I Killed Him

There are distractions in a murder case.

The biggest of these is the fact that the murderer, the deceased, and the others present are all human beings, with their own individual logic and interpersonal relationships.

Minagawa Katsuhiko's death was simple: he was not killed by an outsider, nor was his bloodied body found after he left the crowd alone for a while, but he died of poison in front of witnesses.

Ichijō Mirai ignores the interpersonal factor, which he does not specialize in, and simply and brutally goes to the source of the poisoning: how many sources of poison could Minagawa Katsuhiko have taken, ignoring the fact that he died by poisoning and ignoring the fact that he killed himself?

Only three.

One, chocolate.

Two women confessed and handed over chocolates.

When Kaori Sekiya confessed, Minagawa Katsuhiko refused and didn't take the chocolates, so she passed them on to Minagawa Sasumu. When Watanabe Yoshimi confessed, Minagawa Katsuhiko said yes and took the chocolates.

There is no apparent conflict between the two of them.

Second, cigarettes.

Minagawa Katsuhiko smokes all the time, and after smoking her own cigarette, she smokes Tanaka Naomichi's cigarette.

There was a clear conflict between the two of them, with Minagawa Katsuhiko treating Tanaka Naomichi quite badly and Tanaka Naomichi threatening to kill Minagawa Katsuhiko.

Third, the food on the table.

All of the food at the gathering was served by Mrs. Minagawa, including orange juice, sushi, coffee, cake, etc. There was no apparent conflict between them.

There was no obvious conflict between them, but there was a hidden one, and according to Minagawa Sasumu, it was suspected that they were not related as people thought.

From the beginning to the end, Minagawa Katsuhiko had contact with only three types of people, excluding the possibility that he took drugs to kill himself when he was alone.

There is a problem with the third one: when Minagawa Katsuhiko left the table for the first time, the other people at the table could have taken advantage of the opportunity to spice things up as well.

But Ichijō Mirai had noticed that there was no one sneaking around.

He tapped on the table, "Is there anything else you wish to say?"

Watanabe Yoshimi opened his mouth, but in the end he couldn't think of anything else to say in his defense, so he shook his head and insisted, "I didn't cause Katsuhiko's death, and when the police come, they can look into the piece of chocolate I gave them."

"OK," Ichijō Mirai called out the name of a person, "this gentleman, please speak."

It was Tanaka Naomichi.

Tanaka Naomichi kept his head down until two or three seconds had passed and the living room was still quiet, then he realized he had been called and looked up.

He was still grim, "I was in the living room when the murder happened, and I only passed a carton of cigarettes to that Minagawa guy."

"But I did it in public. Everyone saw me."

"I shouldn't be so stupid, should I?"

It's not necessarily true. It's possible that he wasn't trying to get away with it at all.

Ichijō Mirai didn't say anything, just nodded his head to indicate that he'd heard the speech, and called for the next speaker, "Mrs. Minagawa."

Like every werewolf slayer, Mrs. Minagawa was listening intently to the first two speakers, not realizing that she was the third to be named, and her eyes widened for a split second as tears curled up in her eyes, "Me?"

"Well," Ichijō Mirai said succinctly, sweeping a friendly reminder over Conan, who was listening more intently than Mrs. Minagawa, "the first two were explaining that they didn't poison themselves."

Mrs. Minagawa responded, "I prepared all the meals for the gathering."

She looked to the others, "But everyone ate, didn't they?"

"After the meal was served, everyone savored the food with great enthusiasm, didn't they? I also ate some in the kitchen with Sasumu, how could I have poisoned something that everyone ate?"

"Even if it was poisoned," Mrs. Minagawa hung her head and her voice dropped, "I wouldn't give it to my own child, would I?"

Next to her, Minagawa Sasumu clutched her mother's shirt and nodded vigorously, "Uh-huh! I ate everything! Mom didn't poison it!"

He then whispered with some panic, "Mom, brother..."

Mrs. Minagawa patted his hand and said grimly: "Help your brother find the murderer."

The living room fell silent again.

Ichijō Mirai, instead of naming names right away, glanced at Conan.

Conan was looking at Minagawa and her son, his brow furrowed as if he was thinking about a problem. 

As he thinks, he looks up with a frown on his face, locks eyes with Ichijō Mirai, who doesn't call the roll, pauses, and tentatively raises his hand, "Well, Mrs. Minagawa, I have a question I'd like to ask."

He's asking Mrs. Minagawa, but his eyes are still on Ichijō Mirai, and it's a little weird: he's not naming the next person yet, so he's not waiting for him to ask a question, is he?

Ichijō Mirai nodded to Conan and looked over at Mrs. Minagawa.

Conan turns his head as well.

Mrs. Minagawa is hesitant, "What is the question?"

"Sasumu just said that I can make Brother Ichijō my own brother if I work hard enough, it took him two or three years to get along with Mr. Minagawa and make Mr. Minagawa his own brother," Conan said, "It's going to take me even longer to make Brother Ichijō my brother, so I have to work hard."

Mrs. Minagawa's face paled before he was even halfway through his sentence.

She subconsciously tried to look at Kaori Sekiya, who was sitting at the very edge of the room, and then withdrew her eyes with restraint halfway through.

Conan watched her subtle reaction and said in a childish tone, "That's strange."

"Isn't Mr. Minagawa your biological child?"

Kaori Sekiya spoke, "No."

She had lost her mind from the moment she saw Minagawa Katsuhiko's body and was still speaking softly, "Katsuhiko his... parents died in a car accident, just seven years ago."

"Mrs. Minagawa was his aunt and adopted him after his parents died."

"Since it was seven years ago, no one else in the club knows," she explained, "but Katsuhiko and I were childhood friends,"

As much as Mrs. Minagawa subconsciously looked at her, she subconsciously looked at Watanabe Yoshimi and pursed her lips, "and liked him."

"So I'm concerned about him and know about it."

Watanabe Yoshimi locked eyes with her for a few seconds before they looked away together.

"You've liked him for so long," Tanaka Naomichi couldn't help but speak up, "and he doesn't still treat you like that!"

Kaori Sekiya looked down a little embarrassed, "He didn't bully me, he just rejected me."

"And I know that he likes Yoshimi, and I know that he will definitely agree to Yoshimi's confession today."

Because, "Yoshimi looks like Katsuhiko's mom."

Tanaka Naomichi was slightly offended by his beloved's rebuttal, but he kept his mouth shut.

Ichijō Mirai listens to them without a change of color, and nods at Conan, who looks at him tentatively again.

Conan immediately asked: "Brother Tanaka, I just heard Sasumu say that you like Sister Sekiya very much, and you also said that if Mr. Minagawa dares to disappoint Sister Sekiya, you will definitely kill him, right?"

The whole room changed.

Wakamatsu Toshihide, who was sitting next to Tanaka Naomichi, almost just reacted to the meaning of those words and crawled away, crawling to the opposite side of the table in horror, "Naomichi, you!"

The others weren't the only ones who were surprised.

Tanaka Naomichi was also surprised, "Sasumu said that?"

He looked to the confused Minagawa Sasumu, and then to Kaori Sekiya, who blushed slightly and looked over skeptically, "Of course not..."

In the middle of his sentence, the sound of a police car's bell rang out sharply in the distance, one after another, like the cry of a soaring eagle.

Tanaka Naomichi fell silent.

When he spoke again, he said, "It's me."

"I killed him," he stopped struggling, "I poisoned the filter of the cigarette."

"Who told that guy to treat Sekiya like that, knowing that Sekiya likes him but not rejecting or agreeing to it, spending time with Sekiya and letting Sekiya watch him spending time with Yoshimi!" He was quite quick, "Today is Valentine's Day, I guessed that guy will definitely agree to Yoshimi's confession and reject Sekiya, so I prepared the poisonous cigarette in advance."

"Sorry, Sekiya."