Tokyo: The Player Behind the Scenes.

Chapter 37: Following the Clues

During a boring break in class, Shin Higashiyama once again used his "borrowed ghost eyes" technique, having Yoshiyuki Ueda wear his eyes, and wandered over to the old school building.

He soon saw that a quick-access police booth had been set up between the old teaching building and the secret room.

This is a modular house that can be placed in areas where police need to be on duty temporarily. It contains a generator, air conditioning and heating, equipment and a certain amount of food reserves, and also has a certain degree of defensive capability.

The nearest police station is not far from here. The Metropolitan Police Department made this arrangement mainly to appease the school's concerns that the "serial killer" would continue to commit crimes, and to present a positive image to the outside world, since students are involved.

In fact, many reporters who have caught wind of this have already come knocking on our door. It's impossible to keep it a secret any longer. This is the limit of the excuse of "not alerting the enemy." We'll be on TV tonight.

Without a doubt, this will inevitably attract a lot of criticism and condemnation of the Metropolitan Police Department for its incompetence.

But this case is truly extraordinary. In an ordinary case, if all the details and the victim's information were input, Tianjin AI could make a fairly accurate judgment, and might even provide the most likely locations where the murder weapon was thrown, the most likely eyewitnesses, and output a complete chain of evidence.

The police only need to conduct investigations and visits based on the suspects and locations provided by Tianjin AI to solve the case.

The problem is that after inputting the situation that happened at Komagome Academy, the AI ​​got stuck in deep thought, constantly negating its previous reasoning, and the final result was far-fetched, even nine-tenths of the way.

Tianjin AI's thinking logic has a strong materialistic nature. It is not that it cannot use metaphysical knowledge, but once it is allowed to use metaphysics to solve problems, it will start to create secondary stories.

Since AI, with its comprehensive thinking, cannot solve the problem, we can only use the boundless imagination of the human mind to break through.

The Metropolitan Police Department had no choice but to discontinue the external brain and return to the traditional approach to solving cases.

"Then let me ask you, let me ask you, do you still remember how you learned your first introductory lesson?"

"Uh, I forgot."

"That means wherever there's a trace, there's a way! It's not that we can't find it, it's just that Conan hasn't arrived yet!"

Is there such a saying?

"No," a calm voice interjected.

"Who said there wasn't one—Section Chief! When did you get back?"

Inside the quick-access police booth, two members of the First Investigation Division, who were on duty and protecting the scene, were chatting idly when their division chief suddenly arrived. Startled, they quickly stood up straight.

"Has anyone from outside come in?" Ping Shenglong didn't lecture him, but simply asked calmly.

"No, they are all our people and school officials," the detective immediately assured.

"I'll take someone to look around the area; don't worry about me."

"Yes!"

Ping Shenglong turned around, took several sets of on-site protection kits from the supply box, and printed an on-site access permit before leaving.

Walking outside the electronic warning tape, Kurosaki bent down and curiously examined the warning posts standing on the ground. These warning posts were like nodes, with two nodes connected to each other, holographically projecting a banner with a yellow and black background that read "All contact is prohibited while the scene is being preserved."

"If I jump over it, will it stop turning red?" Kurosaki was referring to the fact that if he trespassed directly, the warning line projection would turn red, and the warning post would sound an alarm and automatically contact the nearest on-duty police officer.

Ping Shenglong shook his head: "Unless you dig a hole more than ten meters away, it will still trigger the alarm. In fact, you are already within its monitoring range."

"Looks like he's not as useless as I thought." Kurosaki shrugged, took the access pass handed to him by Taira no Ryu, and waved it in front of the warning post.

The warning posts did not react.

Kurosaki tried jumping back and forth a few times around the warning line.

Still no response.

Having completed the experiment, Kurosaki jogged to the eaves of the old teaching building before Taira no Ryu's face darkened. He expertly donned the disposable on-site protective gear, including a hood, gloves, and shoe covers.

Ping Shenglong glanced at his somewhat practiced movements, his gaze slightly narrowed, but he didn't say anything more.

"The footprints on site require specialized analysis. If you haven't studied this, you'll need to use this." Ping Shenglong took out a tablet, opened the footprint tracking code sent to him by his assistant, and the system automatically turned on the camera. Suddenly, rows of different colored footprints appeared on the ground in the camera's view, with each color also labeled with a name.

Kurosaki clicked his tongue in admiration: "This is really convenient."

"Based on your analysis at the hospital, the biggest point of suspicion now is the footprints in the library. Because Hosokawa was unable to communicate before, we could only guess that Koizumi was triggered by fear and suddenly rushed out to fight the murderer. But now it seems that he was frightened by something and ran away in a panic."

As they talked, they arrived at the library on the first floor.

A chilling aura, whether psychological or lingering from the residual power of the formation, seemed to linger, sending shivers down one's spine.

Kurosaki stared intently at the footprints of Koizumi displayed on the tablet, following them all the way past the marked "fright boxes" and slowly stopping in a dark corner.

Ping Shenglong turned on his flashlight from behind and shone it clearly into the corner.

The two stared at the ground for a while, then looked at each other and nodded.

"There was clearly room, but it stopped here. And this spot is just big enough for one person to stand comfortably, but there are no footprints."

Kurosaki didn't continue speaking because a gust of cold wind seemed to suddenly blow in through the doorway, causing him to shiver involuntarily.

Ping Shenglong recalled the skeleton and books that disappeared from the secret room, which also left no footprints.

Perhaps, Kurosaki Chimei really is his Conan.

"Nobi Tomoaki!" Kurosaki roared suddenly, almost causing Taira no Ryu to instinctively draw his gun and perform an iaido.

"I know you're here! And I know you warned those poor students!"

"Now, can you come out and we can talk this out? What exactly happened? Is Teacher Jiao Tan still here?"

Kurosaki's echoing voice slowly faded away, leaving only his heavy breathing.

"If Mr. Jiao Tan were still here, we probably wouldn't be a match for him, so he must be gone now, right? If I'm right, then please blow a gust of wind for me."

Inside the library, everything was calm.

Although he received no response, Kurosaki's face was still full of affirmation.

Ping Shenglong took a deep breath, looked around, and surprisingly spoke up: "The skeletons in the secret chamber... should they be returned to your family?"

Kurosaki suddenly widened his eyes and turned to Heisei Ryu: "What secret room? What skeletons? You actually have clues you haven't told me?!"

Shinichi Higashiyama silently observed them from Ueda's perspective.

It's not surprising that they were able to find out about his paper doll, after all, he clearly took something from the secret room, but... Nobi Tomoaki?

Is this the most suitable body that Tetsuro Muto found, or another skeleton in the secret room?

This name sounds so similar to Tomoyoshi Nobi's; he definitely won't believe it if I say there's no connection.

Shin Higashiyama has no immediate plans to contact the authorities; he might fabricate a faction to disrupt their investigation.

but not now.

(End of this chapter)