Pact of the Abandoned Witch

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#82

Alright, time to strike your alibis, you keep on saying that once in a group nobody would leave unnoticed, however, the only groups that are clarified from 11:00 to 12:00 are:

  1. Gohda, Genji and Kumasawa
  2. Gohda, Genji and Kanon
  3. Kanon, Shannon and Nanjo
  4. Shannon and Kinzo
  5. Nanjo, Shannon, Kumasawa, Kanon and Kinzo
  6. Nanjo, Shannon and Kinzo
  7. George, Jessica, Battler and Maria
  8. The adults

So, I’d like you to clarify: between 11:00 and 12:00, “the adults” refer to which group of people? Even if you say nobody left the group besides Kyrie and Rudolf, the only people who talked during the conversation in the beginning are Krauss, Natsuhi, Eva and Rosa. So I must ask: Where is Hideyoshi? Is he included in the group known as “the adults”? Was he under the supervision of Krauss, Eva, Natsuhi and Rosa from 11:00 to 12:00?

#83

The group of adults, after Rudolf and Kyrie left, consisted of Natsuhi, Krauss, Hideyoshi, Eva and Rosa. This group disbanded only at the time when their disbanding was witnessed and established in the timeline.

#84

Even though I doubt it is true, there is still a 7-minute opening in between Kanon’s conversation with the cousins in the guest house and the locking up of the mansion.

He can still have either killed Rudolf in the guest house and then rushed him back to the mansion or first rushed back to the mansion, killed him there and slipped out before Shannon and Nanjo went downstairs.

#85

Let me add to this:

Kanon killed Rudolf quickly, locked the room, returned to his room in the guest house, and later in the night Kanon returned to the mansion (after all, there is no confirmation of what Kanon did after 12:15 AM) and used a hidden passage to sneak back into it. He used the opportunity to return the gun to the gun room, go back to Kyrie and Rudolf’s room, lock and seal it from inside and wait in hiding until Kyrie woke up. After that, he switched between hiding spots in order not to be detected by Kyrie and left the room shortly after her.

#86

For some reason a picture of Dlanor with her eye twitching was flashing in front of my eyes right there…
Kanon can do all of this in the timespan between Genji unlocking the door in the morning and Kyrie waking up, so there is no reason for a secret passage to be used as of yet.

#87

But Kanon is back in his room by 12:15 AM. Unless he wakes up instantly before the mansion is locked (at 12:20 AM, I believe) and has enough time to hurry, there is no way Kanon can enter the mansion because all the entrances and exists are locked by Genji. I used a hidden passage because a hidden passage can’t necessarily be locked, it could just be a hole or something. It also provides room for Kanon to bypass the locked doors/exists and fully carry out his crime.

#88

First, I only now realize that it should actually be 00.15 AM, but I guess it’s just a typo.
Second… the mansion was not locked at 00.20 AM (this is the time Genji and Kumasawa went to sleep), but at roughly 00.00 AM. Kanon only had those 7 minutes to do the deed and rush back to the guest house. Since Shannon left the mansion immediately before it was locked up and wasted time up until 00.15 AM, Kanon had still 15 minutes time to take his shower and watch her returning.

I’m assuming here that he is really good at running. XD

#89

There are no secret passages. We can use whatever definition of that the good father uses.

Additionally, let’s say that the shortest amount of time to get from the guest house to the mansion is ten minutes. The same applies the other way around.

#90

Alright, let’s try this new approach:
While Genji was cleaning the gun room, someone stole a gun from there without Genji noticing, alternatively, Genji himself stole the gun. Sometime between 11:00 and 12:00 the culprit was either alone or without anyone’s supervision, and had the gun nearby, Rudolf showed up and, before being noticed by anyone, he was killed and had his body hidden in some dead spot where nobody was able to find it. When the culprit disbanded from their group, they put Rudolf’s body back in his bedroom and locked it. On the next morning, the culprit woke up before Kyrie, sealed the bedroom and hid inside it, the culprit kept changing their location so that Kyrie wasn’t able to find them.

I’ll check later in the story to see if I find someone with free time, sorry for the vagueness but I think this is specific enough for a theory.

#91

Unfortunately, it isn’t enough. Primarily because I can’t imagine how one could’ve, in these particular alibi scenarios, shot someone without anyone noticing, and then hiding the body. Still gotta keep it reasonable. And, I mean, if the answer was something as simple as that, then that sort of… defeats the point of the alibi game and this whole discussion about accomplices, people keeping watch over each other, etc.

I know you can figure this out. Regardless of what assumptions you might have or what wrong road you might’ve taken (and you’ve taken quite a few admittedly), there’s always enough time to step back, look at the situation and the chain of events from another point of view.

#92

I still haven’t had the time to make a timeline for everyone’s alibis for the time of the murder, so my options in theorizing are pretty limited, but let’s not let that stop us.

Shannon shot Rudolf while she was alone with Kinzo during Kinzo’s fit. Kinzo’s mental state was so disturbed that he barely registered what was going on around him. Rudolf came to the study, Shannon shot him dead, and moved him into the bathroom in Kinzo’s study. Rudolf’s corpse was there in Kinzo’s bathroom until tomorrow morning, until Shannon moved it into Rudolf and Kyrie’s room and created the locked room as described in previous blues. As for why Kinzo never went into his bathroom… obviously if he has a bathroom made of solid gold that is as big as his own study, which is described in Umineko as “a mansion within a mansion”, he would use that bathroom instead. I mean, who wouldn’t?

Regarding “the shortest amount of time to get from the guest house to the mansion is ten minutes”, it is possible that Rudolf was shot from a distance. As long as Rudolf himself opened the window to his room, it is unnecessary to go all the way to the mansion, simply getting close enough to make the shot would suffice. Since we don’t know what kind of gun Rudolf was shot with, “close enough” could be any distance - it might’ve even been possible to shoot Rudolf from the guest house itself. That Kyrie specifically brought up the possibility of Rudolf being shot from a distance is foreshadowing of this.

#93

Creative.

But alas, it’s all based on a false premise that I’ve left uncountered for far too long.

Let’s rectify that, shall we?

At the moment Genji walked into the kitchen to begin helping Gohda, the key to the gun room was still on him (on Genji’s person, naturally). The key had, up to that point, not once left his possession (which is to say, not once left his person). Of course, at the moment directly after Kanon left the kitchen, the key was still in Genji’s possession - which is to say, on his person. Finally, since you could claim Gohda pickpocketed the key, went and somehow got himself the gun before leaving, had Rudolf be outside, and then shot him from a remote place or something of the sort: Gohda did not pickpocket the key to the gun room off of Genji. Finally, to make sure it’s nice and sealed: Genji did not accidentally lose or drop the key or gave it to someone and then forgot about it, or anything of the sort that might involve the key leaving his person of his own accord. This applies for the entire game.

#94

I’m not quite sure since when you mean that. Was Genji born with that key and never ever put it away ever since then? :stuck_out_tongue: I am saying the culprit doesn’t need to keep the key to have the gun. A culprit not named Godah might have been able to steal it at any given point before the story, taken a gun and returned the key. This way only the act of returning the gun needs to be explained and for that the culprit had plenty of time the next morning.

#95

Of course, it only refers to the interval relevant to the story.

But let’s just say it like this.

At the time dinner ended, the gun - the murder weapon that killed Rudolf - was most definitely still in the gun room. The door to the gun room was at that time, naturally, locked.

#96

Have I missed something or is the possibility of someone stealing a gun from the gun room while Genji was cleaning it still without response? The door to the gun room could’ve been unlocked for the entire time Genji spent there as he was cleaning the mansion. Depending on the layout of the gun room, it could’ve been possible for someone to grab a gun near the door without Genji noticing anyone had been there.

Then there’s the fact that you did not confirm the key stayed in Genji’s possession after “the moment directly after Kanon left the kitchen”. However, the problem is that it seems nobody who had the chance to steal the key from Genji was alone long enough to steal a gun and commit murder. It would be fun if Kumasawa stole the key from Genji, and Gohda stole the key immediately afterwards from Kumasawa, left the kitchen and stole the gun, somehow returned the key back to Kumasawa, and Kumasawa then returned the key back to Genji, with neither Kumasawa nor Genji ever noticing the key had been stolen from them. However, in addition to being completely ridiculous, it appears Gohda didn’t have a chance to return the key to Kumasawa, so that theory is a bust.

#97

To tell you the truth, I just forgot about the cleaning thing. Genji never went to clean the gun room after dinner. Let’s just say it’s not something he does too religiously. And given that the gun had to have been in the room right as the dinner ended, that should take care of all of that.

Your assumptions given the second blue are correct, in the sense that it doesn’t work given the timeline.

#98

Just for clarification: The ‘dinner’ is not anything mentioned within the story. So it happened before the first chapter started?

Fine. Since I am out of ideas for the moment, let me have a little fun (dons his best Battler impression):

Godah is just a figment of everyone’s imagination! That’s why he couldn’t help with any cleaning duties and never talked to either Kanon or Kyrie! It also means that Genji had no alibi when he entered the kitchen at 10.30 and could have committed the crime any time up until Kanon and Kumasawa entered!

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#99

The dinner was explicitly mentioned by Kanon, and made clear to have happened at some point earlier in the evening. (In this case before the narration started - I picked it explicitly so I could deny someone just being in the gun room on some other random day.)

None of the persons presented in the story are figments of anyone’s imagination. A person must have a single human body and a single personality.

#100

Since I don’t remember anything in the narrative to suggest the key to the gun room is anything other than an ordinary key, this is probably not going to work, but to leave no stone unturned…

The key to the gun room is a remote that can be used from within the kitchen to open the gun room. Kanon managed to use it to unlock the gun room while he was in the kitchen together with Genji and Gohda.

#101

The key to the gun room is a normal, standard, physical key. Just like all the other keys on the island, it needs to be inserted and turned in their respective door for either locking or unlocking.