A mu*der mystery novel.

(No harem, no tricks, no invincibility, no system, no brainless, no satisfying literature. Enter at your own risk.)... more>>

When I thought it was just an ordinary day, I found myself trapped in a place of doom.

When I thought all I needed to do was participate in death games to escape, I discovered that everyone was awakening supernatural powers.

When I thought this place was a "land of gods," everything was heading towards annihilation... <<less

He Chuan Zhou had the same dream again. In that dream, a youngster would stand in front of everyone's questioning and doubts and said with a high-spirited yet arrogant voice : I will become a policeman !
She felt that this freak was lame, unlike herself, who just wanted to make money.... more>>

Fifteen years have passed, and everything that was supposed to grow had grown.

When they reunited after a long time, he was sitting in the car, a glass window separating them, wearing a suit and leather shoes, holding an unlit cigarette in his mouth, as if gritting his teeth, but his eyes slightly glanced outside, speaking arrogantly and provocatively: "Hey, Captain He. "

The so-called fate tricks people probably means that even though I have not changed my original intention, I still embarked on a completely different path from my dream. <<less

He doesn’t necessarily seem mu*derous, according to others. He’s very popular, and attracts much affection. But to me, he is the most despicable person in... more>> the world. He forced me into an extremely inconvenient situation. To regain my reputation, I can only make him disappear. If only he would vanish without a trace, I will be able to live a truly calming life <<less

In the winter of three years ago, the first locked room mu*der in Japanese history was committed.... more>>

All of the evidence pointed to the defendant. It was certain they were guilty. And yet, they were found innocent and released. Why? Because the crime scene was a perfect locked room no one from the police or the prosecutor's office could solve.

"Since the room was locked, it was impossible for the defendant to have committed the mu*der. It's no different than if they had a perfect alibi." That was the argument of the defense, and that was the argument the judge sided with.

The ruling sent a ripple throughout Japanese society. No matter how suspicious you were or how much evidence you left behind, as long as you managed to create a locked room that no one could solve, you were immune from prosecution. With the common anti-mystery fiction talking point "there's no reason anyone would ever actually commit a locked room mu*der" completely overturned, the rate of locked room mu*ders in Japan skyrocketed.

When the police proved unable to deal with the surge of locked room crime, the Ministry of Justice published an official categorization of all known locked room tricks as an investigative aid. When that proved insufficient, Division Zero of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department, a police division dedicated solely to solving locked rooms, was created. When that still proved insufficient, locked room detectives, private investigators specializing in locked rooms, were officially licensed by the state and authorized to participate in police investigations. Calling a locked room appraiser, someone specializing in searching buildings for secret passages, is now a common first step in criminal investigations.

On the other side of the spectrum, locked room agents, assassins and crime planners specializing in locked room mu*ders, have become some of the most notorious criminals in Japanese history, and even a cult worshiping the scenes of locked rooms as a way to purify the souls of the deceased has made rapid inroads into Japan.

The protagonist, Kasumi Kuzushiro, is an introverted, somewhat cynical high school student who loves mysteries. Kasumi often finds himself dragged along on bizarre journeys by his flighty childhood friend, Yozuki Asahina. Due to their staggeringly bad luck, these trips often leave them in the wrong place at the wrong time to be caught up in locked room mysteries. Fortunately, another of Kasumi's childhood friends, Shitsuri Mitsumura, is the greatest locked room expert in the world, and can always discover the truth.

Hm? How did a high school girl become the greatest locked room expert in the world?

It's simple.

She's...

Volume 1 was the grand prize winner of the 2022 This Mystery Is Amazing! awards. <<less

Two short novels, including the title story and Black Fairy Tale, plus a bonus short story. Summer is a simple story of a nine-year-old girl... more>> who dies while on summer vacation. While her youthful killers try to hide her body, she tells us the story—from the POV of her dead body—of the boys' attempt to get away with mu*der. Black Fairy Tale is classic J-horror: a young girl loses an eye in an accident, but receives a transplant. Now she can see again, but what she sees out of her new left eye is the experiences and memories of its previous owner. Its previous deceased owner. <<less

Physically confronting your abusive superior might be cool and satisfying when it happens in a drama, but, as Kazuo Sugishita is learning, it's less cool when you're sitting at home afterwards, terrified to learn how you'll be punished when you return to work the next day. The sentence he faces sounds surprisingly lenient - just a temporary reassignment to the company's entertainment department while things blow over. But he changes his mind when he gets the specifics: Kazuo has been assigned as manager-in-training (read "servant") to Shiro Hoshizono, the "Star Watcher": A pompous, showoff-y, completely insufferable talent with no actual talents except using his sickeningly sweet words and foreign model looks to seduce lonely middle... more>> aged women into paying for the privilege of hearing him speak.

The day after his new assignment, Kazuo and Hoshizono leave for Saitama Prefecture, where Hoshizono has been recruited to become an image character for a campground in the mountains, alongside a group of other colorful characters, including a romance novelist with the looks of Cleopatra but the personality of someone's grandpa and a UFO obsessed conspiracy theorist.

But the morning after their arrival, their host is found strangled to death in his lodge, the road back is buried in an avalanche, and... you can probably see where this is going.

Turns out, despite how he comes across normally, Hoshizono is actually a genius detective!

The novel features a unique chapter naming scheme where each chapter is titled as a three to four sentence summary of its own contents, focused upon what information about the case is discovered and what evidence appears, for ease of reference.

A nominee for the 50th annual Mystery Writers Association of Japan Award, long story category. <<less