N-A-A Chapter 24 The Detective's Pre-Dinner Game
Chapter 24 The Detective's Pre-Dinner Game
At the critical moment, Eevee, who was about to cause trouble, mysteriously disappeared as if he had never been there at all.
Hugo and the tray in his hands remained firmly in place, and almost every creature in the room breathed a sigh of relief in unison.
Looking in the direction where Eevee disappeared, the landlord and the detective saw a bright blue Poké Ball held out horizontally. It turned out that the girl had used the Poké Ball to retrieve Eevee just in time from causing trouble.
"I'm sorry, my partner and I have caused you trouble," Azure said apologetically. As she apologized, she had to look at Hugo. She opened her mouth as if in a daze, but said nothing more, as if she had swallowed a bitter cup of wine.
Little Blue seemed to be forcing herself to stay awake—the landlady noticed Blue's fatigue. Hugo, on the other hand, had already discerned Blue's thoughts the moment the two entered the room; it was an expression his clients often wore.
After the Eevee sneezing crisis was resolved, Hugo continued to shuttle between the kitchen and the dining room. Considering that it was never too late to mend the fence, Douzi ordered Yanwu and the others to stay away from the detectives.
The crisp sound of opening a large bottle of soda is especially pleasant on a summer day, and the food is already plentiful on the table.
After cutting the pizza with a roller, Hugo suddenly started a conversation: "My hometown is a conservative and old-fashioned small town, where people sometimes pay attention to some strange table manners. One of them is that if someone at the table looks troubled, they must tell you their worries before the meal is over."
"What if that person doesn't want to talk?" Douzi asked with interest.
“Then the others at the table can guess as they please,” Hugo replied, “until that person reveals their troubles.”
“Your hometown must be very peaceful,” Douzi commented earnestly.
“Although it’s peaceful,” the detective said, putting down the pizza-cutting wheel as if ready to dig in, “there’s often a lot of noise around the table.”
Douzi laughed heartily, then insisted on pressing Bilan into a seat before sitting down herself: "This is truly an interesting village rule, Sister Xiaolan, you must try it."
Bilan was still somewhat hesitant. She didn't know how to recount that incomplete incident. It was both obvious and elusive, seemingly over yet still a thorn in her side. What good would it do to tell her now?
"What type of Pokémon did you heal?" The detective's nonchalant voice suddenly rang out from the other end of the table, startling Touko and leaving Azure speechless.
“The smell of blood is ten times stronger than the smell of sandstorm. Since I know you experienced a sandstorm, I also know that you, Azure, came into contact with blood before that. There are many ways to come into contact with blood, but there are no obvious bloodstains on your body, which means you deliberately came into contact with blood after the incident; moreover, since Douzi doesn't know about this, we can infer that you didn't waste much time on the way—with these two conditions limiting you, your actions are very limited…”
Douzi, who was listening with a dizzy head, nodded with a confident expression: "I see, I completely understand now. This is why Sister Xiaolan is sulking, right?"
“It’s emergency care, right?” Hugo asked, picking up where he left off.
Even though they were discussing a bloody mystery, the detective nonchalantly grabbed a slice of pizza and took a bite of the cheesy tip.
The topic naturally shifted to azure. Under Hugo's insightful aura, the oppressive feeling of being trapped in a mystery had completely disappeared. The experience that had been stuck in his throat could now be spoken smoothly without any awkwardness or stiffness.
"That was a brave eagle. It flew into a dead-end alley while searching for a lost child, but for some reason it was seriously injured."
Azure began her narration, recounting in detail the events of the day in which the Warrior Eagle was injured.
"...Strangely, the child saw an elf fly into the alley from a distance, and no one or no elf ever went in again after that, while the warrior eagle was seriously injured inside."
"Could there have been some dangerous spirits hiding in the alley all along?" Douzi speculated, his words flowing freely.
Azure shook her head: "I was the first person to walk into the alley after that, and I didn't see anything that could attack Warrior Eagle."
The detective suddenly asked, "So what happened next?"
So Bilan gave a brief description of her mother and the emergency doctor who arrived later.
"So, your previous claim that the Warrior Eagle entered the alley to track down the missing boy was just speculation?" the detective asked astutely.
“That’s right,” Azure admitted honestly. “The child got separated from his family, and then the mother’s Pokémon started tracking him down. There’s no other explanation for this except that he got lost, right?”
“Something’s strange here,” Hugo said. “Since the child was lost and the elf was badly injured, the mother shouldn’t have known their exact location. How did she find the child?”
Azure was taken aback; she had never thought about this question before.
"Furthermore, why was it the child who was being tracked who discovered Warrior Eagle's whereabouts? Why was he able to guarantee that no one had entered the alley, yet he himself never went into the alley to check on Warrior Eagle's situation?"
Bilan was completely confused, but Douzi seemed to already know the answer and loudly guessed, "Of course it's because the little boy lied. Hugo, you once said that lies are always contradictory."
“There are no contradictions in Azure’s narrative.” Hugo shook his head, as if he were educating a wayward student. “The problem with her narrative is that the assumptions are disconnected from reality, and that is the root of all the irrationality.”
The detective clapped his hands lightly, as if about to announce something important: "Regarding this incident, I have now fully understood the truth behind the mystery of how the Warrior Eagle was injured in a dead-end alley where no one goes."
The detective's face showed neither pride nor joy, as if he were a civil servant reading out some boring administrative regulation.
"This morning, I said in this room that there is no absolute good or evil in the world, and this statement is very appropriate for this incident. In this incident, you can neither find a vicious criminal nor see any great things like justice and righteousness. The truth is boring and heavy, like gravity, which will make all beautiful and illusory things fall to the ground."
"I just want to know who exactly caused the Warriors Eagles to be harmed in this incident." As if it were a matter of course, Azure made the same statement as she had made that morning.
“To be honest, from a detective’s perspective, I would prefer the truth of this incident to remain buried. The brave eagle has been rescued, the criminal will never repeat the same mistake, and no one will suffer secondary harm because of this.” Looking into his bright blue eyes, Hugo sighed and continued, “But it seems I have no choice but to speak now.”
"If you keep quiet, you can forget about eating the pizza you made today," Douzi said angrily, waving her little fist.
“Sigh.” Hugo sighed and continued very reluctantly, “There are three murderers: the brave eagle, the little boy, and his mother.”