Jiroo Kuroki calls Kogoro to help his artist sensei, Shizusan Hayakawa's, depression due to the fact he is unable to draw anymore due to his age. During a fishing trip, Hayakawa's maid finds that he had hanged himself on bamboo.
After at through investigation, Conan tranquilizes Kogoro to reveal that Kuroki murdered Haykawa. Conan reveals that he drugged Hayakawa with sleeping pills and bought him to the bamboo forest where he tied a noose around his sensei's neck. Kuroki then cut down the bamboo around the vicinity to allow the bamboo with the noose to gain more sunlight and grow exponentially allowing it to hang his master. Kuroki confesses and reveals he wanted to sell the paintings he painted under his own name but his sensei refused it.
