Chapter 88 The Ghost Wandering in the Land of Death
"If you keep going east along this road, you'll reach the Mihana Bridge." Conan shielded his eyes from the glaring sunlight and looked east along the road.
The sun was blazing down on the earth. It was around two o'clock in the afternoon. The Junior Detective League had come here after leaving the Mouri Detective Agency.
"Hey, I say, aren't we a little early?" Ai Haibara said quietly as she approached Conan from behind, her hands in her pockets.
"Many eyewitnesses online are saying that the 'ghost' mostly appears in the evening."
“But some people have also seen the ‘ghost’ around three or four o’clock,” Ayumi Yoshida heard Ai Haibara say.
"If we come early and stake out the spot, we definitely won't miss it, Ai."
Hearing this, Conan was speechless, thinking to himself, "What kind of ghost comes out in broad daylight? This guy's ghost-playing skills are terrible!"
Oh right, how could I forget Haibara? She definitely knows something!
Previously, Conan relied too much on obtaining information from Gu Ze, and almost forgot about Ai Haibara, the former researcher of the organization.
"Hey, Haibara, you should know him, right?" Conan held up a photo on his phone. "This is a policeman named Kurosawa Jin."
Suddenly bumping into a face that resembled Gin's, Ai Haibara trembled slightly in fear, but regained her composure a second later.
Even if it's not the same person, seeing this face will still trigger Ai Haibara's PTSD.
As expected, Gin is still terrifying!
"I know, but I don't know much about it." Ai Haibara turned her head away, shifting her gaze from the photo.
"I heard that he obtained important documents about the organization, and coincidentally, he looked just like Gin. On a whim, Gin personally intercepted and killed him."
"That's pretty unlucky," Ai Haibara concluded.
Upon receiving this news, Conan thought that it was just as he had guessed.
Pedestrians hurried past on the road, completely unconcerned as to why a few children were looking around; most of them were lifeless corporate slaves.
Conan leaned against a lamppost, continuing to browse online posts in hopes of getting more information.
His fingers swiped across the screen, and a minute later, he suddenly stopped.
He opened a picture, took two steps forward, held up his phone, compared it to the road, and turned to look at the coffee shop behind him.
"That coffee shop."
This picture was taken by someone who was in a cafe on the street when Kurosawa Jin was killed.
According to him, he hid when the incident occurred, and had long forgotten the details, leaving only this photo.
Looking at this photo.
On the chaotic street, two cars collided violently, and thick black smoke and billowing flames engulfed both cars and the surrounding green belt.
A man lay pitifully on the ground, large patches of blood spreading out from beneath him, still glaringly obvious even in low-resolution images.
The camera angle was too low, and the corpse's face wasn't captured at all.
Conan looked at the dramatic scene on his phone, then at the now pristine and clean road, and his brow furrowed deeper and deeper.
"Hiss..." He gasped.
Wait a moment!
He seemed to have noticed something was wrong.
Zooming in on the image on the phone reveals several pixels of a different color on the side of the corpse, predominantly brown.
What is that?
After Conan squinted and examined it for a moment, a beam of light pierced through his head.
"Haibara, how did Gin's mission to intercept Inspector Kurosawa go?" he asked hurriedly.
"Gin did a great job on that mission; the boss even praised him." Ai Haibara asked, puzzled, "Did you find anything?"
"So, Gin brought the documents back to the organization?"
"Yes."
From the organization's perspective, Gin not only eliminated an excellent police officer from the Metropolitan Police Department, but also retrieved the important documents that had been taken away.
So what's the story behind the file bag next to the body?
There's a 70% chance these brownish pixels represent a file folder!
The situation is becoming increasingly confusing...
"Hey, what are you kids doing here?" Matsuda Jinpei's loud voice immediately caught their attention.
Looking in the direction of the sound, a Mazda was parked on the side of the road, and Kenji Hagiwara and Jinpei Matsuda were getting out of the car.
"It's Officer Hagiwara and Officer Matsuda." The three kids, who frequented crime scenes, recognized the two.
“Let’s find that charlatan again,” Mitsuhiko replied.
"It's that 'ghost' that's all the rage online."
Hearing this, Kenji Hagiwara squatted down and patted each child's hair. "Wow! You're all amazing! You're not afraid at all!"
"Officer Hagiwara, Officer Matsuda, you're here to investigate too, right?" Conan approached the group and looked up at the two policemen.
"That's right, Conan is still as smart as ever."
Kenji Hagiwara and Jinpei Matsuda were close friends and neighbors of the deceased Jin Kurosawa, so it was expected that they would come to investigate, Conan thought.
The Junior Detective League shares the same goal as the two, and Kenji Hagiwara and Jinpei Matsuda are willing to go along with the children's ideas.
As the saying goes, interests should be cultivated from a young age. Who knows, one of these children might become a police officer in the future, especially Conan.
However, it would be too conspicuous to have them stand by the roadside, so Kenji Hagiwara had the Junior Detective League sit in the car.
The two adults naturally stood by the roadside, blending into the crowd.
While waiting, Ayumi looked at the two professional police officers outside the car window with admiration in her eyes.
"I never expected to meet Inspector Hagiwara and Inspector Matsuda. What a coincidence!"
"This is so exciting! It's just like the TV dramas on TV!" Yuan Tai said excitedly.
Ai Haibara leaned back comfortably and reminded them, "Don't oversimplify this matter."
"The perpetrator is very likely a murderer who has been released from prison, or a member of a criminal gang... It would be quite dangerous to investigate."
"Huh? Why do you say that?" Ayumi asked curiously.
"That was a few weeks ago, right, Edogawa?" Ai Haibara cued Conan in the passenger seat.
After receiving the signal, Conan patiently explained, "A few weeks ago, Inspector Kurosawa's grave was maliciously destroyed. The police initially determined that it was the work of his enemies."
"According to Inspector Megure, the Metropolitan Police Department is furious when they find out."
“I know about this too! My dad told me that the ashes have disappeared.” Mitsuhiko quickly raised his hand.
Ayumi exclaimed in surprise, "Ah!"
The perceptive and sensitive Ayumi quickly developed sympathy for Officer Kurosawa.
"Therefore, the person we are looking to arrest is very likely the same person who is raiding the tomb."
Conan warned, "Officer Hagiwara and the others made us sit in the car to protect our safety, so don't wander off!"
"Hmph, Conan, you're the one who likes to run around, aren't you!" Genta looked at Conan with disdain.
Conan: ...
He was speechless!
The sun moves slowly from east to west along its predetermined path, little by little.
Just as the three little ones were getting bored and drowsy, some unusual activity finally started on the street.
"Look at that alley over there." Mitsuhiko pointed out the window, and everyone in the car looked in his direction.
A man with messy, silver hair emerged from the alley.
He was wearing a worn-out, yellowed white shirt and an ill-fitting pair of black trousers.
"Kurosawa Jin" hesitated for a while, looking around to make sure there weren't many people around before stepping out of the shadows of the alley.
At this moment, Kenji Hagiwara was sitting on an outdoor chair in front of a shop, reading a newspaper, while Jinpei Matsuda was standing next to a trash can, smoking.
While the two appeared to be doing their own thing, they had actually been paying attention to the "Kurosawa Formation" for some time.
It's so similar! When Kenji Hagiwara saw "Kurosawa Jin's" face, his heart clenched.
He desperately wanted this to be the Kurosawa he had always longed for, but as a believer in science, he knew it was impossible.
As "Kurosawa Jin" drew closer, the distance between him and the car carrying the Junior Detective League and the two police officers gradually decreased.
Sitting in the passenger seat, Conan held his breath, staring intently at the returning "ghost."
His hand unconsciously reached for the car door handle, making sure he could get out of the car as quickly as possible.
Just as the "Kurosawa Formation" was forty meters away from them, a loud crashing sound came from the opposite street.
A flowerpot fell from the rooftop of the house across the street and shattered into pieces on the ground.
Conan sensed something was wrong. He looked towards the rooftop opposite and saw a dark figure flash by.
Someone's there!
Looking over here, "Kurosawa Jin," who had just heard the loud noise, trembled like a startled rabbit, his eyes widening as he stared at the remains of the flowerpot.
He was terrified and took a few steps back before quickly turning and running away.
"hateful!"
Kenji Hagiwara threw down his newspaper and chased after them with Jinpei Matsuda.
"Stop! Don't run!" Matsuda Jinpei roared.
Upon hearing this sound, Kurosawa Jin ran even faster, disappearing into the alley he had just come from.
After Conan got out of the car, he followed closely behind the two of them, and the three little ones were not to be outdone.
The alley was quite narrow, only wide enough for two people to pass through.
"Don't run!"
"Kurosawa Jin" seemed very familiar with this place, knocking down the clutter piled up in the alley as he ran.
The pursuit team overcame numerous obstacles and relentlessly chased their pursuer until they finally reached the exit of the alley.
It was a main road with a constant flow of people.
From a distance, Conan saw "Kurosawa Jin" crossing the road when there were no cars and running towards a large shopping mall with a noisy crowd on the other side.
However, Kenji Hagiwara and his group arrived a step too late and were stopped by cars.
Once the traffic thinned out, Conan and his friends were able to cross the road and enter the shopping mall.
The mall was brightly lit, and the shadows of people on the polished marble floor created flowing spots of light.
Looking out into the vast sea of people, there was no sign of the "Kurosawa Formation".
"There are too many people, it's hard to find." Kenji Hagiwara stood at the entrance, looking troubled.
"Why can't we just let the dead rest in peace? Why do we have to cause all this trouble!" Matsuda Jinpei said through gritted teeth.
"Why don't we check the surveillance footage?"
Just then, a familiar voice came from behind Conan.
Gu Ze walked over wearing a black trench coat that he didn't usually wear, with Ai Haibara following behind him.
"Little Gu Ze, what are you doing here?"
Kenji Hagiwara was pleasantly surprised by his unexpected encounter with Gu Ze.
"I was just passing by and happened to run into Ai, so I came over to see if there was anything I could do to help."
After chatting for a bit, Kenji Hagiwara and Jinpei Matsuda took their police IDs to check the surveillance footage, and the three kids insisted on going with them.
Leaving Gu Ze, Ai Haibara, and Conan behind, Ai tactfully made an excuse to leave, giving Gu Ze and Conan space to talk.
"You knocked that flowerpot down just now, didn't you, Brother Gu Ze?"
Conan stared sharply at the composed Gu Ze, "You said last time that you were investigating the Kurosawa Jin case."
[Ding! Shinichi Kudo is extremely annoyed; he still can't see through you!]
Shinichi Kudo's approval rating +5]
Gu Ze smiled, pretending not to have heard anything, and looked up at the giant screen in the mall.
He said out of the blue, "Want to go see the new movie? I heard it's based on the story of Inspector Jin Kurosawa."
Conan followed Gu Ze's gaze.
A movie poster was displayed on the large screen.
A handsome man with silver hair and blue eyes is gazing deeply into the eyes of a blonde woman, and they appear to be at the scene of an explosion.
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