Scenedoku

Crime-scene logic cases

The Chef's Choice

Osaka, late October · omakase for a famous critic · the twelfth piece was never served · Difficulty: Detective 6 · 9×9

Osaka, a narrow side street behind Dōtonbori, a Tuesday evening in October. Master Akira’s little sushi restaurant consists of a counter, a tatami room and a private room. Victor, the most feared food critic in Paris, sat at the counter, but after the eleventh bite he vanished. Nine people were in the restaurant. Victor was found dead; the review never appeared.

Rules

  1. Every row and every column holds exactly one person. As soon as you place someone, cross out their whole row and column.
  2. “Beside” = directly left, right, above or below, and in the same area. Squares with objects (the curtain, the shelf, the counter, the fish tank, the sink, the stove, the charcoal grill, the fridge, the crate, the scales, the tables, the folding screen, the stone lantern, the stone water basin, the pond and the potted plant) cannot be occupied; the bench, the stools and the floor cushions can.
  3. Directions refer to rows and columns, not to the same line: “exactly one row north of him was a guest” = the person in the row directly above was a guest, in any column; “the northernmost person in her area” = nobody else in her area was in a row further up.
  4. The murderer was alone with the victim: nobody else was in that area. The victim made no statement – his square, too, follows from the others’.

Statements

  • Akira (master chef and owner): The charcoal grill was somewhere in his area. He was not beside the stove.
  • Botan (okami (landlady), Akira’s wife): Exactly one row north of her was somebody beside the counter.
  • Chiyo (waitress): The scales were somewhere in her row.
  • Daiki (apprentice chef): The stone water basin was somewhere in his column.
  • Eiji (rival chef from Kyoto): He was the only man beside one of the stools. He was the southernmost person in his area.
  • Fumiko (food blogger): She was the only one sitting on a floor cushion. She was not beside a floor cushion.
  • Goro (tuna wholesaler): The crate was somewhere in his column.
  • Haruka (the critic’s interpreter): She was beside a table. She was alone in her area.
  • Victor (food critic from Paris): The victim. He was alone with the murderer.

← Cases