Conan: I'm a zaibatsu in Tokyo

Tokyo Airport.

With one hand in his pocket and the other casually resting on Ai's head, the two stood at the exit of the arrival hall.

"Zhengyi! Xiao Ai!"

When Hongye saw the two from afar, a bright smile immediately appeared on her face, and she quickly walked over.

"Red Leaf." Zheng Yi smiled and waved at her.

"Why did you come in person?" Hongye walked up to the two of them and said with a smile, "You could have just sent the driver to pick you up. Why did you have to wait here?"

"It's just on the way," Ai said casually.

If you don't come, she'll definitely complain for days after you go back.

Zheng Yi and I aren't that stupid.

Zheng Yi took the suitcase from Hongye's hand, and the three of them walked out side by side.

"Have you finished dealing with things in Kyoto?" Zheng Yi asked casually.

"Yes, that's about it." Hongye nodded.

He put his suitcase into the trunk and opened the car door: "Get in."

Inside the car, Hongye sat in the passenger seat, Zhengyi drove, and Xiao Ai sat in the back.

“Speaking of which,” Hongye fastened her seatbelt, turned to look at Zhengyi, and asked with a hint of curiosity, “what do you write in your diaries?”

"I can't tell you that," Zheng Yi replied casually while turning the steering wheel. "You'll find out when we open them together later."

Xiao Ai nodded.

That's right, you'll find out later.

Ai asked Momiji, "What did you write?"

“If none of you tell me, I certainly won’t tell you either,” Hongye said.

"What's the content roughly?"

"I won't tell you."

After returning home, they put Hongye's suitcase back in the bedroom, and the three of them went to the living room and looked at the notebook on the table.

“Since we’ve already written them, let’s put them together.” Zheng Yi crossed his arms and leaned back on the sofa. “Anyway, we won’t open them for several years. Putting them apart will only make them easier to lose.”

Ai, sitting next to him, nodded in agreement: "Yes, centralized storage and unified management."

Looking at the two of them so confident, and then at the two diaries on the coffee table, Hongye couldn't help but raise an eyebrow.

"Are you so sure no one will be watching?" she asked, her gaze sweeping back and forth between Zheng Yi and Xiao Ai's faces.

You guys actually put your diaries on this table; it's so convenient to peek at them!

Shouldn't it be put in a box with three locks, and each person have a key?
"Of course not," Zheng Yi replied decisively, even patting his chest.

"Who am I? How could I go back on my word? I would never peek, and I trust you wouldn't either."

Ai also put down her teacup and said seriously, "This is a basic issue of trust. If we don't even have this much self-control, then this exchange diary has no meaning."

Seeing the two of them so open and honest, Hongye's doubts were actually suppressed.

That makes her seem a bit petty.

Zheng Yi said, "Besides, the diary has to be written every day, and taking it out of the box every day is too much trouble."

"Okay." She nodded, feeling that there was some truth to that.

She took her diary out of her bag and gently placed it on the table. "Let's put them together then."

“However…” Hongye said, “You’re just putting them in such an obvious place? What if…”

“There’s no such thing as ‘what if’.” Zheng Yi interrupted her directly: “I said I won’t peek, and I trust you won’t peek either. This is a matter of principle.”

Ai nodded and added, "Besides, even if someone wanted to peek, given our vigilance, it's impossible for us to be completely unaware."

"Alright then." She smiled and shook her head. "Then I'll trust you."

……

The night was dark.

Hongye, wearing a silk nightgown, slipped out silently through the crack in the bedroom door.

She walked barefoot on the wooden floor without making a sound.

"Putting it in such an obvious place, and still shamelessly claiming to be open and aboveboard..."

Hongye sneered inwardly as she tiptoed toward the living room table.

"Both Shoichi and Ai are not to be underestimated; this is definitely a psychological trap they set!"
The diary was placed in such a conspicuous position to lower their guard and make it easier for them to peek at it at any time.

"Hmph, trying to fool me? No way!"

Hongye found herself an extremely perfect excuse.

This isn't spying; it's 'preemptive retaliatory reconnaissance.' Since they're so heartless, they can't blame her for being unjust.

Using the moonlight streaming in through the window, Hongye easily made her way to the table.

She took a deep breath, feeling a mix of excitement and guilt, and opened Ai's diary.

However, when she approached with anticipation, ready to capture the diary entries Ai had written, she froze instantly.

"..."

By the faint moonlight, Hongye stared at the contents of the paper.

Those were rows of extremely twisted, bizarre, and haphazard lines and symbols.

"What...what kind of scribbling is this?!"

Hongye felt that her eyes had suffered a serious workplace injury.

She doesn't recognize a single symbol!
"That damn Ai, she actually used such inhumane language to defend herself against me!"

Hongye gritted her teeth, angrily closed the diary, then opened it again and flipped through Zhengyi's diary.

"What Ai wrote looks like chemical symbols, it must be one of those things, right? Zheng Yi shouldn't be like that, right?"

Hongye opened Zhengyi's diary with great hope.

"..."

Silence fell over the living room once again.

Zhengyi's diary did not contain those strange symbols, but it also did not contain normal Japanese characters.

It was covered with English letters and numbers, interspersed with all sorts of strange punctuation marks and parentheses.

"What is this thing again?!" Hongye scratched her hair.

Zheng Yi is no pushover either.

"Fine...fine!" Hongye's chest heaved with anger as she finally realized what was happening.

These two guys were definitely in cahoots!
They deliberately used this incomprehensible stuff to trick me. I thought they were being honest and straightforward, but it turns out they were just waiting for me to find out!

She was set up by Shoichi and Ai.

"Trying to fool me? Not so easy!"

She took a deep breath and took out a fountain pen and a small notebook that she always carried with her.

By the moonlight, Hongye squatted down by the table and quickly copied down every single word of the "heavenly book" in Xiao Ai and Zheng Yi's diaries.

After copying the last symbol, Hongye quickly put the diary back in its original place, making sure the angle was exactly the same as before. Then, carrying her notebook, she scurried back to her guest room, satisfied yet still fuming.

Back in her room, Hongye locked the door, turned on the desk lamp, and stared at the dense symbols and codes copied into her notebook, her eyes filled with unwavering determination.

"You just wait!" Hongye sneered.

She'll decipher these things sooner or later.

Two o'clock in the morning.

Zheng Yi's bedroom door was pushed open extremely slowly, and he slipped out on tiptoe, wearing loose pajamas. He was just about to make his way towards the living room when he looked up and froze on the spot.

Just a few steps away around the corner, Ai was also moving out in an extremely awkward posture.

She was still clutching a pen tightly in her hand, staring intently at Zheng Yi.

The two stared at each other for a full three seconds in the dimly lit corridor.

"..."

"..."

No one spoke, and they even deliberately kept their breathing quiet.

Zheng Yi raised an eyebrow, while Xiao Ai quickly hid the pen behind her back.

The two tacitly looked away, pretending that nothing had happened, and then crept downstairs one after the other.

Shoichi and Ai approached the table from either side.

Shoichi opened the diary with great skill, while Ai leaned in beside him. The two of them looked at it with anticipation in the moonlight.

"How come you flip through the diary so skillfully?" Ai asked.

Zheng Yi said softly, "Because I read a lot of books."

Ai snorted softly, clearly not believing Masakazu's words.

Zheng Yi gave a soft hum.

Didn't you also sneak out under the cover of night, just like me?
Neither of them are good people, so you didn't criticize me.

Masakazu flipped through the diary without changing his expression, skipping over the sections about himself and Ai, and went straight to the diary written by Momiji.

"She actually spoke in Chinese," he muttered under his breath. "Does she think she can keep us at bay like that? How naive!"

Who can she possibly defend against like this?

Ai nodded in agreement. Compared to her and Masakazu, Kouyou was still too naive and inexperienced.

“But it also has Korean, it’s a little more complicated,” Ai said.

But it's useless, it can't be prevented.

The two looked at each other and smiled.

After laughing enough, Zheng Yi carefully read what Hongye had written.

To two self-righteous idiots:

See the word as the face.

If you two are truly as open and honest as you claim, and haven't been peeking at this diary, then what you're seeing now is just a greeting written in Chinese.

But if you're currently sneaking around in the downstairs living room, peeking under the moonlight, then please allow me to say something with a smile:
Two big idiots!
I knew you guys would peek!
Zheng Yi! Don't think you're being sincere when you pat your chest and make promises during the day. Your shifty eyes and the slight twitch at the corner of your mouth have already betrayed you.

And Ai, don't think that you can hide the scheming in your eyes by pretending to drink tea nonchalantly.

You two put your diaries in such a conspicuous place and shamelessly claim to have them "centralized for safekeeping." Do you even believe that yourselves?
Hmph, two big idiots, big fools
—Ooka Momiji, who saw right through you all long ago.

Ai and Masahiro exchanged a glance, neither of them in a very good mood.

Ai whispered, "It seems like Momiji saw right through you."

“No, it’s that I’ve seen through your thoughts,” Zheng Yi said.

Ai's previous behavior was too despicable; once she becomes open and honest, she can't convince Momiji.

It's all Ai's fault. If it weren't for her, Momiji would never have suspected her.

Ai covered her mouth and yawned, then whispered to Masakazu, "I'm going to sleep now. You can read it yourself."

That idiot Shoichi, he can't even fool Momiji.

"Go on, go to sleep early," Zheng Yi said softly.

You silly Ai, you can't even fool Momiji.

……

early morning.

Zheng Yi yawned as he walked down the stairs, a tuft of hair stubbornly sticking up on his head.

He tried to look energetic: "Good morning, you two! The weather is really nice today."

Ai, sitting at the dining table, didn't even look up.

She held a cup of black coffee in her hand and said softly, "You sound tired. Didn't you sleep well? What did you do last night?"

"No, I slept very well last night."

Just then, Hongye also came out.

She walked to the dining table, stiffly pulled out a chair and sat down, looking even worse than Masakazu and Ai.

Good morning.

As soon as she finished speaking, Hongye couldn't help but yawn, and tears welled up in her eyes.

Ai and Masahiro exchanged a glance.

It seems that not only did we have projects to do on both nights, but Hongye was also up to no good yesterday.

Ai spoke first, asking, "Kurenai, what did you do last night? You look like you didn't get enough sleep."

"I... I was just engrossed in reading a novel last night," Hongye said, rubbing her eyes with difficulty.

Zheng Yi asked, "What novel is it? You're so engrossed in it that you don't even want to sleep."

"Um, the romance type," Hongye said softly.

As he was chewing on a fried egg, he caught a glimpse of Hongye out of the corner of his eye, looking like she might fall asleep at any moment.

Hmph, she must have secretly gotten up last night to read his diary, just like Ai Haibara did.

But we were already on guard against you, so even if you saw it, you wouldn't understand it.

Ai sipped her coffee, glancing at Momiji's weak and strained appearance out of the corner of her eye, a cold smile playing on her lips.

Ha, Hongye must be just like Zhengyi, unable to resist sneaking a peek at the diary.

But she was already on guard against you.

Mingmei came out of the kitchen with a glass of milk and sighed helplessly when she saw the three of them like this.

"Did all three of you secretly look at that exchange diary last night?" Akemi asked.

"No!" the three of them said in unison, refusing to admit it.

Mingmei said, "If you keep peeking, there's no point in continuing to write. Besides, you're all too cunning."

Mingmei pointed at Zhengyi and said, "You used the company's confidential password."

He then pointed at Ai and said, "You were probably using those chemical equations, weren't you?"

Then he looked at Hongye and said, "You're simple-minded, but you've never thought about writing a proper diary."

The three of them were wary of each other, and none of them kept a proper diary. How could you possibly end up like Mrs. Jiyou's family, where, years later, when you open your diaries, you'll find such sweet memories?

"Um, am I wrong?"

When Mingmei realized that her words were not appreciated and that all three of them were staring at her intently, she subconsciously took a step back.

"That's right." Zheng nodded.

Hongye nodded, "That makes a lot of sense, but..."

"Sister," Ai asked softly, "how do you know so much detail? How do you know what we wrote?"

"what?"

Mingmei subconsciously brushed the hair from her forehead back: "You left it on the table. The wind blew in that day and opened the diary. I saw it by accident."

"That was definitely careless," Ai nodded. (End of Chapter)