The Novelist Forced to Become Famous - Chapter 372

Min-cheol Park took her place: “I’d like to share Dan’s thoughts on who he would choose as his heir. We’ve discussed this before, but now the clues are clearer – blood relation. Who has a blood relationship with Dan?”

“The eldest son, second daughter, third son, and nephew. First, we can rule out the second daughter. From a man’s perspective, I wouldn’t want to become a woman, especially when I have three other choices.”

Several men in the room nodded subconsciously.

The ladies: “Hmph.”

Min-cheol Park, however, didn’t seem to notice this issue and continued: “First is the eldest son. He’s the most logical heir, and choosing him would be very convenient. But does Dan really have no doubts about his fertility? If he does, he won’t have another heir.”

“Moreover, the eldest is the oldest, almost 40 now. Would an old man really be satisfied with a middle-aged body? I certainly wouldn’t be. If you’re going to do it, you’d definitely want to do it once and for all, choosing a young body.”

“So I seem to be the most suspicious, but don’t forget, Dan thinks I have bad luck. If he believes in witchcraft, he can’t ignore that about me. What if I end up bringing death to someone? Besides, even a vicious tiger won’t eat its cubs. No matter what, it’s still his own son. Could Dan really bring himself to do it?”

“Lastly, there’s the nephew. He’s an outsider, but still has a blood relation to Dan. He’s young and excellent, completely meeting Dan’s requirements. Plus, he’s been working in the company, so taking over would be very convenient.”

Admittedly, Reporter Park’s analysis was logical and convincing.

But everyone also gave Jiang BaiYan a chance to defend himself.

Jiang BaiYan said: “You’ve overlooked one candidate.”

“Who?”

“The grandson,” Jiang BaiYan asked Zhang Xue’er, “How old is ‘your’ child?”

Zhang Xue’er recalled: “7 months.”

“You should know the gender by now, is it a boy?”

She nodded.

Jiang BaiYan said: “I think everyone has overlooked the issue of success rate. The essence of reincarnation is like a cuckoo taking over a magpie’s nest. Even with the aid of witchcraft, can an aging soul overpower a young, healthy one? What if it fails? To ensure success, it’s best to choose a soul weaker than your own.”

“In Eastern folk culture, an infant’s soul is very unstable and fragile, relatively easy to replace. Dan is very likely to choose the third generation as a vessel. Everything would be new, wouldn’t that be better?”

This… seemed to make sense too.

Kumiko Terauchi said: “I think what Mr. Jiang says makes sense. The witch’s diary clearly states that after the reincarnation, the soul still exists, indicating that reincarnation isn’t 100% successful. Following this logic, the second daughter becomes highly suspicious. As a mother, it would be hard to accept her child being replaced by her father, right?”

“The same goes for the father,” Ishikawa said. “The second daughter might still have reservations due to family ties, but the son-in-law wouldn’t. Moreover, if Dan chooses the grandson as his heir, the parents would have proxy rights over the property for a long time. He could get a large sum of money.”

Liu Sau-chi, not expecting the fire to reach him, was greatly surprised: “But I didn’t know about this.”

“That’s just your side of the story,” Wu Lie said. “I’m not doubting you, but your story has an obvious flaw – you needed money and were being threatened, but you did nothing. That’s very strange.”

Every character had a crisis, and everyone took action, except for the son-in-law who, despite needing money, didn’t make any requests to his father-in-law. This inevitably seemed a bit incongruous.

In his panic, Liu Sau-chi couldn’t think of a defense and deflected: “Ran-er didn’t take any action either.”

Ran-er Kim: “Uh, Ishikawa didn’t do anything either.”

Hiroto Ishikawa: “…That’s true, but I didn’t need to do anything.”

—

Live streaming platform, comment section:

[The game has entered the backstabbing phase]

[Classic game theory: Prisoner’s dilemma about to unfold]

[Damn, I think everyone makes sense]

[Don’t know who to side with]

[Is the witchcraft approach right or wrong? Have we all been led astray?]

[Setting-based reasoning, the world setting must be used in reasoning, it’s usually not wrong]

[Yeah, with so many details, it would be a waste not to use them]

[So annoying, why suspect our little Bai? It must be that uncle]

[Vote for the uncle!! Protect our Bai!!]

[Sisters, let’s form ranks, protect little Bai!!!]

[Are you crazy? Turning a reasoning game into a popularity contest?]

[Fans are brainless]

[What gives you the right to insult people?]

…

—

Once the chain of suspicion appears, it’s hard to make it disappear.

Jian Jing twirled her pen, resting her chin in thought.

Wataru Kojima directly communicated with her: “Does Ms. Jian have any thoughts?”

“I have a doubt,” she said frankly. “Why did Dan want me to see him at 12:30? By that time, even if the ritual went smoothly, he should have been dead.”

Wataru Kojima said seriously: “The only reason I can think of is that Dan hoped someone would discover his body quickly, not waiting until tomorrow morning.”

Jian Jing: “The reason?”

He fell silent.

“It’s strange, isn’t it? If this wasn’t my own experience, I would suspect it was a lie. But I know it’s not made up, so Dan must have had a reason for doing this.”

Jian Jing propped up her pen, the tip blotting a dot of ink on the white paper.

“I have two thoughts. First, Dan believed that after the reincarnation ritual, the vessel’s soul would enter his body, so he hoped I would discover it quickly to provide timely help.”

But Wataru Kojima immediately refuted this idea: “The witch’s diary doesn’t mention anything like that. If it was a soul exchange, the ritual would surely have specified. Besides, since Dan decided to steal someone else’s body, he wouldn’t be so kind. The diary also says his body would die.”

“Then only one possibility remains,” Jian Jing said gravely. “He wanted me to appear with the corpse. To make me a suspect.”

Others, hearing their discussion, couldn’t help but ask: “Why?”

“Because I’m of the witch’s bloodline,” Jian Jing explained. “He wasn’t sure if I knew about the immortality technique. If I did know, or if the witch had secretly told me, then I might have guessed what he had done, which would undoubtedly be very dangerous for him.”

Everyone had a moment of realization: “That makes sense.”

Jian Jing said: “If no murder had occurred, when I arrived at the study, Dan would have already died naturally. To others, it would look like we had a conflict, causing his heart attack, and I wouldn’t be able to explain.”

“Wait,” Hiroto Ishikawa suddenly had an inspiration and blurted out, “So, you cut off his head?”

Jian Jing: “?”

“Completely unnecessary,” Wataru Kojima spoke for her. “Ms. Jian could have simply pretended not to go, not mentioning that Dan had asked for her. No one would have known she was there.”

Hiroto Ishikawa felt a bit embarrassed: “That’s true.”

“The phone call,” Min-cheol Park remembered something and asked Jian Jing, “Did you make the call to the restaurant?”

She shook her head and explained: “I don’t think covering up the call would be a good idea. I couldn’t be sure if Dan had anyone with him when he made the call. If someone was there, and I said there wasn’t, it would only invite suspicion. Also, even if I covered up the call, I couldn’t remove all traces. If fingerprints or hair were left, I couldn’t explain it, since I hadn’t had the opportunity to go to the study before.”

After a pause, she added, “Moreover, a shallow, money-loving young girl’s first reaction upon seeing a headless corpse would definitely be to leave in fear, not to consider whether she might become the prime suspect and try to cover up traces of her visit.”

Jian Jing’s analysis of both the character setting and the game mentality was reasonable and quickly gained everyone’s approval.

Wataru Kojima said: “Ms. Jian’s analysis of Dan should be pretty accurate. It fits his personality of not leaving loose ends. But that’s not the main point. We still don’t have a clear idea about the killer’s identity.”

“I think we should stop focusing on motives,” Jian Jing rubbed her brow, trying to correct the direction. “What really determines the killer’s identity is never the motive, but their actions – beheading is a time-consuming and laborious act. The killer stayed at the scene to do this, which must have had a purpose.”

Min-cheol Park flipped through his notebook and said: “I think it’s because the killer was afraid. They feared Dan’s soul might return to his body, so they decided to cut off his head, solving the problem once and for all.”

“But the witch’s head is also missing,” Kumiko Terauchi reminded.

Valeriya boldly speculated, “Could Dan’s soul have entered the witch’s body?”

“That’s not possible, the vessel requires a blood relation,” Ran-er Kim said.

“What if the killer didn’t know this?” Liu Sau-chi offered a contrary opinion.

Wu Lie thought it made sense: “If the killer hastily learned about reincarnation, they might indeed not know the specific conditions. The witch’s diary was in her room, so the killer might not have known the exact details of the ritual. They might have thought anyone would do, so just to be safe, they cut off the witch’s head too.”

“Aren’t you overthinking this?” Andrei said. “Maybe the killer did this just to vent their anger.”

“That seems unlikely,” the others weren’t very convinced.

After all, this was a game. In reality, killers dismembering bodies wasn’t uncommon, but it was hard to imagine someone getting so emotionally invested in a game.

But Jian Jing said, “There’s another possibility: provocation.”

“Towards whom? Us?”

She nodded: “Some criminals, like the well-known high-IQ offenders, sometimes deliberately do things like leaving coded messages or sending letters to the media as a way to taunt the police or detectives. There are also serial killers who use the same method of killing as their identifying feature, intentionally letting people know the cases are their work.”

The guests thought about it and felt it wasn’t impossible.

Drawing the role of the killer was certainly challenging, but it was also the focus of the entire livestream. Whether showing off skills or being deliberately mysterious, this kind of intentional behavior couldn’t be ruled out.

After all, this wasn’t just deduction, it was also a game, and games have their own strategies.

Wataru Kojima: “Since Jian-san brought it up, why don’t we analyze the significance of the headless corpse?”

He looked to Jian Jing for approval, and she made a “go ahead” gesture.

“First, the most familiar headless corpse trick is the swapping of victim and perpetrator. If the body’s clothes belong to A, people assume A is dead, while B is missing and suspected of murder and fleeing. In reality, A is the killer who has already escaped wearing B’s clothes.

“Second, the head is needed to create a misdirection. For example, using a head and clothes to create the illusion that the victim is in a locked room with only a ventilation duct too small for a person to pass through, yet the victim has vanished. In reality, the killer used a mechanism to remove the head from the locked room and dumped the body elsewhere.”

Jian Jing: “That’s a good trick. Have you written about it?”

“Yes, in the third volume of my humble work,” Wataru Kojima said politely. “If you’d like, I can send you a set.”

“I’d be honored,” she said. “Please continue.”

“Third, the needs of serial killing. The killer cuts off the first victim’s head and places it on the second victim’s body, creating confusion about the number of bodies and the timeline. I won’t elaborate further on this.

“Fourth, human body puzzles. The killer murders multiple victims, cutting off parts of their bodies to assemble a corpse in their desired image. Or they use this to confuse the body count, pulling the wool over everyone’s eyes.

“Fifth, trophies or souvenirs. I noticed many doll heads in the witch’s room. Perhaps heads have special significance in certain cultural customs, and the killer keeps them as medals of achievement.

“Sixth, similar to faceless corpses, it’s just to hide the victim’s identity. This was Jian-san’s earliest suspicion, right? Worried that the body you saw might not actually be Dan’s.”