Hearing Mary's words, Russell finally recalled the topic. He cleared his throat and said, "I wanted to say, yesterday, Charlotte and I encountered an interesting case."
"An interesting case?" The young girl's lovely eyebrows raised slightly, and she leaned her body a bit closer in Russell's direction. "What kind of case could make even Charlotte find it interesting?"
"Mm... simply put, there is a lady named Holly Davey who says she seems to have encountered a ghost."
Russell recounted Holly Davey's experience in detail. Mary listened without saying a word, the light of thought and confusion flashing occasionally in her azure eyes.
"Mm... an invisible ghost who secretly collects the coffee cups the lady has used, sprays the perfume she wears, reads the books she reads, and even sleeps in the bed she has slept in..."
Mary pondered for a moment, her brows furrowing slightly.
"Two possibilities—either Ms. Holly Davey has a psychological illness, such as multiple personalities or the like. Or, a complete pervert and stalker has latched onto her."
"Then, from your perspective, which possibility do you lean towards?" Russell asked.
"The latter, I suppose. If it were multiple personalities, the logic doesn't hold up in some places," Mary said while taking notes. "For example, regarding the warming of the bed, there is an obvious loophole.
"But then again, if it really is the latter, the situation seems even worse. If I had a choice, I would rather choose to have a split personality myself than be entangled by a pervert."
Regardless of safety concerns or other considerations, at least a split personality is one's own self and wouldn't harm oneself.
Russell nodded in deep agreement.
"So, what was the result?" Mary pressed. "Did you find that Mr. Ghost?"
"Regrettably, we did not." Russell shrugged. "Ms. Davey has temporarily gone to stay at a friend's house."
He paused, then continued, "Charlotte and I turned the entire apartment upside down. The doors, windows, and locks were all intact, and there were no secret passages or ventilation ducts one could crawl through. In every aspect, that guy seemed to have truly... appeared out of thin air."
"Appeared out of thin air..." Mary said thoughtfully, then flipped to a new page in the notebook on her desk.
Next, she picked up her pen and casually drew a square on the paper, adding a slightly smaller square beside it. Russell took a glance; it was roughly a crude schematic of a room.
"The layout of the apartment—is it roughly like this?" she confirmed first.
"Mm, just about," Russell nodded.
Thus, Mary began her analysis.
"If we exclude doors, windows, and secret passages..." Her voice was very soft, as if she were muttering to herself, yet also as if she were questioning Russell. "Then—what about the walls?"
She asked tentatively, the tip of her pen hovering over the black solid lines. "Something like breaking through the walls?"
"Impossible," Russell immediately negated this answer. "The apartment walls are all brick and stone structures. To break through or dismantle them would cause too much commotion; it would be impossible not to be discovered. The people living in that place are mostly elderly folks who generally prefer quiet."
Hearing this, Mary nodded, then lightly crossed over the lines representing the walls, marking them with a small 'X'.
"To be honest, after hearing your description, my first thought was—that ghost might be living in Ms. Davey's home," Mary said.
"Honestly speaking, that's not practical." Russell shook his head. "Ms. Davey's apartment is a single-person apartment; it can't hide anyone."
"So, this is just a guess," Mary said, her pen tip sliding gently over the floor plan composed of two squares. "Isn't that what deduction is? Bold hypotheses, followed by careful verification. First propose a possibility, and then start from the existing information to comprehensively refute it."
"This stuff sounds so familiar... Charlotte seems to do the same thing," Russell said.
He thought of the time he proposed the split personality guess, only to be negated by Charlotte from a logical perspective. Sure enough, these two people were too alike in certain degrees.
"Then, let us try it once as well. This time, I will propose the hypothesis, and you will refute it," Mary said softly. "I hypothesize that this ghost never left Ms. Holly Davey's home from the very beginning. Now, it is your turn to refute."
"Mm... just as I said earlier, the apartment is smaller than imagined; it cannot hide people," Russell said. "For an adult to live in a studio apartment without leaving any traces... honestly, even if Moriarty came, he couldn't do it."
"Logically speaking, it seems so." Mary nodded, but she was not in a hurry to rebut. "But what if the 'hiding' I spoke of is not a static behavior, but a dynamic one?"
"Dynamic?" Russell raised an eyebrow, not quite understanding the term.
"The rules of hide-and-seek are just not to be caught, but it was never said that one must stay motionless in one place, was it?" She smiled, then turned the notebook around to make it easier for Russell to see clearly.
"What if there is one or more pieces of modified furniture in the apartment? When Ms. Davey is at home, it is just an ordinary piece of furniture, but when she leaves, the person living inside can come out and move around. For example, a sufficiently wide wardrobe with a back panel that can open; or perhaps a very heavy sofa that is actually hollow inside."
"Impractical." Russell shook his head. "If it were to that extent, Charlotte would have discovered it."
Even if Charlotte couldn't discover it, he would have.
Of course, he did not say this sentence out loud.
"Moreover, the process of modifying furniture itself is hard to do without leaving any traces, right?"
"Mm... that is true." Mary nodded, then wrote down the words [Furniture Modification] in her notebook and crossed them out with a line.
She did not feel discouraged by this; instead, she became even more interested.
Just as Mary was preparing to propose a second hypothesis, the old professor's voice suddenly rang out from the lectern. Although the voices and movements of their discussion had been deliberately kept low, for that somewhat eye-catching area in the back row, it still appeared incredibly abrupt.
"Last row, Mr. Watson."
The old professor pushed up his glasses, looking at Russell with displeasure. "Does my course make you feel bored?"
[Professor Fields is dissatisfied with your behavior of slacking off. Malice Points +10]
As the voice fell, the entire class's gazes concentrated on Russell, filled with schadenfreude and anger. If you don't want to learn, can you not affect other students who do?
"Uh..." Russell stood up slowly, his gaze sweeping over the blackboard while his mind searched for how to answer.
Just then, he suddenly felt as if his waist had been poked by someone.
Turning his head to look, he saw Mary calmly spreading open her notebook and pointing at the diagram with her pen. Seeing this, Russell's eyes instantly lit up.
"No, Professor Fields, your course is very interesting," he hurriedly spoke up. "I was just discussing some questions regarding structural mechanics with Mary."
Hearing this, the professor narrowed his eyes, seemingly not quite believing it, so he slowly turned his gaze toward Mary at the side.
"Is that so, Ms. Morstan?"
"Yes, Professor." Mary stood up and nodded gently. "Just now, when you spoke about stress transfer and structural utilization within a closed system, I had a small question, so I started discussing it with Student Russell. I didn't expect to disturb your lecture; I am truly very sorry."
[Mary Morstan's defense of you has caused other students to feel intense jealousy toward you. Malice Points +30]
No, I can't laugh yet...
Listening to the voice in his mind, Russell forcibly suppressed the twitching of his mouth and spread his hands toward the professor.
Seeing this, Professor Fields seemed somewhat surprised as well. He fell silent for a moment, then cleared his throat, his tone softening.
"Having questions is a good thing, but still, try to discuss them after class." Professor Fields paused, then continued, "So, what is your question?"
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