LRAB Chapter 25, Act 1: Tragedy
Chapter 25, Act 1: Tragedy
Azure and Douzi looked at each other in bewilderment.
"You mean these people deliberately put on an act in front of Sister Xiaolan? Did the little boy and his mother originally intend to extort money from her?"
“That’s not how it is.” The detective shook his head. “The course of events is not complicated. The reason why there are incomprehensible contradictions is simply because you, as the parties involved, have a problem with your perspective on the events.”
Hugo arranged the packaging bags and beverage cans on the table to resemble the terrain of a street, and pointed his slender finger at the entrance of the dead-end alley.
"This is where Azure spotted the Warrior Eagles."
He then pointed to the back of the entrance—
"This is where the little boy was."
“What does this mean?” Azure couldn’t help but ask. “That child did appear behind me after I saw the Warrior Eagle, and he testified that I was the first human to enter the alley after the Warrior Eagle, but what does that mean?”
“This means that the child could only have arrived at the scene after you.” The detective emphasized the word “could only.”
"That boy loudly accused you of being the murderer. Since he cared so much about the Warrior Eagle, there's absolutely no way he could have just watched the eagle fly into the alley and remained indifferent, much less stood at the alley entrance counting how many people went in and out. He must have..."
Hugo's fingers slid through the gaps in the street model: "Straight to the crime scene."
Azure still couldn't understand, staring intently into the detective's eyes.
“But he didn’t do that. That can only be because he couldn’t, was unable to, and had no means to enter that alley that was only a few steps away.” Hugo pulled his finger out of the simple map, as if the little boy being represented had vanished into thin air in the alley. “At the same time, he could still ensure that he was monitoring the people coming in and out of the alley.”
"Why?" Douzi asked loudly, swinging her high ponytail, completely bewildered. "Is there a glass dome locking the boy inside?"
"Oh!"
A gasp came from Azure. The confusion in her eyes had vanished.
“There really is such a glass enclosure!” Bilan said. “The residential building next door has an open-air elevator.”
“That’s right.” Hugo snapped his fingers, seemingly quite used to praising his companions who followed his line of reasoning.
"The only explanation that can rationalize all the contradictions that Azure witnessed is that the little boy was not standing on the main street outside or in the alley where the incident occurred before he entered the dead-end alley, but in a glass elevator that offered a commanding view of the alley entrance. Therefore, when he was in the elevator, the child could only watch as the Warrior Eagle flew into the deep alley entrance, and then go to the alley just a step away to check the situation."
Hugo said in a teacher-like tone: "Your previous mistake was that you were looking at enclosed spaces from a two-dimensional perspective."
"In fact, even in a dead-end alley in Feiyun City, where skyscrapers stand tall, there are still countless entrances and exits, which are the windows of the buildings. Most of these windows are tightly closed, but under the cover of smoke and dust, the few open windows are easy to miss. This is not a shameful thing; height and field of vision often cause us to overlook things that are not on the same level as us."
After thinking for a while, Douzi finally had a look of sudden realization and made a bold deduction: "Could it be that the murderer escaped through the window that was open above the dead-end alley?"
“No.” Azure and the detective said in unison.
Hugo made a gesture for ladies to go first, and Azure said directly, "It wasn't that the Warrior Eagle flew into the dead end to find the child, but that the boy chased the Warrior Eagle to the scene."
“That’s right, so the reason why the Pokémon was injured is self-evident,” Hugo sighed.
Azure added details about the scene: "I saw many piles of trash nearby, including fragments of Poké Balls."
It seems that once the logic is clear, various clues will emerge one after another from the mud, like mudfish in the rain.
However, Douzi still didn't understand what it meant.
"In short," the detective finally revealed the truth, "this mystery is actually about a Pokémon falling from a building."
This is actually a simple story, or rather, an accident.
A little boy playing by the window accidentally let his Poké Ball fall out. His Braviary couldn't release the ball in time to avoid it and crashed to the ground, sustaining serious injuries. The boy hurriedly took the elevator downstairs to check on the situation and saw an older girl who had arrived at the scene earlier.
...You killed Yingying!
The little boy naively thought that the warrior eagle had wings and could fall straight down from the sky unharmed. However, he did not notice the Poké Ball that was already smashed to pieces on the garbage heap next to him. How could the eagle, which could not be released from the ball in time, spread its strong wings?
Since the Warrior Eagle wasn't injured from the fall, the culprit responsible for its near-death experience and profuse bleeding must have been the older woman who was the first to arrive after the incident. He saw clearly from behind the elevator glass that no one else had entered the alley except for her.
He was certainly a child separated from his family, but he had left home on his own initiative. Only a child who hurriedly ran out of the house would be wearing those loose, pajamas-like clothes…
"That's why the mother slapped her son at that moment," Hugo added. "No parent would show mercy to a child who has caused such a disaster."
After the reasoning was completed and the mystery was solved, the two ladies across the table fell silent once again.
"There's another question." As if remembering something, Azure broke the awkward silence. "According to this explanation, the only culprit who harmed the Warrior Eagle should be that child, or even a regrettable accident. Why do you, Hugo, say there are murderers in this incident? And three of them? And the mother, the child, and the elf are the three parties involved?"
Faced with a barrage of questions, Hugo sighed again, looking regretfully at the pizza that had grown cold on the table: "It seems I accidentally said too much. I should have stopped here."
"No!" Azure's eyes shone brightly; she had never been so passionate about anything outside of elf battles. "I want to find out the truth."
Douzi, standing nearby, shouted, "Me too!" and raised his hands to urge Hugo on.
"While it's possible to interpret this as an accident, such an accident is still too coincidental, not to mention there's a very obvious inconsistency." The detective helplessly restarted his deduction.
"There are two coincidences. The house has more than one window. Why would the Brave Eagle's Poké Ball happen to fall out of the window facing the dead end? And this dead end is usually deserted and is a blind spot for people on the main street."
Hugo lowered his voice and continued, "Also, why is the Pokémon in the Poké Ball a winged, flying Brave Eagle? You know, if it were any other kind of Pokémon in the ball, it wouldn't be able to wait for Azure's emergency rescue in the face of this kind of high-rise fall—it would only end up being smashed to pieces."
The girls couldn't help but shiver. They had finally sensed a conspiracy.
"Where is the inconsistency?" Azure stared intently at the detective, as if to say that she was ready to face the truth.
“Time,” Hugo said, “the time between Ibrahimovic discovering the anomaly and your arrival at the scene. It’s been too long.”
"What do you mean?"
“If that family lived on a low floor, the child wouldn’t have taken the elevator; he would have run down the stairs. If they lived on a high floor, like the 5th to 10th floor, the child should have reached the alleyway long before you arrived. But he was still in the elevator…”
“This means the child’s home must be at least on the thirtieth floor. Only a floor that high would take so much time.” Douzi chimed in, and being familiar with Feiyun City, she finally made the correct deduction. “There are very few buildings in Feiyun City with fewer than twenty floors, especially on the commercial street we were walking on. The average number of floors there is thirty-five.”
"Then, the inconsistency arises. At the 30th floor, a distance of about 100 meters, Braviary had nearly five seconds to escape from the Poké Ball."
Hugo suddenly stopped speaking, but time continued to pass by, second by second.
One, two, three, four, five.
A full five seconds.
The silence stretched out time endlessly.
"It's been too long," Azure sighed, now knowing the answer to the mystery.
“Yes, it’s been too long,” Hugo nodded.
“That would have been enough time for the Warrior Eagle to take flight, but it didn’t.” Azure’s eyes were filled with sorrow, and her voice was filled with indignation. “Just because that child’s parents wanted to teach her son a lesson.”
"That's right. The parents of the child in this incident probably placed a Poké Ball containing a Brave Eagle next to the window facing the dead end in an attempt to correct their son's bad habits. When the young and ignorant child accidentally pushed the Poké Ball out the window, the Brave Eagle falling from the window would leave an unforgettable memory for that child, and he would never play dangerous games near the window again."
"What a cruel educational method," Douzi couldn't help but sigh.
Hugo continued, "Regardless of such educational philosophies, I believe that in that mother's original plan, the Warrior Eagle would not have been injured, because in Douzi's description, the mother's reaction at that time was one of great surprise and sadness, right?"
The detective looked at Azure to confirm.
“I don’t think that was acting,” Azure said.
"So, the final culprit in this case has appeared: the brave eagle. What broke its wings and left it severely injured and dying was its pride."
Hugo opened his Pokédex, and a comical electronic voice echoed in the restaurant of the Feather Residence.
"Valiant possesses a courageous character that shows no fear even at death, making it a brave and proud Pokémon. It is a valiant and resolute aerial warrior, also known as the Warrior of the Sky, who will fight for its companions regardless of danger, never giving up no matter how severe its injuries, and taking pride in this. The more frontal wounds a Valkyrie has, the braver it is; those with more back wounds will be looked down upon within the group..."
Azure and Douzi seemed to be able to hear the dripping blood between the lines of the illustration and explanation.
"In the mother's original plan, the Warrior Eagle was supposed to lie on the ground pretending to be seriously injured, close its eyes and pretend to be unconscious in front of its crying, ashamed and remorseful little master—but it rejected such a script, resolutely spending those five seconds of free fall, until finally bouncing out of the ball due to instinct, but by then it was too late."
Hugo's reasoning is so tragic and poignant. Even though all the reasoning is completely baseless, the detective's story-like words are filled with a strange sense of realism.
"The pre-meal games are over, let's eat!" Hugo clapped his hands loudly. "There are still two hot pizzas in the oven, let's eat quickly, the elves are starving."