Conan: I've been linked to the tech tree system.

"Now, please invite our three lucky guests to come forward tonight."

Shimabukuro Kimie stood in a simple little space in front of the waterfall, her face glowing red from the torches that were as tall as a person on either side of her.

"Okay, I'll be right there."

Kazuha Toyama grabbed the rope blocking the way and crouched down to crawl through.

In contrast to her, Naoko Kuroe, who had also won the lottery, appeared calmer, walking over with her hands in her shirt pockets.

"Who is the other one? Has the other person arrived already?"

Shimabukuro Kimie looked around; apart from these two, no one else was walking this way.

"Ah, it's me."

A drunken man, reeking of alcohol, slowly walked over.

Most of the people on the island recognized him; he was the alcoholic father of Kadokyo Saori, who had sent the letter of request to Hattori Heiji.

"Huh?" Hattori Heiji was taken aback. "That's strange. I thought that lady had also won."

He recalled how excited Ebihara Tomi was when he saw her just now.

Doesn't seem like an act?

"Yeah, where are you?"

Conan, standing next to him, also had a detective's spirit and remembered this detail.

With that, Shimabukuro Kimie handed the three dugong arrows in her hand to the three winners, Kazuha and the others.

"Now, please, the three of you, receive the light of bliss."

The so-called "light of bliss" is just a white salute.

The person in charge loaded the cannon into the special cannon barrel and fired it. White fireworks exploded in the sky, illuminating the Mermaid Falls in the dark night for a moment.

In that instant, the audience realized something was wrong.

"Look what that is?!"

Some of the guests noticed something was amiss in front of the waterfall.

Using the light from the fireworks, everyone looked over and saw a dark figure hanging in front of the waterfall.

With her long hair flowing over her shoulders and her body swaying from side to side, she resembled a mermaid swimming upstream against the current in a waterfall.

The missing Ebihara Tomi, dressed in a pinkish-purple dress, appeared with a frighteningly pale face. When she reappeared in everyone's sight, she was already a corpse.

-----------------

Regardless of whether there are any other events planned for the celebration, they will all be forced to stop at this point.

Several detectives were busy running around, first calming the crowd down, then calling the police. Before the police arrived, they took it upon themselves to run to the top of the cliff, where strong men dragged Ebihara Toshimi's body, which was hanging on the edge of the cliff, up.

"Sumimi...could she have committed suicide, or was she murdered by someone else?"

Shimabukuro Kimie held her hands to her chest, looking very worried.

"No, neither of those two possibilities are possible."

Rokuro, who had previously stopped Kotomi from making extreme remarks, calmly observed Kotomi's corpse.

“This is what’s around Sumi’s neck.” He held up a rope attached to Sumi’s neck and a sharpened wooden stick at one end. “It’s a fixed rope set up on the riverbank specifically to prevent danger.”

This is the rapid side of the waterfall, and there's a "Danger" sign on the bank, making it look like an accident.

"I see." Kogoro Mouri said, indicating that he understood now.

"In other words, Miss Sumi lost her balance after walking to the riverbank and fell into the river. Although she managed to grab the rope, the rapid current caused the wooden stake to break off, and she was strangled to death by the rope on her way down the waterfall."

Without thinking twice, Kogoro Mouri started by making some deductions.

"But don't you find it strange? The festival is clearly taking place below the waterfall, so why does she insist on coming to the forest at this time?"

Hattori Heiji raised a question.

Conan, however, clearly didn't have this question, and instead rested his chin on his hand, gazing at the corpse in thought.

All I can say is that the newcomers are still refuting Kogoro Mouri's line of reasoning, while those who truly understand have already ruled out the incorrect answer that the victim died in an accident.

However, it's difficult to discern anything from the body alone, making it hard to gather more clues.

"She's probably looking for the mermaid's grave, isn't she?" Naoko Kuroe, who had followed behind, suddenly said.

"What?" The detectives turned to look at her; it seemed there was more to this story.

"Because the mermaid's grave is somewhere in this forest. Three years ago, on the night of the festival, after the shrine's warehouse caught fire, the mermaid's bones were reburied here."

"That's possible. I know that Tomomi has always been very concerned about that matter."

Kimie Shimabukuro turned to look at her.

"Wait, you guys keep talking about mermaids, are those skeletons really mermaid remains?"

Hattori Heiji, a materialistic detective, felt uneasy listening to the group talking about mermaid skeletons, as if they were very certain that mermaids really existed.

“It’s hard to say, at least that’s what the villagers on the island say,” replied Kimie Shibukuro, the least superstitious shrine maiden on Mermaid Island. “But the police from the mainland believe that it is the skeleton of a middle-aged woman.”

"That's utter nonsense!!"

When Naoko Kuroe heard that someone was slandering the existence of mermaids, her tone became agitated, and she argued vehemently, "That skeleton has all the bones below the waist, so you can say that, right?"

"Below the waist?"

Kogoro Mouri felt a chill run down his spine upon hearing this.

"During the fire, a burning beam fell near the waist of the skeleton. After the villagers moved the beam, they discovered that the area where the foot bones should have been was completely smashed."

"what?"

Hattori Heiji frowned as he listened.

"That's why the TV reports said that a mermaid's corpse was found here."

Lu Lang shrugged helplessly.

Such a description sent a chill down the spines of everyone present.

The forest was pitch black at night. Not only were there corpses nearby, but one could also hear something that was both terrifying and strangely plausible, making the listener feel a sense of warmth.

That means everyone present was a seasoned detective or family member; an ordinary person would have been traumatized long ago.

"The longevity granny also became a celebrity overnight," Naoko Kuroe added.

"But didn't the police say back then that it was a middle-aged woman?" Materialist Conan didn't believe such a thing either.

“Yes, they suspect that it was probably a tourist who didn’t get the Dugong’s Arrow and sneaked into the warehouse to look for a spare arrow.” Kimie Shimabukuro leaned forward and spoke gently to the child.

"The main reason for the warehouse fire was probably that candles were lit in an attempt to see what was inside," said Kimie Shimabukuro, her tone completely natural.

Chapter 161 How exactly did you solve the case?

"A full year passed and the identity of the remains could not be determined, so the shrine buried them."

"And then... I never expected that something like this would happen later," Shimabukuro Kimie recounted in a heavy tone.

"Something happened? What happened?"

Lu Lang continued, "Some people came to rob the tomb, and later, some even had the audacity to try to pry open the tomb and steal the mermaid skeleton inside."

"Their claim is that mermaid skeletons are also an elixir of immortality."

"That's why my great-grandmother had someone secretly move the grave to this forest for burial last year."

The three of them, including Shimabukuro Kimie, worked together to fill in the gaps in what had happened before.

"So, who are the people they've asked for help?" Kogoro Mouri pressed on.

"I don't know, I only heard her say that she is a trustworthy person."

"Tsk." Kogoro Mouri was a little confused, but based on his years of experience, he simply said, "Anyway, whether it's suicide, homicide, or an accident, let's get Ms. Kotobuki's body down the mountain first, and then investigate when the police arrive."

Upon hearing this, Rokuro went over and picked up Sumi's body: "If this was murder, then Sumi, who ran away to this place behind everyone's back, must also have a problem." His words were merciless.

"Oh dear, your fiancée just had an accident. You're really cold-hearted," Naoko Kuroe said sarcastically.

"Fiancée?" Kogoro Mouri was taken aback. Was that so?

Lu Lang acted as if nothing had happened; it was truly unbelievable.

"That was a marriage that my parents decided on without my consent, and it has nothing to do with me."

Rokuro turned around and spoke to Naoko Kuroe in a very resolute tone.

Out of the corner of his eye, he glanced unnaturally at Shimabukuro Kimie, who was standing to the side without any emotional fluctuation.

He carried the body away into the distance, saying, "Besides, my parents are long gone, so this has nothing to do with me."

"...Killing someone because of an unbreakable engagement? That seems quite reasonable."

Standing next to Toru Tono, Shiho Miyano suddenly smiled and spoke.

Tohno Toru glanced at her.

He's a promising young man. He hasn't been involved in many cases, yet he's already figured out some of the patterns in the murder cases in the Detective Conan world.

Unfortunately, it's still not professional enough. Although the motive of killing because of an engagement is quite reasonable, there is another important factor in Conan's cases: the murderer can never be directly deduced from simple clues known at the beginning.

If this Lu Lang committed murder because of a marriage contract, then this case is far too simple.

“I don’t think so,” he said.

"Oh? What insights do you, the great detective, have?" Shiho Miyano crossed her arms and looked at him with great interest.

It is said that being a detective is a profession that emphasizes reasoning, meticulous logic, and unraveling cases step by step. However, after a few cases, she suddenly realized that Tohno Toru was not such a traditional detective.

Although his reasoning can be described as logically rigorous and well-organized, the reasons he finds out the murderers in these cases are often quite mysterious.

Compared to Shinichi Kudo's forward reasoning, Toru Tono seems to identify the culprit first and then work backward to find the clues, rather than using the clues to point to the culprit.

This makes this person solve cases much faster than a normal detective, since looking back for clues is much easier than following a complex web of clues to find the culprit.

But what if this method leads to the wrong culprit from the very beginning?

Logically speaking, solving a case in this way is likely to lead to a dead end, resulting in it taking much longer than normal reasoning—after all, it is very likely that the premise was wrong from the very beginning.