Chousuinou Kei 2

Chousuinou 2

*Reserved for use by the NilaiTP Group

p1:
Right: The super electric brain shines with its divine deductive capabilities!!!
Upper left: Story: Gomi Kazuo
Art: Tanaka Yoshiki
Scenario: Mizuno Mitsuhiro
Bottom left:
Title: The Cursed Melody chapter 2
Episode 2: The Witness in the Dark
Chousuinou Kei

p2:
Maori: It wasn’t an accidental death?

Maori: Did somebody really die to some form of cursed music?!

Maori: And the deceased is the creator himself?

Hiroshi: It’s just an accident. An accident! / This is a perfect closed room!

Right sidebar: We’ve gone from the accidental death of a drunkard to death by curse!! What is the truth?!

Maori: It has to be true… / He died because of the cursed sound. I’m sure of it!!

Nikaidou: …Kazaoka, / can you solve this mystery?

p3:
Kei: Has there ever been a case / I couldn’t solve?

SFX bubbles: Beep beep / beep

p4:
SFX in bubble: Whirrr

SFX in bubbles: Bebebeep. / Bebeep!

SFX in bubbles: Beep whirrrr / Beep! / Be beep…

Nikaidou: Kazaoka, have you figured something out?
Kei: …Nikaidou-sempai,

Kei: Who lives in the apartment directly above this one?

p5:
Nikaidou: The older brother of the deceased. / We had him identify the body before you arrived.

Nikaidou: He should still be in his room… What of him?

!

Kei: Could you call him here?
Nikaidou: Do it.
Hiroshi: Yessir!!

Hiroshi: …Dammit. / What’s his plan here?!!

Maori: Sempai, what are you…?
Kei: …You’ll understand, soon enough.

p6:
Hiroshi: After you…

Nikaidou: I know it must be hard on you to keep seeing your brother’s dead body. / My apologies.

Text: Kanzaki Ryuu (38), Surgeon.

Ryuu: Why hasn’t my brother yet been moved from the spot where he died? / I feel sorry for him.

p7:
Nikaidou: Ah…. Please don’t worry about these two. They’re students from my old high school. / They’re rather good with IT stuff, so I asked them to look at some mechanical things for me.
Ryuu: ………

Kei: Kanzaki-san, / you seem rather… tired.

Hiroshi: What are you saying, you idiot?! / Of course he’s tired! He just lost his brother!

p8:
Ryuu: Well, that is one reason, / but truth be told, I didn’t get a wink of sleep last night. I was busy reading some materials.

Kei: You must be quite busy, / as a first-rate “doctor.”

Ryuu: I am indeed a doctor, but… how did you know?

Kei: Well, / you smell faintly of medicinal alcohol. / Furthermore…

Hiroshi: Wait a second! / You’re good so far, but don’t push him too hard! / He did just lose his brother!

Ryuu: …..Sniff!
Hiroshi: !

p9:
Ryuu: He was the only family I had left… / Our parents died when we were young, / and the two of us had to work hard to survive…!

Ryuu: Mr. Detective, / you said the time of death was last night, correct?
Nikaidou: Yes.

Ryuu: I spent all of last night staring at some charts for a surgery I was doing tomorrow, / never even realizing my brother was in so much pain so close by… / His chair broke and he fell, right?

Ryuu: I told him…
Flashback!Ryuu: Go buy a replacement for that weird chair of yours. / And you shouldn’t litter the floor with dangerous things. / I told him, but…

Ryuu: I worried about him, too, / since he drank without restraint.

Ryuu: If only I had warned him more stringently…

p10:
Ryuu: I’m a doctor, / but I couldn’t even save my own brother’s life.

Ryuu: I’m a failure as a doctor…

SFX Bubble: Blur

p11:
SFX Bubble: Be beep!

SFX Bubble: Beep!

SFX Bubble: Be be beep!

SFX Bubble: Be be be beep

SFX Bubble: Whine…

SFX Bubble: Beep bop bop

SFX Bubble: Beep bop!

p12:
SFX Bubble: Beep boop. / Beep boop bop bop / Be be be be beep.

SFX Bubbles: Be be be / beep!
Boxes: That one section of the air vent / deviates by 0.7 millimeters.

Boxes The probability that, within the last 48 hours, something with a Shore durometer reading of at least 42 touched it is… / 98%!!
SFX Bubbles: Beep boop boop boop! / Beep beep!

Kei: The probability of his temporal region striking an object on the floor…

p13:
Kei: For the crystal pyramid, 27%.

Kei: For the various golden objects, on average 12%.

Kei: The stuffed crocodiles, 5%.

Kei: The cactus… 3%.

Kei: The probability of hitting any one of those / and dying is…

1.8%.

…Rather low.

p14:
!
SFX Bubble: Beep boop boop / Beep ba boop! / Beep beep…

Kei: …I suppose

Kei: you might truly be / a failure as a doctor.

Hiroshi: Hey! / I told you to keep a lid on it—
Nikaidou: continue, Kazaoka.

Kei: ……Were you aware / that your younger brother designed the cursed music app?

p15:
Maori: …..!

Hiroshi: ?!

Ryuu: ………… / Pretty much.

Ryuu: My brother had been interested in charms and the supernatural… / all that sort of stuff ever since he was little.

Kei: Whoever hears that app’s music / will truly die, or so the rumor goes.

Ryuu: ………I know…

Kei: Assistant Inspector Nikaidou here / is currently inspecting the scene of the crime.

Kei: And…

p16:
Maori: ?!!
Kei: This is that tune!

Maori: Eeeeek!!!
Hiroshi: Stop!

p17:
Kei: Why are you so calm,

Kei: Kanzaki Ryuu-san?

Ryuu: Well…….
Box: Ran really far away.

Kei: As you have all seen, this cursed music does not kill. / However, while this cursed app is a rather complicated system…

Kei: For some reason, / all traces of it have been deleted from this PC…

Ryuu: …!!

p18:
(?): Wh—What?! / What happened?! / A blackout?!

Maori(?): I—I’m sorry! / I must’ve accidentally hit the switch on the wall!

SFX Bubble: Pah!

Maori: Are all the lights back on?

Maori: It’s so… bright now.

Kei: The illumination when she turned on the switch was 100 lux. The average lighting in the room is 60 lux... / Rather dark…

p19:
!!

Kei: …These blinds…

Kei: Did your brother keep them closed, day and night?

Ryuu: …Yes. The blinds were normally closed. / My brother preferred dark places, you see…

Kei: It’s already dusk, / but is the lighting always around this level?
Ryuu: Well, / yes, it is.

Ryuu: ……

Ryuu: What of it?

p20-21:
Kei: That fish tank…

Kei: and that organism,

Kei: The leafy sea dragon.

p22:
Kei: The probability it achieved that level of stress in the last 48 hours… / 390% / !!

Sea dragon: Bump/ Bump / Bump…

Kei: ……….. / Complete.

Kei: My mind has just now finished formulating a certain hypothesis.
Hiroshi: A hypothesis? Haven’t you done enough yet?!!

Nikaidou: Well, let’s listen to him, Suzumori.
Hiroshi: …Yessir.

Kei: If my hypothesis is correct…

Kei: it will prove that this was murder.

p23:
Kei: And that the culprit…

Kei: Is you. / Yes, you… the elder brother.

p24:
Hiroshi: Ha ha ha! I don’t care what your relationship with the Inspector is—you’ve gone too far. / Did you hear one word I’ve said?
Kei: ……

Hiroshi: I myself cut the lock on the door when we entered. / I can testify there was no one in here save for the victim!

Ryuu: Sigh… I wondered what you were going to say… / What possibly makes you think I would murder my own brother?

Kei: As I said before, / this is nothing more than a theory.

Ryuu: Ha ha. / I don’t have time for this foolishness.

Ryuu: I have the word of a detective, a rather airtight alibi.
Kei: But there are too many strange things in this room.
Ryuu: What…?

p25:
Kei: This has been bothering me for a while now, / but at this spot, far away from the desk, / is a single whiskey stain.
Hiroshi: Huh?!

Hiroshi: Ah! You mean this…?

Kei: Based on the splash pattern of this single droplet, / we can conclude it fell vertically.

Kei: Furthermore…

Kei: Directly above this spot on the floor / lies an air vent…

Ryuu <aside>: *Sigh*

Hiroshi: Hey, high school kid, how crazy are you going to get?! <small text: That’s for sure!> / What makes you think you can declare all that to be true?!

Nikaidou: …I see. I expected no less of you, Kazaoka.

p26:
Hiroshi: Ah! I get it!! / It was the alcohol! He converted a large quantity of alcohol into gas!!

Hiroshi: He then used the air duct to pump the gas into his brother’s room, rendering him drunk! / Then his brother, stumbling around drunkenly, tripped and fell!
Lower right: The culprit, laughing evilly to himself.

Ryuu: This is stupid… You, too, Mr. Detective? / That is less a hypothesis and more a delusion.
Kei: I agree. There was no need for you to do that.

Kei: There is no sign that you forced your brother to drink, / or that alcohol was injected into him after his death.

Kei: We must conclude that he drank the alcohol of his own free will.
Nikaidou: …….
Hiroshi: …Like. I. Said.

Hiroshi: Hey, wait!
(lower right): Stop messing with us adults!
Hiroshi: Then what’s the spot of alcohol supposed to mean?!!

p27:
Nikaidou: Calm down and let him finish!
Hiroshi: Ow. / Sorry.

Kei: Though there’s no sign he was forced to drink, / there is but a single whiskey stain far from where he lies, directly beneath the air duct. / And is from the last day or two.

Kei: That is the key to solving this crime!

Kei: Allow me to say once more that this is just a hypothesis. / But for instance…

Kei: suppose you possessed a long, snake-like object you could control freely.

p28:
Maori: A snake?
Ryuu: ………..

Kei: Last night, you used that snake-like object / to go from your room to this one…

Kei: You went through a corner of the air duct / and entered this room.

Ryuu: What do you mean, a snake? / And even supposing you are right, no matter how drunk my brother was he would have noticed such a thing.
Kei: Correct. There is no proof yet. We are still verifying.

Ryuu: ……

Nikaidou: Kazaoka, please continue.

p29:
Kei: Please take a look at these headphones.

Kei: The left side has been set to play exceptionally loudly.

Ryuu: Another hypothesis?

Kei: No… / This is no hypothesis. I verified it with my own ears.

MaorI: But there was no music playing then…
Kei: I used noise.
Maori: Huh?

Kei: I confirmed it using noise.

Kei: Kanzaki-san… / were you aware your brother couldn’t hear very well out of his left ear?
Ryuu: …What of it?

p30:
Kei: When you sent the snake-like thing through the air duct from the floor above, / you were aware how impossible it would be not to make any sound.

Kei: Therefore, you needed a distraction. / You used your brother’s app. / By way of an overseas call, you called his phone from an undeterminable number.

Nikaidou: ……..

Kei: Naturally, your brother placed the phone against his right ear. / His left ear couldn’t hear well, so you realized this would effectively plug both his ears.

Kei: Furthermore, you wanted the developer of the cursed app / to die immediately after hearing its music.

Ryuu: ………..

p31:
Kei: Every other person who has died to the app’s music has died in an accident. / … You must have been certain the police were aware of that. / Thus, you believed they would be predisposed to declare this an accident as well…

Kei: That / was your foremost objective.

Ryuu: Shut up and get a hold of yourself, you little brat!! / I mean, what’s this “snake-like object I could control freely” supposed to be?! / No such thing could possibly exist!!

p32:
Ryuu: … Do you think you have the right to just hypothesize someone is a criminal?

Kei: To be sure, / this is still nothing but a hypothesis…
Ryuu: ……!

Kei: Kanzaki-san, you said this room’s blinds were always shut, / that this is as bright as it ever gets in here?
Ryuu: …Are you saying the darkness proves I murdered him?

Kei: …Furthermore,

Kei: are you familiar / with that mysterious organism?

Ryuu: Huh?! / …..I have no idea!

p33:
Kei: That… / is an organism which undergoes a great deal of stress when exposed to light.

Kei: The leafy sea dragon.
Sea dragon: Bump… / Bump…

Ryuu: ?!

Kei: The leafy sea dragon / is rather hard creature to raise.
Sea dragon: Bump
Kei: It is heavily stressed even by the light of a camera, and will sometimes even die.

Ryuu: What does that have to do with this case?

Kei: It’s rather strange.

p34:
Kei: That leafy sea dragon is clear proof…

Kei: That this was a crime!

Ryuu: !!!!!