Volume 24

Chronology
‹ Volume 23	List of Chapters • List of Cases	Volume 25 ›

Volume 24
Information
Release date:	July 17, 1999
Chapters:	232-242
ISBN:	ISBN 4-09-125494-2
Publisher:	Shogakukan
English release date:	July 15, 2008
English ISBN:	ISBN 1-4215-1676-4
English Publisher:	Viz Media
Featured Detective & Keyhole
Perry Mason Tomoaki Araide
Aoyama's death & Conan side images

Volume 24 was released on July 17, 1999 in Japan.

Cast

Characters
Conan Edogawa Ran Mouri Kogoro Mouri Wataru Takagi Miwako Sato Mitsuhiko Tsuburaya Ayumi Yoshida Genta Kojima Ai Haibara Juzo Megure Hiroshi Agasa Ninzaburo Shiratori Shinichi Kudo (background) Eri Kisaki Gin Vodka Shiho Miyano Sumiko Kobayashi (dream)

Gadgets

Gadgets
Voice-Changing Bowtie Stun-Gun Wristwatch Button Speaker Earring Cellphone Transmitter Microphone Criminal Tracking Glasses

Chapters

Innocent Suspect Case

File 232 - Finding Evidence

The Detective Boys are still investigating.

People

Higashida
	Company employee

Masami Muranishi
	Victim (strangled)

Kitagawa
	Company employee

Major events

• Sato and Takagi's romance is once again explored.
• Takagi is relieved when he learns that Sato only thinks of Megure as a father figure.

Blackout Murder Case

Characters introduced

Tomoaki Araide
	25 years old Doctor Teitan High basketball coach

Hikaru Yasumoto
	22 years old Household maid

File 234 - Another Half Year...

Conan has noticed that lately, Ran is somewhat cold and indifferent to him (Shinichi) whenever he calls her up, and she also spends her evening and night outside (supposedly heading to karate practices), not even having dinner at home.

It is another day. Kogoro attends an appointment with his physician, Yoshiteru Araide (who operates a small clinic beside his house), and takes Conan and Ran with him as Yoshiteru requested. Yoshiteru tells him that he has "just half a year”, which Kogoro and his company misinterpret as him only having half a year left to live. They become devastated, only to learn only to learn that Yoshiteru actually meant that Kogoro needed to reduce alcohol consumption during six month to prevent further damage to his liver. As for bringing family members, that is because Yoshiteru knows that an alcoholic like Kogoro will not be able to stop unless family members keep an eye on him. When Yoshiteru is called away to treat another patient (who is female), his wife, Yoko Araide, mutters derisively under her breath that that case is more sexual than medical (i.e. that Yoshiteru has an extramarital affair).

While looking for the bathroom, Ran runs into the doctor's son Tomoaki, and they introduce themselves to each other; Tomoaki mentions that he will take up a job in a hospital in Aomori Prefecture starting the following month. The household maid Hikaru Yasumoto breaks a flower pot and is warned by a furious Yoshiteru that she will be fired if she commits such a mistake again. Tomoaki attempts to calm his father down, and Kogoro prepares to leave once Ran has come back. Yoshiteru laments the lifestyle of Kogoro, saying that he does not want to see Kogoro dead while still in his prime of life, especially when his name coincides with that of the great detective. Upon learning that his patient is the real Kogoro Mouri, Yoshiteru invites Kogoro and company for dinner, and implies that he did not think that the two were the same person because Kogoro has shown a total lack of medical knowledge in front of him and the detective demonstrated a prolific understanding of such matters when solving cases (that happened obviously thanks to Conan).

Before preparing to eat, Dr. Araide decides to take a bath (this is a habit of his). At the dinner table, much to Conan’s consternation, Ran is staring at Tomoaki, and both Kogoro and Yoko say that the two would make a good couple, with Kogoro mentioning a parallel between them and Holmes and Dr. Watson. Tomoaki respectfully objects and says that he does not believe that a detective and a doctor make a good combination. Mitsu (Tomoaki’s grandmother) enters and says that rather than eating with outsiders (even Yoshiteru and Yoko are, because Yoshiteru married into the Araide family and Yoko is his second wife) she prefers to be alone in her room. Yoko makes a call to a friend (called Masae) to talk about a forthcoming class reunion by using the landline right outside the dining room (which is also the kitchen).

Suddenly, the lights go out and Hikaru breaks something and ruins the food inside (others do not seem to notice). She then is ordered to go to the fuse box to switch it back on. The light goes on, then blinks out and goes back on again. Conan and Kogoro find that Ran is holding onto Tomoaki tightly, and she explains that she was afraid and thought that Tomoaki was her father; Conan does not seem entirely convinced of this explanation. Yoko (having hung up) and Hikaru go to the bathroom to check on Yoshiteru, who they suppose is furious because of the power blackout. But instead they find him seemingly dead in the bathtub.

File 235 - In the Darkness...

Tomoaki tries to resuscitate his father, but to no avail. Megure and Takagi come to the crime scene, and they and Kogoro initially think that Yoshiteru's death was an accident, with Yoshiteru accidentally leaving the wire of his electric razor in the water during the blackout and is electrocuted once the switch is turned on. Conan points out the various problems with this theory, which allows them to rightly conclude that someone must have used a device to cause the blackout and have taken advantage of the darkness to enter the bathroom unnoticed and place the wire in the water instead. Tomoaki knows that they are suspecting his family and himself and is quite upset with it.

The police ask for the alibi of the suspects. Yoko says that she was in a call the whole time; Tomoaki says that he was in the dining room (as confirmed by a flushing Ran); Mitsu says that she was coming downstairs from her room on the second floor; and Hikaru says that she was trying to find the fuse box. Tomoaki also mentions that earlier that day, while everyone else was in the house, he was in Teitan High School as a substitute for the basketball coach, who is suffering from a bone fracture. Ran confirms this and Conan starts suspecting that Ran has been out on evenings to watch Araide coaching; after all, he is a handsome fellow, is kind and approachable, and has outstanding qualifications (he graduated from a prestigious medical school and scored the highest in his year).

File 236 - The Unbelievable Link

Tomoaki notices that Hikaru has a burn scar on her arm and that his grandmother has a wound on her left foot. He therefore takes them to the second floor for treating the injuries and, to his discomfort, is followed by a policeman as Megure still suspects them. Ran offers to help and Conan thus wants to follow them as well, but he is stopped by Kogoro. The investigation continues and Yoko mentions that Yoshiteru's first wife (Mitsu's daughter and Tomoaki's biological mother), named Chiaki, died four years ago due to drunk driving. She details that Chiaki and she were classmates during nurse training and that Chiaki's death was shocking to her because of her dislike of alcohol.

Since the police are unable to find more clues, Megure accepts Conan's proposal to simulate the blackout. Conan thus goes upstairs to call Ran and others, but sees her holding hand with Tomoaki; he does not know that this happened because when treating the injuries, Ran accidentally injured herself and Tomoaki was trying to disinfect her wound (he also does not know that when Tomoaki complimented Ran on her familiarity with bandages, she says that she has gained experience by treating a naughty boy (Shinichi) during youth).

The simulation reveals that Hikaru took an exceptionally long time to turn on the light; this means that the alibis of multiple people are problematic. Tomoaki, on the other hand, does not see that the simulation has led to any new information and slams the police and Kogoro for unreasonably suspecting his family and not considering their feelings. Conan is still stuck, partially because of lack of evidence and partially because Ran and Tomoaki's relationship made him unable to focus; this changes when he stumbles across a fragment of something on the second floor and sees something in Hikaru's room. He now seems to know who the culprit is, and so he tranquillizes Kogoro and makes Megure carry him into the bathroom where the murder happened. Conan then announces to everyone that Kogoro knows the truth about this murder and that once he is finished taking a bath he will reveal it.

File 237 - From the Bottom of Heart

  Show spoilers »

About 20 minutes after Conan’s announcement, there is another blackout and Hikaru is sent to turn on the light again. Yoko Araide appears in the bathroom as the light is turned on and Conan reveals her to be the culprit. It turns out that she used a trick which allowed her to keep the call with Masae uninterrupted even if she is not near the landline. This allowed her to go to the bathroom and place the wires in the water without Masae noticing any irregularity (she told the police about this, which made them think initially that Yoko's alibi was valid). Yoshiteru would not leave the bathtub (which would frustrate Yoko's plan) because it was very dark (so he could not see what Yoko had done) and coming out of a bathtub in complete darkness is dangerous. Furthermore, Yoko wants the police to think that it was an accident (as opposed to a murder by any person in the family; she would not like to see that), and it depends on Hikaru switching on the light quickly. However, fearful that Yoshiteru would kick her out following her breaking something again, Hikari first went back to her room to hide the fragments, and dropped a fragment on the way (this explains why she was burnt and the wound on Mitsu's foot). The fragments in Hikaru's room thus are evidence that she had no time to commit murder and that Mitsu was trying to come down from her room during the blackout.

Conan further says that Yoko is in the bathroom now because she wants to silence and kill Kogoro (who she thinks knows the truth) in the same way she killed her husband. Also, Conan mentions that he begins suspecting Yoko when seeing that she was using her left hand to hold the landline before the blackout, but switched to the right one after.

Yoko, seeing that everything has been exposed, confesses that she murdered her husband. The motive is that after their marriage, Yoko found the diary of Chiaki, which detailed how she had succumbed to alcoholism and eventually had committed suicide because of Yoshiteru's continuous extramarital affairs. Outside the bathroom stands Tomoaki, who is extremely angry because he realized that the second blackout was a "despicable" trick aimed at making the culprit reveal him/herself; the others have stayed in the dining room because the police does not allow them to leave (Tomoaki was able to run past the blockage of Megure). He thus hears the rest of Yoko and Conan's conversation. Conan advises Yoko to turn herself in, and he invents a method of killing Yoshiteru that does not involving Hikaru and tells Yoko to use stick to that narrative (the current one requires Hikaru to switch on the light in order to work, which means that technically Hikaru committed the murder; if she learns about this, she will be forever burdened). Yoko agrees.

As Kogoro and Conan prepare to leave, Conan finds Tomoaki and Ran together again, and as he hears "please tell your father this" he suspects that Tomoaki is proposing to Ran. However, it turns out that Tomoaki is merely asking Ran to deliver his apologies to Kogoro for having shouted at him, and Ran is asking Tomoaki to lend her the sweater that he is wearing. She later heads to her mother's office so that Eri would show her how to knit a copy. Since Ran insists that Eri does not touch her copy, they end up with three sweaters, two of which have been knitted as Eri’s demonstrations. Ran then sends hers to Shinichi (via Agasa) and Eri implies that hers should go to Kogoro.

People

Yoshiteru Araide
	Victim (electrocuted) 51 years old Local practitioner Tomoaki's father

Yoko Araide
	46 years old Yoshiteru's second wife

Mitsu Araide
	74 years old Tomoaki's grandmother

Chiaki Araide
	Deceased Yoshiteru's first wife

Major events

• Tomoaki's kind demeanor is put on display here, as well as Conan's jealously when he sees Ran acting very nice around him.
• Conan becomes very jealous when he sees Ran acting very nice and sweet around Araide, and thinks that she may have fallen in love with him.
• It turns out Ran was acting so nice to Araide because she wanted to make a sweater for Shinichi, and she liked Araide's.

Hotel Party Murder Case

Colored page of Gin from Haibara's dream

Characters introduced

Kenzo Masuyama
	71 years old Auto manufacturer chairman

Chris Vineyard
	29 years old Actress

Shigehiko Nomiguchi
	56 years old Politician

Naomichi Mugikura
	43 years old Announcer

File 238 - The Secret Corner of Betrayal

Haibara had a nightmare about Gin. The day after, back from school with Conan and the Detective Boys, Haibara comes across Gin's Porsche. Conan places a microphone under the seat and they get to know about a Black Organization member named Pisco, who was sent to Haido City Hotel and tasked to eliminate the corrupt politician Shigehiko Nomiguchi, who had ties with the Organization.

File 239 - The Black Burial Ranks

Conan and Haibara go to Haido City Hotel, hoping to find Pisco and prevent Nomiguchi from being killed. But all people in the party's hall are wearing black. There's Chris Vineyard who is an actress from America. Conan uses the voice of Shinichi and calls the police to protect the politician. Later, the lights go off and a movie is shown on a giant screen, meanwhile, the murder occurs : the room's chandelier fell from the ceiling and crashed over Nomiguchi.

File 240 - The Sudden Parting

Conan thinks the purple handkerchief he found right after the murder must belong to Pisco and he asks the receptionist about the identity of those who were given such a handkerchief. As the party's guests suddenly rush out of the hall and confront the media, Haibara gets separated from Conan and is abducted by Pisco.

File 241 - The Bullet from the Past

Haibara is locked in a liquor store but manages to escape through the fireplace after regaining her adult body, thanks to Conan's advice to drink baikal. Meanwhile, Conan deduces the identity of Pisco and how he had the room's chandelier fall over Nomiguchi. Gin and Vodka turn up to the hotel and enter the liquor store, hoping to meet Pisco, but left as none was there. Once out of the chimney, Haibara gets shot by Gin.

File 242 - The White World

Conan rushes to the hotel's rooftop to rescue Haibara, who dives into the chimney and ends up recovering her child body.

  Show spoilers »

Pisco then confronts Haibara but Conan reveals the former's identity to be Kenzo Masuyama, and explains how he murdered Nomiguchi by shooting in the chandelier's chain. Masuyama had previously put some fluorescent painting on the chain to see it while in the dark. He told Nomiguchi to stand below the chandelier, where he had also put some fluorescent color. Masuyama then placed his purple handkerchief over his silencer to cover the noise and sparkles caused by the detonation, and to stop powder from staining his clothes. Conan takes Haibara out of the liquor store while Pisco inadvertently causes a fire with his cigarette. He is later killed by Gin as a picture of him will be released tomorrow in the press, showing his raised arm with the gun. Pisco then wasn't able to tell Gin about how he discovered Sherry shrank to a eight-year-old. Later on, a Black Organization member named Vermouth, who is revealed to be Chris Vineyard, tells Gin and Vodka that she will stay in Japan for a while to check out for "something".

People

Mika Nanjo
	38 years old Novelist Tarumi's lover

Yasuo Mihei
	62 years old Baseball team owner

Naoya Tarumi
	35 years old Music producer

Chris Vineyard
	29 years old Actress

Yoshiharu Tawara
	58 years old University professor

Kenzo Masuyama
	71 years old Auto manufacturer chairman

Shigehiko Nomiguchi
	Victim (crushed) 56 years old Politician

Naomichi Mugikura
	43 years old Announcer

Major events

• Conan and Ai suspect that a Black Organization, Pisco, is going to be at a hotel to plan a murder.
• Haibara's past is once again explored, and it is hinted that she has some sort of history with Gin.
• Haibara returns to her adult form, Shiho Miyano, after drinking alcohol. Gin kills Pisco, and Vermouth is shown at the end, discussing the situation with both Gin and Vodka.
• Gin takes very special interest in Shiho.

Trivia

• The title for each chapter are worded as the following in Case Closed:

• File 232 - On the Spot
• File 234 - Six More Months
• File 235 - In the Dark
• File 236 - An Unbelievable Connection
• File 237 - The Remains of the Heart
• File 238 - The Street Corner of Betrayal
• File 239 - The Black Funeral
• File 240 - A Sudden Farewell
• File 241 - A Bullet From the Past
• File 242 - A World in White

Cover in other countries

• 

  China
• 

  Finland
• 

  France
• 

  Germany
• 

  Hong Kong
• 

  Indonesia
• 

  Italy
• 

  Korea
• 

  Malaysia (Chinese)
• 

  Malaysia (Malay)
• 

  Norway
• 

  Rep. of China (Taiwan)
• 

  Spain (Spanish, Volumen 2)
• 

  Spain (Spanish, Volumen 2)
• 

  Sweden
• 

  Thailand
• 

  United States
• 

  Vietnam

See also

• Manga
• Volume 21-30
• Detective Conan