Chapter 22: I am so innocent

Jiang Xia turned back and, as expected, found that Conan had located the corpse with pinpoint accuracy in the exhibition hall.

He even shone his flashlight directly onto it.

Two girls standing outside the hall froze in unison as they stared at the corpse suddenly illuminated by the light.

A second later, two overlapping screams echoed through the corridor—a piercing, boundary-breaking soprano that was even more jarring than a police siren.

Ran Mouri and Sonoko Suzuki huddled close together, looking at Jiang Xia. Remembering the blood on him, they stammered incoherently, "You... you... you..."

Jiang Xia: "I didn't kill him."

The two girls opposite him clutched their chests and breathed a simultaneous sigh of relief. "Oh, we thought so too..."

Before they could fully relax, they saw Jiang Xia looking at them thoughtfully. "You'd believe me just because I said so?"

Ran Mouri: "..."

Sonoko Suzuki: "..."

That sounded far too much like a line a villain would use when turning against the heroes.

Two pairs of terrified eyes snapped back toward Jiang Xia: "!"

"It wasn't me," Jiang Xia repeated with great patience.

...

However, this time, Ran Mouri and Sonoko Suzuki still looked horrified, albeit with a hint of suspicion.

Jiang Xia observed them, feeling that these two classmates had quite interesting reactions.

As expected, once people are fooled enough times, their sense of vigilance increases accordingly...

...

Having had his fun, Jiang Xia softened his tone. "That 'You'd believe me just because I said so?' was actually just a simple question..."

Ran Mouri, Sonoko Suzuki: "..."

Seeing Jiang Xia's "innocent" expression, the two simple and kind classmates couldn't help but silently reflect on themselves.

"..." Indeed. Thinking back carefully, shouldn't Jiang Xia's sentence "You'd believe me just because I said so?" have been interpreted as something like, "You'd believe me just because I said so? You trust me so much? I'm touched"... or something along those lines!

At this thought, Sonoko Suzuki cleared her throat to cover her embarrassment, walked back to her original spot, grabbed Jiang Xia's hand, shook it vigorously, and said firmly

"I was just joking! Of course we believe you."

...Ah, his hands really are nice to hold.

And they weren't what she had expected.

They weren't cold.

In fact, they were quite warm; he could probably moonlight as a hand warmer in the winter.

...

While Sonoko Suzuki was lost in the sensation of holding Jiang Xia's hand at the entrance of the hall...

Conan walked back from the side of the corpse.

He first reminded Ran Mouri to call the police, then looked at Jiang Xia

"We believe you didn't do it, but since you're the first person to discover the body, the police will suspect you first—you should try to recall your schedule for today very carefully. It's best if you can find an alibi, and also check if you saw anyone suspicious on your way here."

It wasn't that Conan blindly trusted Jiang Xia's character.

It was just that the state of the corpse in the hall was too gruesome, with blood splattered everywhere.

In other words, if Jiang Xia had just killed the man, it would be impossible for him to be this clean.

Furthermore, Conan had seen Jiang Xia hit people before—he used a stick to hit them one by one, like playing Whac-A-Mole in an arcade.

But an act like this, mimicking an oil painting by nailing a person to a wall... it had a strong sense of ritual and was quite complex.

No matter how he looked at it, it didn't seem like Jiang Xia's style.

...

Therefore, Conan felt that the reality was likely that Jiang Xia had passed by, entered the hall for some reason to take a look, and accidentally stepped in blood.

As for why Jiang Xia didn't turn on the lights, scream, or call the police...

...Perhaps it was related to his personality.

Everyone's reaction to seeing a corpse is different.

Conan indeed couldn't imagine a scene where Jiang Xia would be screaming while running out of the hall.

"..." Thinking about it this way, Jiang Xia's calm exit from the hall seemed quite reasonable.

And theoretically speaking, Jiang Xia's mental state was already... unstable. In short, certain abnormal behaviors actually seemed quite logical when applied to him.

Conan: "..." Speaking of which, he wondered if Jiang Xia actually went to see a psychiatrist for those ten-plus days of medical leave and ten-plus days of truancy every month.

Thinking of this, Conan couldn't help but review the daily routine he had observed from Jiang Xia: it seemed to consist entirely of speeding, fighting, and visiting exhibition halls...

Conan thought wearily that the answer was likely no.

...

The exhibition hall was not far from the Metropolitan Police Department.

The high schoolers stood at the entrance of the "Hell Exhibition Hall," waiting for the police. Some were terrified, some were deducing, and some were hoping to catch a ghost... Before long, the police arrived.

...

Inside the Hell Exhibition Hall.

The overhead lights were turned on, instantly illuminating the room.

Inspector Megure entered the hall along with officers from the Forensics Department to search for clues, and he dispatched several subordinates to interview witnesses.

Officer Sato took her orders and stepped out. Her gaze swept over the four of them, eventually stopping on Jiang Xia's back.

Based on her experience, there was a high probability that the killer was among the first discoverers.

And compared to the two high school girls whose faces were pale and who were dodging eyes to avoid looking at the corpse, and the elementary schooler who wasn't even as tall as Sato's legs, Jiang Xia's suspicion level shot up instantly.

However, as she approached, Jiang Xia turned around. Seeing his face, Officer Sato was momentarily stunned.

...She had just seen this person in the office not long ago.

Although Miwako Sato was not a forensics officer, she had handled so many homicide cases that she had gained a fair amount of experience.

—She could tell roughly how long the corpse had been dead.

And at this moment, based on her rough judgment... when Mr. Nakashin died, Jiang Xia was sitting in their office reporting the case.

"..." It seemed that this time, the killer was not among the first group to discover the body?

............

The police quickly completed their questioning.

Unfortunately, the witnesses were unable to provide many clues.

However, Inspector Megure soon discovered with pleasant surprise: there was actually a surveillance camera in the Hell Exhibition Hall that was pointed directly at the crime scene.

Inspector Megure waved his hand happily. "Quick, go get the footage!"

...

Five minutes later.

After seeing the surveillance footage.

Inspector Megure was no longer happy.

The footage did indeed capture the murder process.

But it failed to capture the killer's face—the killer wore a set of Western knight's armor with an iron faceplate that completely obscured their features.

...

While the police were sighing as they watched the footage.

Nearby, Jiang Xia was silently fiddling with his phone.

There was an extra video clip inside, which he had just surreptitiously recorded.

—Just now, while everyone else was watching the surveillance, Director Ochiai of this exhibition hall had crouched down, pretending to tie his shoelaces.

During this time, the old man with the white beard used the "crouching" motion to secretly swap a working pen for the one Mr. Nakashin had used before his death—a pen that no longer worked.

This was part of Director Ochiai's murder plan.

A few hours ago, he had put on the identity-concealing knight's armor and deliberately killed the man under the camera. During this process, the old director did not kill Mr. Nakashin with a single blow, but instead left him some breathing room—and as expected, while being attacked, Mr. Nakashin realized he couldn't hold on. He reached for a piece of paper on a nearby table and picked up a pen lying there, intending to secretly write down the killer's name.

However, that piece of paper had actually been placed there in advance by the old director. The paper already had another employee's name written on it.

Furthermore, the pen in Mr. Nakashin's hand was broken and couldn't write at all.

The Hell Exhibition Hall was dimly lit, making it difficult for the camera to distinguish such minute differences.

Therefore, as long as Director Ochiai promptly swapped the broken pen used by Mr. Nakashin with a working one after the fact...

The whole event would appear to be "Mr. Nakashin, before dying, took advantage of the killer's distraction to write the killer's name on a note."

But in reality, that name was merely an employee being framed.

...

While the police were contemplating the surveillance footage.

Jiang Xia bypassed all the steps of deduction and walked up to the old director.

Director Ochiai was standing with his hands behind his back, gazing deeply at the oil painting on the wall—the painting opposite the corpse, depicting a knight killing a demon but being splattered with filthy blood.

In the director's eyes, the newcomer Mr. Nakashin was untrustworthy—it was said he had promised to keep the exhibition hall running after purchasing it. Who would have thought that he would now suddenly want to tear it down and convert it into a hotel?

Thus, Director Ochiai did not regret the murder: he was punishing Nakashin, a man who defiled art.

Consequently, the director felt that the blood-soaked knight in the painting was very similar to his own situation.

—Gallant, tragic, sacrificing everything just to purge evil.

...A true man should be like that.

As he was feeling sentimental, a faint voice drifted over from the side

"The righteous knight subdued the demon, but at the same time, he himself was tainted by the evil blood... Is that what you think?"

Director Ochiai: "!"

Startled, he snapped his head toward the side.

He saw that the young man who had first discovered the body had walked up beside him at some unknown point.

"..." Recalling Jiang Xia's words, Director Ochiai felt they were pointed, and he froze in guilt for a few seconds.

After a moment, he stroked his waist-length beard and forced himself to calm down.

—He must be overthinking it.

This perfect murder plan could not be easily seen through.

This kid in front of him was probably just talking about the oil painting.

...

However, just as Director Ochiai comforted himself.

In the next second, Jiang Xia's topic shifted completely away from the oil painting.

Jiang Xia suddenly said in a low voice, "You should know, when signing a land sale contract, the seller can place restrictions on the subsequent use of the land—for example, by writing 'must continue to operate the exhibition hall and shall not be used for other purposes' into the contract."

Director Ochiai was stunned.

Jiang Xia continued, "However, such restrictions tend to deter many buyers. In other words, once restrictive clauses are added to a contract, the land becomes very difficult to sell.

"—It seems now that your predecessor did not include the 'restriction on land use' agreement in the contract.

"A promise not written into a contract cannot be trusted. Even a rookie who has only been on the job for a few months knows this, let alone your former boss..."

At this point, Jiang Xia looked up to observe the director, hesitating as if to say more: "By the way, you are already quite old, having navigated the workplace for decades. And as a director, you must have signed many contracts—you wouldn't have never thought of this, would you?"

Conan, who had slipped to the side and been eavesdropping silently for a long time: "..."

Although he didn't quite understand the background... from the things Jiang Xia was saying, it seemed he was suspecting the director was the killer.

...But why?

And how did Jiang Xia know so much about the exhibition hall's affairs?

Could it be that the girl at the ticket booth told him?