The Zashiki Warashi of Intellectual Village Bonus 1 Part4

9:10 - 9:20 PM

Hayabusa's Notes:

Who would benefit from Shuuren's death? The corporation group that had their stock prices influenced by his fortune telling or the Hos.h.i.+mi kids who weren't getting any work because he did it all himself? Dounyuu didn't want all the suspicion on himself, so he started spreading gossip about the others. Yatsui Tos.h.i.+ knew some cooperative work between his Yatsui General Trading Company and Matsus.h.i.+ma Construction had led to some negligent construction, but he wanted to know which company had been in charge of that. Matsus.h.i.+ma Ryou wanted to know who had buried a mannequin in the road they had been working on and what it was meant to protest. Toyokawa Ryuu wanted to settle whether an accidental death in a Toyokawa Automobiles car had been due to the car or the road.

Hayabusa: "This is when it got more and more confusing."

Enbi: "Th-that was cruel… But if you look over all the information, some of them stood on the side of justice and didn't have a reason worth killing someone over. If Shuuren's fortune telling had 'just' been about manipulating stock prices, there was no real threat of seeing someone's unspeakable secret. But were we moving away from that a.s.sumption?"

Hayabusa: "And revealing all that didn't actually help Dounyuu any."

Enbi: "Yeah, even the people he wasn't talking about would have a worse impression of him. And if the murderer was from the corporation group…"

Hayabusa: "They could 'silence him' before he said too much."

9:20-9:30 PM

Hayabusa's Notes:

Opinions are split over whether we should stay in a single group or split up to separate rooms. We decided we could monitor each other regardless thanks to the transparent walls, floors, and ceilings, so those who wanted to stick together are in the living room and the others went to the bedrooms.

Enbi's Memos:

Yatsui Tos.h.i.+, Toyokawa Ryuu, and most of the others went to the bedrooms. The detective stayed with Enbi-chan in the living room. →My heart's pounding.

Enbi: "This is where it differs from the standard mansion mystery. Normally you'd never have both choices being essentially the same."

Hayabusa: "But despite the open environment, the murderer killed Shuuren without anyone noticing. We couldn't let our guard down."

9:30 PM

Hayabusa's Notes:

It's a cold night. I decided to give Enbi my blanket.

Enbi's Memos:

Eh? What's this? Did he fall in love with me???

Hayabusa: "Y'know…"

Enbi: "G-girl's sometimes have a hard time controlling themselves!!"

Hayabusa: "How starved for affection were you? We're not talking about a gla.s.s of water in the desert here."

Enbi: "A-a-a-a-a-a-anyway, since we had nothing to do but observe each other and needed a way to keep each other awake, we decided to try a thought experiment. How could a murder happen in the Gla.s.s House where all the walls were transparent?"

9:35 - 11:00 PM

Hayabusa's Notes:

We began discussing our thought experiment.

Enbi's Memos:

Was the murderer really in the entrance hall? (It's possible the murderer opened the front door and fired from outside. Then they could have stolen the keys and locked us in from outside. In other words, it was a complete third party.) Was there really a murderer at all? (It's possible Shuuren shot himself in the chest with the bolt.)

Enbi: "There were a few possibilities, but they were kind of a stretch. If they fired the crossbow from outside, stealing the crossbow would've been difficult. And if Shuuren had killed himself, someone still would've seen it."

Hayabusa: "But it would have been difficult to sneak around in that transparent mansion."

Enbi: "We discussed the refraction of light and the properties of gla.s.s, but we couldn't come up with an idea that really stuck out."

Hayabusa: "We also discussed some things that weren't directly related to Shuuren's death."

Enbi: "Stealing the crossbow or claiming it was stolen would suggest the crime was planned and they could have waited for Shuuren since he locked up along the same route every day. …But in this case, a lot of it came down to coincidence."

Hayabusa: "For example, what would have happened if the tunnel hadn't collapsed or the storm hadn't blown in?"

Enbi: "Plus, the detective and me showing up wasn't planned."

Hayabusa: "If it was a carefully thought-out plan, they could have held off and waited for their next opportunity."

Enbi: "But they did it anyway. In that case, they either couldn't extend the schedule…"

Hayabusa: "Or what looked like a coincidence had actually been planned."

11:00 PM - 12:00 AM

Hayabusa's Notes:

We ran out of ideas for our thought experiment. Enbi and I began chatting to fight off sleep. We discussed our own lives. Enbi brought up the His.h.i.+gami Women. Enbi believes she will always be part of some case or another. But she can choose what role she plays, so she thinks taking on the deduction role will prevent her from ending up with the killing role. I'm not entirely sure how much I believe of that. Besides, even if she knows a lot about killing, if she's using her power to solve the case as quickly as possible, doesn't that just make her a good person?

Enbi's Memos:

Oh, c.r.a.p! I said too much! But I guess it's fine since he said that.

Hayabusa: "We're talking about some pretty meaningful stuff here, aren't we?"

Enbi: "And you're a really good listener, detective. It was almost all about me!"

Hayabusa: "And the problem is how obviously 'dere' it made you."

Enbi: "Oh, shut up! I'd never felt those feelings before, so I didn't know how to control them!!"