Basically, the residents of Light City did not trust the police. Among citizens, the perception that "the police do nothing" was widespread, and it had become an open trend for people to declare they’d rather believe in Heroes than the police. Things were so bad that some would even call them "tax thieves" right to their faces.
"Ah, you must be the police officers?"
"Yes, are you the one who reported this?"
"Yes."
Nevertheless, if someone had resorted to filing a police report, the chances were high that it was, quite literally, a 'murky' case.
Too ambiguous to publicize and receive a Hero’s help... yet too maddening to simply let slide. Only when such a subtle incident occurred—one where they needed to borrow even a cat’s paw to resolve it—did the police get their turn.
"Then please explain the situation in detail."
"Um, well..."
Opening the door to the first-floor apartment, a middle-aged woman let out a deep sigh.
"Actually, my daughter has been acting a bit strange lately... I was hoping you could talk some sense into her."
"Strange? Could you explain in a bit more detail?"
"Yes, well, what happened is..."
The reason she had reported this to the police was as follows.
She had a daughter, who for the past week had been unable to sleep a wink, claiming to hear things at night.
"Every night, she has fits, saying she hears sounds like bugs flying by her ears or nails scratching a chalkboard... but I really don't hear anything at all. At first, I thought it was just exam stress. But she keeps getting worse, throwing things and acting like she's not in her right mind..."
At first, the mother had tried getting her sleeping pills prescribed and coaxing her gently. But today, when her daughter started swinging scissors at the air and even tried to harm herself, she got scared and called the police.
"So I was hoping you could come to the house and calm my daughter down. Even if she won't listen to me, if you officers gave her a stern scolding, wouldn't she settle down a bit?"
"So you're saying you just want us to lecture her?"
"Yes. I think it'll be enough if you tell her to keep it down, as if a complaint came in from the neighbors."
The daughter's mother didn't have high expectations for the police. She absolutely wasn't asking them to solve the problem; she just wanted them to make her daughter be quiet so she wouldn't be a nuisance to the next-door or downstairs neighbors.
To begin with, she didn't have much faith in the profession of policing, and she figured there was nothing the police could do about her daughter's mental issues.
"Hmm."
Park Eun-young, who had been listening to the story, soon turned her head slightly and spoke quietly to Kang Jin-ho.
"Seems like it's nothing much, right? What a shame, Jin-ho. Right?"
A hint of disappointment brushed past her crimson irises—probably because she had been eagerly wondering, "What kind of case could this be?" while riding in the police car.
'...Why does this woman even work as a police officer?'
Barely suppressing his desire to give this dopamine-addict villain a piece of his mind, Kang Jin-ho replied just as quietly.
"Well... I think we might be able to solve it, though?"
Having answered thus, Kang Jin-ho followed the mother inside the apartment building.
"???"
Startled, Park Eun-young stared at Kang Jin-ho’s back with wide eyes.
No, but how was he going to solve a daughter not being able to sleep?
**
"Excuse us. We're here because a report came in..."
"Get out! Get out!!!"
The moment Kang Jin-ho and Park Eun-young gingerly stepped into the house, a large pillow came flying at them from inside.
—Tuk.
"...Hmph."
Park Eun-young lightly caught the pillow with one hand, looking at the daughter with cold, settled eyes.
"...I said get out!"
Immediately after, the daughter flashed a slightly frightened expression, grabbed her head, and slammed the bedroom door shut before locking it.
"A-are you alright?"
"Yes, it's just a pillow. Whatever."
This was the situation: they had called the police, and suddenly the daughter was throwing things. The mother watching from behind was greatly flustered and busy apologizing repeatedly, and while Park Eun-young smiled and said it was fine... Kang Jin-ho somehow felt that smile was chilling. It felt as though tonight, at any moment, a young girl's neck might be severed.
"Excuse me! I have a question, ma'am!"
Feeling that the girl's life might be in danger at this rate, Kang Jin-ho hurriedly stepped forward. Because after hearing the explanation up to this point, he had realized exactly what kind of incident this was.
"That hysteria... how long has she been showing those symptoms?"
"Um... I think it's been about a week?"
"Has your daughter perhaps done something that might make someone hold a grudge against her? Even a trivial grudge."
"Eh, a grudge?"
The mother listening couldn't hide her bewilderment. Her child suddenly couldn't sleep—why was he asking if she had suddenly made an enemy?
"Our child has such a bright, lively personality... I don't think that could have happened... And as far as I know, she gets along well with her school friends..."
"Is that really so?"
Kang Jin-ho knelt down on one knee and rapped the floor with his fist.
"This apartment. I understand it's one of the older apartment buildings in Light City, is that right?"
"Yes, that's true, but..."
"Is that why? I understand the soundproofing here is inadequate, making it an apartment complex with severe conflicts among residents. You said your daughter is usually very energetic, and that she dances or sings at night... then wouldn't it have been noisy for the person downstairs?"
"Yes, I've truly felt sorry about that... I went down several times to apologize, and even brought them various foods..."
"Who lives downstairs?"
"Well, a young man living alone..."
"I believe that man is the culprit."
"...?"
The daughter's mother furrowed her brow and tilted her head as if she couldn't understand.
"What does the man downstairs have to do with my daughter acting strange...?"
"People naturally become sensitive when they can't sleep properly. It's certain that your daughter hasn't been sleeping properly."
"That's true, but..."
"I thought about the reason she can't sleep. You said you couldn't hear it, but what if your daughter really was hearing noise?"
"Yes...? Is that possible?"
"If it's telepathy, it's possible."
"!!!"
Telepathy was a relatively rare ability in Light City, yet at the same time, it was an ability that was mocked for various reasons.
Truly outstanding telepaths could help command and coordinate situations, but mediocre telepaths were completely useless anywhere.
Just because you have telepathy doesn't mean you can work well, or do jobs others can't... Because it was so incredibly difficult to actually create value, it was an ability welcomed nowhere.
"Generally, low-rank telepaths cannot read others' minds or hold conversations. But pushing short words or certain noises into another person's brain is well within their capabilities."
Kang Jin-ho glanced beyond the door as he continued.
"The man downstairs probably suffered from the floor noise and harbored a grudge. Since he couldn't sleep because of the noise, he retaliated in the exact same way against your daughter, the source of that floor noise. By directly shoving loud noises into her brain at night. That's why it was impossible for any sound to reach your ears, even though you're in the same house."
"Hmm... that could be possible."
The mother listening quietly nodded unconsciously.
Kang Jin-ho's words had no definitive evidence, but they had at least a solid, connected logic. If the young man downstairs harbored a grudge and actually had telepathic abilities... it was a scenario quite capable of happening.
"Wait, Jin-ho. Can I ask you something?"
Park Eun-young suddenly cut in. She tapped Kang Jin-ho's shoulder and asked.
"Your explanation makes sense, but... why did you think it was telepathy, of all things? It could have been another ability. And couldn't it be someone other than the man downstairs?"
In response, Kang Jin-ho picked up the pillow that had fallen to the floor and spoke.
"When she threw the pillow and went inside just now, she didn't cover her ears but grabbed her head, right? If she had truly been hearing noise with her ears, she would have covered her ears, not her head—that's what I thought. There's also research showing that prolonged exposure to telepathy causes headaches."
"Oh, really?"
"Yes. And when this was someone else's doing, the goal appeared to be 'causing as much pain as possible,' which made me think it was a crime born of a grudge. Since you said your daughter has an active personality, I thought that aside from unintentionally creating floor noise, she wouldn't really have any significant enmity with anyone."
"Hmph... impressive?"
Park Eun-young suppressed the urge to clap and grinned.
In fact, taken separately, the evidence was nothing special, and depending on how you looked at it, could seem forced... but put together, it looked quite plausible. Like a crooked drawing that somehow looked decent when viewed from afar.
Some might say, 'Does it make sense to suspect a citizen based on such a scenario?' But Park Eun-young didn't agree.
Superpower crimes fundamentally left no definitive evidence unless the same superpower was used to catch them. Even then, no one could refute the question, 'What if the assigned Hero is lying?'
Furthermore, looking at the extremely few cases where ordinary police officers arrested superpower criminals, most started with a 'plausible scenario' like Kang Jin-ho's and stumbled upon the truth while blindly charging through the investigation. In the first place, no proper evidence was left behind.
What mattered was the accuracy of that suspicion. Right now, Eun-young thought, Kang Jin-ho's intuition looked tremendously accurate. Perhaps he had the best intuition of anyone she had ever met in her life.
"Um... excuse me, but you really are police, right?"
The mother, who had been listening quietly, unknowingly opened her mouth. And no wonder—since in Light City, the police were also the very symbol of incompetence. Proper case solving was something only Heroes could do; she had never heard of or seen a police officer conduct such deduction.
"Our rookie here is quite capable."
As if she were the one receiving praise, Park Eun-young puffed out her chest delightedly. She looked at Kang Jin-ho with eyes dripping with pleasure.
"Uh, yeah."
Kang Jin-ho averted his eyes from that burdensome gaze and quietly headed toward the front door.
"It's ultimately just a guess, though. Let's go downstairs first and talk things through? If we check his Superhuman Registration Card, we'll be able to confirm whether my guess was right."
Truthfully, Kang Jin-ho wasn't in a bad mood right now either. As he recalled, this seemingly trivial case was loosely connected to a certain Hero.
If he could make that Hero's acquaintance starting with this case, he could quickly take care of his remaining karma allocation—so how could he not be pleased!