of them would, or none of them would admit that they would.

After inspecting the theories on people besides themselves, the media's choice was Jiwoong. They somehow dug up some old photos and said that Jiwoong was jealous of his step brother and vice versa, saying they had completely different lives.

One lied to cause problems, and the other was very truthful with himself. But recently, the finger does point towards the boy after those messages they found. The two didn't know what to think about Jiwoong and left it aside for now to focus on Gyuvin's parents.

Still, there were more suspects on that list. And apparently everyone else was slowly finding out who it was and connecting the dots. But for Yunmi and Yujin, they went through every single thing in the case carefully, and even had the guts to privately invite Gyuvin's parents for an interrogation again.

"Okay so he definitely got stabbed at like three or four in the morning, but only once." Yunmi kept on writing the words down. "Did the killer think the singular stab would be fatal along with the head injury?" She leaned back and turned to Yujin for his input.

"Maybe someone stopped the killer from carrying on, and that's why they left him with one single wound." Yujin shrugged before looking at some documents he managed to get from the detectives' office in their new house. "Or maybe they deliberately did it since Yejun clearly wanted to stay alive to see you all suffer, and just make a fake death."

"When I spoke to him, he seemed too calm about it - like he didn't really care that much that someone stabbed him. He showed me footage and said he knew who did it." She bit her lip as she continuously clicked her pen. "And when I asked who his ex was, he told me to leave. I thought he'd try something weird. But the weirdest thing was him asking me to leave."

Yujin exhaled and stretched his arms out. "He's so hard to read, you can never tell what he's planning. But he's smart enough to plan a death."

"Even the autopsy we got was made up." She pointed at the autopsy report on Yujin's lap. "None of that happened. No bag or anything, and the blow with the bat definitely wasn't fatal as we know." She bit the inside of her lip and rummaged through the papers. "But mine and Gyuvin's fingerprints were on it.. so I kind of don't get it."

Yujin hummed and took out a picture of the bat that had her fingerprints on it. "You said there was also a bat you thought Yejun was going to hit you with in that office, did it look like this one?" He showed her the bat that had both hers and Gyuvin's fingerprints on them, and she couldn't even remember holding the bat.

Yunmi looked at the picture, and imagined the bat that Hanbin found. Then her mind went back to the traumatic experience in the office with Yejun and she paused. She went silent for a bit as she collected her thoughts. "Now that you say it, no. What was another one doing in some random office?" She looked at it again. "They're different colours."

The boy widened his eyes and looked at Yunmi. "Do you think the one in the office was used instead of the one you held?"

"I don't get how, though. I saw footage of us holding it, and then someone holding one too. It could just be the same thing but the person just used gloves or something I don't know." She furrowed her brows.

"This stupid bat." Yujin huffed, placing the picture on the desk. "Seriously, who the fuck had it?" He put a massive question mark on it and turned back to his sister. "The suspicions always get higher but the evidence makes it so much harder on who to point it on."

"Well, him and I did conclude that two people were involved." She replied with a sigh, but then quickly sat back up and had herself a light bulb moment. "You heard about all of the interrogations right? I heard the boys took notes, even Taerae. If he gives us notes on our whereabouts, then maybe we can figure something out.

"Should we call him in?" Yujin asked, and quickly got up once Yunmi nodded. But as soon as he got up to get Taerae from the kitchen, there was a knock on the door. "Yunmi?" Taerae's voice called from the other side. "I have something to ask you."

Yujin and Yunmi ended up agreeing to trust Taerae in this little investigation of theirs, and they nodded before Yunmi turned towards the door "Come in." She shouted, and then quickly being followed by the door opening.

"I was going to- woah." Taerae halted his pace and saw the documents littered across the bed and desk. "What's all this?"

"Uhm, before you ask me that question, can I ask you one first? Really quickly?" She clasped her hands together as if she was going to beg and she waved her hand to force him fully into the room.

He raised a brow and closed the door. "Sure, what is it?" He slowly walked towards the bed and sat down next to Yujin, avoiding all of fhe documents and papers scattered across it.

"You keep your little notepad with all of the notes from interrogations with you right ? Like notes from everyone." She turned to him with pleading eyes.

He nodded suspiciously. "Are you really investigating this on your own? Wasn't he like, awful to you and everyone else?"

Yujin sighed. "She got over the mourning period and felt bad and now she wants to investigate. So it'd be a great help if you stayed quiet about this." Taerae could only nod, after spending loads of time with the siblings, he was glad they found trust in him.

"Okay, so like us four were in the college. And we were probably the only ones there besides the killer... um do you have any weird notes or things that have been mentioned?"

Taerae immediately nodded. "Actually, I was looking through them earlier. I was going to ask you about this just now." He then sighed, getting a little bit nervous to ask the question. "Um, did you see Ricky at all that night?"

She raised her brows in surprise. "No... well I actually don't remember anything as I've established like many times. And if Gyuvin saw him we would've known by now."

The older nodded and opened his phone to a note that Hao wrote during one of his interrogations. "According to Hao and another source, Ricky was seen on the camera holding something shiny, which he stated was his phone." He read aloud before swiping down. "And he claimed to see someone with a baseball bat, but didn't see anyone and left with Gunwook after not seeing Yejun."

But before he could carry on, Taerae got a phone call. He awkwardly smiled and picked up his phone. Yunmi nodded for him to answer and the siblings indicated for him to put it on speaker.

He did so, and Hanbin's shaky voice came out of the phone. "Oh my God, I just saw Yejun. Like he's actually alive. What the fuck." The three went silent but Taerae was beyond shocked for obvious reasons.

"What the fuck do you mean Yejun's alive?"

"He's in Chaeri. I came by as Gyuvin's father asked me to check out a computer that has a virus... but when I opened the door to a random room he was in there."

˚ ༘ ೀ⋆｡˚

LATER

"Thank you for coming." Yunmi said with a fake smile and gritted teeth. "How come you've been quiet for so long? No one's heard from you in ages and people are already having their correct suspicions."

Gyuvin's dad could only chuckle lowly. "It's nice to see you finally investigating, which is what I asked you all to do in the first place."

"Well I'm so sorry you decided to force me in a house with my ex friends and expect investigations." She retorted with a scoff. "I get that we're suspects but it looks like I'm the only one doing the investigating, since no one else would care for him that much."

Gyuvin's mom snorted, making Yunmi look up with a glare. "You're very naive. All of you. I didn't think this would all happen - all we wanted was you guys to be friends again."

"So you helped plan a fake death to do so?" Yujin raised a brow from Yunmi's side. "I fail to see your actual motive on acting like this. You're more involved than my sister."

The man rested his head on his palm. "It's not our motive, it's more of Yejun's. I think you know that already, yes?" He glanced at Yunmi, who stayed silent. "We didn't kill him."

"I already know he's alive." Yunmi said, causing the adults to look at each other and smile a little before turning back to her. Them two seeming more close was a little unsettling to see. "Uhm, what?"

"Yeah, we're taking care of him. But we didn't try to kill him." The woman shrugged, and her aura seemed weirder than usual. "At the end of the day, this just shows how much of a slut you are."

Yujin immediately sat up straight after hearing that. "I'm sorry? Where did that come from?" He raised his voice and Yunmi placed her hand on his shoulder, trying to make him calm down.

The woman smirked. "Do you want to hear what I have to say?" Something about her was so off, and it was definitely unexpected for the two of them. They just so happened to not notice her odd behaviour over the past weeks. "Okay, listen very closely."

Yunmi gulped as the two adults sat across her shared a look. "The summer house, you remember it all right?" Gyuvin's mom smiled. The mention of that house never failed to send a shiver down her spine. "You were out and about that summer, and you decided to play over three people. Including Gyuvin."

The girl then scoffed and slammed a hand on the table. "We're going off topic, and I know what you're going to say. Get out of my business, you're the one interested in college students, not me." She balled up her first and the woman chuckled.

"Oh, do you not want to talk about it? It could bring a clue to the killer." Her soft voice sounded so sarcastic and fake that it made Yunmi angry. "I'm being serious, you do know the killer was involved with most of the incidents."

Yunmi looked up, and as much as she didn't want the clue, she couldn't resist and leaned back. This sent a sign to the two adults that she wanted them to carry on. But from the side, Yujin looked at them with too much suspicion.

"The weed incident, when you and Yejun got alcohol poisoning, you and Ricky, every single party, the underage drinking, even the fights. All of it happened because of one person." Gyuvin's father spoke this time, and he looked at the girl's eyes.

She didn't even bother to ask why they knew everything, and she sighed. "I don't get it."

The man snickered. "Your journal, I've heard you found it. Maybe if you looked closer you'd realise." He then sighed and glanced at Yujin. "So, I guess that's done. What's your issue, Yujin?"

"Since when were you two so friendly?" Yujin asked, staring at the two who obviously weren't together. Everyone knew they kept up a fake relationship but keeping the act in front of the two was beyond weird.

"Oh, right." The man chuckled, turning to Gyuvin's mom with a smile. "We got back together." Both Yujin answered Yunmi's mouths dropped open and they went silent.

"...What?" Yunmi coughed out. "What about Hyeri?"

"I left her mom." He shrugged. "Was a bit useless, honestly. I thought she'd help my school get a better reputation but that failed." He laughed at their faces and then leaned back in his chair. "The reason why is irrelevant, and I think you'll find out soon."

Yunmi was so confused by his words. "But-"

"You said you were going to interrogate is fully, so why don't you start already?" He cocked his head to the side and since Yunmi seemed too overwhelmed, Yujin was the one who took over.

"Did you print letters towards Jiwoong to threaten him?" He asked lowly, referencing to Yujin finding out that the threatening letters being sent to Jiwoong were from Gyuvin's printer.

"What? Why would I threaten Jiwoong? What did he do?" Gyuvin's father asked, his tone sounding genuine confusion. "Where did this come from?"

"Your printer. Well the one Gyuvin uses the most. We know Gyuvin didn't do it, so who else could've done it?"

"It wasn't us." The woman said with a straight face. "Why would we print things like that out? We're not that stupid to use our own printer."

Yujin looked at Yunmi, who was still sitting silently. He sighed and wrote down a little note. "Okay, that wasn't an official question I was just curious." He placed the notepad down and looked up again. "The real question is, how would the killer get into Chaeri in the first place? They clearly knew the passwords and secret places."

The man hummed. "We have two passwords for the backdoor that only we know. Do you want them?" Yujin nodded and the man began to say the password slowly. "408060 on weekdays, and 060804 on weekends."

"Is there any meaning to the password or no?" Yujin asked after writing down the numbers. They were the same thing, just oddly backwards.

"There is, but actually I didn't set it." The man shrugged. "Hyeri's mother set it for me as I have a bad memory and that was pretty easy for me."

"Well do you know the meaning?" Yujin raised a brow, looking down to try figure it out himself. But it didn't help as nothing came to his head.

"Obviously I do, but I can't tell you." The man sighed. "You'll know when you see. I'm being serious, it's not that hard to figure out. And it has something to do with the killer."

"Hey why are you acting like you aren't being interrogated right now? You're still a suspect." Yujin crossed his arms at the man. "Or do you know who it is?"

"Oh yeah, it fully occurred to us that one day your sister was locked in your room or something and everyone tried to come to save her. I argued with them all and that was when I realised who did it."

"What happened that day?" Yujin asked, still writing down on the notepad with his scruffy handwriting. "Like during the argument, or are you not going to tell me and force me to ask someone else?"

He laughed. "Why don't you ask Hanbin? He saw everything, and heard everything. I'm sure he's figured it out by now too."

˚ ༘ ೀ⋆｡˚

- KIM JIWOONG

Z

jiwoong:
i knew it

Z:
oookaay knew what

jiwoong:
i know why you killed him

Z:
I literally told you this ages ago

jiwoong:
what i mean is that i now know your motive

jiwoong:
i'm going to fucking rat you out
you shouldn't have killed him

Z:
technically it wasn't my plan
want to know something juicy

jiwoong:
what

Z:
i'm the one who brought a secondary baseball bat and hid it in an office, i'm sure you saw it, yes?

jiwoong:
what do you mean

Z:
you were hiding in that office
weren't you?

Z:
or you were at least in there at one point.

˚ ༘ ೀ⋆｡˚

what's your opinion now x