After obtaining the fake document, Akihara was completely penniless, with nothing left except for the fare to return to Shizuoka.

But thankfully, he was in a good mood. As he stepped out of the alley and looked up, Akihara discovered that the black market for forging documents was located near the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department headquarters. He could see the Metropolitan Police Department building just by looking up, and couldn't help but sigh, "The most dangerous place is often the safest."

Home was a long way away. To save money, Akihara had to walk a long distance to the long-distance bus station on his own. He casually (not really) passed by the restaurant where the three members of the police academy group had their meal.

After passing through this commercial area, he still needs to go through a residential area and a school area before he can finally reach his destination.

It was four o'clock in the afternoon, neither rush hour nor particularly busy, and the area was unusually quiet due to its remote location. Only the occasional passing resident or vehicle broke the tranquility. Because of its age, some buildings may have even been constructed before the war, repaired and maintained to this day. The facilities here are somewhat weathered, and old-fashioned streetlights still hang on the utility poles, flickering weakly even in broad daylight.

"If you're looking for a setting for a Japanese ghost story, this is the perfect place," Akihara remarked.

Suddenly, he heard a girl scream not far ahead, followed by the dull thud of a blunt object hitting flesh and a man's curses.

Akihara:……

"Is it possible... that my Originium Arts are actually words that become law..." Akihara thought to himself as he quickened his pace and ran toward the direction from which the sound came.

He was certain the sound was coming from a small alley ahead. When he ran towards the sound, he discovered that the situation might be a little different from what he had imagined.

There were five people in the alley. Two shorter middle school students were trapped inside, while the three on the outside looked like high school students—three distinct-looking thugs with spiky hair, cornrows, and pompadours. The one with the spiky hair was clutching his head and yelling, while the other two thugs laughed at their companion's predicament as they slowly pulled out short knives from their waistbands.

And the one who caused all of this was the middle school girl with the mop. She glared angrily, shielding the middle school boy behind her.

The spiky-haired boy, his face flushed with anger after being hit on the head with a mop by the girl, rushed forward, snatched the mop from her hand, and snapped it in two with all his might. However, the mop did not break in half as he had expected.

Enraged, he threw the mop aside and pulled a sharp dagger from his waist.

"Well, you little brat, he was going to just pay up and call it a day, but now he's going to make you bleed!" He flashed what he thought was a ferocious grin, his face still bearing the red marks from being hit with a mop. "I remember the guy behind you had a dead father who was a great magician, right? Even though his father was a conman who got himself killed, he must have left him a lot of money, right?"

"You! You're not allowed to talk about Kaito's father like that!" The girl, who had been calm until now, finally snapped after hearing the spiky-haired man's words. "Do you know who my father is? He's a policeman. Arrest you all..."

"Alright, alright, Qingzi, they want money, just give it to them." The boy who had been protected by the girl stepped forward, showing no sign of panic, and even had a smile on his face. He took off his backpack, unzipped it, and said, "Here, all my money is in here, take a look for yourselves."

As he spoke, he offered his schoolbag to the person in front of him.

The three men, thinking the boy had chickened out, laughed loudly, occasionally uttering a curse that translated to, "We were ready to fight to the death, why has Your Majesty surrendered first?" The three thugs, unsuspecting, peered closer to investigate.

With a whoosh, several pigeons fluttered from the boy's schoolbag, accompanied by bursts of colorful smoke and ribbons, and landed directly on the faces of the three men. Seeing this opportunity, the boy immediately grabbed the girl's hand, bypassed the thugs, and ran towards the alley exit.

The three men were thrown into a panic by the sudden appearance of pigeons. They waved their arms to shoo away the fluttering pigeons and shouted angrily, "Don't run!" Then they chased after them with their knives in hand.

The spiky-haired boy was the most energetic, running in the lead. He saw that the two middle school students were about to run out of the alley, and in a fit of rage, he threw the dagger in his hand hard. Only after it left his hand did he realize that he seemed to be about to cause a big disaster.

Just then, he suddenly heard a deep sigh, and a young man calmly walked out from the alley entrance, using his body to shield the flying dagger and the two junior high school students.

At that moment, time seemed to slow down. The blade pierced the young man's body inch by inch, terrifying him so much that his vision blurred and his legs went weak. In that instant, he planned out the rest of his life: first, spend his life in juvenile detention until adulthood; then, spend his life in prison working a sewing machine; by the time he's released in his seventies or eighties, he'll be completely out of touch with society; and finally, in despair, he'll hang himself from a beam…

However, the knife seemed to encounter no resistance whatsoever, maintaining its initial velocity as it continued flying forward until it completely disappeared into the young man's body. The spot where the knife had pierced the young man appeared clean and smooth, without a single trace of a wound.

The spiky-haired guy hadn't recovered yet, and stammered as he pointed at Qiu Yuan: "You, you...you are..."

Qiu Yuan snapped his fingers, and the dagger appeared out of thin air in his hand. He casually twirled the dagger and smiled at the hedgehog-headed man.

"I'm just a magician who's passing by."

Kaito Kuroba, who had stopped behind him, widened his eyes. Before today, he had considered himself the second-best magician in the world—the first being his father, Toichi Kuroba—and yet he hadn't even seen through the young man's magic trick.

"Alright, alright, put your hands on your heads and squat down. You're still young, you still have a chance to start over..." Before Akihara could finish speaking, the thugs had already come to their senses, and with a hint of annoyance at being teased, they walked menacingly toward Akihara and his group in their Osaka accents.

"You charlatan, who do you think you are, daring to talk to us like that?"

Akihara shrugged helplessly, his eyes glazed over as he pondered philosophical questions like, "Who am I? Where am I? Why am I playing house with a bunch of kids?" He casually weighed the dagger in his hand, estimated its weight, and then flicked his wrist, sending it flying back.

The blade sliced ​​through the air, just as he had predicted, grazing the face of the spiky-haired guy in front, precisely passing through the gap between the two thugs behind him, and plunging deep into the mud.

This time, he didn't leisurely wait for the other party to react as before. He had somehow produced a black-covered ID in his hand and waved it at the three of them.

“I’m a police officer,” Qiu Yuan cleared his throat and said in a stern voice that he rarely used. “You three, put your hands on your heads and squat down against the wall.”

"You are... a police officer!"

"Are you a policeman?"

Two voices spoke at the same time; the first came from the thug in front of Qiu Yuan, and the second came from behind him.

Hmm? The voice in the back sounds familiar, but I'm not sure. Let me listen again.

Qiu Yuan frowned slightly, turned around, and hadn't had time to change his dignified expression.

He saw Kenji Hagiwara, who was still panting, staring at him with a look of surprise and uncertainty, holding his Interpol ID card that he hadn't had time to attach a photo to yet.

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