WeTried Translations

Translator/Editor: ZERO_SUGAR

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◈ The Police Do a Better Job Than Heroes

Chapter 4

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Becoming a Rookie Officer (4)

"Officer Kang."

Precinct Chief Raphael was generally easygoing, always quick with a smile, but this time even he couldn't help but turn serious.

"Read the room a little. I'm being nice about this, but don't mistake me for some pushover uncle from down the street. A citizen just had something stolen from them, and you want to crack jokes?"

Raphael figured Kang Jin-ho was messing around.

An officer, and a rookie officer who'd only finished processing and gotten assigned today, was claiming what? That the cake sitting right here was the culprit? Was he even serious?

Kang Jin-ho had a reputation as a genius back at the police academy, sure, but catching a culprit in a case involving powers wasn't a job for a genius. That took a superhuman. And as far as Raphael knew, Kang Jin-ho didn't have a single power to his name.

"Apologize, now. We're going to be working together a long time, and I'd rather not start things off on the wrong foot over something like this. We need to get the report written."

Raphael scratched at one of his horns and sighed quietly to himself. He'd had high hopes for the rookie, and here he was spouting nonsense on his very first day. The disappointment ran deep.

"Hold on a second."

That was when Officer Park Eun-yeong stepped in, smooth as anything.

"I don't think our Jin-ho would say something like this without thinking it through. Let's hear him out before we judge. Right, Jin-ho?"

"Uh, yes! That's right!"

Kang Jin-ho had no idea when he'd become "our Jin-ho," but he nodded along anyway. He'd already worked out a plan before he'd gone and opened his mouth like this.

I already know who did it.

There was no question the cake was the culprit. This was a case he'd solved back when he was playing HiCiSi, and the trick behind it had been clever enough that it stuck vividly in his memory.

But knowing the answer wasn't the hard part. Convincing everyone else how he'd figured it out, that was the real problem. He couldn't exactly stand here and say "I saw it in a video game" or "I actually have superpowers, that's how I knew."

So he had to explain, as convincingly as possible, why the cake was the culprit, and how he'd managed to notice. It wouldn't hold up to perfect logic, not with a case like this involving powers, but it needed to sound plausible enough that people would go, huh, that actually checks out.

If the logic jumps around too much, Eun-yeong might just decide to crack my skull open and take a look inside.

For the record, that wasn't hyperbole. It had actually happened in the game. The cold sweat running down his back right now wasn't for nothing.

Kang Jin-ho took a slow breath and finished steadying his mind. From this moment on, he was a genius. A genius who'd cracked the case in one shot through terrifying insight and razor instinct. A rookie officer brilliant enough to leave Raphael stunned and Eun-yeong shaking in her boots.

"So, you can explain it, right? Why this cake is the culprit?"

"Yes."

At Eun-yeong's prompting, Kang Jin-ho lifted his chin with all the arrogance he could muster and began.

"First, the table where the register was sitting. Everyone remember it?"

One of the senior officers checked the crime scene photos they'd taken earlier.

"Hmm... other than the torn wire, there's not much there, is there?"

"I thought that was strange."

"How so?"

"If the café owner wanted to hide the register, wouldn't they just unplug the wire instead of ripping it out by force like this? And if they did tear it out by hand, they'd have needed some kind of tool. But if you look at the cross-section of the wire..."

Kang Jin-ho pointed at the ragged, torn end of the wire.

"It looks like it was ripped apart with bare hands, rough tears all through it. I figured that would be impossible for an ordinary person to do, which meant the café owner wasn't the culprit."

"...Huh. That's actually a fair point."

The other officers found themselves nodding without quite meaning to. Nobody could find a flaw in what Kang Jin-ho had said.

"And, sirs. You said the security footage showed no one coming or going between closing last night and this morning except the owner, correct?"

"Uh, yeah. That's right."

"Then there are only two possibilities. Either someone can move in and out of the building without being caught on camera, or..."

"Or?"

Park Eun-yeong watched with an amused little smile, turning it over in her head.

"Or the culprit and the register never left the café to begin with."

"Wait, wait. Rookie, are you saying the culprit was holed up inside the café this whole time? Together with the register?"

Raphael was having trouble following.

"Hah. My head's starting to hurt. Can you lay this out more clearly?"

"Yes, I can. Actually, Officer Park?"

"Yes, Jin-ho?"

Park Eun-yeong answered warmly.

"I understand there are superhumans who can transform, correct?"

"That's right. There are powers like that."

"When they transform, what happens to the clothes they're wearing?"

"Sometimes the clothes stay behind and only the body changes... and sometimes the clothes transform along with them."

"In the case where the clothes transform too, could something as large as a register transform along with a person the same way? And if that happened, wouldn't the register's wiring get torn out the same way, like it was ripped apart by force?"

"Yeah, I think that actually makes sense."

"!!!"

"!!!"

The other officers' eyes went wide as Kang Jin-ho let a smile creep across his face, as genius-looking as he could manage.

"Here's my theory."

The culprit had come into the café during a busy stretch, scoping things out, waiting for his moment. Once the owner's attention slipped, he'd found a blind spot, transformed, and hidden.

"Sirs. You only checked the footage from closing until this morning, right? If you check the daytime footage too, I'd bet there's a customer who walked in and never walked out."

"Hold on, let me check right now. Um... hang on... there! Right here! This guy in the mask!"

The senior officer who pulled up the footage let out a stunned exclamation, exactly as Kang Jin-ho had predicted. They'd been so focused on the overnight hours, checking for any break-in, that it hadn't occurred to them to check the daytime footage with customers around.

"Right. The culprit was exploiting a blind spot in how people think. He probably already knew the internal cameras were broken, which is why he targeted the register after closing."

Once the culprit made contact with the register, he'd transformed together with it. Whether police showed up or not, he'd planned to just hold that form and wait it out, then break the transformation once he was safely outside the café. The reason the register was still sitting there when the owner arrived at seven was simply that the culprit had all night to spare and no reason to rush.

"Once he breaks the transformation, the register would go back to its original state, right? After that, he could just break it open and take the cash inside. It's not a big enough case to bring a hero running, and the police can't investigate their way to catching someone who's disguised as furniture."

"...Um, rookie. There's still something I don't get."

Raphael raised a hand slightly, asking his question.

"If it went the way you're describing, sure, I get how he could steal the register. But doesn't the culprit still have no way out of the café? A superhuman transformed into an object can't move under their own power, right? So even if he breaks the transformation, he'd still get caught on camera walking out. What was the point?"

That was a fair concern. The exterior cameras were working fine, so if someone perfectly healthy suddenly strolled out carrying a register, they'd get caught immediately.

"That's exactly why I think the culprit transformed into the cake."

Kang Jin-ho said this with a grin, shaking the box holding the cake.

"Not just any cake, either. A cake this smashed and misshapen. No owner in their right mind would serve that to a customer. Eventually the police would leave, and once it's clear there's no way to salvage the case, the owner would need to get back to business, right? And a defective cake like this would get thrown out."

"!!!"

Disguised as a cake, nobody would think twice. A cake sitting in a café display case wasn't suspicious at all. And once the owner tossed the ruined cake into a trash bag, all he had to do was break the transformation somewhere off camera and slip away.

"Something about a smashed up cake like this sitting in the display case bothered me from the start. So I watched it closely, and I noticed it was moving, just slightly. Almost like it was breathing."

"...That works. That actually works."

"Impressive."

Raphael nodded over and over, clearly impressed. At the same time, Officer Park Eun-yeong watched Kang Jin-ho with her eyes gleaming like a cat that had just spotted a fish.

The logic wasn't airtight. There were some serious leaps between each step. But there was something strangely convincing about the way the rookie spoke, like he'd seen the answer key beforehand.

Besides, the moment powers got involved in a crime, logic stopped mattering as much. Instinct, the ability to leap toward the right answer, mattered a lot more.

"You were already thinking all that from the moment you walked into the café? I had no idea..."

"I noticed the wire looked weird too, but... wow. That actually holds together."

The two senior officers stared at Kang Jin-ho, looking a little dazed. They'd been the first to arrive at the café, and yet the rookie had spun up a plausible scenario in no time flat, working off just a few scraps of evidence.

Clap!

"Well, it's still just a theory for now. I suppose we should confirm it?"

Park Eun-yeong clapped her hands together, smiling brightly.

"It'd make for a nicer picture if the cake broke its transformation and confessed right about now... but it's staying quiet. Just like a normal cake would."

"..."

Park Eun-yeong circled the table where the cake sat, humming a little tune.

"What should I do~ How do I get you to talk~ I think we've got you dead to rights..."

"..."

"Or, hmm... maybe I should just poke you a few times with this fork? Ahaha."

She smiled playfully and brought a plastic fork close to the cake. But for a split second, Kang Jin-ho caught a glint flash behind her eyes.

"Aaaaaaaah!!!"

The words had barely left her mouth when the cake writhed and twisted, and a person came tumbling out in a heap. He was clutching the register from the café tight against his chest.

"Please, please, spare my life...!!!"

"I'm a cop, you know? Why would I kill anyone."

"Please don't hurt me! Please...!!!"

"..."

Kang Jin-ho forced himself to look away from the scene.

"Keep talking and see what happens?"

Park Eun-yeong's warm smile was, honestly, terrifying.

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