The following day, at dusk.
"What's wrong?" Conan stood on the sidewalk, using a public payphone to call Ran.
"Shinichi, I don't really know how to put this, but… does Conan like me?"
Ran was back at the Detective Agency, her voice sounding troubled. Just today, Ayumi and Mitsuhiko—acting like little adults—had approached her separately to ask some questions.
What Mitsuhiko said wasn't so bad; he was asking for advice on how to get along with his childhood friend Ayumi, and he even mentioned that he'd been paying a lot of attention to Ai lately. Typical childhood worries.
As for what Ayumi said to Ran…
She told Ran that since she already had Shinichi, she should tell Conan to give up on her entirely.
"What are you talking about? I don't like you at all, you dummy!" Conan held the bowtie to his throat, his face flushed red as he argued back.
Sometimes, it seemed he got his identities mixed up. Even though he was using Shinichi Kudo's voice, he was currently blushing while defending himself as Conan Edogawa.
"This guy is really stubborn, isn't he?" Tsuneo asked the elderly woman at the nearby newsstand.
"How should I know? Hey, young man, are you going to buy something or not?" The old woman snapped, her hands behind her back. She was hard of hearing, so her voice was naturally loud and gruff.
"Fine, I'll take this one."
Tsuneo noticed the Great Detective had finished his call. He had been browsing the papers for a while and felt awkward leaving empty-handed, so he picked up a colorful, glossy magazine and paid for it.
"It seems the love lives of your little group are quite the headache," Tsuneo said as he got into the car, tossing the newly purchased magazine to Conan.
A bunch of first-graders… how do they have so many romantic troubles?
"Stop making fun of me. And why did you buy a magazine like this anyway…?" Conan looked at the cover, his face turning an even deeper shade of red as he shoved it aside.
This is definitely not something I should be looking at.
"Gin has his eyes on Yoshiaki Hara," Tsuneo said, his tone shifting as he checked the monitoring via Noah's Ark.
"It's not just that he refused to cooperate. He actually hacked into the Organization's computers and stole internal data…" The detective in Conan agreed that Mr. Hara had given the Organization plenty of reasons to target him.
"It's been a while since I've seen that silver-haired killer. I'll find some time to go and meet him."
As he spoke, Tsuneo pulled the car up in front of the Mouri Detective Agency. By chance, Uncle Mouri was just walking back from nearby.
The bumbling detective looked like he'd been playing mahjong or something similar; he reeked of cigarette smoke.
"Where did you take this brat this time?"
"Just over to Professor Agasa's. Oh, by the way, Mouri-sensei, here—this is for you." Tsuneo stuffed the magazine into Uncle Mouri's hands.
"Oh?!"
Mouri's expression brightened instantly. He quickly tucked the magazine into his coat.
"…" Conan watched the two of them with a deadpan stare, then silently walked up the stairs to the agency.
Those two are truly hopeless…
The next morning.
The group gathered in an office at the Metropolitan Police Department.
"What's the emergency?"
Tsuneo had been out helping someone fix a water pipe when he was summoned by Inspector Megure. The room was packed; everyone was there, looking like they were attending a year-end meeting.
"Ahem. Brother Tsuneo, please, take a seat. We were just waiting for you." Inspector Megure cleared his throat and nodded to Officer Chiba to begin.
"Right!"
Chiba took a photo from a file and pinned it to a small chalkboard.
"We've called you all here because a body was found in one of the suites at the Twin Towers. It was a stabbing."
Everyone gasped when they saw the person in the photo.
"Councilman Iwumatsu Oki of Nishitama City?!" Uncle Mouri was stunned.
The bald councilman who had been drunkenly mocking everyone just two days ago was now nothing more than a crime scene photo.
"Whoa," Tsuneo muttered. He hadn't expected the guy to kick the bucket quite this fast.
"Yes. We heard that you were all present when he demanded to stay at the Twin Towers from Mio Tokiwa," Inspector Megure noted.
They had brought the group in to get a better understanding of what had happened that day.
"The estimated time of death for Iwumatsu Oki is between 10:00 PM and midnight. No murder weapon was found at the scene. Based on the wound, it was some kind of knife. At the time, Oki was found clutching a small sake cup that had been broken in two," Chiba explained.
"This is it!"
Chiba held up an evidence bag containing a white sake cup that had been deliberately snapped down the middle.
"Appraisal shows this cup is a high-value item. Oki was a heavy drinker, and it's likely he brought it to the hotel along with some Japanese sake."
"We're analyzing whether this was a message left by the killer to hint at their identity," Inspector Megure added.
The cup was right there in the victim's hand. It was incredibly obvious. If it was a "dying message" left by the victim, the chance of the killer not noticing it was basically zero.
"A cup left by the killer? Like a signature?" Professor Agasa scratched his head, confused. "Isn't that a bit too arrogant?"
"No, besides a signature, it could also be a metaphor of some kind," Conan muttered, shaking his head slightly.
At that moment, Officer Chiba pinned five photos to the board—the people the group had met the other day:
Mio Tokiwa, her secretary Ms. Sawaguchi, Yoshiaki Hara, designer Hidehiko Kazama, and Mio Tokiwa's painting mentor, Hosui Kisaragi.
"Does the police believe the killer is among these five?" Mouri asked, looking at the board thoughtfully.
"Because the crime occurred in a new building that hasn't opened yet, very few people knew he was staying there," Officer Shiratori explained.
"I've got it! The little sake cup—the choko—might refer to chocolate! The killer is Yoshiaki Hara, because he loves eating chocolate!"
Mouri's deduction was as baffling as ever. Conan couldn't help but give him a look of utter exhaustion.
Even if the words sound similar… based on that logic, you might as well say the killer is Tsuneo.
"No way!"
"It wouldn't be Mr. Hara!"
"He was nice enough to share his chocolate with us!"
The three kids shook their heads vigorously, defending the programmer. A man who loved chocolate and was kind to children didn't seem like a murderer, and besides, he hadn't even spoken to Councilman Oki.
"Mr. Hara is likely innocent. The police have already questioned these five, and he's the only one with a rock-solid alibi," Inspector Megure said, cutting through the children's protests.
It seemed that "Mouri's Rule of Elimination" was as reliable as ever.
"Why didn't you say so earlier…?" Mouri rubbed the back of his head, embarrassed.
"By the way, I heard that you, Brother Tsuneo, had an argument with Oki before?" Inspector Megure ignored Mouri's sheepish look and turned to Tsuneo.
"An argument?"
Tsuneo shook his head. "I don't do things like that."
"I've always believed in convincing people with virtue. I don't argue."
(End of Chapter)
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