Chapter Seven: Demo Playtest, Day Two, Answer Time ①, Scene Two

“Do you want to continue Answer Time?”

An unexpected question came over the loudspeaker.

Everyone around the round table was startled, none more than Munakata. His voice was hoarse as he asked “Can-Can it continue?”

Kurata smiled and said “It'd be so boring if Answer Time ended just like that. Munakata, you only gave an answer to one of the cases, so you must not be satisfied either. In that case, I'll give you another chance to save your life.”

When Munakata was silent, Kurata continued in a whispery voice “I can authorize one extension per Answer Time. If Munakata can accurately explain the truth of YUKI's murder, his failure will be negated. How's that? It's an offer that's favorable to you and harmful to nobody.”

Munakata's dead eyes lit back up just a little. He murmured hoarsely “...But it's harmful to you, isn't it?”

“Because of the risk that you'll identify the one who killed YUKI, and expose the Executioner? Let me be clear: I can afford to take that risk.”

Kurata's cheery voice effectively covered up whatever true thoughts lay within. Kamo grew more and more confused.

Whatever the case, there was no way this proposal was given in the name of charity.

...If Munakata figures out the truth behind YUKI's death, then he'll expose the Executioner hiding among us. If they aren't able to present counter-evidence, there's no way they'll escape their death. But Kurata isn't taking that risk seriously at all.

A frown tightened Kamo's face.

Is Kurata just that confident that the Executioner's plan is unsolvable? Or maybe she doesn't care who dies, as long as the number of bodies increases?

Unfortunately, there was no guarantee that Munakata did have a correct answer to the YUKI poisoning case. On the contrary, the odds were better that he'd give another wrong answer, and drag another Detective's character along to suffer his failures alongside him.

After a short pause, Munakata said gravely “If I want to live... I have to take the risk and drag someone else into my reasoning, is that it?”

“That's right. Because this is a game where you can only win by gambling your own life and trampling on the lives of others.”

Munakata sniffed and a cruel smile formed at the corners of his mouth. Fuwa and Michi rushed to stop him somehow, but Munakata had already gotten to his feet.

“Of course I'll continue Answer Time.” He glanced at the dumbfounded Fuwa and Michi and tilted his neck as he said “What are you afraid of? Afraid of being accused by me? But... don't worry. The Executioner I'm about to expose isn't either of you.”

Hearing his words, the remaining three people's faces suddenly changed.

Setting aside Kamo, who had already been exposed as the Murderer, the person who Munakata was about to name as the Executioner was one of Yuki, Kenzan, or Azuma.

Of the three, only the victim, Yuki, wasn't nervous. He calmly asked “Well, who do you think killed me?”

“It was you, Aoba Yuki.”

“Oh... Huh? Me?”

Yuki clearly hadn't expected him to say that, as he coughed and sputtered.

Kamo once again covered his face with his left hand. No matter who Munakata had accused, he would have been surprised... But Munakata had accused Yuki.

Indeed, Yuki sometimes took actions that shocked those around him.

Everyone there would have been shocked to learn he'd once tried to take revenge for his childhood friend.

Yuki himself had no regrets of his decision, and even felt he was the same sort of person as Kurata. In that sense, it was likely he and Kurata were on similar wavelengths.

However, Kamo knew Yuki better than anyone else there, and he didn't believe that Yuki would ever become Kurata's accomplice in real murders.

...I can trust him, right?

Munakata paid no attention to Yuki's coughing and continued measuredly “How did they get into the locked room to poison the water? Thinking about that would just be a waste of time. In that situation, it was impossible for anyone else to poison the water via any method.”

Yuki managed to regain his breath, then retorted “Even so, you can't just jump to the conclusion that I committed suicide based on that. That answer doesn't have any shine to it.”

Munakata raised his eyebrows at Yuki.

“Just now, Kamo waited until I was finished explaining my reasoning before responding. It seems you're different from him.”

“I think that's just because Mr. Kamo was nervous... Anyway, even if you say I myself organized this incident, that still doesn't explain the whole case.”

Munakata grinned as Yuki sat up straight and gave his response.

“You mean the poison?”

“That's right. I've been thinking about this since the start of Answer Time. Mr. Munakata, you completely ignored the idea of poison in your answer, didn't you? Mr. Kamo didn't bring it up when he gave his counter-evidence either.”

Kamo couldn't help but smile bitterly in the face of Yuki's sharp accusation. The reason he'd avoided the topic was because carelessly discussing the poison could harm his actual position.

Yuki continued “Kurata said that there weren't any poisons or enough sleeping drugs to knock someone out in the entirety of Puppet Hall, is that correct?”

“That's correct. The one and only exception is that someone, either the Murderer or Executioner, was given a vial containing several thousand times a lethal dose of poison.”

“However, the fact is that Ms. Michi collapsed from some sort of drug and I died of poisoning. If the Murderer and the Executioner weren't both in possession of poison, there's no way to explain that!”

Munakata smiled lazily.

“The reason I didn't mention the poison is because of how closely related it was to your crime. After all, the only time that poison was actually used was in the death of MICHI.”

Kamo almost gasped, but barely managed to control himself.

Looking at Yuki again, his whole body was tense and he didn't speak for almost ten seconds before he recovered enough to ask “...What is your basis for saying that?”

“First off, the dose of poison Kurata prepared was too large. That cup contained enough water to save five times without refilling, so assuming the poison was placed in the cup, they would have only needed five times the lethal dose to guarantee death.”

“That makes sense, there really wasn't any need to prepare over eight thousand times the lethal dose.”

Munakata scoffed and grinned.

“Then let's think about it from a different perspective. All of our thoughts so far have involved the idea that 'the poison was ingested via the mouth'. What if... the Murderer actually poisoned her via 'absorbing the poison through the skin'?”

Yuki's eyes went wide.

“You think the poison was on the doorknob?”

“That's right, you're quick on the uptake. Michi's avatar touched the storeroom's doorknob with her bare hands, and the poison was absorbed through her skin. Because the poison is a colorless liquid, it wouldn't be visible no matter where it was applied.”

“...Then he wiped the poison off the doorknob and the corpse's hand afterwards to destroy the evidence?”

“Precisely. The only drawback to this method is its inefficiency. Only the avatar's fingers would have touched the small amount of poison on the doorknob, and only a portion of that would have been absorbed through the skin.” Munakata looked at Yuki, who hadn't said a word, and declared triumphantly “That's why it was necessary to prepare so much poison. I don't suppose that's wrong, is it, Mr. Kamo?”

Faced with his provocations, Kamo hesitated whether or not to respond.

His rebuttal to the accusation of killing MICHI was already completed; at this point the only parties engaged in Answer Time were Munakata and Yuki. At this point, there was no point in saying anything that would risk a slip of the tongue. Making that judgment, Kamo chose to remain silent for the time being.

“That's an interesting hypothesis. But it doesn't explain how my character died, does it?” The one who refuted Munakata was instead Yuki, who continued mockingly. “If I didn't use the contents of X's poison vial, then how did I kill myself? If you can't explain that, your whole theory is dead on arrival.”

Munakata laughed out loud.

“You died of poisoning without using the so-called poison.”

Everyone reacted to those words.

“Um... What do you mean?”

Yuki didn't get angry, but instead just looked deeply confused. His expression still looked relaxed, but his face grew paler and paler.

He wondered just how Munakata interpreted his shock as he continued with his malicious grin “One doesn't have to drink 'poison' to die of poisoning. Even something that isn't usually harmful can kill at high dosages. Alcohol poisoning, for example.”

Yuki looked caught off guard, but he quickly responded “There isn't any alcohol in Puppet Hall, just tons of natural water... right?”

Yuki suddenly lost steam. Kamo nodded reassuringly at him.

But at the same time, he sighed to himself.

...Yuki had given up his Detective role and hadn't seriously investigated anything, but in doing so he'd harmed himself. Looking at him like this, it was clear he didn't even know what was in the kitchen.

The key to a successful defense was in making good use of the information available.

No matter how you thought about it, Yuki, who hadn't investigated, was at a disadvantage.

Munakata didn't notice Kamo's concern, as he was busy operating the 3D monitor. He quickly pulled up an image of the kitchen.

“I didn't say alcohol was used in this case. You used salt.”

“...Salt?” Yuki muttered before lapsing into silence.

On the 3D projected kitchen's shelves were a variety of spices and seasonings.

The palm sized containers were almost empty, especially the salt and miso, which had the least residue left.

“You've heard that too much miso can kill you, right? Once a human body ingests too much salt it can trigger salt poisoning, leading to hypernatremia and even death.”

What Munakata said was true. Many things were harmful to the human body in high doses, even things you ate everyday.

Yuki responded in a panic “But those containers are so small. There's no way I could know I'd die from eating that little.”

“There's no point in playing dumb. I saw with my own two eyes that there was a bottle of soy sauce under the shelf, and I remember its capacity: 400 milliliters.”

Yuki was dumbfounded. He probably agreed that combining the salt, miso, and soy sauce would potentially exceed a lethal dose.

Munakata pitilessly continued “You brought all that salt, miso, and soy sauce back to your room. I expect you also emptied out the other containers because you were afraid we'd suspect something if only the salty seasonings were empty. Then, you locked your door, acted out that scene of you being poisoned as you saved, then drank the soy sauce, dissolved the salt and miso in water, and drank that, too. And just like that, you'd consumed a lethal overdose of salt.”

Yuki was silent. Munakata quickly continued.

“A poisoning that involved no poison... It's a brilliant idea, no? Until we got solid proof that it was all organized by Yuki, we'd be forced to uselessly run in circles and try to solve a locked room trick that didn't exist.”

Kamo couldn't help but bite his lip.

...That isn't possible. Munakata got it wrong again.

Kamo was confident in his memory, so he could assert that much.

Kamo had confirmed the amount of salt and miso at the very beginning of last night's Investigation Time. The amount left was the same as it was now. Therefore, it was certain that Yuki hadn't eaten any seasonings, whether it was during Investigation Time or Crime Time.

However, Munakata kept talking.

“I realized that Yuki was the mastermind behind his own death when Kurata made that big fuss about the existence of the poison vial... since she said that, we all assumed that poison must have been used in YUKI's murder, right? No one would have thought that he'd actually just eaten a bunch of salt.”

Kamo listened absently as he kept thinking.

...It's too bad he didn't at least look at the soy sauce bottle last night.

That had been a mistake. He still had a piece of information that Munakata didn't know: last night, he'd picked up the soy sauce bottle to measure its contents, and the label had read “Reduced Salt”. If you were deliberately trying to give yourself salt poisoning, surely you wouldn't use reduced salt soy sauce. It was a weak objection, but he had to take the gamble.

Thinking that, Kamo decided to speak up, but Kurata chose that exact moment to interject.

“Ah, ah, ah. Only the accused can make their own defense; no one can help them. The moment you speak up in his defense, both Yuki and the person who tried to help him will be punished.”

Once again having his mind read, Kamo could only swallow his words.

At that moment, Yuki spoke softly. “Puppet Hall has a laundry room, but there isn't any detergent or fabric softener anywhere. And there isn't any dish soap in the kitchen, either, and I didn't see any shampoo or body wash in my bathroom.”

Munakata looked hesitant to respond.

“That's your counter-evidence?”

Yuki's gaze shifted from the monitor to Munakata, and he nodded.

“...I think you misunderstood Kurata's words.”

“What?”

“When talking about the liquids our avatars were capable of ingesting, Kurata said that she hadn't placed any poisons in the building 'that reached a lethal dose'. Then she said... that she purposely forced us to drink water regularly and that she'd given either the Murderer or the Executioner poison.”

Kamo also remembered all that. Munakata seemed to be getting more confused the more he heard.

“So what?”

“If that were the case, then there would be two poisons present in the game, right? Posion... and water.”

Munakata laughed.

“How can water be a poison!?”

“Easily. There is such a thing as water poisoning, and if you drink large amounts of water at once, it can be as harmful to the body as salt.”

“You're talking nonsense.”

“I'm not making it up. I had to research it for a novel once. Water poisoning is the opposite of salt poisoning and will trigger hyponatremia. If the body can't excrete water due to kidney failure, it will cause the same condition.”

“...Just how long are you going to spew nonsense like this?”

Munakata's tone was getting vicious, but Yuki just smiled.

“I admit, I'm not being very clear. The issue here isn't 'what is poison', but 'what does Kurata define as poison'. Considering what she said, I think Kurata should have defined both water and salt, which can kill if ingested in sufficient quantities, as poisons.”

It was a bit of a stretch, but there weren't any actual flaws in his claim.

Virtual characters can only drink liquids. Kamo hadn't seen any detergent, shampoo, or alcohol in the VR world, so if you thought about it from the perspective of someone avoiding putting any liquids that could kill if ingested in the game, it made sense.

Yuki continued “Assuming that, other than X's poison and 'water, but not enough to cause fatal water poisoning', there aren't any poisons in Puppet Hall... that would mean the reason the salt, miso, and soy sauce containers were empty wasn't because they were used for a crime, but because they were empty from the beginning so that there wouldn't be salt in the game world.”

“That's all bullshit! You're distorting the facts!”

Munakata's head shook violently. He was on the verge of tears. Yuki's expression had also grown deeply distorted.

“I don't know how much seasoning there was when the game started... Do you, Mr. Munakata?”

Munakata lowered his head and didn't say anything. Yuki looked to the monitor.

“It's useless for the two of us to keep arguing, so please, let's let the one with the relevant information decide.”

A sigh came from the speakers.

“Yuki's deduction isn't wrong, the poisons I was talking about include things like detergent and seasonings, and it's certainly true that the Hall doesn't have enough sodium chloride to give someone salt poisoning. The method of suicide described by Munakata is impossible.”

Perhaps he'd had a premonition... After hearing those words, Munakata just looked down at his hands. Yuki was silent, taking no joy in his successful defense.

Kurata continued with a sigh “Man, I wanted to kill off three of you at once with this Answer Time, how was I supposed to know that you'd both manage to defend yourselves? You all are no fun.”

“Do I... have to die?” Munakata mumbled.

“Yep. You've made two errors of deduction in a row, there's no more reason for you to live. You will die, and in death you will become a new puzzle to further torment your fellow detectives.”

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