Chapter 55: Non-Red: I Overthought It!

"Sharp-nosed viper, also known as the hundred-pace snake or five-step snake, is a highly venomous snake distributed mostly in China and northern Vietnam. It is brownish-black with markings similar to the red-banded snake." Chi Feichi looked at Heiji Hattori. "Your guess is correct. This was artificially injected with venom and disguised as a snakebite, but the culprit clearly lacks sufficient knowledge. Although it's called the five-step snake to imply that one dies within five steps, that is an exaggeration. The venom does not take effect that quickly, and the culprit injected too much. As for the means of acquiring the snake venom... no one would specially go out to buy this kind of snake venom; it is much more troublesome than buying cyanide. The only way to acquire it that I can think of is a biological research institute."

Kogoro Mouri: "..."

He could actually answer...

The ambulance and the police arrived quickly.

As Kikuhito Morizono and Akio Shigematsu were wheeled out on stretchers, a large crowd of reporters had already gathered outside the door.

"Mr. Morizono, we heard that both your son and your butler have been involved in an incident. Is this true?"

"Will your son's wedding tomorrow be canceled?"

"We heard that your son's company is suspected of bribery. Do you have anything to say? Is it related to today's incident?"

"Was this incident man-made or an accident? Is someone deliberately targeting the Morizono family?"

Camera flashes lit up the area. Juzo Megure finally managed to squeeze through the door with the police officers, closed it behind him, and let out a sigh of relief.

"I am Inspector Megure of the Metropolitan Police Department. I have already been briefed on the specific situation." Juzo Megure greeted Mikio Morizono, then cast a half-lidded glance at Kogoro Mouri. "It was this jinx, who manages to find incidents wherever he goes, who told me..."

"How can you call me a jinx? That sounds terrible," Kogoro Mouri said with a dry laugh. "You should say that incidents are summoning me, the great detective Kogoro Mouri!"

Standing at the entrance of the dining room, Chi Feichi heard this and subconsciously turned his head to look at Conan, who was running around the scene.

Indeed not a jinx, but rather a grim reaper. And not Kogoro Mouri, but rather a certain elementary school student.

Originally, the misunderstanding between Kikuhito Morizono and Akio Shigematsu had been resolved, and they had reached a consensus to cancel the wedding; nothing should have gone wrong. To think an incident still occurred anyway.

He had wanted to thank the Morizono family for their warm hospitality over the past two days, but ended up sending both the original culprit and the victim to the hospital, while also bringing a heap of trouble upon himself...

It really was a complicated feeling.

After walking over, Juzo Megure also spotted Chi Feichi standing by the dining room door. "Oh, my younger brother Chi, you're here too!"

"Inspector Megure." Chi Feichi nodded.

"You've been appearing at crime scenes quite often lately, though you still can't compare to a certain jinx." Juzo Megure glanced at Kogoro Mouri, then lowered his voice. "Still, be a bit careful. Don't get infected..."

Come to think of it, he had run into Chi Feichi at crime scenes several times recently. Although his attendance rate couldn't match Kogoro Mouri's, during the recent movie theater incident, Kogoro Mouri wasn't even there. And during the magic enthusiast incident when he first met Chi Feichi, Kogoro Mouri had only been dropping off his daughter, whereas Chi Feichi had stayed the whole time.

Every time an incident occurred and he led a team over, he always ran into familiar faces, which left him with very complicated feelings.

The former Shinichi Kudo, the current Kogoro Mouri, and now adding Chi Feichi to the mix...

He almost wanted to try detaining all these fellows to see if it would lower the crime rate in Tokyo.

"Inspector Megure..." Wataru Takagi sweatdropped and gave a low reminder. They were public servants after all; how could they be so superstitious?

"Ahem." Juzo Megure gave a dry cough, walked into the dining room while ignoring the previous topic, and asked Chi Feichi with a serious expression, "So, what is the situation now?"

Wataru Takagi also took out his notebook, preparing to take notes.

Last time, he had privately asked Juzo Megure about Chi Feichi. Following the magic enthusiast incident, the police had investigated Chi Feichi's background and confirmed whether he possessed legal capacity.

The judgment given by Aoyama Fourth Hospital was that Chi Feichi's current condition legally qualified him for limited criminal responsibility and capacity to act.

Due to his delusional symptoms, he lacked the capacity to stand trial.

As for his testimony capacity, it depended on whether Chi Feichi experienced auditory or visual hallucinations, and his capacity to serve a prison sentence would also depend on the circumstances.

For anyone else, there wouldn't be much to consider—they could just be asked to rest on the side. However, Chi Feichi's deductive and analytical abilities were quite good, and from their interactions, he showed no abnormalities and was still fairly reliable...

Chi Feichi said, "If you want to understand the situation, you should go find Mr. Mouri and Hattori."

Wataru Takagi, who was preparing to take notes: "..."

Just that laziness alone was quite exasperating...

Juzo Megure also turned his head to stare at Chi Feichi, speechless. How could a young man lack motivation to this degree?

"I am involved in this incident," Chi Feichi explained.

"Oh?" Juzo Megure was somewhat surprised. However, not knowing the details, he couldn't say much more, so he nodded and chose to question Heiji Hattori instead.

"Inspector Megure, actually you can ask me..." Kogoro Mouri muttered as he followed along.

The police were busy investigating the scene and checking everyone's personal belongings, while Conan and Heiji Hattori were also inspecting the surroundings.

Chi Feichi's personal belongings consisted only of a mobile phone, a keychain, a geometric pattern key charm, and Kuro...

After passing the inspection, he sat aside with Kuro.

"Master, did I cause trouble?" Kuro watched the busy police officers and said dejectedly, "If I hadn't run around blindly with Rebecca, maybe the criminal wouldn't have used snake venom, wouldn't have faked a snakebite, and wouldn't have caused trouble for you. If I hadn't caused trouble for you, you wouldn't have to sit here and watch..."

"It's not your fault," Chi Feichi said softly.

Kuro remained dejected. "Master, you don't need to comfort me..."

"It's probably because I meddled with things earlier, making the other party feel that an opportunity had arisen." Chi Feichi finished expressing his conjecture.

Kuro was skeptical. Could it be that it had just accidentally been dragged into this?

Chi Feichi continued, "Besides, if she had only wanted to harm someone after seeing you and Rebecca fight, there wouldn't have been enough time to prepare snake venom and props that simulate a venomous snake's fangs. So regardless of whether you caused a fuss or not, she was going to do it anyway."

"That's true. But humans are really complicated; the snake didn't even provoke her..." Kuro lowered its head aggrievedly, then quickly raised it again. "She? Master, do you know who the culprit is?"

Chi Feichi looked at the maid who was currently being questioned by the police. "Sachiko Eguchi."

Kuro turned to look at the plump, middle-aged maid in disbelief. "Eh? Does she have a grudge against Kikuhito Morizono or Akio Shigematsu?"

"I don't know the motive," Chi Feichi shifted his gaze to the food cart parked by the wall. "I only know the modus operandi and the evidence."

"Oh, so the Master only knows..." Kuro paused, looking at Chi Feichi speechlessly. "Then you should be able to tell the police, right? With evidence, can't she be convicted?"

"Wait until I become a suspect first," Chi Feichi said softly. "Kuro, you haven't met my father, but you can probably guess what kind of person he is. Career is very important to him..."

Kuro listened silently, having already imagined a series of reasons.

It had heard its master talking to his father on the phone; their relationship was very cold. But the master still cared about his family, right?

Did the master think his father was always busy with his career and neglected him, which was why he wanted to become a suspect? Did he want to make his father worry a little?

So the master had so many sentimental and childish sides to him after all. Should it say something right now?

Unfortunately, it wasn't very good at comforting people...

How difficult it was to be a snake.

"If the heir to the Zhinchi Group were to become a criminal suspect, it would have an impact on the Zhinchi Group, and he would be angry," Chi Feichi continued. "He doesn't need to do anything illegal; as long as the real culprit receives a heavy sentence and isn't granted sentence reduction or bail, then my goal will be achieved."

"G-Goal?" Kuro was bewildered.

This... seemed a bit different from what it had imagined?

"I was very angry earlier," Chi Feichi said, his voice and expression remaining calm. "She shouldn't have pointed her spearhead at you. Perhaps in her eyes you're just an animal, but in my eyes, it's different. I will make sure to hold her accountable for framing you. It's just that navigating personal connections myself is troublesome, whereas for my father, it only requires expressing an intention. Therefore, I just need to make sure my father has that intention."

Kuro stared blankly at Chi Feichi. Although this reason touched the snake, it felt like it had wasted its worries earlier.

The master didn't want fatherly affection at all; plotting against his own old man in secret was the real truth...

"However, I also need to strike the right balance. The status of an heir in this country is very high. Once word gets out and mental illness and criminal suspects are linked together, the pressure of public opinion will be too great, which will also have a huge impact on the Zhinchi Group. By then, he might not only be angry at the real culprit, but also angry at me for causing him trouble," Chi Feichi analyzed to himself. "Therefore, it's best if I am listed as a suspect, but quickly cleared of suspicion. That way he'll be a bit annoyed, but not to the point of anger."

Kuro's mindset suddenly turned into that of a salted fish.

With a master like this, what else was there to think about? What else was there to worry about?

Just watching the show was enough!

The police were still somewhat uneasy, so they searched the surroundings once more for venomous snakes, but ultimately came up empty-handed.

"Inspector Megure, searching for venomous snakes is just a waste of time because the venomous snake simply doesn't exist," Heiji Hattori reminded him. "There's a huge problem with the injected dose of venom. It's clearly man-made!"

"However, if someone wants to inject toxins, they would need to use something resembling a venomous snake's fangs to pierce the human body and inject the venom," Juzo Megure raised his question. "At that time, Mr. Kikuhito Morizono was sitting by the dining table. Miss Kaede Katagiri, who was on his right, and the maid Miss Sachiko Eguchi, who was serving dishes, could both avoid everyone else's sight and do it. But Mr. Shigematsu had been standing alone in the back ever since he entered the dining room, and the wound was on his calf. If someone walked up to him, squatted down, and stabbed him with something, he should have noticed something was wrong and spoken up. Besides, shouldn't you people sitting on the opposite side of the table have seen it?"

"The culprit didn't necessarily walk over, squat down, and stab him," Heiji Hattori looked at the food cart. "At that time, Mr. Shigematsu was standing to the left and rear of Mr. Kikuhito, which is to the right side of master Mikio. When the dishes were being served, the food cart started from master Mikio's position and was pushed along to serve the dishes. If a tool for injecting venom was installed on the lower corner of the food cart, and it bumped into him as it passed by, Mr. Shigematsu would only have felt a slight pain and assumed it was just the food cart bumping into him. Reluctant to suddenly interrupt or squat down and roll up his trousers to check his calf while master Mikio and others were talking, he would have endured it. By the time he realized the pain was severe, it was already too late. To tamper with the food cart, Miss Sachiko Eguchi, who was responsible for serving that side, could have easily done it."

"Also, taking advantage of when the food cart was coming over, Miss Kaede Katagiri could have also bent down, pretending to drop something, and reached out from under the table to stab Butler Shigematsu, right?" Conan added.

Kogoro Mouri immediately looked at Kaede Katagiri, watching her with suspicion. "I remember when the dishes were being served, Miss Kaede really did bend down to look under the table, right?"