Genius Composer Kidnapping Case

The **Genius Composer Kidnapping Case** is one of the many kidnapping cases conducted by the talent-kidnapper Hummingbird.

It is the twelfth main case in the *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* series.

## Overview

Three days after Hummingbird kidnapped genius sculptor Masatatsu Oyama, he releases him. On the same day, he sends a calling card and a guitar to Nyo-Nyon at her concert venue in Tokyo to inform her that she will be his next kidnapping victim.

Totomaru and Ron attended the concert because Toto got platinum tickets from his friend Higuchi who works at the venue. For this reason, they were the first at the scene, and Nyo-Nyon and her manager Mitsubashi consult them about the calling card. A company originally booked the venue for a party yesterday; they cancelled the party last-minute, but not without still paying full. Ron deduces Hummingbird must have made that booking to plant the guitar and card.

The day of the announced kidnapping, the Metropolitan Police Department's Special Crimes Division under Namazu barricade and watch the roads to Nyo-Nyon's mansion. Hundred officers have been positioned like a spiderweb within a 500-meter radius of the mansion to protect Nyo-Nyon and catch Hummingbird. Toto and Ron—disguised as Kamoo—are also present because Nyo-Nyon requested them. They are also joined by the Yamanashi Prefectural Police because the mansion is both in the Tokyo Metropolitan Area and the Yamanashi Prefecture under Sannou and because they also received a calling card from Hummingbird; this is a first as Hummingbird never sent a card to the police before.

Nyo-Nyon is locked in her composition room on the top of her house's clocktower. There are only two small windows which look out to the garden, and Mitsubashi has the only key to the tower. Four Metro Police officers guard the front of the mansion, and four Yamanashi Police officers the garden. Namazu, Toto, Ron, Sannou, and Mitsubashi guard the inside. An hour later, the numerous brand-new smoke detectors in the mansion go off at once and announce a fire in the living room where they are staying. Sannou is the first one to run upstairs, but he needs to wait for the key first. When the door is finally unlocked, Nyo-Nyon is gone.

## History

Hummingbird approaches Masatatsu Oyama in his house and offers him some coffee. Oyama, frightened and confused how Hummingbird could even enter his house because the police highly secured the place, demands to know what he wants from him. Hummingbird tells him that he wants to host the world's greatest soul-stirring talents and no one will stop him from doing so.

Three days later, Totomaru takes Ron to a Nyo-Nyon concert after his friend Higuchi got them platinum tickets for it. On the way to the concert venue, they talk about the latest Hummingbird kidnapping—he kidnapped the sculptor Oyama and released him today—and his baffling trademarks: He always sends a calling card to his next target who is a genius in their field. And no matter how much effort the police put into protecting his target, Hummingbird is able to kidnap them. He never asks for ransom, only for a demonstration of their talent and releases them a few days later.

In front of the venue, Ron spots a man with a mask and sunglasses in the crowd; he simultaneously watches two videos—one about first-class ballet, the other about a master craftsman—on two different smartphones and has two different earpieces in each ear. Ron approaches the man and asks if he can guess his occupation as he wants to polish his skill in this area. The man allows it to him, and Ron deduces that he is Hummingbird—or, rather, a wealthy heir who admires him. Toto apologizes for Ron's behavior, saying that he currently has the talent kidnapper on his mind. Then, they say goodbye to the man and go inside. The man was indeed Hummingbird and notes Ron's sharpness. After the concert, Higuchi approaches Toto and Ron because he needs their assistance: Hummingbird sent a calling card to Nyo-Nyon.

Sometime later, on the day of the announced kidnapping, Toto is requested by Nyo-Nyon to help protect her alongside the Metropolitan Police Department's Special Crimes Division under Namazu because he was the officer at the concert venue. He meets up with Namazu; together, they go to Nyo-Nyon's mansion and are greeted by both Nyo-Nyon and Ron, who was called by Nyo-Nyon because he impressed her at the concert venue. Namazu is suspicious of Ron, but before he can check his ID, the Yamanashi Prefectural Police under Sannou arrives because the mansion is on the border of the Tokyo Metropolitan Area and the Yamanashi Prefecture and they also received a calling card from Hummingbird. Begrudgingly, Namazu agrees to cooperate with the Yamanashi Police, and Toto, Ron, Nyo-Nyon, Sannou, and Namazu go into the mansion.

Inside, Totomaru informs Ron that, until recently, no one knew Nyo-Nyon's face and voice. Her songs were originally created with voice synthesis and her videos were animated. Nyon-Nyon jokingly remarks that she could not show her face fast enough though when a management agency offered her a lot of money. She also tells them about the mansion's history: The original building burned down in a fire. Of it, only the clocktower remained; the rest was rebuilt. Because of that, smoke detectors were installed all over the mansion. And when Sannou suggests to take Nyo-Nyon to a place where nobody could get near her, Nyo-Nyon takes him and the others up the clocktower. On its top is her composition room, and after Namazu inspects it, he allows her to stay there. The door is locked by Mitsubashi, and she, Toto, and the others wait in the living room.

Toto and Sannou stand observant at the foot of the staircase leading up the clocktower. And while everyone waits for Hummingbird to strike, Ron prepares a variety of brown-sugar-flavored desserts, i.a., donuts and parfaits, because he wants Hummingbird to recognize his talent for making sweets. Sannou informs him that while his creations are delicious, Hummingbird is only interested in "soul-stirringly" extraordinary talents. Ron replies that maybe deduction talent would count; however, he already knows that it is the best in the world and does not need Hummingbird's "approval." He adds that he, of course, does not mean his deduction talent but Toto's.

A moment later, the smoke alarm is set off and the speakers announce a fire in the living room. There is no fire though. Sannou and Ron immediately hurry to the composition room; Toto gets the key to it from Mitsubashi first before he, the manager, and Namazu run after Ron and Sannou. While they run up the stairs, Toto hands the key to Namazu who unlocks the door and reveals that Nyo-Nyon has already vanished. Sannou notes how the police was defeated, but Ron replies that the game has only just begun.

The investigation begins: Namazu goes to contact his subordinates at the base of the hill on which the mansion stands while Mitsubashi offers to show Ron, Totomaru, and Sannou around the lower rooms. Before they go downstairs, Sannou asks Toto if he feels confident which he negates. Ron remarks that humility is Totomaru's strong point.

In the storage room, Mitsubashi notices that the curtain is gone, and Toto and Ron ask her a few questions regarding Nyo-Nyon's work. Although she claims not to know anything about music, Mitsubashi's word choices in her replies show that she is actually knowledgable in this area.

Afterward, they return to the living room where Toto goes over the facts and says that he has no idea how Nyo-Nyon could have been kidnapped from the composition room; it seems impossible to him. However, Sannou announces that he has solved the case and wants to tell his deduction when Namazu returns. While they wait, Toto informs Ron that none of Hummingbird's victims have filed criminal reports after their kidnappings. Ron then asks Toto to contact Chicory as he wants her to look into something for him.

Namazu returns, and Sannou says that he believes Mitsubashi to be Nyo-Nyon's kidnapper: When the smoke detectors went off, Nyo-Nyon ran downstairs. However, they had locked the staircase door beforehand, and she had no key. Frozen in fear, she pressed herself behind the door and waited. Then, Sannou, Namazu, Toto, and Ron hurried upstairs and did not notice Nyo-Nyon behind the opened door in their haste. Mitsubashi, who took longer to get to the composition room, did though. While everyone else was upstairs, she abducted Nyo-Nyon and hid her in a secret room.

Mitsubashi protests, but Sannou insists to take her to the Yamanashi Prefectural Police for an interrogation. Ron objects on Totomaru's behalf, and Totomaru states that Mitsubashi cannot be Hummingbird because she is the real Nyo-Nyon: She betrayed herself with her word choice earlier (referring to "volume" as "level") and showed signs of distress when she was in the composition room with the windows uncovered ("Nyo-Nyon" said "she" was afraid of heights). Mitsubashi confesses that she is indeed the real Nyo-Nyon. The other woman is a singer her agency hired to be her "face" when she threatened to quit if she had to reveal her own.

Right before Toto uncovered Mitsubashi's secret, Namazu went to the foot of the hill after his subordinates reported of having seen a suspicious person there. Sannou decides to head there as well, and Ron, Toto, and Mitsubashi accompany him.

On the drive, upon his request, Ron tells Sannou "Toto's" deduction on how "Nyo-Nyon" was really kidnapped: After the smoke alarm went off, she, having no other way to escape, looked out of the window and saw a group of Yamanashi police officers holding the stretched-out storage room curtain and urging her to jump. "Nyo-Nyon" complied, and the Yamanashi officers who are all accomplices of Hummingbird carried her away. However, that was only the first part of Hummingbird's plan: Hummingbird and his accomplices dressed up as police officers so that he could bypass all security, declare Mitsubashi the culprit, and boldly drive her away under the guise that he would bring her to the police station—like Sannou tried earlier.

Cornered, Sannou parks on the side of the road and admits that he is indeed Hummingbird. He tells Ron, Mitsubashi, and Totomaru that he is kidnapping geniuses for his daughter who is a musical genius. He raised her to be one of the next top pianist, but his strictness and sheltering broke her. Now, his daughter cannot live without medication anymore, and only the talent of supreme artistic geniuses could stir her soul. To hear his daughter's heart again if only for a moment, he has started to kidnap geniuses and persuade them to have a conversation with her.

Toto insists that what he is doing is still a crime and demands to know where "Nyo-Nyon" is. Hummingbird replies that she is in this car's trunk. Toto and Ron go to check it, but she is not there, and Hummingbird took this chance to escape. Ron confesses that he let him escape because he was fascinated by the love he has for his daughter—and because the conversations the kidnapped geniuses have with Hummingbird's daughter make them happy and help them recover from slumps. He theorizes that the daughter can sympathize with the geniuses' loneliness and heal their wounds with her understanding.

Two months later, Ron and Toto learn that Mitsubashi founded her own agency and created hit after hit. It is unknown whether Mitsubashi met with Hummingbird. Toto wants to arrest Hummingbird anyway because he is still a criminal, and Ron is excited about meeting him again in the future.

## References

1. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 31, page 12
2. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 31, pages 2-5
3. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 31, pages 11-12
4. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 31, page 7
5. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 31, page 13
6. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 31, pages 14-18
7. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 32, pages 2-4
8. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 32, pages 7-19
9. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 31, pages 2-18
10. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 32, pages 2-19
11. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 33, pages 2-19
12. ↑ *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga; Chapter 34, pages 3-20