Maori Kogoro began to understand everything

"Um," Maori asked, "Where is the restroom?"

“Ah?!” Kōto Yonekura was startled. He turned around and saw Maori. He quickly put away his phone and said, “You can see the sign after turning left from this side.”

"Oh, thank you." Maori walked away and noticed that Kōto Yonekura walked quickly to the other end before leaving.

The chief producer is the person in charge of this press conference. What should Koto Yonekura do at this time?

I always feel something is strange, as if I am intentionally avoiding him...

Will nothing else happen?

"Oh! This is the women's restroom!" A short-haired female staff member came out.

"S-Sorry, I didn't mean it."

……

Room B of the large prop warehouse has a gate control system because it stores the giant monster suits prepared for the new movie. Of course, Isao Yonekura is one of the authorized personnel. After separating from Mori, Isao Yonekura went straight to the outside of the warehouse and swiped the gate open with his ID card.

"What do you want from me, Xiaoshan?"

"Crack!"

The warehouse door closed automatically after he entered the rice warehouse, and the dim environment inside made him frown.

The new monster suits were fixed with ropes and stood in a row of shelves. At first glance, they looked like living creatures waiting to attack, which was very scary.

"Hasn't that Xiaoshan guy come yet?"

Kōto Yonekura shouted, turned his back to the first monster suit, and took out his cell phone to check.

"Really... why did you invite Maori Kogoro over? It's unlucky..."

Chapter 170 Serial Cases

"Shua!" (sound of flushing water)

Maori dried his hands and walked out of the bathroom, only to find that there was almost no one here, it was very deserted. He could occasionally see a few staff members before, but now there was none.

"Has the show already started?"

I hurried back to the venue and finally heard some voices, but the performance didn't seem to have started yet. It was still a break. However, the guests were obviously a little impatient and many of them were talking while looking at the time.

"It's over there in Warehouse B!" A staff member passed by Mao Li and hurriedly took the host away, as if something big had happened.

Warehouse B...

The direction the staff went was the same as before, which was the staff area.

Maori felt a chill in his heart.

At this time, outside Warehouse B, many Nichiren TV staff gathered together, in the middle was the pale-faced subordinate of Yonekura, Yuya Kosugi, who handed the business card to Mori.

……

"The victim is the chief producer of Nichiren TV's film production department, Isao Yonekura, 43 years old..."

Large prop B warehouse.

After the forensic personnel collected evidence, Officer Otaki of the Osaka Prefecture Investigation Division 1 went forward to examine the body.

The monster suit made for the new movie was completely pressed on Isao Yonekura, with the exposed fangs directly piercing his abdomen and blood flowing, which looked shocking.

"Isn't this too tragic? And why is this place so dark? This isn't a horror movie... Can't the lights be brighter?"

"No, there's something wrong with the lighting system here."

"Really? Open the door then."

Officer Otaki complained and asked Maori who was standing nearby.

"Detective Maori, what do you think?"

"From what we saw at the scene, it was obviously not an accident," Mao Li said solemnly, his hands folded. "Someone cut the rope that secured the holster while Producer Yonekura was coming over."

"But if someone cuts the rope, he should know, right?" Officer Otaki asked doubtfully.

"It must have been attracted by something."

Maori glanced across the scene.

Isao Yonekura was lying on his back and was pressed under the leather suit, which means that he actually noticed it but did not have time to dodge.

A mobile phone was dropped on his bloody right hand. From the bloodstains wiped off his index finger and on the screen of the phone, it was clear that Mi Cang seemed to have used fingerprint unlocking before his death.

"In order to successfully use the fingerprint to unlock the phone, he wiped the blood off his index finger on his clothes. Maybe there are some clues left in the phone."

Maori continued.

"Also, there is a damage on the top board of the rack caused by a knife. It should be that the prisoner dropped the knife he used to cut the rope... He doesn't look like a repeat offender."

He was clearly here to attend a movie launch, but the producer was murdered in such an outrageous way.

This method of killing can succeed. I don’t know whether to say that the criminal is too naive or that Koto Yonekura is too unlucky.

Maori recalled the time when he met Kōto Yonekura in the corridor.

Maybe he was the last person to see Yonekura, but why did Kōto Yonekura come to the warehouse at that time, and why was he avoiding him when facing him...

There seems to be something else going on.

In the Nichiren TV 601 conference room, Officer Otaki was temporarily requisitioned to question Kosugi Yuma who discovered the body. Hattori and Conan were like cats that smelled fish, and they immediately got together with Officer Otaki to participate in the investigation and interrogation.

At the press conference, when Mao Li came back, there was not much change at the scene. The host just came over and said that the press conference ended early. The murder of Koto Yonekura was not made public, and only the staff knew about it for the time being.

"Is the interrogation over?" Ai asked when she saw Maori coming back.

"Not yet. Hattori and the others are still following us," Maori said as he looked at the crowd dispersing from the venue, "but I probably won't be needed for this kind of case."

After seeing the scene, he knew that the criminal's ability was limited and the police alone could handle the situation.

What concerned him was the "Onda" that Isao Yonekura kept talking about.

He just checked the information and found out that an accident happened in Kyoto yesterday. A man named Onda fell off a cliff while driving a sports car and died.

It was said to be an accident, but Mao Li did not find any signs of braking from the photos of the scene released by the police, so he was not sure what exactly happened.

But I always felt that Yonekura’s expression at that time was a little strange.

I think he saw the news, but that feeling of annoyance and anger...it doesn't seem normal no matter how I think about it.

"And then?" Xiao Ai was very curious about the case. "What exactly happened?"

"It is said that producer Yonekura left a note for Kosugi, asking him to go to the big prop warehouse at 2:30," Maori explained. "According to Kosugi Yuya, Yonekura will go on a business trip to Bangkok right after today's filming press conference. Maybe he wanted to tell him something... Of course, this is all Kosugi Yuya's unilateral statement. He also threw away the note, saying that it said he should throw it away, and the police were unable to find it in the end."

"So this person might be the murderer?" Xiao Ai suddenly felt that solving the case was much more interesting than the press conference, and couldn't help but continue asking.

"Of course there is a motive. After all, I have been suppressed by Yonekura and have no chance to make a breakthrough."

Maori shook his head.

"But I think it's unlikely that he is the murderer. No matter how useless a criminal is, he wouldn't let himself discover the body. In this case, the police might directly regard him as the murderer. And if he is the murderer, he should at least clean up the scene. He wouldn't keep Mikura's phone that might contain the death message."

In Mori's opinion, Yuya Kosugi was just an unlucky guy who was framed by someone, and maybe someone from Yonekura called him over in his name.

In this way, while getting rid of Yonekura, Kosugi can be framed, and the suspect can be easily found based on the winner.

There are three producers under Yonekura, all of whom are members of the Yonekura team. If something happens to Yonekura and Kosugi Yuma, the remaining two will benefit.

It just so happens that the police are now investigating those two people.

"Ok?"

A prying gaze aroused Maori's vigilance, and when he looked quickly he vaguely saw someone dodging.

From the side, it looks like the squirrel policeman in Kyoto, the one who always brings a little squirrel with him...

"What's wrong?" Xiao Ai asked vigilantly, "Is there anyone?"

"It seems... not a bad person."

Maori felt no ill will.

If it's Ayanokouji, is it related to the "Onda" case in Kyoto?

"Uncle!" Hattori shouted from outside, "Officer Otaki has found out. At the time of the incident, the staff with the warehouse door card, besides Mr. Kosugi, were the only two people in the employee area... Do you want to come to the conference room for questioning?"

"Ah, I'll come over later."

Maori decided to trust his own consciousness and talk to Ayanokouji first - as a detective, his unscientific intuition can sometimes help him solve the case, or find the key.

At the stairs of the Osaka Nichimi TV building, Ayanokouji stopped in surprise and found that Mori was waiting for him in front and seemed to have been there for a while.

"Detective Maori..."

"Squeak!" The little squirrel on Ayanokouji's shoulder stood up with its fur all over. It dived into the pocket with a whoosh, and looked at Mori tremblingly.

"I guess Officer Ayanokouji, you're here because Kōto Yonekura is involved in some other case?" Maori looked at the little squirrel that shrank back in surprise and asked Ayanokouji.

"How do you know?" Ayanokouji asked suddenly in surprise.

"In fact, before Kōto Yonekura went to the warehouse, I met him in the corridor and heard him mention a name called 'Onda'."

Maori asked seriously.

"Can you tell me in detail? Since you came here secretly to investigate, you must think that Onda's case is not an accident?"

Ayanokouji remained silent. In front of a real expert, he couldn't hide anything. It was really scary.

"I have this idea," Ayanokouji said as he took out a photo from his arms. "The driver who was killed was called Onda Takashi, a screenwriter... but the name "screenwriter" is just a title. He usually lives on squandering his parents' property. Onda has a mansion in Iwakura and two sports cars, a red one and a blue one. The accident happened on a mountain road near the mansion. The driver and the car fell off the cliff together. It seems that he failed to turn on the mountain road and rushed down. In addition, he seemed to be drunk, so the local police station ruled this case as a traffic accident."

"And then?" Mao Li didn't know much from the news reports, so he continued, "Did you go to the scene to investigate?"

"Yes, even if he was drunk, he would have stepped on the brakes, but there were no brake marks on the ground, so I don't think this was a simple traffic accident."

Ayanokouji explained.

"According to my investigation, Onda drove a red sports car on even-numbered days and a blue sports car on odd-numbered days. However, it seems that the blue sports car had some problems. Although yesterday was an odd-numbered day, Onda was driving a red sports car when the accident happened. The failure of the blue sports car was not man-made, and there was no problem with the brakes. Logically, if someone tampered with it, they should target both cars at the same time. So in order to find out whether this incident was man-made or an accident, I further investigated and found that Onda had contact with Koto Yonekura. I thought of coming here to find Yonekura to ask about the situation, but who knew that he was suddenly killed."

"I see," Maori sorted out the information about Ayanokouji in his mind and asked curiously, "But even so, you don't have to be so sneaky, right?"

"Well, this place was blocked when I came here," Ayanokouji said awkwardly, "Besides, I don't have any solid evidence yet."

"So what is the relationship between Onda and Yonekura?" Mori asked as he took Ayanokouji to the conference room on the 6th floor.

"They once attended an independent film screening, and they are said to have been on very good terms since then, but it's strange that Onda doesn't have Yonekura's contact information on his phone."

"Do you suspect that Onda's death is related to Yonekura?"

In conference room 601, when Maori and Ayanokouji came over, the questioning of the remaining two people from the Yonekura team had already ended.

Neither of them had an alibi, but each had their own version of events.

The thin man Yoshito Mihara said that he sprained his foot a few days ago. At the time of the incident, he was alone in the conference room on the 3rd floor to confirm the filming process, and asked a female staff member to get painkillers from the car in the parking lot.

"I remember that I asked her to get the car keys at around 2:20 p.m., and she brought the medicine at around 2:10 p.m. We had a press conference today and many people took the elevator up and down, so it took a little longer, but it was only 3 minutes. With such a short time, it was impossible for me to climb the stairs to go back and forth between the 6rd and th floors with a sprained foot, right?" the thin man defended.

Another producer who looked a bit stronger, Gao Nei-zun, then said, "I was alone in the toilet during that time, and there were not many people around, so I don't have an alibi. But it's impossible for me to kill Mi Cang because I have a severe fear of heights. I wouldn't even dare to go up to the top of the shelf..."

"Awaited!"

Mao Li directly led Ayanokouji to open the door and go in.

"Officer Otaki, please wait a moment. Officer Ayanokouji wants to talk to you about something other than this case."

"Hey!" Ayanokouji, who was following behind obediently, was startled.

The matter of Onda was just his personal judgment, and he had no intention of discussing it with the Osaka Prefectural Police. The reason why he followed Mori here was just to be a follower and see the situation.

"Huh?" Hattori asked in surprise, "Aren't you the Kyoto prefectural policeman?"

This guy who carries a squirrel with him left a deep impression on people during the last Genji Hotaru incident.

"Then I'll be leaving first." Maori said goodbye.

"Huh? Where are you going?"