It had been two days since Gin showed up at the Mouri Detective Agency with many apologies and Edogawa Conan disappeared for good. Kudo Shinichi was finally at his own house without fear of Black Organization agents out to kill him, and he was extremely happy about the entire ordeal. I mean, he freaking met Santa Claus. He could have been a little less offended at how Santa basically did everything to satisfy Ran and not himself, but Kudo Shinichi is a definite candidate to be the poster child for arrogance. I wouldn't put it past him if his portrait was there in the hall of Poster Children right now under a big plaque listing how many times he put his pride first and girlfriend second. Nevertheless, he was enjoying cleaning his own house as himself and not having other people clean up forcibly for him as a six year old. He was definitely NOT going to go back to being Edogawa Conan using Santa's Christmas magic incantation, not even if he needed to escape a burning building through an opening that only his six year old self could get through.
Shinichi was presently in the attic, dusting off the various old stuff that his parents left to sit around. He opened a chest and dug around in it for amusement. Underneath a bunch of records, he found a box. Inside it were letters. Shinichi smiled to himself. They were fan mail for his dad that he kept for so long. His dad had a soft spot for dedicated fans who sent him letters of admiration. He went through a couple of them, wondering why he kept them specifically. Most of them seemed like particularly normal letters that he would get on a daily basis. He dug around some more through the papers and found one that was specifically ornate-looking. It was laced with gold and the fancy handwriting upon the envelope gave off a cold feeling on his fingers. There was no return address and it was still sealed. What was this? He opened the envelope and a slight winter chill flew out from the interior.
He pulled out the letter, cold to the touch.
"Dear Kudo Yuusaku-san, my interest has been piqued by your talent in both writing and solving mysteries. Forgive my forwardness, but I am an old man living far in the north. I don't have time for humbly prancing around the subject at hand. I have a challenge for you."
This was no fan letter. It was an invitation.
"I have uncovered a puzzle that runs deep within the roots of my family. I have enclosed the details. I have not been able to figure it out myself, but I was hoping for you to look into it."
Shinichi then took note that the aforementioned details were likely to be the extra papers still inside the envelope.
"It would be greatly appreciated if you could look into this. I will forgive you if you lack the time, the funds, or the accessibility to solve said conundrum, but if you do not have the time, please place it in the hands of one who does. Signed, a friend."
This, of course, engaged Shinichi's immediate attention. Forget that the rest of the attic was rotting in dust, this was a mystery. His father would never have time for a game like this, so it was obvious that only he could be the one to solve it.
He dug the rest of the envelope's contents out and spread them on the desk in his father's study. The final piece of paper, folded into a tiny square, was the coldest of all. Shinichi had forgotten that ice cold paper was kind of strange because he was too distracted by the mystery at hand, and as he opened it, he realized that the paper was probably embedded deeply with wintry magicks because the study disappeared and it was suddenly very, very white out.
Shinichi found himself headfirst in a pile of snow. He dug himself out and looked around. This was not Japan. This was not regular. There was snow for miles. A conifer or two faintly appeared in the distance. A great sea of dark waves expanded past the horizon. The sky was a bright blue but no sun was visible. Wherever he was, it was incredibly cold.
He was definitely not in the North Pole, because the snow was real, and cold, and wet, and now Shinichi was as well. He stood up and righted himself in the two feet of snow as best he could. The papers he had taken out of the envelope were scattered around him and he gathered them up and stuffed them back into the envelope and then into his pocket where they would be safer. There was shelter nearby in the form of the underside of a snowy cliff. Interestingly enough, there was a door as well, embedded in the ice. Shinichi went up to it and tried to open it, but the door and doorknob were both frozen. Taking up arms (er, legs), he smashed it in with a soccer-level kick, practically shattering the door and allowing his entry.
The interior of the 'house' was nearly as elaborate as Santa's own workshop lobby, except it was drab and frightening instead of happy and full of Christmas cheer. It was huge and empty with light only coming from magical frozen torches. There were pillars of thick ice throughout the hall, fountains made of blackened stone with frozen water standing in place, and gargoyles of ice which grimaced at him with teeth made of icicles. Shinichi felt rather unnerved by all of this, but at least he was inside somewhere where he wouldn't eventually get snow blindness.
Every step he took echoed throughout the hallway, even though he was stepping on a thin dark red rug. He finally came to the end of it, where three large archways went deeper into the cliffside, one going down stairs so deep that he couldn't see the end.
Shinichi decided to consult the envelope. He opened the contents past the letter again. A second letter was now present, which he quickly unfolded.
"I see you've taken an honest interest in my puzzle. Please don't be startled by your change of location, I will send you back easily when it's all done. You can find me in my study. Once inside my home, take a right at the first crossroads."
Shinichi wondered why someone would always be in their study regardless of when the letter was written. The right archway led down a straight hallway with a wooden door at the end, decorated with cast-iron bindings. He knocked on the door. No one answered, so he opened the door. It slowly budged open.
A man sat inside at a desk. Shinichi took second thoughts about whether he could rightfully call him a man. His skin was paler than any dead man, and his hair was almost as white as the winter wonderland outside. He was tall and thin and looked like he had an angry disposition. He wore a flat white hat with a blue band and a blue jacket with a striped scarf.
"I see it's finally high time that you came around to my case," said the man. "It's been ten years since I sent that letter." He turned around to face Shinichi, but his movements were strange and stiff, as if someone kept stopping him and then moving his body slightly and then taking another picture. His body's texture looked as if it was made of some uniform plastic. Shinichi was a little creeped out by this, but he ignored it because this man had obviously been living in this desolate expanse for ages and it probably had affected his appearance.
"I'm not Kudo Yuusaku," said Shinichi.
The man didn't look very pleased to see a teenager. "Then who are you?"
"I'm his son, Kudo Shinichi, a detective like him."
"Are you as good as him?"
"Better."
"Ah, you'll do as a replacement." He turned around in the chair to face him. "I'm the Snow Miser."
"Snow Miser?"
"I'm the king of cold, and I've got a real cold case for you. Your father's procrastination isn't going to help one bit."
"What happened?"
"My brother, the Heat Miser, was killed ten years ago to this day."
"The exact day? December 27th?"
"Right on the spot. Not even Santa Claus could figure out what happened to him. Everyone in the North Pole-isphere forgot all about it after a while, except me. That's why I sent for your father. I had heard on TV that he was the best detective around. We watch a lot of TV up here, what with the snow and all."
"And he never came?"
"Nope, not even a reply. I guess you found his letter?"
"Yeah. I'd be happy to solve this case for you."
"Well, you would have no other choice, would you? You're practically stuck up here unless I use my wintermancy to send you home."
"I suppose you're right."
"By the way, how are you handling this so well? Usually mortals who show up on my doorstep are rather astounded by the whole deal."
"I had to solve a case for Santa just a few days back. I've been through stranger ordeals."
"Hmph. He still isn't much for deductive reasoning, is he?"
"He hasn't got a clue." Shinichi and the Snow Miser both laughed. I mean, that was a really good pun.
"So," said Shinichi, "where do we start? Where did the Heat Miser live?"
"Right down the lane," said the Snow Miser, "but I'd rather not get out my walking cane, so we'll just go there with a bit of my holiday magic." He waved his hand and with a blast of cold they were in a completely different environment.
"I see he wasn't very suited for this latitude," said Shinichi.
The room was literally a rock face above a pit of bubbling lava that was strangely not melting Shinichi's skin off his bones, and the bones as well.
"The volcano under his house got a little more active recently," said the Snow Miser. "Don't mind it."
