First of all, we have Saikawa’s groundbreaking discovery that Moe might be in love with him! Immediately followed by his reasoning about his own superiority I think it’s funny that even the author seems to mock him during that passage. (Or at least I thought so.)
Secondly, finally, a murder, no, even two! And so far nothing that disputes our theory of the rotating main hall. I think I need to digest this once more:
Ritsuko was found in front of the reappeared statue, dead. If we assume that she actually was in Noboru’s room, then that room is conveniently located right in front of the statue, so he could have taken her outside and killed her while she was still drunk and the fog was still thick.
Would it be possible to get her out of the window while she is drunk? Or would he need another person’s help?
Then he’d have the room key and would be able to do with it what he pleases. Especially the scene with Shun’ichi at his mother’s room’s door would become more plausible: Noboru would wait inside until he knocked a few times, would then unlock the door, let him enter and kill him. Afterwards he could sneak out again, lock the room and take the key outdoors where he places it next to Ritsuko.
The big question is: Why did Noboru kill the two?
Wild theory #1: The person who solves the puzzle of the disappearing statue inherits the property. But if Noboru is an insider, he cannot solve the puzzle because he knows the secret already. Still he might be interested in inheriting it because maybe he is an illegitimate child of the professor? (His mother worked for him for ages, and Noboru is younger than 20, so this might be a possibility.) In order for that, he would need to get rid of all legitimate heirs. That would mean he needs to kill Ryouko, Kazuki and Kisei as well. (At some point it would probably get a bit too obvious, but hey!) So my call would be that he tries to kill them, but Saikawa and Moe discover his sinister plans and stop him at the last minute (or maybe right after he killed Kisei).
What do y’all think? (Edit: about this week, not about my thoughts )
The only thing I thought (which contradicts your wild theory#1) was that maybe Shun’ichi wasn’t supposed to get killed. Maybe the murderer was hiding in Ritsuko’s room for some reason, and at first tried to ignore Shun’ichi banging on the door, but after a while got worried it was going to attract attention (which it did) so they unlocked the door to let him in and kill him.
I guess another possible explanation for why the murderer let Shun’ichi bang for a while could be that they just got back into the room (through the window) while he was banging.
And yay for a little bit of Saikawa/Moe character development! So it sounds like Saikawa is officially aromantic/asexual? And he seems to think he decided to be this way, but it must be his natural tendency anyway because I’m not sure you can decide those things.
Hm, that’s a very interesting take on this. So you think the murderer only wanted to kill Ritsuko? Do you have an idea for a motive?
That sounds like a very plausible succession of events. The murderer was hoping for Shun’ichi to go away and leave the room alone, and when that didn’t happen, they had to do something about it.
You mean after taking Ritsuko outside and killing her? But the window is to the other side of the building from the statue, right? (The statue being near the south entrance iirc.) That would mean the murderer walked Ritsuko all the way around the building?
Oh I thought he was just very slow on the uptake Like he said, “not being able to take a sharp turn” or something.
I thought he decided to be very rational and to think things through properly and that, not letting his emotions take the lead (which is a standard academics’ education, I guess?). (Because IIRC in the previous books he was reacting emotionally to Moe, wasn’t he? E.g. in the scene in the first book where he got that panic attack? And also in the second book where he was jealous when his friend approached Moe?) Or maybe I am just interpreting too much here, which is totally possible
I’m starting to get annoyed by Moe… xD
Interesting theories, I like the illegitimate child theory.
I do however think that Shun’ichi was meant to be killed. His knocking and him immediately entering the room made it seem as if someone had sent him a note, maybe with either “I’m gonna kill your mother, but you can try to save her if you can” or “I know the secret to the statue riddle, do you want to know? You’ll inherit this building if you can solve it”.
Immediately followed by his reasoning about his own superiority 
I think it’s funny that even the author seems to mock him during that passage. (Or at least I thought so.)
)
Like he said, “not being able to take a sharp turn” or something.
