What's the identity of Rum?

[PirateKing]

Although I no longer have the chapter and page number references
At some point in the past I made a timeline thing of things

Presumably Ethan was already attempting to infiltrate the BO by the time he began living in Osaka,
and the earliest that we can track him to, he is already in Osaka.

0. Ethan joins the CIA ?? years ago.
Ethan marries Eisuke and Hidemi's (unnamed) mother ?? years ago
Hidemi is born 27 years ago
Eisuke is born 17 years ago

1.Eisuke living with his mother at the Okudaira residence, father working in Osaka, Hidemi studying abroad ?? years ago
(Hidemi came back on vacations, Ethan only came back on New Years Holiday)

2.Eisuke and Hidemi's mother dies ?? years ago and Eisuke goes to live with his father in Osaka
The photograph of Ethan from when he and Eisuke were living in Osaka had to have been taken approximately 13 years ago.
Eisuke gets blood transfusion from Hidemi while living in Osaka after entering primary school

3.Hidemi estranged herself from the family around 10 years ago.
(in the present, it is said that Eisuke hasn't seen the Okudaira family in almost 10 years)

4.Ethan dies to save Hidemi around 4 years ago.

Thanks a lot for the breakdown, it helps a lot. In the DC wiki, it says that Ethan started working for the CIA 30 years ago, but I dunno where it says so in the manga. So if the hypothesis that Ethan was working for the BO while he was in Osaka is correct, it means that roughly 13 years ago, Ethan was a spy for the CIA in the BO, right?

So if there is a possiblity that Kuroda and Ethan are acquaintances, it fits into the timeline where Ethan was 3 years into working for the BO, and where Kuroda has the accident leading to the coma. My only question is whether Ethan's wife is somehow tied into all this. If her death happened before Ethan started working as a spy, there is a possibility that her death could have motivated him into taking up such a dangerous job. Again, only speculation.

Thank you again!

[Uchiha Shadow]

unless, your saying that she felt the BO sense from Vermouth but thought it was coming from Sera? But when she first felt it on the train she knew it was from behind, so I still don't see how it was her BO sense.

Yep, that's what I'm saying. Haibara was probably to distracted by Sera's scrutiny to properly evalutate where that feeling was coming from.

When you say it like that, it does make sense, I'm still not entirely convinced, but I will not disagree, anyway, it has nothing to do with the Kuroda stuff, she didn't even have the same eyes(if you know what I mean) so it's clearly her just being scared.

[Serinox]

unless, your saying that she felt the BO sense from Vermouth but thought it was coming from Sera? But when she first felt it on the train she knew it was from behind, so I still don't see how it was her BO sense.

Yep, that's what I'm saying. Haibara was probably to distracted by Sera's scrutiny to properly evalutate where that feeling was coming from.

When you say it like that, it does make sense, I'm still not entirely convinced, but I will not disagree, anyway, it has nothing to do with the Kuroda stuff, she didn't even have the same eyes(if you know what I mean) so it's clearly her just being scared.

Yeah, that was my point with the pictures I posted earlier. Different eyes, no SFX = regular fear.

[jimmy_kud0_tv2]

nooooooooooooooooo
that entire discussion over the past few days is just .... gone!
well I guess we were warned about that.... oh well



There was some talk about how the idea of the Vinegar cups trick that Dr. Agasa pulled in Scarlet Epilogue might have been an indication of how Gosho will pull the trick about Rum's identity through the form of "cheating"

Then there were conversations about how the descriptions so far might be misleading in some way

Resume.

[Jd-]

If the discussion is of great importance, we'll take the time to go get it and summarize it here.

I do apologize for any inconvenience--as stated in the announcement post, there was an issue that could have meant losing all of the discussions, so we had to hurry and go with our most recent backup to ensure everything didn't go boom.

[jimmy_kud0_tv2]

If the discussion is of great importance, we'll take the time to go get it and summarize it here.

I do apologize for any inconvenience--as stated in the announcement post, there was an issue that could have meant losing all of the discussions, so we had to hurry and go with our most recent backup to ensure everything didn't go boom.

no no its ok
I had just forgotten

[PirateKing]

Wow, talk about a bolt from the blue. Oh well.

[unclesporkums]

Never fear, all.

After watching episode 783 (Scarlet Epilogue), and re-reading Chapter 898, I'm interested in the seemingly innocent case in between, that is Professor Agasa and the vinegar cups. Just a quick recap for those who haven't read recently - Professor Agasa places four cups in front of him - 3 contain vinegar and one contains lemon juice. He tells the Detective Boys that they can shuffle the glasses around while he's not looking, but he can always find the glass that contains the lemon juice - and he does.

Confused about this, the Detective Boys ask Conan and Subaru about it, who then attempt to solve the case. A lot of panels later, it's revealed that all four glasses actually contained vinegar from the start, and that Agasa was only pretended like he was drinking lemon juice in order to fool the Detective Boys. Right then, is (what I think) is a clue :

Genta : "But that's..."
Subaru : "Cheating."

Now, while this just seems to be a another case of the unreliable narrator, what if it isn't? A few posts earlier, I'd mentioned that Rum's one-eyed appearance seems to good to be true, and that it's probably false information spread by Rum himself, so that the focus of those trying to identify him are turned the wrong direction. The lemon juice-vinegar case itself, where Agasa cheated up front looks to me like foreshadowing of Rum, and that his/her identity will not be who we think it is.

It looks to me like Gosho is telling the reader that sometimes it's important to resort to a bit of cheating to get a point across, which is done by making Agasa cheat (which I don't think he's done before). It's like a veiled statement that even Gosho may cheat from there on when he reveals information to us - like the case of Rum's fake eye, and that the readers shouldn't take it at face value. I'm going to be a little careful about writing down people with fake eyes as Rum, because he/she might not even have a fake eye in the end. Just what I think, though.

[PirateKing]

You're my hero _/\_

[unclesporkums]

No prob.

[Shinichi Edogawa]

After file 925, there are more evidence that Kuroda is not Rum :

Spoiler:

Ai's BO radar didn't work on Kuroda and he would have recognized her as Sherry

[PirateKing]

So, I was re-reading, looking out for possible RUM suspects, and it's possible (50-50) that I've found one. Manga 487-490/ Anime 406-408, the case where Conan, Heiji, Ran and Kazuha meet the magicians. Apparently, their mentor - also an excellent magician - Mr. Masakage, disappeared 10 years ago, never to be seen again. Here's a picture :



According to the story, Mr. Masakage wrote down a certain magic trick in his notebook, but he then realized that the trick was too dangerous to be performed. So he set out to get the notebook back, and disappeared without a trace. Now, while his backstory doesn't give any clues, his profession and general appearance is suspicious.

1. To start off, he is an old man, and has quite long hair. Both fit with RUM descriptions - old and feminine man. The third description of him being a man is self-explanatory.
2.Aside from that, Mr. Masakage always wears sunglasses, he is never seen without them. This could be because he has a fake eye (Putting aside my theory that Rum doesn't have a fake eye).
3. Also, he is described to be a top class magician. That means he's well versed in sleight-of-hand and psychological tricks, which is useful in keeping his real identity a secrey. In case the long hair wasn't enough, he could have used illusions to make people believe that he was a feminine man, or perhaps a muscular man.
4. The timeline was what first caught my eye - he disappeared ten years ago. We know that Kuroda - who is possibly a central character in the RUM arc - had his accident ten years ago. Is it possible the two incidents are connected? No idea.

I'm not suggesting the person is RUM, merely pointing out some interesting facts that I noticed. Of course, it is also possible that Mr. Masakage is important to the Magic Kaito storyline (I've only read 10 chapters of that). I also dunno if Masakage's name has already been mentioned somewhere, so if this is a repost, sorry about that!

[Siff]

I have a feeling that this is Rum:

[Uchiha Shadow]

I have a feeling that this is Rum:

Well, we don't even know if he has a fake eye, but the main problem with him being RUM is that early in the series it was shown that 3 years later he was at his daughter's marriage, so I don't see how he can be RUM.

[David mason]

^If matsumoto is Rum then the raven chaser movie wouldn't make sense. Then again it wasn't canon but still