The establishment of the Time Travelers Alliance began in the first year of Conan

Chapter 252 What is the only irreconcilable conflict between Conan and Ai Haibara?

finally arrived at home.

Three bottles of baijiu (Chinese liquor) would be quite heavy for a first-grade child to carry all the way.

Conan turned and glanced at the Kudo residence next to Dr. Agasa's house; his heart was now filled with hope.

He hoped that he could turn back into himself.

and--

Conan tilted his head slightly and glanced at Ai Haibara, who had walked to the doorbell and pressed it.

He followed behind Ai Haibara the whole way, and as it turned out, Haibara did indeed remember the way to the professor's house.

While waiting for the doctor to open the door, Ai Haibara talked about how she discovered that Shinichi Kudo had shrunk.

Ai Haibara smiled as she looked at Conan's curious gaze.

"Because on that form, only your situation was listed as 'unknown,' the organization assigned me to check on the situation."

Ai Haibara had long since realized that Conan had been testing her all along.

To be honest, this caution made her feel a little more at ease, but also somewhat dissatisfied—aside from that piece of information about the antidote, which she didn't know was true or false, she hadn't received any other promises.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the figure standing behind her pause slightly because of her words.

"I didn't expect that you would never go back after you shrunk, so the organization probably thinks you died somewhere."

But before Conan could even feel relieved about his rare act of caution, Ai Haibara's second half of her sentence made him freeze.

"However, the last time I visited, I noticed that there was one less set of children's clothes in your wardrobe."

Seeing the beads of sweat on Conan's forehead, Ai Haibara chuckled to herself. Sure enough, no matter how smart he is, he's still just a child.

She turned her head, met Conan's relieved look, shrugged, and added:

"You don't need to worry about that now. The organization probably doesn't have the energy or time to deal with you."

"Otherwise you would have been dead long ago, wouldn't you?"

"If what you say is true, and what the organization wants is in your hands."

Conan subconsciously touched his wrist, the scene of Ran parting with him this morning flashing through his mind. At the same time, he remembered what he and Heiji had seen at the harbor yesterday.

He put down his backpack and leaned against the gate railing. Conan knew that Ai Haibara was subtly protesting.

After all, she had promised to tell her the information related to the drug called APTX-4869 and to help her create the antidote.

But he himself is now keeping a lot of information very secret.

"Okay, I apologize for my previous probing, but I had my reasons for doing so."

Ai Haibara raised an eyebrow and tilted her head, wanting to hear how Conan would explain next.

"The main point is that you're a member with a name associated with alcohol. In other words, you're a high-ranking member of the organization, right?"

Conan voiced the question that had been lingering in his mind for a long time.

"But you don't know GSSRA, you don't know what the organization is looking for, and you don't know what it refers to—"

"Conan! Ai!" It was Dr. Agasa's voice.

The porch of the villa in the distance opened, and Professor Agasa waved to the two people standing at the door, then reached out and tapped the controller on the door.

The villa's gate opened.

This little incident interrupted Conan's next words. He and Ai Haibara exchanged a glance and said, "Let's go inside and talk."

……

Now, three figures, one adult and two children, are sitting around the coffee table.

Professor Agasa picked up the pot of black tea, filled three porcelain cups with the boiling tea, pushed one of them toward Conan, and winked at him at the same time.

"So you've already told Ai?"

"Yes, I was just about to tell her."

Conan took the cup of black tea and glanced down at the pale red liquid—

The next second, a terrifying scene suddenly appeared before his eyes, and before he could even see it clearly, he slammed the teacup onto the coffee table.

The tea spilled out, but fortunately the coffee table wasn't red, so it just looked like a spreading puddle of water, rather than something bright or sticky.

Wait, what am I thinking?
"Conan?"

Dr. Agasa's worried voice pulled him out of this quagmire of unknown origin, unease, and fear—he handed him a towel.

"Ah, it's just a little hot."

Conan subconsciously offered an explanation, took the towel and wiped the water stains off the table, then picked up another pitcher of cold water and poured some into a cup.

The color of the tea suddenly became much lighter, and the momentary palpitation disappeared.

Another unexpected turn of events.

This made the atmosphere suddenly become a little... a little strange, especially after Conan put the lid on the porcelain cup.

It might sound absurd, but in the white steam rising from the black tea, Conan felt as if he saw the figure of a familiar person.

He told himself that this was just a temporary illusion, after all, divination methods like tea divination, or any other divination techniques that rely on psychological tricks to create an air of mystery—those must all be fake.

After a moment of silence, Ai Haibara spoke first.

"So, Kudo, the information you said you wanted to tell me at the door was—"

"It's a pointer."

Professor Agasa glanced at Conan again with concern before taking over the conversation.

"Since Conan has already promised to tell you, I'll be frank. Whether it's the organization you mentioned, GSSRA, or even 'Science Frontier,' they're all looking for those pointers..."

"Ai, you saw me fiddling with that watch this morning, right?"

Professor Agasa's expression was unusually serious, but it was as if he were telling a fairy tale.

"That's what they're looking for, the 'truth' about everything, and the hope that can save everything."

It's hard to describe how Ai Haibara felt when she first heard this "strange story"—yes, a strange story, the first time Ai Haibara had heard that a watch could be related to "everything".

This sounds like a search for a treasure hidden by the first head of a family, a "weapon that could turn the tide of the Edo period."

Perhaps in the end they will find that the so-called "weapon" is actually just a bunch of outdated analyzers or decoders.

Dr. Agasa's words even left her momentarily at a loss for how to respond.

Logically speaking, as a scientific researcher, a scientist who may have learned many skills in Hawaii while studying in the United States, such boasting should have elicited merciless ridicule from Ai Haibara.

But Professor Agasa's tone and his earnest gaze told her that it was all true.

"What the doctor said is true."

Conan finally shook off the memories that were trying to catch up with him. He glanced at Professor Agasa, nodded to him, and gestured for him to bring over the watch.

Then, he turned to Ai Haibara and began to explain the origin of the two pointers in a low voice.

"Those two pointers were obtained from Gin and Vodka."

"The first time, they wanted to blow up the entire train."

Conan's voice was calm, yet carried a deliberately suppressed composure.

"the second time……"

Conan recalls that harbor, the harbor from which he has just escaped—though he feels as if a part of him has remained there forever.

"The second pointer..."

Conan's voice became a little hoarse.

He thought of Miss Yami.

He remembered her dying words to him: "...I'm entrusting the truth to you, little detective."

And, with her life, she gave herself that eternally shining thing, that hope entrusted to her.

"The second pointer was given to me by a traitor from the Black Organization... a good man."

He paused for a moment, then looked up at Ai Haibara:

"If you're a member of the group that knows about liquor, you might know who she is. It happened at the Beika Town cargo port..."

Conan lowered his head, and everything that happened that day, like the eerie and cold rain in the alley in his dream, fell to the ground.

"...Before Hattori and I arrived, Gin shot her...She managed to hide the pointer and gave it to me at the last moment."

Ai Haibara's body began to tremble slightly—her subconscious had already realized what had happened that night.

"Hattori and I only found out that she was working at the Beika branch under a false identity..."

Conan looked up. "Haibara, I don't know if you know the truth about her..."

The moment Conan's gaze swept over Ai Haibara, he froze.

He saw Ai Haibara, a person who seemed so calm and indifferent to everything around her. The icy blue emotions in her pupils melted away, turning into a vast ocean filled with sorrow.

That sorrowful and trembling heart caused Ai Haibara's entire world to tremble, and the scalding tea splashed down, burning her skin red.

But Ai Haibara felt no pain at all, because what followed the sorrow was the raging anger that surged up from the sea.

Just as Dr. Agasa had "feared," the "conflict" immediately erupted like a tsunami.

Beneath that facade of strength and composure lies a burning passion within Ai Haibara's heart that has never faded.

The emotions buried beneath the calm surface are now being shattered word by word by Conan's narration.

Then, those emotions began to spread unchecked to the surroundings.

"Then why didn't you save her!"

That piercing scream, that furious shriek—was almost like a bolt of lightning tearing through the atmosphere.

"Ai! Calm down!"

Dr. Agasa, who was carefully taking the watch out of the decoding box, suddenly turned around, dropped what he was holding, and ran towards Ai Haibara.

But it was too late.

Ai Haibara rushed up to Conan, grabbing his collar with both hands, her voice a mixture of sobs and anger.

"Then why didn't you save her? She's my... sister! She returned the pointer to you!"

A gaze, now useless yet filled with pleading, along with those sorrowful tears, almost engulfed Conan.

"So why didn't you... why didn't you save her..."

The desperate accusation finally subsided, tears blurring her voice, leaving only a sob that she couldn't suppress.

"I'm sorry, Haibara."

Conan was standing there.

There was no dodging, no explanation.

He let Ai Haibara question him with trembling fists, her hoarse sobs, and her sorrow. "I'm really... so sorry I couldn't save your sister."

……

As the sobs subsided, Ai Haibara finally calmed herself down.

"I was a little emotional just now."

Ai Haibara had calmed down, and her voice carried a hint of apology.

"I know it wasn't your fault."

Conan shook his head. He didn't say anything. He knew he did have a chance to save Miyano Akemi, but he didn't seize it.

—Ai Haibara has already told him her sister's real name.

For some reason, Conan felt a deep empathy for Ai Haibara's emotions.

The reddened eyes, fragile posture, and slightly forced apologetic smile of Ai Haibara before my eyes overlapped with the figure lying in the twilight in my mind... or another figure.

“I promise you… that won’t happen again.” — Conan wanted to say this, but he opened his mouth and no sound came out.

It was Ai Haibara who broke the silence, pretending that nothing had happened:
"So what exactly is that pointer?"

This strong child immediately pulled herself out of that sad atmosphere—to be honest, after a cathartic cry, Ai Haibara even felt much better.

As the old saying goes, when you confide in and share your sadness with another person, the sadness is halved.

"I never knew that the organization's purpose was to find things related to pointers."

Ai Haibara stared at the object on the coffee table—a black watch with six dials, which Professor Agasa had just placed on the table.

"what's it for?"

“It’s a key,” Dr. Agasa said softly, staring at the two hands moving on it. “A key that can save everything.”

He was silent for a moment, but finally added that sentence.

"Maybe that includes your sister."

"I'm going crazy," Dr. Agasa thought, but deep down, a voice told him, "This is just a metaphor to comfort children, like telling the soul of the dead that it has actually gone to a real heaven."

A look of surprise flashed across Ai Haibara's face.

But Professor Agasa looked at Conan, and the two exchanged a glance—Conan felt that he had understood what Professor Agasa wanted him to do.

So, to Professor Agasa's equally astonishment, Conan offered his explanation.

"After all, your medicine can make people young again, right? From this perspective, it doesn't seem impossible to bring the dead back to life."

"not to mention……"

Conan glanced at Professor Agasa, who had "already lost his memory," and remembered Heiji Hattori mentioning some things related to the boundaries of science.

At that time, Heiji Hattori complained to Conan with a skeptical attitude about the Black Organization and the strange technology at the edge of science.

……

In the corridor of the infirmary, Hattori Heiji chuckled and half-jokingly revealed that information.

"We suspect that they may have found some alien technology, or even received help from extraterrestrial civilizations."

"Those pointers might be related to activating something. Maybe a long time ago, an alien spaceship crashed on Earth?"

“We are asking governments around the world about these things.”

Hattori Heiji lowered his voice, "To be honest, judging from their evasive attitude, it might really be true."

"Moreover, this makes it clear why those two organizations seemed to appear out of nowhere."

He then complained to Conan:
"Maybe it was one of their own people who secretly took the stuff and ran away to do it, and then made us GSSRA clean up their mess..."

Although we certainly won't be able to see the [real timeline], its "spirit in heaven" will surely be gratified that its "grand plan" has finally succeeded.

……

Conan snapped out of his daze and began to provide "evidence" for his "reasoning".

"You may not know this, but Dr. Agasa's memories were erased by an organization called 'Science Frontier'."

"Just like how you make people young again—sounds incredible, right?"

"From this perspective, perhaps being resurrected from the dead isn't such a big deal. After all, there's no such thing as a soul. In the end, it's just about getting the brain back to work after it has stopped."

"Furthermore, from the perspective of the principles behind human cryopreservation technology..."

The atmosphere, which resembled a discussion of a science fiction novel plot, along with Conan's constant stream of arguments, made Professor Agasa and Ai Haibara, who were sitting on either side, look increasingly strange—the previous somber atmosphere was completely swept away.

"In short, our next goal is to go to Moonshadow Island and find that thing called—"

“The shadow of the full moon,” Professor Agasa added softly.

"Yes, find the pointer called the Shadow of the Full Moon, and then get your hands on that so-called 'last hope'."

Conan's optimistic attitude made Professor Agasa stand up and applaud him. Then, this dreamlike "bubble" was popped by Ai Haibara herself.

"Although I don't know why the organization suddenly went to look for the pointer, I can tell you, Kudo, that drug has nothing to do with so-called aliens, and the organization has no connection with the extraterrestrial civilization you mentioned."

Ai Haibara paused for a moment, then said, "Because that drug was developed by my parents."

She looked up at Professor Agasa and Conan—she appreciated their comfort and good intentions, but Ai Haibara knew in her heart that the dead were destined never to come back to life.

"However, I will develop the antidote before heading to Moonshadow Island. Now that you have determined that it is caused by a certain component in the baijiu, I only need to react and compare them with the cells one by one."

"Doctor, regarding the equipment..." Ai Haibara looked at the doctor and rattled off a series of equipment names, "Now that we know the specific ingredients of the antidote, this equipment should be enough."

"Microscope, centrifuge, chromatograph..."

Dr. Agasa recited the names of all the instruments that Ai Haibara had mentioned, and then, under the somewhat surprised gazes of the two children, he scratched his head sheepishly.

"I've already bought all these things. After all, I started preparing after Conan called me about it."

Then the doctor added, "Of course, if Ai-chan were to do it, it definitely wouldn't explode as often as I do!"

"Maybe it'll be successful in just one night!"

……

And that's exactly what happened.

At 3:33:33 AM, some painful sounds came from the locker room.

Once dressed, Shiho Miyano and Shinichi Kudo, who was back in his blue high school suit, appeared together in front of Professor Agasa.

"I used about one-third of the concentrate that was just extracted."

Shiho Miyano glanced at Shinichi Kudo, who was jumping around excitedly in the underground laboratory.

"Based on your memory of the description and the amount of alcohol you drank calculated based on your height, this should be enough to sustain us for about 3 hours."

"Only three hours?" A thought suddenly struck Shinichi Kudo. "What if I ate more—"

"If you want to commit suicide."

Just a few hours later, Shiho Miyano began to miss the shrunken Shinichi Kudo, and she rubbed her forehead in exasperation.

“APTX-4869’s role is to fully activate the apoptosis program; in our case, it should have only triggered its occasional immaturity mechanism.”

"It now appears that the immune response triggered by your cold, along with the components in the alcohol, activated telomerase activity."

"Therefore, theoretically, the time it takes for us to revert back this time may be even shorter, since such a single-structure organic molecule is easily metabolized by the liver."

“No, you don’t need to get wet or exposed to the wind.” Shiho Miyano sighed. She had already figured out what Kudo was up to. “There are quite a few drugs that can cause immune symptoms.”

"As for what you're thinking about, blocking the apoptosis mechanism of APTX-4869 for a long time, I might try using something like an RNA vaccine, or using nucleoside nucleic acid analogs, to transfer the code that transcribes and synthesizes it into the body."

"However, specific transcription falls under the category of gene therapy."

Ai Haibara glanced at the equipment in the laboratory; it was clearly hopeless.

In her view, treating one person might cost a million dollars—not including the cost of equipment.

"Besides, our sample size is too small, so don't even think about using yourself as a test subject; I would never agree to that."

"Furthermore, we must consider the drug resistance that may result from the immune system adapting after repeated use."

Ai Haibara mentally calculated the time and considered several possible treatment methods.

"My rough estimate is that the antidote we can currently produce can probably maintain the original body size for about a day."

She paused, then added, "Moreover, it can only be taken a maximum of three times consecutively."

"That's enough for now!"

A glimmer of hope instantly ignited in Conan's eyes—the door that had once been tightly shut was finally opening slightly towards him.

With a research direction in place, it's only a matter of time before a real antidote is created.

"If I were an adult, I would definitely be able to subdue them the next time I meet them!"

Shinichi Kudo's voice was filled with unprecedented excitement.

"Heiji Hattori told me that the third pointer is on Moonshadow Island, and we will definitely run into them!"

"Really? I think so too."

Shiho Miyano answered softly, a faint smile appearing on her lips, but her voice suddenly turned cold.

"This is what I meant—one condition for you to get the antidote."

"Shinichi Kudo, you must really like Sherlock Holmes, right?"

Ai Haibara's tone suddenly became strangely calm, even carrying a mysterious connotation.

"Then you must have read the Milverton case in 'The Return of the Condor Heroes'—"

Shinichi Kudo's expression suddenly turned serious. He already knew what Ai Haibara, no, Shiho Miyano, was about to say.

Dr. Agasa's idea is undoubtedly correct.

The only irreconcilable conflict between Conan and Ai Haibara has never been the death of Akemi Miyano.

Rather—revenge.

Shiho Miyano softly recited this sentence:

“When the law fails to bring justice to the parties involved, private revenge becomes justified, even noble, from that moment on.”

Then, she looked into Shinichi Kudo's eyes, which held a hint of resistance, and heard a calm voice that carried an undeniable air—originating from the deepest anger and sorrow within her.

Conan instinctively looked into her eyes, while Shiho Miyano was looking directly at him.

Now, the lake-blue that had just melted in those eyes has cruelly frozen again.

Shiho Miyano's voice was as cold as snow on a winter night.

"I need you to kill Gin for me."

"Moreover, it has to be done by me personally."

—The soul that emerged from the snowy forest was always filled with hatred and anger.

P.S.: It's mid-month, please vote with some monthly tickets! QAQ
(End of this chapter)