"And who told you the trail had gone cold?"
Hearing that, Shinichi looked confused. At this stage, every useful clue they had only served to eliminate the two suspects. Had Ritsu discovered something he himself had overlooked?
Always eager to learn, Shinichi couldn't help asking, "Inspector, did you find something?"
After taking two drags from his cigarette, Ritsu immediately stubbed it out. He had only wanted to satisfy the craving for a moment, smoking in front of minors wasn't exactly appropriate.
He tossed the extinguished cigarette into an evidence bag and, instead of answering directly, prompted him with another question.
"When Eguchi invited us inside, didn't you notice anything?"
"??"
Shinichi carefully searched through his memories.
The first thing he noticed upon entering had been the large number of athletic shoes lined up in the entryway, allowing him to deduce that she was a woman who loved sports and exercise.
There were no decorative ornaments on top of the shoe cabinet either, suggesting she didn't care much about quality-of-life aesthetics. Many Japanese women, especially those living alone, liked placing decorations in the entryway to make their homes feel warmer and more inviting.
A woman living alone?
A flash of realization crossed Shinichi's mind, and he smiled in surprise.
"Living alone! She's supposedly living alone, yet she was able to casually prepare a pair of men's slippers in the apartment!"
'Quick learner. With only a small hint, he had already pieced it together.'
"Not just that. I also noticed a man's necktie stuck between the sofa cushions. In situations like that, it usually means Eguchi and her boyfriend were doing something on the sofa—uff!"
Before he could finish, something smacked him on the head.
Ritsu instinctively shrank his neck and turned around in confusion, only to see Hayasaka glaring at him with a flushed face and a resentful expression.
"What?"
"What kind of knowledge are you teaching a high school student?!" Hayasaka lowered the notebook in her hand and frowned. "So you think Eguchi's boyfriend is suspicious, right? What's your reasoning?"
Shinichi coughed awkwardly.
Truthfully, the moment he heard there was a tie stuck in the sofa cushions, he had immediately understood. He deliberately looked away and pretended not to know what they were talking about.
"I couldn't understand why the killer dumped the body in the parking lot of this apartment building," Ritsu said, continuing to play the role of a patient mentor. "And I also couldn't understand why the killer stole Eguchi's clothes and put them on the victim."
Rather than directly revealing the answer, he instead laid out the clues necessary to solve the equation and let them think for themselves.
Hayasaka only needed a moment to arrive at the conclusion.
"You mean the killer deliberately framed Eguchi. And the reason he could frame her… is because he could freely and easily enter her apartment?"
"Exactly. And Eguchi must have told her boyfriend before that her clothes had been getting stolen."
"That killer's pretty impressive," Hayasaka muttered with reluctant admiration. "Not only did he frame his own girlfriend, but he even managed to shift suspicion onto that perverted underwear thief."
"Impressive? More like clever to the point of stupidity."
Ritsu glanced toward the corpse, which had already been zipped into a body bag and taken away, and said leisurely,
"Right now, he's probably hiding somewhere laughing at the incompetent police he believes could never solve the case. Little does he know… he stepped into the hunter's trap from the very beginning."
"You mean you already ruled out those two before even meeting Eguchi?" Hayasaka asked.
"Yeah. The killer is meticulous and has strong counter-surveillance awareness. The moment I confirmed this wasn't the primary crime scene, I knew the murderer wouldn't live nearby."
"Then why are we still standing around here? Shouldn't we ask Eguchi about her boyfriend?"
"No need. The name she gives us is probably fake anyway."
After being away from the scene for a while, Takagi came jogging over carrying a black laptop bag.
"Inspector! I brought everything you asked for!"
"Thanks."
Under everyone's curious gaze, Ritsu made no attempt to hide his hacking skills. His slender fingers rapidly tapped across the keyboard as strings of data appeared onscreen before being further decrypted.
The corner of Hayasaka's mouth twitched.
This guy had directly hacked into every single one of the victim's social media accounts. And his cracking speed was even faster than the technicians in the cybercrime division.
"Found it."
After around several dozen minutes, they finally located useful information in a Yahoo email account. Since Yahoo Mail logged mobile GPS data, Ritsu successfully pulled up the GPS records from Yositaka's phone after she got off work at 10 PM the previous night.
Shinichi leaned in closer and exclaimed in surprise, "She drove toward the suburbs?"
"Yeah. According to the GPS data, the victim drove over ten kilometers away after work." Ritsu zoomed in on the information displayed on the screen and said, "To a small bar called Takano."
"Can you look up the owner of the bar?"
"Yeah. The owner is Takashi Takano, thirty-five years old. He exchanged messages with Yositaka on LINE and invited her to drink at the bar he runs."
Ritsu pulled up Takano's social media account and noticed that he had listed his height in his profile.
178 centimeters. A perfect match for the killer profile he had deduced.
It had to be him.
The phone's last GPS location. A late-night establishment that was still legally operating. A quiet, isolated suburban area with private space.
It really was the perfect place for a criminal to choose.
"Hayasaka, Takagi, prepare to move out!"
"Huh? What about me?" Having apparently been excluded, Shinichi pointed at himself in confusion.
"Which car am I riding in?"
Ritsu narrowed his eyes into a half-lidded stare. Pulling a random ten-thousand-yen bill from his wallet, he tossed it at Shinichi and said,
"Catching criminals has nothing to do with you. Go home and find your mom."
Instinctively catching the bill, Shinichi stood frozen in place as he watched the Volkswagen Beetle and Nissan drive off without hesitation.
Holding the money in his hand, he felt strangely conflicted.
Like he'd just been abandoned.
Looking down at the "ill-gotten gains" in his hand, he let out a bitter laugh and shook his head.
For the first time ever, Shinichi felt like he couldn't see through someone.
Ritsu gave him an incredibly complicated feeling, as though the man were shrouded in fog. You'd step closer and manage to blow part of it away… only for the mist to gather again immediately.
Bold deductions. Meticulous logic.
Exceptional combat ability. Skilled with advanced technology.
Absolute observational prowess and a razor-sharp sensitivity toward clues.
Shinichi curled his lips into a self-deprecating smile.
Compared to himself, wasn't Ritsu far more like the Sherlock Holmes written by Arthur Conan Doyle?
'Looks like there's still a lot I need to learn.'
Shinichi scratched the back of his head.
If only he could stay by Ritsu's side and learn from him. Unfortunately, he was still just a high school student. It was difficult for him to get involved in cases, let alone become someone who worked alongside the police.
"Man… I'm really jealous of Hayasaka-san and Takagi-san." For now, he should just obediently listen.
Go home… Though it wasn't like he could find his mom there anyway.
After all, his unreliable parents had dumped him alone and gone traveling around the world.
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