Chapter 77 Lock
"Damn it! It's not him either!"

In the police station, Conan looked at the teenager in the interrogation room and kept biting his nails.

This was the third blackmailer to surrender, but like the previous two, none of them told anyone that they were being blackmailed.

"Calm down!"

Kudo Yusaku was also a little anxious, but he was better able to control his emotions. He turned to the policeman next to him and asked, "How many more?"

The policeman looked down at his notes and said, "There are four more to come."

Kudo Yusaku nodded.

Soon, the next person was brought into the interrogation room.

She is a young girl with outstanding appearance wearing a blue skirt and jacket.

The interrogating policeman was a slightly plump middle-aged man. He changed the pen and paper and began to go through the process expertly: "Name!"

"…Sato Tatsumi."

"age?"

"19 is old."

"Profession?"

"…I am currently a first-year student at Sapporo Medical University."

The slightly plump police officer didn't look up, and quickly wrote down all the information from the other party, then asked casually: "So, Ms. Sato, have you told anyone about the blackmail you were subjected to by Yoshimori Nobuyuki?"

Sato was silent for a moment: "...Yes."

"Huh?! What did you say?"

The slightly plump police officer who didn't care at all was suddenly shocked. He never expected that he would actually have an unexpected gain!

He looked up and asked quickly, "Who? Who did you tell this to?"

Sato was shocked by his attitude, looking a little uneasy, and hesitantly said: "I... I only told one person... It was my classmate in high school, his name was Asakura Takaaki."

"Where is he now?!"

"Ah...he, he is now a student at Hokkaido University."

The slightly plump police officer gestured outside.

The police officer standing next to Conan immediately turned and left.

Conan knew that he was going to summon Asakura Takaaki mentioned by Sato.

Finally a clue!

Conan was also excited. He paced back and forth outside, feeling unusually uneasy: "Could it be him... Asakura Songming, could he be A?"

He knew that there was something wrong with his mentality.

Because he actually began to pray that Asakura Takaaki was A!

Although he didn't want to admit it, Conan knew that he did feel a little timid - he didn't dare to think, if this method couldn't find A, then what else could he do?
It's like looking for a needle in a haystack. The clues are few and far between. The path to the truth is not based on reasoning, but on a series of illusory bridges built with assumptions...

These past few days in Hokkaido were like a wake-up call for him, making him feel for the first time what frustration was like despite having always had smooth sailing since childhood.

Moreover, Officer Fujisai's efforts made it impossible for him to accept the result of failure.

"I hate this kind of case!"

He cursed under his breath.

There is no longer the excitement that I had when I first accepted the case.

Kudo Yusaku shook his head and said nothing.

He understood his son.

Although he wanted to be a detective since he was a child, what Conan likes is not so much the identity of a detective as the feeling of being omnipotent in the detective game.

He likes to chase the truth, use sharp reasoning to pierce through disguises, force cunning murderers into a dead end, and then accept everyone's admiration with peace of mind.

He prefers heroes to detectives.

So, he is complacent about his reputation as a high school detective and is determined to become the 19th century Sherlock Holmes... He is craving the spotlight!
There's nothing wrong with that. He's just a 17-year-old boy and it's not wrong for him to be in the spotlight.

However, a life that is too smooth will only breed arrogance and make him too superstitious about his own strength... and when he encounters difficulties that cannot be solved by his own strength, the frustration and anxiety will be greater than that of ordinary people.

Just like now.

This is not a detective game where you have to choose one from three. There are no clues visible to the naked eye, and no suspects in front of you... This place is shrouded in fog, and you have to figure everything out by yourself.

When the reasoning that he relied on for his livelihood was shelved, Conan had no confidence at all, no matter how reasonable his speculation was. This was the result of being too superstitious about his own reasoning. Without reasoning, he also lost his sense of security.

Too immature.

Kudo Yusaku sighed softly in his heart.

——You are not a qualified detective at all now.

But it doesn't matter!

Minzhi Middle School is a test!
The proud reasoning is useless and will rightfully generate anxiety.

However, how do you face it after discovering your immature side?

Should I resist such cases from now on and only hide in the environment I am good at? Or should I learn from the setbacks and become more confident?
Yusaku Kudo is looking forward to Conan's growth.

So, he did not try to persuade Conan and chose to let Conan face everything on his own.

Only by defeating the immature self of the past can one achieve growth!

He has always believed this!

Time passed slowly.

After Sato, the last three blackmailers were also interrogated.

However, apart from Sato, there were no other eye-catching gains.

Just as everyone was waiting for Asakura Songming to arrive, a police officer hurriedly called.

"Officer! This is bad! Asakura Songming escaped!"

The slightly fat police officer was stunned: "What's going on?"

The police officer on the other side panted a little, but still explained the situation clearly: "We found him at Hokkaido University, but when he saw the police ID we showed him, he ran away! There are a lot of people here, and we are short of manpower, so we haven't caught him yet!"

The slightly plump police officer took a deep breath and began to mobilize other police officers to go together.

Conan and Kudo Yusaku looked at each other, and a hint of joy flashed in their eyes.

Yes, it’s joy!

Since Asakura Songming can run, there is no doubt that there must be something wrong with him. This greatly increases the probability that he is A.

"Is it finally...over?"

This is the light before dawn!
##
Qingshui Community.

The seventh floor of the second building.

Although there are six households here, Megure can easily tell where Shinichi Mizutani's home is by looking at the seals on the doors.

After making sure that no one was watching, he took out a piece of wire and pried the door open to get in.

Just one night after the incident, everything here remains the same.

The overturned sofa, the broken pieces of the vase on the floor, the crooked water dispenser in the corner, and a flattened disposable cup...

He looked at the scene in front of him and slowly simulated the place where Yamazaki Rin committed murder.

Everything is obvious!
At the beginning, Yamazaki should be sitting on the sofa, and Mizutani Shinichi is most likely standing in front of him...

After all, sitting on the sofa in the same row and talking about blackmail... this is too weird.

And when Shinichi Mizutani was taking a cup to get water with his back to him, Yamazaki, determined to kill him, took out the rope he brought with him, or the rope he found here, and jumped over to strangle him to death.

The sofa fell over because he stood up so quickly, and the vase next to it was also brought to the ground by him.

The water dispenser was moved away from its original position due to the struggle between the two, and the flattened water cup was either stepped on or caused by the heavy pressure after Shinichi Mizutani's death.

The police came to the same conclusion after investigating the scene, but they were unable to find any clues... no fingerprints, no hair, even the shoe prints on the ground were wiped off.

Megure knew that it was not Yamazaki who did it, but someone who came here later. This ability to clean up all clues was very similar to the case of criminal A.

He stood by the water dispenser and looked out the living room window.

There are three buildings in Qingshui Community, standing in the shape of a Chinese character “品” (Chinese character for “product”), and each building has nine floors.

Because the water dispenser is on the right side of the living room, what you can see should be Building No. 3 on the left side of Building No. 2, and it must be a room on the left side of Building No. 3.

Because of the wall, people on the same floor cannot see it, and only the eighth and ninth floors can see the location of the water dispenser.

Then the scope is clear!
Megure narrowed his eyes.

There are only four households under suspicion!
He walked out of Shinichi Mizutani's room and headed towards Building No. 3, looking towards the sun with a burning gaze.

(End of this chapter)