Daily Spy Life in the Detective Conan World

Chapter 612 The True Purpose of the Tour Group
By the way, Xia Chuan had only been up there for less than five minutes, right?
How did you figure that out?

Could it be related to Anya? Does she have a dog's nose?

Three questions were asked in a row, but Conan could not get reasonable answers.

"We've sorted through some of the deceased's belongings. Could you help us identify them?"

Xia Chuan already knows who the murderer is, but the current situation is that the murderer has already left the scene, and any evidence he had on him has been disposed of.

Now the only way is to find another way to get the killer to strike again and catch him in the act.

The benefits of having Anya were immediately apparent.

This was the first time Xia Chuan had used Anya in a case, and the results were gratifying.

Even if you forget the details of the case and the murderer, you can immediately identify who the murderer is. It's like getting the conclusion first and then working backward to deduce the murderer. This is much more convenient than finding clues, alibis, or timelines.

Looking back on all the cases we've been through, Anya seems to have provided crucial evidence on many occasions, which now seems to be due to her mind-reading superpower.

soon.

The forensic team brought out the deceased's belongings, which Hattori Heizo, Toyama Ginjiro, and Mori Kogoro had been discussing earlier.

Cell phone, cigarettes, watch, keys, and wallet.

Besides the more conventional items, two of them were particularly eye-catching.

A broken tile and a tattered scroll.

Seemingly feeling that he shouldn't let an outsider like Natsukawa lead him by the nose, Toyama Ginjiro picked up the tile and scroll and looked at the tour group members: "Do you remember these two things?"

The remaining four are: Kazuya Arihiro, who plays Tokugawa Ieyasu; Fukushima Toshiaki, who plays Akechi Mitsuhide; Wakiita Shigehiko, who plays Oda Nobunaga and is told by Natsukawa that he has an unlucky face; and Katagiri Maho, the only woman in the last group, who plays the wet nurse.

Ginjiro Toyama's eyes were as sharp as a hawk's, and under his gaze, the expressions of the tour group changed to varying degrees.

Some people looked at the tiles with strange expressions, but most people focused their attention on the scroll.

The scroll was opened, revealing it covered in scorch marks. Half of it was incomplete, but the most obvious mark was the large "dragon" character at the top!

"what"

Anya muttered something under her breath, exchanged a glance with her father, and then silently walked to a corner.

"You seem to have seen this before?"

Ginjiro Toyama immediately saw through the situation and pressed, "Tell us what you know. Although concealing information won't get you locked up for long, it will still affect the police investigation. If telling us helps solve the case, there will be a reward later."

With a combination of carrot and stick, someone immediately stepped forward.

“If I’m not mistaken, this appears to be a treasure map, and it’s related to Toyotomi Hideyoshi. We are all Toyotomi Hideyoshi enthusiasts, and we have indeed seen similar treasure maps before.”

Katagiri Maho, the only woman in the group, spoke up to explain, and then walked over to Toyama Ginjiro, giving him a serious once-over.

Seeing the scattered charred marks on it, she shook her head with slight disappointment: "It might be a treasure, but it's charred quite badly now, so it's probably unusable."

Upon hearing this, the other members of the tour group immediately gathered around, and their expressions turned bewildered upon discovering the tattered and charred scroll.

"But there's clearly no writing on it!" With Hattori's help, Conan was lifted up and saw that the scroll only had the character "Dragon" on it, and he was puzzled: "There's nothing on it, so why would I think it's a treasure map?"

Conan turned to look at the group of tourists.

However, every time his gaze swept over someone, he would find that the other person deliberately avoided his eyes and kept their mouth tightly shut, showing no intention of answering.

Conan thought to himself, "How annoying!" Even though he was just a kid, these members of the tour group were so wary and wouldn't say a word. They probably knew everything about the treasure map, and maybe the tour group's real goal was even related to the treasure map.

"Why don't we try soaking it in water and see?"

Xia Chuan took a bottle of mineral water and, to everyone's astonishment, poured it directly over the carefully preserved scroll.

Whether it was trust or something else, the two policemen, Hattori and Toyama, remained unmoved, while the tour group members were the most agitated, but they still held back.

“I think the thickness of this paper is abnormal. It may have a layer. In ancient times, there was a technique to make the text visible only when it was exposed to fire or water. Now the scroll is charred like this and the text is still not visible, so it must be related to water.”

After Xia Chuan finished speaking, the water was completely absorbed by the scroll, and writing began to appear on the scroll.

"This does indeed look like a treasure map."

Looking at the Chinese text above, Conan rested his chin on his hand, lost in thought.

"But it seems to be all in Chinese. Conan, can you understand it?"

Anya always had the urge to tease Conan, "Did you learn that in Hawaii again?"

“The origin of the Japanese writing system is traditional Chinese characters, especially during the Tang Dynasty. We gained a lot of knowledge from the Tang Dynasty, and many characters are still in use today. And the same is true during the Toyotomi Hideyoshi era.”

After explaining it, Conan memorized the secret message on the scroll, while glancing at the four members of the tour group over there.

Toyotomi Hideyoshi's treasure, Toyotomi Hideyoshi's travel group—even he himself wouldn't believe that the murderer wasn't among them.

"Hey, officer, did you suddenly call the four of us back just to show us this?"

One of the men, with a long, narrow face, frowned and said, "This case should have nothing to do with us. It's purely suicide. Otherwise, the murderer would never have left this scroll. It's a treasure map; no one would miss it."

As he spoke, he turned to his companions and said, “We are all fans of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, but it is all by chance that we have come together. We didn’t actually know each other before; we were just friends in an online chat group.”

"Is that so?" Xia Chuan chuckled, but didn't say anything more.

"The pattern on the gourd above the treasure seems to be somewhat similar to the emblem of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, and the dragon character appears when it gets wet, which reminds me of a dragon and tiger mural in Osaka, where the pattern only appears after the mural gets wet."

After studying it for a long time, Heiji Hattori came to this conclusion, but he didn't say it out loud. Instead, he whispered and plotted with Conan.

However, Xia Chuan thought differently and said directly, "This secret code doesn't seem to be complete, and the gourd pattern is only half there. Considering the dragon character on it, could there be two treasure maps, with the other one being a tiger character scroll?"

Upon hearing this, the expressions of the tour group members shifted slightly. Except for the guy with the long face who seemed puzzled, the others had a strange glint in their eyes.

Just then, one of them suddenly felt something thud under his feet.

He lowered his head inexplicably, and then his expression changed instantly.

While everyone else was distracted by the police scroll, he picked up the scroll from the ground.

(End of this chapter)