The Ultimate Outlaw

The First Murder

        As Maki's words leave her mouth, everyone except Niles seemed to be affected by them. The room was silent with shock, horror and despair. Rantaro thought he would get used to the idea of people killing each other, but he supposed that he wouldn't unless he killed someone himself. He was better off than the others but he was still taken aback. He looks at Niles and sees that the man was the same as he was before Maki's news.

"Bring us there. Certainly that bastard bear wants us all there to further explain things," Niles says. Maki nods and she turns on her heels, leading the way to where she found Ryoma's body. Niles and Rantaro were the first to follow, the others eventually snapping out of their stupor and following. Shuichi catches up to be side by side Maki, knowing that if everyone else was going to get through this, he would have to put his skills to use. The group only paused when the TV crackled to life, displaying Monokuma.

"A body has been discovered! Everyone please gather in the cafeteria so an explanation can be provided!" Monokuma announces before the TV crackles off. Everyone changes course just a smidge and goes into the cafeteria like Monokuma had asked. As people gathered in the cafeteria, no one was in a clump bigger than three as everyone looked at one another suspiciously. Niles had a wicked and sadistic smirk on his lips as he watches everyone, making everyone, minus Rantaro and Kokichi of course, squirm under his gaze. It was rather satisfying to see everyone so uncomfortable! Might make everyone more bearable to deal with afterwards! Just as Tenko was about to yell at Niles, Monokuma and the MonoKubs appeared.

"Oh good! Everyone is here! Daddy! You can explain the rules more!" Monophanie says happily.

"Upupu~ Looks like one of you finally did it! What a shame that perk wasn't used, but I guess the possible threat of death is a good enough motivator!" Monokuma starts out.

"Would you really have let the murderer go scot-free? Or was that a lie?" Kokichi asks, tilting his head.

"Father doesn't lie! The murderer would have most definitely been let go without having to do a trial!" Monotaro answers.

"How interesting. So we can safely assume that Monokuma here cannot lie to us and neither can the MonoKubs," Niles says.

"Yup! We also don't have to answer questions if we deem them unimportant!" Monokuma says. "Now, onto the fun part! Since a murder has occurred, you fuckers have to debate about whodunit like I mentioned a few days ago! As a reminder, if you guess correctly, only the blackened gets punished. Guess wrong however.... The blackened goes free and the rest of you are punished! Gaaaahahahahaha!"

"And punishment is death.... Right..?" Kaede asks, fidgeting a bit.

"HELL YEAH IT IS!" Monokid shouts.

"Anyways! You all have a short period time to investigate the murder so that you have clues and evidence to use during the debate. Use it wisely cause once I get bored, you all will report to the Shrine of Judgement~! Oh, and since none of you know how to perform an autopsy, I have so generously given you a Monokuma File! These Files tell you who the victim is, their height and weight, the cause and time of death and if there is something in their system that shouldn't be there! Now, off you go! The clock is a-ticking!" Monokuma says before disappearing.

"Well, we might as well read over the File.." Shuichi says, pulling out his MonoPad. Everyone else does as well so that they could all see what caused Ryoma's death. "So the cause of death was bleeding out due to a slit to both common carotid arteries with the time of death being around 3:07PM."

"How morbid. So that was fifteen minutes after the music went off then," Niles comments.

"Very fresh then. But we need to do a thorough investigation. Let's go to where Ryoma is," Rantaro says, looking to Maki. Maki sighs and leads the way to where Ryoma's body was - the storage room. Everyone fanned out as they entered, a few horrified gasps as they see how Ryoma's body was strung up a few feet above the ground between two of the support beams in front of the pole vault poles. His feet were about two feet off the ground. Ropes were used to string up Ryoma by his wrists and his head was slumped forward. There were two streaks of still wet blood down his body as well as a wet pool of blood beneath his feet, all pink of course since that's the color of blood!