Conan’s Corpse Picker

Jiang Xia picked up the greeting card and opened it to check. He found that the card was exactly the same as the "death notice" that Officer Sato showed them before, and it should have been sent by the same person.

Last time, the cute Christmas card said "Santa Claus with a red beard" would kill for this show.

This time, the message on the greeting card is:

[When the 12 o'clock bell ends

My shadow will appear in the well.

——Red-bearded Santa Claus]

"well?"

Jiang Xia walked to the window, glanced down, and saw a spacious dry well in the yard - this should be the only well nearby, and it was also the location marked in the greeting card.

The time now is around 11:50, and it will soon be 12 o'clock as the greeting card said.

"It's so late at night and it's so cold that we have to ask people out." Jiang Xia looked at the snow-covered yard outside and was quite dissatisfied.

But a detective obviously shouldn't care about such trivial matters. He thought for a moment, took his coat and went out.

When I walked to the stairs, I happened to see Officer Sato not sleeping at midnight, but looking at two vending machines, deep in thought.

Jiang Xia said hello: "What's wrong?"

"Huh?" Sato Miwako came back to her senses and pointed to the machine selling bento, "This type of A set meal is sold out too fast. Before I went downstairs, I saw there were three or four more copies. I originally wanted to wait until I came back. I bought one to improve the taste, but now I see it’s gone—this restaurant is obviously in charge of food, so who is buying bento so frequently?”

Jiang Xia thought of the sneaky trio of temporary workers: "Maybe someone was worried that the chef would poison the food."

Officer Sato held the hot coffee he just bought and said happily: "There are really more and more persecutory paranoia these days."

After a pause, she saw Jiang Xia's dress and felt something was wrong: "Are you going out?"

Jiang Xia nodded.

Officer Sato suddenly frowned: "How dare you run around alone at this time? Don't forget that the scriptwriter slipped out of the house for no apparent reason in the middle of the night and was killed."

Jiang Xia took out the greeting card: "Someone sent me an invitation letter."

As soon as Miwako Sato saw the familiar greeting card, her expression changed: "'Red-bearded Santa Claus'?! You actually want to go quietly by yourself for such a dangerous thing - luckily I saw it, see you next time For this kind of thing, you must remember to call me together."

…

There is only one more person in the team.

When he walked to the lobby on the first floor, Jiang Xia suddenly felt something.

Turning around, he saw a single sofa placed at a strange angle, and a strong man in black was sitting on the sofa, his face as heavy as iron, his sharp eyes scanning the people coming and going, as if every one Everyone is a potential criminal in his eyes.

"Mr. Inozuka?" Jiang Xia walked over, "Why are you sitting here."

"..." Saburo Inozuka, "This drama gave me a lot of feelings. I can't sleep, thinking about life here."

Jiang Xia: "..." It's quite artistic, but your expression doesn't quite match the lines.

But this is not a problem. He warmly invited: "I am planning to solve a case. Do you want to come with me?"

Saburo Inozuka trembled: "Goodbye, have a good trip."

Jiang Xia glanced at him as if he didn't understand, nodded, turned and left.

Behind him, Saburo Inozuka pushed up his sunglasses: "..." He suddenly went out at this time. Could it be that Jiang Xia is the protagonist on the stage tonight?

...Wonderful! Compared with this detective, he is definitely a dispensable piece of cake.

Saburo Inozuka felt a sense of security in his heart.

But soon he thought of something again and glanced at his phone with complicated eyes: "..." It has been a long time since he replied to Maya Hashimoto's message. Why is there still no reply now?

Could it be that his two companions were also dragged to the show?

Indeed, if you want to deal with a detective like Jiang Xia, it's not enough to have two brushes. Maybe it won't take long for a police car to arrive and escort Maya Hashimoto and Kazuma Kurosawa, the two villains who murdered the detective, to the police station. Then two bullets flew far away on the way...

Thinking of this, Saburo Inozuka suddenly fell into deep thought.

——At that time, both companions will be eliminated as risk factors, what about you? Will they be killed together?

...Or he might as well run away before the police came.

...No, there is surveillance above his head now, and he has an alibi as hard as iron! Stay here and don't move. As long as he persists afterwards, he won't be forcibly taken away by the police. On the contrary, if you run away at this moment, or accept Jiang Xia's invitation and go with him, something bad will happen to you!

Saburo Inozuka: "..." It's really scary. Ever since I encountered that thing, there have been traps at every step. Something as simple as "surviving" has turned out to be so difficult.

After going through an extremely fierce ideological struggle and imagining a bunch of plans that were either reckless or extremely cautious, Saburo Inozuka finally made a decision.

He slowly leaned back in his chair, intending to remain unchanged in the face of changes.

…

The ghosts watched Inozuka Saburo sit upright and then collapse, then collapse and then sit upright. Although they were quite puzzled by this human's behavior, since he had murderous intent, the ghosts decided to be generous and not care so much.

Jiang Xia passed by Inozuka Saburo, took a few strands of boiled water that was neither salty nor light, sweet and murderous, and left with some satisfaction - after going out to endure the cold, he finally gained something.

…

After meeting no other people, Jiang Xia and Sato Miwako walked out of the hotel door, stepped on the crunching snow, and came to the well in the courtyard.

Sato Miwako used her flashlight and carefully looked down. I expected to see corpses or other things related to the case, but there was just a patch of snow-covered weeds inside, and it didn't look too unusual.

"We agreed to come to the well at zero o'clock to see his shadow? It's already passed, but nothing is wrong. Could this guy send you a greeting card just to make the tiger leave the mountain?" Sato Miwako took back the flashlight and looked at it suspiciously. All around, "Luring you away and then causing mischief in the hotel?"

"Probably not." Jiang Xia tightened his collar, "It's so close. What happened? He ran back in less than two minutes."

"That's right..." Sato Miwako was confused, "So the 'red-bearded Santa Claus' is simply late?"

At this time, Jiang Xia's cell phone suddenly rang. The caller ID shows an unknown call.

Jiang Xia picked it up easily. He usually exchanged contact information with people from all walks of life. The pile of business cards he sent out was probably higher than Conan's.

Therefore, the more unknown the call was, the faster he answered it: "Hello, I'm Jiang Xia. If you have a commission, you can come directly to the door, or leave a message at the email address of Amuro Detective Agency. I wrote the email address on the business card, and you can also call directly online. Found."

"..."

There was silence on the phone for a while, and after several seconds, a voice changed by a voice changer came through.

The caller tried his best to bring the off-track atmosphere back on track with a horrifying and twisted smile: "I've been waiting for a long time, detective."