Conan: When Shinjiu and Maolilan swap bodies

It is the power of the gods!

Time will flow backward in their hands! Aging will return to youth, and death will be trampled underfoot!

They are the new generation of gods!

These lives are but a negligible price to pay before the throne of God.

Ai Haibara lowered her eyes, her eyelashes casting a small shadow in the pale light, obscuring the fleeting sneer in her eyes.

god?

Mortals call themselves gods.

The throne is forged with the blood of others, and the ladder to heaven is built with countless bones.

Turn living people into numbers, curves, or a few lines of text in experimental records.

Then stand on the corpses, close your eyes, cover your ears, and tell yourself—this is a great achievement, a miracle, an inevitable path of human evolution.

It's ridiculous.

That withered, decaying thing, long past its time in the earth, wants to continue sitting on the throne built of countless bones, to continue watching more people die with its murky eyes…

dream!

Crumbs from the energy bar fell softly from her palm, landing in the pale light like silent specks of dust.

She glanced down at the crushed energy bar, tossed it into the trash can, and then followed Fiano's footsteps toward the observation room.

The lights in the observation room were as stark white as those in the laboratory.

A pane of glass separates two worlds. On one side are cold instruments and a detached observer; on the other—a middle-aged man lies on a bed.

His body was covered in a dense array of testing devices, the electrode patches gleaming metallically under the light. His chest rose and fell slightly; he was still alive, unaware of what he was about to face.

Fiano stood in front of the observation window, looking at the sleeping person inside.

"Let's begin."

Chapter 601 She is the murderer

Through the observation window, the middle-aged man woke up.

The moment he opened his eyes, Ai Haibara saw the fear and confusion in them. He didn't know where he was, or what would happen next.

Electrode patches were densely packed on his body, like some kind of terrifying parasite. The thin wires connected to the cold instruments, turning him into a string of numbers about to jump.

Fiano pressed the intercom.

"start."

An assistant entered the cubicle and forcibly fed him the medication. He struggled, but couldn't break free of the restraints.

Ai Haibara forced herself to stare.

She stared intently at every scene, every change, every scream. She had to etch them into her mind, into her bones. This was her debt; she had to remember it.

One second. Two seconds. Three seconds.

The test subject began to tremble. At first, it was just a slight spasm, then his body bounced violently on the bed, like a fish thrown ashore.

The excruciating pain of his cells tearing apart caused him to scream—a sound that wasn't squeezed out of his throat, but rather exploded from his entire body.

Ai Haibara's fingers clenched the notebook tightly.

Fifteen seconds. Thirty seconds. One minute.

His body was shrinking. At a visible speed, his skin wrinkled, his bones contracted, and his muscles atrophied. The process was like a videotape on fast-forward, a living person being forcibly twisted into another form.

He remained at the level of an eight or nine-year-old.

After shrinking, he slipped out of the loosened restraints. His tiny hands trembled as he raised them to his eyes, staring in shock at his unfamiliar body. A sliver of reason seemed to return; he opened his mouth, as if wanting to ask something, but then didn't know what to ask.

"Success?" Fiano's eyes lit up as he looked at the various testing instruments beside him. Blood pressure, heart rate, and brain waves were displayed on the screens—everything looked perfectly normal.

Ai Haibara didn't speak. She just stared at the clock on the wall.

Three minutes later.

The test subject suddenly began to tremble again. This time it was more violent than before; the small body twisted and convulsed on the bed, as if being torn apart from the inside by something. The young face contorted into a ferocious shape, and the screams were so shrill they almost pierced the eardrums.

Three seconds. Five seconds. Ten seconds.

He stopped moving.

The body lay curled up on the hospital bed, looking like a seven or eight-year-old child, eyes still open, mouth slightly agape as if shouting something. The distorted expression on that innocent face was frozen in time.

Something in my stomach suddenly churned up.

Ai Haibara gritted her teeth, suppressing the nausea. Holding the clipboard, her fingers white, she tried to keep her voice steady:

"3 minutes and 43 seconds. The key to maintaining stability in the shrunken state has not yet been determined, and detailed comparative data is needed."

She put the record board down.

"I'm going to the restroom."

Fiano glanced at her, then his gaze quickly returned to the fluctuating numbers. He no longer cared about her. He only cared about the numbers.

The assistant followed closely behind until Ai Haibara entered the restroom stall.

The moment the cubicle door closed, Ai Haibara seemed to lose all her strength. Leaning against the door, her body slowly slid down until she almost knelt on the ground.

She leaned over the toilet and gagged violently.

My stomach is contracting, my esophagus is spasming, but I can't vomit anything. I haven't eaten much for the past few days. Energy bars, coffee. Energy bars, coffee. My stomach is empty, only that acidic and bitter liquid is churning inside.

Tears welled up without her noticing. Large drops rolled down her cheeks, splashing onto the toilet rim and the floor tiles. She raised her hand and covered her mouth tightly, her shoulders trembling violently.

Pairs of eyes appeared in my mind.

Young, old, naive, fearful, numb...

They took the medicine she had made herself and died one by one before her eyes.

She couldn't deceive herself.

She is the murderer.

Even with a thousand reasons and ten thousand unavoidable circumstances, nothing can change this fact. They died at her hands, at the hands of her drugs. Her hands concocted the poison that took their lives.

Tears seeped through his fingers and streamed down his knuckles.

She huddled on the floor of the cubicle, leaning against the door, her whole body trembling.

I don't know how much time has passed.

A knock came at the door.

"Shirley?" the assistant's female voice came from outside the door. "Five minutes."

Ai Haibara's eyelashes trembled.

She raised her hand and wiped her face hard with her sleeve.

Five minutes have passed.

She had been vulnerable for five minutes.

She doesn't have much time to be vulnerable. She has so much to do. Time is running out. Every minute and every second counts.

She stood up, pressed the flush button, pushed open the door, and went out.

The assistant stood by the sink, looking at her red-rimmed eyes, her face expressionless. She didn't speak, offer comfort, or ask questions. She was simply confirming that she was still there, that she was alright, and that she could go back to work.

Ai Haibara walked to the sink and turned on the tap.

When cold water was poured onto my hands, the water in front of me turned red.

Her hands were immersed in blood, the red seeping from between her fingers, dripping down her knuckles, drop by drop, into the white sink, spreading into scarlet flowers.

Upon closer inspection, it seemed to be just an illusion.

The water was still clean and clear, and her hands were spotless.

She stared silently at the flowing water, watching it turn red one moment and return to transparency the next, like some kind of cruel game.

After a long while, she scooped up some icy water and splashed it on her face.

The icy water lashed against her skin, and her consciousness felt as if it were being slowly tortured in this desperate lucidity. Lucidity was painful, but she needed this pain. The pain reminded her who she was and what she needed to do.

She turned off the tap, took out a few tissues, and dried her hands.

Then I looked up and saw myself in the mirror.

His face was as pale as paper. His eyes were sunken, his lips were cracked, and there were two dark circles under his eyes.

Those eyes seemed to have lost their light, yet also seemed to still burn with the last embers of a dark flame.

She stared at those eyes for two seconds.

Then he turned around and walked out of the restroom.

Stepping out of the restroom, she paused. Two figures approached from the hallway ahead. Koniak was still dressed as usual, all in black with a hood, while Gin beside him wore a cold expression, giving off an unapproachable air.

Upon seeing her, Koniak raised an eyebrow, a playful smile appearing in his scarlet eyes.

"Oh dear."

He drawled out the last syllable, took a few steps to stand in front of her, bent down slightly, and leaned close to stare at her face. His eyes swept from left to right, then from right to left, as if admiring some rare object.

“Dear Shirley,” he said, his tone laced with undisguised teasing, “you look so haggard after just a few days?”

He reached out and lightly touched her eye socket with his fingertip.

"Look at those dark circles under his eyes. Tsk tsk tsk, they're even darker than Gin's."

Gin: "..."

Chapter 602 Gin, you want to flirt with me?

Neither of them reacted. Qingze withdrew his hand, put it back in his pocket, and turned to walk towards the research lab.

"Come on, come on, don't just stand here." He glanced back at Ai Haibara, his tone urging, "Don't you have to go back to work? The boss is waiting for the results."

Ai Haibara stood still, watching his back, without moving.

Qingze took two steps, then realized that the person hadn't followed, so he stopped and looked back at her.

"What?" He tilted his head, a mischievous glint in his eyes beneath the hood. "Do you want me to carry you over?"

Ai Haibara took a deep breath and started walking to catch up.

The door to the research room was pushed open, and the stark white light was still glaring.

Fiano was standing in front of the data terminal when he saw the three people enter, and he nodded to Gin.

Gin ignored him and went straight to the computer to check the experimental records.

Qingze, on the other hand, was quite at ease. He sat down in the chair, put his legs up on the stool next to him, and sank into the back of the chair, his posture as lazy as if he were in his own living room.

“Fiano,” he said, his tone casual, “do you all have some kind of evil spirit around you? Why are you all so pale and have dark circles under your eyes, like your life force has been drained?”

Fiano glanced at him and rolled his eyes.

With tight deadlines and heavy workloads, I'm staying up late every day and drinking coffee like water. Can I really stop?

Ai Haibara walked to her lab bench to check the data from the experiment she had just completed. (When Koniak is not present.)

Qingze didn't seem to care and continued, "I think you guys should take a break. Otherwise, if you're distracted one day and mix up the reagents, blow up the lab, and all your research will be for nothing!"

Ai Haibara's fingers paused on the keyboard.

"Konyak," Gin's voice came from the data terminal, "Shut up."

Qingze shrugged. "I'm just reminding you. After all, you guys are all acting like ghosts, some of you are even mentally unstable. That possibility is not small."

No one paid him any attention, and the research room fell silent as those who were busy continued with their work.

Gin flipped through the experimental records on his computer page by page. He didn't spend time watching the videos one by one, but went straight to the experimental records.

All the results so far have been death. Of the test subjects he captured, only the Karasuma family members reacted to Drug A. Those outside the family did not experience any adverse reactions after taking it; they all died directly without exception.

Koniak was right; the drug really does only work on specific bloodlines.