“I’m embarrassed to show off my deduction in front of a great detective, but since this involves information only insiders would know, please don’t think I’m trying to one-up you or that I’ll brag about winning.”
(I don’t think there’s winning or losing in deduction. Is this kind of male-oriented consideration?)
Katsura-san couldn’t hide his irritation at that condescending way of speaking.
“What is it? Why don’t you just say it clearly?”
Kai-san pointed to the spot where Director Shimoda had been sitting in seiza, grinning.
“The director who was made to drink poison must have had an idea about the culprit. He quickly thought of an expression symbolizing the culprit… a dying message, and executed it.”
“That’s the seiza? What exactly does it mean?”
“Don’t you realize, Katsura-kun? When you think of seiza, you think of shogi, right?”
“Huh, shogi? So what?”
“To indicate the culprit’s name, the director treated the floor tiles as a shogi board and sat in seiza there. Don’t you get it yet? When you think of shogi, there’s the pawn, the rook, the bishop, and the knight—”
When she heard “knight,” Kabemura-san exclaimed “Ah!”
“That’s right! The name Katsura Ryouma contains [knight/keima]! Katsura-san! So you were the culprit!?”
“Hah!? That’s impossible! It’s a false accusation!”
Suddenly being forcefully concluded with “It’s shogi! Knight! Therefore you’re the culprit!” Katsura-san was beyond anger and somewhat amazed… Well, it really is a false accusation.
But Kai-san, high on deduction, wouldn’t stop.
“This was a dying message worthy of Director Shimoda, who was in the shogi club as a student. Katsura-kun, how about confessing honestly?”
But something about the phrase “shogi club” seemed to catch Katsura-san’s attention, and he suddenly became calm… Hmm? What’s wrong?
“Hmm, shogi club. That’s strange.”
“What’s strange about it?”
Having noticed something, Katsura-san regained his composure and smiled slyly at Kai-san.
“According to what I heard, Director Shimoda wasn’t in the shogi club.”
“Wh-what?”
“Yes, I believe he was in the go club.”
And as if returning the favor, Katsura-san began presenting his own deduction.
“As Kai-san said, he was probably using these square floor tiles as a board to indicate the culprit. But this seiza wasn’t representing shogi but go, wasn’t it?”
“Go?”
“And the name that contains ‘go’ is—”
There Kabemura-san exclaimed “Ah!”
“That’s right! The name Kai Goroumaru contains [igo/go]! Kai-san! So you were actually the culprit!?”
(Kabemura-san, what a perfect palm-flip.)
This is the type of person who naturally complicates situations and spreads misunderstandings on social media, I thought, looking at her with enlightened eyes.
Katsura-san pressed closer to Kai-san as if turning the tables.
“I see, I see, so you realized this was a message indicating go, and hastily lied like that to try to frame me. Your thinking was quick for once, but your finish was sloppy.”
The two doctors, trying to frame each other, gradually heated up and seemed ready to grab each other.
“Don’t lie! Director Shimoda was in the shogi club!”
“No, the go club. I have no memory errors!”
Then Kabemura-san, who had stirred things up so much, raised her hand.
“Wait a minute! I think there was the director’s profile in the newsletter. If we look at that, we should be able to tell what club he was in as a student.”
Saying this, she began flipping through the newsletters lined up in the magazine rack.
Finding the target page, she showed a surprised expression. The two suspect doctors were riveted.
“Which is it?”
“Director Shimoda was in his student days—”
“St-student days?”
“—in the go-shogi club, apparently.”
“…”
An unexpected answer dominated the area with silence.
Having thoroughly built up suspense, Kabemura-san cheerfully laughed while reading the details.
“Apparently there weren’t enough club members, so the go club and shogi club were merged. The director seems to enjoy both.”
Knowing that neither is the culprit, I could only be speechless at this subtle punchline. The two doctors and Yuuno-san also had indescribable expressions.
Paying no mind to such things, Kabemura-san was getting excited all by herself.
“Oh? Then perhaps you two were actually accomplices?”
“Of course not!”
“You’re harmonizing again, how friendly~”
Katsura-san and Kai-san became furious at the grinning Kabemura-san.
In the midst of this, I noticed that cool Yuuno-san’s eyes were wandering.
(Huh? Could she have some idea about the dying message?)
Thinking this, I peeked into her mind. Then—
“…”
READ THE ORIGINAL TRANSLATION AT LOCALIZERMEERKAT.GITHUB.IO
[Feee, when the director started suffering, I tried to help him by carrying him to the sofa, but he was too heavy, so I gave up halfway and sat him on the floor before going to call for help.]
(Eh!? You just gave up halfway!?)
Apparently, she abandoned the rescue attempt midway, left him sitting on the floor, and went to call people, but by some miracle he maintained the seiza position.
(A miraculous seiza that wasn’t a dying message at all!? What a misleading miracle!?)
She’s really a genuine klutz… or is she actually a klutz? Anyway, once the trick is revealed, it’s nothing special—everyone was overthinking a coincidental occurrence.
I immediately tried to clear up the misunderstanding by presenting the truth I had gleaned as if I had deduced it.
“It might certainly look meaningful. But the truth might be something unexpected.”
“What do you mean, great detective-san?”
“Um, for example, this was an accident, and the culprit tried to help the director by laying him down on the sofa. However, because his body was too heavy, they gave up. That happened to result in the seiza position… how about that theory?”
“…”
A brief silence, then—
“No, isn’t that a bit too forced?”
I was normally scolded.
(No, I thought “what am I saying” partway through too!?)
But hey, this is the truth, seriously, it’s fact so it can’t be helped.
Complaining in my head won’t help. I have to accept the fate of a mind-reading detective being looked at as if I’m a bad detective making forced connections.
Only one person in this situation showed understanding—Yuuno-san, who was the person involved.
“…”
[The great detective deduced everything, but she’s troubled because people won’t believe the truth… I feel kind of sorry.]
(No, don’t apologize in your mind, confess! Confess! That would solve everything!)
“…Sigh.”
[But if people won’t believe it even when the great detective says it, they won’t believe me if I tell the truth honestly, and I’ll probably end up being judged as premeditated murder and get prison time. Maybe silence is flower.]
(How dare you! What’s with that flower! I’ll wither it for you!)
I found myself becoming rough with Yuno-san, who was being overly pessimistic.
Unaware that I was raging fiercely in my heart, Katsura-san and Kai-san firmly believed the culprit was their rival right in front of them, along with the chaotic situation of Kabemura-san, a fujoshi head nurse who was grinning while encouraging their delusions.
Yuno-san, the actual culprit, tried to decide on staying silent, but perhaps due to her inherent kindness, she reconsidered.
[Wait! Don’t run away, Fuuko. If I stay quiet like this and get found out, the punishment will be heavier! It was an accident, so if I tell the truth honestly, it’ll be fine, right! The detective who figured everything out might even defend me!]
(That’s right, that’s right, tell the truth! That way everything will be resolved peacefully!)
Despite being younger, I cheered for Yuno-san with the feelings of a parent. My mood was like a cheerleader supporting the baseball team… no, since I kept screaming in my heart, maybe more like a rough cheering squad?
Ring ring ring──
At that moment, a phone call came into the director’s office.
“Yes… what? I see, understood.”
“What’s wrong, Katsura-kun?”
“Kai-kun, the components of the drug given to Director Shimoda have been identified… apparently it was benzodiazepine-based.”
“Benzodiazepine-based?! Then it’s something like Halcion?”
Hmm? Some kind of drug talk I don’t really understand came up. But from their reactions, I can tell it seems quite serious.
“Um, excuse me. Ben… er, what kind of medicine is that?”
Perhaps there was something difficult to say, as Katsura-san taught me somewhat hesitantly.
“…It’s a sleeping pill.”
“A sleeping pill?”
Even so, their reaction seemed exaggerated, and in the first place, can someone really foam at the mouth and collapse from that?
Kai-san answered that question for me.
“Well, that… there was a period when this was frequently used in sex crimes. It causes disorientation and makes memories vague, and depending on the type, it can even induce aphrodisiac effects. In America, some of these substances are called ‘date rape drugs.’ Blue coloring is applied to prevent crimes, but…”
“Eh?”
I opened my eyes wide in surprise.
(Why would something like that be in the squeezed rag water?)
Just as I was thinking about this, Kabemura-san raised her hand while going “Mufumufu.”
“Ufufu! Auntie figured it out!”
“What?!”
“In other words, this is what happened! The culprit was after the director’s body!”
“””……”””
His hair was already thinning, and he was plump with a two-tone combination of visceral and subcutaneous fat – a middle-aged man. It was hard to believe anyone would be after that body. Honestly, isn’t that even more far-fetched than my deduction?
But Kabemura-san was a seasoned, well-aged fujoshi. Perhaps because she’d been using part of her brain for delusions for so long, she began explaining her far-fetched theory sometimes boldly, sometimes logically, while grinning and getting excited.
Visit the request page If there’s a Japanese Light Novel (LN) or Web Novel (WN) you’d like me to translate
When the donation goal progress bar above hit 100% one novel will be chosen for translation
| Table of Contents | Next* |
Support the Author by Buying the Original Books!
