Chapter 15

"Everyone, I finally saw the truth and knew what secret the murderer had hidden."

At this time, Kogoro Mouri was sitting on a chair with his head lowered and his elbows on the table. His posture was still upright, and he looked unexpectedly contradictory, both asleep and awake.

However, Hoshikawa Kazuaki, who was sitting opposite him, had already secretly seen all of Edogawa Conan's actions, and it took a lot of effort to prevent himself from laughing out loud.

When analyzing clues before, Date Ko had paid special attention to the situation here. He was originally a little disappointed with Mouri Kogoro's performance at the crime scene, but now he heard that he solved the case faster than himself, and saw that the remote control that had disappeared was now placed on the table, he immediately breathed a sigh of relief.

Under the expectant gaze of the crowd, "Sleeping Kogoro Mori" has begun his performance.

"The deceased was a pastry chef, but she died with heavy makeup on. Given her profession, she would not wear such heavy makeup for no reason. Xingchuan said before that he bought snacks made by the deceased at noon today, which means that the deceased actually came back to put on makeup after get off work at noon. Because she had an appointment to meet someone here, and it was that person who chose to kill her during the meeting."

"The murderer is someone who makes the deceased willing and feel the need to face the situation in a better way. For a single woman, what kind of person fits this description?"

This kind of analysis is actually just a summary of the previous reasoning, but for some reason, the people present couldn't help but think more about it.

Many people's eyes have already begun to involuntarily look at the two male suspects present.

Hoshikawa Kazuaki was tricked by the big Kudo Shinichi last time, and this time he was tricked by the small Conan again. He was so angry that his teeth were itching. But he couldn't interrupt the reasoning show of "Mouri Kogoro", so he could only listen with a gloomy face, and in fact, he had already scolded Edogawa Conan in his heart.

Fortunately, Conan Edogawa did not pull any real or fake murderer tricks this time, but continued to analyze the situation in the name of Kogoro Mori:

"The murderer first had an argument with the deceased, then strangled her with a prepared weapon until she died. He then used the air conditioner to adjust the indoor temperature to fake the time of death and create an alibi. During this period, the first thing the murderer had to do was to choose a scapegoat to take the blame for the murder instead of himself."

Hearing this, Xingchuan and Ming felt a jolt in their hearts, and suddenly a certain psychological shadow was triggered.

What's even more infuriating is that the key prop in the case, the air conditioner remote control, was indeed found in his own room. In this case, who is the unfortunate person who was made a scapegoat? Is there any need to say it?

Just as I was thinking about it, I saw Kogoro Mouri's arm miraculously raised up and pointed at Kyoko Ichikawa who was clenching her fingers nervously.

Xingchuan and Ming were stunned for a moment, their faces full of disbelief.

The one who was framed by the real murderer was obviously me, so why did Maori Kogoro's hand point to Ichikawa Kyoko? Could it be that Conan, with his short arms and legs, couldn't reach Maori Kogoro's arm and accidentally moved it in the wrong direction?

"Me?" Kyoko Ichikawa was also very surprised by this answer, and couldn't help but ask: "How did the murderer frame me? How come I didn't know about this?"

I only heard Maori Kogoro explain:

"The murderer knew that you and the victim had an appointment to go to a sale together tonight, so he used a pre-prepared recording of canceling the appointment to gain your trust. Then he used another prepared recording to ask you to water the potted plants so that you would appear at the crime scene on time at 2:30."

"But we all know that the reason why it must be 2:30 is because in the murderer's plan, only if the body is discovered at this time can the alibi he created for himself using the air conditioner be the most impeccable. On the contrary, Miss Ichikawa, who has the key to the deceased's room, is naturally the most suspicious."

"From the murderer's point of view, if the police investigating the case failed to discover the secret of the air conditioner, then Ms. Ichikawa, who had the key and no alibi, would undoubtedly be the murderer. If the secret of the air conditioner was discovered, then the only person who could enter and exit the room freely and turn off the air conditioner at the right time would be you."

"Ah? Just like that, I will be regarded as the murderer?" Kyoko Ichikawa's face was full of disbelief.

"Of course it's not just that. In fact, the murderer originally planned to sneak another more important prop into your room while you were out. But what he didn't expect was that you, who originally planned to go out, actually stayed in the room, and he naturally couldn't complete the final frame-up. So, the criminal was anxious."

Just when everyone's eyes were following Mouri Kogoro's every move, waiting for him to reveal who the criminal was, he suddenly changed his tone and began to introduce the remote control on the table.

"If I'm not mistaken, this remote control is the air conditioner remote control in the deceased's room. And it is very likely that the control range of this remote control is much larger than that of ordinary remote controls on the market."

Seeing that Maori Kogoro was indeed talking about the remote control, Date Kou walked up to him and after carefully checking, he said:

"It is exactly as Detective Maori said. I heard from a friend that this remote control is a modified model that can be used with many types of air conditioners. The infrared signal it emits has a distance twice that of an ordinary remote control, making it most suitable for long-distance control in particularly large venues."

He looked at the environment on site, which was obviously more cramped than that of an ordinary apartment, and added: "It is really overkill to use it in such a small apartment."

Kogoro's chopping sound came: "No, in fact, the murderer is looking at the effect of remote control. I have sent Conan to check. There is a window in the corridor here, facing a telephone pole. The interesting thing is that someone has fixed a mirror on the top of the telephone pole. Looking from the position of the window, the mirror can just illuminate the air conditioner position of the deceased's room."

Officer Megure looked serious and ordered the police officer beside him: "Go and have a look." After checking, the police officer quickly responded: "Officer Megure, it is indeed true."

Ida Ko also walked to the window next to the air conditioner, squinted his eyes and looked back, and could barely see the face of the policeman reflected in the mirror in the distance. He suddenly realized:

"So that's how it is. The murderer used this method to freely control the air conditioner without entering the scene. In addition, I have just checked that the air conditioner is an old model and has no timer function. It can only be adjusted and turned off by remote control."

He turned to look at Maori Kogoro who lowered his head and asked in a deep voice:

"Then the person who took the remote must be the murderer. Detective Maori, where did you find this remote?"

"In fact, the remote control was found in Hoshikawa and Akira's room."

As soon as these words were spoken, everyone present immediately locked their eyes on Xingchuan Heming, and some police officers even wanted to arrest him immediately.

Once again being considered as the murderer, Xingchuan and Ming frowned and struggled to maintain a gentle expression, but they couldn't help sneering in their hearts. Edogawa Conan, you are really good, you are used to persecuting me, right? Do you really think I won't fight back?

He just smiled awkwardly under the cannibalistic gazes of the crowd, and then explained calmly:

"Everyone, I'm not the murderer, but I don't know why this remote control is in my room. Oh, I remember that kid Conan was running around the crime scene and these rooms like a little detective. Maybe he was rummaging around and brought it to my place by accident?"

Conan Edogawa, who was curled up under the table enjoying the fun of reasoning, suddenly got smart after hearing what he said. He immediately crawled out from behind the table, holding the back of his head and grinning foolishly, trying to fool people with it, with cold sweat on his back.

Fortunately, the reliable Date Kou had already deduced the truth and explained it to everyone in time:

"So, the murderer originally wanted to put the remote control in Ms. Ichikawa's room to frame her, but today Ms. Ichikawa changed her schedule and did not leave the room. The murderer had no choice but to find that Hoshikawa was out, so he suddenly got the idea and pried the lock and hid the remote control in Hoshikawa's room. This also explains why there were traces of prying in Hoshikawa's house."

Everyone suddenly realized what was going on, and Conan breathed a sigh of relief, taking advantage of the time when no one was paying attention to him and crawling back under the table. At the same time, he glanced in the direction of Xingchuan and Ming. He always felt that Xingchuan and Ming seemed to have mentioned him on purpose. Did they discover something? No way? He shouldn't have revealed any flaws.

At this point, the last suspect, Katsuya Kimura, finally started to get anxious. He suddenly spoke up and yelled at Kogoro Mori, who was sitting with his head down: "Hey, what do you mean? Are you implying that I'm the murderer? Stop kidding."

Seeing the criminal trying to fight to the death, Conan was refreshed and immediately threw away his previous guesses. He quickly picked up the voice changer, and everyone only heard Maori Kogoro's steady and powerful voice saying slowly:

"Who else could have asked the deceased to dress up for the date, knew the deceased's schedule for the night, recorded the audio related to the date, and had the key to the deceased's apartment, except for you, her boyfriend?"

Unexpectedly, Kimura Masaru blurted out: "Of course it's that Hoshikawa! Yuko has been wanting to hook this guy for a long time, and even rejected my proposal for this reason!"

Even if Xingchuan Heming had a good temper, he was still angry at this moment. He said with some embarrassment: "Stop talking nonsense here. I have nothing to do with the deceased, and I never knew her itinerary, let alone her key!"

Maori Kogoro also said, "Stop quibbling, Kimura Katsu! In your testimony, you said that you had been in the room since 1:00 to make a phone call, but when you were chatting with your colleagues, you mentioned the content of the advertisement in the building opposite. But you didn't notice that the advertisement was not broadcast until after 1:00 and could only be seen from the window in the corridor. This means that you were not in the room at all, but stood by the window in the corridor the whole time."

"You immediately turned on the air conditioner's heating function after the murder, and after one o'clock, you came to the corridor window and used the remote control to control the air conditioner through the reflection of the mirror to restore the temperature in the city to normal and shut it down. Then you pried the lock and hid the remote control in Xingchuan's room. But you must not have noticed that there was a potted plant on the floor near the entrance of Xingchuan's room. When you hid the remote control, you accidentally rubbed off the pollen, and it is still stuck to your trousers."

Everyone quickly looked at Kimura Katsu's trousers, and sure enough, there was an invisible yellow stain there.

Kimura Masaru panicked and tried to hide from everyone's sight, but he found himself in despair and had no place to hide. He could only reluctantly explain: "Maybe I accidentally got it dirty outside. You can't convict me because of this coincidence."

"What if there is a murder weapon?"

"What? Murder... weapon?" Kimura Katsu's face turned pale and he couldn't help but take a step back, but his way was immediately blocked by the police behind him.

I only heard Maori Kogoro say: "Your shoelaces are tied one right side up and the other wrong way up. It must be because you tied them the wrong way up in a panic after strangling the victim with them. You probably didn't notice that the victim also put makeup on her neck for a makeup effect. Now it is stuck to your shoelaces along with the victim's skin debris, just waiting for the police to take it for testing, so they can convict you. Do you have anything else to say?"

Kimura Katsuichi's face flushed, his eyes widened and he gasped, as if he wanted to make a final rebuttal, but after persisting for a while, he finally let out a breath and admitted as if he had given up:

"You're right, I did kill her. I never thought that my careful plan would be seen through."

When they saw him plead guilty, police immediately surrounded him and arrested him.

Xingchuan and Ming watched with satisfaction as the real murderer this time was handcuffed in front of them. The treatment was indeed completely different from what they had experienced last time.

After seeing the police escorting the criminal to leave and watching Conan Edogawa crawl out from under the table, when everything was settled, the moment that Hoshikawa Kazuaki had been waiting for finally arrived.

He stepped forward to stop the police escorting the prisoner, and at the same time, he turned his head to look at the people who were looking at him with surprise, and said with a smile: "Officers, you forgot one thing. I found that my food was poisoned at noon today. And as I said before, today's lunch was actually bought from a dessert shop outside, and the person in charge of making it was the victim of this case, Ms. Kobayashi Yuko."

Seeing that everyone looked surprised, Xingchuan and Ming stepped back and made way, but he went a step further and said, "I don't know if you have noticed that the deceased Kobayashi Yuko's lunch today was actually the same as mine, both were Japanese confectionery with special sauce. So why don't we ask the police officers to test the deceased's lunch today to see if it was poisoned like mine?"

Everyone present was shocked. Inspector Megure's first reaction was to turn around and ask for Kogoro Mouri's opinion, but Conan was completely confused by the change in Hoshikawa and Akira, and he couldn't make a conclusion for Kogoro Mouri who was asleep.

At this time, a police officer suddenly reported to Inspector Megure: "The forensic doctor has reported that the deceased was poisoned before his death."

Inspector Megure's eyes widened in an instant. He finally believed in Hoshikawa and Ming's judgment and immediately ordered: "Go and take the food that the deceased had at noon for testing." He looked at Hoshikawa and Ming with a complicated look and added, "Then compare it with the food ingredients of Hoshikawa and Ming at noon."

Xingchuan and Ming smiled with satisfaction.

He had already anticipated the consequences of voicing this guess at this time, and the sudden news from the forensic doctor was completely unexpected, but it also helped him a lot.

After following the science fiction for so long, it was time for him to start his own mission in the forum. His first step was to complete the other three dungeon missions whose contents were revealed by Date Kou just now: saving the other three police academy teams.

The author has something to say:

Ding Dong! Fat Chapter is here to tease!

Of course, it’s not that I’m particularly fat, but I just wanted to tell the story better, so I just put them all together.

I have been writing about the case in the previous two chapters. I thought it was very exciting when I was writing it, but I found it was a bit too obscure after reading it again. So I will try to explain it as clearly as possible in this chapter. I just hope that your reading experience will not be too bad because of me.

I plan to make the crime-solving story a little simpler in the future, which will be much better. But this time there is no other way, it is a necessary preparation.

If you have any reading experience after reading this, whether good or bad, please remember to tell me immediately so that I can make adjustments in time and try to write articles that everyone will like.

I also want to say one more thing, and it’s not corny but the truth: I love you so much!