Chapter 59: The Truth is Only One (3000 Words)

Ran started crying.
"Idiot, don't cry..." Kudou Shinichi endured his discomfort and offered a brief word of comfort.
"Hey, you just popped out of nowhere and said my deduction was wrong. Are you saying my logic was flawed?" Heiji Hattori demanded, clearly unsatisfied.
"That's right. I'm telling you that your deduction is merely armchair theorizing, and it relies on a trick that is one hundred percent impossible to execute."
"What did you say?"
Next, Kudou Shinichi demonstrated the oversight in Heiji Hattori's deduction. Because the victim was seated and overweight, it was physically impossible for the weapon to slip into his pocket the way Hattori had deduced. Furthermore, he had found the fishing line used to frame the suspect hidden in various parts of the room.
"If what you're saying is true, then how did the killer escape from this locked room? Are you telling me the victim committed suicide?"
"No, it wasn't a locked room at all. Moreover, the tricks and props the killer used to create the illusion of a locked room were left right at the scene."
"The real trick?" Heiji Hattori failed to grasp it.
Kudou Shinichi explained the book on the table and the loud opera playing when Hattori, Kogoro, and the others entered the room.
They were used to disguise the victim's expression and drown out the sounds made during the murder.
"You mean the killer is..." Heiji Hattori finally understood.
"The killer is the very first person who approached the victim after entering the room—Mrs. Ikemura!"
The decisive piece of evidence was the groove in the wife's key ring used to conceal a poisonous needle.
Koe Ikemura confessed with a level of cooperation straight out of an anime.
Her entire motivation stemmed from revenge. Her former husband had been framed by Ikemura, and she only learned the truth after her biological daughter with her ex-husband fell in love with Ikemura's current stepson.
Following that realization, she meticulously planned the revenge, not only for her first husband but also to ensure her daughter's happiness would not be blocked by Isao Ikemura.
It was hard to judge, yet entirely characteristic of Beika Town.
With the case concluded, Kudou Shinichi leaned against the bookshelf in the study and broke into a fit of violent coughing.
"Shinichi, are you alright?" Ran asked.
"Yeah, just a bit of a cold," Shinichi replied weakly.
"By the way, how are you so intimately familiar with this case? You must have been lurking nearby and peeking the whole time, right?" Heiji Hattori couldn't help but complain.
"Wrong. That bespectacled kid called and told me."
"Conan?" Ran looked doubtful.
"That's right. He said there was a strange detective from Osaka and told me to get back immediately, so I had to wrap up my own troublesome business and rush over." Kudou Shinichi felt a profound sense of wrongness. This didn't feel like a cold; his entire body felt as though it was about to fall apart.
"You're lying!" Ran shouted.
She pointed at Heiji Hattori. "He's right. If you were really far away, you wouldn't have gone silent like that—at least you would have called! But you didn't! You've been right by my side the whole time, haven't you?! You must have been watching me worry, just to laugh at me behind my back!
"Why! Why must you be so cruel!"
Kudou Shinichi had no idea how to explain, but fortunately, another wave of violent coughing seized him.
"Hang in there, I'll go find a doctor right away," Ran said anxiously as she rushed out of the room.
Kudou Shinichi let out a long breath. He had barely managed to bluff his way through.
"So the deduction was wrong right from the start... I have to admit, I've lost fair and square this time," Heiji Hattori conceded defeat with unexpected grace. "As expected of Kudou Shinichi, your deductive skills are truly a cut above."
"You're wrong. Deductions aren't about winning or losing, nor are they about who is superior," Kudou Shinichi said, leaning against the bookshelf and struggling to maintain an upright posture. "Because there is always only one truth! And a detective is simply someone who uses that truth to console the living!"
Heiji Hattori smiled and adjusted his cap. "You're right. I was too obsessed with winning and losing, which clouded my judgment."
"It's not just you..." Kudou Shinichi clutched his chest, his entire body trembling. "I only realized this truth myself a short while ago..."
"Hey, Kudou, are you really just suffering from a normal cold?"
Kudou Shinichi did not answer him.
"It feels like my bones are melting... Am I shrinking again? I can't shrink here... I absolutely cannot let anyone discover the secret that Kudou Shinichi is Conan..."
Ignoring Heiji Hattori's shouts, he bolted out of the room.
Ran, returning with a doctor, happened to see Shinichi sprint past. Before she could stop him, she watched Kudou Shinichi vanish around the corner of the staircase.
She followed his trail, only to find a pile of clothes left on the floor. Guided by a faint sound, she discovered Conan hiding in a nearby restroom.
"Shinichi-niisan said there was a new case, so he hurriedly put on his coat and rushed out," Conan forced himself to stay conscious and replied. "Oh right, Shinichi-niisan also said... under no circumstances should anyone find out... that he was involved... with this incident..."
Conan could no longer fight it, collapsing unconscious onto the floor.
Only then did Ran snap out of her resentment toward Kudou Shinichi. "Conan, are you alright?"
Back at the Metropolitan Police Department, Kiichi held the floor plan of the apartment's first floor, studying it repeatedly.
He had specifically called Sato to thoroughly check the premises. None of the door locks on the emergency exits showed any signs of tampering. If that was the case, how on earth did the killer—or rather, Rika Yajima's lover—manage to enter the apartment?
It was a flawed locked room, yet no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't crack the method behind it.
Moreover, viewing the locked room as nonexistent altogether...
Keita Katase had both the opportunity and no alibi.
He had inspected the new will; Keita Katase had already inherited everything, meaning he had no motive to commit murder. And if the motive stemmed from an affair with Rika Yajima...
No, there were still too many loose ends, such as the person Reiko Akiba had seen, and the victim's two boyfriends...
How irritating. He really wished Conan would show up and turn the scene into a closed-circle detective novel scenario so he wouldn't have to investigate suspects one by one.
What was Conan up to anyway? He had no idea which original canon case Megure had been dispatched to handle this time...
Just as he was thinking this, Megure returned, escorting Koe Ikemura.
Aside from the responding officers, the entourage also included a certain black-skinned chicken.
After inquiring briefly about the situation of that case, Kiichi fell silent.
Now that was a blockbuster event.
The case was an absolute classic: the first instance of Shinichi turning back into an adult using Baijiu, paired with Heiji Hattori's most humiliating performance. While everyone else debuted at their peak, Hattori's grand entrance was a massive disaster.
None of that mattered, however. What truly mattered was that Conan's main account was currently online.
Kiichi indeed remembered Heiji Hattori's Baijiu and Kudou Shinichi returning to solve the case as an adult, but he hadn't interfered beforehand.
After all, he couldn't remember the diplomat's name, making advance investigation impossible, nor would he know how to explain his foreknowledge that Baijiu could temporarily counteract the APTX 4869 poison.
Other things could be spoiled in advance. Even if he knew the finale and simply blurted out Renya Karasuma's true identity, no matter how suspicious others might be, he could always brush it off with a smug "My deductions are just that genius," forcing everyone to swallow their doubts.
Yet the Baijiu detail defied both scientific and Conan-logic explanations.
His original plan had been to let Hattori ply Shinichi with alcohol. No matter which diplomat died, he himself would inevitably be dragged into investigating the case, at which point he could provide cover for Conan, hold Ran back, and let Conan quietly hide until the alcohol wore off and he shrank back down.
Yet fate had tossed him into an entirely different case.
Actually, Kiichi didn't hold any real blame toward Conan for turning back into an adult to solve a case.
If the police arrested the wrong person, Conan simply couldn't help himself.
Perhaps swallowing his frustration, calling Kiichi afterward to explain the situation, and then capturing the real culprit sounded like a better choice in retrospect.
How should he put it?
Just imagine it yourself: a diplomat was murdered, and the police, assisted by the son of the Osaka Prefectural Police Chief and the famous detective Kogoro Mouri, arrested the wrong person.
In that scenario, neither the Hattori father and son, nor Hakuba, Megure, or Mouri would have any hope of escaping the fallout.
Just to protect a leaked "possibility," he effectively dropped a nuclear bomb on his own faction's headquarters.
Were they seriously going to rely entirely on the FBI at that point?
Although Conan certainly hadn't thought things through to that extent, the whole ordeal essentially boiled down to choosing between two different poisons.
On the other hand, if Conan had genuinely managed to restrain himself, Kiichi would have been truly terrified.
In that case, he would have had to thoroughly investigate Conan's recent activities to ensure he hadn't been possessed by some strange transmigrator. Based on his understanding, when it came to teamwork, most transmigrators were inferior to Conan—not to mention the bizarre types who operated on an "airport logic" of eliminating anyone whose spotlight threatened theirs.
Don't talk to him about Conan acting impulsively and ruining things, or how Conan growing up carried the risk of "exposure" and thus made him a "terrible teammate."
What kind of mythical teammate do people dream of? Someone who is endlessly patient, constantly calm, unshakeable, perpetually rational, and never hesitates in the face of any tough choice?
Do such teammates exist?
They certainly do.
Just borrow the Key of Time and Space from the God of Transmigration, travel to the DC Universe, and find a man named John Constantine in England.
He satisfies every single one of those requirements.
However...
Don't cry foul when you're dragged down to hell.
After all, he was the teammate you chose.
Since the secret hadn't leaked, the matter would pretty much blow over on its own.
Still, Conan had certainly been reckless, and this presented a prime teaching opportunity.
Yukiko would probably be delighted... though she hadn't returned to Japan yet.
However, when it came to teasing Conan, there was someone even more professional available.
Kiichi dialed the number for Professor Agasa's house and briefly filled him in on the situation.
After that, he wouldn't need to worry about it anymore.
Soon enough, however, he noticed a certain black-skinned chicken eyeing him with suspicious scrutiny.
When their gazes met, the boy looked away guiltily for a fraction of a second, before snapping his head back to lock eyes with him in an unyielding stare.
"..."
"You're Heiji Hattori, aren't you?" Kiichi walked right up to say hello. He was feeling rather tired and desperately needed a refill of coffee.
"Yeah." Heiji Hattori looked at Kiichi. He had often heard his old man at home talk about a remarkably talented rookie police officer in the headquarters. It was a pity that officer wasn't assigned to the Ikemura case, so the moment the investigation wrapped up, he had tagged along behind Inspector Megure to sneak inside.
"What do you want?" Kiichi poured himself a cup of instant coffee from the breakroom. He figured that if Beika Town kept operating at its current pace, when he eventually died, his cremated remains would probably smell like roasted coffee beans.
"Hehe..." Heiji Hattori scratched the back of his head with a silly grin. "I heard there's a really thorny case here at the precinct..."
Oh? So someone was proactively volunteering to be a workhorse?