Hm. Your theory accounts for almost everything. However, you need to try resolving how the culprit fooled Larry and Franziska, as well as explain how every piece of evidence relates to the truth of what transpired. If you can do that, I'll acknowledge your theory as one of many plausible solutions to this mystery. Knox’s 8th: It is forbidden for the case to be resolved with clues that are not presented.
Very well then. The biggest question remaining is the relation that the letters have to this crime. Franziska's letter has a set of numbers written on the back. I took those numbers and corresponded them to the letters on Larry's poem. Unless I messed up, in order, the letters are "igepusts." Obviously that makes no sense but unscrambling the words, we get the words "guess" and "tip." I believe they serve as a password to let people know that they are in on a secret. Phoenix lured Franziska out of the bathroom by letting her know that Larry was still alive. He then proceeded to kill her. Then, he found the code on the back of her letter, and with Edgeworth's help, (he was in the library where the letter was found) deduced the code and convinced Larry to open his door by speaking the password.
You're correct that the cipher corresponds with Larry's poem, but incorrect on the usage of that cipher (although I am impressed you managed to pull out a hidden message like that). That's good enough for me, in all honesty. Congratulations! I acknowledge this as a viable solution on my gameboard. There are also some alternative solutions that can be found by looking at every single piece of evidence, but I'm satisfied with ending this Endless Night right here. Thanks for playing!
I come back to this forum for the first time in months, and I find an active EN? Amazing!
Let's get started....
Spoiler : :
Initially, I suspected Larry's corpse in the right bathroom was actually real because of the wording in the red, but as I couldn't find clues for a disguise I realized a much better solution for that part: Larry faked his death (with Franziska's help) in the right bathroom by using the sleeping pills to knock himself unconscious and using Franziska's whip bound around his arm to stem the blood flow, ensuring Payne wouldn't find a pulse. The bathroom door was locked during the preparations, then unlocked when they wanted to be found.
As for the rest of the case, here's an easy solution: Alfred is the accomplice. He barricaded Klavier in the file room during the first search for Franziska, and knocked out Payne. The rest of the crime is easy enough to carry out with Klavier as a culprit: Phoenix had been knocked out with drugged bottles of grape juice, and Edgeworth was knocked out by Larry. Alfred didn't see anyone else enter the central hallway because he left that hallway to help the culprit, and didn't notice anything suspicious while guarding that hallway because he left it when convenient.
All moving of items is trivial without Alfred locking down the central hallway and with anyone carrying the items being unconscious.
Of course, we don't HAVE to take Klavier as the culprit in this kind of scenario: He could still have been unconscious when the barricade was removed, while Phoenix could have lied about his unconsciousness if he were the culprit.
Ah, Phoenix killing Larry was just a mix-up, in my theory Edgeworth is the one on the left side of the building at the time, so naturally only he could kill Larry, and that's what I must have had in mind.
As for keys: After Payne left the library, Phoenix is in wine cellar with wine cellar key, and Edgeworth is in library with dining room key.
Edgeworth moves to dining room, opens the door to study with his key, goes to the cellar (the door was unlocked by Phoenix immediately after Payne and Alfred left the study), puts dining room key into Phoenix's pocket while taking wine cellar key for himself.
Then Edgeworth wakes Phoenix up (who passed out shortly after unlocking the wine cellar door), and Phoenix moves to dining room through the study and locks the dining room door.
Edgeworth then knocks out Payne, kills Larry, and moves Payne to the study with all needed items (and he has the key to lock wine cellar door after that).
Discoveries of the bodies happen after that.
