The Pitfall of Fire Precautions

Episode 803 (Int. Episode {{{int-episode}}})
Information
Title:	The Pitfall of Fire Precautions
Japanese title:	火の用心の落とし穴 (Hi-no-Yōjin no Otoshiana?)
Original airdate:	December 12, 2015
Broadcast rating:	9.1%
Filler case:	#252
Season:	24
Manga source:	TV Original
Case
Cast:	Conan Edogawa Ai Haibara Detective Boys Wataru Takagi
Case solved by:	Conan Edogawa
Next Conan's Hint:	Children's park
Staff
Director:	Yasuichiro Yamamoto
Screenplay:	Junichi Miyashita
Storyboard:	Shigenori Kageyama
Episode director:	Koichiro Kuroda
Animation director:	Seiji Muta (supervisor) Michitaka Yamamoto Ryuta Imaizumi Juri Saito
Voice Cast: Minami Takayama as Conan Edogawa Megumi Hayashibara as Ai Haibara Wataru Takagi as Genta Kojima, Wataru Takagi Yukiko Iwai as Ayumi Yoshida Ikue Otani as Mitsuhiko Tsuburaya Akiko Takeguchi as Harue Yatabe Anri Katsu as Suguru Kamaishi Tomoya Yano as Fireman
Music
Opening song:	Nazo
Closing song:	Kimi e no Uso
Chronology
Prev episode:	« Tottori Sand Dunes Mystery Tour
Next episode:	Conan and Ebizo's Kabuki Jūhachiban Mystery »
List of episodes

The Pitfall of Fire Precautions (火の用心の落とし穴 ,Hi-no-Yōjin no Otoshiana) is the 803rd episode of the Detective Conan anime.

Cast

Characters
Conan Edogawa Ai Haibara Genta Kojima Ayumi Yoshida Mitsuhiko Tsuburaya Wataru Takagi

Gadgets

Gadgets
Power-Enhancing Kick Shoes Anywhere Ball Dispensing Belt

Case

Situation

One night, Conan, Haibara, and the Detective Boys are on fire safety patrol. Conan and Haibara discuss about the two arson cases that happened four and two days ago.

Arson (past)
	Location: Sumire Park Suspects: None known

Arson (past)
	Location: Tsutsuji Park Suspects: None known

Out of nowhere, everyone on patrol sees a man run toward the direction of a fire. They arrive at a park to see a jungle gym in flames and suspect that man is the arsonist. Genta tells everyone he knows that man.

Arson
	Location: Himawari Park Suspects: Suguru Kamaishi

The next day, the five children hide at an alley near a bento shop, waiting for that man, who, according to Genta, always buys an extra large seaweed lunch at that same shop, where he orders his eel lunches. Conan and Haibara are bothered by the fact that these three arson cases occurred at the same locations - at playgrounds - as the arson cases from last year. The ones from last year lasted for two weeks. The fourth arson case last year resulted in the death of a drunk office worker, who was sleeping while wrapped up in a construction tarp. After that, the cases stopped occurring until recently.

Arson (past)
	Victim: An office worker Suspects: None known

The man from yesterday arrives at the bento shop to order his usual seaweed lunch, and as he heads back home, the kids secretly follow him. They sit out on the streets, spying the man in his apartment for the whole day. At night, the man walks out of his house, and they quietly follow him again; unfortunately, they lost him because a train passed by and stopped them. Conan and Haibara decide to head the park where the fourth arson case from last year took place, since the next arson will most likely take place there, and the Detective Boys follow. At the park, they see a sheet draped over the slides on fire; meanwhile, an unknown person runs past the park.

Arson
	Suspects: None known

The sheet is blown up into the air and is about to hit the Detective Boys when suddenly the man they spied on before tackles them, allowing them to barely avoid it. Because of this, the man lost sight of that person who just ran past the playground again, just like yesterday. For some reason, he seems to be paying attention to all of these recent arson cases. After some police investigation and questioning from Detective Takagi, everyone heads home.

The next day, the man heads out from his home, hoping to not see the kids again; unfortunately, they were waiting just outside. They all head to Sumire Park, the site of the first arson case, to investigate the chain of arson cases. This year, a side of a seesaw was burned. On a Beika Real Estate commercial sign, the kanji 戸 is circled in red.

Arson
	Location: Sumire Park Suspects: None known

Next, they head to Tsutsuji Park, the location of the second arson case. This year, an arched bridge was burned. On a sign post of a ramen restaurant, the character へ is circled in red as well.

Arson
	Location: Tsutsuji Park Suspects: None known

Then, they arrive at Himawari Park, the place where the third arson case took place. Last year, a playground horse was burned. On a caution sign for pedestrians, the kanji 歩 is circled in red, too. After some investigation in the park, the man takes them to an eel restaurant. As the Detective Boys enjoy their eel rice, the man tells them he will order some eel liver soup; however, Conan sees the order menu and a 10000 yen bill and realizes he lied and already left the restaurant. He runs outside, but the man is nowhere to be seen; the man baited the kids here so that he can split off with them. He heads to a factory that is closed today.

Meanwhile, Conan reads the news articles regarding the arson cases again and then immediately leads Haibara and the Detective Boys to the park where the fourth arson case took place. Conan and Haibara head to top of the apartment building near the park and see the character ニ circled in red on a sign labeled "Ninja Fortress". After seeing this, Conan figures out what is going on.

People

Suguru Kamaishi
	25 years old Job-hopper One person "detectives"

Harue Yatabe
	48 years old Part-time employee Clerk of bento shop

Resolution

  Show spoilers »

Conan tells Haibara and the Detective Boys that those characters circled in red - 戸, へ, 歩, and ニ - represent a countdown. These characters can be read as to, he, ho, and ni, which can spell out いろはにほへと (irohanihoheto) backwards; in other words, there will be a fifth arson. They look at all the equipment in this playground and learn they were all produced by Iroha Toys; this is probably the same for all of the burned equipment in the other parks. Conan realizes the fifth arson will take place at a Iroha Toys factory located nearby, and they head there immediately.

At the front gate, Conan sees a van with a logo of that bento shop Genta goes to buy his eel lunch. They look into a window of the factory and suddenly see a person holding a lit-up torch. Conan leaps over the gate and charges into the factory, where he sees oil spilled all over the place. The arsonist tries to throw the torch at the oil, but Conan, with his soccer ball, knocks the torch out the window and reveals to everyone that the culprit is Harue Yatabe. She is the only one who could have driven that van to the factory.

The man also figures out she is the arsonist. When he bought seaweed lunch a few days ago, he grabbed the change from her hand, and on his way home, he smelled his hand and detected kerosene, leading him to guess she is the culprit. Today, he went to the factory and saw her inside the van with the shop's logo, confirming his hunch. As she walked into the factory carrying two oil tanks, he sneaked in, but she used a pipe to knock him unconscious. Afterwards, he was tied up and gagged until the kids arrived.

One and a half year ago, a child was badly injured at a playground because of a defect in a equipment made in this factory. Iroha Toys blamed it all on her, the factory manager at the time, fired her, and pretended to know nothing about it. She set up the countdown to get revenge on the company and make them regret what they did to her.

As the police escort her to the station, the man turns himself in to Detective Takagi. He witnessed last year's fourth fire and committed the robbery which happened in the apartment building near that playground. Since then, he stopped robbing, but because he was afraid of being arrested, he did not report this robbery; he pretended to be unaware of that arson. However, he regretted doing this, as the arsonist would have been caught sooner if he confessed his crime at that time. That was why he wanted to catch the arsonist himself and then turn himself in to the police.

Trivia

• It would have made more sense for Inspector Yuminaga from the arson division to have appeared instead of Detective Takagi from the homicide division. However, due to the death that occurred, Detective Takagi might have been called out there in case there was a tie to a murder.

See also

• Season 24