Eight p.m., Toshima-ku, Ikebukuro.

"Log: Since 4:35 p.m. last night, no other information has been found for the time being."

In the room of the apartment, Mochizuki Ayano picked up a voice recorder and recorded the information on time.

With big dark circles hanging on her face, she can go out without makeup, and COS has collected 320,000 candidate names for the popular panda "Ayahama".

Because her left eye can see some things that the [Detective Glasses] can't observe, she takes the initiative to ask to carry out the monitoring mission herself.

"Ding-dong."

With the sound of footsteps, someone rang the doorbell outside the door.

"Hello Ms. Mochizuki, the goods you ordered at the Dezenkan have been delivered."

Outside the door, the delivery man said respectfully.

"Okay, please leave something at the door, I'll get it later."

Mochizuki Ayano focused on the apartment opposite, and just replied coldly.

It is common sense to minimize contact with the outside world when monitoring weirdness.

So these days, she has been living by delivering door-to-door goods from the website of the former museum.

What's more, she was in a vacuum in the room wearing only a pair of pants and a T-shirt.

Naturally, I won't open the door to pick up food.

"I want to protect the smiles of the people I love and the people I love."

Through the door, there was a faint sound of such an unknown voice.

It took five minutes for Mochizuki Ayano to carefully bring in the goods that had been placed at the door.

It was a big bag of food and groceries.

Just as she returned to the window and picked up the binoculars to look, her phone rang.

"Kaori Kamikawa, a resident of Room 405, died suddenly and without warning in the isolation protection room, the time of death was 8:35, and the cause of death was heart obstruction. Chief, I'm sorry, it's our dereliction of duty......"

On the other end of the line, the dejected voice of an agent was heard.

Just yesterday, after discovering that the light was stuck in room 405, they immediately took isolation and protection measures for the woman who lived alone in the apartment, and by the way, they also carried out a physical examination, and did not find anything abnormal.

Unexpectedly, there was still a problem under my nose.

"Exactly 16 hours, damn it...... Did she say anything unusual or anything before she died? ”

Without warning, she was watching the latest episode of Tokyo Hotel before the onset of the illness. However, as she lay dying, she said...... She shouldn't have taken the elevator. ”

Mochizuki Ayano immediately took out a notebook and recorded the word "elevator".

Is it a haunting spirit, or is it a strange killing?

There is no particularly clear line between the weird and the resentful.

After all, the weird often takes the form of a ghost.

The only difference is that, compared to the resentful spirits who act entirely by obsession, the strange has rigid and irresistible rules of conduct, and traits that are difficult to completely eliminate.

This is also a point of great distress in Lesson 9 when dealing with supernatural cases.

It is difficult to know the truth without temptation.

But temptation means sacrifice that can come at any time.

The 2CH Forum's description of "Hell Apartment" is extremely vague, mentioning only that the lucky ones selected by this apartment will receive a special pass to Hell.

Supernatural cases are often hidden in a large number of suicides and accidents that are difficult to identify and cannot be traced.

In Japan, where suicide has become a culture, people commit suicide anytime, anywhere.

Although the number of traffic fatalities in Japan is less than 4,000 per year, the number of accidental deaths due to various other causes is quite horrific and difficult to count.

After the search support and analysis center regularly conducted big data comparisons of cases, it was discovered that in dozens of seemingly unrelated suicide and accident cases that occurred in the past two years, the deceased was actually a resident of this apartment.

And there is a fixed time interval between each case.

The reason why I didn't find out until now is because ...... All of these cases happened outside of the apartment.

It can be said that this apartment, where the "murder method" is extremely hidden, can enter the field of vision of the ninth lesson, which is a complete accident.

And the reason why this apartment is so important is because it is the first weirdness that embodies "anti-detection awareness".

"Is the 'rule' of that apartment really as simple as 'there will be a death in the room chosen by the lights'?"

Staring at the word "elevator" on the notebook, Mochizuki Ayano fell into deep thought.

Her gaze shifted to the information on the apartment at the desk.

The Ikebukuro Royal Copo Apartment was built 10 years ago, and there have been no strange rumors or strange cases since its completion.

According to the floor plan of the apartment, this long, narrow six-story old-fashioned apartment with a total of 24 units, each unit is connected to the front and back of the apartment, so that from her side you can see the windows of the living room of each suite.

And to put it oddly, this apartment is only equipped with one elevator.

Of course, because there are stairs in the apartment, the floors are not high, and there are not many residents, so it is quite enough.

Don't...... What does it all have to do with that elevator?

Thinking so, Mochizuki Ayano began to get dressed.

"Hi, Xili, call Takeshi Iwata."

"Okay, I'm calling Takeshi Iwata."

"Section chief, I'm ...... in Mt. Haruna"

On the other end of the phone, Takeshi Iwata's deep voice came.

At this moment, he is leading the team to squat in another place that is suspected of being strange.

"I'm going to go to the elevator on the first floor of that apartment to confirm in person, and now I'll hand over the on-site command here to you, and the surveillance work will continue by my team downstairs."

She decided to take a look at the elevator for herself.

"But...... Section Chief, this doesn't meet the 'Weird Contact Code of Conduct'. ”

The "Strange Contact Code of Conduct" is a series of specific rules of action formulated by the Institute to avoid contact with the strange as much as possible before thoroughly clarifying the strange rules, and to focus on observation.

"Don't worry, I'm just going to the elevator to have a look, it's better than waiting here and not being able to do anything, okay, if you let that apartment go on like this, the rooftop above will no longer be able to stand 'spirit', and it will really become hell...... Besides, I'm not among the people who are limited by the Institute's guidelines. ”

Speaking of this, Mochizuki Ayano smiled a little self-deprecatingly

"But...... Roger, I asked the people on the 10th floor to continue watching. ”

Takeshi Iwata seemed to want to say something, but finally chose to remain silent.

By the time Mochizuki Ayano got dressed, put on light makeup, put various equipment in her backpack, and stood in front of the gate of the Ikebukuro Royal Copo Apartment, it was already half an hour later.

"A group of apartments has been granted access to the target apartment monitor."

A message came from agents on the tenth floor of the same building.

"Roger."

After saying this into the headphones, Ayano Mochizuki took a step towards the elevator room.

"Risa-chan, I'm downstairs, what's your house number?"

At this time, a cute girl standing in the elevator hall and talking on the phone attracted her attention.