At Hotel Versteck located in the quiet town of Ruhenheim, an old man is talking to a little boy about the bike he picked up from the rubbish dump being faulty again. The boy is feeling upset over being teased by others that he is a moving piece of trash riding on the dumped bicycle but the old man tries to lift his spirits and starts repairing it as the chain has fallen off. Just then, the boy brings the old man's attention to Lunge who had called up earlier to book a room.Lunge remarks to the old man who operates Hotel Versteck that he is glad to get a room at such a short notice whereby the latter explains that this isn't a big problem as the rooms are always empty. The owner says that Ruhenheim is such a quiet place and the only guests staying here besides Lunge are an elderly couple where the husband has mobility problems due to leg injuries. The boy named Wim offers to carry Lunge's luggage into Room 302 which the owner claims to have the best view in the hotel. Lunge then tells Wim that the bicycle didn't look like a piece of trash to him which makes the boy very encouraged by his words.
Lunge pays a visit to the local police station where the policeman is startled by his appearance. The latter gets even more bewildered when Lunge asks how long it would take to ask for reinforcements to come to the town. Nevertheless, the policeman explains that it would take about an hour for reinforcements to arrive if they contact the state headquarters. However, the policeman is sceptical about anything happening in this quiet place. Lunge suggests that the local police should start checking on everyone who enters the town from now on before anything terrible happens.
Meanwhile, Wim is testing his bicycle on the streets but the chain comes off again, causing Wim to lose his balance. As he grimaces in pain, the bullies come to mock Wim again and even stamps on his bicycle. When Wim tries to stop them, the bullies kick his face before walking off. Just then, Grimmer appears before Wim to extend a helping hand...
Lunge is taking a break in the hotel's lounge when the elderly couple chats with him. They find out that he's on a holiday alone and suggest that he can write a postcard to his grandson. At this moment, Grimmer enters the hotel and asks for lodging while Lunge returns to his room quietly without saying anything.
Grimmer goes to the train station and notices that nobody has alighted at Ruhenheim. As he is leaving the station, he hears a faint sound of a gunshot...
At the same time, Mr Hennich who has heard the same sound mentions this to his wife but she doesn't believe him since nobody in this town would own a gun. She suggests that it is likely that the drunkard living near them may own one which is met with sceptism by Mr Hennich that the drunkard can't even shoot anything properly. The wife exclaims that she won nothing in the lottery again and accuses her husband of being a jinx which leads to them quarrelling.
Mrs Hillman is running around town looking for her dog, Ludwig and comes to seek help from the owner of Hotel Versteck. She gets hysterical and wonders if the gunshot has anything to do with the disappearance of Ludwig. The owner suggests that Hillman should go to the police for help but she is not convinced that the policeman will put in effort to search for Ludwig since he hates dogs. Suddenly, Grimmer who is using the alias Neumaier offers to help Hillman look for Ludwig.
As Grimmer goes around to look for Ludwig, he finds out from the locals that they do not like Hillman and her noisy pet. When he turns up at Hotel Bergbach, Grimmer finds out that there is no guest staying there and the grumpy owner states that he would have known if the noisy dog was around since his place is too quiet.
Grimmer bumps into Lunge on the streets and they exchange some words before parting ways. Lunge happens to see Wim being thrown out of his house by his alcoholic father because he wants the boy to buy more wine. The owner of Hotel Versteck brings Wim back so that he can be spared from the violent outburst of his father.
Grimmer is at a sausage store where he talks to the shop assistant who can't stop talking about her desire to leave Ruhenheim which is too quiet. She hopes to meet someone who will take her away from the town and laments that she hasn't met such a person yet. When the girl tells Grimmer about Ludwig's preference for bones, he seems to have an idea about where to find the dog.
Lunge meets the local policeman who jokes that the terrible thing which Lunge was referring to should be the disappearance of Ludwig. When Lunge asks the policeman about the gunshot, the latter dismisses this and explains that a car broke down on the highway so the backfiring sound could have been mistaken as a gunshot.
Grimmer finds Ludwig on the hill munching on a bone which it buried in the past and is surprised to see Lunge appearing soon after. It appears that they both came to the same conclusion after obtaining different clues. Lunge questions Grimmer's reason for being in Ruhenheim where the latter throws the question back to him. Grimmer points out that he knows about Lunge's identity and can feel that he's not here for vacation. Not to be outdone, Lunge reveals that he also knows about Grimmer's real identity. It turns out that the both of them have come here for the same purpose i.e. to stop the massacre that's going to happen soon.
The Hennich couple quarrel again about the wife's obsession with the lottery. Before the husband leaves for work, his wife exclaims that she has a winning ticket...
Wim is trying to find out from the bullies about the whereabouts of his bicycle and gets a shock when they tell him that it has been thrown at the vampire's mansion on the western hill.
Mr Hennich returns to the apartment hurriedly and brings back some guns to protect themselves now that they have won the lottery worth 20 million marks. The husband explains that they won't need to use the ammunition if nobody knows about the matter but the wife reveals that she bought the numbers based on the birthday of a local, Mr Konrad whom she met at the store. Although Konrad may not know the numbers which Mrs Hennich bought, there is a chance that others may have come to know about this since Mr Hennich mentioned that the girl at the sausage store was looking at him just now. The couple get paranoid about people having designs on them after knowing about their new-found wealth and resolve to protect themselves with the guns they acquired.
Wim goes to the vampire's mansion to search for his bicycle and almost gets scared to death when he sees Lunge and Grimmer there. Grimmer tells Wim that his bicycle is at the foot of the mountain and the latter was tricked by those bullies. The men then remark that Bonaparta didn't come to the mansion for some time and the dead cat outside the mansion was killed by a submachine gun which suggests that the people they are looking for should be near the town. Just then, Lunge spots the numerous sketches of Johan and Nina at various stages of their childhood and realises that Bonaparta must have been dissatisfied with his sketches no matter how many he drew...
Meanwhile, Konrad is pulling out the vines from the cowberries field on the hill when a man approaches him from behind and points a gun at him...
Seems like the final stage of Monster is to be set in Ruhenheim. Grimmer and Lunge were talking about a massacre which is to happen soon so I guess this is largely related to Johan. The issue is what will Johan stand to gain from this series of events. I guess when the main characters are all assembled at Ruhenheim i.e. Tenma, Nina, Johan etc, that will probably mark the end of everything. And that could jolly well happen in the last 2 episodes or so thus we have a long wait before the doubts are cleared.
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