Chapter 161: Asuka and Light (1)

Asuka Kiri originally wanted to send a few people out first, but it was clear that neither Hagiwara Kenji nor Edogawa Conan, nor even the two girls who had just been scolded by the three for running in, were willing to let him go and mess with the control panel.

Having expected this to happen, the boy breathed a sigh of relief. Fortunately, he had already thought of a countermeasure.

When the few people walked to the corridor near the elevator on the second floor, Asuka Kiri, who had been walking in front in silence, suddenly stopped. He turned around and met Hagiwara Kenji's eyes.

"It's right here." The young man said, motioning the half-long-haired man to look at the small exhibition hall next to the elevator. The exhibition hall was not affected by the previous explosion, as if it was specially built to protect something. The poor elevator next to it had been blown open long ago, leaving only the dark elevator passage that was directly connected by the bomb. Looking down from dozens of floors above, it makes people feel dizzy.

It would be terrible if I didn't step on the air and fall down...

Edogawa Conan couldn't help but look inside and thought secretly.

The exhibition hall they went to before, which had many large pieces of cloth-like decorations hanging, was just diagonally below here. It seemed that the collapse of that exhibition hall did not affect this place.

The decoration inside is very similar to the previous exhibition hall, with large pieces of solid-colored hanging cloth and a few picture frames hanging on the walls. The boy had previously wondered why the art exhibition used such an uncommon decoration method. Now he thought it was probably to cover up the so-called control panel.

"Where is the control panel?" Hagiwara Kenji looked around but didn't find anything that looked like a control panel. He was about to enter the exhibition hall when he was stopped by the white-haired boy. He couldn't help but wonder, "Can't you tell me this?"

"This is not your job." Facing the sharp police officer who had a suspicious look in his eyes, Fei Niao Wu could only pull off a piece of pure-colored hanging cloth from the side and spread it on the display cabinet in the middle. He explained his plan in detail to the ace of the explosives disposal team in front of him, "I need you to dismantle the bomb."

"Bomb?!" Edogawa Conan looked up at the serious-looking white-haired boy, and exclaimed, "Didn't the previous bombs stop?"

"Yeah. That guy said that the control console is connected to the bombs in four locations in the venue, and they will explode automatically after the goggles are removed." Not finding anything to write with, Asuka Mizuki narrowed his eyes and simply bit his index finger. He roughly outlined the entire second-floor exhibition hall on the cloth, and finally drew a circle in several corners, "...probably here. After you dismantle the bomb, I can..."

As he spoke, he casually wrote the word "bomb" on the cloth. Even though it was written with his fingers, the sharp pen tip could be vaguely seen, as if it was carved with a knife.

At the moment when his hand fell, the police officer, who was extremely dissatisfied with his behavior, tried to pull his wrist, but Asuka Mizuki nimbly dodged it.

"Hmm... this range is too wide." Suzuki Sonoko, who had not been persuaded to leave, looked at the map and couldn't help but sigh, "There are exactly four of us. It would be more efficient if we split up to search, right?"

"No! We don't know if there are any criminals running around in there. It's too dangerous to split up, right?" The girl's words instantly squeezed out some doubts in Edogawa Conan's mind. He crooked his half-moon eyes and immediately retorted, "Maybe we'll be caught on the road."

"It's better to split into two teams," Mao Lilan said worriedly, "It'll be faster than searching one by one."

The glaring blood red on the canvas reminded Hagiwara Kenji of the painting he saw in Asuka Kiri's room that night. He was absent-minded and said, "This is the only way for now."

The four circled positions are all on the supporting points of the building. If there is an explosion, the entire building will collapse. It seems that Bomore and his men are planning to use this method to gain access to the control panel in exchange for a chance to escape. The police who come to operate the control panel and the hostages in the building will also be buried under the rubble along with the explosion.

The man with semi-long hair subconsciously looked up at Asuka Kiri, wanting to ask him how he was going to leave, but saw the white-haired boy spread his hands and said, "I'll find the control panel here, and I'll leave the bomb to you."

"Okay." Hagiwara Kenji looked at him, and suddenly reached out to rub the boy's soft white hair, just like he did every time he said goodbye to Asuka Kiri, and sighed softly, "Leave it to me, I will take care of it."

He didn't know whether to be angry at the other party for biting his finger directly, or to feel that 124 at least knew to cooperate with them and didn't become a lone ranger.

If I had to describe it, Asuka Mizuki is like a child who is excluded from the world, doesn't know how to get along with others, but is gentle at heart, while 124 is more like a machine, and will choose the least time-consuming and energy-consuming action for all actions. For example, before, instead of using torture to extract information, which he didn't know whether it would be effective, he chose to exchange his secrets with a nonchalant attitude, which was more labor-saving and time-saving. Another example is now... he

could have found something that could be used as a pen if he looked around the venue, but the boy bit his finger without even looking.

The two personalities have 800 minds in total, 124 has 799 of them, and the remaining one is left for Asuka Mizuki to do some harmless and childish pranks. Thinking of the scene when Matsuda Jinpei was holding a pink patterned strawberry-flavored candy stick in his office not long ago, Hagiwara Kenji laughed a little, but that smile soon faded.

None of 124's thoughts were focused on other things. All the time he appeared and all his actions seemed to be just to survive as much as possible. He should have been angry, whether as a policeman or an elder, watching a person who was almost a stranger to him occupy his child's body and do things that were already considered crimes, and stabbed a bloody hole in Bomore's shoulder like "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth".

But in reality, the man only felt a panic and powerlessness. The boy's cool eyes like autumn water and his attitude of not caring about his own body made him unable to vent his anger at all.

No matter what, he is a child who grew up in my eyes.

"Wait for me to come back."

Hagiwara Kenji threw down this sentence, turned around and followed Suzuki Sonoko, who had just discussed with him and was in the same group, and ran to the farthest corner on the simplified map.

Now is not the time to get entangled in these things. He will explain everything to others after he gets out.

"Conan, let's go too." Seeing that the other two had already left, Mao Lilan lowered her head and said to the boy who was looking at the map and thinking about something at her legs.

"Okay..."

The two of them just ran to the corridor not far from the exhibition hall, but Edogawa Conan stopped, turned his head and looked at the direction he came from, and shouted to the long-haired girl, "Sister Xiaolan, wait for me!"

After that, without waiting for the girl to react, the boy turned around and ran towards the exhibition hall

.

After the four people left, Asuka Kiri took out the medicine box that Edogawa Conan had handed to him not long ago from his pocket.

There was no bitter taste when he put it in his mouth, and he swallowed it dry. Then he remembered that he had lost his sense of taste a long time ago, and he should not be able to taste it even if the medicine was wrapped in bitter bile. First, there was

a strange bloating and pain.

Coming from the eyes and heart, the white-haired boy squinted his eyes, turned his head subconsciously to look out the window, and finally saw a slightly different scene from the unchanging black and white gray.

This feeling is very strange. He has seen completely black and white pictures in the past few years, and now he suddenly glimpsed a different dark light. He felt a shock in his heart and subconsciously walked towards the window not far away from him.

Just as he walked to the window, before he could look far away, a pain that could split a person in half came from his heart and the ankles that had been hurt for a long time today. The ankles that were still barely able to support themselves suddenly softened, and the white-haired boy fell to the ground in a somewhat wolfish manner.

It hurts so much...!

My heart hurts, my ankles hurt, my back that was scratched before hurts, and my fingers hurt. If I had known it would hurt so much, I wouldn't have written a blood letter for convenience.

The intense pain superimposed on the mountain ridge that made it difficult for people to breathe. Fei Niao Wu lowered his head and grabbed the clothes at his chest, gasping for breath, trying to get rid of the suffocation that came with the pain.

Unlike the explosive pain in the hot spring hotel, as the effect of the drug stabilized, the strong squeezing feeling in the heart gradually subsided, and other pains in the body could be ignored for the time being.

Fei Niao Wu was tortured into sweat, and when the pain in the heart finally disappeared, he leaned his upper body against the edge of the low window in the exhibition hall as if exhausted.

The city, which was always brightly lit, fell silent because of the sudden change in this building. The steel city that never slept all night had few lights today and fell asleep quietly. Only countless high-rise buildings stood silently, dark and oppressive.

This is enough.

The faintly cast starlight astonished the dim street lights that could completely change into countless different colors. Although it was still dim and the main tone was still black and gray, it was an incredible view for Fei Niao Wu.

The boy looked out the window in a daze, and then he heard the sound of slightly hurried footsteps coming from far away.

"...You can see it every day..." Fei Niao Wu opened his mouth slightly, and his clear voice with a little smile rang in the empty exhibition hall, "Is this the scenery?"

Then, without waiting for the person's answer, the boy rested his head on his arm on the window sill and murmured to himself, "It's so beautiful..."

Edogawa Conan stood at the door, quietly looking at him and the empty medicine box that was thrown aside casually.

This was his only chance to see color. He thought that all his internal organs were in a mess because of this thought, and they ached dully.

The boy walked towards the only window of the exhibition hall.

The exhibition hall was full of large areas of black and gray, and the solid-colored long cloth used for decoration outlined the interior in pieces. The white-haired boy leaned against the window, and was the only bright color in the picture.

This is the scene that Asuka Kiri sees every day.

Edogawa Conan thought. He couldn't help but reach out and gently touch the goggles on his face. This thing that contained dangerous goods that could take his life allowed him to temporarily glimpse a corner of the world in the eyes of his good friend who he could never see through.

"...124."

After the boy said this name, the boy who had been leaning against the window and had not turned back, thinking about something, turned his head, and Edogawa Conan directly met the other party's eyes, which tended to be bright gray under the effect of goggles.

"Have we... met each other?" The boy said, his voice was a little hoarse. He had a strong intuition that the person in front of him, whether it was 124 or Asuka Kiri, probably knew his identity long ago.

He looks exactly like Kudo Shinichi when he was a child. For Mao Lilan and the others, it might just be doubtful. After all, the idea of ​​rejuvenating from old to young is still too incredible for ordinary people. But 124 is different. He came out of the organization's laboratory and knows better than anyone what kind of things the organization can research that are almost contrary to the laws of nature.

124 paused for a moment and did not respond. However, Edogawa Conan saw the meaning behind the other party's silence.

He felt familiar when he saw the words written by the white-haired boy just now. Asuka Mizuki's handwriting is more clear and majestic, which is very similar to the feeling he gives people, but the two words just written on the canvas are very sharp and quite aggressive. It was

not until he ran to the corridor that Edogawa Conan suddenly realized that he had seen this font before.

It was a long time ago.

Ever since Asuka Kiri transferred to their class and became friends with them, several children whose parents were always busy at home liked to go out and play with Tsukiyama Asari, and they would go out camping every once in a while.

He had seen this kind of font during a camping trip.

It was a summer evening, and the temperature was unexpectedly high that year. Even in the mountains, it was difficult to avoid the heat. The only small automatic fan they brought was placed in the tent of the two girls. Kudo Shinichi was awakened by the annoying mosquitoes and heat in the middle of the night. When he sat up in a daze, he found that the white-haired boy was no longer beside him.

He thought the other party had gone to the toilet, and after waiting for a long time, he saw no one coming back. He felt frustrated and went out to look for him with a flashlight. After quietly searching the entire camping site, he saw a note next to the sleeping bag.

[Be back soon.]

The sharp handwriting seemed to be able to tear the paper. It was very different from Asuka Kiri's usual handwriting. The boy, who had not yet become the Sherlock Holmes of the Heisei era, immediately thought that someone had taken his friend away and pretended to be a note. His face turned pale with anxiety, and he tried to look around again. Finally, he saw the entrance to the path leading to the top of the mountain. There were faint traces of someone walking in the weeds, but the shoe prints that should have been left were deliberately covered up.

She must have been kidnapped!

With this thought in mind, Kudo Shinichi frowned and walked up the path, even ready to confront the traffickers. When he reached the top of the mountain, he didn't see anyone else. There was only a white-haired boy lying on the grass, thinking about something.

"Xiao Wu, why did you come here?" Kudo Shinichi was relieved. When he walked in, he smelled the magical six-god mosquito repellent that Yueshan Asari bought from next door on Asuka Wu, and simply lay down very close to the other party.

The boy laid soft grass under his body. The temperature on the top of the mountain was a little lower than that on the mountainside. There was also no wind that could blow into the tent. He felt that the heat just now was taken away by the gentle evening breeze. He couldn't help but sigh in his heart, "No wonder this guy wanted to go out. It was really comfortable to lie outside."

"What are you looking at?" There was no response to his question. Kudo Shinichi followed Asuka Mizuki's gaze and understood immediately. He was looking

at the stars.

There are more stars in the summer than at any other time, and that day was a rare cloudless summer night. Looking up at the starry sky, Kudo Shinichi, who was already a little sleepy, finally couldn't help but close his eyes. When he was about to fall into a deep sleep, he suddenly heard the white-haired boy next to him who had not spoken a word said.

'The first time I saw stars was the day I came out of the laboratory.'

He had long lost the soft and sticky voice that was unique to children and spoke very softly, as if he didn't care whether the people around him could hear it or not. Kudo Shinichi thought a little confusedly in his sleepiness that Asuka Mizuki seemed to be different now.

'Lying here, I don't know where to run or where to go next. Will I be accepted...'

The boy lay quietly on the grass, looking at the starry sky. It was the same starry sky he saw when he climbed out of the laboratory pipe many years ago, ran up the mountain in a panic, and finally fell to the ground exhausted and raised his head.

The boy, who was not believed by either the organization or the police, left before the police broke into the organization's laboratory. He looked at the other experimental subjects who cheered and rejoiced after hearing the voices of the police outside, and he suddenly realized.

What are the police...? The boy, who had never been taught these things by anyone, thought.

Are they people who can come to save them? Or are they the same as the father and mother who can come to save him that the children in the same room kept talking about.

But my parents threw me into the mountains to feed the so-called gods in the mountains who could transform into wolves.

If the police were another name for my parents, they would not have saved me. So he stumbled out in the chaos and fell into the darkness of the night from the dark laboratory.

He paused, and suddenly a little smile squeezed out of his throat.

'At that time I didn't know what it was, I just felt that it was very bright.' The white-haired boy stretched out his hand, as if he wanted to reach the stars far beyond the sky, 'It is something that will shine at night, a safe place where no one can find it. How can I get to that bright thing? If people can...'

It is a place that can be accepted. From the dark and narrow basement in the village to the cage without any lights in the laboratory, the boy subconsciously equated any words related to hope with light, and stubbornly wanted to reach the stars that were almost impossible to be held in the arms of others.

"Of course you will be accepted, don't think about it." Kudo Shinichi retorted, he turned his head to look at his somewhat special friend, the white hair hung on the lawn because of the boy's movements, and under the shining of the stars, it looked like flowing moonlight. The boy's mind moved, and he reached out to pick up a strand, as if holding solidified water, "It's not your fault."

The white-haired boy stopped talking, and Kudo Shinichi looked at him and intuitively felt that his friend was a little unhappy.

The note with obviously different handwriting, the footprints that were subconsciously hidden, the memories that he could still talk about even though he was said to have forgotten the things before the age of seven, and the sudden silence, all had their answers today.

In the exhibition hall, Edogawa Conan pursed his lips, his expression full of regret.

If it was 124 he met that day, then the few times he felt that Asuka Misaki was a little strange afterwards were probably when 124 temporarily replaced the shy and gentle boy and came out.

But now, he can only temporarily recall that memorable summer night and the appearance of the boy on the ship holding a gun, but the other encounters seemed to be shrouded in mist and he can't remember them clearly.

No matter what, every time 124 comes out, it is for protection. Whether it is to protect himself or to protect them. Even if everything was faked by 124 at the beginning, it's not like he can't tell whether the other party's feelings for them are real.

Before the boy could say anything else, he felt a chill on the side of his face.

Asuka Kiri squatted down in front of him at some point and gently pinched the boy's soft cheek with her hand. There was a softness in the boy's eyes, like a quiet pool of water in a bamboo forest. It was the same scene he saw countless times when he looked into the boy's eyes before.

"Kirito." Edogawa Conan opened his mouth and immediately realized who the person in front of him was.

"It's time to go." The boy pointed to the watch on his wrist and spoke, with a completely different tone from 124.

Now is not the time to talk about this. Conan Edogawa also understood this, but he suddenly felt a little flustered, and was eager to confirm whether he had really seen 124. After finally getting the answer, he felt a big gap.

"I..." The boy pursed his lips and moved back what he wanted to say, "See you later."

"Well, goodbye." Asuka Misaki's voice was very light, but it was particularly cautious.

When I came, I probably saw 124, and in the short few seconds when I recalled that meeting on a summer night, the boy who was very unfamiliar to me replaced Asuka Misaki.

Why is this, so that he can deal with me, or so that Asuka Misaki can also glimpse the world dyed with colors. Did he let him out only after he had endured the pain when the drug took effect?...

The boy didn't know what the argument 124 mentioned before was about. Perhaps it was related to this matter. In addition to the sadness, the boy's face also showed compromise, as if he had reluctantly agreed to a request that he himself thought was excessive.

That's probably it.

Edogawa Conan walked out of the exhibition hall and glanced at his watch. There is less than half an hour left. Let him enjoy this opportunity while they deal with the bombs distributed in the four corners.

Even if... for Asuka Kirito, this is probably not what he wants to see most.

He exhaled, turned around and ran to Ran Mouri who was waiting for him in the corridor. He did not see him. After he left, the boy silently looked at his back for a long time, until he could no longer see anything, then he stood up and slowly walked to another direction in the exhibition hall. Under the heavy curtains was the control panel they had been looking for for a long time.

Edogawa Conan and the others were now wearing goggles and did not have the ability to defuse the bomb. They could only find the location first and then find the professional bomb disposal police, at least not to let Hagiwara Kenji waste time in finding the bomb.

He and Mao Lilan were assigned to the two corners of the east side. It was very difficult to find such a bomb that was hidden in an unknown place when they were completely color blind. When the two finally found it and went to the west side of the second floor to meet Hagiwara Kenji, almost ten minutes had passed.

When the two ran to the exhibition hall in the farthest corner of the west side, they saw the short-haired girl at the door of the exhibition hall at first sight. Suzuki Sonoko kept looking outside as if she was watching the wind. When she saw the two people coming, she waved and smiled, "We have found it. Officer Hagiwara is defusing the bomb."

At this point, the noisy girl finally realized what was going on and lowered her voice, fearing to disturb the focused policeman inside.

"How's the situation over there?" Suzuki Sonoko asked in a low voice.

"Yeah! We found it." Mao Lilan's face was full of sweat from just running, and her expression was very worried, "But will we be in time? It's been almost ten minutes..."

"Don't worry, this kind of bomb, one can be dealt with in three minutes at most. This is the second one." Hagiwara Kenji comforted, he was very confident in his bomb disposal skills, the previous one was dismantled very smoothly.

But...

the man with half-long hair kept frowning, with a weird sense of disharmony.

"Is this more difficult to dismantle?" Conan Edogawa kept approaching the other party and asked.

"Stay away, it's dangerous to get so close." Kenji Hagiwara, who had just driven Suzuki Sonoko to wait outside the exhibition hall, immediately spoke up. Seeing that the boy had no intention of leaving, he shook his head helplessly, "No... it's too smooth, a bit strange."

"It looks like a very common type, it doesn't seem to have anything to do with the control panel..." Kenji Hagiwara's voice gradually faded.

As his voice faded, the whispers of the two girls guarding the door became clearer.

"After showing Officer Hagiwara the location of the bomb, let's go find Xiao Wu first." Suzuki Sonoko said.

"Well, after we turn off the control panel, we'll leave together." Mao Li Ran responded with a smile, and the two looked at each other's cat-like faces and couldn't help laughing.

The relieved short-haired girl smiled and stretched, "But Officer Hagiwara is so handsome! More handsome than before, it turns out that men at work are the most handsome."

"Sonoko--" Mao Li Ran said helplessly, "But I didn't notice it before, maybe it's because bomb disposal police will wear explosion-proof suits that cover their entire body when defusing bombs..."

"Wow, isn't that just like a masked wrestler in professional wrestling?"

A masked wrestler in professional wrestling...

Conan Edogawa listened to the two people's conversation and suddenly recalled the case in the wrestling arena a long time ago. Because of this case, Mao Lilan always liked to talk about professional wrestling with other friends during those days. He remembered that when they were having lunch at the Poirot Cafe, Asuka Kiri listened to their conversation with his head tilted, and didn't say much. He waited until Mao Lilan asked, "How is it, is it very powerful?" before he responded.

What did he say at that time...

"Well, I also like that wolf-faced warrior." 'The white-haired boy held up his head, rolled the pasta on the plate onto the fork and put it into his mouth, 'I feel like a pathetic and brave man. After all...

when the identity is announced, it is the time to die. '

"When the identity is announced, it is the time to die." The boy murmured.

He suddenly reacted and felt as if he was suddenly hit hard on the back of the head and heart. Before he could move, sweat slid down from his forehead.

Before the panicked boy had time to tell the police next to him, the half-long-haired man stood up and ran to the venue next to the elevator. He was so flustered that he didn't even have time to stop for the long-haired girl who bumped into the door when running out of the exhibition hall.

Damn it!

Conan Edogawa gritted his teeth and followed closely behind Kenji Hagiwara, and every previous scene immediately flashed through his mind.

The entanglement and sadness of the white-haired boy when Kenji Hagiwara bandaged his wound, the sudden change in attitude, the bomb that was slightly offset from the position casually outlined on the cloth, and the cautious "goodbye".

He just wanted to get them away!

Using this method means that the operation of the control panel is very complicated, and it may take nearly 20 minutes to complete. It's still in time now...

it must be in time.

Running through the collapsed hall, Kenji Hagiwara's mind was almost blank. He didn't have time to think about anything, and he couldn't even hear the sounds around him. The boy running beside him was saying something loudly, and the hoarse voice circled around his ears, but the man didn't hear it at all.

The dim corridor overlapped with the public space in the middle of the residential building many years ago. The white-haired boy was tied to the bomb, and the eyes as quiet as a pool of water just stared at him motionlessly.

When he was less than four meters away from the exhibition hall, a huge explosion burst out from the inside with a dazzling light. Along with the explosion, there was a fire. The sound echoed in the winding corridor and the empty hall, like the ringing of an old bell.

It was just like watching the bomb explode, unable to save the child who could not escape the chain, and could only hold him and wait for death to come.

The man's eyes were bloodshot, and the flames burned his eyes, which had not seen the light for a long time. He felt a pain as if they were cut by glass fragments. He did not stop and ran towards the depths of the fire.

The

steps to operate this control panel were indeed cumbersome and troublesome.

After Edogawa Conan really left, Asuka Mizuki quickly found the control panel hidden under the hanging cloth.

It was not big, not even as high as his waist. It was so small, but there were countless bombs buried under it.

As long as the control of the goggles was released, the bombs below would explode. The boy was almost speechless when he heard what Bomore said, and he couldn't understand what kind of extreme one-for-n operation this was. It was like the screenwriter was sharpening his knife to attack the only long-haired police officer in the entire theater who could defuse bombs and see colors.

Forget it.

The boy almost immediately thought of a solution.

What Bommer was right about was that he didn't have much time. First it was his sense of taste, then his vision and hearing, just like when he escaped from the laboratory at the age of five. He was injected with a relaxant by Cointreau at that time, so he was able to survive to this day, but now the relaxant has disappeared.

Whether it was the antidote developed by Haibara Ai or the relaxant developed by the organization, he only had one chance.

The person who designed this control panel seemed to be obsessed with the red band that was once tied around his wrist. All operations were related to the color red. Seeing so many colors squeezed on the screen, Fei Niao Wu thanked Huiyuan Ai in his heart for researching the drug in time, and then he breathed a sigh of relief.

It would take at least ten minutes, but fortunately he estimated that it would take at most twenty minutes for several people to complete it. The locations of these bombs were what he heard from the criminals when they were chatting before. They were all bombs that could be controlled by controllers, but now the controllers have long been in the hands of the police.

Since they can all be controlled remotely, he should not be found out that he was lying.

The boy focused all his attention on the screen that was so bright that it gave him a headache, but he couldn't help but be distracted, thinking about the look in the eyes of the few people when they left. He

really couldn't bear to let them go... maybe? Maybe he could escape this explosion... at least he could see them again.

Maybe?

As expected, the time was controlled within ten minutes. After the last step was completed, a huge countdown appeared on the screen as promised, starting from the number three.

The white-haired boy turned his head instantly, gritted his teeth and endured the pain in his ankle and ran outside, as if he wanted to get rid of the shadow of death that was about to swallow him up. The outside of the exhibition hall had already collapsed a lot because of the previous explosion. The rubble around the elevator fell from the elevator passage that was wide open like a monster, and hit the bottom layer that was still burning with a raging fire.

Before he ran to the door of the exhibition hall, Asuka Kiri heard a huge explosion behind him. The moment the sound rang out, he was immediately thrown to the side by the aftermath of the explosion and fell to the dark elevator entrance.

The feeling of weightlessness made him close his eyes subconsciously. The next second, the boy felt his wrist tighten, as if someone was dragging him hard.

......?

Asuka Kiri looked up in a daze and saw Hagiwara Kenji's face slightly distorted due to the pain in his shoulder.

The other party rushed directly into the fire scene after the explosion, and grabbed the boy who was about to fall down without caring whether he would fall down with him.

Wait a minute!

"Are you crazy?!" the white-haired boy gritted his teeth and shouted. He wanted to struggle hard to get rid of the other person's hand that was holding him, but he was afraid that the struggle would be too intense and he would just drag the other person down with him. "Let me go! Do you want to die?!"

There was nothing around to leverage, and the ground in front of the elevator was covered with a large piece of slippery tiles. The moment he was grabbed, Kenji Hagiwara fell down, and his upper body was about to stick out. It was only when the three people who came after him each found a leverage point and grabbed the policeman that the two of them stopped their actions of going to death together.

The explosion was followed by a raging fire.

All the piles of hanging cloths in the exhibition hall finally came in handy at this moment. After being ignited by sparks, they quickly burned up. The scalding flames spread from the exhibition hall, and large patches of black smoke rose up.

"Little liar." The hoarse voice of the man came from above his head. The wound on his shoulder was torn again and blood flowed down the hanging arm and stuck to the wrist of the white-haired boy, which he held tightly. "That salty cake must have been made by you and put in there to make up the number. I haven't settled the score with you yet! You hold on tight, don't try to run away first!"

What? It turns out that he ate the cake first.

It seems that he really mixed up the seasoning...

Asuka Kiri couldn't help but laugh. He looked up at the man's eyes wet with tears and whispered, "Let go, Brother Hagiwara."

Without any leverage, their current balance was only temporary. Sooner or later, they would be dragged down by him, not to mention the raging fire around them.

Maybe he should tell them that he was about to die, or tell them seriously that even if he went out, he would still be targeted by the organization. Gin had received his photo on his phone, and he might have set it as the screen saver to catch him.

Or tell him how much trouble he will bring to them if he survives, that Conan Edogawa's hidden identity will be discovered, that Toru Amuro's closeness to him but never revealing anything to the organization will arouse suspicion, that these friends of his will become bargaining chips for the organization to get him, that Shuugo hiding in the dark will be illuminated by the light, and... Cointreau, who gave him the sedative and concealed the fact that he had a younger brother, what kind of cruel correction method will the organization impose on him?

"I don't have much time left."