Investigation

Chapter 10

Jihyun

"Hey, Jihyun," Taehyung called. "They've just managed to get into the victim's email."

I went to his desk and lowered my body to look at the computer screen. I squinted to see each email's users and there was one that caught my attention.

"Look at this," I said, pointing at the screen. "This guy emailed the victim non-stop. Can you open the emails? I wanna know what he sent."

We raised an eyebrow as soon as Taehyung opened one of the emails. It was a threat to the victim. We opened the others and one of them was even a death threat.

"Is there any way we could locate whoever sent these threats? We need to bring him in."

"I'll send this to tech."

I nodded, then I went back to the white board while taking a sip of my coffee. Not long after that, Taehyung approached me and sat next to me.

"What's the update on forensics?"

"Yeah, so it gets weirder," he said. "They said whoever killed her may be involved in the absence of her teeth."

"Huh? She doesn't have any teeth?"

"They must've removed all of her teeth and taken those with them."

I raised an eyebrow. "That's so weird. Why would they do that?" I said. "If I should guess, the killer must've been a dentist or something."

"Detective Kim," a tech guy called as he approached us. "We located the guy. The name's Ji Minhyuk."

"Send uniform to bring him in for questioning."

---

"So, Mr. Ji Minhyuk," Taehyung said with a file of Minhyuk's profile on his hand, "I must ask. How well do you know Song Minyoung?"

"Look, I've told the officers that I'm completely innocent."

"Well, you're talking to me now," he said. "Answer my question, Mr. Ji."

He rolled his eyes. "Song Minyoung is my classmate in college. She helps me with homework and stuff," he said. "Can you just tell me what is going on? Why was I dragged here?"

"We saw the emails that you've been sending her," I said, giving him printed copies of the emails that we discovered earlier. "These are threats, Mr. Ji. Yes or no?"

He groaned. "Ever since Minyoung stopped helping me with my school work, my grades has been dropping real fast," he said, "so yes, they are threats. I sometimes threaten her to help me, but they don't mean anything. You can't arrest me for this."

"Mr. Ji," Taehyung said, "Miss Song was murdered yesterday morning."

Minhyuk widened his eyes. He looked flustered for a while before clearing his throat and adjusting his seat. "I didn't do it, detectives."

Taehyung kicked one of the table's foot, causing a loud bang. "You literally just confessed to sending her threats, one of which was a death threat!!" he yelled. "Do you seriously expect us to believe that you didn't do anything to her?!"

"I swear I didn't do anything. I may be a bit of a bully and I may be verbally violent and aggressive," he said, "but I swear, I would never murder anyone."

"Where were you at 3 AM yesterday, Mr. Ji?" I asked.

"I was at Jisung sport bar. I work night shift as a bartender there."

I sighed. "Alright," I said. "Do you know anyone who maybe has been threatening Miss Song other than you?"

"Not that I'm aware of, detective."

I looked at Taehyung, then he pointed at the door with his chin as a sign that we should talk outside.

"He has a pretty strong alibi," I said. "What do we do now?"

He sighed. "I guess we have to let him go," he said, "but we need to get his alibi checked out first, so we still have to keep an eye on him."

After we let Minhyuk go, Chaeyeon and Seokjin approached us. They looked pretty confused.

"Hey, guys," Chaeyeon said. "Can you tell me the update on Song Minyoung's murder? What do you know about it?"

We both shrugged. "We don't have much information right now," I said. "All we know is that the killer slit her throat with a pretty clean cut and that her mouth was sewed shut."

"The forensics also just updated us that the killer may have removed all of her teeth."

Chaeyeon then turned to Seokjin and whispered him something.

"Why? What happened?" I asked.

"Uh, yeah so," Seokjin said, "we may be looking for the same culprit."

Both Taehyung and I raised an eyebrow. "What? There's another murder?"

"Yeah," she said. "We were just called to check on a dead body and I recognized the pattern from your case."

"So it's a pattern now?" Taehyung said, then he turned to me. "Jihyun, does that mean he's-"

I cut him off. "A serial killer."