The Pirated Onmyoji of the Detective World

"What?" Conan, puzzled by the arrival of the police car, immediately ran to the window, climbed onto a chair, and leaned out to look at the library entrance.

A police car was parked in the open space in front of the library.

As the police car door opened, Inspector Megure stepped out.

"What exactly happened?" Conan asked, puzzled.

Meanwhile, Yuu Aragaki, who was standing to the side, looked at Ayumi Yoshida with a smile and said something that hit the nail on the head: "Something might have happened."

At this moment, he had roughly recalled things about the library.

Watching the retreating figure of Director Tsugawa, who was about to leave to deal with the police, he muttered to himself, "I didn't expect that just when I felt I was weak, another case would come my way."

"Case!" The Yuki-onna, who had been idly perched on Aragaki Yu's shoulder, immediately perked up upon hearing those two words.

Case = Bodhidharma!

Then the Snow Woman looked at Conan, who was still leaning against the window.

And Conan = Case!

The snow woman nodded excitedly. That's right, so Conan = Daruma!

The Snow Woman's expression as she looked at Conan instantly became one of immense satisfaction.

Chapter 73 The Overweight Elevator

"Excuse me! Wait for us!" Conan, curious about why Inspector Megure was here, grabbed Aragaki Yu's hand and rushed toward the elevator that was about to close.

The other children in the Junior Detective Club followed closely behind.

Forced to run along, Aragaki Yu looked helplessly at Conan, who was holding him.

"You can go if you want, but why did you have to take me with you?"

Although it's true that if Conan didn't want to move, he wouldn't be able to pull it at all with his strength.

However, Aragaki Yu could probably guess Conan's thoughts.

If there were a real case, Inspector Megure would most likely not say anything to an elementary school student, but if it was someone Inspector Megure valued, he might even invite them to help solve the case.

Indeed, just as Aragaki Yu had guessed, Conan's mind was currently filled with thoughts like, "Damn it! Once I drink some baijiu and turn back into high school detective Shinichi Kudo, all this trouble will be over! It's all that damned Black Organization's fault!"

Unexpectedly, after the group ran into the elevator, the elevator sounded an overload alarm.

"Huh?" The Junior Detectives all exclaimed in confusion.

Conan glanced at the sign posted inside the elevator—[Capacity: 7 people; Load Capacity: 450KG]

"It seems the number of people has exceeded the limit."

Besides the Junior Detective Club and Aragaki Yu who had just run in, the elevator also contained Director Tsugawa and two other borrowers.

"1, 2, 3... 6, 7," Yuan Tai counted the number of people around him on his fingers, even more puzzled. "There are seven people in the elevator now, just right?"

"You forgot to count your own!" Conan rolled his eyes and reminded him.

"There's no other way, let's just take the stairs!" Led by Conan, the group left the elevator and ran to the stairwell to get downstairs.

Still being held by Conan, Aragaki Yu glanced thoughtfully at the top of the elevator as he ran out of the elevator doors.

Aside from Aragaki Yu, no one noticed the gloomy expression on Director Tsugawa's face as the elevator doors were about to close.

When the group arrived on the first floor, Inspector Megure was already questioning Director Tsugawa in the library's lobby.

"You're the curator here, right?"

"Yes, my surname is Tsugawa, nice to meet you, officer."

"We're here today mainly because of the matter concerning your library's employee, Tamada Kazuo." As he spoke, Inspector Megure pulled out a photo of Tamada Kazuo from his pocket.

"Oh! Him? He hasn't asked for leave these past two days and hasn't come to work!" Director Tsugawa replied, looking at the photo in Inspector Megure's hand.

"Inspector Megure, what happened?" Conan grabbed Yu Aragaki and went straight to Inspector Megure's side to ask.

"Oh, it's Conan!" Inspector Megure heard the familiar voice, looked down, and sure enough, he spotted Conan. Following the hand Conan was holding, he looked up and his face lit up with surprise. "Oh! It's Aragaki too! What a coincidence!"

Upon meeting Aragaki Yu, whom Conan brought along, Inspector Megure, as expected, took the initiative to explain the situation.

"That's right, Mr. Yutian, he has been missing since the night before last."

"What?!" Director Tsugawa looked surprised. "I was wondering why he wasn't coming to work!"

Inspector Megure continued to explain his purpose: "We heard that he and you were working overtime at the library the night before last, right?"

“But…but I left the library earlier than Mr. Tamada that day to go home, and I don’t know what happened after that,” Director Tsugawa explained.

Seeing the police officers searching every corner of the library, Conan asked with some confusion, "Inspector Megure, why are they investigating this warehouse? Mr. Tamada could very well have disappeared on his way home."

"This is just to be on the safe side!" Inspector Megure glanced at Conan, then looked at Yuu Aragaki and explained, "Mr. Tamada is usually a very serious person. He always calls his family before leaving the library, but he didn't do that the night before last."

After listening to Inspector Megure's words, Conan stroked his chin and analyzed, "In other words, he was very likely kidnapped from here while he was working overtime."

"That's right, that's what we police think too, which is why we came here to investigate and see if there are any clues."

“No, perhaps there is another possibility. Perhaps Mr. Tamada is still in this library.” At this moment, Yuu Aragaki also added, “Of course, if that’s the case, then it means that Mr. Tamada has been killed by someone in this library.”

"Ah!" Upon hearing Aragaki Yu's words, the children in the Junior Detective Club all showed expressions of horror.

Even Inspector Megure and Conan's faces began to turn serious.

Meanwhile, the curator, Tsugawa, also looked rather grim.

At that moment, a police officer ran over to Inspector Megure to report the results of the investigation: "Officer, we have investigated every place here, but we haven't found anything suspicious."

"Hmm." Inspector Megure fell into deep thought. "So, Mr. Tamada was indeed taken away, or perhaps he was attacked outside."

"Alright, then we'll head back now! Sorry for bothering you so much," Inspector Megure said to Director Tsugawa.

"Ah, not at all. After all, I was also very worried about Mr. Tamada's condition!" Director Tsugawa breathed a sigh of relief as he watched Inspector Megure turn to leave, but his face still showed a worried expression.

"Well then, Brother Aragaki, we'll head to other places to continue our investigation!" Inspector Megure said goodbye to Yu Aragaki.

"An overloaded elevator."

"What?" Inspector Megure, who was about to walk out of the library, stopped in his tracks after hearing Aragaki Yu's incoherent words.

Conan, standing to the side: ? ? ?

Director Tsugawa, who had just revealed a smug expression: !!

Director Tsugawa's eyes immediately darkened, and his face turned extremely ugly.

"I was saying that when Conan and I were about to get off, the elevator was about to be taken, but it was marked as overloaded."

Ignoring the murderous look on Tsugawa's face, Aragaki Yu repeated his words once more.

"Is there something wrong with that elevator, Aragaki-kun?" Inspector Megure still didn't understand what Aragaki Yu meant.

Conan, on the other hand, suddenly had a flash of inspiration after hearing Yuu Aragaki reiterate the overweight elevator. He remembered something he had felt was off but hadn't been able to figure out.

"Big brother, if you're asking why that elevator was overloaded, Conan has already explained it. It's because I forgot to count my own weight!" Genta scratched his head, looking embarrassed as he reminded him.

“Brother Aragaki, our men just checked that elevator, and there’s nothing suspicious inside!” Inspector Megure explained to Aragaki after confirming the findings of their previous investigation with his subordinates.

“But that elevator was overloaded after only a few of us were on it.” Aragaki Yu’s eyes were fixed on the Junior Detective Club beside him.

"Big brother, didn't I already say that? There are eight of us, including me, which exceeds the elevator's capacity of seven people! How come you can't even figure that out?" Genta suddenly felt that the older brother in front of him didn't seem very bright.

Chapter 74 Could it be... a ghost?

“No, Genta, actually what Aragaki-nii said isn’t wrong.” Conan, who had been deep in thought, finally spoke up.

"What!?"

Now, Genta was completely confused.

"But Conan, didn't you just say that with Genta, there are eight people in the elevator, but the elevator can only carry seven people, so the overload alarm went off?" Mitsuhiko, who was standing next to him, didn't understand why Conan had suddenly changed his tune.

"But did you know?" Conan, seeing the bewildered members of the Junior Detective League, began his usual educational explanation: "Whether an elevator is overloaded depends not on how many people are inside, but on its carrying capacity!"

"So that's how it is! I understand now, Conan!" Mitsuhiko, who was standing next to him, also understood what Conan meant.

"What's going on? Conan, Mitsuhiko!" Genta and Ayumi still couldn't understand what Conan was saying.

"What Conan means is that although there were eight of us in the elevator just now, the four of us are just kids! The combined weight of the four of us kids is only equal to, equal to..." Mitsuhiko started counting on his fingers.

"It's roughly equivalent to about 100 kilograms." In order to resolve the incident quickly, Yuu Aragaki took over from Mitsuhiko and continued to explain to everyone, "That's roughly equivalent to the weight of two adults. Add me and three other adults who were in the elevator at the time, and there were only six people in total."

"Then why is the elevator overloaded?" Inspector Megure, who had been listening for so long, finally asked the most crucial question. "Could it be...?"

Before Aragaki could answer, Inspector Megure clapped his hands, clearly understanding something.

Inspector Megure exclaimed excitedly, "Could it be that there was something else somewhere in the elevator back then?!"

As everyone analyzed the situation step by step, Director Tsugawa's expression grew increasingly grim.

Genta stood to the side, staring in horror at the direction of the elevator: "Could it be... there was a ghost in the elevator back then!?"

Okay, there are still people who don't understand the key point of the topic.

Director Jinchuan:...

Conan and Mitsuhiko: ...