Chapter 56

The Perfect Murder, The Perfect Killer, Part 3 (完璧な殺人と殺人者 其の参,) is the 56th chapter of the Bungo Stray Dogs manga.

Summary
The Cleaner points his gun at Ranpo, who falls under all three kinds of passengers: those who talk to much, those who bring trouble with them, and those with no money. Mushitaro instructs the Cleaner to put his gun away, since Ranpo has no evidence to the crimes being committed after all. Ranpo quips that he has already foreseen the event, after which the police block their vehicle. He explains that Poe has been on the other end of the line ever since, after which Minoura approaches them to arrest the criminal.

The Cleaner invokes his diplomatic rights as a diplomatic staff from the Russian Federation along with several other defenses, allowing them to evade capture. Ranpo then lets the vehicle leave, at which Mushitaro bids Ranpo farewell. As they leave, Mushitaro notices his phone typed with foreign-language text, afterwards receiving a call from Ranpo. Ranpo admits that someone regular such as himself shall never defeat someone with an ability. Even so, he asserts that he shall defeat Mushitaro because he knows his friends believe in him. Just then, Mushitaro is transported to the foreign text's setting.

As he comes to, Mushitaro finds himself being strangled by Yokomizo at the inn where he died. Yokomizo states his hatred for Mushitaro, but the latter tells him that he is wrong. Soon after, Yokomizo dissipates; Ranpo arrives at the room and shows him the real scenario that happened, in which Mushitaro strangled Yokomizo to death. Mushitaro realizes that the setting is made out of Poe's ability, who recreated the murder scene upon Ranpo's behest. The detective deduces that Mushitaro was close to the victim, but Mushitaro interrupts him and says that he can easily escape the setting once he tells the truth of the Kindaichi case. Ranpo assures that Mushitaro will turn himself in once he hears his reasoning.

Before Yokomizo's death, Mushitaro visited his friend and asked about his upcoming mystery novel. Mushitaro suggested some genres including meta-mystery and anti-mystery that Yokomizo could write for his work, but the author rejected them. In the end, Yokomizo admitted that the ultimate mystery most probably did not exist, afterwards retracting his opinion.

Back to the novel setting, Mushitaro confesses that he has indeed killed Yokomizo, but Ranpo bluntly replies that he did not kill him. He goes on to deduce that, if he truly is the killer, then the trick and the motive are also too clichéd, almost like a script. Hence, Ranpo concludes that Yokomizo wrote and took part in the Kindaichi murder, in which the author had killed himself. Despite its absurdity, its impact is great that many people obsessed over the mysterious case, thereby becoming the ultimate mystery that transcends reality.

In the midst of writing his final novel, Yokomizo prepared to finish his ultimate mystery, especially given only one year left to live due to gastric cancer. Partway through writing the story about his own murder, Yokomizo realized that he needed a criminal with a real killing intent, asking Mushitaro to take such role. Ranpo then reminds him of the hidden manuscript, where the word "end" is smudged with water droplets. In the end, Ranpo deduces that the water droplets were Mushitaro's tears while killing his friend, which then fell on the final page. He switched the final page with a photocopy to avoid his tears being analyzed, thereby preventing the public to know about the victim and the criminal being accomplices.

Mushitaro tells him that there is no evidence, but Ranpo assures him that, should the truth be exposed, it would be enough to generate gossips that would devalue Yokomizo's ultimate mystery. In order not to lose to Dostoevsky's schemes again, Ranpo urges Mushitaro to surrender, or else he shall turn himself into a demon like Dostoevsky and publicly announce his theory that shall result to the worst possible outcome that denigrates Yokomizo's final wish.

Realizing that he cannot let Yokomizo's death be in vain, Mushitaro agrees to turn himself in. Moreover, Mushitaro revokes his ability, which results in evidence surfacing gradually proving Kunikida's innocence. Poe also informs Ranpo that the decoy corpse's wounds have no organic compounds, making it possible that Mushitaro might have never killed anyone at all. Ranpo approaches Mushitaro in the police car and hands him a business card of a spy from the Special Division for Unusual Powers in danger of having their cover blown in an anti-government group. The detective urges Mushitaro to help the spy, who is also a recruiter for the Special Division; after all, his ability would prove beneficial for the government organization. Ranpo then walks away and secretly burns the hidden manuscript page.

Meanwhile, along the way, the police car encounters a commotion for what appears to be a murder incident. As the driver asks a fellow officer who the victim is, the officer tells him that the driver himself is the victim, afterwards shooting the latter in point-blank range.