A Flash of Green Above His Head

Tendo Haruka stared blankly at Fujino.

Suddenly, she felt that compared to herself, this detective before her was the one who had truly been swindled out of both money and love by a "good friend."

As though she felt understood, she wiped away her tears with a handkerchief. "But if I didn't do that, someone like me, a country girl who can't do anything right... no one would ever consider me a friend."

"Are you sure you don't have any friends?"

Fujino looked at Tendo Haruka and asked, "Where did you borrow all that money from?"

"From coworkers I often worked part-time jobs with."

"If they were willing to lend you money, what else could they be but good friends?"

Fujino was speechless for a moment. "Would strangers in your family just lend you money whenever you asked?"

Tendo Haruka clenched the handkerchief in her hand.

She suddenly recalled how, whenever she borrowed money, those people had worried about her situation and asked whether she was sick or something.

At that moment, her gaze froze. "Those people... are good friends?"

Fujino glanced at Tendo Haruka, whose eyes were gradually clearing. "Have you figured it out now?"

"Mm..."

Tendo Haruka wiped at her reddened eyes with the handkerchief again and sniffled. "I'm really terrible. I ignored so many real friends because of those people."

"It's good that you've figured it out."

Mr. Fujino, life mentor extraordinaire, looked at yet another wayward girl who had abandoned her thoughts of murder after his verbal persuasion, and he could not help feeling deeply gratified.

He had long since seen through the pattern of Conan World's murderers. Most of them were people who had worked themselves into a dead end, people who could pick up a kitchen knife and kill over some trivial matter...

In