Turnabout Chessboard: Chapter 3

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[[Previous: Chapter 2 | Next: Final Chapter]]

...The witch's side withdraws from the scene of the Second Twilight. That was a clever trick, but it won't work twice, you see?

I must now prepare for our next skirmish, so there will be another brief recess before the trial resumes.

Comments

[wright_idea]

Yeah. Gotta say, this is the first case we've had where we don't even get the BODIES.

[I see Beatrice decided to 'elaborate' again too. Great. How the heck are we supposed to pull THIS one off if we don't even know what happened to them?]

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I was going to be merciful, but I decided to punish Kyrie for daring to bare her fangs at me. She wasn't even allowed the dignity of a corpse!

[roofjumping]

No corpses, huh...

[ She clicks her tongue with a rather disgusted look on her face before saying: ]

That's just begging to hear their deaths confirmed in red.

[young_bastard]

Gretel's right. A closed room without a corpse is barely worth addressing! Until you confirm their deaths in red, Kyrie and Kanon might not even be dead at all!

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Don't get too greedy, Battler! You're the one who must fight a battle on multiple fronts, not me. No matter how wide your blue truth's reach, I can dismantle it by striking at a single point! Allow me to cut down your blue: Ushiromiya Kyrie died at 6:00 PM!

Now, we can't just leap right in, or Phoenix will complain about the lack of evidence, hmm? Come forth, Dick "Just Gumshoe is fine" Gumshoe!

[heypal]

...That's not exactly what I meant, sir.

[itwasfeyt]

[Gumshoe again.... here we go.]

...Hmm.... [Maya seemed lost in thought for now.]

[wright_idea]

[Geez, we have to red-truth even the corpses now... this is nuts.]

Detective, if you could give as much detail about the crime scene as possible?

[heypal]

Sure.

[Another “dream”, another murder. What a great day for a detective. Oh, did that say great, we meant awful. Some detective he’s been. Well, time for the usual testimony at least.]

[The Vanishing Act]

At 2 pm on October 5th, Maria Ushiromiya was discovered holding a letter saying that Kyrie Ushiromiya would die at 6 pm in the VIP room. Around the time mentioned in the letter, Kyrie supposedly entered the VIP room to search for Kanon, a servant. Her husband Ruldoph saw her enter the VIP room himself, but was unable to follow after her.

The door was unlocked by a master key. Neither Kanon or Kyrie were anywhere within the room. The only things out of place were thekey, one of the mansion’s winchester rifles, and a handprint.

[He’s mixing the testimony with “summary everyone knows” and “actual evidence” today.]

[roofjumping]

... A handprint?

[ That's rather curious. But there's also the Red Truth that Beatrice just said, though maybe she'll ask on that later. Let's just focus on this for now. ]

Where was this handprint and how big was it?

[ Normally she wouldn't be helping, but she'll play along. Might as well move things forward faster than slow it down. Just in case they don't ask about it. ]

[heypal]

It was on the inside of the door. Bloody. If I had to guess... it was about as big as a hand.

[young_bastard]

[ Battler might be a little annoyed at how unhelpful that estimation was if he was at all inclined to take that handprint seriously. As it is, he's figuring it's just another attempt by the culprit to make the crime scenes look as spooky as possible. Phoenix and Maya should be glad this Fragment's low on magic circles. ]

If we can't tell who the handprint belongs to, it's probably not important evidence, right? I'm more interested in that rifle. Did it look like it'd been fired recently?

[heypal]

Its definitely been fired recently, no doubt about it.

[itwasfeyt]

Hmm, if it was fired.... do you think someone was really shot in there?

[wright_idea]

[Hmm... Well, it wasn't said in red, so we can't be certain next. But I'm not sure what it would mean if it WASN'T.]

Did you ask the gun for handpri --

[He catches himself.]

Er, never mind. You said something about a key?

[heypal]

Yep.

[wright_idea]

...You know, generally that's a prompt to TALK about the key, Detective.

[*sigh* The court may be different, the circumstances may be different, but Gumshoe is still Gumshoe.]

[heypal]

Huh? Oh, sorry pal. [Its been a day.]

It was the VIP room key. Like Ruldoph said, Kyrie used it to enter the room, but was unable to enter himself.

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And there you have it.

How will you respond, human side? How was Kyrie killed and then erased from a closed room by a human culprit?

[roofjumping]

That's if we're assuming that she was killed in this room.

[ Gretel says this rather boredly, as if she has absolutely no interest in this at all whatsoever. She does have other ideas, on how to go about this, but let's start simple. ]

[young_bastard]

Yeah, let's start with the basics. Kyrie didn't die in the VIP room at all!

[ahaha_wav]

Blue truth, ineffective! How could she have died anywhere other than the room that she was seen running into mere seconds before her death? I won't be denied by such a vague theory!

[itwasfeyt]

Maybe... there was a trap door or something?

[Maya doesn't even know.]

[wright_idea]

[...? That's odd. Why didn't Beatrice say that as a red truth? There's something odd about this. Is it some sort of trap?]

About that... The only person who witnessed her enter the room was Rudolph, correct?

[ahaha_wav]

Yes, that's correct. One witness or five witnesses, what difference does it make?