Spoilers should always be hidden using spoiler blur.
When discussing a specific section, please mention where you are in the book, ideally by chapter so people reading different versions have a clear point of reference.
Feel free to read ahead if it’s exciting, but please refrain from spoiling ahead of the appropriate week.
If you have a question about grammar, vocab, cultural things, etc - ask! That’s a welcome part of the discussion too, and other readers will be happy to help.
This chapter took a minute to rev up, but I feel like we’re getting somewhere
The absolute lack of 由里絵 in so many scenes has me convinced she’s involved. I also still think it’s a combo of her + 正木 for the first disappearance and then her + 紀一 for 正木’s death.
Did you all notice that when they talked about watching the butler go up into the crawl space that she and him weren’t mentioned? Like…where were they? Did he go to join her downstairs?
I also wonder if all the incense in the room was a cover for something…it seems an unusual detail otherwise. So either it’s covering for something or it’s a subtle indication that he (古川) left the room with it burning far longer than one normally would.
Me too. 由里絵 keeps being the most suspicious of all of them, I’d be very surprised if she’s as innocent as she is portrayed.
Do you mean 正木? He went downstairs to swap positions with the butler who had been keeping watch in case anyone came down the stairs. I think 由里絵 stayed downstairs as well, so she, 正木, and 古川 (assuming he disappeared of his own free will) are the ones with the most freedom of movement at the moment.
I wonder if we’ll see 正木 again, he should be getting murdered soon.
I wondered whether the incense burning somehow accidentally led 古川 to a secret passageway (I dunno, revealing an air current through a hidden door or something). The author has already raised the possibility of secrets in the building’s construction, and unless both the chess players are lying it doesn’t seem like 古川 could have got past them. Plus there was that bit of torchlight the butler saw…
2 Likes
As an Amazon Associate, Natively earns from qualifying purchases through any Amazon links on the site.
