Conan: When Shinjiu and Maolilan swap bodies

Inside the door.

In the darkness, Sera Marie suddenly opened her eyes.

Chapter 558 I plan to return to the organization

The rain didn't stop.

Shuichi Akai held up an umbrella, and his trouser leg quickly became soaked.

His steps were steady, and he made almost no sound when he stepped through the puddles.

Half a step behind him, Sera Mary, also holding an umbrella, shone sharply in the night under the heavy rain, her green eyes, identical to those of Shuichi Akai.

The doorbell rang only once before it was opened.

Ai Haibara stood in the entryway, looking at the two people outside the door—a young man in disguise wearing a disguise mask, and a woman whose figure had shrunk but who no longer concealed her imposing aura.

She offered no pleasantries or explanations, but simply stepped aside to make way for them.

"Come in."

The door to the villa next door opened at the same time.

A person opened a black umbrella and stepped into the rain. Tall and slender, with unhurried steps, raindrops splashed up in a fine white mist along the edge of the umbrella.

He walked from the other end of the rainy night, then stopped at the edge of the light on her porch, closing his umbrella.

Yusaku Kudo looked up and met the gaze of the petite girl inside the door through the rain curtain.

He removed his disguise, and his eyebrows and eyes were exactly like Shinichi Kudo's, but he had accumulated more than thirty years of experience and composure.

“Miss Haibara,” Yusaku Kudo said, his gaze falling on Subaru Okiya, who had arrived in the living room first.

Ai Haibara stepped aside, making way for the doorway.

"Please come in."

In the living room, Professor Agasa had already been persuaded to go back to his bedroom.

Four untouched cups of hot tea sat on the coffee table, steam rising at an angle and quickly cooling into the air.

Shuichi Akai glanced around the living room: there were several duffel bags and a safe piled up in the living room, and Ai Haibara was dressed neatly, looking ready to leave at any moment.

Sera Mary didn't sit down; she stood by the coffee table, her gaze fixed on Kudo Yusaku's face.

Yusaku Kudo sat down leisurely, his expression calm and unperturbed.

Without any pleasantries or introductions, Hideki Akai got straight to the point.

"Tell me. What happened?"

Ai Haibara stood in the center of the living room, facing them.

"First, check here for listening devices."

Shuichi Akai had already taken out his equipment after entering and was now walking around the living room, quickly conducting an examination.

In the living room, there was nothing except the one he had installed in the floor socket.

After confirming that there were no other listening devices, Ai Haibara finally spoke.

Without any probing or pretense, she got straight to the point and spoke directly.

“Konyak called.”

Sera Mary's brows furrowed suddenly.

Yusaku Kudo adjusted his glasses.

Shuichi Akai's gaze darkened, but he did not interrupt.

"He knows who I am, knows that Shinichi Kudo is still alive, and knows the mechanism of action of APTX-4869..."

She paused, a very short pause, but so heavy it was almost audible.

“He told me that the organization was conducting human experiments and there were already cases of people turning back to their youth, but there were no survivors... But the existence of Kudo Shinichi and me has been exposed.”

“Koniak.” Shuichi Akai repeated the code name, his tone flat, as if confirming a missing link in an intelligence chain. “A core member of the organization, rumored to be the ‘most loyal person’.”

It's very strange that someone like this would suddenly call Ai Haibara.

Especially since he knew so much...

“The rumors are false,” Ai Haibara said.

She raised her eyes, her pupils carrying a deep, almost numb calm.

"Before this, I thought so too. But he installed a listening device in my room..."

Shuichi Akai's pupils suddenly contracted.

"Was it that night?"

"Yes, it must have been that night."

The night Koniak appeared on the street.

"He noticed me a long time ago, not just me, but also Shinichi Kudo, but he kept quiet until just now..."

Ai Haibara briefly described the cassette tape left by her parents and what she heard on it.

Sera Mary's eyes sharpened further. "So, only people from three bloodline families can activate Drug A?"

Ai Haibara nodded silently. "That's right, and the success rate is extremely low. I, Shinichi Kudo, and you should be the only successful cases so far."

Successful samples represent danger; they mean that once exposed, they will be targeted by the organization and become test subjects.

Shuichi Akai stared intently at her. "What are you planning to do?"

"I intend to return to the organization."

“No way!” Shuichi Akai refused outright.

If she goes back, she will never be able to come out again. If she defectes again, the organization will increase the number of guards around her exponentially.

He promised Mingmei that he would protect her sister well. Moreover, now that her identity is out in the open, she is no longer just Mingmei's sister, but also his sister!

Ai Haibara raised her head and met his gaze, her expression calm.

"I know Drug A best. Now that they know the reversal effect has worked on me, they will definitely not let it go. You are all aware of the organization's methods."

"If they want, Professor Agasa, those kids, Ms. Mori... all these people I know can be tools to force me into this state..."

If Binga was so ruthless as to use a train full of people to force Shinichi Kudo to show up, how could the other members of the organization not use similar methods to force her to show up?

It doesn't even need to be as grand as Binga's.

Shuichi Akai remained silent, but something in the air, like a long-stretched string, was silently twisted again.

"Moreover, Koniak will help me."

Shuichi Akai's gaze was fixed on her. "How can you be sure that Koniak will help you?"

“Because he hates the organization,” Ai Haibara said firmly.

She wasn't sure if Koniak would help her, but at that moment, her tone was unwavering.

The sound of rain hitting the window was fine, continuous, and endless.

Three pairs of questioning eyes looked at her, waiting for her explanation.

“You may not know, but Koniak was an experiment of the organization. From the moment he came to the organization, he was subjected to another project of organizational experimentation. He was experimented on, manipulated... He hated the organization to the core.”

This is brand new intelligence.

Prior to this, although Shuichi Akai had worked undercover, his authority was far from sufficient to know so much.

Moreover, during the years he was active, Koniak had already faded into obscurity, and there was even less talk about him.

Yusaku Kudo crossed his arms in front of his chest. "Then how can you be sure he's broken free from the control?"

Ai Haibara shook her head. "I can't be sure. I can only gamble."

“He’s telling you this to force us to take action.”

Shuichi Akai clenched his fists, his voice heavy.

It seems that not only Ai Haibara, but his disguised identity has also been exposed.

That night, Koniak splashed water in his face, probably as a reaction after realizing his true identity.

Sera Mary turned her head to the side: "Forced?"

“He knows too much. Our identities, Sherry’s whereabouts, Shinichi Kudo is still alive... If any of these pieces of information were reported, the organization would raze this entire street to the ground tonight.”

Shuichi Akai's voice was steady, like deconstructing a clear trajectory of a ballistic missile, "but he didn't say anything. He chose to make this call, chose to expose that he knew everything, but asked for nothing in return."

He turned around; the eyebrows and eyes behind the disguise were gentle and harmless, but the true gaze beneath was cold and sharp.

"He wasn't extorting money. He was handing over a knife."

Ai Haibara looked up and met his gaze.

“He knew we would take action,” Shuichi Akai said. “That’s what he’s been waiting for.”

Chapter 559 Are you trying to confess your feelings to me?

The sound of rain suddenly became very loud.

Sera Mary's gaze fell on Ai Haibara's face, as if searching for the afterimage of a familiar face, but soon, it was replaced by something more complex and profound.

"You called us here, so you already have a plan in mind?"

Ai Haibara did not answer immediately.

She lowered her head and pushed the safe in front of Shuichi Akai.

Then he placed a metal box containing cassette tapes and a cassette player in front of Yusaku Kudo.

Finally, he took a medicine box out of his pocket and handed it to Sera Mary.

"These are the results of my research over this period of time."

"My research materials are in the safe, and the tapes left by my parents are in the metal box."

"The antidote is a semi-finished product, but the first dose should last for three days. The effect will decrease afterward. The more you take it, the stronger the resistance becomes and the worse the effect becomes."

“My parents tampered with the original molecular template of APTX-4869.”

“The key structural domains contain unstable disulfide bonds. Any modification made in the direction of ‘perfect optimization’ will trigger conformational collapse, turning the drug from a telomerase activator into a whole-cell apoptosis inducer.”

She raised her eyes, her voice soft, yet like a blade falling into still water:

"In other words, the real, stable drug A that can keep people young forever—never existed in the first place."

Outside the window, a silent bolt of lightning tore through the sky, turning the entire living room a ghastly white.

"I need to return to the organization, create a finished antidote, and let you all return to normal life. I also want to make this greedy idea disappear completely!"

This is the karma left behind by her parents, and she will eventually have to end it all!

.....

Outside the window, the rain was pouring down, but Mihana Hospital was as quiet as ever.

Conan sat on the hospital bed, looking at the news reports on his phone.

[Metropolitan Police Department reports on villa shooting: Female victim found in bizarre situation at crime scene; public appeal for clues]

[The Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department issued a major case report today: A female body was found in an upscale villa in the western part of Shirakawa Bay. Preliminary investigation at the scene revealed that the body was located in the living room, with a fatal gunshot wound to the heart, and an unregistered handgun was found in her hand.]

The deceased's identity is unknown; the furniture around the body was severely damaged; the autopsy confirmed the time of death was 72 hours prior; no CCTV footage was available...

The case has been classified as a "Special Investigation Headquarters-level murder case." Anyone who witnessed the incident near the time of the crime or has information about visitors to the villa is urged to contact the Metropolitan Police Department's First Investigative Division immediately. A reward of up to 300 million yen is offered for valid leads.

Conan stared at the report released by the Metropolitan Police Department, his brows furrowing more and more as he read.

An unregistered handgun, suicide... and obvious signs of a struggle—nothing about it seems normal.

For some reason, he was inexplicably concerned about this case.

Amuro Tooru was also watching this news.

Compared to Conan, who only knows a partial picture through news reports, he immediately retrieved relevant case information and even saw photos of the deceased.