Conan's grammatical investigator

Chapter 1390 The Organization's Killer

"Is Kaito Hotta dead?"

Qin Zhibo was so surprised that he repeated what was said on the phone.

This sentence also attracted the attention of Masumi Sera and Nanatsuki Koshimizu who were sitting across the table. They stopped smiling and looked at him with concern.

"Is it suicide?" Qin Zhibo asked.

"No... it can be confirmed that it was a homicide, but the specific cause of death cannot be determined at this time."

Megure paused for a moment, "...Brother Qin, you should come over and take a look."

“Where is the scene?”

"In the hotel room where Kaito Horida is staying. You should know exactly where it is, right?"

"Yes, I'll be there soon."

Qin Zhibo hung up the phone and immediately fell into thought.

Since Megure contacted me and knew that I knew the location of Kaito Horida's hotel, it meant that they had already conducted a preliminary investigation of the scene and contacted the program team of Nichiren TV to understand the situation.

In this case, the police have not determined the cause of death, and it seems that the problem is indeed a bit tricky.

At this time, Shiliang, who was sitting opposite, asked seriously, "Uncle Qin, what's going on?"

Qin Zhibo picked up the coat on the back of the chair and explained, "Horita Kaito died in the hotel room. It was murder..."

"Kill him?"

Masumi Sera and Nanatsuki Koshimizu's eyes widened and they looked even more surprised.

  Kaito Horita was killed?

Could it be that the evening TV show broadcast caused him to be sought after by his enemies?

But it's only been over an hour, the enemy's efficiency in seeking revenge seems to be a little higher...

"Uncle Qin, wait a minute, let's go together!"

Sera and Nanatsuki Koshimizu put on their coats and prepared to follow.

Qin Zhibo glanced at the two of them, "You guys?"

"Don't underestimate us!"

"We are both detectives after all!"

Koshimizu Nanatsuki also nodded seriously and agreed, "Besides, this matter is more or less related to us, so it's only right for us to go and take a look at the scene."

Looking at Shiliang and Yueshui with serious faces, Qin Zhibo thought for a moment, but couldn't find any reason to refute, so he could only agree.

……

The hotel where Kaito Horita stayed was on the other side of the Nichiren TV building, and Qin Zhibo drove to his destination in 15 minutes.

As soon as I entered the first floor lobby of the hotel, I saw a large number of reporters had arrived and were trying their best to search for exclusive news.

Originally, if a second-rate detective like Kaito Horita died, not so many people would pay attention to it.

But he had just appeared on TV and newspapers were writing tomorrow's news based on his perjury and burying of corpses when they suddenly received the news of Horida Kaito's death.

Which newspaper wouldn’t want to get a piece of the pie of this kind of program that can be called the “top-level current newspaper”?

However, due to the obstruction of the police and the hotel, these reporters could not go up to disrupt the investigation of the case. They could only wait for the people from the first investigation department to come down and then block the way for interviews.

Qin Zhibo and the other two went around to the staff elevator on the side of the hotel, identified themselves, and then went up without being discovered.

When we took the elevator to the floor where Kaito Horida's room was, we saw that the corridor with a radius of 10 meters from the door had been cordoned off.

Gao Mu was standing next to the cordon. When he saw Qin Zhibo coming, he immediately raised the cordon to greet him.

"Mr. Qin, Officer Megure is waiting in the room..."

Takagi glanced at the two girls behind Qin Zhibo. One of them was Shiliang, whom he had just met today, and she was Qin Zhibo's disciple.

I don’t know the other one.

"Mr. Qin, who is this?"

In order to avoid unnecessary trouble, Qin Zhibo directly replied: "She is also my disciple."

Koshimizu Nanatsuki was not unconvinced at all. She smiled and raised her hand to greet him, "Hello, my name is Koshimizu Nanatsuki. Thank you for your guidance."

"what?"

Gao Mu looked at the two female disciples following behind Qin Zhibo, each of them was very young and beautiful, and couldn't help but envy the profession of detective.

Of course, if you want to have this kind of treatment, you must also reach the level of a top detective.

Otherwise, like Kaito Horita, the ending would be not very good.

"Officer Takagi, can we go in?"

Qin Zhibo's words interrupted Gao Mu who was in a daze, and the latter quickly came back to his senses, "Well, please follow me."

Under Takagi's leadership, the three of them passed through the heavily guarded corridor unhindered and arrived at the crime scene.

As soon as he entered the room, Megure was standing with his hands behind his back, staring at the corpse in a daze.

The body of Kaito Hotta was even more unusual.

I saw Kaito Horida tied to a chair, his eyes were wide open, saliva was flowing from the corner of his slightly open mouth, and his head was tilted to the left shoulder.

Now Kaito Horida has really become the "soul detective" that he had always dreamed of.

Such a death was obviously homicide.

  The murderer didn't hide anything, but why did Megure say he couldn't be sure of the cause of death?

At this time, Megure noticed someone coming behind him, and when he turned around, he saw his "long-awaited" brother Qin.

"Brother Qin, you are finally here..."

"Eh? Who are the two behind?"

Like Takagi, Megure also raised his own questions.

"They are my disciples." Qin Zhibo replied.

"Disciple?" Megure was stunned for a moment, "But isn't your disciple the young man with golden hair from before?"

Megure was talking about Toru Amuro, because Toru Amuro had been involved in several cases before, so he wrote them down.

Qin Zhibo smiled and said, "That's my eldest disciple, and the other two are my second and third disciples..."

"By the way, where is the case going now?"

Qin Zhibo brought the topic back to the case, and Megure then signaled with his eyes to Takagi next to him.

Takagi took out the police manual from his arms and began to introduce it seriously.

It turned out that the police received the call at 6:50 in the evening.

The person who called the police was the hotel staff. They found the body of Kaito Horita when they were restocking the room supplies...

Qin Zhibo turned his head and looked at the clock hanging in the room. It was 7:40.

The show "Unsolved Cases Uncovered" ended at 6:30 in the evening.

However, because Kaito Horida was worried about being blocked by reporters or police, he hurriedly left the TV station before the program was fully recorded.

That is to say, he was murdered not long after the show was aired.

And judging from the luggage scattered on the bed and the half-packed suitcase, he originally planned to run away.

Megure then continued, "We have already seen the content of that program, so we immediately investigated the director of Nichimi TV."

"However, when the crime happened, he was at the TV station handling the follow-up of the program. His colleagues testified throughout the whole process and he has sufficient proof of his alibi."

"In addition, Kaito Horida has previously excavated the bodies of five missing persons, three of whom have been identified, one of whom is the director's sister..."

Gao Mu held up the police manual and continued, "We have just completed the investigation of the relatives of the other two bodies. One family is not in Tokyo now, so they do not meet the conditions for committing the crime."

"Although the other family was in Tokyo, they did not watch the evening show and did not know about Kaito Horida's situation."

Qin Zhibo nodded in understanding, "In other words, the possibility of a vendetta due to the content of the program has been basically ruled out..." Qin Zhibo walked to the body of Kaito Horida, seemingly observing the body, but actually started the automatic investigation.

【Corpse Investigation√】

[Name of deceased: Keito Hotta]

[Time of death: 1 hour ago]

【Cause of death: poisoning】

[Corpse investigation completed, character skill obtained: Art and Crafts (Performance)]

[Acquire repeated skills, converted into 1000 proficiency of that skill]

Kaito Horita has been studying day and night on how to make channeling look more realistic, and it finally came true at this moment.

With the help of these 1000 proficiency points, Qin Zhibo's performance skill was successfully upgraded to level 3.

At the same time, the system's task prompt popped up.

[Side Quest: Find out the murderer of this case]

[Task requirements: Find out and capture the murderer alive]

[Task reward: 3000 general skill proficiency]

Qin Zhibo glanced at the task requirements and immediately realized something was wrong.

This mission is different from previous case branches. Not only is there no time limit, but the criminal must be captured alive.

Moreover, the mission rewards are much higher than those of ordinary cases.

You should know that the general Blizzard Villa mode only has a reward of 1000.

  Could it be that the murderer this time is very unusual?

At this moment, Nanatsuki Koshimizu stood behind Kaito Horida's body, looked at the back of his head and said, "You can see bleeding spots at this location of the deceased. He must have suffered a trauma before he died, right?"

Takagi looked at the location that Nanatsuki Koshimizu pointed to and quickly introduced: "The forensics department has already found that location, but it is not a fatal injury."

"The murderer must have knocked Mr. Horita unconscious from behind, and then tied him to a chair..."

“But other than that, no other injuries were found on the deceased.”

The disadvantage of autopsy is that it can only provide feedback on the actual cause of death, while other injuries are selectively ignored.

Qin Zhibo came behind the corpse, took a look at the injury on the back of Horida Kaito's head, then looked at the half-packed suitcase on the bed. A "Xiao Hei" automatically appeared in his mind and he reconstructed the crime process.

"The deceased was probably packing his luggage by the bed when he was attacked and knocked unconscious by someone behind him."

"Judging from the position next to the bed, the murderer must have been hiding in the closet in advance, just in time to sneak attack the deceased from behind."

As soon as Qin Zhibo finished speaking, Sera Masumi held his chin up and analyzed seriously.

"The murderer knew that Kaito Horida would return to the hotel after recording the show, so he ambushed in the closet in advance."

"In this case, the murderer's motive for killing Kaito Horida is completely irrelevant to the broadcast of the program."

"And judging from the fact that Horida Kaito's hands and feet were tied, the murderer did not kill him immediately. It is possible that he forced him to confess something..."

Nanatsuki Koshimizu also said: "And the final method of killing is also somewhat suspicious..."

Although the autopsy concluded that the patient was murdered by poison, the specific poison used was not specified.

And the forensic department couldn't detect any toxic reactions...

Qin Zhibo raised his chin, his eyes flashing with thought.

If there is a possibility that Kaito Horida was killed for some reason, there is another possibility.

That is, he had previously said that he knew the inside story of the Haneda Hiroshi case.

The case of Hiroji Haneda is an important case related to the organization. Kaito Horida's original plan was to discuss this case on TV, but he temporarily changed it to the Lavender Villa case.

Although judging from what we learned from Furuguri Sanpei, what Horida Kaito knew was not a big clue at all.

But the organization is likely to silence him out of caution.

If we consider it from this perspective, it is easy to guess the poison used.

APTX-4869.

Only this thing can kill people without being detected by police toxicology tests.

In this case, the murderer should be someone in the organization...

"report!"

Suddenly, a policeman came to the door and reported, "Officer Megure, we found a staff member in the hotel who saw the appearance of the suspected murderer."

"what?!"

Megure's face lit up with joy, "Where are the others?"

The policeman made way for an elderly female cleaner who appeared at the door.

"That was a man with long black hair and wearing all black clothes..."

"Because his hat was pulled down so low, I couldn't see his face clearly."

This vague introduction immediately made Megure, who was originally a little excited, wilted.

"This……"

"If you see that person again, will you still recognize him?"

"Ah?" The cleaner was stunned, thought for a few seconds and nodded, "I don't know, maybe I can try..."

The cleaner's ambiguous answer may even be regarded as invalid evidence in court.

And even if we want to find a suspect now, we can't find one.

Megure was somewhat "uncomfortable" when faced with a situation where the man committed a crime and ran away.

But after listening to the cleaning lady's description, Qin Zhibo already had some clues.

Black hair, medium-length hair, the first person Qin Zhibo thought of was that person.

Scotch!

Since Gin's death, Scotch whisky seems to have taken over Gin's job, and assassination is naturally part of his job.

If that's the case, there's a way to confirm whether it's him.

All we need to do is ask Toru Amuro to bring an old photo of Scotch Whisky and have the cleaning lady identify it.

However, this matter cannot be known to ordinary police officers like Megure.

"Inspector Megure, since this case has nothing to do with the content of the show, I don't have any good solution."

"The only way to go now is to investigate who Horita Kai had offended during his lifetime. Of course, we can also start by investigating the people who were affected by his 'psychic power'..."

"Then I'll take my leave now. Remember to contact me when there is any progress."

Qin Zhibo pointed out a conventional investigation approach to Megure, and then left the scene.

……

After leaving the hotel, Qin Zhibo drove Koshimizu Nanatsuki back to the apartment.

"Bye-Bye!"

"Bye~"

The two girls reluctantly said goodbye at the entrance of the apartment building.

Qin Zhibo sat in the car and waited until Shiliang returned to the car and sat in the passenger seat.

But just as he was about to send Sera home, a wise smile appeared on Sera's lips.

"Uncle Qin, this case should be related to that organization, right?"