The Divination Results
At the sound of Mona's ringing cry, a thin veil of mist seemed to gather all around them.
"Whoa!" Sonoko and Ran gasped in unison, and their confidence in Mona's fortune-telling climbed yet another notch.
Oh, come on — seriously? The moment Mona shouted, Conan had spotted the haze forming around them. Illusion or not, he could have sworn the humidity had crept up as well. Not that he believed for one second that astrology had anything to do with it; some hidden mechanism had to be producing the effect. And with the so-called astrologer fully absorbed in Sonoko's reading, he saw his opening: slip quietly around behind the table and find whatever gadget was responsible.
He made it barely three steps before Ran seized him by the collar.
"Conan, what did you promise me before we came here!?" Ran demanded, fixing him with a stern look.
"Sorry, Ran-neechan. I won't wander off again." Conan felt his nerves prickle under that stare; terrified of genuinely setting her off with another stunt, he had no choice but to sit obediently at her side and listen to the results of Sonoko's reading.
"Mm — a question about love? Understood." Eyes fixed on the star-patterns surfacing in her hydromancy basin, Mona murmured the words thoughtfully.
Sonoko leaned in, curious, for a look of her own, but beyond the stars reflected prettily on the water's surface she couldn't make out anything at all.
Mona made her wait no longer, delivering the verdict straight out — and in remarkable detail, without a single detour around the point.
"Your destined one will appear at the seaside in summer — and when danger finds you, he will step forward to shield you."
"Ooh! A hero swooping in to save his lady? How romantic!" Sonoko lit up at the result, cupping her cheeks in both hands, face gone rosy. She was clearly already picturing the scene — her destined knight stepping in at the moment of peril — utterly sunk in the fantasy.
Strange. How could she be that specific?
After all, as far as Conan was concerned, astrologers, diviners, and fortune-tellers of every stripe actually relied on a technique called cold reading to win people's belief. Cold reading was the art of deducing a stranger's inner thoughts and intentions — with no preparation whatsoever — by observing and analyzing the fine clues in their words, manner, and body language. Its whole trick lay in making the subject believe that this person knows all about me, thereby earning their trust and building a connection in record time. A practiced cold reader could mine a dozen little details — clothing, hairstyle, sex, tone of voice — then float high-probability guesses and study the reactions to check whether each deduction had landed.
Which was why Conan had assumed this astrologer would open with a few question-shaped lines to establish trust, and only then, guided by the conversation, offer results vague enough to fit any answer. Instead she had asked next to nothing and stated her result outright. If she got it wrong, wouldn't she be exposed on the spot? Judging by how many people around here trusted her divination, had she really never been wrong even once?
No — that was impossible the moment you actually thought about it! Far more likely, Sonoko had asked about the future, something no one could verify, and that was precisely what let the woman invent whatever she pleased. In any case, he refused to believe astrology was genuinely real.
"See, see, Ran? What did I tell you — this fortune-telling really is accurate!" Sonoko sprang to her feet and surrendered the seat. "Come on, hurry, your turn! So what are you going to ask? Don't tell me you're planning to ask about that Kudou guy?" She shot Ran a sly sideways glance as she said it.
Caught dead to rights, Ran looked a touch embarrassed, but she steeled herself and decided to have a reading done on Shinichi all the same. Ever since he had left her at the amusement park, she hadn't set eyes on him once. He did call from time to time, but without seeing him in the flesh she couldn't quite shake the worry — and with so many people swearing this divination was accurate, she figured that even if it amounted to nothing else, it would at least give her a little comfort.
Conan's eyes narrowed into slits. Heh. Nothing's even happened yet, Sonoko, and you already know the reading is accurate?
Then, hearing Sonoko guess that Ran meant to ask about him, he felt a tug of warmth — and immediately a jolt of nerves. What if this astrologer, knowing nothing of the real situation, casually spouted some nonsense that left Ran worried sick?
Ran told Mona what she wished to divine and, just as Sonoko had before her, rested her hand on the hydromancy basin.
Mona wasted no words on preamble and began at once.
"Fate, reveal yourself!"
⟨ Hydromancy ⟩
"Wow! The mist's back! However many times I watch it, this is just amazing!" Sonoko marveled at the thin fog welling up around them once more.
Damn it — he hadn't caught this astrologer Mona pulling a single trick. Forewarned by last time, Conan had watched her like a hawk from the moment Ran's turn came, alert for the slightest unusual movement; all he saw was her laying both hands on the rim of the basin, and the instant she finished that line, the entire surroundings transformed.
Don't tell me she has an accomplice?
Mona wasted no breath on hedging, and the result she pronounced next left Conan drenched in a cold sweat.
"Miss Mouri — the one you wish to ask about stands within a black shadow at this very moment, yet he is in no danger. He is not far from you. Indeed, he may be right there at your side."
Ran fell into a thoughtful silence at the result. The worry didn't evaporate, but hearing that Shinichi was in no immediate danger lifted some of the weight all the same.
Hold on — how on earth did she see that? What else can she see? If he had her divine the two men in black he'd crossed paths with at the amusement park, could she read that too? Conan's shock had spilled over into wild speculation.
But once the idea surfaced, there was no reining it back in. He wanted a lead on those two so badly it ached — wanted his real body back as soon as possible, and never again to have to watch Ran worry like this.
"Hey, hey, big sis — is fortune-telling really that accurate? I wanna try too! Ran-neechan, let me have a turn, pretty please?" Conan laid the curious-little-kid act on thick.
Seeing him so eager for a reading of his own, Ran didn't stand in his way; she let him take the seat at the table.
"And what would you like to ask, little one?" At the scene before her, Mona's brow arched almost imperceptibly, though her tone stayed perfectly ordinary.
How do I phrase this? Ask outright about the men in black from the amusement park, and Ran would connect it to Kudou Shinichi in a heartbeat — a direct question was impossible. Which left...
"A while ago, I accidentally took the wrong medicine," Conan said, deliberately a little vague. "I want to know about the two people who made me take it." Some part of him still doubted divination truly worked, so he wanted to see whether, without offering a single date or detail, it could really draw out the information he was after.
What kind of question is that? Ran found it a little odd — Conan had taken the wrong medicine a while back? She studied his face and his small frame carefully. Hmm — he looked the picture of health, so it couldn't have done him much harm.
Ah — so he really had gone and asked something tied to the Black Organization. Mona wasn't the least bit surprised that this was his question of choice; if anything, she was rather curious herself what the hydromancy basin would show.
Mona gave her answer.
"Liquor!"
She herself, though, was a little startled by how sparse the basin's reply proved — far less than she had expected. Could it be that anything touching the main thread of fate was simply that much harder to divine?