The Legal System.

Koichi stepped through the portal with a glum look on his face. He didn’t hate the capital, but it was so… familiar. Spending the better part of his life there had forced him to become familiar with every damned crack in the sidewalk. Things weren’t all that incredibly different here, though the obvious lack of most technologies was annoying to him. Of course the architecture was quite a lot more eastern as well, but he was so used to it he barely spared a thought. The streets were always bustling, carts and Youkai rummaging through the streets.

But he didn’t come here to reminisce and comment on the buildings, he came here to find something out. In between two large shops sat a small building, a place he knew as HQ, but was more commonly known as the defence force building. Once upon a time this had been one of the most respected places in the city. The defence force calmed citizens from dissenting opinions over the wars, and tried to keep tensions as low as possible. Nowadays? It was practically falling apart. The walls were paper thin and most of the walls were ripped. At least they kept the pay up with the times, even if the building was about to crumble under it’s own weight.

Once he entered, Koichi was met by the familiar guard, Duro. Simple hellos were exchanged, and he headed to his office. Ever since the defense force had gotten its funding cut, he’d been confined to a tiny little office the size of a janitor’s closet. Probably one of the reasons he felt fine sleeping in that janitor’s closet of a dorm for so long…

He began to search through files, trying to find anything on necromancy. He’d heard whisperings of it before but… he’d never actually heard of it succeeding. There was no harm in letting them try if it was bound to fail, right? Welp, it worked. Now he was going to have to look through papers till the end of time. As he was searching, Chief Kano entered, and leaned on his desk with one arm. The wood creaked defensively, and the chief stood back up, scared it would buckle under him.

“So, how’s the job going?”

“I haven’t been able to find much, it’s pretty dry.”

He didn’t want to announce that their ritual to bring the bird back had worked. Not till he made sure that it wasn’t illegal. He hoped at least.

“Great, then you won’t mind looking into some petty theft.”

Koichi sighed, the chief usually knew when he was lying, and always punished him by forcing him to go on cases he hated. Petty theft was the type he most often got put on because of this.

“What are the details…”

“One of the salesmen on Ichi street said his sake shipment got nabbed. Looks like the perpetrators left some clues though.”

He slapped a cloth bag down on the table, and Koichi took the ingredients out. Inside was a tag, a napkin, and a key mould.

“They’re pretty stupid if they left all this though…”

“Yeah well I just hope they weren’t tied to the clans, rather not get into it with them, after all, these things have been happening a lot more lately. Good luck, I’m assigning you Aimai, like usual. Just don’t try and lose her this time will ya?”

“You know exactly what I dislike, don’t you?”

“One of the perks of working with you so long. Have fun.”

The chief offered only a short wave and walked off. Koichi didn’t want to waste a lot of time here, so this case would have to be a fast one. The only problem was that he would have to work with…

“Koichi!!!”

Her.

“Hey what’s up! It’s been so long!”

“I was here only two weeks ago Aimai, what do you want.”

“Chief told me we’d be working together to catch some rotten sake thieves, right?”

“That is… correct…”

“Then let’s get started! Is that the evidence?”

“This is the only evidence bag we have the budget for, yes.”

If he could get her on topic, maybe, just maybe, they could get something done. He poured the contents out on the table and they got looking. Soon Koichi realized that the tag was from somewhere that he knew. A little store over on Shichi, near where his tiny apartment was. They headed over there as quickly as possible, the sooner this stupid case was over the sooner he could get back to the necromancy matter.

A small boar Youkai stood outside of the store, sweeping, and when he saw them waved inside.

“Hello! You looking for anything?”

“We’re actually from the defense force, do you have a moment?”

“Of course! Come inside!”

Bringing them into the store, he sat on a short stool behind the counter.

“Now, what is the matter?”

“Sir, this tag was found at the sight of a theft, a full shipment of sake was stolen. I recognized it as the same from your store.”

“Oh! Do you happen to know what the scoundrels looked like?”

“Not a bit! But we were hoping that you might remember who was here from eight to three on Wednesday!”

Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

The store owner’s jaw dropped when Aimai said this, and he leaned one head on a hand.

“I’m sorry, but there’s no way I’d remember that… Do you have any other clues?”

“Just a napkin and a key mould…”

“Napkin? What kind?”

Koichi brought out the napkin, to which the store owner turned over in his hands inquisitively.

“I knew it! We offered a new brand of napkin, and if we’re lucky, they wrote a review!”

“Review?”

“Follow me!”

The small man hopped down to the floor and gathered a book which had been placed one counter over.

“The new brand was unknown to me, so I had folks review it for me.”

On the page was a bunch of small comments about the napkin, and Koichi flipped back to Wednesday.

“There. Eight to three, looks like twelve names.”

“Wow we’re already down to twelve names!”

“That’s harder than you make it sound you know…”

“Oh, you can actually cross off these two names, one of them is my grandson, and the other is my own review. Had to get the process started!”

Koichi took note of the other names, and they concluded their business at the small store. Once they’d walked out, he was again annoyed to find that Aimai’s pumped up o-meter was yet again at an all time high.

“Wow, we’ve almost cracked the case and we just started like an hour ago! You’re the best detective we have Koichi!”

“Thanks.”

He’d been called a terrible detective so much lately that he almost missed being praised by Aimai. No that was stupid, he didn’t miss that idiot. A few minutes later they arrived at their next stop, the locksmith. Bringing a mould of a key could really help them out. The locksmith concluded that it was indeed the warehouse the sake was supposed to be stored in and they set out. Although it was customary to meet with the victim of a petty theft first, Koichi liked to shake things up a bit during such a boring case. The human-esque Youkai owner of the sake warehouse simply told them what was expected. Broken in during the night, guard was already asleep. He’d be no help.

With that they headed back to HQ to cross check the names they’d gotten in the book. It took hours, but they’d been able to check out nine of the ten names they’d been give. The last one could wait till tomorrow, it was almost midnight… Tired, Koichi told Aimai to call it a night. Even she’d been working pretty diligently for once. He wished she’d always been like this…

He decided to stay in his apartment for the night, no reason to go back to the inn for the night. Wouldn’t have to wake everyone up with a noisy portal that way. He’d finish this stupid case tomorrow and get back to the matter he’d come to HQ for.

“Damn keys…”

He dropped them, and bent over. As soon as he did he heard a loud noise on his door. Freezing, he carefully looked up to see that a club had just whizzed past his head and into the door, where a large boar and turtle were standing. The boar with the club couldn’t get it free of the door, so the turtle clocked him, knocking him out before he could even react.

Once he came to he was sitting tied to a chair in a large stone room. It was empty save for a few other chairs, a table, and some lights. The king was against electricity, so seeing electric lighting here was quite the bad sign. As he was thinking, a voice spoke up.

“Hello again detective. It’s been too long.”

Without even looking up he realized who it had been all along.

“I couldn’t even recognize you at the shop. It seems like you’ve got a better front in the capital than I’d thought, Ōjō.”

The cackling man was none other than the capital’s self-named nemesis, Ōjō of the Ishimura clan. He wasn’t all that much of a problem, but he often was involved in these petty crimes. Of course he’d leave behind a stupid amount of evidence, then kidnap Koichi once he felt like he was too close. The guy was a classic stupid villain.

“So! Are you ready to face your doom?”

“Can we please not go through this. As long as I know it was you I can close the case, please.”

“Wha- No way! I’m not gonna get thrown in the slammer for this!”

“Just return the sake then!”

“No way! Stole it fair and square!”

“Ugh… you don’t want me to call her, do you. Because I don’t want to call her unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

“No! Please don’t!”

“Then let me go.”

“Grrr… Fine, let her come!”

“You really love making my life hard, don’t you.”

He whistled loudly, and within seconds Aimai crashed through the door of the room.

“You called!? Oh, hi Ōjō, your highness, hehe!”

“I'm not a princess get over it!”

Aimai broke through the rope binding Koichi’s hands like butter, and soon they were running away from the three men.

“I didn't want to do this again when I got back!”

“C'mon this is fun Koichi!”

After around twenty minutes of hiding they'd finally lost them. Aimai made sure he was ok, and they went off to home. He locked everything in his house, reassured himself of the strength of the bars on his windows, and went to bed.

Gods he hated how this always happened.

Luckily he was able to explain what had happened to the chief the next day, and he sent out a small police force to yet again arrest the boar man. Though he was technically a part of the Ishimura clan they didn’t seem to care about him. He seemed like the only member they genuinely didn’t give a damn about.

Once all the shit was cleared up, it was back to necromancy. He visited the library, sifting through all the legal documents, till one of the king’s messenger’s approached him.

“Detective Kurusawa?”

“I am.”

“The following message from the king himself.”

On a screen a small image was shown, and an even smaller man stepped upon the dais.

“Greetings detective Kurusawa! According to my sources, you seem to be staying with none other than the Orchid herself! None of my men have ever been able to get that close to her, kudos for that! Anyways, the matter at hand. I hear that they practiced a form of necromancy, is this correct? If so, this is highly illegal. You will bring them all to me at once, and they will face trial! Thank you for your continued service detective. Should this work out… correctly, I’ll make sure the defense force receives the funding it rightly deserves!”

The screen buzzed off and Koichi was left with his thoughts.

“They really want the Orchid back… But if he ordered me to do it I can’t really refuse. The only way to win is by proving them innocent I suppose. Looks like I got my answer without the books. Great. So yesterday was a waste.”

As he walked out into the sunlight he hoped that this wouldn’t lead to any trouble. Oku wasn’t exactly the most understanding Youkai he’d ever met. If she got angry about him trying to force her to play by the capital’s rules shit could hit the fan quite quickly. He would need a few guys from the force to come with him if he ever stood a chance. Then there was Lawrence. He’d have to formally invite them to the trial, the humans at least. Get a warrant…

If they won this legally, the king could do nothing.

But knowing him, this would be be nothing but a sham.

It would have to be so convincing that you could never call them guilty. Something so impossible to overturn... Suddenly he had an idea. It would be a stretch, but if it worked but… he had to get to Lawrence right away. He might just be able to keep them all out of the slammer.

Gods know it wasn’t going to be easy… and why was he doing this for them anyways?

Maybe he was softer than he thought.

Or maybe he was just an absolutely terrible detective.