Astrology
When Xia Yu saw the words "Lavender Villa" in the quest description, her thoughts went straight to Noelle, who was working as a maid inside that very villa, and she sent off a message asking whether she knew anything about what was going on.
Noelle's reply came back before long.
Gazing at the words "Detective Koushien" displayed in the world quest, and fitting them together with what Noelle had told her, Xia Yu realized this had to be the fuse for the Detective Koushien incident that took place later in the canon timeline.
The case had left a deep impression on her. It was one of the few stories in Detective Conan where she had genuinely felt sorry for the killer. If she remembered right, the culprit's name was Koshimizu Natsuki — a girl who had orchestrated the entire plot to avenge a close friend who had worked as a maid and been wrongly accused, with the ultimate goal of flushing out the high school detective whose careless deductions had driven her friend to her death.
Noelle and the others most likely hadn't connected the Lavender Villa murder to Detective Koushien at all. As Xia Yu recalled, Koshimizu had cast a wide net to find her target, inviting several high school detectives to the event — three besides herself, if she wasn't mistaken: Hattori Heiji, Hakuba Saguru, and... ah, and one more, a boy named Tokitsu Junya. Which meant the oddly-spoken high school detective Lisa had told Noelle to track down had to be Tokitsu Junya himself.
So Xia Yu passed along everything she knew to Noelle. As for whether that detective really was Tokitsu Junya — well, Noelle could verify that with her own investigation. Xia Yu remembered that if she stepped in to help too much, Noelle probably wouldn't be happy about it.
And whatever Lisa intended to do to the man once he was found, Xia Yu had no intention of meddling. Lisa was an adult, and a sharp one at that; she knew exactly what she was doing. Xia Yu trusted her to know where the line was.
What actually occupied Xia Yu's mind was a different question: why had this world quest refreshed even though Conan never appeared in it? Could it be that the quest was tied to cases from the original story itself, and since the Lavender Villa murder that Lisa and Noelle solved would directly influence the later Detective Koushien incident, the world quest had refreshed and been marked complete all the same?
Xia Yu stroked her chin thoughtfully. Did that mean Conan wasn't actually necessary after all? Maybe it didn't matter whether he was present or not — so long as the original cases got solved, the world quest would complete itself.
But her enthusiasm deflated within minutes. The trouble was that when Conan wasn't around, half these cases never even got triggered in the first place — and no trigger meant no refreshed quest. Take the library director, for instance: Lisa had been keeping watch for days on end without catching the man making a single suspicious move. Were they really expected to just sit around until the Detective Boys happened to wander into that library?
She let out a long sigh. So in the end, it really is the cases that summon the detective.
Two days later, Xia Yu was reading the newspaper's latest coverage of the Lavender Villa murder case. So the butler had finally gone to the Metropolitan Police Department and told the truth after all. Only... Xia Yu's eyes narrowed slightly as she scanned the article. The reporting focused almost entirely on condemning the police for their incompetence, while the detective who had originally misled the investigation was brushed over in a single throwaway line — apparently because, with no name attached, the journalists had nothing to grab onto.
A faint frown creased her brow. Ugh, Lisa is not going to be happy reading this. I wonder how she's planning to teach that "high school detective" a lesson?
In Shikoku, two other people were reading that same article.
Koshimizu Natsuki looked over the report, and something like joy flickered across her face.
Good. Kana's name is finally clear. But — her fingers pressed down hard on the words "high school detective" printed on the page — there's still someone who hasn't paid the price for what he did!
Across town, Tokitsu Junya was reading the very same article.
There was none of the relief or gladness others might have felt — only a creeping dread. If it ever came out that he was the high school detective who had misled the police, the damage to his reputation would be devastating. That, he could not accept.
And beneath the fear, a simmering anger was building. It had all happened so long ago. The culprit had already "taken her own life out of guilt," the police had closed the book on it — what possible point was there in digging it all up again? Why did those detectives have to stick their noses in and chase after the truth?
That evening, at the Mouri Detective Agency.
"Ran, did you hear?" Sonoko was perched on the office sofa, bouncing with excitement as she leaned toward Mouri Ran beside her.
Conan sat on the neighboring sofa, ostensibly glued to the television, while both his ears strained toward the girls' conversation.
Sonoko, you menace, every time you come looking for Ran it means trouble. Why do you keep dragging her off to meet sleazy guys? he grumbled inwardly. Showing up this late — don't tell me she's here to introduce Ran to somebody and drag her back out again at this hour.
No way. I'm listening in properly. And "did you hear"? Did something special happen recently or something?
"Mm-hm, I did! They say anyone who's been to see her swears she's spot-on!" Ran clearly knew exactly what Sonoka meant — even with Sonoko's vague hand-waving, there was no mistaking the subject.
"But nobody knows where that astrologer sets up her stall! Apparently she's in a different spot every day, so whether you find her at all is pure luck." Ran was honestly a little curious herself, but with no idea where to look, she could only sigh and let it go.
Astrology? Seriously? So this is what they're chatting about. Conan relaxed the moment he realized they weren't talking about some handsome guy. Still, honestly — grown girls like Sonoko and Ran believing in this stuff?
"Ha! Well, I know where she is today!" The moment Sonoko saw Ran's interest, she eagerly shared the astrologer's location. "Heh heh, I asked my classmates to message me if anyone spotted her, and sure enough, one of them saw her at that exact spot today and texted me. I came straight to you the second I found out — I knew you'd be interested, Ran!"
"Well then, no time to lose — let's go find her right now before she packs up and moves!" Sonoko sprang to her feet and grabbed Ran's hand, already pulling her toward the door.
"W-wait! Ran-nee-chan, I wanna come too!" The instant Conan saw Sonoko yanking Ran away, he hopped off the sofa, seized Ran's other hand, and clung on with the full battery of his best wheedling.
Please. There was no way on earth he was letting two girls wander out alone this late at night to meet a total stranger. What if something happened to them?
And besides — astrology. One word and he could smell the scam, the kind that preyed on gullible young women. He was going along to see exactly how this "astrologer" planned to work her con, and if he played his cards right, maybe he could expose her on the spot and cure Sonoko and Ran of believing every fortune-teller they stumbled across.