Episode 1111: Rube Goldberg Machine (Part 1)
Scenario: A morning in the dreary-but-peaceful forest kicked off with a customary morning radio - Moriyama Shu's Morning Frolic. The shabby machine still managed to work despite its treacherous vicinity; it was being wrapped upon one of the trees: with an alarm clock assigned to six o'clock straight. If it was propagating the radio programmer, six o'clock must have arrived. Whilst broadcasting the programmer, the machine seemed to possess a built-in feature that automatically distributed some bird food at that time. With the food loaded onto the plate, two birds who were resting on the branches swiftly dashed towards it, seizing the first pleasure of the day. Just as the two birds were rejoicing over their "breakfast", an atrocious crow cropped up, brutally blasting them away. For some reason, the excessive force exerted by the crow on the plate of that radio machine led the plank to fall apart - this activated a pulley-like wheel, resulting in several dominoes to fall, overlapping each other; afterwards, it pushed a tiny marble to slide down a pre-prepared track, with all those momentum the ball gather along the long journeying upon the track, it eventually rebounded at a metal can, bumping into a glass bottle which was attached with a rope; this then triggered a brick to be thrown onto a platform made out of wooden block, thereupon, the timber that were deposited on top of that platform fell accordingly, landing exactly at a lever device; finally, the axe that was originally quiet sitting on it ejected with a considerably amount of force. After all of those gimmicks, parts of a chimney fell abruptly from a nearby villa, this was followed by a tragic scream.
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| Yamamura reminding Ran that he is now an inspector, not a police detective. |
Coincidentally, the Mouri family were lingering around the district as well. They were there because of Kogoro's affair: a client of his requested him to ascertain the identity of the intruder who has been on the rampage around his house; however, they managed to solve the mystery effortlessly, and the truth turned out to be that the intruder was merely a raccoon. As a result, they were on their way home, conversing jovially. After some minutes, they noticed Inspector Yamamura within a few miles, standing beside a huge mansion. Right after he saw them, he instantly waved at them. Kogoro thus inquired of him about what case he was investigating, and Yamamura responded that there seemed to be an accident that happened a while ago, with the outcome of having one deceased: a middle-aged man who got struck down by the fallen chimney pipe, when he was drinking coffee on the deck of the mansion. Ran remarked that she has seen the victim already on TV, and Yamamura uttered that the victim is named Kohei Inoue, who is the chairman of the chain restaurant "Cheom Cheom". Even though the situation at the crime scene made several people, including Yamamura, believe that the victim lost his life in a sorrow accident, but Conan, who has perceptive insight, immediately realized that it was actually a murder! He then pointed out that at one end of the chimenry pipe, which took Inoue's life, the interface was apparently dented. With this detail recognized, he surmised that it must have been caused by mankind.
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| Conan manifesting his deduction. |
By adjusting the perspective to the case, Inspector Yamamura thus advanced on investigating some acquaintances of Inoue, and found out that there were four people who lived in the same mansion: Fuma Tanaka, the president and CEO of "Cheom Cheom"; Norihiro Shimada, an investor who invested on "Cheom Cheom"; Arata Kawamoto, another investor who has been friends with the victim since school; Nanako Inoue, the victim's second wife, meanwhile the person who discovered the body. In addition, everyone that Yamamura mentioned possessed an alibi, except Inoue's wife.
After hearing about the possible suspects in the case, Conan decided to look for some clues. He utilize his criminal tracking glasses and glanced around: he then noticed a wooden house with intricate types of objects and determined that it must have something to do with the crime. He also urged the others to tag along; as they arrived there, they saw the radio machine along with that fallen plate. Conan contemplated and gazed at the alarm display with the time "6AM". As Ran questioned him about the situation, he explained to her about the notion of the "Rube Goldberg Machine", which was basically a set of mechanisms that liaise altogether, performing a simple action but in countless different steps and fashions. He then deduced that most likely, the culprit also used this type of machine to set up this automated murder.
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| Tanaka offering them some yangnyeom chicken to try. |
Puzzled, the four of them entered the mansion and began asking the victim's wife some questions. They then learned that the victim had always gotten the habit of drinking coffee in the morning, at the exact spot and time. Kogoro thus deduced that the culprit most likely took advantage over this habit, and devised this complicated mechanical trick, as it would work out quite impressively since the victim's lifestyle was rather fixed. Yamamura then exclaimed that this would make solving this case much easier since they could simply narrow down the suspect circle with only the personnel who knew this habit. However, the victim's wife's proceeding words splattered Yamamura's figments of fantasies - the victim just got to disclose this habit some months ago on the TV, so technically, most people would have known this habit he had.
The victim's wife, Nanako, accused the president of "Cheom Cheom", Tanaka, for this murder. So they visited the restaurant where Tanaka worked. Tanaka kept insisting on his innocence, and reluctantly denying the accusation. After some questioning, he revealed that he really did undergone some unpleasant arguments with the victim not long ago, but that was concerning the Yangnyeom chicken sauce: the restaurants sold yangnyeom fried chicken, and the meal had to be laced with a special sauce that is sweet and spicy. Tanaka then explained that the sauce that he currently uses was invented by the founder of the restaurant, and he had no access to the secret recipe. He begged the victim many times for this recipe, just in case something would happen to him, but his request was being remorselessly turned down by the victim, who was obstinately against offering the recipe to Tanaka.
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| Yamamura conversing with Kawamoto at the resort area. |
After visiting the "Cheom Cheom" president, Tanaka, everyone decided to have a word with Kawamoto, an unemployed investor who was friends with the victim. In front of Inspector Yamamura, he justified his integrity by demonstrating to everyone that there was literally no reason for him to murder Inoue, as they were not at odds, or any of the kind. After some unproductive talks, Kawamoto introduced them to another person who has a relationship to the victim - the proprietress of Club Rokumaikai, Manami Teshima. He claimed her to be Inoue's mistress. Accordingly, hoping to gather some useful information, rushed to find her, and fortunately, she was also in the same resort area, so meeting her came very handy in this scenario. Yamamura began to ask her questions. Teshima declared that the victim helped her open the club she now owned. Seeing how close Teshima was to the victim, Kogoro proceeded with his inquiry, asking if she knew who would hold grudges against the victim. Teshima thus responded to him that she in fact could relate to a person - Norihiro Shimada, one of the investors in the "Cheom Cheom" restaurant. Evidently, he had just had a tremendous quarrel with the victim from a few days back, and it happened to take place within her club. Afterwards, the police brought to them some findings regarding this investor. This proved that Teshima was not lying to them: Shimada had a fatal argument with the victim with respect to some company management policy; however, Shimada went too far by pointing fingers at the victim and roaring cruel words such as "I'll kill you". With this piece of information, Kogoro speculated that most likely their fight had escalated into a murder.
At the same time, within Shimada's lodging, a sense of malice was lurking in the room... Just as Shimada was taking a shower, there was a black silhouette acting suspiciously within his house.
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| Conan constructed a suspect relationship chart in his mind |
Back to Kogoro's end, Conan looked up Shimada on the internet and found out that he was previously a passionate member of the Rube Goldberg Machine Club from the Haido University; and according to the website Conan searched, Shimada was precisely the president of the club that year, which could testify his ability of making Rube Goldberg machines. This did not wash up his innocence but seemed to append a further evidence for him being the murderer. While Yamamura and Kogoro were discussing and considering talking with Shimada, Conan strolled out and peered at the frozen lakes, where the snow was ubiquitous. Teshima showed up behind him and talked with Conan proactively. She told Conan that if he genuinely solved this puzzling Rube Goldberg Machine case, she would love to treat Conan a meal at her club, and Conan chuckled. All of a sudden, Kawamoto interrupted their conversation and started to overwhelm her with harsh words. Teshima, on the other hand, obviously was unwilling to back down, and stuck him with even more aggressive sentences - she declared that Kawamoto had a motive to kill the victim since Kawamoto nearly married Nanako, so in a way, Inoue "stole" a girl out of Kawamoto. Nevertheless, Kawamoto then began to suspect Teshima as the culprit simultaneously, since she had some affairs with Shimada as well, apparently.
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| The Rube Goldberg machine plan that Conan found in Shimada's room. |
Conan heard all of that, and timely, Ran came to pick him up because Kogoro and Inspector Mamamura decided to pursue the prime suspect they currently had, Norihiro Shimada. They went to his lodging community but heard the news that Shimada was out. Conan thus began investigating Shimada's house alone, trying to dig up some valuable clues. He approached his house from the back side, where those big windows were installed. He noticed a pair of footsteps leading to that glass door upon the huge window. Conan was able to enter Shimada's house through that glass window. Within his room, there was an opened liquor and some left-over yanghyeom chicken on the table, and on the floor, right next to Shimada's bed, Conan found a sheet of paper that had the structure of the Rube Goldberg machine drawn on it. Conan promptly understood it was the plan for the complex Rube Goldberg mechanism they saw this morning. This further suggested that it was Shimada who plotted this murder, since he was quite into the Rube Goldberg machine itself.
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| Inspector Yamamura receiving numerous phonecalls. |
Yamamura, Kogoro, and Ran got to Shimada's room too. Conan received another prominent clue from Yamamura: Shimada was sketching that Rube Goldberg machine plan in a public area and was apparently showing off to other people, and numerous witnesses could verify this fact. This precisely matched the tossed Rube Goldberg Machine plan paper in Shimada's house.
Yamamura then received a phone call from an anonymous user. The content of this call was that they saw Shimada buying mitarashi dango at a certain outlet mall; although this statement was doubted by Kogoro, they still attempted to go around and search for him. But then, Yamamura received another phone call, informing him that Shimada was also seen in a shop, eating tenzaru soba; but after some time, another phone call claimed Shimada to be buying homemade sausages in a shopping centre. This made Yamamura and Kogoro question the validity of the eyewitness information. With this predicament, they have been mandering around the area like a manipulated marionette. At last, Yamamura was told that a body was found, under the bridge that they were about to cross, and judging by the body's clothes and appearance, that was definitely Norihiro Shimada.
