"So this mushroom isn't edible?" Kojima Genta listened hard for a while before reaching that conclusion. Disappointed, he plopped down on the ground. "What do we do? We don't have any clues at all. If we still can't find matsutake by dinnertime, are we going to go hungry?"
Professor Agasa laughed. "It won't come to that. At most, we just won't have any matsutake to eat." —They could always buy some from a shop; the stores surely had matsutake in stock. But saying that now would only spoil the children's sense of adventure, so Professor Agasa kept the truth to himself and stopped halfway through his explanation.
Sure enough, the three actual children looked utterly disappointed. They had come all this way specifically to eat matsutake. If they couldn't have any, what was the point of this trip?
Conan looked at his dejected classmates and seemed to see himself from not long ago, after his failed fishing attempt.
He sighed and offered a friendly reminder. "Take a close look around—the majority of the pine needles are still green, but some have turned yellowish-green.
"Matsutake usually grow around the roots of Japanese red pines, drawing nutrients from the trees. Since some of the nutrients are taken away, pines with matsutake growing around them tend to look rather wilted.
"Also, matsutake have certain requirements for sunlight, drainage, and ventilation as they grow. As long as we narrow things down based on those conditions and search the area..."
"Look!" Conan led the children around in a circle, soon stopping beneath a pine tree. He looked toward its roots with a confident smile. "Isn't the culprit right here?"
Suzuki Sonoko, who was taking photos with Mouri Ran nearby: "..."
Suzuki Sonoko put away her camera, looked at Conan as he led the group in