In all my time I've read or watched works of fiction, and I have never once been all that big of a fan of detective fiction. Generally, I always found the narrative and characters to be lackluster, something I couldn't bring myself to care about all that much.
There have been a couple of times in my life that a detective fiction work has managed to be something I liked, but most of the time those works are more than just detective fiction. Oftentimes adding elements that stray away from the classical roots of the genre.
So, in a way, those works are difficult to even recognize as detective fiction anymore, instead just being mystery. And mystery, I was at least a fan of. Worlds where so many secrets are built up in and revealed over time—was my favorite type of mystery work.
It's not as if I don't find detective fiction impressive. I do. I most definitely do. Being able to weave together a mystery with logical coherency and being able to stimulate one's mind into trying to solve the case—it's not an easy thing to do. If anything, it can be just as difficult as some other genres.
But I'm just not interested in breaking down the puzzles, piecing together the clues, and then concluding with who the culprit is. Oftentimes, I would figure out the culprit through simply reasoning through the narrative itself.
Generally, there's a red herring. A character the author pushes to be the obvious culprit. And I identify them and eliminate them. But usually, there's always a secondary character that receives more time in the narrative but doesn't receive the treatment of being the red herring. And then I just guess it's them, oftentimes building my reasoning based on guessing a culprit before ever building the logical events of how the murders were performed.
Of course, this isn't an absolute success. There's no way it could be. Take cases with multiple culprits, for example; such a method could never be used. But even with that, I still find myself rather uninterested.
I remember an essay I once stumbled upon, talking about the pointlessness of the detective fiction genre. And while I disagree with the conclusion, I find myself understanding some of the grievances. I personally am not a fan.
And that should be fine.
It absolutely should be.
Similarly to how some people aren't fans of romance, or fantasy, or sci-fi, I myself am not a fan of detective fiction.
Perhaps I'm too stupid.
Perhaps I'm undisciplined.
Or perhaps I'm some other accusatory adjective that someone could throw out at me.
But fiction to me is something I wish to enjoy. Something I wish to deeply resonate with. And I find neither in detective fiction.
So why do I make such a point to think about it?
The answer has two obvious answers for me: the first is the fact that I'm envious of those who can enjoy things like Conan Doyle, Christie, Poe, or whoever.
It's an untapped genre for me.
A place I cannot ever reside in.
Maybe I just haven't tried enough, and that is fair. It's not as if I've read or watched a lot. But the ones I have read or watched I've found to be dull. And that's a frustrating thing.
I have works that I love ranging from fantasy to romance to crime drama, and so on.
But detective fiction?
I have a work that barely fits the mold of it.
By definition, yes, it most certainly is detective fiction.
But the feel of it is different.
The very soul is fundamentally different.
It's a stupid thing, I'm aware.
But it's what I think—what I feel.
So then, what about the second reason?
It's rather simple: I find myself in a nightmare that recreates a work of detective fiction.
When the night began, I certainly tried.
But it wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that my heart wasn't completely in it.
And then, my heart was torn to shreds.
I still feel like I'll break at any instance. That a single breeze would make my heart collapse entirely.
It's not a feeling I would associate with detective fiction.
And that—that frightens me to no end.
* * *
Alphonse stared at Aion in silence.
"There's no way that's true, right?" Juno spoke up and laughed, a little nervous.
"What makes you think I did it?" Alphonse asked.
"Huh?" Juno was shocked that Alphonse didn't deny it immediately.
He should've. So why didn't he?
"Shall we go case by case?" Aion asked with a glare directed at Alphonse.
Alphonse smiled and said, "Sure. Esme, how could I have possibly done that? Ignoring the fact that I loved her for now, how could I have committed the actual murder?"
"Esme wasn't actually dead when we all entered the room," Aion began. "We can ask Cassie, and I'm sure she'll verify it."
Aion looked over at Cassie, who looked annoyed, and said, "Yeah, yeah, we didn't check the body. Like, who would want to touch a dead body? That's gross."
"So, when you rushed over to her, you pretended to be emotional and performed dramatically for the crowd, but instead you finished her off. This would mean Esme locked the room herself, presumably to get away from the person who stabbed her in the dark."
"And why didn't she say anything when the others opened the door?"
"There are two possible reasons: one, she was afraid the group were the killers. And two, the option I'm leaning toward, she passed out from blood loss. The site did have a decent amount of blood."
"This is all a nice theory, but this is under the assumption she was actually alive. What if she locked herself in the room and then died? That would mean the stabber could've been anyone?"
"You are right that she may have died after locking the room herself, but I imagine that you still rushed over to her to check. On top of that, you could do your whole melodramatic performance to make us all so sad for you. Too bad you failed! So, now we can look at the other cases. Mark's case is pretty easy to do in your case, and it would explain the time issue that was present initially. Since this is under the assumption Esme ran away, we can say that the time gap is no longer unreasonable to commit both murders in the dark."
"Then how about Arthur? How was he killed? He was, after all, in a similar type of room to Esme."
"This time, I don't have the luxury of having seen you in action. However, in this case the room can be locked from the outside. Which is strange for this mansion; in other words, it was purposefully changed. And the only person still alive that had that authority is you. Additionally, someone like you could easily take the other keys to the room considering your position. Domineering your damn privilege around like a spoiled brat."
"Then how about Sam?"
"Sam was killed before the party based on the temperature of his body. This means you could've called him over, since you two are friends, and dealt with him before the party ever began. On top of that, because the servants were ordered to focus on the ballroom and foyer, they wouldn't have gone back in that area and found the body. And, of course, this order was issued from higher up; in other words, you fall in line once more."
"And how would the room have been locked? Since you didn't mention the room having the locking mechanism changed like Arthur's."
"The keys in the doorknob were likely planted there way before the party began, making it appear that Noah and James had tried to unlock the door. In other words, it was a pseudo-locked room."
"Then how about Noah and James?"
"Poison. As someone in your position, you would have access to more information than most, giving you access to and knowledge of poisons. You, at some point in the night, poisoned them. My guess would be right before leaving to search for Arthur's body. Or perhaps a trap. You chose a fast-acting poison to ensure they wouldn't leak any information, and since they are ignorant, they would be too distracted with the fact that it seemed like they were cursed. And then, at some point, you poisoned Aira as well. This time you used a slower-acting poison so it would have a wider spread of kill types."
"Wow~" Alphonse looked impressed, even smiling at Aion's conclusions. "That's quite the narrative you made in such a short period of time. I mean, if I'm not mistaken, these are all recent conclusions of yours, correct?"
"Within the last hour, yes."
"Now that is fascinating, but things aren't so simple. You still have all the other murders to explain, the letters from Pride, and why I would even do all this. To me, this just seems like a sloppily put-together thought process that didn't have the time to put every detail together."
"Oh? You think so? Unfortunately for you, I have explanations for the rest as well."
"...You do…? Despite not having seen most of them?"
"Yes," Aion said with a smirk. "You see, the chandelier incident is rather easy. You live in this house; you could've tampered with it at any point."
"And how would I have had it dropped at the right moment?"
"Some sort of electronic device that activates falling—quite easy, huh?"
"And all the others in locked rooms?"
"This is more of a broad conclusion, but it's still effective. Outside of you, only one other person even comes close to your level of authority and knowledge of this place: Dorothy, your mother's personal maid."
"Huh?" Dorothy was surprised at her being suddenly dragged in.
"But Dorothy could not possibly be the culprit: she would've had no time to kill Sam earlier in the day, since Cassie had her alibi, correct?"
"Ugh…can you stop dragging me into this?" Cassie complained. "But yeah, she was there the whole~ time."
"Taking this a step further, she wouldn't have been able to change the lock on Arthur's door, nor would she have been able to commit Esme's murder either, for she was in the ballroom the whole time. And if Esme died beforehand, that's only fixing her on one thing."
"She could've personally changed the lock."
"Fair point. However, the points against it being her keep adding up. Now, we should shift over to the motive. What do all the victims have in common?"
"They shouldn't have anything."
"Precisely! So glad you figured that out all on your own. I thought your religious rantings destroyed all your intelligence!" Aion grinned viciously and continued. "The victims certainly didn't have much interconnectedness. That's quite undeniable. So let's look at it another way: do any of the victims have connections?"
"The most obvious would be the servants, but two are still alive, with another being alive or dead currently."
"Indeed. However, let's look at the first victim: Esme. Your proclaimed fiancé has a personal connection to you. She was even used postmortem to call off your engagement with Juno. Then there's your father. He pushed the engagement, and now he's dead. Your mother also pushed the engagement; now she's dead. Then there is William. He is the father of Juno, someone with the power to force the engagement, and now he's dead. Basically, all to off your engagement, you specifically targeted those four, with the others being collateral to muddy the truth. Additionally, you feigned religious insanity. My proof is how calm you are now!"
"That's an insane allegation," Alphonse said, his eyes genuinely shocked. "Then how would you explain Juno and her mother still being alive?"
"Yeah! Why wouldn't he have killed me!?" Juno decided to jump in to speak up for Alphonse.
Her mother, on the other hand, seemed like she was still in a state of shock.
"Simple: further misdirection. At this point, with William gone, Juno's family lost a significant amount of power, meaning the engagement had even less weight. In other words, killing off the two of you would've missed out on additional concealment of everything. So how about that, Alphonse!?"
Aion's eyes burned with a strong animosity toward Alphonse. The latter did not react to the anger; rather, he reacted to the insanity of the allegations.
"Your narrative is pure insanity! You're just creating a convenient narrative to frame me as the murderer!"
"Then let's eliminate everyone else," Aion said.
"Oh?" Alphonse seemed to be challenging Aion to try.
Aion took the challenge on with a confident and arrogant smile, "As I said earlier, anyone not associated with the manor can be eliminated as the culprit since setting up the chandelier trap, killing Sam, and having Arthur's room rigged that way would be impossible otherwise."
"I can agree with that," Alphonse said.
"Now, we'll move onto Cassie," Aion said.
Cassie's face twisted in disgust at being dragged back in, but Aion didn't care.
"Alphonse, you see, earlier, I made a statement about Dorothy not being able to kill Sam in the time window. Now, think about that in reverse with how I verified that."
Alphonse didn't react. Perhaps he already knew, but he pushed in the off chance Aion stumbled at this step.
"In other words, Alphonse Magnatium, you, by default, have to be Pride!" Aion pointed an accusatory finger straight at Alphonse.
The survivors in the gazebo all looked at each other in apprehension, perhaps wishing for one of them to step forward and refute everything Aion had said.
"Well, Alphonse Magnatium, or should I say Pride!?" Aion's wrath was on full display.
Then, the garden went silent. The blood-red moon moved closer and closer to its peak at midnight. It seemed like with each passing minute, the garden grew more and more ethereal.
And in this garden, Alphonse started clapping.
"Well done, Aion Belial," Alphonse's tone completely changed. "To think you figured all of that out without even having to see all the rooms."
"If you didn't go so murder happy toward the end, I couldn't have done so."
Alphonse laughed and said, "Yes, I suppose so. But Aion, I have one last question for you."
"What is it?"
"First, all of you may leave." Alphonse looked behind him toward the guests. "There's a door in the back of this garden, and you may leave."
"Wait, wait, wait! I can't just leave after all that!" Juno said with a conflicted expression. "Alphonse, please tell me it isn't true, that you did all this because—because you hated our engagement so much!"
Alphonse stared at her for a few seconds before saying, "I hated every second of it. It was awful, terrible, and truly abysmal to deal with you. Get out of my sight before I kill you too!"
Juno looked frightened and scurried off. No one seemed to care that they were leaving Aion alone with a killer. And soon, the door to the garden was heard shutting, and a click from an auto-lock resounded.
Then, the two were under the blood-red moon, staring each other down for several long seconds.
Then, Alphonse sighed and said, "This whole time, you never really believed I was Pride, right?"
Aion's mouth fell open; his seething rage was gone in an instant.
"How did you…?"
"Aion, I can tell when you're lying. The thing is, you were genuinely enraged with me. So you crafted this narrative to ruin me."
"Then why didn't you deny it?"
Alphonse laughed and said, "And how would I do that? While yes, your narrative was insane, it still wasn't anything that could be easily and outrightly refuted. And with no other possible suspect, I naturally lost."
"I see."
"So, what part about me angered you? How I treated you? What I did to Luna? My religious ramblings? My cold indifference toward certain things? What was it?"
"All of it and more," Aion said.
Alphonse laughed bitterly and said, "Yeah, I should've guessed. So who really is the culprit?"
"Honestly, I have no idea. Frankly, I don't see it being any of the survivors."
"Then a foreign individual?"
"Oh? You're not pushing religious insanity?"
"You would just get angrier with me, and at this point, I don't see any reason to do so."
"I see. A foreign individual is possible. I just…"
Alphonse didn't ask. He seemed to understand that it wasn't something that could be explained with simple logic.
"Then what do you think it was?"
"I'm pretty sure one of the deceased was the killer," Aion said as he turned his gaze toward the moon.
Alphonse laughed and said, "Wow, that must be one insane person to willingly kill themselves like that."
"Indeed."
"So, what now? You ruined me, and now I'm going to be known as a mass murderer. Is your wrath sated?"
Aion looked at Aphonse, and said, "I don't know. It's just that, right now, everything feels so awful. You just accepted defeat just like that, and honestly, that pisses me off."
"Yeah, I guess."
"Since you asked me a question, may I ask you one?"
Alphonse smiled and said, "Sure."
"You could've countered what I was saying, right?"
Alphonse laughed and said, "Of course. I was just amused by the narrative you made, so I let it slide."
"So your reputation isn't ruined, huh?"
"Yep, you failed."
"Wow, just turning your attitude right around."
"Well, I thought I fooled you; I really did for a moment."
"Yeah, that's never happening."
"Really?" Alphonse asked, a malicious smile forming on his face. "Well, I'm sure if we ever faced each other again, you won't deal with me going easy on you anymore. And when that happens, I'll be sure to savor your defeat."
"Yeah, sure, whatever," Aion said as he turned back toward the manor. "Actually, did you figure out who Pride is?"
Alphonse only smiled.
"Yeah…" Aion mumbled, disheartened.
Alphonse and Aion were like two fools dancing on a stage. Playing a performance that was ultimately meaningless. Whether one had achieved victory in the argument, or the other, neither would've gained anything of value in the end.
It was simply a battle of pride.
Then, he walked back to the manor. Through the glass hall and into the wooden interior of the Magnatium Manor. Soon, he found himself at the front door, and he grabbed the doorknob, hoping it would open.
To his surprise, it did.
Stepping out into the cold, Aion had a sad expression on his face.
Alphonse, Aion thought, he's the protagonist for a reason. Goddamn piece of shit…
Aion stared toward the rest of Magna and saw the orange glow from the lights still shining brightly. In fact, it was even brighter than when Sam, or rather, fake Sam, and he went to the party.
And then, the grand clock tower in Magna struck midnight.
And Aion awoke in that cold shack once more.