The Case of the Island Observatory Murder Pt. 5

**The Case of the Island Observatory Murder Pt. 5** (孤島天文台殺人事件⑤, *Kotō tenmondai satsujin jiken ⑤*) is the 13th chapter of the *Ron Kamonohashi: Deranged Detective* manga.

## Summary

Ron and Toto gather the guests at the observatory dome, with Toto saying this is to quickly arrest the dangerous serial killer, and would thus appreciate their understanding and cooperation. Toto says the killer is in the room. Donzawa demands that he explains it properly; Toto complies.

When Grizzly was shot on the roof, Ron and Toto immediately ran down to where he landed. That is because right after hearing the shooting, they looked out a window and saw him falling. To put it another way, if they had not seen Grizzly falling, it would have made more sense to head to the roof, where the gunshot came from. But there was someone who immediately ran to where Grizzly was outside. Someone who even came out without an umbrella, in order to cover up the fact that he got soaked by the rain when he shot Grizzly on the roof: Jumonji.

Jumonji chuckles uneasily, saying Toto scared him, and that he jumped to the wrong conclusion. He just lost his composure after hearing a gunshot and ran outside without thinking. Also, how will he explain Onodera's murder? He was with Toto when she was killed.

Toto says that he has figured out the trick. Jumonji pretended to go back to his room during the party, then attacked Onodera while she was alone and gave her sleeping medicine. After that, he laid her down with Ron the dome room, where he had already shot out the lights with the gun. That is also when he put the master key in Ron's pocket. For the finishing touch, he put glue on the door and sealed Onodera and Ron inside.

Unno asks how did he lock the door. Toto says that is the really clever part. He gave Onodera a lighter dose of sleeping medicine than given to Ron. So when she woke up, she first headed over to the glowing light switch. But all the lights had been destroyed, so they did not turn on. Onodera then tried to leave through the door after noticing it next to the light switch, but it would not open since it was glued shut. She thought the door must be locked, and when she turned the lock to open the door, she actually locked it.

Donzawa demands to know how did somebody shoot her after that. Toto continues: The killer anticipated Onodera's next action and had one more trick prepared. The fishing line they found on Grizzly was the hint. The killer tied one end of the fishing line to the top of the telescope, and tied the other end to the trigger of a gun that was hidden inside the air vent. Since the lights would not turn on and the door would not open, the only other illumination in the dome was coming from the switch to open the dome's ceiling. If Onodera opened the ceiling, she would have some light from the stars and could probably get someone's attention by shouting.

She pulled the switch. As the dome opened, the telescope started to rotate towards the stars it had been programmed to observe. At the same time, the fishing line tied to the top of the telescope grew taut and pulled the gun's trigger, and it fired onto Onodera's back. When Grizzly found it, the fishing line had already snapped due to the telescope's rotation.

Jumonji complains. The gun was lying next to Ron, it was not in the vent. Toto replies the gun that was next to Ron was the model gun from the lobby. While everyone's attention was focused on the corpse, Jumonji went and retrieved the real gun from the air vent, and used that gun to kill Grizzly. Jumonji wants to know, assuming Toto is right about the murder method, whether he has any proof that he did it. Toto says he has a question for him: Before they broke open the door to enter the dome, he asked Unno to get some flashlights. How did he know the lights would not turn on inside? That is information only the killer, who broke all the lights ahead of time, would know.

At this, Jumonji surrenders, saying that if they have seen that far, then he has lost this bet. But he does not regret it. Onodera died because she had to, he says. Toto asks what Onodera do. Jumonji says that Onodera has been sniffing around about the murders that happened there ten years ago, that her being an "astronomical photographer" was a cover story. She was really a journalist and investigated unsolved crimes. She showed up out of the blue a few years ago, and Jumonji knew right away that she was there to investigate the murders. Onodera left that viewing party to rummage through his room.

Considering that Jumonji killed Onodera because he had something to hide, Ron asks him if the gun he used to shoot her is the same one that was used in the murder ten years ago. Jumonji confirms this and that he had been hiding it the whole time. On that day, Jumonji relates, his father who was the director at the time, killed all the guests with a gun, then killed himself. He was the first one to arrive on the scene, and he desperately wanted to hide his family's shame, their shame. But what is done is done, he says. He just wanted to live the rest of his life in peace, but that "stupid woman" was trying to dig it all back up, and Grizzly was just as stupid for investigating further as pinning the crime on Ron would have solved everything. If he had not kept investigating like that, Jumonji would have rewarded Grizzly handsomely for protecting his peace.

Kill on Sight is triggered, and Ron tells Jumonji to shoot himself. Holding the pistol, he tells him to repay the death with his own death. Before the ability can take hold of Jumonji, Toto grabs the pistol and tackles Ron. Ron regains consciousness, wondering what he did. Then, Jumonji says that he will not be killed by Ron as he raises a capsule; he wants to settle it his way. Jumonji swallows the capsule as Ron grabs him, telling him to spit it out. Jumonji says he is too late.

Ron shakes him, saying he still has questions: Why was it him? Why was the trap set for him and not anyone else? Did Jumonji plan on Ron coming too? Jumonji says of course he did. He weakly says, no matter how much Ron struggles, he will never escape "his" grasp. Ron shakes him again: What does he mean? Who is he talking about? However, Jumonji only says that the sun is rising as he slumps and foams at the mouth. Ron keeps yelling, demanding Jumonji not to die because he still has questions. Toto quietly stops him, saying it is no use, Jumonji is dead. The almond smell points to cyanide poisoning.

As the sun begins to rise, Toto talks on his cellphone. He announces that the local police are headed toward the island, to the relief of the remaining guests.

Ron, meanwhile, remains in the dome by himself. He says to Jumonji that he calculated it from the start. He took advantage of his love of brown sugar, and lured him to the viewing party through Toto. Then, he set up a trap to make him look like the killer in front of a BLUE instructor. He asks Jumonji who he is and, if someone gave him instructions, who those people were. Ron then remarks that it was fitting that an observatory director's last words were "The sun is rising." Ron opens the dome to show him the sunrise. As sunlight enters the dome, Ron is shocked by what he sees.

Toto returns to the dome with the local police. The police interrogate the guests, while forensics record the findings for the bodies. Toto thanks Princess Ori for answering his questions. Princess Ori in returns says that when Toto is working, he shines like a "first-magnitude star." Toto blushes as Princess Ori runs away in a "Comet Dash."

Later, Toto tells Ron, sprawled out on the lobby sofa, that the police had loaded up the bodies and set off. They could soon head back once they are ready as well. Ron says it is a shame that Grizzly is leaving as a corpse. It seems like he was someone who really understood Ron. He asks Toto if he remembers how before they came to the island, he said we was giving up detective work? He is taking it back. The case was exactly like the one from his past and it was not a coincidence. He was discovered at the scene of a murder with no memory of what happened. When he woke up, he was accused of being the killer.

Ron also found another point of similarity. He showed a picture of the spot where Onodera was killed, after the sun came up. Marked on the carpet under Onodera was the intersected number 96, exactly the same as the scar on Ron's neck. Ron says that it was dark in the dome the whole time, and he did not notice since the carpet is black. But the mark had been drawn in red ink before Onodera was killed.

Ron sits up and holds his head. He should have realized it sooner. If someone was objectively observing his life, the Bloody Field Trip Case was an abrupt anomaly. The only time, before or since, that a culprit died and he was blamed for it, was that incident. It was after that incident that he started trying to pressure culprits to death, and most importantly, he got the scar on his neck during that incident. In other words: The Bloody Field Trip was a set-up.

Toto asks who would set him up, then Toto himself realizes: The person that Jumonji mentioned. Ron continues that he devoted his life to detective work and they stole five years of it from him. Then, they got tired of him wallowing in self-pity, and prepared another murder case like the one five years ago and invited him in. It is like they wanted to declare that they have a brain superior to his own, like they are mocking him for their control over his life as a detective. They are messing with him. He adds that this is the greatest humiliation of his life and that he will not forgive them for this.

Meanwhile, in the police boat, a policeman pats his shoulders, saying it looks like it is just him and the corpses. Soon, one of the body bags unzips, and Jumonji sits up. He says he narrowly escaped death, and thanks the policeman. Jumonji ate the fizzy almond scented candy, squeezed a ball under his arm to stop his pulse so that nobody would suspect he was still alive. The policeman says he was quite the actor, and on behalf of his family, Jumonji has their praise. Jumonji says it is not necessary. The only reason he was able to avoid death and start a new life, is because they reached out to him when he was in trouble with Onodera.

It feels like a dream to him, to think the legendary M. Family, which stands at the peak of the criminal world, actually exists and appeared before him. They say that all the world's crime goes through the M. Family, and that 100% of the cases they are directly involved in go unsolved. Jumonji gushes that they are the greatest crime family in history.

The policeman says they are more famous than he thought, then asks how Ron is. Jumonji says he observed him closely, that he is just like they said, he suddenly changed once he knew Jumonji was the killer. There was murderous intent in those eyes. He thinks he would have been killed if he had not pretended to kill himself.

The policeman then shoots Jumonji in the forehead as this is all he needed to hear. He removes his disguise while he reports to his brother that it is done. He also reports that he has heard that Ron tried to kill the killer and that he saw him for the first time. His brother asks what he thinks, and he answers that Ron is not like any of them. Even after hearing he is the sixth-generation descendant of that arch-enemy detective, they could not believe it. The brother reminds him that Ron is also the ninth-generation descendant of someone else and then asks if Ron got his message from five years ago. While he steers the boat, he reports that Ron's face went pale after seeing the mark on the ground; thus, he must not know what it means.

The brother says Ron will come to it eventually, the blood of their side which flows through him. After all, he has the blood of both the supreme detective Sherlock Holmes and the king of crime James Moriarty in his veins.

In the Nandan Observatory, while they wait to go home, Ron starts hula-hooping again, and Toto remarks his bad mood did not last long at all. Ron says that he thought about it, he figured that it is kind of wonderful that he has his own personal mystery now. Toto gripes that he should think about it a little harder. But Ron pauses from the hula-hooping, and says that he forgot to ask the most important thing: Will he continue to help him out? Toto pauses, then answers with a wink and smile: If he is not around, someone will pin a murder on Ron in no time. Ron smiles back.

Ron also says that Unno the chef gave him some brown sugar syrup she did not need. She gave him three, so Toto could have one. Toto says it is his favorite, so he did not have to. Ron then says give it to Amamiya, presenting a container filled with brown sugar syrup that Toto says looks just like marine fuel. Toto relents, saying maybe he could give it as a souvenir.

## Characters in Order of Appearance

* Totomaru Isshiki
* Ron Kamonohashi
* Takumi Jumonji
* Eisaku Donzawa
* Minami Unno
* Princess Ori
* Winter Moriarty
* Mylo Moriarty