Yuji Kudo, the manga artist behind Detective Conan.

"Mr. Kawasawa, are you alright? You seem unsteady on your feet."

As the two strong young men carried the wall clock, which he had only recently taken home and used, out of the house, Kawasawa stared intently at the clock, which still smelled strongly of lacquer.

"I'm fine. Could you please turn on this clock in the mountains?"

Everyone looked at the absent-minded Shan Zhong, until Marina urged him anxiously. He then looked up, holding a small lock-picking tool, and quickly opened the front panel of the clock.

"Ah!! Kotoha! How could this happen!"

The screams instantly echoed throughout the street. Worried that Marina couldn't handle such a shocking scene, Yuko first shielded her behind herself, then pushed Jintaro and Yata to the front so that they could report the actual situation.

"Well……"

Mrs. Oda covered her mouth and ran to the corner to vomit, while Dr. Kawasawa frowned and stayed with the two high school students beside Yamanaka, observing the cause of Kotonoha's death.

"Kotoha wasn't killed by being hacked to death."

Mr. Kawasawa pointed to the various parts of Kotonoha's body that were randomly arranged inside the clock, and pointed to the neck, saying, "The cutting marks here are quite severe, far exceeding the number of cuts required to separate the head and neck."

The area above the neck was a bloody mess, one arm was bent around the chest on top of the cabinet, and the other was pressed under the right leg. Because no one dared to touch the corpse inside, everyone just looked and wondered why there seemed to be no head inside.

"Kotoha, who is it? Who killed her? Who is so cruel!" Yamanaka knelt beside the clock, his eyes bloodshot. He wanted to reach in and pick up his fiancée, but just as he crossed the edge of the wooden box of the clock and was about to touch Kotoha's fingers, he immediately pulled his hand back.

"Has the police not arrived yet?" After leaving the watch shop in the mountains, Yuko asked Kawasawa to find the neighbors in the alley to call the police. Looking at the scene that was getting noisy, she felt her head was throbbing.

"We're almost there. Many police officers in Kyoto are from noble families. Unlike the police in Tokyo, they don't ride bicycles; they ride scooters."

Kawasawa looked towards the alley entrance. Just over ten minutes ago, he noticed that some neighbors from the alley had run to Shitsubou's house. He figured that Shitsubou Kotoha's father must be here by now.

"Words! Words!"

A well-dressed, overweight man tripped at the alley entrance, then scrambled over on all fours, threw himself against the wall clock, and wailed, "My daughter!"

"Mr. Shiting, Mr. Shiting, this is not appropriate!" Kawashawa desperately stopped the deceased's father.

"Boom boom." The roar of the motorcycle announced the arrival of the police. After lighting a cigarette, the policeman who had reached the wall clock pulled the man that Kawasawa was desperately trying to stop aside and asked the neighbors in the alley to take the somewhat distraught Mr. Shiting away to comfort him.

“Officer Ito, it’s your turn to come today.” Kawasawa immediately shrank back.

Tell everyone to disperse.

Cooperating with the police, Kawasawa and the four students immediately cleared away the onlookers gathered around the clock-shaped coffin. The police then turned their attention to the instigators of the incident, the students from Izumi High School.

[Isn't he just an ordinary policeman?]

Suddenly noticing that Kawasawa's expression and demeanor were a little off, as if he was deliberately avoiding the police's gaze, Yuko glanced at him a few more times.

"Why aren't you wearing your high school uniform?" As expected, she noticed his gaze and looked Yuko up and down. His eyes lingered on the embroidery on the hem of her clothes before he abruptly ended his question and began to inquire about what had happened.

"Disappeared after bursting into flames... and then found as the dismembered body in the Kawasawa family's wall clock?"

“Officer Ito, that’s how it is. It has absolutely nothing to do with me, really.” Kawasawa pointed his index finger at himself at the police officer: “You know, I dare not get involved in any more messy things.”

"Stop talking nonsense. I'm telling you, I'm on duty today because I'm investigating a murder case. If you cooperate, I won't mention anything related to you."

Sure enough, the Japanese police of this era were no good either. Officer Ito half-threatened, "Those stray dogs have recently killed a few people, things aren't peaceful yet."

"I know I know."

This is why Kawasawa didn't notify the police immediately after Kotoha Shitani disappeared. Having served Japan, he naturally wanted to keep a low profile after the defeat and avoid dealing with government officials for the rest of his life.

“Officer Ito, there are no heads in the clock.” In front of the other three, Yuko skillfully and expressionlessly reached into the clock, picking through Kotonoha Shitani’s body as if she were buying vegetables.

"The suspects for the murder are Mr. Yamanaka, her fiancé; Ms. Oda, who had an argument with Ms. Kotoha at the corner; and Mr. Kawasawa, who just happened to be at all the scenes for some unknown reason."

Yuko stopped Kawasawa, who was about to waste time arguing, saying that it was absurd that he could appear at every scene without being suspected.

"Leaving aside the possibility that Mr. Kawasawa might have murdered Shitsubi after bringing the clock home yesterday, perhaps even the method of disappearance was your trick."

Yuko's lips curled up slightly: "But in my opinion, Kotoha Shitani should have died before that trick was performed."

"Oh, looks like Kyoto has another not-so-simple guy." Officer Ito's attention swept over the students. "Since that's the case, you've discovered this method of disappearance, haven't you? Why don't you tell us? It'll make my job a little easier."

"Then please move to the alley."

"Before that," Ito said, hands on his hips, "who exactly are you? I've never seen you before."

"Have you seen me before?" Yuko paused for a moment, scrutinizing Ito closely. She remembered that she did know Ito Daisuke, the younger brother of Kaori's grandmother who was on par with Hattori's father, during the Tengu case, but he didn't resemble this person at all.

"I'm just a detective passing through; don't remember me."

She turned her head, playing with the ends of her hair, but was startled by Marina, who was shining brightly in front of her. Upon closer inspection, she saw that her grandmother was being held back by two boys. If it weren't for Jintaro and Yata, Yuuko might have been pinned to the ground by Marina right now.

"Marina?!"

"Minister, please don't get so agitated!"

The two boys could barely hold back the head of the reading club, and the girl's eyes were full of longing.

"This is... the protagonist I've always dreamed of!!" (End of Chapter)