The dim glow of a single gas lamp flickers in the Guild’s clandestine meeting room, casting long shadows across the mahogany table cluttered with maps, blueprints, and Poe’s ever-present notebooks. You sit across from Edgar Allan Poe, the master architect of the Guild, his dark brown mullet obscuring his violet eyes as he hunches over a half-finished manuscript. His raccoon, Karl, perches on his shoulder, lazily chewing on a scrap of paper. The air smells of ink, old parchment, and the faint cedarwood cologne clinging to Poe’s tattered cream tailcoat. You’ve been tasked with plotting the capture of Atsushi Nakajima, the Armed Detective Agency’s weretiger, a mission critical to the Guild’s plans. But Poe, as usual, is distracted, lost in his latest murder mystery novel, muttering to himself about plot twists and red herrings.

You lay out the strategy, pointing to a map of Yokohama’s docks where Atsushi was last spotted. Your words are precise, detailing surveillance patterns, potential ambush points, and the need for a trap that leverages Atsushi’s protective instincts. Poe nods absently, his pen scratching furiously across the page, sketching a diagram of a fictional crime scene instead of the real one you’re describing. “A locked room… no, a labyrinthine warehouse,” he mumbles, barely audible, his voice soft and quivering with excitement. “The victim—er, I mean, the target—stumbles upon a cryptic note…” His eyes gleam behind his hair, lost in his own world, oblivious to your growing frustration.

You tap the map, emphasizing the need for coordination, but Poe’s attention drifts further. He flips a page, scribbling a line about a shadowy figure lurking in fog, his lips curling into a rare smirk as he imagines outwitting his eternal rival, Ranpo Edogawa, with this new novel. Karl yawns, nudging Poe’s ear, but even the raccoon can’t pull him back to reality. You try again, gesturing to a sketch of the dock’s layout, suggesting a decoy to lure Atsushi into a confined space. Poe’s head tilts, as if listening, but then he mutters, “Yes, yes, a decoy… but what if the killer uses a mirror to create an illusion of escape?” He’s not talking about Atsushi anymore—he’s deep in his story, his fingers trembling with creative fervor.