Three Choices, Please Vote

Jiang Xia walked into the side room and looked over the Scene of the Crime.

It looked as though a vicious fight had taken place here—the walls were covered in Knife Marks, and even the ceiling had them. Everything around the room had been smashed to pieces as well.

Across from the door, a corpse clutched a Katana in its hand, pinned dead to the wall by another long blade through its chest.

The deceased was the head of this household, Maruden Jirou.

Some time ago, Maruden Jirou had suspected his wife of having an affair, so he hired Mouri Kogoro to investigate.

This afternoon, Mouri Kogoro had found the answer and come to report back.

While the two were talking, another visitor arrived. Maruden Jirou left Mouri Kogoro behind and went to the side room to receive the guest first.

Then he ended up like this.

After the police were called, they brought in three suspects.

One was Mrs. Maru's lover, who was also the Family Doctor.

The other two had both borrowed money from Maruden Jirou. One was a Sculptor, and the other was a Kendo Coach.

Jiang Xia swept his gaze across the room, and his attention was drawn to the corpse's lower leg.

—A fresh Shikigami was clinging tightly to it.

"..." Once the case was solved and the culprit received the punishment he deserved, the Shikigami's obsession would dissipate.

...Then he could lure the Ghost away.

At the thought that his number of Shikigami was about to increase by one,

Jiang Xia looked at the "Kendo Coach" among the three suspects and secretly fast-forwarded to the conclusion. "You're the murderer, aren't you?"

"?!" Inspector Megure's heart skipped a beat when he heard Jiang Xia's conclusion.

—A few minutes ago, Mouri Kogoro had said exactly the same thing as Jiang Xia.

Mouri Kogoro believed that with so many signs of a fight in the room, the only person who could have fought a Kendo master like Maruden Jirou to this extent was another Kendo master—Suwa.

But soon, prompted by a certain first-grade child, the police gradually noticed several suspicious details and concluded that Suwa was not the murderer. Someone had deliberately framed him.

Inspector Megure: "..." What was going on with Brother Jiang Xia today?

Mouri Ran leaned closer and quietly reminded Jiang Xia:

"The victim's grip on the Knife is wrong—normally, the dominant hand should be in front, but he was clearly holding it the other way around."

"That's right." Mouri Kogoro spoke steadily.

"This grip, along with the signs of fighting, was obviously arranged deliberately by an amateur—not just the walls, but even the ceiling is covered in Knife Marks. Who would fight all the way up there?

"So the murderer must have killed Mr. Maru in a Sneak Attack, then deliberately staged the scene like this to pin the blame on the Kendo Coach!"

"..." Conan gave Mouri Kogoro a gloomy look. Those had clearly been his lines just now.

And when he said them earlier, Mouri Kogoro had smacked him on the head. Yet now Uncle Mouri had taken them for himself... Tch! What a hypocrite.

Jiang Xia crouched beside the body, pretending to examine it. He secretly reached out and tugged at the Shikigami on Maruden Jirou's leg as he casually said, "They're taking advantage of our reverse Mindset."

The Shikigami was a little afraid of him and slowly shrank by a size.

But it still stubbornly hugged the corpse and refused to come down no matter what.

Jiang Xia could only let go regretfully.

He stood up and glanced back at the messy room. "The fact that there are so many Knife Marks shows that the murderer had plenty of time to stage the scene. Even if he wasn't familiar with Kendo, he could have tried it out a little and known which way was more comfortable to hold a Knife. It would have been difficult to get it backward."

Conan paused slightly, then quickly understood what Jiang Xia meant. "You mean the murderer arranged all this so we would conclude that 'the scene was deliberately staged this way by an amateur,' and rule out the expert first?"

And among the three suspects, only the Kendo Coach counted as an "expert"... Was Suwa really the murderer?

But...

Inspector Megure stroked his chin thoughtfully, feeling that this deduction was not rigorous enough.

"Still, it's possible that an amateur knew Mr. Suwa would be coming today, so he deliberately made the murder scene exaggerated. That way, when we saw these marks, we'd think Mr. Suwa had staged them to look like an amateur's work. But in reality, it was an amateur's work that was so amateurish it was easily mistaken for an expert deliberately making it look amateurish."

Jiang Xia: "..." He barely understood what Inspector Megure was saying.

But if they kept layering things like that, it would never end.

So Jiang Xia silently turned his head away, pretending not to have heard him, and continued with his own explanation.

"The victim lost a lot of blood. When the murderer posed him, some of it would inevitably have gotten on his clothes, hands, or shoe soles. We can test Mr. Suwa for it. If there isn't any, search along the route for discarded clothing.

"Also, there's one more thing..."

Jiang Xia walked over to the wall, where a Cabinet made up of many drawers stood.

Compared to the rest of the room, the Cabinet had been damaged even more severely, with dense and chaotic Knife Marks covering it.

Furthermore, on closer inspection, the scratches on the Cabinet actually came in two types.

One kind was very deep, as though it had been deliberately carved, and there were strange breaks in the middle.

The other kind matched the Knife Marks elsewhere in the room.

"The order of these drawers was Disrupted." Jiang Xia rapped his Bent Finger against the Cabinet door, secretly pulling the Progress Bar of the investigation forward. "The victim carved words here. After the murderer discovered them, he mixed up the order of the drawers. Then, in order to conceal the carving marks, he had no choice but to make the entire room look as if it had been slashed up by random blades."

As he spoke, his gaze traced the broken marks in a circle.

Then Jiang Xia put on gloves, removed several drawers, and rearranged them.

Very soon, amid a series of clicks,

As the drawers returned to their original positions, the knife marks on them were perfectly restored. The broken traces reconnected, eventually forming the two kana characters: "suwa."

—The pronunciation of "Suwa."