Kogoro and his companions who were waiting were frightened by her old appearance and leaned their upper bodies backward unconsciously.

“Do you guys have anything to do with me?”

Hattori and the others were so surprised that they were speechless. Their first impression was that the old woman looked like a monster, short and ugly, but then they had a kind of respect for the elderly. While they were stunned, Conan first raised the question that he cared about most.

“Old lady, how do you decide the number for drawing the Dugong’s Arrow?” Conan asked.

He waited for a moment, but there was no response. He thought she was hard of hearing and wanted to say it a second time.

“It depends.”

He was startled by her sudden opening of the mouth.

“I pick the numbers in the horse races sometimes.” She laughed.

This sense of déjà vu of Kogoro Mori made Conan a little unbearable, Hattori broke out in a cold sweat, and the others also looked dumbfounded.

“In that case, you don’t need to send only three arrows a year. You can just sell a few more dugong arrows. Wouldn’t that make everyone happy?” Hattori asked.

“That’s impossible.” Jun Hui said, pulling the hair used for disguise, “I already have very limited hair to tie those arrows.”

As soon as she finished speaking, a voice shouting “Jun Hui” came from the room in the distance.

“Great-grandmother, I have prepared the bath water for you.”

She turned slowly.

“Excuse me, if you don’t have anything important to do, I’m going to take a shower and go to bed.”

“But we haven’t finished asking questions yet…” Conan shouted.

Junhui looked past him and looked at Heye who was hit by the dugong’s arrow.

“And that little girl over there.”

“Hmm?” Xiaolan and Kazuha responded at the same time.

“I’m talking about the one who tied her hair.” She pointed at Kazuha. “The dugong arrow was originally a precious arrow that could drive away demons and evil spirits. Once you let go of it, the demons will build a nest on your body. If you are a man, you will be buried in the ground and become a heartless hungry ghost. If you are a woman, you will enter the water and become a mermaid who cannot speak. So I advise you to carry it with you at all times.”

In order to make what was going to happen next more confusing, she planted a seed of superstition in everyone’s heart. It sounded a bit like a threat, not the advice an elder should give to a young person, but she didn’t have the time to worry about other people at the moment. Everything was cast into the flame of revenge, just like the flame on the night three years ago, burning slowly and quietly, just like her mother who she could not escape from, they could not escape either.

“Her voice is hoarse and she looks terrible. I don’t think this old woman will live long!” Hattori expressed his opinion of her, and no one else objected. This was obvious.

This meeting yielded little, Conan thought. They had no choice but to return to the hotel. When they arrived, Winette was using a brush to paint ink on Akane’s face. The more common method was to stick notes between children, but there was no ink on her face, which meant that she was winning.

Winnet asked them if they wanted to join, but no one wanted to. They simply told them the unfortunate news of Ebihara Sumi’s death. She acted compassionate and prayed for her, becoming a priest who loved all living things, and no one doubted her. She understood Yugi’s intentions and asked for details. After a short night talk, everyone fell asleep. The night in the town was extremely quiet, with only the faint sound of the waves echoing.

This trip obviously did not bring much positive emotions. The detective was nervous, and so was He Ye – she was frightened by the legend of the dugong arrow. Xiaolan and the others accompanied her to relax until the evening. At this time, the detectives urged them to attend the funeral of Ebihara Sumi. The purpose was certainly not as simple as condolences. They made no secret of it: they wanted to meet the residents of the town and get information.

However, the case has not progressed beyond the framework of the accident, and everything is still a possibility in its infancy. As long as there is no change, they are willing to believe that this is just an accident caused by superstition. Those who went to pay their respects were all villagers and the few of them who witnessed everything at the crime scene. Winnet refused in the name of “irrelevant people”. Although many unfamiliar relatives and classmates would come to the Japanese funeral, on the isolated island, everyone knew and knew each other under the influence of the acquaintance society, and the news of death could not be spread at all.

It is impolite to participate as a tourist, not to mention that no one here is a believer in God.

They accepted this statement and did think that it would make the atmosphere awkward. If she recited the prayer at the memorial service, it would probably have the opposite effect. Moreover, their purpose itself was not pure. It was mainly to explore the possibility of homicide. Kazuha and Xiaolan had the same concerns, afraid of disturbing each other, but Hattori asked Kazuha to bring her school uniform with her, and Xiaolan also brought black clothes. As for her parents, it was enough to wear a suit to attend. There was also an admission ticket for Akane Tada. Although Winnet’s clothes were also based on black, the combination was not “plain” enough, and it looked a bit abrupt when she appeared at the funeral.

Afterwards, Winnet waved goodbye to them with a friendly face and stayed out of the matter. But when they left, her expression changed and she took action. Akane Hanta and Cheng Shi turned a blind eye, Winnet put on Heijiang’s mask, padded her height, and changed into the mourning clothes prepared by Junhui – a more uniform style on the island.

She acted quickly and arrived at the mourning site before any of them.

Of course, she was not here to pay condolences on behalf of the real Heijiang.

After a brief appearance as Kuroe, she turned toward the shrine, a blanket already laid out halfway to the sea.

She came to the place where Jun Hui and Hei Jiang had agreed to meet. It was a beach covered with waves. Under the black starry sky, the sand looked like the scales of a mermaid – the light was absorbed by the starry sky. There was no one here, only a dying corpse and a ghost. The ghost was silent, blending into the waves, riding the whistling sea breeze, gradually approaching, and from her narrow shoulders, it gave her a hand knife that deprived her of consciousness.

There was no resistance, no screaming, and the sound of the waves remained.

“How beautiful!” Winnet thought to herself. She carried a person who was getting heavier and heavier, sank into the sea, and was stirred by the unrestrained dark waves.

After drinking too much water, the unconscious person seemed to wake up. Her resistance was like that of a weak child. Winnet effortlessly controlled her in the sea until her face was as pale as the bright moon. Winnet was like an elegant puppeteer, controlling the body with silk threads, making her head hit a reef as the waves beat, but this could not stop her centripetal force to return to the land, and she continued to drift, while Winnet swam towards the hotel in the cold sea.

At the same time, Conan and his friends arrived at the mourning site.

They were one of the early ones. There were only a few names on the same page of the list, including Kimie, Saori’s alcoholic father, and Kuroe. It was night watch, so they quietly entered the room and saw Kimie and Mr. Kadowaki sitting on their knees. Kogoro felt that Kadowaki was not a good person. Maybe he was related to Saori Kadowaki’s disappearance. Moreover, Kadowaki did not seem to go home last night. After asking Kimie, he learned that Kadowaki had been drinking with tourists in the bar all night.

“What, that guy actually drank all night?” Hattori complained, with an expression that said this guy was hopeless.

“Hey, why isn’t Miss Naoko here? Her name is on the roster.” Kogoro looked around but couldn’t find Kuroe.

“She was here just now, but she went out for a while. However, I felt that there was something wrong with her expression.” Jun Hui said.

Winette showed up halfway through, right in this meeting place, and Kadowaki also witnessed it, but he looked drunk all day and no one asked him about it.

“I think she must have gone to the bathroom,” said He Ye.

“Then let’s go over and take a look.” Xiaolan replied. In fact, they also wanted to go to the bathroom and take a look at the same time.

After pushing open the paper door, it was a gloomy dark sky, with a storm coming and a flash of thunder. Xiaolan screamed, and Heye turned to her with a smile that showed he had discovered something cute.

“What’s wrong, Xiaolan, are you afraid of thunder?”

Xiaolan’s frightened expression did not ease. She tremblingly stretched out a finger and pointed at the beach in front of her.

“No, there seems to be someone over there…”

“Where is it?” He Ye asked.

Xiaolan slightly adjusted the direction of her finger, and looked down at the beach, at the edge of the waves, there was an inverted oval-shaped object, and another lightning flashed, and the human figure of “it” could be vaguely seen. He Ye was so scared that he hugged Xiaolan’s arm and said in a panic tone, “It’s true.”

“What’s going on?” Hattori followed him out of the room.

“It seems like there’s someone there!”

Hattori and Conan who had just come out looked in the direction that Kazuha pointed, and coincidentally another flash of lightning passed by, revealing a figure that looked like a tattered rag doll falling to the ground, sandwiched between the gradient colors of brown and blue.

“That is!”

It was undoubtedly a person.

And it was the missing Naoko Kuroe.

The detective instinct told them to observe and control the scene immediately, and called Kogoro in the house. Hattori and Conan borrowed flashlights, walked down the embankment and came to the beach. Conan and Hattori used flashlights to illuminate Kuroe, and Kogoro took pictures with Kuriyama Midori’s Polaroid camera.

“I think she drowned like Miss Ebihara.”

Hattori checked her mouth and nose, which were filled with foam and sand, and were extremely pale. Her skin was also in the same condition, but it was not loose or tight, indicating that she had not been in the water for too long. He shone the flashlight back and forth on the marks on the beach, with a strange tone.

“There is only one kind of shoe trace on the beach, which is the slippers that Miss Heijiang was wearing. How is this possible?”

The footprints extended all the way to the vicinity of the waves.

In other words, only Heijiang appeared here.

“The footsteps are not messy, which means there are no signs of fighting,” said Kogoro.

Conan followed the footprints and headed towards the sea as he moved forward.

“But don’t you think these footprints are a little too close to the sea?”

“Indeed, if you just come out to breathe some fresh air or wait for someone, there is no need to get so close to the sea. Look, the waves have already hit the footprints.”

“From this perspective, the possibility of suicide is very high,” Kogoro said, because it looks like it is walking straight into the sea.

Given the intensity of the waves, it is not uncommon for humans who go into the deep sea to be washed back. In fact, the body is indeed some distance away from these footprints, which is completely consistent with this speculation.

“But there are still doubts.” Conan said.

Kogoro’s patience with this elementary school detective who couldn’t figure out his position was limited. He once again pulled Conan by the back of his collar, hung him up, and asked him what was so strange. Conan struggled like a stranded seal. He said that Kimie had seen Heijiang in the auditorium. In other words, without any signs, in just a few minutes, a person faced the sea and died generously. And their impression of Heijiang was that she was a person who believed in the legend of immortality. Her obsession with life and youth was much heavier than that of ordinary people. She was not the kind of person who would easily commit suicide.

This was just one of them. He looked at the increasingly fierce waves and thought that it was high tide now, which might destroy some clues.

“And the dugong arrow on this big sister’s body is missing.” Conan reminded Kogoro.

He and Hattori searched carefully and found that it was indeed the case. It stands to reason that a superstitious person like Heijiang would never ignore the curse of the longevity woman and not carry the dugong arrow with him.

“There’s nothing strange about this. It must have been lost due to the impact of the sea water when she committed suicide.”

Hearing his words, Hattori found Kazuha and asked her where she wore the dugong arrow. The answer was that it was placed close to her body inside the lining of her coat. Kuroe’s clothes were intact, which was enough to prove that the waves were strong enough. Under the regular and powerful impact, the possibility of the dugong arrow being lost was very low. Kuroe was wearing a belt, so it was also possible that the arrow was stuck on the belt.

“Maybe the murderer took her dugong arrow. Although it is not clear how he covered his footprints, it makes sense that there would be no traces if he walked around the beach and got here,” said Hattori.

“Yes, and the criminal is someone Miss Heijiang is very familiar with, otherwise she would not take the initiative to approach her.”

Conan analyzed and he got closer to the waves and found some crystal fish scales under the moonlight.

He chuckled inwardly. It couldn’t really be that a mermaid came across the sea to kill people. It was as unreasonable as a dark fairy tale.

“Hey, hey, you two…it’s more likely that you’ll commit suicide right now.”

“That’s true.”

Hattori rubbed the back of his head. For the first time, Kogoro pointed out the inconsistency. If there really was a murderer, he must be an extremely cunning guy. Even the death of Ebihara Sumi might have been related to him. Just when they were at a loss, a group of people with flashlights ran over from the other end of the beach.

……

549 There is a scapegoat

“What are you guys doing here?” Their flashlights were pointed at Maori’s face.

“Ah, we are investigating the case.”

“This is the responsibility of our Fukui Prefectural Police!” he emphasized.

“Fukui Prefectural Police?”

“You guys are finally here…”

Mori and Hattori sang the same tune.

The police collected evidence and took photos. They returned to the house on the shore and talked to the girls. Hattori told them what Conan had found, and they were immediately scared out of their wits – the scales reminded them of mermaids. Eri Kisaki and Midori Kuriyama comforted Ran and the others, saying that such mythical creatures did not exist in reality.

“Could it be that the mermaid is the murderer?” He Ye was still a little scared.

Xiaolan takes on the responsibility of leaning on someone’s shoulders.

Hattori was embarrassed, and his tone was somewhat speechless: “Fool, there is no such thing as a mermaid in this world? And it is hard to say whether it was suicide or homicide. However, based on Miss Heijiang’s personality, the possibility of homicide is higher. I think the murderer must have walked all the way along the wave line, so there are no footprints or anything.”

He didn’t tell her the other half. If it wasn’t suicide, then Heijiang walked towards the wave line by herself, which means she was not only not wary of the murderer, but was even very intimate with him. And they didn’t know how the murderer made her sink into the sea without any resistance, because they didn’t find any signs of struggle. Everything seemed too weird, as if she was really attracted by something and committed suicide by jumping into the sea.

Kogoro looked at everyone present and asked who saw Heijiang walking out of the house at the time of the incident.

“Mr. Kadowaki and I both saw that Naoko walked into the auditorium, bowed once, and then left.”

Benzo, who looked drunk, said nothing.

“Benzo, did you see that? You signed after Naoko.” Fukuyama Rokuro beside him looked at him sideways with a stern attitude.

“I saw it. Although there was no one in the room when I went in, Kimie and Naoko came in after a while. However, Naoko just paid her respects and left. Not long after, they came again.” He said drunkenly, but his speech was fluent and his mind was clear.

“So, Miss Naoko went to the edge of the waves after leaving the auditorium. Given such a tight time schedule, it is basically impossible for her to commit a crime. It seems that the only explanation is suicide.” Kogoro reasoned, touching his chin.

This time, Hattori and Conan did not refute. Time is indeed a big problem. It is as if the murderer stood on the wave line waiting for Naoko to die. There are too few people who can make her unguarded and keep the appointment without being there. Among them, the only person who can do this, apart from Kimie who did not have time to commit the crime, is Fukuyama Rokuro, who they know of, and he just arrived at the scene. If the speed can be so fast, then there is reason to suspect that the criminal is not human, or left from the sea.

“Suicide? Sumi died accidentally yesterday, and Naoko committed suicide today. Don’t you think it’s strange?” Facing Kogoro’s statement, Fukuyama Rokuro couldn’t believe it. “And I’m sure Naoko is definitely not the kind of person who would commit suicide.”

“At the moment, it seems that suicide is indeed a high possibility. However, the dugong arrow on Miss Naoko’s body is gone, and fish scales have appeared on the wave line. It’s as if someone deliberately arranged it, as if to challenge us detectives.”

Hattori interrupted, remembering the letter for help sent by Saori. It would not be surprising if there really was someone behind everything.

“The Dugong Arrow is missing?” He Ye covered his chest.

“Could it have been taken away by the murderer?” Xiaolan added anxiously.

At this time, Jun Hui casually mentioned Saori, saying that she also went missing after the dugong arrow disappeared. She seemed to be thinking, muttering: “Could she be…”

“Well, maybe she is in a very bad state now.”

Hattori speculated that he didn’t say it was done by the murderer because he was being rigorous. But deep down, he already thought it was a carefully planned conspiracy, even too perfect that they couldn’t find any traces.

“What, are you talking about Saori?” Suddenly, a grandmother next to him said, “I saw her near the Mermaid Falls yesterday morning.”

She was not the only one there. Another old man said he saw Saori appear in the forest near the waterfall and passed by in a flash.

The three detectives perked up.

“Are you sure that the person you saw was really Miss Saori?”

“That’s absolutely right. Saori is the only one on the island who dyes her hair and wears glasses. And she usually wears blue clothes.”

“So, she might be trying to escape from someone, so she can’t show up in front of everyone.”

Kogoro looked at the drunken Kadowaki Benzo and asked him about the situation, but he didn’t know anything. It was a common understanding on the island that the relationship between father and daughter was not good, and Saori often ran away from home; Benzo sighed: “I just hope she doesn’t become a mermaid like the dead girl.”

“Mermaid, what do you mean?”

“Don’t you know? The legendary Eight Hundred Bhikkhunis specialize in eating human flesh. From here, she looks like she was caught in a sea net.”