Maori Kogoro began to understand everything

From ten o'clock after the banquet until half past ten, Mao Li played poker with these suitors of Shijing Lihua in the living room to pass the time.

In the middle of playing cards, Mao Li curiously asked these people about the purpose of pursuing the bad-tempered Miss Yotsuga. Mifune was the first to speak with a helpless smile:

"I simply have no choice. My Mifune Electronics Industry cannot do without the support of the Shijing Group."

"Me too," Gojo Osamu said in distress, "My trading company is not doing well either. It's not like Ichieda Takashi and Nikaido, who are just trying to become the next president of the Yotsuba Group..."

"Huh, don't you want to?"

Nikaidou smiled and said, "Whoever can marry the young lady will be able to ascend to heaven in one step... But I think you should stop dreaming. The young lady has already decided on her marriage partner two years ago."

"Two years ago?"

The faces of several people in the living room changed again.

"What happened two years ago?"

Maori asked doubtfully.

"Ah, nothing,"

Nikaidou realized that he had said the wrong thing, smiled and changed the subject, "But now that I think about it, I really miss it. In the past, members of our yacht club often gathered here."

"Yacht club?"

"Yes, we also took the young lady's yacht to visit nearby islands... Mr. Rokuda was the driver."

"Haha, I have a yachting license."

The atmosphere in the living room became lively again, and these people didn't seem to want to talk more about what happened two years ago in front of Mao Li.

Just as everyone was chatting heatedly——

"strangeness,"

Rokuda checked the time and asked, "Why is it so slow for Miss to change her clothes?"

"Yeah, you should have changed your clothes a long time ago, right?"

"Want to go have a look?"

Gojo said worriedly.

"Who cares? Who can afford to offend that young lady?"

Mifune sat aside angrily, and the others stopped talking when they thought of Lihua's temper.

Another half an hour passed, when Maori, who had not said much, was almost about to fall asleep, the clock on the living room suddenly struck eleven.

"Isn't the young lady taking too long?"

Yizhi Long stared at Zhong and said in surprise, "It's just a change of clothes..."

Mao Li frowned, stood up and said to the old servant who was entertaining everyone, "Grandma Mi, could you please go to Miss Lihua's room and take a look?"

"Okay."

"We'll go too."

Yizhi Long and a few others rushed to the second floor. Seeing this, Mao Li had no choice but to follow them.

Although he didn't want to admit it, when factors like "night", "bad-tempered young lady", "villa far away from the city", "not showing up for a long time" and so on appeared at the same time, Maori always felt something was not right.

Chapter 39: Drugged Mao Li

"Miss!"

"Ms. Lihua!"

The group searched everywhere in the villa, but still couldn't find any trace of Shijing Lihua.

"Ms. Lihua, answer what you heard, don't hide anymore!"

"Strange, I can't find it..."

"Could it be that she walked into the woods and got lost?"

"That's for sure,"

Mifune said dissatisfiedly, "She must think it's fun to play tricks on us like this!"

"Okay," Yizhi Long advised, "No matter what, let's all go look in the woods again."

"This is the only way. We can't just leave that young lady alone."

Maori frowned and walked into the woods. In the dark night with rumbling thunder, the woods looked gloomy and creepy - this made Maori think of the last incident of the bandaged man.

Although he didn't like the bad-tempered Miss Shijing Lihua very much, he didn't want her to suffer such a fate...

"Boom!"

There was another burst of thunder, and it looked like it was going to rain.

"It's going to rain soon, everyone should split up and look for her. We must find the young lady quickly!"

Rokuda, who was himself an employee of the Yotsuba Group, was the first to rush into the woods, looking quite anxious.

The group quickly dispersed, and Maori, who was not familiar with the place at all, followed Mifune.

"Miss Lihua, can you hear me?"

Mao Li and the other man shouted at the top of their lungs, looking for someone everywhere, but there was no response at all. There was only the faint shouting of other people coming from another direction.

After a while, cold raindrops fell, and the sound became heavier and heavier.

"Damn it, this young lady is really troublesome,"

Mifune stopped and said, "Uncle Detective, I think we should go back to the villa first. Maybe the young lady has already gone back by herself."

"Don't you feel something is wrong, Mr. Mifune?"

Mao Li frowned and said, "Even if it's a joke, it shouldn't be like this... Miss Lihua hasn't responded yet, maybe something has happened..."

"Humph, uncle, you don't know. She is that kind of person. Now she must be laughing at us in the dark for being played by her like a clown!"

Mifune scoffed and turned around, "Anyway, I'm going to go back now. If you want to look for it, go ahead. But be careful, it's easy to get lost in this forest."

"Boom!"

Another burst of muffled thunder was heard, and Mao Li followed Sanfen in a hurry back to the villa in the heavy rain.

At this time, the other few people had also returned and were gathering around the fountain in front of the villa.

"what happened?"

Maori's heart sank.

"It's Nikaidou, Nikaidou..."

The other people looked at Nikaidou lying on the ground with horror, "It looks like someone pushed him into the water and drowned him!"

"How could this happen? He was fine just now..."

"Who on earth would do such a thing?"

"Humph!"

Mifune smiled coldly, "There is one person right now who is the most suspicious among us. That's right, it's Miss Lihua who is missing now!"

"Mifune, how could Miss Reika do such a thing?"

"It's too early to say that. Miss Lihua might have been killed."

Mao Li put on his gloves quickly, squatted beside the body to check for a while, interrupted the noise and said, "Anyway, everyone go back to the villa first, call the police, and wait until the police arrive to talk about anything..."

"No, Detective Maori,"

Granny Mi shouted at the gate of the villa, "I've tried, but the phone call doesn't work!"

"Even cell phones are not allowed?"

Maori said with a headache.

"It's useless. The signal is very poor in this place. I can't make a call."

"So we're trapped here..."

Maori's eyes swept over the people present. When someone died, everything was no longer a joke, but a premeditated murder. The murderer was likely among the people in the villa. Except for Mifune who was with him just now, everyone else was a major suspect.

Liu Tian groaned, "It seems that we can only wait until dawn for the chairman to send someone to pick us up. I think we should sit down and have a cup of coffee first, and then talk about it tomorrow morning... Aunt Mi, could you please make some coffee for me?"

"Okay, I'll go right away."

"Then I'm going to the bathroom."

"Wait for me, I'll go too."

Mifune and the others left the living room one after another, and Rokuda followed suit and said, "I'll go to the sink and get some towels. I think everyone must be soaked by the rain now..."

"sorry to bother you,"

Mao Li nodded slightly and reminded, "We don't know where the murderer is now, so you'd better not be alone."

While waiting for the others, Maori looked at the increasingly heavy rain outside and went out again to check Nikaidou's body.

When he returned to the living room, everyone was wiping their wet hair with towels. No one looked unusual, or rather, everyone looked suspicious.

"But why was Nikaidou killed?"

Five ways to cultivate the incomprehensible path.

"Who knows..."

"About this,"

Mao Li sat down in the living room, looked at everyone and said, "Mr. Nikaido seemed to have said before that Miss Lihua's marriage partner was decided two years ago. I think this may be the motive for the murder."

"How is it possible...are you doubting us?"

"Yeah, Uncle Detective," Mifune met Mori's gaze and chuckled, "Do you think we would kill him just because of what he said? That's ridiculous. Besides, I was with you when Nikaidou died."

"Mr. Mifune is definitely not the murderer,"

Mao Li said with sharp eyes, "I was just thinking that something seemed to have happened two years ago. Can you tell me? What exactly happened two years ago?"

"This……"

"It was an unfortunate accident,"

Liu Tian explained in a deep voice, "On that day two years ago, we moored our yacht beside a small island and dispersed to have fun. We didn't realize that a storm was coming..."

The atmosphere in the living room was heavy. Except for Liu Tian who spoke, everyone was silent.

Liu Tian continued, "When the thunderstorm came, most people returned to the yacht for shelter. Only the eldest lady remained on the island..."

"It was a small island that would sink at high tide. One of us took a rubber boat to rescue Miss Reika. Half a day later, we found Miss Reika and Nikaidou floating on the sea wearing life jackets, but our rescue companion was missing... Her body was found floating on the sea three days later..."

"Who are the companions you are talking about?"

"She is my granddaughter, Yaeko,"

Granny Mi returned to the living room with the coffee. "She sacrificed her life to save the young lady. Yaeko probably died with no regrets... Come, I've made the coffee."

Mao Li did not drink the coffee immediately, but asked thoughtfully: "You said that only Miss Lihua was left on the island, what about Nikaidou?"

"He was out fishing alone in a kayak, and we have no idea how he ended up with the eldest lady,"

Liu Tian drank coffee and said, "Now it seems that the reason why he was so confident that he could marry the eldest lady might be because of something the eldest lady promised him at that time."

"Is this so..."

Mao Li also picked up a cup of coffee and started drinking: "After you finish your coffee, let's search the villa carefully again. Let's find Miss Lihua first."

"But the murderer may still be there..."

"Then let's split into two groups so we can supervise each other."

Mao Li gave these instructions while yawning loudly - for some reason, he suddenly felt very sleepy.

He tried to cheer himself up, but his eyelids became heavier and heavier...

"Detective Maori, what's wrong with you?"

Gojo Shuu said strangely.