Chapter Text
10/02
This is another recurring day in Poe's life.
He's always visiting the Yokohama Public Library, which is huge—everything an avid reader dreams of.
Woody with rustic details, two floors, plus the incredible smell of books that wafts through the hallway.
Poe scribbles a note with his review of the book he just read.
“Seriously, who would be intellectually incapacitated enough not to suspect from the opening pages that the murderer was the gardener? Not just because of the murder weapon, but the fact that they didn't find fingerprints. And the way the character was written, it was obvious that he would be part of the 'plot twist'.”
Furiously scribbling that last sentence, Poe realizes that the book wasn't even that bad.
He was just bored and experiencing the biggest creative crisis he had ever gone through in his life. Soon, any work that failed to fill his lack of creative capacity instantly became terrible.
Poe places the note between the pages of the book and returns it to the shelf.
Karl pokes his head out of Poe's cloak, which he tries to hide as quickly as possible.
“I already told you I'm going to buy food when we leave here, don't rush me,” Poe whispers to Karl.
Unfortunately, the library doesn't allow animals. So they will be leaving quickly.
Ranpo, on the other hand, has no idea where he is. He suspects that Kunikida must have lost him about twenty minutes ago.
He had just solved a case, and now he appears to be on the other side of town in front of the Yokohama Public Library.
Damn, until the agency finds him, it will take an eternity.
Too distracted by his thoughts, Ranpo doesn't notice a guy running toward him—
A guy who is definitely trying to hide a raccoon in his cape (who hasn't?). The stranger bumps into Ranpo and mutters an apology.
But before he could say anything, the stranger had already turned the corner of the street. Ranpo stays there processing what happened.
But anything he was thinking about disappears when he sees a sweets stand next to the large establishment.
He picks up a bag full of caramel candies as he walks to the library’s front door.
Ranpo analyzes the place while pretending to hear a scolding from the librarian saying that he couldn’t bring food in there.
Ranpo is happy that the girl couldn’t follow him the whole way because she was clearly having difficulties due to the pregnancy she was trying to hide.
But he didn’t care, so he searched the detective fiction section.
“BORING!!” – Ranpo exclaims. He could guess the killers just by the titles of each story. But in one of the books, he sees a paper sticking out between the pages—
A paper that was definitely not a bookmark, because it was kindly folded.
He unfolds the paper in his hand.
Hmm... Interesting, we have a critic here. How cute, explaining something so obvious—of course it was the gardener, Ranpo thinks to himself.
He likes people with critical sense and the way he wrote. He was someone familiar with reading. Ranpo would say that this person is a writer.
Something in Ranpo liked the ambitious writer who was looking for a challenge. Maybe someday he could talk to this person more...
For someone to put notes in books, they must be here frequently, at least.
Ranpo makes sure to find all the notes.
It doesn't even take him ten minutes to read each one of them. Ranpo finds a pattern in the chosen books:
They were all psychological thrillers, horrors, and even detective fiction.
Soon, he picks up the book he thinks will be the next title chosen—
And leaves a note there.
10/04
And Poe finds it.
“Creative crisis must suck. You should read something different for a change. Have you ever read Notes from the Underground? You would like it—you would, because I’m always correct, my dear writer.”
– The greatest detective in the world