Science: The Little Shota of the Maori Family

This night seemed to be a night of gossip and complaints between the two girls.

The next day.

The sky is dark over the sea, seagulls fly low and cry non-stop

"You little brat, you have to thank me." Maori Kogoro leaned over the guardrail, smoking a cigarette and said to Hattori Heiji: "You rashly ran over and said you had a case to investigate in Fukui. Just because I followed you doesn't mean I don't have other things to do..."

"Well... you don't have anything to lose anyway." Hattori Heiji said with a smile: "Just think of it as a chance to relax."

Maori Kogoro snorted, "Okay, now you can tell us which island we're going to?"

"It's called M Country Island." Hattori Heiji turned his head and looked at the isolated island that had come into view. "However, the residents living nearby call it another name, the island where mermaids live."

"The island where mermaids live?" Kogoro Mouri was stunned.

"Yes." Hattori Heiji sighed, "I also heard that there is an old lady living on that island who specializes in eating mermaid flesh in order to achieve immortality."

Maori Kogoro snorted, "The person who asked you to come to the island, could it be that he wants you to help him find a mermaid?"

"No, quite the opposite." Hattori Heiji's face darkened. "The letter of request contained only a few simple words, clearly written in a hurry. It read: 'The mermaid is about to be killed. Come and save her.'"

Kogoro Mouri's cigarette fell from his mouth and he was stunned.

……

After the boat docked, the group went to the hotel to put their luggage.

Kogoro Mouri and Heiji Hattori share a room, while Toru Watanabe, Ran, and Kazuha share a room.

While the two women were packing, Toru Watanabe used the excuse of going to the bathroom and sent a message to Maya Tachibana, asking her to come to Country M immediately.

Since Pu Siqinglan joined the team, Watanabe Toru has not recruited anyone else.

There is no shortage of criminals and lunatics in this world, but their abilities are far from meeting Watanabe Toru's requirements.

This mermaid on Mermaid Island is a rare object of Watanabe Toru's favor.

Her criminal plan was rigorous and meticulous. If it weren't for the bug that Conan encountered, she could continue to live freely with a new identity.

More importantly, her makeup skills are superb and she can do many things that ordinary people cannot do.

After receiving a reply from Maya Tachibana, Toru Watanabe returned to the room. After everyone had packed up, they went out to look for the client.

However, the search process was not smooth. According to local people, the client, Monkyo Saori, had been missing for three days. Even the owner of the specialty store where she worked did not know where she had gone. In desperation, several people had to come to the shrine on the island to inquire about the news.

M Country Shrine.

"How old is my great-grandmother?" Shimabukuro Kimie, dressed as a shrine maiden, held a coin used for prayers and cleansing. Her voice was gentle yet serious. "She wasn't 200 years old as some say. She just turned 130 this year. You can find out by going to the household registration office. She just lived a little longer than others, and yet it's causing such a commotion."

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"Of course..."...Xiao Lan was sweating.

Hattori Heiji asked, "So, where is your great-grandmother now?"

"Of course, in the room," Shimabukuro Kimie said, "For tonight's celebration, pray sincerely for the arrows that will be sent out."

"Well...well, did your great-grandmother really eat mermaid meat?" Maori Kogoro couldn't help but ask closer.

"Huh?" Shimabukuro Kimie was stunned for a moment, then burst out laughing: "Hahahahahahaha... How could there be mermaids in this world... Those are all lies."

.... ... 0

"But, that dugong arrow isn't..."

Shimabukuro Kimie stopped laughing and explained, "Actually, that arrow used to represent a forbidden arrow, cast with a spell to exorcise evil spirits. But at some point, the islanders began to associate it with mermaids, arbitrarily changing it to a dugong, a sea-dwelling creature. It became known as the dugong's arrow... That's what my late mother told me."

"So your mother has passed away." Xiaolan said softly.

"Yes, she and my father perished at sea five years ago," Shimabukuro Kimie said. "Even my grandparents disappeared while sailing out to sea before I was born."

"Your entire family died at sea?" Yuanshan Heye couldn't help but exclaimed: "There must be a reason for this."

"There's no reason." Shimabukuro Kimie smiled and said, "I've been to the main island with Saori before, but nothing happened."

"What? You and Saori are on a boat?"

"When was that?"

When they heard the name Menkyo Saori, the expressions of Maori Kogoro and Hattori Heiji suddenly became serious.

"Just four days ago..." Shimabukuro Kimie said, "I said I wanted to see a dentist, so she went with me because there is no dentist on this island."

"At that time, was Saori's emotional state stable?" Maori Kogoro asked.

295. Dugong Arrow

Shimabukuro Kimie recalls that day: "Saori was terrified because she had lost the dugong's arrow. She was worried that the mermaid would seek revenge on her. Even when I told her that it wouldn't happen, she still didn't believe me."

"Oh, you're still too stupid." As he spoke, a woman in a purple dress stepped forward. "You say that because you don't believe in your great-grandmother's power at all."

Shimabukuro Kimie turned around in surprise: "Sume?"

"She really did eat mermaid flesh, and she really does possess magical powers." Ebihara Sumi stroked her chin. "You should also know about the mermaid corpse that was found three years ago..."

"The body of a mermaid?" Hattori Heiji and Mori Kogoro looked surprised.

Xiaolan also recalled: "Isn't this what you are talking about the report three years ago..."

"'Seventy-nine-three' is just an exaggeration on TV," Shimabukuro Kimie said quickly.

"Heh... didn't you see it too?" Ebihara Sumi's expression turned a bit sinister. "The mermaid's bones were broken, that weird..."

"Sumei, stop talking." A man put his hand on Shanghai Laoyuan Sumi's shoulder to stop her from speaking.

Ebihara Hisumi turned around in surprise: "Rokuro?"

"Some things are inconvenient to say in front of outsiders." Fukuyama Rokuro said, looked at Maori Kogoro and his group, turned and left: "If you guys are here to look for Saori, you should go to Saori's house to find out the situation, but the prerequisite is that her drunkard father must welcome you."

Sumi Ebihara also followed.

"It's really strange." Hattori Heiji watched the two people leave: "I'm a little speechless. Someone has disappeared, but no one is worried about her safety..."

"That's because Saori used to quarrel with her father and run away from home, so everyone is used to it," explained Shimabukuro Kimie.

"Um, could you please take us to Saori's house?" Kogoro Mouri asked.

Shimabukuro Kimie smiled and said, "Of course, I'll be free after the celebration."

Xiaolan asked curiously, "What do you do during the celebration?"

"We'll sell numbered tickets to the guests in advance," Shimabukuro Kimie said simply. "Whoever matches the number my great-grandmother shows will receive a dugong arrow. Well...it's actually a lot like a lottery. Oh, right..."

She pulled out two wooden plaques with numbers on them and said to Mao Lilan and Toyama Kazuha with a smile, "Do you want to give it a try? An elderly couple canceled their trip this morning, so we have two extra number plates."

Xiaolan, Yuanshan and Ye looked at each other, then smiled at each other, stepped forward to take the wooden sign and said, "Okay then."

……

At night, torches flickered in the open space outside the village shrine.

The villagers beat drums in unison and in rapid rhythm, while other villagers and tourists chatted and laughed in low voices, gathering towards the shrine from all directions.

Watanabe Toru and others stood at the front of the crowd, looking forward to the upcoming celebration.

As the last drumbeat fell, two waiters slowly opened the door of the shrine. Inside the room, a short old woman with her back to the crowd picked up a long pole on the wooden rack and slowly turned her head.

She was wearing heavy makeup, with who knows how many layers of white powder on her face, making it look so pale that it gave people an indescribable weirdness.

"It's the Longevity Lady."

"The longevity lady has come out."

The villagers whispered.

"This is the longevity lady." Maori Kogoro whispered: "She is really small..."

Hattori Heiji's eyes narrowed, somewhat disappointed: "She's just an old woman with heavy makeup on..."

The longevity lady slowly came out from inside, dragging a long pole, then extended the pole to the torch, lit the fire, and then lit the paper on the door.

Amid the crowd's exclamations, three burning numbers appeared on the paper one after another.

Three, one hundred seven, eighteen.

In the crowd, Ebihara Hisashi was filled with joy: "Oh my God, it really is true, I won."

"Xiao...Xiao Lan." Beside her, Toyama Kazuha excitedly clutched the sign, "My...my number won."

As the longevity woman returned to the shrine, not long after the door closed, Shimabukuro Kimie emerged and said solemnly, "Next, please head to the Mermaid Falls, where the dugong arrows will be released."

One hour later...

On the rocky beach in front of the Mermaid Falls, the sound of the waterfall is deafening.

Shimabukuro Kimie stood among the torches, looking at the crowd before her. She said, "Now, please invite tonight's three lucky guests to come forward."

"Okay, I'll be there right away." Yuanshan Heye smiled and walked forward under the pulled rope.

On the side, a short-haired woman with a cold expression also pulled the rope and walked over with her hands in her pockets.

Seeing that there were only two winners, Shimabukuro looked around and asked loudly, "Who is the other one? Isn't the last one here?"

A drunken man came over holding a wooden sign: "It's me."

"Huh?" Hattori Heiji looked puzzled and muttered, "That's strange. I thought Miss Sumi had won the lottery."

After the three dugong arrows were fired, the villagers lit fireworks.

Fireworks rose into the sky, illuminating the vertically falling waterfall, and also illuminating Sumi Ebihara, who was hanging in the waterfall and being washed by the water like a mermaid swimming upstream.

……

It took nearly two hours to finally get Sumi Ebihara's body down from the waterfall.

Shimabukuro Kimie looked at her best friend's body, covering her mouth in disbelief. "How could this happen... Did Sumi commit suicide? Or did someone kill her?"

"No, neither of the two 3.0 situations you mentioned is possible." Fukuyama Rokuro, Ebihara's fiancé, remained calm in the face of his fiancée's death.

He pointed to the rope loop around Ebihara Sumi's neck and said, "This is a fixed rope set on the river bank to prevent danger."

"That's right," Kogoro Maori said, pinching his chin. "So, Miss Sumi reached the river in the dark and suddenly lost her balance. Although she grabbed the rope in a hurry, the fast-flowing water caused the wooden stake to fall off, and she was strangled to death by the rope as she fell into the waterfall."

"But don't you find it strange?" Hattori Heiji questioned. "The village festival is clearly taking place at the foot of the waterfall, so why would she go to the forest above at this time?"

296. Perfect Makeup Techniques

"I think she probably wants to find the mermaid's grave." Naoko Kuroe, who was standing aside, expressed her opinion.

"what?!"

Kogoro Mouri and Heiji Hattori turned their heads and looked at her.

Naoko Kuroe continued, "Because the mermaid's grave is somewhere in this forest. Three years ago, after the shrine's storehouse caught fire during the festival, the mermaid's bones were buried here."

Shimabukuro Kimie stroked her chin and pondered, "That's possible. After all, Sumi has always been very concerned about that matter."

Hattori Heiji couldn't help but interrupt, "Wait a minute, you keep talking about mermaids. Are you sure those bones are really the remains of a mermaid?"

"It's hard to say." Shimabukuro Kimie shook her head. "Although the villagers on the island said so, the police from the mainland believe it is the skeleton of a middle-aged woman."

"That's pure nonsense." Naoko Kuroe's voice rose sharply. "That's only true if the skeleton's bones below the waist are all there.

"Below the waist? Maori Kogoro was stunned."

Fukuyama Rokuro sighed, "A burning beam fell right on the skeleton's waist. When the villagers removed the beam, they discovered that where the leg bones should have been was completely shattered. That's why the TV reported on the discovery of a mermaid's corpse, and the longevity lady became a celebrity overnight."

"But didn't the police say that this was a middle-aged woman?" Kogoro Mouri asked curiously.

"Yes, they suspected that tourists who hadn't been struck by the dugong's arrow had sneaked into the warehouse in search of a spare," Shimabukuro Kimie said. "The main cause of the warehouse fire was probably the candles. A year later, the identity of the skeleton hadn't been determined, so the shrine buried it. But then something unexpected happened."

"Something happened?"

Fukuyama Rokuro took over the conversation. "Some people came to rob the tomb. Some tourists even had the whimsical idea of ​​prying open the tomb and stealing the mermaid bones inside. They said that mermaid bones are also a magic elixir of immortality..."

"That's why my great-grandmother had someone secretly move the grave to this forest last year." Shimabukuro Kimie sighed slightly. "As for who that person was, my great-grandmother didn't tell anyone."

……

After Sumi Ebihara's body was brought down from the foot of the mountain, a man immediately rushed over, hugged Sumi Ebihara's body and cried bitterly. From the whispers of the people around him, it was discovered that it was Sumi Ebihara's father.

"Dad." Xiaolan and Toyama Kazuha walked out of the crowd.

Maori Kogoro turned around and said, "Xiaolan, have you contacted the police in Fukui Prefecture?"