Sato Miwako walked over, crouched down, and opened the Grill.
A scorched smell immediately hit her face—Jiang Xia had been right. The source of the strange odor was indeed here. But strangely, the Grill was empty, with nothing inside.
Jiang Xia glanced down as if thinking, then turned and walked toward the trash can nearby.
When he lifted the lid, a shriveled bouquet was revealed inside. It was the same kind as the potted flowers that had been placed on the shoe cabinet earlier.
"What is this, dried flowers?" Sato Miwako looked at the item, which seemed rather out of place in a kitchen trash can. "No, more precisely, they look like fresh flowers that shriveled up before being thrown away... Strange. Why would fresh flowers dry out like this? This isn't a desert."
As she spoke, she turned her head, only to find that Jiang Xia had vanished from the kitchen at some point.
Officer Sato: "...Huh?"
Where did he go?
"Brother Jiang Xia?"
Whenever a Detective disappeared from one place, he appeared somewhere else.
In the Audio-Visual Room, Inspector Megure looked at the returned Jiang Xia with delighted surprise. "Did you find something?"
Jiang Xia nodded and looked toward where the victim had fallen. In front of her stood a massive screen. Beneath it was a Videotape player, and above it was a row of inconspicuous overhead cabinets concealed behind a Curtain.
Jiang Xia walked over and pulled back the Curtain. To his surprise, the overhead cabinets also contained quite a few machines.
Seeing them, Inspector Megure could not help muttering to Hoda Hideo, "Just how many movie machines did you buy? This room is almost full of them."
"Ha ha, it can't be helped. Equipment gets updated too quickly." Hoda Hideo scratched his head and gave