Chapter 253

"Don't worry, I will definitely give it my all today to solve this case before he gets here and get revenge for you!"

"And, as long as I defeat that guy, you, as his defeated subordinate, will definitely bow down and admit defeat to me, right? Hehehe."

Heiji Hattori said, laughing triumphantly. Conan's eyelids twitched violently, and he had black lines all over his forehead.

Hehehe your big head!

I have been bullied quite badly by Akaso Kaze, but haven't you also never won against him?

Also, who told you that I would bow down and admit defeat?

Conan glared at Heiji Hattori with hatred and then said seriously, "Hey, Heiji, how about we have a competition to see who finds the truth first?"

"Oh? Are you planning to have a contest?"

Heiji Hattori was stunned for a moment, reached out to turn the brim of his hat to the front, and smiled, "Then as you wish!"

He turned to ask Chika Shimoda, "This lady, I am a high school detective. Can you tell me the specific situation?"

Hearing that he was a detective, Chika Shimoda wiped the tears from the corners of her eyes and explained the situation.

Conan listened while silently examining the corpse.

He put on gloves and checked the call logs and emails on the phone that had fallen first.

Huh, two people had been in contact with the deceased just a minute ago.

Heiji Hattori finished listening to the sequence of events and asked, "Ms. Shimoda, after you drove Kawakami and Nakamachi, who were drinking together, back home, why were you standing outside the building taking pictures?"

"That's because I wanted to show off the apartment my boyfriend lives in to my friends."

Chika Shimoda explained with a sob.

"I see," Heiji Hattori said noncommittally.

"In any case, contact Kawakami and Nakamachi now and have them return here as soon as possible. This is definitely not an ordinary suicide case. Also, you don't mind if we go into Mr. Takai's room to take a look now, do you?"

"O-of course."

Chika Shimoda didn't refuse at all.

A dozen minutes later, inside Takai's room.

Conan and Heiji Hattori, wearing white gloves, searched around the room and finally focused on Takai's bedroom, both pinching their chins to ponder the case.

Conan asked, "Heiji, Takai must have fallen from this room, right?"

"Yeah!" Heiji Hattori nodded. "Except for the balcony next to it, only the window here is open, and the position roughly matches; it should be here."

Conan nodded, pacing along the wall and looking at the floor.

"We checked carefully when we entered the door just now. Takai's door was indeed locked from the outside, and there are no signs of the lock being pried open, so we can rule out the possibility of an intruder."

"As for the room, we have checked it one by one, and we can be sure that there was absolutely no one else in the room besides the deceased at the time of the incident."

Conan slowly walked to the window Takai had fallen from, looked up, and said with a solemn expression, "If I hadn't seen the curtains, I would have also concluded that Mr. Takai committed suicide."

"Exactly!" Heiji Hattori stood beside Conan, looking up at the curtains.

"The curtains in this room were clearly pulled hard by someone; even the bearings are deformed. Assuming Mr. Takai really wanted to commit suicide, why would he grab the curtains?"

"And that mark on the window."

Conan pointed to the window. "That should have been hit hard by something, right?"

"Finally, there's the position of the bed."

Heiji Hattori turned to look at the bed placed next to the window and reached out to pinch his chin again.

"If you look closely at the floor, you'll find that the bed's position was clearly moved, and it was not long ago! My intuition tells me that this matter is definitely related to Mr. Takai's death."

"So, Mr. Takai's death is definitely not suicide, but murder!"

Conan and Heiji Hattori reached their conclusion and exchanged glances, but they couldn't feel happy at all.

I mean, they only deduced that Takai's death was murder, not suicide, after examining the scene.

And that guy Akaso Kaze just answered a phone call, listened to Teacher Jodie for a few seconds, and directly concluded it was murder.

How on earth did that guy do it?

This is just too unscientific.

Jodie's voice came from the doorway, "Inspector Megure, you're here."

Inspector Megure looked at Conan and Heiji Hattori in the room, pressed down on his hat, and complained helplessly:

"Conan? Heiji? I was wondering why you two are everywhere? Lord Akaso was right; you two really are Gods of Death."

"Hahaha..." Conan and Heiji both laughed awkwardly.

That guy Akaso Kaze, how many people has he told that we are Gods of Death!

You have to know that you are a famous Onmyoji; many people will believe what you say!

Conan narrowed his eyes and scratched his head, acting cute. "What God of Death! It's just a coincidence, just a coincidence! I'm here to see Teacher Jodie today, I didn't expect to run into a case again."

Inspector Megure was speechless, pointing at the room, his dead fish eyes glaring at Conan and Heiji Hattori.

"Did you two investigate this room without permission again, just like before?"

Heiji Hattori waved his hands even more awkwardly.

"Inspector Megure, don't worry about those details! Although we investigated it ourselves, we were wearing gloves and shoe covers; we definitely didn't damage anything at the scene."

"You two guys..."

Inspector Megure pouted and turned to direct his subordinates.

The police immediately began to survey the scene, while Officer Takagi walked up to Conan and Heiji Hattori to inquire.

"Student Heiji, we police met the deceased's girlfriend downstairs earlier."

"She said Mr. Takai committed suicide because she locked the door from the outside when she left with two other colleagues, and no outsider could enter. May I ask if what she said is true?"

"Yes." Heiji Hattori nodded.

"Regarding the fact that the door was locked from the outside, we can testify that it is absolutely true. However, to say the victim committed suicide, I'm afraid that's not right."

"We speculate that the victim must have been murdered!"

"What? Murdered?" Inspector Megure and Officer Takagi were both stunned, then their expressions became serious. "Do you have any evidence?"

"This..." Heiji Hattori was just about to answer when he saw the police bringing three people in, saluting Inspector Megure:

"Inspector Megure, Mr. Takai's girlfriend found the other two colleagues who were drinking this afternoon. These are the two: Mr. Toya Nakamachi and Mr. Noboru Kawakami."

Inspector Megure was just about to greet them when Conan and Heiji Hattori had already rushed over with bright eyes, asking:

"Mr. Nakamachi, Mr. Kawakami, hello! We have some questions we'd like to ask, is that okay?"

Toya Nakamachi and Noboru Kawakami looked at Conan and Heiji, a bit confused.

Why are a high schooler and a kid asking the questions? Shouldn't it be the police?

Inspector Megure's mouth twitched, and a "tic" mark appeared on his forehead.

You two little guys, this is too much. Am I the Inspector or are you?

A few dozen minutes later, the interrogation of Chika Shimoda, Toya Nakamachi, and Noboru Kawakami ended.

Inspector Megure frowned and said, "I see. So it was because Takai was drunk and started cursing that Mr. Kawakami sent Mr. Takai into his bedroom and then left."

"After that, Ms. Shimoda drove Mr. Kawakami and Mr. Nakamachi home, then returned downstairs to the apartment building to take pictures of Takai's apartment for her friends, which is why she was taking pictures downstairs. Unexpectedly, Mr. Takai fell from the window."

"When Mr. Takai fell, Mr. Kawakami was on the phone with him, and shortly before Mr. Takai fell, Mr. Nakamachi had sent a text message to Mr. Takai."

"That's the situation, right?"

"Yes, that's right." Shimoda, Nakamachi, and Kawakami all nodded.

Takagi checked the phone and said:

"Inspector Megure, Mr. Takai did receive a call from a person named Noboru Kawakami. In addition, about two minutes before this call, the phone received a text message from Toya Nakamachi."

"The content of the text message is: 'You said that if you want to get ahead, you have to disregard human feelings. I cannot agree with this point; please also be more considerate of your subordinates' feelings.' That is the full text of the message."

Heiji Hattori pinched his chin and pondered:

"Mr. Nakamachi's text message doesn't seem to have any problems, and Mr. Kawakami only talked to the deceased on the phone; it also feels very normal."

"It's really strange. What method did the murderer use to make the deceased jump off the building? Hey, Conan, did you think of anything?"

Suddenly, a ringtone sounded from Heiji Hattori's body.

He was stunned for a moment, took out his phone from his pocket, pressed the answer button, and said, "Hello, who is this?"

The voice on the phone was intermittent and unclear.

"Hello, can't hear clearly? The signal here is really bad..."

Heiji Hattori was a bit helpless, looked around, and walked quickly to the balcony.