The rules are simple. Until we find out who the liar—the murderer—is, we cannot get out. We’re locked in this dim courtroom until the mystery is solved. Locked with the creepy colorful figures. Figures that will retaliate if we attack carelessly.

  Narumi told us we had everything we needed to solve the puzzle. If we go over it together, we’re sure to find the solution. Or will we?

  “I’ll start us off then.” Katja crossed her arms and set the pace. “Right now, the father’s the most likely one to be the culprit. The body was found in the lawn, and the father was mowing the lawn. This is the most straightforward solution.”

  We talked on the stands near the bottom of the cour room. Hecate had to sit down as a result of the figure’s attack. I sat next to her, and Narumi next to me.

  “And that’s not good enough…” Carol rested a hand on her waist with an upset look in her eyes. “Since this is a murder, one of them is likely to be lying, right?”

  Narumi nodded. “Yeah… One of them is lying. It wouldn’t make sense for the murderer to give themselves away.”

  “Finding the liar shouldn’t be too hard then. All we need to do is listen to what those things said and find a contradiction.” The father, the mother, and the younger brother all gave statements of what happened when we stopped in front of them. They even repeated their lines like NPCs in a game. “Sh- should we talk to them again…?”

  Carol immediately shot down my idea. “No. Having to approach those things once was enough for me.”

  “I still… Remember what they said…” Hecate said with laborious breaths. “Want me to repeat it…?”

  “Nope…” In response, I poked her cheek. “I want you to keep your mouth shut and rest…”

  “Iroha’s right. You rest, Hecate. I remember it too, so I’ll sum it up.” Katja coughed to make sure we were ready. “Beginning with the mother, she was in the kitchen when the older brother, the victim, went outside. The younger brother then went to the kitchen in search of his sibling. Finally, she claimed the father was outside the whole time.”

  “For the younger brother now, he said he was playing with his brother in his room before the brother went outside. He saw his mom in the kitchen and was back in his room when the body was found.”

  Carol nodded along. “So far so good…”

  Katja nodded and continued. “The father said he was in the kitchen getting a drink and found the body when he went outside to mow. That should be everything. Although, the victim also spoke, but all he said was that his body was found on the lawn.”

  “It’s obvious, isn’t it? There’s a problem with what the father said!” Carol wiggled her finger confidently.

  “Ahahahaha… There’s an obvious contradiction, isn’t there?” I couldn’t help but smile, and Hecate nodded at my side.

  “The mother’s statement… and the father’s statement… cannot both be true at the same time…”

  “Right!” Carol confidently smiled. “She said he was outside the whole time, while he claims he was getting a drink in the kitchen? Yeah, right…”

  “So the liar’s between the father and the mother…” Katja looked down while thinking. “Which one is it?”

  “Well… The brother’s not contradicting either of them, is he?” Carol shook her head. “Guess we can’t use the same logic to narrow it down.”

  “You can’t, but what the kid said vouches for the mom. She says she was in the kitchen, and he says he saw her there.” Carol and Katja nodded while I explained. “There’s only one lie, and for one of those two to be a lie, the other one would also have to be a lie, so they must be telling the truth.”

  “Then the father’s the liar… Changing nothing… Our first train of thought was right… He was outside… and the body was outside…”

  “Yeah… We were right in our first try…” I nodded to Hecate, then turned to Narumi. “The father’s the murderer, right?”

  Narumi was surprised when all our eyes fell on her and averted her gaze. “Uhmm… I don’t know… It might not be that simple…”

  “Huh? Really?” Our logic seemed really sound… She was really on point earlier, but she did say she might not be able to help us… I thought she was being humble or something, but… Maybe she was being serious?

  “What do you mean it’s not that simple?” Carol pointed at her. “If we missed something, spit it out.”

  “Come on, Carol… You know I’m not good with these kinds of problems… I overthink everything if I try, so I’m not saying anything! I don’t wanna put wrong ideas in your heads. If you don’t notice anything, that just means I was wrong.”

  If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  “Now’s not the time for that! We need every idea we can get!”

  “No… If I say something, it might lead you down the wrong path… I’ll say it at the end… When you’re all sure…”

  “She’s not wrong, Carol…” Katja tapped her shoulder. “We found a contradiction, but that’s all… We haven’t considered all possibilities yet. It wouldn’t hurt to take another look around.”

  “*Sigh…* Fine, whatever you say…” Carol loosened her shoulders and turned towards the ghostly figures. “Our logic is right, though. There’s no way we’re wrong about the father. He’s definitely lying.”

  “Let’s think about it some more… Maybe there’s something we missed…” Katja and Carol both walked around the monsters in the center and swept the area. I got up and joined them.

  I’m with Carol on this… We found the contradiction… Is it really not that simple? What is Narumi hinting at…?

  “Do you think this is a real case, Iroha?” I bumped into Katja while walking around the figures, and she whispered next to me. “Do fathers really kill their own children…? I thought that kind of thing doesn’t normally happen…”

  “Well… It’s not common, but unfortunately, there are all kinds of people out there… Might be a real case, might not…”

  “I see…” Katja squeezed her arm while looking at the yellow figure splattered on the floor. “In the normal world, those people are treated like they’re the worst, aren’t they? People who kill their own kin deserve nothing but the worst…”

  It would have been easy to understand if I had heard anger. Maybe she held some kind of grudge, which made her feel that way… Instead, I heard her voice tremble… Ever so slightly…

  “Uhmm…” What am I supposed to say? I’m gonna sound like a bad person regardless, aren’t I? “It’s a bad thing! Let me start off by saying that… It’s bad… But there are some situations where it’s justified. In self-defense, even if the other person is family, depending on the circumstances, I think it can be fine… Also, when… Never mind… I can’t think of anything else on the spot… But I’m sure there are other cases…”

  “I see…” Katja didn’t look away from the yellow figure…

  Was that the wrong thing to say? Wait, I’m a hypocrite, aren’t I? Didn’t I kill hundreds of demons for my own desires? Because my girls are too cute? And all without a single hint of regret. I can’t pass moral judgements on anything, can I?

  “Uhmm… Katja…” Suddenly a chilling possibility passed through my head. The House of Imaginary Boundaries is an orphanage of sorts, isn’t it? If she’s saying this… “Did you…” I whispered in her ear. “Did you kill your parents?”

  Her eyes widened, then her lips formed into a smile, and she scoffed. Relieved. “No… I wasn’t the one…”

  I was wrong…? “Why were you talking like that then? You scared me for a second…” Then again, of course she didn’t. It doesn’t even make sense. She would have been way too young for that.

  “You’re right. It makes no sense.” She chuckled again with a distant expression. “I got lost in thought. In the end, I’m just a tool to protect people. These thoughts are unnecessary for that. Let’s solve this problem and exterminate this monster at once.”

  “Of course!” I nodded in return. Confusing… But our priority is getting out of here! Hecate needs medical assistance as soon as possible! Hecate couldn’t walk around and investigate with us. She was thinking while sitting next to Narumi and took a deep breath.

  “I give up. What’s the problem, Narumi…? Isn’t the father the culprit…?”

  “Like I said, I’m not sure if it’s a good idea to say something… I might just be imagini-”

  Narumi tried to avoid giving an answer when Carol interrupted. “I figured out what you were worried about. The lie is too easy to spot.”

  We all gathered as the conversation started again. “What do you mean…?”

  “It’s a direct contradiction against a corroborated alibi. It’s so easy to spot, even the five of us can do it. Four idiots whose only redeeming quality is fighting ability and one who knows how to cook.” Hey! “It’s almost like the one lying wanted to get caught.”

  “Why would the murderer want to get caught?” Katja shook her head.

  “Beats me…”

  “Maybe the liar was covering for someone…” I said… And the implication of that is… “Maybe the liar and murderer aren’t the same person, and the liar was trying to cover for the real murderer.”

  Carol was shocked. “Really? Narumi, is she right? Can that even work?”

  “I’m not saying anything, but…” Narumi closed her eyes, then turned to me. “You get it, right?”

  I nodded back and extended my sword. Their eyes were locked on me. I slowly stepped into the center of the room, between the figures, and faced the real killer.

  *Stab!*

  The real killer… The one who killed the older brother… Was none other than the green figure. The younger brother…

  My sword pierced the small figure. All four figures flickered creepily and disappeared as the whole room got brighter. All that remained was a small monster skewered by my sword. A monster that looked like a double-headed mushroom.

  “I- Iroha…?”

  Katja and Carol both stared with hesitant eyes. “Is that the monster? You’re telling me the kid was the culprit?”

  “Yeah… If the liar is covering up for someone else, the younger brother had to be the culprit.” With the ghostly figures gone, the subject became a lot less sensitive. “The key here are the gaps.”

  “Th- the gaps?”

  “The gaps in their statements. We can ignore what the father said since he was lying and focus on the other two. The younger brother went to the kitchen and was in his room when the body was found, but no one said he went immediately back after going to the kitchen. He could have gone outside after his brother, killed him, and returned.”

  “Isn’t that just conjecture?” Katja was unsatisfied with the answer. “Looks like you got it right, but isn’t that a bit of a leap?”

  “Any conclusion other than saying that the father is the culprit because he lied is conjecture.” Narumi lazily added. “It all starts with the idea that the lie was easy to spot on purpose, so it’s all conjecture. If you accept that, her decision was the most likely to be correct.”

  “Let me continue. That gap doesn’t explain everything, of course. The body was found outside after being stabbed with a knife multiple times. If the father was mowing the lawn as the mother said, why would he have a knife with him? If you look at it that way, when the kid stopped by the kitchen, he would have been able to grab a knife before sneaking out.”

  “If that’s not enough, the fact that the father would lie to cover for someone should convince you. If the mother was the culprit, he probably wouldn’t have covered for her, since she should know better than to do that to her own child. A kid, on the other hand, might do something bad without even knowing it. He was worth protecting… At least in his parents’ eyes. The gap in the mother’s statement plays into that too. She doesn’t say where he goes. It protects the kid without saying anything that’s straight up false. Isn’t that right, Narumi?”

  I was expecting a nod. Some kind of confirmation that proved I hadn’t just solved it by accident. She knew the answer… Or so I thought, because she was looking blankly at me for some reason. “Narumi?”

  “Ah! Sorry, I spaced out. It’s probably right. I mean, the monster’s dead, isn’t it?” She shrugged. That’s it? That’s all I get?

  “Narumi’s right. As long as the monster’s dead, it doesn’t really matter to us, does it?” With a smile on her face, Katja shook her head and walked up to my side. “About this thing now… Wait… Is it…?”

  As she called attention to the skewered mushroom creature, its body started shining. It is… It is exactly as she was thinking… It’s one of those!

  The monster, which used to be smaller than a person’s head, grew much bigger and heavier until I couldn’t hold it with my sword anymore.

  *Thud!*

  A big, metal sculpture hit the floor. The monster turned into a big set of scales, tilted to one of the si-

  “What the hell?!” Carol interrupted my train of thought. “Isn’t that the statue we saw at the mall we went to the other day, Iroha? It totally is!”

  “Ye- yeah… you’re totally right…” That sculpture got turned into a monster? Just what are the odds? Right after I noticed it even existed thanks to Sarasa and Ririna… Is this that effect? The one where you notice things more frequently after you learn about them…? What was it called?

  “They were talking about these damn scales in the news!”

  “Wait… Really?”

  Carol shot me a glance like I was dumb. “Don’t tell me you didn’t see it… They were talking how the sculpture disappeared on the day we went there and the cops were saying it was stolen or something… No wonder they couldn’t find where it was.”

  While we were talking, Katja had gone up the stairs to see about the door. “It’s open… I guess this means our work here is done.”

  “Well done… girls… Iroha…” Hecate extended her arms. “Can you give me a hand?”

  Me? Isn’t this going to expose us? Then again, Narumi and Katja aren’t the type to pick up on romantic clues, are they? “Of course!” She wrapped her arms around my neck, and I lifted her like a princess. “Let’s get you out of here!”