1
“Your name is Aoi, right? You're a detective, if I recall correctly.”
Ichijou Yuma called out to the woman standing by the fireplace, a glass of whiskey in her hand.
“You don't. I'm not a detective, I'm a great detective. Aoi Tsukiyo. A pleasure to meet you, Ichijou Yuma.”
Taking her outstretched hand, Yuma observed her. She was in her mid-twenties, maybe a bit younger than himself. She was about as tall as his own 175 cm, and was smartly fit in a British-style three piece suit with light brown checkers.
She wore a matching tie and had a handkerchief in her breast pocket, and she wore flat-heeled leather shoes. She looked good in men's clothing. Her short hair had been dyed in subtle streaks and given just enough of a gel to add volume. She had a well-proportioned face with a thin, high nose and thin, well-shaped lips. She wore no makeup. Despite her strong features, her double-lidded eyes were rounded enough at the edges to stop her from coming across as cold.
“A great detective...”
As he rolled the words on his tongue, Yuma realized why the first sight of Tsukiyo had caused him to feel a sense of deja vu. She was wearing the exact same outfit Sherlock Holmes had been when he saw him on TV. Come to think of it, when she first entered the Tower, she'd been wearing a cape and even a deerstalker.
“So... What's the difference between a detective and a great detective?”
When he asked in confusion, Tsukiyo proudly puffed out her chest.
“A normal detective investigates whatever their client wants. Searching for missing people, a fiance's background check, even the ever-classic infidelity.”
“And a great detective doesn't, I take it?”
“No, never,” Tsukiyo replied, grinning. “A great detective only takes on complex mysteries. The sorts of cases that the police could never handle on their own.”
“Oh, I see.”
Unable to respond to the woman's unusual behavior, Yuma gave a vague nod and waited for his chance to leave. He'd accomplished what he set out to do. There was no need to deal with the eccentric any longer.
Just as Yuma was about to say goodbye, he heard a voice from behind him say “Oh, a great detective, is it?” Yuma turned around, and his eyes widened. There stood a small old man in traditional Japanese clothing.
“Mr. Kuruma!”
As Yuma straightened his back, Kuruma Koushin, a leading figure in honkaku mystery, scratched his bald head, a sly smile on his kindly face.
“I wish you'd stop calling me that. It makes me feel so old, especially coming from a doctor.”
“No, that's not true... Mr. Kuruma will always be Mr. Kuruma,” Yuma said, his voice shaking.
He had always loved mystery novels, especially what were known in Japan as “honkaku mystery”: stories of fantastic, seemingly incomprehensible mysteries that were nevertheless unraveled by detectives who had mastered the use of logic.
In the six years since he became a doctor, Yuma had been too busy to read all that much, but back when he was a student, he'd carried a paperback or two on him at all times, and opened them every chance he got.
He'd first fallen in love with mysteries in middle school, starting with the most classic of the classics, Agatha Christie. When he read And Then There Were None, Murder on the Orient Express, and The Murder of Roger Ackroyd, he was so shocked by their unexpected solutions he'd felt like he'd been struck three times in the head by a club. Afterwards, he furiously devoured the works of Edgar Allan Poe, Arthur Conan Doyle, Ellery Queen, John Dickson Carr, S. S. Van Dine, Freeman Wills Crofts, and many others. Even after exhausting most of those classic foreign mysteries, he found himself with no shortage of new works to read. Because Japan had produced many excellent honkaku mysteries that were just as good.
From the late 1980s to the early 1990s, the shin honkaku movement, beginning with the publication of Shimada Soji's The Tokyo Zodiac Murders and truly blossoming with Ayatsuji Yukito's The Decagon House Murders, had introduced the world to a number of great talents, including Norizuki Rintaro, Arisugawa Alice, Utano Shogo, Abiko Takemaru, Orihara Ichi, and Kitamura Kaoru, who published one diverse and original work after another as though they were all in competition.
Kuruma Koushin was one of those authors who had risen to prominence in the early days of the shin honkaku movement. He was particularly known for his skill at creating locked room mysteries, and had released many well-regarded masterpieces. When Yuma's employer and the owner of the Tower, Kozushima Tarou, had introduced Kuruma at dinner, he hadn't been able to believe his ears.
“But I am glad to be recognized. Young people nowadays don't read many novels. Have you read any of my works?”
Yuma worried how he should respond. He had read everything Kuruma had ever written. If it had been possible, he would have wanted to have a long, deep conversation with the author he admired. But he didn't have time for that right now.
He had to speak to everyone present, and make himself as memorable as possible.
“I did read a few of them, a long time ago...”
Before he could elaborate on his memories of the works, he was pushed away from behind.
“Of course, I've read them all!”
Tsukiyo pushed Yuma aside and stepped forward, grabbing Kuruma's hand with both of her own as she raised her voice.
“I love all of your works, Mr. Kuruma. But your debut, The Locked Room Game, is the best. The way you combined physical and psychological tricks was a work of art. And then there's your second work, The Hand That Breaks the Locked Door. Of course, the locked room trick there was wonderful, but that was also the first appearance of the great detective Totsuka Kai. His character is filled with appeal: he's quiet, but he harbors such deep feelings about the cases he solves. And The Invisible Key, well, everybody already knows that's the best book in the Totsuka series. When I finished it the first time, I was too stunned to breathe! I believe it's the pinnacle of the locked room genre.”
Tsukiyo kept talking so fast it sounded like she wasn't breathing now, either. Until a moment ago, she'd had the air of a handsomely beautiful intellectual, but seeing her now, with big, sparkling eyes and flushed cheeks, it was impossible to recognize her as anything but a fangirl standing before her idol.
“T-Thank you. I'm glad to hear you enjoyed them.” Kuruma was leaning a bit backwards.
“It isn't just your works, I know about you, too. Kuruma Koushin, 73 years old. At the age of 42, while working as a top-class architect, you won the Tokyo Mystery Newcomer's Award for The Locked Room Game, which became a huge hit, instantly making you a darling of the mystery world. Your favorite author is John Dickson Carr, and your favorite work of his is The Department of Queer Complaints, starring Colonel March. Your pen name, Kuruma Koushin, comes from the Japanese words for 'car' and 'march', and like Dickson Carr, you specialize in locked room stories. You especially-”
“W-W-Wait a moment! I can see that you're very knowledgeable when it comes to mysteries...”
Kuruma tried to soothe her, but Tsukiyo just seemed upset that she couldn't talk anymore. She puffed her cheeks in a pout as she shut her mouth.
So in the end, she was just a mystery nerd? Yuma watched them from a step away, thinking that Aoi Tsukiyo was nothing more than a Sherlock Holmes cosplayer.
Growing bored, he was about to leave when Kuruma cleared his throat.
“Truth be told, I've heard rumors about you as well. So, there really are great detectives in this world, like someone right out of a story.”
Yuma blinked, and Tsukiyo, who had been leaning forward, straightened her back. The innocent smile that had covered her face was suddenly very mature.
“I'm honored to be known by someone like you, Mr. Kuruma.”
Tsukiyo placed a hand on her chest and bowed as gracefully as an actor at curtain call.
“Is it true you were the one to solve the murder and dismemberment of that IT company president on a luxury cruise liner anchored in Tokyo Bay earlier this year?”
“Eh?” The sound escaped from Yuma unbidden. He'd heard about that case. The dismembered body of an IT company president – one of those people who was popular with the media – was found in a suite on a luxury cruise ship. If he recalled, the door was locked and nobody else was found inside, and there were even reports calling the case an impossible crime, but a month after the incident, the victim's business partner was arrested for the murder.
Yuma's eyes widened when Tsukiyo answered without a moment's hesitation, “Yes, it is.”
“But it was the police who caught the culprit...”
“It was the police who investigated the victim's background and uncovered the culprit's motive. A police detective I know asked me for help, and I was the one who uncovered the how and why of the locked room and explained why the victim needed to be dismembered.”
“That's ridiculous. The police would never consult with a private investigator.”
“It is rare, I'll grant you. But...”
Tsukiyo paused and cocked her head back triumphantly.
“I am a great detective.”
Yuma couldn't tell if she was serious. As he stood there confused, Kuruma's face began to flush with excitement.
“When I read about the case in a magazine, I couldn't imagine such a gruesome and bizarre murder could really happen. I thought for sure it would never be solved.”
“Oh, no, it wasn't even that hard.”
Tsukiyo didn't sound humble. Her tone was that of disappointment.
“At a glance, it seemed like a frightfully complicated incident. But the truth was disappointingly simple. The reason he dismembered the body was so he could use the parts as components of a physical trick to lock the door from the outside. And the reason he locked the door was to delay the body's discovery until he could get off the ship. I'm sure the police would have realized the truth in time, even if the culprit hadn't gone on a suspiciously-timed business trip. I was hoping for a mystery with a bit more meat on its bones...”
“How incredible. I hear you've solved many other cases as well. Like the case where the body that had fallen to death was found on top of a high-rise apartment building in Roppongi, and the case of the murderer who vanished from the detention cell in a police station in Adachi, and...”
Yuma couldn't believe his ears as Kuruma rattled off case after case. All of them had gotten widespread coverage in the news as “mysterious incidents”. To think this self-proclaimed great detective had solved all of them... But Tsukiyo's expression didn't grow any brighter.
“They're all the same. When you hear the outline, you think 'Oh, what a fascinating mystery', but the truth is always a boring crime with a second-rate culprit. It's so rare to find a real mystery, a crime that, despite its cruelty, is beautiful and artistic, one that would require full use of my abilities as a great detective.”
A beautiful, artistic crime... As Yuma stood there, dumbfounded by the words that made it sound like the woman hoped more gruesome crimes would be committed, he heard a stifled laugh. A middle-aged man sat on a sofa a few meters away, the ends of his thick lips turned up. There was stubble on his chin, and the suit wrapped around his chubby body was thoroughly wrinkled.
“A great detective? Full use of your abilities? You're just a picky, choosy woman who can't be bothered with cases that don't catch your interest.”
Kuruma frowned, probably bothered by the man's attitude.
“Just what are you saying? I believe you were a detective?”
“Yeah, that's right. Kagami Tsuyoshi from the Nagano Prefectural Police, First Investigation Division. Nice to meet you.”
With that, Kagami raised the glass in his hand and said “Gimme one more!” Instantly, Tomoe Madoka, the Tower's maid, came over and took the glass, saying “Right away, sir.”
“I see your glass is also empty, Dr. Ichijou. Would you like a refill?”
Madoka, who approached with a swish of her stereotypical maid's uniform, had a coquettish smile on her round face. She was supposed to be in her late twenties, but she had a baby face that made her look fully underage.
“No, that's alright. Thank you, Ms. Tomoe.”
When Yuma handed her his empty cocktail glass, Madoka bowed, said “Excuse me,” and left.
“Alright, then, I'll answer your question,” Kagami said with a snort. “That so-called 'great detective' is famous within the police force, sure enough. I hear she's solved plenty of tough cases. But she always turns down the really hard stuff, because she's afraid she won't be able to solve 'em.”
Kagami counted them off on his fingers.
“The case of the disappearance of that guy on the jumbo jet in flight, the swimmer who burned to death in a pool, the destruction of the dinosaur fossils from that museum...”
Those cases had also been major news stories, and all of them were still unsolved. As Yuma recalled the details of the cases, Kagami pointed at Tsukiyo.
“The police asked you to chip in for all of those cases, but you refused. So when you see a case you can't solve, you just run away with your tail between your legs. Do I have that right, 'great detective'?” Kagami said provocatively. But Tsukiyo showed no signs of anger.
“If I had a second body to send, I would have been happy to help with all those cases. But even a great detective can't play two roles, so I was forced to decline.”
“So you turned them down because you were busy? What an excuse. I don't know if you really are a great detective or not, but in the end, that's all you're worth.”
Kagami stood up, snatched the glass from Madoka's hand, and walked away.
“What a rude man. Just ignore him, Ms. Aoi.”
Tsukiyo shrugged at Kuruma and smiled.
“It's okay. Great detectives are often misunderstood, especially by policemen.”
“I suppose so. By the way, Dr. Ichijou.”
Yuma, having suddenly been addressed, shouted “Yes!? Yes?”
“You're Kozushima's personal physician, aren't you? Have you been living here long?”
“No, I only became Mr. Kozushima's doctor six months ago. And I can't stay here full-time because I have to look after my family. I usually live in the town at the foot of the mountain and come up here two or three times a week to check on the patient. The only people who live here are Mr. Kozushima and the servants, Ms. Tomoe the maid and Mr. Oita the butler.”
“Oh, is that so? So, have you heard what Kozushima is planning tonight? I understand it's some sort of important announcement.”
“No, I haven't been told anything.”
Yuma doubted it would be anything good. Memories from last month rose to the surface of his mind.
“I'm planning on hosting a little event.”
Kozushima, lying in his bed, had suddenly announced that as Yuma was taking his blood pressure.
“An event?”
Yuma casually asked as he typed the blood pressure readings into his tablet. Instead of Kozushima, it was the butler, Oita Shinzo, standing next to the bed, who responded “Yes.” Dressed in a starched shirt, black suit, and bow tie, and with gray hair firmly slicked back, Oita looked exactly like what you'd imagine from hearing the words “a butler”.
“The master will be inviting several guests to the Glass Tower on the fourth weekend of next month, where he will make a very important announcement. He would like for you, Dr. Ichijou, to be present. The event itself will take place overnight, and the guests will stay overnight as well. We would appreciate it if you did so as well, doctor.”
“What exactly is the announcement you'll be making?”
“I'm afraid I can't tell you that, sir. You'll have to look forward to hearing it on that day.”
Kozushima sat up in the bed and stroked his snow white beard, an innocent smile breaking across his usually stern face.
Perhaps the announcement was some new discovery in the field of biology. After all, Kozushima had been a professor at the Teito University Department of Biotechnology up until his retirement a few years ago, and he'd made several major achievements in that field. It was even said he would receive a Nobel Prize before too long.
But it seemed his expectation had been wrong. Yuma remembered the guests Kozushima had introduced at the dinner they'd just had in the dining room.
A great detective, a mystery novelist, a police detective, a psychic, an editor from a mystery magazine... They clearly weren't the people to call for an announcement regarding the life sciences. So the announcement must have involved Kozushima's “other side”.
Kozushima Tarou was a devotee of mystery fiction, and a collector of related memorabilia. He had sunk a significant portion of his considerable wealth into buying up things like rare books and first prints of mystery movies from both Japan and abroad, and stored them in a display room in the Glass Tower. The so-called “Kozushima Collection” was famous among fellow mystery enthusiasts. He had probably called them all to brag about some new acquisition.
“I'm looking forward to the announcement, but I'm really just happy to have had a chance to visit the famous Glass Tower.”
Yuma returned to his senses when he heard Tsukiyo's voice fill with excitement.
“It's an honor getting to see the Kozushima Collection in person. When I received the invitation, I actually jumped for joy.”
Tsukiyo clasped her hands together like she was praying and looked up at the chandelier hanging from the high ceiling with shining eyes.
As he'd thought, the so-called great detective was nothing but a fangirl in a Holmes cosplay. As Yuma stared at her, Kuruma spoke up.
“Do you know Kozushima, Ms. Aoi?”
“Yes, I've met him a few times in Tokyo. He wanted to hear about the cases I've solved, so I told him as much as my great detective's client confidentiality agreements would allow me. So, what is your relationship with Kozushima, Mr. Kuruma?”
“He took my novel writing course a few years ago. Honkaku mystery fans wanting to write their own works is a common occurrence.”
“A novel written by Mr. Kozushima!?” Tsukiyo's voice had gone up a few octaves. “What sort of novel was written by one of the world's leading mystery collectors? I'd love to read it!”
“Well, unfortunately, just because you love mysteries, that doesn't mean you can write good ones yourself. The novels he wrote... How do I put it...? They lacked originality. They always came out sounding like something he'd read before.”
Kuruma gave an ironic smile.
“He must have realized that himself, as he hasn't released anything in a long time. He also stopped attending writing classes. But if he hadn't tried, we would have never met, and I wouldn't have been invited here tonight. I'm also interested in the famous Kozushima Collection and the Glass Tower it's kept in, so I was happy to come.”
“This Glass Tower is built in the shape of a giant TRIDENT. I didn't know that until I heard Kozushima's story at dinner just now.”
Tsukiyo excitedly rambled on, then her eyes turned to an object by the fireplace. It was a model. An elaborate model of the Glass Tower that stood on the slope of Mt. Chogatake in the southern half of the Hida Mountains, where Yuma found himself now. A clear glass window ran in a spiral around a one meter tall cone of wine-red stained glass. It was like a transparent snake coiled around the spire. At the top of the cone was a space covered in transparent glass. That was the display room where the Kozushima Collection was kept.
“A tall glass spire built deep in the mountains. It's the sort of building you'd see as the setting of a honkaku mystery novel. I expect someone to be killed any second now.”
Yuma felt his heart lurch. A small noise escaped from the back of his throat.
“Is something wrong, Dr. Ichijou?”
Tsukiyo was staring straight at him. Yuma felt like he was being drawn into her large, brownish eyes. He barely managed to force out a response.
“No... It's nothing. I just have the hiccups.”
“They say drinking sugar water will help with that.”
“I see. Well, I'll have to go try that. Excuse me.”
Yuma quickly turned around and left them.
Calm down. That detective was just making a joke. Reassuring himself of that, he turned his eyes to the glass window to his right. You could tell this area had once been a ski resort. Pure white snow fell from above, and a few dozen meters away, a dense forest could barely be made out against the darkness.
Taking deep breaths, he made his way through the game room. The gently curved space was over ten meters wide and easily thirty long, and it had not only a fireplace and several couches, but a billiard table, a poker table, a jukebox, and even a bar. It also had many blind spots, as there were several thick pillars made of marble covered in decorative glass the color of amber standing in the room. Everyone in the Tower, except for Kozushima, the owner, were spending their time in this room.
He had to talk to everyone. First... Yuma approached the bar. He passed the butler, Oita, who was helping Madoka serve drinks, and called out “Thank you for all your work.”
“I could say the same to you, Dr. Ichijou. Are you enjoying yourself?”
Oita gave a dignified bow, holding a tray of cocktail glasses in one hand.
“Yes, but I'm trying to limit my alcohol intake, thank you. I am Mr. Kozushima's doctor, after all.”
“There's no need to worry about that now. Just relax. I have orders from the master to treat you as a guest, not a doctor.”
“Is that so? Then I guess I'll have to take you up on the offer.”
“By all means,” Oita smiled before walking away.
“Yo, Sakaizumi, can I get a cocktail?”
Yuma called out to the brown-haired young man in a T-shirt and jacket who was shaking a cocktail shaker behind the counter.
“Oh, hello, Dr. Ichijou. What can I get you?”
The chef, Sakaizumi Taiki, asked cheerfully.
“Give me a gimlet. Although, I didn't know you could make cocktails, Sakaizumi.”
“What are you talking about, doc? My name's Sakaizumi. Saka izumi. I'm halfway to being a sake fountain already! Of course I can make cocktails. Even when I cook, I always make sure to think hard about how it pairs with the drinks. Didn't you think the sauteed duck earlier went perfectly with that red wine? Pretty good, right? That was an extremely expensive wine, you know. If it wasn't for Mr. Kozushima, I'd never be able to share meals like that.”
Sakaizumi picked up a glass from the counter and took a sip of blood-red wine.
“Yes, your food was delicious, as always.”
Sakaizumi responded to Yuma's answer with a proud huff and a “It was, wasn't it?”
In truth, Yuma had been so nervous that he hadn't been able to taste a thing. However, there was no doubt that Sakaizumi was an extremely talented cook. He lived in the town at the foot of the mountain, and Kozushima frequently called him up to taste his cooking. He had cooked for Kozushima's events several times in the past, and every single one of them had been mouthwateringly delicious.
That evening, the guests, who had each driven up to the Glass Tower in their own cars, were first shown to their rooms, then served a full course meal of French cuisine prepared by Sakaizumi in the dining room on the first floor at 6:30 P.M.
After introducing all the guests, Kozushima, the host, talked about his mystery collection non-stop until dessert was served. As a result, Yuma and the other guests hadn't had much time to talk to each other.
When dinner ended at 8:00, Kozushima said “I'll be making my announcement at 10:00, so please, feel free to relax in the game room until then,” and left the dining room.
“But what is Mr. Kozushima's announcement, anyway?”
Sakaizumi asked that to nobody as he poured alcohol into the shaker.
“Are you interested, Sakaizumi?”
“Honestly, not really. I'm happy as long as I'm allowed to make good food. That's why I'm happy whenever Mr. Kozushima asks me to cook for him. He always writes me blank checks for ingredients. ...Well, not that the cooking is the only nice thing about this place.”
Yuma smirked and pointed a thumb at Madoka, who was working away, her maid's skirt fluttering around. It was no secret that Sakaizumi had feelings for Madoka. Yuma had seen him approach her a few times before. Madoka didn't seem opposed to the idea.
“Well,” Sakaizumi said, scratching his head, “if there wasn't anything good about this place, I wouldn't come up this mountain so often, no matter how good it paid. And to be honest, cooking up here is a bit scary. This building completely ignores the Building Standards Act and the Fire Service Act.”
“I don't know much about the law, but I can believe that. But Mr. Kozushima's taxes pay for a whole lot around these parts, so they can't do anything about it. So, how are things going with you and Ms. Tomoe?”
“We're getting along. We're going on a date in town on her next day off.”
Sakaizumi shook the shaker with a shy smile, then poured the clear liquid into a short glass.
“Here's your gimlet.”
Yuma took the glass and immediately gulped it. The strong gin-based cocktail burned all the way down.
“Ah, are you okay? That's a pretty strong liquor to chug like that. You're gonna have a nasty hangover.”
“I can handle my alcohol. It was delicious, thank you. I hope things go well with you and Ms. Tomoe.”
If he didn't numb his feelings with some alcohol, he'd go insane.
Yuma raised a hand to Sakaizumi, who smiled and said “Thanks” as he raised his wine glass, then walked away from the bar. Now, the ones he still had to talk to were...
Yuma turned to see two people sitting at the poker table about ten meters away: A skinny middle-aged man with glasses, and a portly middle-aged woman with a pink dress and aggressively pink hair.
Yuma approached them and asked “You playing poker?”, and the man turned around.
“Ah, you're Mr. Kozushima's doctor...”
“Ichijou Yuma.”
The man stood up and said “A pleasure to meet you. This is who I am,” and handed Yuma a business card from his pocket. The card read “Super Mystery Monthly Magazine, Editor-in-Chief, Sakyo Kousuke”. He knew the magazine. It was a monthly fiction magazine known for its scattershot approach to story selection, placing proper honkaku stories of logic and reasoning next to unbelievable tales of the paranormal.
“We weren't playing poker.”
Sakyo sat back down in his seat and turned to the woman sitting in the dealer's seat.
“If you tried to play poker with her, she'd just read all your cards.”
“You're Ms. Yumeyomi, right?”
Yuma turned to Yumeyomi Suishou, and the woman's crimson-painted lips formed a smile.
“Oh, so you know me.”
Her face was covered in pure white makeup as she grinned at him.
Yumeyomi Suishou was, if you took her word for it, a psychic. She regularly appeared on TV, using her psychic powers to solve cases. Yuma had watched her show a few times, but always changed the channel right away. It was an overproduced show about a questionable topic.
“Of course. I watch Psychic Detective Case Files every day. Never miss an episode.”
“Why thank you.”
Yumeyomi puffed out a chest wrapped in a pink dress completely covered in frills.
“I'm having Ms. Yumeyomi read my fortune. It's a rare opportunity, after all,” Sakyo said excitedly.
Looking down at the poker table, Yuma saw that the cards weren't playing cards, but tarot cards.
“You normally need to make a reservation months in advance to get a fortune read by me. But since Mr. Kozushima has been such a supporter of my work, I decided to make a special appearance today. Your name was Ichijou? Shall I tell your fortune as well?”
Yumeyomi skillfully shuffled the cards.
“I'll pass. If I get a bad fortune, my anxiety will go out of control.”
Yuma had no interest in fortune telling and didn't believe for a second that Yumeyomi Suishou was a real psychic. Now that he'd achieved his goal of speaking to her, there was no reason for him to stay. Just as Yuma had turned around and was about to leave, a sharp voice demanded “Wait.” Yumeyomi lowered her eyes to glar at him.
“You should be careful. There is an ill omen about you.”
“An ill omen...” Yuma touched his cheek.
“Yes. You will soon find yourself in great trouble. Be careful within this tower. This land is filled with strong negative emotions, and they have gathered and concentrated here.”
Frowning at Yumeyomi's ominous tone, Yuma said “I'll be careful,” and left the poker table.
Just ignore her, Yuma told himself. She was just trying to confuse him by saying random things that could be interpreted any number of ways. It was con artistry 101. Yuma walked slowly and observed his surroundings. The guests were spending their time freely, and the servants were serving them. It had been about 30 minutes since they'd gone to the game room for free time, and the awkward atmosphere that had once filled the room had loosened considerably.
It would all be okay. Yuma stepped into the shadow of a pillar. No one saw him. Forcing himself to be patient, he casually walked towards one of the three entrances to the game room. Carefully pulling open the door to ensure it didn't make a sound, he noiselessly slipped through the gap.
Somehow, he'd made it out of the game room without anybody noticing. He exhaled all the way to the bottom of his lungs and looked up. The circular hall on the first floor had multiple glittering chandeliers hanging from a ceiling that must have been at least five meters up. There were several doors lined up on the wall, leading to the theater, the sub-kitchen, the dining room, and the entryway leading to the front entrance. In the center of the space was an enormous pillar covered in colored glass, several meters in diameter. Passing through an entrance on the side of the pillar, a spiral staircase could be seen stretching both above and below.
Yuma tried to moisten the inside of his dry mouth and began to climb the stairs.
Although it was a spiral staircase, the pillar it surrounded wasn't hollow, so he couldn't see above or below. The two meter wide staircase, surrounded by black glass in all directions, stood out in the soft light of the LEDs embedded in the wall.
After climbing one and a quarter revolutions up the steep spiral stairs, he came across two metal doors, one next to the other on a small landing. They were sturdy metal doors with the words “Tenth” and “Ninth” engraved on their surfaces in an archaic font. Yuma glanced at them without stopping. From that point on, he passed another landing and another door ever quarter revolution up the spiral staircase.
Passing doors marked “Eighth”, “Seventh”, “Sixth”, and “Fifth”, Yuma stopped in front of the “Fourth” room, which was where he was staying. There wasn't much further to go until he reached his destination, the “First” room.
Was he really going to do this? Could he do it?
His breathing, already strained from the long climb up the stairs, became even heavier. Even though his body was hot, the sweat flowing without end all over his body was icy cold. His entire body was trembling uncontrollably.
There was no way he could do it like this. He decided to go back to his room and cool his head for a moment. Yuma took a key with “Fourth” carved on its surface from the pocket of his jeans. It was the key to the Fourth room.
The image of a girl with a carefree smile flashed through his mind. The Fourth key fell from his hand and bounced down the glass stairs. Yuma stopped trembling. He was suddenly extremely calm.
It wasn't a question of whether he could do it. He had to do it. There was no other way.
Yuma bent over and picked up the key, then quickly made his way up the stairs. After passing doors marked “Third” and “Second”, he climbed half a rotation around the spiral stairs and finally arrived at the door engraved with the word “First”.
Standing on the landing, Yuma let out a long yet shallow breath, then knocked on the door. The heavy sound echoed off the glass walls. Soon, a hoarse voice asked “Who is it?”
“It's Ichijou. Can I speak to you for a moment?”
After a few seconds, in lieu of a reply came the sound of the locked snapping open.
Grabbing the knob and pulling the door, Yuma was greeted by a beautiful, shining full moon. The room was dimly lit by indirect lighting. The walls were made entirely of clear glass, allowing him to see the twinkling stars in the night sky outside.
Five years ago, Kozushima had suffered a myocardial infarction that left him with with heart problems, so he rarely left the First room. He stayed in the room and let Oita and Madoka take care of him. However, the damage was by no means severe, so he could still go up and down the stairs on his own. In fact, earlier that night, he had gone back and forth between the ground floor and the First room on his own.
Yuma was once again struck by how strange the Tower's design was as he gently locked the door behind him. Every time he visited the First room for Kozushima's checkup, he had a strange feeling like he was stepping into empty air.
The space was in the shape of a doughnut, wrapped around the pillar that ran through the center of the Tower. It had no partitions and was dotted with a desk, a reception area, a dining table, a bed, and various other items of furniture. On the wall next to Yuma was an ovular mirror standing at head height, beneath which was a small bookshelf.
Unlike the bookshelf beside the desk, which was filled with specialist texts on biology, biochemistry, and biophysics, this small bookshelf was filled with novels. Most of them were honkaku mystery novels published during the shin honkaku movement, a time from the late 1980s to the early 1990s when young Japanese mystery authors were debuting and releasing masterpieces one after another.
“It's good to see you, Mr. Kozushima.”
Yuma called out to Kozushima Tarou, the owner of the Glass Tower. Kozushima stepped around the desk he was standing in front of and sat down in a leather chair with his back to Yuma. On display next to the desk was a scale model of the Glass Tower, about twice the size of the one in the game room.
“What brings you up here, doctor? It isn't even nine o'clock yet. I told you all the event wouldn't start until ten.”
“I was just wondering how you were feeling.”
Yuma tightened up his throat so his voice wouldn't tremble.
“How I'm feeling? I feel great. Just thinking about the show I'm about to put on gets my blood pumping.”
Kozushima turned his chair around to face Yuma. In the dim light, the sparkle in his eyes was blinding, and he smiled until his canines were visible, like a wild animal bearing its fangs. His long, thick hair was white to the point of almost being silver, and his beard reached down to his chest, looking almost like a lion's mane.
“You shouldn't get so excited. Your blood pressure will rise, straining your heart.”
Overwhelmed by Kozushima's enthusiasm that made it hard to believe the man was in his seventies, Yuma spoke softly. Five years ago, Kozushima had suffered a heart attack requiring coronary artery bypass surgery. As his personal physician, Yuma had been charged with giving Kozushima regular check ups and adjusting his blood pressure and anticoagulant medications to ensure it didn't happen again.
“I'm not worried about that. I've been waiting for tonight's event for a long time.”
Kozushima reached for a box of chocolates on his desk, picked up a truffle, and popped it into his mouth. There were several cigarette butts in the glass ashtray.
“I've told you so many times to avoid sweets and fatty foods as much as possible. And now you're even smoking?”
“Relax, will you? Today is special.”
As Kozushima licked the chocolate from his fingertips, Yuma slowly moved his eyes to the desk. Inside a small, elegantly carved glass case was the key engraved “First”. Kozushima was in the habit of keeping the key in that box whenever he was in the room.
Just as planned. Having confirmed he'd cleared the first hurdle to his plan, Yuma spoke.
“You certainly invited some unique guests. A police detective, a mystery novelist, a psychic, and even a great detective.”
“Actually, I originally wanted to invite another doctor.”
“A doctor? Other than myself?”
“I hear there's a certain female doctor at a hospital in Tokyo who's been solving one mystery after another. I believe she works at Tenikai General Hospital. But she turned me down, saying she was busy with another case. How unfortunate.”
Kozushima shook his head in deep regret.
“Well, you were able to get a great detective to participate, so it all worked out. But if that woman had been there, I wouldn't have been needed for tonight's event.”
“What are you saying, doctor? You have an important role to play.”
“Indeed. I have no intention of handing responsibility for your health over to another doctor.”
“I am grateful to you. It's hard to find a doctor who will agree to make regular trips out here in the mountains.”
“I'm the one who's grateful. I'm making so much money, even though I only see one patient three times a week, twice if I'm lucky. I can't work full-time, so I don't know what I would have done without you.”
“It must be hard, caring for your family.”
“...It is.”
The image of a girl sitting in a wheelchair flashed through his mind. Yuma forced the smile to remain on his face.
“By the way, Mr. Kozushima. What is that important announcement you've prepared?”
“There's no way I can tell you that now. Not after all the preparations.”
Yuma scratched his head and said “I thought so.” He hadn't expected to learn here. He just needed to continue the conversation so Kozushima didn't become suspicious. He needed to hand “it” over to Kozushima as naturally as possible.
“But...”
Kozushima licked his lips. He looked like a snake tasting the air.
“If it's you, doctor, I don't mind sharing the outline. Consider it a payment for all you've done for me.”
“The outline?”
When Yuma repeated him, Kozushima leaned forward and lowered his voice,
“I've gotten my hands on an unpublished novel.”
“You mean you found an author's posthumous work?”
Yuma couldn't keep himself from shouting. It wasn't uncommon for unpublished manuscripts to be found after their authors' deaths. If the author had been famous, the value of their posthumous work could be immeasurable.
“If you're interested in it, Mr. Kozushima, it must be a mystery. Who is the author? Is it Japanese? Or a foreign work?”
Yuma spoke rapidly, his curiosity as a mystery fan ignited.
“You'll have to wait for that. I'll just say it's a work by an extremely famous person whose work everyone knows.”
If an unpublished work had fallen into someone else's hands, it was safe to assume that the author had already passed on. So who could it be? Edogawa Rampo, Yokomizo Seishi, Ayukawa Tetsuya, Matsumoto Seicho, John Dickson Carr, Ellery Queen... The names of many famous authors ran through his head.
“If it's made public, it will completely overturn the history of mystery novels. I'm sure it will become news worldwide.”
Completely overturn the history of the genre? Could it have been a posthumous work of one of the legendary mystery writers like Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, or Edgar Allan Poe?
“It was hard... It was extremely hard...”
Kozushima's eyes darted to the ceiling.
“Tonight, I'm going to make the big announcement, then have it published. That's why I invited Mr. Sakyo, the editor-in-chief of a mystery magazine.”
“I see. A work only has value if people can read it. But you decided to use it for some entertainment first.”
Kozushima smiled, as innocent as a schoolboy.
“The work is a fair play mystery. All of the clues necessary to find the truth are included, and if you think about it logically, you can identify the culprit.”
“I see, it's the sort of book that comes with a Challenge to the Reader.”
“Exactly. That's why for the event, I'm going to reveal the part before the solution, then have the guests take their own stab at solving it.”
“I see. A mystery novelist, a policeman, a psychic, and a great detective. It's the perfect lineup to solve a mystery. So what will the prize be for the one who gets it right?”
“Gets it right?” Kozushima let out a sly chuckle. “Nobody will get it right. I've read it many times already, and I tell you, the tricks in this book are works of art. Nobody will be able to see through them.”
“If it's such an impossible mystery that no one can solve it, why are you letting them try?”
“For the publicity. It's such an incredible mystery that even that murderers' row of murder solvers couldn't crack it. If that story is presented to the media, all of Japan, no, the entire world will listen. And my name will spread as the publisher.”
“You don't need to do that, Mr. Kozushima. Your name is already world famous. You invented the TRIDENT.”
As soon as Yuma said that, the smile on Kozushima's face disappeared like the tide going out.
“The TRIDENT...”
Kozushima muttered to himself and touched the object on the desk. A conical piece of glass, about twenty centimeters tall sitting upright. A light installed in the tip of the spike gently illuminated a model of a DNA helix floating in the oil which filled the object.
The TRIDENT was a groundbreaking invention developed by Kozushima which had completely altered the course of gene therapy.
During his time at the university, Kozushima had worked in partnership with a pharmaceutical company to develop a new drug delivery system, which could deliver a specifically chosen amount of medicine to a specifically chosen body part over a specific duration of time. And, about ten years ago, that drug delivery system had developed into the TRIDENT.
By making minute alterations to the molecular structure of the tip of the cone of nano-material, the TRIDENT could bind to the receptors of different types of cells and inject DNA directly into their nuclei. As a result, gene therapy had been advanced by decades, fundamentally changing the way cancer and many diseases previously thought incurable were treated.
Kozushima was instantly a leading candidate for the Nobel Prize, and the device's patent made him several billion yen per year. It was thanks to the wealth generated by the TRIDENT that he'd been able to build this glass museum and fill it with a valuable collection of mystery paraphernalia collected from around the world.
“It's true that I gained fame and fortune through the TRIDENT, but that couldn't fulfill my heart. I desperately threw myself into further research, chasing even greater fame, but a towering wall stood before me.”
“A wall?”
“Ethics. The wall of modern ethics. Tell me, Dr. Ichijou, who in this world was responsible for the most advancements in medicine?”
“Advancements in medicine? ...I'd say Alexander Fleming.”
“Wrong. It was the Nazis.”
Yuma's face stiffened.
“Oh, don't make that face. You're a doctor. You know how much the Third Reich contributed to the development of medicine. They weren't bound by any sense of ethics, and they didn't hesitate to carry out any inhumane experiments they saw the need for. It was the Nazis who made the greatest advances in medical science in the shortest amount of time.”
Kozushima took a deep breath and touched the object in front of him.
“I'm disappointed. Science bound by ethics is like a man bound in shackles. Or perhaps it's me who never had any interest in science to begin with. Why do you think I built the Glass Tower?”
Kozushima stood up and approached the model of the Glass Tower next to the desk.
Located at the top of the tower, the display room was covered in a conical glass dome and served as the exhibition room for the Kozushima Collection. Directly beneath was the First room, where Yuma and Kozushima were talking, completely surrounded by clear glass. Further down, the Second through Tenth rooms ran in a spiral.
The exterior walls, with only the exceptions of the rooms' windows, were covered in smooth wine-red glass, and on the first floor, only the dining room and the game room had clear glass windows. The base of the model recreated the ground outside, covered in pure white snow and surrounded by forest.
“It's a good model. The craftsman added a beautiful covering of stained glass over the template.”
Kozushima picked up the TRIDENT on the desk and placed it on the model's snowy field. The Glass Tower and the TRIDENT were almost alike in shape and color, looking like a parent and child.
“Didn't you build this tower in the shape of a TRIDENT to preserve knowledge of its design for future generations?”
What Yuma actually thought was that it was a rotten monument to Kozushima's twisted vanity. An opinion shared by most people, he assumed.
“Well, you aren't wrong. I did have this tower made as a perfect replica of the TRIDENT, down to the tiniest detail. Do you know what my father did for a living?”
“I believe he was a glassmaker,” Yuma replied, recalling something he'd heard in a previous conversation.
“Yes, he was. Not a skilled one, mind you. I grew up poor. But my father forced me to study hard. He said we were poor because he had no education. He told me to study until I vomited blood, and earn lots of money. Whenever he caught me playing, he'd beat me until my own mother couldn't recognize me.”
Not knowing how to respond to Kozushima's dry chuckle, Yuma just nodded.
“I did as my father told me. I made a living through good studies, and made more money than I could ever spend. I wanted to show the world that even the son of an uneducated glassmaker could rise above his station, so I spent a lot of money constructing this Glass Tower. Until recently, that was what I believed, but I've since realized the truth.”
“What's the truth?”
“I've always liked mysteries, especially Edogawa Rampo. But when I was a child, Rampo was considered a vulgar author of grotesquerie, and people looked down on me for reading them.”
“I've heard that was the case.”
“Of course, my father didn't approve of me reading Rampo, either. Whenever he caught me, he'd tie me to a tree overnight. But I kept reading. Akechi Kogoro, Sherlock Holmes, and Hercule Poirot. The world of mysteries was the only place where I could escape that harsh reality. I was especially draw to the high-brow intellectual games the people call honkaku.”
Kozushima was getting more and more energized.
“Even after I became a medical researcher, I would read whenever I was feeling down. But during the heyday of Matsumoto Seicho and the social school, honkaku mystery lost its power in Japan. I thank God I lived long enough to see the 1980s, when Shimada Soji finally threw more fuel on the fire that Yokomizo Seishi, Takagi Akimitsu, and Ayukawa Tetsuya had barely kept burning. Then The Decagon House Murders was released, and the fire lit the grand fireworks display known as the shin honkaku movement. The joy seeing new masterpieces of mystery released on a near monthly basis brought me is what allowed me to succeed as a scientist. That is why I built the Glass Tower and began to live here.”
“That's why?”
“When you first saw this strange building, what did you think?”
Kozushima pointed to the model of the Glass Tower.
“I thought it would make a good setting for a mystery novel...”
Yuma hesitated to answer, but Kozushima nodded approvingly.
“Exactly. It's like the setting of a closed circle honkaku mystery. Living here makes me feel like I live in a fictional world. Spending my time in a mystery mansion, surrounded by mysteries. This is my ideal life.”
Kozushima carelessly tossed the TRIDENT back on the desk.
“Fame in the field of biology means nothing to me. I don't care about the Nobel Prize. I want to be Ayatsuji Yukito, not Watson or Crick.”
Rather than the two scientists who'd discovered the double helix structure of DNA, the greatest biological discovery of the twentieth century, he wanted to be the leading figure in the world of mystery whose 1987 book The Decagon House Murders had sparked a new literary movement. They were words that overflowed with love for mystery.
Yuma took a glance at the small bookshelf leaned against the wall. Lined up right on the top shelf were eleven novels with titles fitting the pattern of The **** House Murders, from The Decagon House Murders to The Strange Masks House Murders.
Come to think of it, the bookshelf in the Fourth room where Yuma was staying had been arranged the same way. As he thought back, Kozushima spread his arms wide.
“And tonight, that dream will come true. By publishing that work, my name will be forever a part of the history of mystery novels.”
Discovering an unpublished work left behind by a famous author and sharing it with the world. Surely, that was an achievement that would be talked about for a long time to come.
“I'm looking forward to seeing whose work it is and what it's like.”
“Please do. I'm planning to have you participate in the deduction battle as well.”
“I can't wait.”
Yuma meant that. If it was possible, he would like to participate in that wonderful event, and try his hand at solving the valuable work. But to do that, he had to convince Kozushima regarding “the issue”.
“Come to think of it... The verdict is coming up soon, isn't it?”
Yuma asked casually, hoping Kozushima didn't realize his intentions.
“The verdict?”, Kozushima whispered. The smile had vanished from his face.
“In the lawsuit to stop Shiota Pharmaceuticals from releasing that new drug. I think it's next month.”
“Yes, I suppose it is.”
Kozushima mumbled something disinterested and scratched the tip of his nose.
“Are you really planning to see it through?”
“Of course. They infringed upon my patent.”
After Kozushima spat those irritated words, Yuma leaned forward.
“But there are a lot of patients out there looking forward to the release of that drug... ALS patients.”
ALS. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. In the United States, it was also called Lou Gehrig's disease. An incurable disease that caused the muscles throughout the entire body to atrophy, and fundamentally, there was still no treatment. As the symptoms progressed, the patient's muscles weakened until they lost the ability to walk, then lost the ability to sit, then finally even the muscles that allowed them to breathe withered away. When that happened, the only way to save the patient's life was to cut open their trachea, insert a tube into their neck, and connect it to an artificial ventilator.
However, once use of the artificial ventilator began, nobody could stop it. Stopping artificial respiration would end the patient's life, and under Japanese law, that was considered murder.
The patient could live for years or even decades longer, their life functions supported by machines, unable to move anything but their eyes. Patients with advanced stage ALS and their families were forced to make an agonizingly painful choice: Let their life come to an end when the time came and they could no longer breathe, or keep on living, even if it meant being plugged into a machine and completely paralyzed.
However, two years ago, there had been a ray of hope. Shiota Pharmaceuticals, the largest pharmaceutical company in Japan, developed a new gene therapy treatment for ALS. The treatment, which delivered DNA to the lateral column of the spinal cord and restored the gene that caused the disease to normal, showed dramatic results in clinical trials. The administration of the treatment consistently managed to almost completely stop the progression of ALS symptoms.
In response to the results of the clinical trials, Shiota Pharmaceuticals applied for approval at the Ministry of Health, Labor, and Welfare. But Kozushima put a stop to that.
Kozushima filed a lawsuit seeking an injunction against the approval, claiming the technology developed by Shiota Pharmaceuticals to deliver the DNA into the spinal cells infringed upon the patent for the TRIDENT. Following extensive deliberation, it was determined that part of the treatment system did infringe upon the patent, and Shiota Pharmaceuticals offered Kozushima a large settlement to have the injunction dismissed. However, Kozushima refused, and the trial was still ongoing.
“It's a groundbreaking new procedure. If it's approved, it will help hundreds of thousands of ALS patients all around the world.”
Kozushima looked at Yuma, who was leaning over the desk and pleading with him, and waved him off like a fly.
“That has nothing to do with me.”
“Nothing... to do with you...?”
“Yeah. It doesn't bother me if some people I don't know die. That treatment stole technology I worked hard to invent. It should be erased from this world.”
“Shiota Pharmaceuticals didn't steal it. They just coincidentally came up with a similar approach to sending DNA into cells-”
“Oh, stop.” Kozushima shook his head in frustration. “I've heard that story so many times, I'm sick of it. That doesn't matter. I just don't like that company.”
“But Shiota Pharmaceuticals offered you so much money.”
“Money?” Kozushima glared at Yuma. “You think this is about money? I have money. They think they can just slap anyone who stands against them with a wad of bills, and they'll shut up and obediently obey their every command.”
“That isn't true. Shiota Pharmaceuticals was genuinely trying to make things right. And on top of that, they're also saving patients with ALS-”
“Shut up!”
Yuma shrank back when Kozushima suddenly screamed at him.
“I don't care about rightness, or justice, or any worldly things like that. I told you, I've chosen to live in this tower, in the world of mystery.”
“...I'm sorry.”
Yuma straightened up from the desk. The center of his heart had turned cold.
That was the sort of man Kozushima was. He only thought about his own interests, and had absolutely no sense of compassion. Yuma had known that from the beginning. Why had he been expecting any different? A dry chuckle escaped from within him.
Maybe he'd felt some pity for him after hearing about his childhood. Or maybe he'd sympathized with him as a fellow lover of mystery. He'd been a fool. He'd known from the beginning how this conversation would end.
He had to erase Kozushima Tarou from this world.
“You've completely ruined my mood. Get out of my room, now.”
Kozushima clicked his tongue and pointed to the door.
“I understand. There's just one more thing I need to do.”
Yuma spoke in monotone and pulled a brown pill case from his jacket pocket.
Yuma opened the lid, retrieved a small capsule, and handed it to Kozushima.
“Just to be safe, please take this medicine.”
“What's this?” Kozushima closely scrutinized the capsule between his fingertips.
“It's a short-acting antihypertensive drug. It will keep your blood pressure from spiking if you get excited at tonight's event.”
Yuma looked Kozushima straight in the eyes. He was prepared to force the pill down his throat if he refused.
Before today, every time Yuma had examined Kozushima, his butler Oita had been by his side, watching over them. Tonight, while Oita was downstairs entertaining the guests, was Yuma's only chance to be alone with Kozushima.
“Do I really need to take this?”
“If you don't want to have another heart attack, take it.”
Yuma gave the order in an emotionless voice, and Kozushima, sulking like a child, popped the capsule in his mouth and swallowed it with some cognac from his glass.
“Is this okay?”
“Yes, it's fine. It's completely fine...”
Yuma's face finally relaxed, and he continued.
“By the way, Mr. Kozushima, do you remember when you showed me your latest addition to the Collection last month? It was powdered pufferfish liver.”
“Of course I remember. Why?”
“That was the same poison used in Mr. Kuruma's masterpiece, Infinite Locked Rooms, remember? But even if it was just for a mystery museum, managing to get a hold of real poison is impressive. As expected of one of the world's leading collectors. I'm truly impressed.”
“What are you saying?”
Kozushima frowned, then, he suddenly groaned “UUUGH!?” and put his hand to his throat.
“Seems like it's working. I expected it to take a bit longer, but I guess I gave you quite a lot.”
“'It's working'? What are you talking about?” Kozushima managed to force through his agony.
“The pufferfish liver. That capsule you just swallowed was full of deadly poison. I'm sorry I took it without permission, but now I've returned it, so everything worked out in the end.”
Kozushima's eyes were so wide they looked like they'd pop, and as he extended one trembling hand to Yuma, he begged.
“The antidote...”
“Unfortunately, there is no antidote for pufferfish poison.”
Yuma told him coldly, and Kozushima collapsed against the desk.
“Why... Why would you do something like this...?”
“I told you I was taking care of my family. Did you think I meant my parents or grandparents? No. They're already dead. My only family is my younger sister, much younger than me... who has ALS.”
Kozushima was able to gasp even through his tightening diaphragm.
“She first developed symptoms two years ago. By the beginning of last year, she was no longer able to walk. It progressed quickly, and if it wasn't treated, she'd probably have needed artificial respiration within the year. That was when we learned about Shiota Pharmaceuticals' clinical trial.”
Yuma bent over and brought his face up to Kozushima's.
“Shiota Pharmaceuticals' new treatment was extremely effective. As soon as she began the clinical trial, the progression of her disease completely stopped. For over a year, she's been able to maintain her muscular strength. There's even a chance that, with rehabilitation, she'll be able to walk again. But if that treatment isn't approved and she's no longer able to receive it, her respiratory muscles will be paralyzed within a year. You understand now, don't you? Why I did this?”
Six months ago, when he'd heard from an acquaintance that Kozushima was looking for a personal physician, Yuma made up his mind. If it was for his sister's sake, he would take on any sin.
“If you... do... this... you'll be... arrested.”
Kozushima's voice came in fits and starts. He was losing feeling in his tongue.
“No, I won't. There won't even be a crime. Your cause of death will be recorded as natural causes within a locked room.”
Yuma picked up the First key from its glass case.
“After you're dead, I'll leave this room, lock up behind me, and return to the game room. When you don't come down at ten and don't respond to our summons, there will be a big commotion, and I'll unlock the door with the master key. While everyone else is distracted staring at your corpse, I'll gently toss this key on the floor. It will land right where it would have been if you'd knocked the case off your desk with your final agonized spasms.”
Yuma put the key in his jacket pocket and casually brushed the glass case off the desk. It fell onto the carpeted floor and rolled along.
“Afterwards, I will examine your body myself and tell everyone you had a heart attack. If I, as a doctor, declare your death the result of illness, it won't be considered a crime. The police won't be called. An autopsy won't be performed. You'll be cremated, and all evidence of the crime will disappear forever.”
As Yuma explained, Kozushima's body, sitting in the chair, listed to the side like a slow-moving shipwreck.
“You can't even sit up anymore. Tetrodotoxin, the poison in pufferfish, acts on the nerves to paralyze every muscle in the body, eventually killing by suffocation when the respiratory muscles all stop working. It's similar to the symptoms of ALS. What you're experiencing is a momentary recreation of the pain suffered by every ALS patient. I'm sure you can understand now why so many people are desperate to get Shiota Pharmaceuticals' new treatment.”
Kozushima glared at Yuma.
“You... bast...”
“I'm happy for you, Mr. Kozushima. It's a locked room murder. Right out of the world of mystery. You're going to become a figure out of that world, just like you always wanted. It's just too bad you had to cast yourself as the victim.”
Kozushima was no longer able to speak, just letting out heavy breaths with a pale face. Seeing him like that, Yuma couldn't even enjoy himself anymore.
Kozushima's death would end the lawsuit keeping the new treatment from being approved. As a result, many ALS patients would be saved. But that didn't justify what he'd done.
Even if it was to save his sister's life, Yuma had committed murder. The ultimate taboo. Normally, he would have been prepared to face the consequences he'd earned. But...
“I can never let myself be caught for this...”
Yuma clenched his fists. If he was arrested, his sister would be left alone in the world, and forced to bear the cross of being “the family of a murderer.”
“I really am sorry, Mr. Kozushima.”
The moment he spoke what he knew perfectly well was a selfish, self-serving apology, Kozushima reached out with both hands for the phone on the desk, and grabbed the receiver.
Yuma's eyes shot open. That was an internal line to the cell phone that the butler, Oita, always carried with him.
Yuma panicked and jumped onto the desk to try and grab the receiver. But like a mother protecting her baby, Kozushima clutched it with strength that shouldn't have been coming from a dying man and never let go.
“Master, what's the matter?”
Oita's voice came from the receiver.
Kozushima, struggling to breathe, was barely able to squeeze out
“Help... please...”
“Master!? Master, are you okay?”
As Oita's frantic voice rang through the speaker, Yuma snatched the receiver out of Kozushima's hands.
“I'll be right there! Please, wait for me!”
With that, the line cut off. The receiver fell from Yuma's hand.
Oita was coming. No, after hearing the way he cried out, there was a chance everyone in the game room was coming.
He had to get away. He had to get out of that room, now. Yuma kicked off the floor and sprinted for the door, opening it and leaving the room. Just as he was about to run down the stairs, his body froze and started shaking.
Kozushima still wasn't dead. If Oita and the others arrived now, Kozushima could tell them what had happened. He had to buy time until Kozushima died.
Yuma took the First Key from his jacket pocket and tried to fit it into the keyhole. But his hands were shaking and he couldn't make it go in. After a few seconds, he was finally able to insert the key into the door, turn his wrist, and start running down the stairs.
His legs stumbled over themselves and he nearly tripped as he reached the landing where the door to the Fifth room was, but then his entire body froze. There were footsteps coming from below. Not just one or two, either; it sounded like everyone in the game room was running up the stairs.
Should he turn back? If he passed the First room and went up the stairs there, he could go to the display room where the Kozushima Collection was on display. The door there could be opened by any of the keys to the First through Tenth rooms. If he hid up there...
It wouldn't work. Yuma vigorously shook his head. Oita and the guests would probably try to open the door to the First room once they arrived on the landing. Right now, they were probably all confused and hadn't noticed his absence, but while they were all gathered on the landing waiting for the door to be opened, they would definitely notice. After all, there were both a police detective and a great detective among the guests.
What should he do? What should he do? Just as it felt like his brain was about to short circuit from nerves, he was struck by an idea. Shuddering like electricity was coursing through him, Yuma turned around and started back up the stairs. He was driven up the stairs by the sound of footsteps he heard behind him, and when he arrived in front of the Fourth room where he was staying, he took out the Fourth key and opened the door.
Yuma slid into the room and leaned against the closed door, breathing heavily. The sound of Oita and the guests' footsteps reverberated against his back through the metal door. With his back to the door, Yuma slid down to the floor.
Somehow, he'd done it. He'd committed the perfect crime.
No. Not yet. Yuma realized he'd been sitting with his head slumped over, and it snapped back up. He wasn't finished yet. He had to rejoin the group as they opened the First room without being noticed.
He put his ear to the cool, icy door. He could no longer hear footsteps.
He stood up and carefully opened the door, peering out into the stairwell. There wasn't a soul in sight. It looked like everyone had already passed.
Yuma quickly stepped out of the room and jogged up the stairs. “Master! Master!” he heard Oita shouting from above. After passing the Third room and going up a bit further, he saw Madoka's thin back in her maid uniform. Beyond her, Kuruma was gazing up the stairs with a grim expression. Several people were lined up on the narrow staircase like they were standing in a queue.
“How is it, Ms. Tomoe?”
Approaching Madoka, standing on the landing of the Second room, Yuma asked in a natural voice that wouldn't have raised any suspicion.
“Ah, Dr. Ichijou. The door isn't opening.”
There was a heavy knock on the door, and Oita's distressed cry of “Master!” echoed off the glass walls.
“Mr. Oita, don't you have a key to this door?” asked a man's voice. It was probably Sakyo, the editor.
“Master has the only key. Well, there is a master key in the key cabinet by the fireplace in the game room.”
“I'll go get it!”
This time, it was Sakaizumi's voice. Sakaizumi said “Excuse me, excuse me,” as he passed Yuma. Yuma watched him disappear around the corner, and the moment he turned back, his entire body went tense.
Aoi Tsukiyo, who was standing in front of Kuruma, had turned her head to stare at Yuma.
“Um... Is something the matter, Ms. Aoi?”
Yuma asked in a hoarse voice, and the great detective narrowed her eyes and said
“Nothing. Nothing at all.”
Before turning back away.
Had she noticed something? Had he made a mistake without realizing? Yuma put a hand to his chest. He could feel his rapid heartbeat against his palm.
After a few minutes, an out of breath Sakaizumi returned, holding the key and shouting “I found it!” as he passed Yuma and the others. Soon, there was the click of the lock being unlocked. The line finally started to move.
Please be dead. Please be dead.
Yuma desperately prayed as he climbed the stairs and entered the First room. The sight he saw within left him speechless.
The model of the Glass Tower next to the desk had fallen over. The colored glass of the exterior walls had shattered and spread across the floor. And for some reason, the paper base of the model was bent at the center and somewhat torn, as though it had been forcibly twisted.
“Master! Are you okay!? Master!”
The pained cry rang out. Oita was desperately shaking Kozushima's body where it lay in front of the desk.
If Kozushima was still breathing, that was it. Yuma would be identified as the culprit and arrested. Nerves buzzing, the doctor walked further into the room alongside the other guests and stood before Kozushima.
“Tomoe, call an ambulance, quickly!” Oita shouted as he looked up.
As Madoka hurried to reach for the phone on the desk, a raspy voice yelled “Stop!”
Madoka started, and her elbow hit the glass ashtray. The ashtray fell off the desk, scattering ashes across the carpet. Kagami clicked his tongue at the sight. Oita lashed out at him.
“Why are you stopping us, Mr. Kagami? At this rate, the master will...”
“How long will it take for an ambulance to get from the city out here?”
Kagami looked down at the motionless form of Kozushima. Oita said “That's...”, clearly at a loss.
“It's too late now. He's dead. I can tell you that. I've seen hundreds of stiffs before.”
As everyone stared at Kagami's frowning face, Yuma placed his hand in his jacket pocket and slipped the First key into his palm. He withdrew it hidden in a balled fist, let his arm hang lip, and gently opened his hand. The key fell noiselessly to the carpet.
“That... Why...?”
Oita clung to Kozushima's body, his shoulders shaking. Yuma moistened his dry mouth, then opened it.
“It was probably another myocardial infarction. Mr. Kozushima had already suffered one heart attack bad enough to require surgery.”
“But why did it have to happen today of all days? He had been looking forward to tonight's event for so long.”
“It was because it was today. He was excited that the event he'd been looking forward to had finally come, which rose his blood pressure and strained his blood vessels.”
Yuma stepped forward.
“I'll confirm the cause of death, if you don't mind.”
If he could declare the cause of death in his official capacity as a doctor, Kozushima's death would be recorded as natural. The perfect crime would be accomplished.
Just as Yuma was about to kneel beside Kozushima, an arm appeared in front of him.
“And just how can you be so sure it was a heart attack?”
Kagami stood before Yuma with arms outstretched, glaring at him. Yuma's heart roared in his ears.
“No, it's just... Mr. Kozushima had a chronic heart condition...”
“Even if that's true, I don't see how we can say that's what killed him without a full autopsy.”
Under the pressure of his gaze, which felt like it contained more murderous intent than Yuma ever had, he could only stutter “I-I-I...”
“Kozushima told us he had some important announcement to make. For him to suddenly bite it right beforehand is too much of a coincidence. Maybe that announcement was something someone didn't want known, like a criminal accusation.”
Kagami kept going, lowering his voice conspiratorially.
“If that's the case, someone might have wanted to shut Kozushima's mouth... permanently.”
“You mean to say Mr. Kozushima was murdered? So, the reason he called me was because he wanted the accusation to be published in a magazine?”
Sakyo's voice was high, strained by the smell of a scoop.
“Don't get ahead of yourself. I'm not saying that's what happened. But since it's possible, we need to report this.”
“Report it... To the police...?”
Yuma's voice trailed off.
“Of course. This could be a murder. First, we'll have a forensics team thoroughly examine this room. If, afterwards, we think there's any possibility of foul play, we'll have the body autopsied.”
If an autopsy was performed, it would reveal that Kozushima was poisoned. No matter what happened, Yuma had to stop that.
“If the autopsy shows any signs of injury, this will officially become a murder investigation. An investigation headquarters will be set up at the local police station...”
As Yuma listened to Kagami's story, he stole a glance at the First key where it had fallen on the floor. Kagami suspected that Kozushima had been murdered through direct bodily violence. That being the case, if the others realized that this was a locked room, he'd be able to convince them that no crime had been committed.
Please, notice it. Someone please notice the key. As Yuma gave that desperate prayer, Kuruma spoke.
“But the door was locked. If Kozushima was killed, wouldn't that mean the culprit is still in this room?”
Tension spread through them.
“The culprit!?” shouted Sakaizumi, looking around.
“There shouldn't be anyone in the Tower except for those of us gathered here,” said Oita, brow furrowed in puzzlement.
“That isn't necessarily the case. Someone could have snuck in without us seeing. Give me a minute.”
Kagami began to carefully search the room. After spending a few dozen seconds circling the doughnut-shaped room, Kagami returned and scratched his head.
“I checked in the bathroom and under the bed, but no one's hiding in here. So, the culprit killed Kozushima, then locked the door behind himself.”
“Wait, we haven't established that Mr. Kozushima was murdered yet.”
When Yuma protested, Kagami frowned and said “Assuming he was.” At that moment, Madoka gasped.
“The key. The key is still in the room.”
Madoka saw the key Yuma dropped earlier and went to pick it up.
“Don't touch that!”
Kagami's enraged voice reverberated through the room, making Madoka shrink back.
“I just told you this might be a crime scene. Don't touch anything!”
“I'm sorry.”
Kagami strode up to Madoka, who apologized with a pale face, and crouched down to look at the fallen key.
“It has 'First' engraved on it, so it must be the key to this room.”
“That is the First key. The master always kept it in that glass case there.”
Oita pointed to the case lying on the carpet.
“I see. So the key fell here when he knocked the case off the desk with his final struggles.”
Kagami scratched his scruffy chin and turned to Oita.
“How many keys to this room are there?”
“Only one. There is only one key to each room in the Tower. The First key was always kept in the master's possession. He was a sensitive man, so he always kept the door to the First room locked, regardless of whether or not he was inside.”
“So then, did someone make a copy?”
“That isn't possible. The keys to the Tower are specially made. They each contain a special IC chip, so there's no way to make a copy without requesting it directly from the manufacturer. And if a request for a duplicate key is made, the contract stipulates that the master must be contacted and personally okay its creation. The only things on this Earth that can open the door to this room are the key lying there and the master key. If you have any doubts, please contact the company.”
“Oh, I was gonna do that anyway,” Kagami said, sounding disinterested.
Kuruma stepped forward.
“If this key was in the room and the master key was kept in the key cabinet in the game room, that means this was a locked room when Kozushima died.”
“What do you mean, a locked room?” Kagami turned and glared at Kuruma. “There's a dead body here. This isn't one of your shitty mystery novels. Get out of my way.”
“Mystery novels aren't shitty!”
There was no way to say the word “shitty” with dignity, but somehow, she pulled it off. Tsukiyo spoke for the first time since the body was discovered, fixing Kagami with a knife-edge stare.
“Mystery novels are sophisticated intellectual puzzles where the author and reader match wits against one another. It's a traditional art form with over a hundred years of history since Edgar Allan Poe published The Murders in the Rue Morgue. These works, where plot twists are carefully woven together to create beautiful mysteries, are art in its truest form.”
Kagami, who had been staring slack-jawed jawed at Tsukiyo as she passionately ranted about mystery theory, recentered himself and straightened his back.
“Well, at any rate, since it's still unclear what happened, it's only natural to do a thorough investigation.”
In the end, there was no way they wouldn't report a dead body. As Yuma sank into despair, Yumeyomi Suishou stepped past him, sending the frills on her dress swaying, and held her hand over Kozushima's face.
“What are you doing?”
“I'm reading Mr. Kozushima's residual thought energy. I sense a strong aura of anger from his body. Probably at an unjust death. As you say, it's highly likely that Mr. Kozushima's life was stolen by someone.”
“I'm not interested in the occult. Just don't touch anything until forensics gets here.”
When Kagami pushed Yumeyomi away by the shoulder and her overly made-up face frowned, the room was filled by the sound of a click. When they turned to face it, everyone saw Tsukiyo holding her smartphone in front of the fallen model of the Glass Tower.
“I told you not to touch anything!”
“I didn't touch anything. I just took a picture.”
Hearing Tsukiyo say that with a straight face, Kagami approached her.
“What's an amateur like you going to do with a picture?”
“I'm not an amateur, I'm a great detective. And look...”
Tsukiyo pointed to the fallen model.
“There's something interesting written there.”
“Something interesting?”
Kagami frowned and looked down. Yuma and the others also approached the model.
The twisted base of the Glass Tower stood out. A single letter had been written in thick brown lines on the snowy white ground.
“...Y?”
Sakaizumi whispered. It was thoroughly crumpled, but it did look like a capital Y.
“What is this?”
Kagami muttered it to himself, but Tsukiyo was happy to answer.
“It must be a dying message.”
“A dying... What?”
“You don't know what a dying message is?”
Tsukiyo cried out in surprise, then dramatically shook her head like an actor in a broad slapstick comedy.
“I can't believe a detective is so ignorant about mysteries. A dying message is a message left by the victim of a crime in the final moments of their life to convey some important information about the crime, like the culprit's name.”
“The culprit's name? So you mean the culprit is someone with a Y in their name? Among you all...”
Kagami looked around at those gathered in the room, then pointed at Yumeyomi's face.
“It's you. Your initial is Y.”
Yuma, whose initial was also Y, went stiff. Was that letter an accusation against him?
“What are you saying, detective? I haven't done anything!”
“Then what is this Y supposed to mean?”
Yumeyomi and Kagami yelled at each other until Tsukiyo admonished them.
“Let's not get ahead of ourselves. To begin with, we don't even know for sure that that letter is really a Y. Dying messages are usually left in some sort of code that isn't easy to understand.”
“A code? Why would they do that? Just write down the culprit's name.”
“If they did that, the culprit would just erase it. That's why they need to make a complicated code so the culprit won't know what it means. That's the basis of a dying message story.”
“Will you stop messing around!?” Kagami shouted, waving his hand at her. “I told you, this isn't a mystery story, this is real life! Do you actually believe a dying person would be able to think of some code?”
“I agree, a normal person wouldn't be able to do that.”
Tsukiyo stopped talking and raised her index finger in front of her face.
“But Mr. Kozushima wasn't 'a normal person'. He was one of Japan's leading mystery buffs.”
Kagami choked on air.
“Mr. Kozushima had a love of mysteries some would describe as obsessive. It wouldn't be surprising if a man like him was able to quickly think of a message even as he lay on the verge of death.”
“...That's a load of crap. There's no way something like that could happen in reality.”
Kagami spat the words, but Yuma could hear the confidence leave his voice.
“You may very well be right. But until we prove it isn't possible, don't you think we need to at least consider it? When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. That's a famous quote from Sherlock Holmes.”
Kagami glanced at Tsukiyo, who stood wagging her index finger side to side, and silently set his face in a grim mask.
“I'll take some more pictures then.”
Tsukiyo turned back to the model of the Glass Tower and resumed taking pictures with her phone. Kagami called out “Hey!”, but it only reached her slender back.
“Even if all that's true, investigating the crime scene is forensics's job. We can't let amateurs mess with it. Just get out and wait for the police to arrive.”
“I know. I'm not touching anything. I'm just taking pictures.”
Tsukiyo turned her head to him and brushed her hair back in annoyance.
“You said earlier it would take a long time for an ambulance to arrive out here in the mountains. The same thing applies to the police. Even if you called right now, it would take at least an hour for the police to arrive from the city. It will be even longer before the forensics team is able to arrive and begin the investigation. Isn't that right?”
“...That's not the same thing.”
“A crime scene is like sashimi.”
Tsukiyo suddenly looked up at the ceiling.
“If you eat sashimi right away, it's so delicious it melts in your mouth, but over time it dries out, loses all its flavor, and eventually rots. Just like the evidence left at a crime scene.”
Yuma felt a chill run down his spine as he watched Tsukiyo rhapsodize about the scene. Comparing the scene of a murder to gourmet food... This great detective wasn't normal.
“So, if we can't touch it and we can't examine it, I think we should at least take pictures to look back over late. Will that be alright?”
Tsukiyo teasingly cocked her head to the side. The middle-aged detective clicked his tongue and spat “Do whatever you want.”
“Alright, then, I will.”
“But I'll be the one to photograph the body. You can take pictures of the rest of the room.”
When Kagami added that, Tsukiyo let out a childishly unhappy “Eh?”
“Obviously. I can't have you uploading pictures of a corpse to the internet.”
“I won't do that, so-”
“Shut up. Stop whining. If you've got a problem with it, I'll kick you out and take all the pictures myself.”
Tsukiyo pouted until her cheeks puffed and reluctantly went back to snapping pictures of the model. Kagami took out his own smartphone from his suit pocket and started taking pictures of Kozushima's fallen body and the area around. Surrounded by no sound but the electronic click of shutters, Yuma felt very uncomfortable.
After a few minutes, Kagami asked Tsukiyo
“Haven't you got enough?”
“Just a few more. Just a few more...” said Tsukiyo, kneeling on the floor and leaning her body this way and that to photograph the model from many different angles.
“You've got enough. Stop that right now.”
Tsukiyo pursed her lips, but she said “Okay” and put her smartphone back in her pocket.
“Alright, let's all get out of here.”
At Kagami's urging, the group trudged their way back to the entrance.
This was the worst possible situation... Yuma grit his teeth. The case was supposed to be closed as natural causes, but before he'd been able to get a word out, they'd declared it a crime. Kozushima's body would be autopsied, and the toxin screenings would surely detect the tetrodotoxin. Once a full-scale police investigation was launched, there was no way he'd be able to escape.
What should he do? What should he do...?
“Butler, how do we turn off the heating in this room? I want to lower the temperature to help preserve the body a bit.”
Oita looked miserable, but he mumbled “Yes, sir,” and pressed the button for the air conditioning on the wall. The ceiling-mounted air control unit stopped.
“You, the cook. Give me the master key.”
After everyone had left the First room and shut the door behind them, Kagami suddenly called out to Sakaizumi. Sakaizumi said “Ah, right,” and quickly handed over the master key, which was labeled “Zero”. Kagami took it and inserted it into the keyhole.
“In order to preserve the scene, this room will be sealed until the police arrive. No objections, I take it?”
When nobody said a word, Kagami's mouth turned up in a satisfied grin, and he twisted his wrist and locked the door. The clack of the lock sounded to Yuma like the sound of handcuffs being placed on his wrists.