Unexpected discovery

I typed in 'Guropeji' on the search engine, certain that there would be plenty of information regarding it online. I was right. There were hundreds of articles related to this page. Most of them were written by amateur bloggers. Others were written by journalists or news reporters. The majority of these blogs were written by young people who were outraged by the existence of such a web page. A lot of them also expressed their anger towards the perpetrators of such actions. I read through some of the posts before deciding to move on to another page.

There was a number of 'forums' dedicated to this topic. Many people were talking about the website. Some were claiming that it was a hoax, while others insisted that it existed and it was real. Those who believed it was fake said it was probably made by one of the media companies in Japan. Some claimed that it was a ploy to grab attention, while others said it was probably an attempt to make money by creating controversy. There were also people who said that it was a 'black market' for people who wanted to buy gory materials.

Even though many people were confused whether it was a hoax or not, it seemed that everyone agreed that it was a very disturbing page.

However, there were still a lot of people who did not believe the existence of such a web page. One of the most popular arguments against the existence of the page was that 'it would not be allowed to exist.' Someone posted a comment saying that the police would shut down such a website immediately if it existed. Another person replied that the police might not know about it yet because the website was private and not easily accessible by the public. A third person pointed out that the site's domain name was registered anonymously and therefore the police could not trace its owner.

Another argument against the existence of the page was the question of 'why?' Why did the perpetrator created this site in the first place? Only the perpetrator and the person who created the site knew the answer to that question.

There were people who argued that the page existed because 'people liked watching gory videos.' One of those who supported this point of view said that there were web pages on the internet that offered pornographic images and videos. She added that there were even porn sites that offered live sex shows. People have always been attracted to sex, violence, and gore, she concluded.

Someone else disagreed with this statement and countered that watching a video of a man being tortured and murdered is very different from viewing a pornographic image or watching a porn show. The person wrote that watching a torture or murder video was just as bad as doing the actual act. He also said that watching a video of a man being tortured and killed was not a human instinct.

The discussion in the forum was quite heated.

But another person pointed out that many people still viewed pornographic images and videos despite knowing how immoral it was. He said that the difference between watching a video and actually committing the act must be understood by both parties involved.

This argument resulted in another debate between two of the participants.

Eventually, the thread was closed by the moderator of the forum.

It also appeared that the web page had a following of its own.

It was a forum page for fans of the Gore Page. It had over 27,000 members and counting. Some of them were regular visitors, while others were newbies. There were several threads that discussed specific video, the most popular one being the 'Top Ten Torture Videos.' Most of the comments were about how disgusting the video was, although some people praised the 'creativity' of the video producers. Some of the videos received negative votes, with one user even claiming that he would like to murder the people responsible for making such videos.

There were also discussions regarding the owner and creator of the Gore Page. According to one user, the person behind it was a 'god' who could control the fate of anyone he wishes. Another said that the creator of the page had sold his soul to the devil and was doomed to hellfire. Still another said that the creator of the page was a person who had experienced a traumatic incident in his life and was seeking revenge upon humans.

Some of the users claimed that the creator of the page was an insane psychopath, while others claimed that the creator was a genius who was able to manipulate the world around him. Several people even posted pictures of the 'owner' of the page, asking for identification.

Reading all of these posts made me realize how cruel and heartless people can be. Even though this was supposed to be a place of entertainment for them, none of these people were showing any empathy towards the victims in the videos. Not even a single person had shown sympathy for the victim. Instead, they were all trying to outdo each other in terms of how insensitive they could be.

Was there any way I could use this forum to my advantage? Was there anything I could learn or do here that could help me track down the creator of the Gore Page?

Hmm? What's this? A thread caught my attention. It was titled:

"What you might know about the voting system of Guropeji"

I clicked on it and started reading.

And I realized that I had made a mistake.

***

After reading the thread, I realized that I've made a big mistake. Below was the written account of the thread starter:

You guys won't believe what I found out about the voting system! For your information, I have voted several times and none of my candidates have won. Or so I thought because I never received any new link from Gore Page. But, you know what, yesterday I received a new one-time link from them. Yes! You guess right! My candidate finally won! (or condemned to hellish torture, don't really care *ROFL). It doesn't matter who the victim was (for the reason I'll explain in a moment), but the method of torture was 'Boiling'.

So what's wrong about it? You must be wondering. Well, let me tell you. For starter, the name of potential victim that I voted on was 'Naoki Takada'. Based on his birthday he was supposed to be in his 30's. Andd....... you can find out the rest yourself!

Sorry LOL. I was just messing around.

Again, so what? What if his name was Naoki or Yuichi or Toru or Yohei or whatsover? NOW this was where things started getting weird! When I watched the video later on, the victim was not a 30's guy; he was a 65 years old geezer for fuck's sake! Also, he was not 'Naoki Takada', but instead 'Sadao Ishibashi'! Yes, narrated by the speaker himself.

I don't know if 'Guropeji' accidentally misplaced or mistyped the victim's name and background. Still, the execution method matched. So there you have it! What do you think? Anyone with the same experience? Comment below and let the discussion begin! XD

***

I continued devouring the thread and reading all the comments, at the same time dreading what I would find out. And true enough, they all said the same thing.

The victim's names on the voting page don't match the actual person on the video.

My palms started sweating, I ran through 'Naoki Takeda' on the search engine and eventually came up with multiple results: his social media accounts, his blog, his website, etc. I pulled out the candidate names from the voting list of Noboru's video and ran them all on the search engine.

And guess what? All of them turned out to be real people. I got a notion that they might be fictional names but no, they were actual people.

So, the next question was: how did the voting list get mixed up? Did someone tamper with the voting list?

No.

The more plausible answer was that they purposely change the names of the candidates! I was naive to think that they would display the actual names of their potential targets. Of course, if I was the website owner, I wouldn't be that dumb. It was the same as announcing who the next victims would be! Someone with connection or who was an acquaintance might warn them! And once they knew, the chances that they could be kidnapped and tortured would lessen considerably! They might look for ways to protect themselves or else they would suffer a fate worse than death itself! Then, the deals would be off.

I was underestimating them.

I should have known better that it was suspicious.

But then again the only way to learn this knowledge was if I voted and my candidate wins. Since I would never vote, I'd never obtain a link from 'Guropeji' and so, I wouldn't know this information. The same could be said for the police investigating this case. I guess they wouldn't have thought of looking into the voting process unless they were given a lead that forced them to think of it. But as luck would have it, I stumbled upon this thread. Now I know that the voting system only determined the torture and execution method, not the name of the actual victim.

It was almost midnight by the time I finished reading the thread. I immediately closed the window and stared at the computer screen. My head was reeling from what I read, but the most important thing to take away from this discovery was that we could no longer use the voting lists to identify the target of the next video. Detective Inspector Saito must know about this. I would tell him tomorrow. With this thought, I fell asleep.

***

"Morning, Kouichi," Dad greeted me as I entered the living room. I had just woken up and luckily I did not overslept.

"Good morning. Dad" I replied. "Did you sleep well?"

"Yeah, thanks." He returned the greeting. "Have some breakfast first before going to school. I have a meeting with the lawyers today so you and Mom are on your own until later tonight. Take care."

I nodded and quickly went to the kitchen and poured myself a glass of milk. Mom was busy cooking so I sat down alone and ate my cereal. As I was eating, I looked out of the window. The sky was a clear blue with a few white clouds hovering above us.

As I finished breakfast, I headed upstairs to get ready. My school uniform consisted of a navy-blue blazer, a pale pink shirt and dark brown pants. I took a quick shower and brushed my teeth. After putting on my socks, shoes and tie, I was done. Before leaving the room, I took a last look at my recently finished Gundam Astray Red Frame Kai model kit, still sitting on my desk. I was quite proud by the way it turned out. There wasn't much detailing compared to the original model but I managed to put in all the necessary parts and paint the whole thing. It took me the whole of Sunday to complete it.

I left our apartment building through the main entrance and walked towards the bus stop. Today's agenda was the police station and 'Daishi Ramen'. Since exchanging phone numbers, Koyuki and I hadn't really talked to each other much. Well, today I intended to change that. I couldn't help but got excited by the prospect of seeing her again.

The bus arrived after five minutes. There were two seats available near the driver but I didn't mind standing. I just held on tightly onto the pole and waited patiently for the bus to arrive at my destination.

When it finally stopped, I stepped out and paid the fare. I wished I remembered the price beforehand. I was about to head towards the stairs when I heard a voice behind me.

"Kouichi!"

I turned around and saw Yumiko waving at me with a smile. She was wearing the same school uniform as me, albeit hers was slightly different. Instead of the navy blazer, she wore a light pink blouse along with a short skirt that covered her knees. She also wore a pair of black stockings along with matching shoes. Her hair was tied into a bun with a small bow at the back.

I seemed to run into her more and more these several days. My mind inadvertently drifted back to the daydream I was having yesterday while she was on the courtyard and I felt my cheeks turn red.

"Hi Yumiko. How are you?"

She followed me descended the bus stairs after handing the bus fare.

"I'm fine thank you. Do you usually ride that bus to school every morning?"

"Yes, why do you ask?"

"Oh... I just thought that was strange since I've never seen you riding the same bus as me until now."

I shrugged.

We both headed towards the school entrance and just as I was to enter the gate, Yumiko said to me:

"So, Kouichi, do you think about me in such erotic ways all the time? For example.. like yesterday in the courtyard?"

What the HELL !?!?