Rin chuckled, then took out his phone, walked to the side, and dialed a number, "Hello? Yuzuha? There's something I need to ask of you..."
Led by his younger brother Tanaka Tomofumi, Zhu Yuan, Seth, and the Detective Boys arrived at the door of the older brother's room on the second floor.
The door was ajar.
Just as Tanaka Tomofumi said, his older brother Tanaka Kazuyoshi's room was extremely simple and uncluttered.
There was a desk, a chair, and a single bed with a neatly made sheet.
At the desk, his older brother was facing away from the door, lie on the table motionless, seemingly in a deep sleep, still wearing the bathrobe from earlier.
"See, officers?"
Tanaka Tomofumi lowered his voice, shrugging helplessly,
"My brother is just sleeping here. There's nothing unusual in the room at all. Please let him rest properly."
To be absolutely sure, Seth still cautiously walked into the room.
His gaze swept across the room, finally landing on the bed.
This was the only place in the room where a body could possibly be hidden.
He squatted down and carefully lifted the bedsheet that reached the floor, looking underneath the bed.
The space under the bed was empty, with only a little dust.
Seth stood up and shook his head at Zhu Yuan.
Zhu Yuan sighed and nodded apologetically to Tanaka Tomofumi, signaling to withdraw.
"It seems the children indeed made a mistake. We apologize for the disturbance," Officer Zhu Yuan said.
"It's alright, the police are just doing their duty," Tanaka Tomofumi replied courteously, seeing the police out the door.
Outside the door, Rin looked at the dejected Detective Boys and deliberately put on a stern face to scold them.
"Alright, have you made enough fuss this time? Don't call the police casually without solid evidence from now on, understand? You've caused so much trouble for the police and others!"
The three children pouted, lowered their heads, looking as if they had suffered a great injustice.
Rin looked at them, a faint smile playing on her lips, but she still pulled them along, saying, "Come on, come on, let's go home."
Watching Rin lead the children away, Tanaka Tomofumi's lips curled into a cold smile as he gently closed the door.
After they had walked some distance, Ayumi couldn't help but whisper to Genta and Mitsuhiko, "Did you two really see wrong? Were those really just rose bath salts?"
"No way!" Genta retorted excitedly, "I saw it clearly! It was definitely blood!"
Mitsuhiko's brows were tightly furrowed, "I'm also sure I didn't see wrong. But... where did the body go? We and the police searched..."
A strong sense of frustration made them feel a bit lost.
Ayumi picked up her Detective Badge and suggested, "How about we contact Conan? He'll definitely have an idea."
"No!" Genta clenched his fist, "This time, we're going to solve the case ourselves! We can't let Conan take all the credit! He always takes the spotlight, it's our turn to show what we can do."
"Right, we can solve cases ourselves," Mitsuhiko chimed in, "When it gets dark, we'll sneak into the Tanaka house again! We must find evidence!"
Genta and Ayumi exchanged glances; although a little scared, they both eventually nodded vigorously.
Night fell quietly.
Three small figures appeared outside the Tanaka house's courtyard wall once more.
They skillfully climbed over the wall and once again ascended the familiar large tree.
Ayumi climbed a little slower, and Genta and Mitsuhiko reached down from above to pull her up.
As they cautiously peered through the window, the older brother's room on the second floor caught their attention.
Only a dim desk lamp was on in the room. The older brother, Tanaka Kazuyoshi, remained in the same posture, motionless, lie on the desk.
"This uncle sleeps too much, doesn't he?" Mitsuhiko couldn't help but whisper, "From morning until now? Not even moving once?"
Genta pouted: "Exactly, he sleeps more than I do! I even turn over and snore when I sleep, he's practically like... like..."
"Like he's dead..." Ayumi finished his sentence, her voice trembling slightly.
This sentence gave them a common thought.
Genta and Mitsuhiko's eyes widened suddenly as they looked again at the motionless figure lie on the table.
A plausible guess sprang to mind.
Perhaps the older brother they thought was sleeping, could he be the body they saw in the morning?
Had he just been posed like this by the killer?!
Ayumi asked with some confusion, "But then, what was that about the older brother shouting loudly for everyone to be quiet? A corpse can't speak, can it?"
"It could be a recording," Mitsuhiko recalled similar situations they had encountered in the past.
"We'll go in and check, then we'll know," Genta said, mustering his courage.
With that, Genta took the lead and slipped into the room through the unlocked window on the second floor.
Once in the older brother's room, it was silent, and they could hear their own nervous heartbeats.
The three children held their breath, approaching the figure lie on the desk step by step.
Ayumi extended her slightly trembling small hand and carefully touched the older brother's hand resting on the edge of the desk.
Cold, stiff.
Completely lacking the warmth of a living person!
Ayumi recoiled her hand as if burned, her face pale, and she whispered to her two companions: "This uncle no longer has a body temperature..."
Genta and Mitsuhiko also bravely touched him, confirming Ayumi's discovery.
"It's really... really a dead body!" Mitsuhiko whispered, both scared and excited, "We weren't wrong!"
"Quick, quick, call the police!" Genta hastily fumbled for his children's phone.
However, as he moved, he accidentally bumped the leg of a nearby chair.
Clang!
The sound of the chair falling was particularly jarring in the quiet room.
As the chair fell, the body, which had been posed in a sleeping position, lost its support and also toppled to the ground.
The three children were scared out of their wits, frozen in place.
Immediately after, hurried footsteps were heard downstairs.
Thump, thump, thump, thump--
Someone was rushing upstairs at an extremely fast pace!
"Oh no!" Mitsuhiko's face changed dramatically.
"Hide quickly!" Genta whispered urgently.
The three children panicked, almost instinctively, scrambling and crawling under the single bed, the only place to hide in the room.
They squeezed together tightly, covering their mouths with their hands, not daring to even breathe loudly.
Bang!
The room door was suddenly flung open.
His younger brother, Tanaka Tomofumi, stood at the doorway, holding a gleaming kitchen knife.
The gentle demeanor from the daytime was gone from his face, replaced by a ferocious expression.
"Who?! Who's in there?!" he roared, his gaze sweeping rapidly across the room.
When he saw his older brother's body on the floor and the overturned chair, his eyes became incredibly cold.
He immediately realized that someone had broken in and discovered his secret.
His gaze searched the room, finally settling on the slightly shaking bed.
"Hiding there, are you?"
Tanaka Tomofumi's lips curled into a cruel, cold smile.
Step by step, he slowly walked towards the bed, the kitchen knife in his hand reflecting a cold light in the lamp.
Finally, he stopped in front of the bed, raised the kitchen knife high, and brought it down fiercely towards the direction of the bed's underside!