Everyone congregates near Grampa's study. The door is locked, but maybe the window ? Gohda proves he's a great Spanner in the Works by mentioning the super-size ladder in the boiler room (the other servants knew about it too, but obviously were trying to keep quiet). As the most senior family member in the room, Eva agrees to take responsibility for breaking in. Despite bragging just before about his climbing prowess, Gohda obviously has cold feet, and Rudolf decides to show off and climb instead. He breaks in... and obviously there's nobody (though there are some signs of the room being lived in, they're all cold). He opens the door from inside, and everyone can enter.
They search the room, but Grampa's nowhere to be found. Natsuhi, Dr Nanjo and Kumasawa improvise that it does happen regularly that Grampa wanders outside his room at night, which doesn't sound very convincing.
And then Erika gets disappointed. Natsuhi is the obvious suspect (flashback to a scene where she pretended being the last one to have seen Grampa, despite knowing he sometimes wanders around and could have met someone else). What kind of crappy mystery has so easy to find a culprit ? Erika'd rather someone else... But why could Natsuhi be so certain noone else had seen Grampa after 23:00 PM ?
Just as Eva prepares to announce her grand theory, Erika cuts the grass under her feet and wonders how long has it really been since Grampa disappeared. None of the relatives have seen him in more than a year, and even the clumsy Gohda corroborates that. The servants had supposedly been interacting with him, but they're all on Natsuhi's payroll. Has she been embezzling the family money, and covered up Grampa's death to avoid investigation ?
Again, Erika is disappointed by such an easy answer.
She slides to the "magical" world, where she announces to Grampa's ghost that (1) she's pleased to meet him and (2) will he please die, now ? But before she can give the final blow, Beato interposes herself, and attacks Erika with this : Grampa may have left his study on his own between 23 PM and 7 AM.
Too bad Erika is now calling reinforcement. We have a new character ! Just as Erika is Bernkastel's perfect piece for finding the human culprit, she also has a piece for fighting witches. Say hello to Dlanor A Knox ! (She speaks like THIS. I've barely read a few screens of her dialogue, and I already find it ANNOYING.)
She comes with quite a few underlings in TOW. This somehow includes the Siestas, and being on the opposite side from Beato makes them feel AWKWARD. Anyway, Dlanor STRIKES : Between 23:00 PM and now, the study's door wasn't opened ONCE.
Back in the real world, Eva gives proof of this with her little paper slip...
Beato's footing in her battle against Dlanor gets less and less assured. The windows ? Certified as CLOSED. What about a secret passage ? According to Knox's 3rd principle, that's FORBIDDEN. Maybe Grampa noticed the piece of paper ? Already DENIED. He's a great inventor, and may have created a drug allowing himself to turn into mist ! or a teleportation device ! According to Knox's 4th principle, such ridiculous plot devices are FORBIDDEN.
Okay, Beato acknowledges that this isn't working. Let's Get Dangerous ! Natsuhi only said she talked to him inside the study : he might have used the phone while hiding elsewhere ! Or he may still be hiding in a blind spot of the room ! Or maybe Natsuhi was calling the room itself "Grampa" ! Or even herself ! Heck he might have escaped through the window while she closed behind him !
Too bad that Erika asks most of those ridiculous questions to Natsuhi, who carelessly denies most of them. Oops. And Dlanor takes care of the last one : where would Grampa be hiding, EXACTLY ? Whatever Beato proposes, Dlanor searches and indicates that he's not THERE. Uh oh...
And then, at the last moment, Battler jumps in. He has a theory that corroborates Natsuhi's version, the closed room AND Grampa escaping from it. He asks Natsuhi to reenact the former night, while he'll be Grampa. Of course, after seeing him going to sleep, Natsuhi would make one more check of the whole study, for cleanliness and supplies... For example, checking the toilet paper in the bathroom, a place where she can't see most the study...
The door makes a huge honking noise while UNLOCKING. There's no opening it without Natsuhi noticing, and that didn't HAPPEN. But then, who talked of the door ? Grampa may have opened the window, and jumped... Then Natsuhi would have felt a draft, and closed it without thinking.
Wait a SECOND. This is the third STORY. Surely Battler isn't SUGGESTING...
Battler jumps through the window. He lands without a scratch, and waves back at Erika, who is positively fuming. (Oh, and there's also a last-ditch battle in mid-air with Dlamor about Knox's 8th principle *, but I'm simplifying things a bit here.)
With this Crazy Awesome move, Battler has saved Beato and Grampa's ghost from inquiry, and destroyed Erika's closed room. (Everyone else agrees that Grampa could have pulled off such a stunt, so she has to concede.) He's a well deserving successor to the Ushiromiya head...
Wow, just wow. This was a truly exhilarating scene. I wasn't so hot about introducing new interchangeable minions, but Dlanor is such a Large Ham that she makes her every single line of dialogue AWESOME. (Her assistants can get lost, though. There's a good reason I've attributed all their dialogue to their boss.)
But of course, the most impressive part is Battler blasting his way through Erika & Dlamor's "perfect" closed room, and finding a way for Natsuhi not to be a liar. Of course, we know she's lying and Grampa is dead, but that's what makes Battler's move even more admirable. It's such a beautiful gesture...
