The final destination of the case was the Tophus General Psychiatric Hospital, located on the outskirts of the empire.
Psychiatric hospitals of this era were different from those of the modern day.
As long as one had power and money, framing a perfectly sane person as a lunatic and locking them away was no difficult task. If their original name was erased from the records, it became nearly impossible to ever find them.
The criminal psychologist Tophus, who had operated this psychiatric hospital for generations, had been aware of this fact since childhood.
“Jayden! This is crazy. Why are you so thin?”
Shelman screamed as he faced his lover, who had been dramatically released.
“Shelman, Shelman… I missed you. I knew you would see my signal and realize something was wrong.”
Jayden whispered, leaning his gaunt cheek against his lover.
“I’m not the only one trapped here. There are eight people in this hospital who were deceived and imprisoned by Professor Tophus.”
“What?!”
“Most of them are my seniors and classmates…”
At around the same time, Lure discovered a stack of manuscripts in a secret safe in Tophus’s office.
“Ah, this is…”
They were all drafts of papers published under Tophus’s name.
However, the handwriting on each manuscript was different.
None of them matched Tophus’s handwriting.
Lure quickly grasped the situation.
Tophus had been imprisoning his talented students, forcing them to write papers, and stealing the results to build his reputation.
Eight students swinging eight pens while being held captive.
One would have to say he chose the nickname “Octopus” quite brilliantly.
Between the evidence Lure found and the dramatic rescue of Jayden, the rest of the victims were easily saved with the cooperation of the police.
Upon verifying the identities of the victims, a single commonality was revealed.
They were all intelligent, capable, and lonely individuals who had no one to lean on.
Tophus had specially favored such students, giving them high marks and inducing them to rely on him because they had no family or friends to come looking for them.
Then, he lured them in by claiming he had a “special job for a talent like you.”
The types of jobs offered varied.
An assistant to a famous detective in the far east, a nursing assistant at a psychiatric hospital where the work was hard but helpful for studying psychology in depth, or even a graduate student position to further refine their studies under Professor Tophus himself.
No matter which offer they accepted, their final destination was always the same: Tophus General Psychiatric Hospital.
The professor’s selection of students had been perfect, and he had enhanced his reputation for a long time by exploiting talents that no one ever came looking for.
That is, except for the one time he overlooked the fact that Jayden had a secret lover named Shelman.
—
“Thank you, Lure. It’s all thanks to you.”
After the case was settled, Shelman held Lure’s hands with a tear-stained face.
“I’m sorry for being so mean to you. Actually, I’ve thought Tophus was suspicious for a while. I wanted to find my brother by tailing him somehow, but I failed every time. That’s why it bothered me to see you sticking so close to that jerk.”
“Shelman…”
“I was anxious that you might become the professor’s next target, and I hated that I felt like I was only in the way. But I was wrong. Lure, you and Detective Hayes are my heroes!”
Lure patted Shelman, who was hugging her and crying.
The fact that the roommate she had lived with in that cramped room wasn’t entirely filled with hatred for her warmed Lure’s heart.
“Lure…”
Lure also generously accepted the apology offered by Ursula, who approached her hesitantly.
“It’s fine. I wouldn’t have been able to trust myself in that situation either.”
She was simply happy that all the misunderstandings had been cleared.
Finally, the entire case was successfully resolved.
[CASE 0. The Exam Begins! – End]
—
— Aftermath —
Unfortunately, not everyone could simply be happy about the conclusion of the case.
After Tophus was arrested, the university was thrown into a state of emergency.
The pride of being the empire’s only public university was at risk of collapsing in an instant.
The university was already facing negative public perception.
People questioned the point of operating a public university if it wasn’t a poorhouse, and some even said that graduating from such a place would only lead to becoming a con artist.
If a case like this were to be reported widely, the lineage of the public university, which had barely been maintained, might be cut off entirely.
The university set out desperately to silence those involved.
They handed out large sums of consolation money to the victims and bought the silence of the Department of Investigation students by promising full scholarships until graduation.
Fortunately, most of them were cooperative with the university.
This was largely because they were poor and needed the money, and because the settlement requested by the university did not involve leniency for Tophus.
In fact, the university was the one most furious at Professor Tophus for tarnishing their prestige, and they were determined to make him pay the price.
At any rate, since they had succeeded in silencing the victims and the students of the Department of Investigation, there was only one mouth left to shut.
The detective who solved this case, Hayes.
The university was naturally most nervous about the negotiations with him.
After all, he was a detective. A detective’s value rises the more significant the cases they solve.
Since he had solved such a bizarre case, reporting it to the media would cause Hayes’s worth to skyrocket.
He would be able to make a name for himself in the detective rankings and be treated as a rising star.
Would an unknown detective, thirsty for fame, really be willing to stay quiet?
“It wouldn’t be difficult — provided the conditions are right. However…”
Hayes’s eyebrows twitched as he looked at the amount the university offered.
“Are you joking right now? Who are you trying to feed with this?”
“Haha… Since we’re a public university, the budget is quite tight… I’m sorry!”
The official made excuses while sweating profusely.
Even if they said that, it was an amount the university had prepared with the utmost sincerity.
It wasn’t that there were no surplus funds within the university, but if they offered an excessive amount to a single individual, it would surely draw attention. If that happened, the act of silencing itself would become meaningless.
Hearing the official’s groan, Hayes put on a contemplative expression.
“Hmm… then how about this? If giving money to an individual is the problem, use the money for a different purpose. That way, you could spend a much larger amount, couldn’t you?”
“A different purpose?”
At first, the official’s heart sank, fearing that Hayes might be suggesting embezzlement through accounting fraud.
But as Hayes’s proposal continued, the official’s eyes, which had been narrowed negatively, widened with touched surprise.
“Are you really suggesting we do that?”
“Yes. Is there a problem?”
“Of course not! Actually, considering the university’s budget, it might be a bit tight, but I will use my discretion to make it happen even if it shouldn’t be possible!”
For the first time in a very long while, the eyes of the official, who had worked out of habit for years, sparkled with passion.
“If we were to refuse such a proposal, that would truly be letting the university’s honor fall to the ground. Since Mr. Hayes has even given up his commission fee, we will show an equal amount of sincerity.”
The university official left after spending quite a long time showering Hayes with praise, calling him a philanthropist, a true gentleman, and a great detective of the future.
“A philanthropist, huh…”
Left alone, Hayes watched the back of the departing official with a meaningful smile.
—
A few days later, the school was unusually noisy.
Lure, who had gone to school as usual, could not hide her confusion as she saw students swarming the corridors.
“What’s going on? What happened?”
“Ah, Lure! You’re here!”
It was a morning that felt strangely familiar.
But the words that followed from her classmate were different than before.
“But why are you here?”
“Huh?”
“What are you doing here? You live in the dorms. You should go and move your luggage out of the dormitory right now.”
Lure was flustered.
‘W-What? Empty my things all of a sudden?’
A terrible thought crossed her mind.
‘Now that I think about it, didn’t that octopus head expel me?’
She had pleaded that the paperwork wasn’t finished yet, but what if that was just a lie he spat out because he wanted to live?
What if the expulsion had already been finalized regardless of the case being solved?
‘What should I do? Does the university even allow readmission?’
“Ugh! I can tell just by looking at your face. You’re having weird delusions again, aren’t you?”
Fortunately, before Lure could fall into a full panic, Ursula clicked her tongue and explained the situation in detail.
“They’re remodeling the entire Department of Investigation dormitory. They told us to move our things before the construction starts.”
“Remodeling? So suddenly? Where did the school get the money?”
“I heard Mr. Hayes suggested it. He asked them to support the remodeling of the entire Department of Investigation dormitory instead of giving him compensation.”
As soon as Lure heard the story, she went crashing out of the school.
Her destination was not the dormitory, but Hayes’s detective agency.
“Mr. Hayes!”
Lure shouted urgently without even offering a greeting.
“Did you really give up all the fame and the reward from the case just to choose the remodeling of our dormitory?”
She was so worried for him that she was practically stomping her feet.
“Why would you go that far, Mr. Hayes!”
“Ah, that? It’s no big deal.”
Hayes replied as if it were nothing.
“Remember what I told you before? That I can’t be satisfied with a half-truth. It’s the same logic. As a detective, how could I be satisfied with a half-solution?”
“A half-solution…?”
“If the situation in the Department of Investigation were left as it was, similar crimes would surely have happened again in the future,” Hayes asserted.
“They are clearly excellent students of a prestigious university, but the treatment the students received was far too poor. Students who don’t have financial leeway at home have no choice but to immerse themselves in work and merit scholarships just to cover their tuition.”
In a situation where one is busy just surviving day to day, it cannot be easy to maintain friendships with those around them.
Classmates become competitors rather than friends, and human relationships narrow.
For isolated students, a professor who can dictate their grades gains immense power.
Naturally, an environment is created where crimes like this one can easily occur.
“So, I just tried to improve the living space, at the very least. So that they can get enough rest in the dormitory and build friendships with those they share their lives with.”
To ensure they wouldn’t be isolated, at the very least.
“This was the best I could do.”
“Mr. Hayes…”
Lure’s heart swelled.
The sight of him taking responsibility for the case he had handled until the very end, even at the cost of his own profit, was the very image of a true detective she had dreamed of.
‘I’m not joking. I truly want to make Mr. Hayes my mentor.’
Suddenly, Lure realized she had been so rushed that she had forgotten to thank him for the dormitory.
“Thank you, Mr. Hayes. Thanks to you, I received a scholarship and no longer have to worry about finding a boarding room. I think I can attend school with a peace of mind now without worrying about living expenses.”
“Is that so? Then you won’t be looking for a part-time job anymore? That’s a bit of a shame.”
“Pardon?”
“Actually, I was going to suggest that you formally become my assistant.”
“I’ll do it!”
Lure grabbed him before Hayes could even finish his sentence.
“I don’t care if it’s unpaid! Mr. Hayes — no, Master! I want to stay by your side and learn how to solve cases!”
Watching Lure shout with such passion, Hayes smiled inwardly with satisfaction.
‘Just as planned.’
In fact, this was Hayes’s goal all along.
Ever since he established the detective agency and solved his first case, Hayes had harbored a desire to hire an assistant.
It was then that he met Lure.
Lure was a top student in the Department of Investigation.
She possessed a wealth of investigative knowledge about this world that he did not know.
Since she had firm convictions of her own, it was unlikely she would commit a crime or betray him.
She knew how to voice her own opinions rather than just blindly following orders. Yet once a decision was made, she followed even the most daring plans without complaint.
‘Where else could I find such talent?’
Lure Poiren — he wanted to bring her in as his assistant.
And Hayes understood perfectly well how to act to recruit Lure.
‘That I didn’t receive a commission fee? As if.’
He had obtained the treasure of the public university without spending a single cent of his own money.
“Welcome to the team, Lure.”
Hayes flashed a bright smile and extended his hand to her.