Chapter 348: Another Use for DNA Comparison
The harsh, artificial glow of the computer monitor illuminated the darkened room, casting long shadows against the walls. Amuro sat perfectly still, his sharp eyes locked onto the screen. For the past few days, he had been carefully reviewing every frame of surveillance footage Kazami had managed to scrape together—covering the entire timeline from the moment Officer Takagi went missing to his dramatic rescue by Matsuda.
He hit the rewind key again. The video skipped backward, freezing on the exact moment Venti appeared on the scene.
Amuro had already extracted a crucial piece of intelligence from Vermouth: this seemingly carefree youth was none other than the Mondstadt Division Chief of the elusive Teyvat Organization. Later, playing the part of the curious junior, Amuro had subtly probed Vodka for details regarding the night Gin and Venti had crossed paths at the bar.
According to Vodka, Venti had casually brushed off his title, claiming his position as Division Chief was merely an empty honorific. But Amuro was a man who trusted his own eyes over secondhand gossip.
He tapped the spacebar, letting the footage play. High above the Tokyo streets, a heavy transport helicopter hovered against the night sky. At the controls sat Diluc. The fact that a man of Diluc's caliber had gone to such extreme lengths—commandeering a chopper alongside a Division Chief to rescue a completely unrelated police officer—spoke volumes. And all of it had been triggered by a single distressed phone call from his younger sister. It painted a clear picture: Diluc was fiercely, perhaps dangerously, protective of Natsume.
, Amuro scrutinized the body language in the footage. When Venti landed and interacted with Takagi, there was no trace of the hostility or guarded tension usually exhibited by underground syndicates when dealing with law enforcement. Instead, Venti's demeanor was relaxed, almost cheerful. It was a stark contrast to the Black Organization's standard operating procedure.
Then came the physical evidence. Amuro slowed the playback to half-speed. Venti leapt from the hovering helicopter, dropping several meters to the unforgiving concrete below. He didn't just land safely; he did so while effortlessly carrying the dead weight of a fully grown adult man. There was no heavy impact, no buckling of the knees.
Amuro's eyes narrowed. An empty title? Hardly.
Even if Diluc's tone toward Venti had lacked the rigid deference one might expect between subordinates and superiors, it was obvious he trusted the youth's capabilities implicitly. To hold a seat as one of the seven Division Chiefs of the Teyvat Organization, Venti's raw strength and tactical value had to match his lofty status.
Yet, a glaring anomaly remained. Amuro leaned back, crossing his arms. How did they find him?
According to Matsuda's report, Klee had only made one brief, panicked distress call to Diluc at the very beginning of the incident. The line had gone dead immediately after. There were no follow-up calls, no GPS coordinates shared, and absolutely no time for a conventional search grid. They had started with zero actionable intelligence.
So how had Diluc and Venti pinpointed Takagi's exact location with such terrifying precision?
When Matsuda had pressed Venti for answers during the official statement gathering, the youth had simply smiled and offered a maddeningly poetic response: "It was a message brought by the wind."
Since Venti and Diluc weren't criminals—and had, in fact, done the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department a massive favor—the authorities had no use to interrogate them further. The police had been forced to accept the whimsical non-answer and close the file.
Amuro reached out and paused the video one last time. The frame froze on Venti's face just as he dropped from the helicopter. Amidst the violent downdraft of the rotor blades, the youth's emerald-green eyes crinkled in a relaxed, thoroughly comfortable smile.
"So, he really is a Division Chief after all," Amuro murmured to the empty room, the blue light of the screen reflecting in his eyes. "I definitely can't underestimate him..."
Closing the media player, Amuro shifted his attention to the thick manila folder resting on his desk. It contained the complete dossier he had ordered Kazami to compile regarding the infamous Twilight Mansion. The files covered everything: the identity of its former owner, the gruesome tragedy that had stained its halls over forty years ago, and the recent discovery of its hidden gold by Kogoro Mouri.
Due to the sheer passage of time, the records concerning the original owner and the decades-old massacre were heavily fragmented. However, the recent incident was thoroughly documented.
Flipping through the crisp pages, Amuro noted the heavy hitters involved in the latest gathering. Several renowned detectives had been lured to the mansion. Even Kaitou Kid had made an appearance, boldly disguising himself as Kogoro Mouri. And then there was Morikawa Shiro, the man who had conveniently claimed to be 'lost' in the area.
Amuro tapped his pen against the desk. He was almost certain that 'Morikawa Shiro' was simply Cointreau in disguise, using the persona to check in on his sister, Natsume.
But the timing bothered him. Why would Cointreau choose that specific moment to reveal himself? If he merely wanted to see Natsume, there were countless safer, quieter opportunities. Why willingly step into a high-profile, incredibly dangerous gathering of brilliant detectives—an event practically guaranteed to attract unwanted scrutiny?
Amuro also noticed a peculiar media blackout surrounding the aftermath. The revelation that the Twilight Mansion was constructed entirely of solid gold should have dominated the national headlines for months. Instead, the story had caused a brief ripple before being aggressively suppressed.
also, Shukuzen Ogami—the detective who had recently purchased the mansion in a bid to find the treasure—had been murdered during the gathering. Shortly after the police cleared the scene, a mysterious new buyer had quietly acquired the property. Since then, an airtight seal of silence had fallen over the estate.
Pondering the implications, Amuro turned his gaze back to the faded, yellowed reports detailing the original tragedy from forty years ago. He had a gut feeling that the answers lay buried in the past. He would start his investigation there. His instincts screamed that Cointreau was somehow connected to that decades-old bloodbath.
Miles away, in a dimly lit safe house, Cointreau glanced at the glowing screen of his burner phone. The encrypted message confirmed that Bourbon was actively digging into the Twilight Mansion incident.
Cointreau's expression remained entirely impassive. He tossed the phone onto the table, unconcerned.
As long as Bourbon didn't discover that the anonymous buyer who had recently acquired the golden mansion was actually a proxy for the Teyvat Organization, it wouldn't draw the paranoid gaze of the Black Organization's Boss.
And the chances of Bourbon uncovering that connection were virtually zero. The current registered owner of the Twilight Mansion was a perfectly clean ghost identity—someone Cointreau had personally vetted and established. On paper, the buyer had absolutely no ties to the criminal underworld, let alone the Black Organization. He was confident Bourbon could dig for years and never find a single flaw in the paperwork.
Shifting his focus to more pressing matters, Cointreau picked up the phone again and drafted a secure message to Glenlivet. He needed to finalize their strategy regarding Bourbon.
What kind of intelligence do you intend to feed Bourbon for your deal? he typed, hitting send.
The room remained silent for a few minutes before the device vibrated on the table. Cointreau unlocked the screen and read Glenlivet's prompt reply.
It's simple. Just send Bourbon the medical records and information regarding Shuichi Akai's relatives. Since Bourbon has deep connections to the police, let him acquire the DNA of the 'corpse' and compare it with Akai's family himself. It's accurate, simple, and convenient. Unlike fingerprints or dental records, DNA cannot be faked.
[Inorin's Note:
Enjoying the story? Dropping a quick review, comment, or Power Stone means the world to me and keeps these daily updates flowing!
Want to read 50 chapters ahead or just want to help keep a shameless translator alive? (My livelihood actually depends on this, haha 😭). You can support me directly here:
(P.S. Just remove the brackets and replace the [.] with a regular dot . to use the links!)
✨ Patreon (50 Advanced Chapters): patreon[.]com/InorinTL
☕ Ko-fi (Support / Sponsor): ko-fi[.]com/InorinTL
Thank you so much for reading and keeping this project alive!]