Chapter 55
The door closed in the darkness. Fan An’s sleepiness had completely vanished.
The space beside her on the bed was still warm. The person who had been holding her intimately just minutes ago had walked out alone into the bitter winter night.
Fan An had been living in Beika Town for almost half a year. She was long accustomed to the rhythm of the City of Crime. Here, anything could be a weapon, and the residents’ skill at hand-crafting bombs put top students to shame.
Guns weren’t rare. Amuro Tooru’s profession was a detective. If he kept a gun at home for self-defense, even if the magazine was loaded with live rounds, Fan An wouldn’t have thought anything of it.
If it had been any other time, she would have gladly helped Detective Amuro film a “What’s In My Bag” vlog:
Hello everyone, and welcome to the “What’s In My Bag” of our very own Working Emperor, who grinds away at a café and also hauls bricks at crime scenes. Next, I’ll be introducing some must-have items for the hardworking professional. This is not sponsored, so family, please be cautious before you get influenced to buy.
First up is this luminol reagent, a definite repurchase. It’s incredibly practical, something you can’t go a day without. It truly deserves its title as the best-selling daily necessity in Beika Town. I recommend getting the family-sized value pack. You get more for less, and it comes with a free sample, perfect for fellow detectives to carry with them on the go.
Next is this roll of fishing line—as we all know, the favorite line of any suspect confessing their method is, “It was the fishing line! I added fishing line!” As a detective, carrying fishing line in your bag helps to evoke the culprit’s fear of the evidence, making it easier to break down their psychological defenses.
And finally, we have this handgun. A classic model with excellent endurance, suitable for scenarios where the culprit attempts to escape by taking a hostage. You can be one step ahead and shoot the hostage—ah, no, I mean, take down the culprit, and restore justice to the world.
What a practical and educational “What’s In My Bag” vlog. I suggest the algorithm recommend this to all new rookie detectives, to help them avoid detours and secure their iron rice bowl in the City of Crime sooner.
“Why did it have to be tonight?” the girl murmured to herself.
Tonight’s outing was definitely not in Amuro Tooru’s plans. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have invited her to stay the night.
It was more like he had been called away at the last minute, to a meeting he couldn’t refuse.
What kind of meeting takes place in the middle of the night, requiring a baseball cap to hide one’s face and a gun?
“It can’t possibly be a proper meeting,” Fan An quickly concluded, and deduced the most likely truth:
Her boyfriend had been dragged into an illegal pyramid scheme!
A detective getting involved in a pyramid scheme was like an anti-fraud police officer getting scammed in an online relationship. It was too embarrassing to talk about.
An’an had a sudden realization. So that’s it. That’s why Tōru-kun didn’t ask her for help. He wanted to solve the problem by himself, to avoid leaving a black mark on his record.
Unfortunately, Amuro had underestimated her perceptiveness. An’an’s sleep quality was indeed usually so good it was like she was in a coma, but at critical moments, her intuition would guide her!
“I can’t alert the enemy,” An’an decisively determined her course of action. “Tōru-kun is very prideful. If I ask him directly, he definitely won’t tell me the truth.”
Being caught up in a pyramid scheme sounds so shameful. If his girlfriend found out, she would never let him hear the end of it.
“I have to take it slow.”
Around five or six in the morning, Amuro Tooru returned home, bringing a chill with him.
He took off his coat in the entryway, went into the bathroom to wash his hands thoroughly, and only after he had warmed up did he slowly walk into the bedroom.
The girl was wrapped in the quilt, fast asleep. She still looked completely carefree. When he picked her up, she unconsciously nuzzled against him, turned over, and snuggled into his arms to continue sleeping.
Amuro held both the quilt and the person, gently patting his lover’s back.
It seemed An’an hadn’t woken up in the middle of the night and didn’t know he had been gone for a few hours.
Amuro breathed a sigh of relief. Although he had prepared an excuse in advance, it was definitely better not to lie. He was already a bad person who was deceiving his girlfriend with his very name. Lying more would really make his conscience uneasy.
‘It’s all Gin’s fault,’ Bourbon gritted his teeth.
Waking someone up from their warm bed in the middle of a cold winter night to work overtime. Is that something a human would do?
If you want to be the distillery’s workhorse, can’t you just do it yourself? Do you have to drag all the employees along to make progress together to be happy?
Gin didn’t know that Bourbon had so many complaints. Wasn’t Bourbon also a famous “king of internal competition” in the organization? When he received an invitation from a colleague to work overtime on a lonely night, shouldn’t he have gladly accepted?
Bourbon: I don’t know how to explain this to someone who doesn’t have a girlfriend.
Go back to the distillery, Gin, go back. Go find Vodka. Good brothers, single dogs, walk side by side.
The temporary mission hadn’t been difficult, but it had served as a wake-up call for Amuro.
‘As expected… living together is still not an option.’
Living under the same roof, waking up in the morning to see the girl’s sweet sleeping face. It would be fun to move quietly and let her continue to sleep, or to be mischievous and wake her up.
She would try to escape reality by burying her face in the pillow, muttering and complaining, only to spring out of bed a second later.
The bathroom would be too crowded for two people. The girl, combing her hair in front of the mirror, would complain that he had pressed on her hair again last night. If this continues, I’m going to go bald!
Gomen. As compensation, he would definitely ask Gin for the group-buy link for his hair care set.
(T/N: “Gomen” is Japanese for “sorry.”)
The kitchen would be bustling in the morning. He would have to make breakfast and also prepare a bento for the girl to take to the set, and at the same time, be on guard against the thief who randomly appeared at the cooking station.
A very bad thief, who loved to cause trouble when he was busy, doing all sorts of bad things under the guise of helping. When she was caught, she would play dumb and look innocent.
Just thinking about it was a headache. If An’an moved in, the mornings would definitely be as chaotic as a battlefield.
Amuro unconsciously curved his lips, as if he could already foresee a daily life of being tormented.
It was just a wall apart. They didn’t even need to hire a moving company. Just pass the luggage from the left hand to the right, and re-register under the apartment manager’s “I knew this day would come” gaze.
But it couldn’t be.
The phone on the bedside table was quiet, as if it didn’t exist. But once it lit up—a message from Public Security or the Black Organization—the young man named “Amuro Tooru” would become another person.
The one who belonged to his lover was only one-third of him.
‘Being neighbors is already the optimal solution,’ the undercover Public Security officer thought silently.
Some distances that seem very close are, in fact, difficult to cross.
…
An’an took a nap.
When she woke up, her back was pressed against a warm chest. The girl looked up, her vision filled with dazzling blond hair.
Dark circles really weren’t obvious on dark skin. You could only see a hint of them at a super close distance. No need for concealer.
No wonder he dared to sneak out in the middle of the night without fear of being discovered.
Being stared at by An’an, the blond young man’s eyelids twitched. He fully opened his eyes in a few breaths, his gaze clear and awake.
“Good morning,” Amuro said, his voice slightly hoarse.
“Bad morning,” An’an said, closing her eyes in front of him. “How strange. Why is the sky still dark?”
Amuro chuckled, his chest vibrating. The girl couldn’t pretend to be asleep anymore and pushed him with her hand.
“I didn’t eat a single proper meal yesterday,” An’an whined. “Shouldn’t you compensate me with a super-deluxe meal today?”
Unlike yesterday’s unyielding attitude of not giving her a break, the blond young man agreed good-naturedly and let An’an order.
The girl shamelessly ordered a feast. Amuro calculated the ingredients needed and decided to go out again.
An’an refused to go with him, using the cold weather as an excuse. She was only responsible for tapping her bowl and waiting for food.
The moment Amuro left, the dark-haired girl immediately got up and climbed over the balcony to go home.
She found a box in the depths of a drawer in her room, opened it, took out the contents, and then climbed back over the balcony.
An’an: “I thought I would never have to use this.”
This was a return gift she had received for helping an old man in need.
A few months ago, Fan An had met an old man in a white lab coat on the street. The old man was being pointed at and scolded.
“You heartless, evil scientist!” the person shouted. “You said you would give me money if I helped you test the effects of an anesthetic. One shot, and I slept for half a month!”
Dr. Agasa: “Because this anesthetic has been used on the same person for thirty years… Mouri-kun’s resistance is getting stronger and stronger, so I had to increase the dosage.”
The person: “Shut up! You just wanted to knock me out and cut out my kidneys to sell!”
Dr. Agasa: “It’s a misunderstanding! I really didn’t. Your resistance is just too weak.”
Seeing that the old man was about to be beaten, the ordinary, passing, enthusiastic citizen of Beika Town, Miss An, stood up.
She had only one question: “The evil scientist asked you to test a drug. Did he pay you in full? Was it higher or lower than the average income in Beika?”
The person: “He paid… it was half a month’s salary.”
Fan An: “Didn’t you just get half a month of paid leave? Is there such a good thing?”
You’re in the midst of good fortune but don’t know it. The enthusiastic citizen condemns you!
“Thank you for speaking up for me,” Dr. Agasa said gratefully. “I have no way to repay you. I only have a few small inventions. Do you see anything you need?”
He held up a soccer ball-shaped bomb, a soccer ball-shaped tear gas canister, a soccer ball-shaped smoke bomb, a soccer ball-shaped…
Fan An: A fifty-year-old man is a soccer fanatic!
Dr. Agasa: No, no. It’s because a child I know is very good at soccer.
Fan An: I see. He’s serving time in Blue Lock, and you miss your grandson, so you made all your inventions soccer-shaped?
What a subarashii deduction. Kudo Shinichi would henceforth be known as Kudo Yoichi.
(T/N: A reference to the anime/manga “Blue Lock.”)
Fan An had politely refused everything soccer-shaped. She was from Yokohama, originally from Kanagawa, a die-hard supporter of Rikkai Dai, and only recognized tennis ball-shaped bombs.
(T/N: A reference to the anime/manga “The Prince of Tennis.”)
Miss An: Tennis is a life-or-death slaughterhouse. Can soccer do that?
No one has ever died in your soccer. So what if you’re a high school student? The middle school students who play tennis are on a whole other level.
Dr. Agasa had failed to sell Shinichi’s favorite soccer-shaped inventions. He dejectedly handed Fan An a plain little box. “A not-so-creative invention. Take it and play with it, benefactor.”
A not-so-creative invention, meaning a super-thin tracking device that could turn optically invisible, was immune to signal blocking and 2G internet speeds, and could achieve cross-provincial tracking. It was known as the stalker’s favorite jelly.
An’an put on gloves. She deftly pulled open the hidden drawer in Amuro’s room and stuck the thin sheet on the gun.
An almost invisible effect. Very perfect. Even An’an, who had stuck it on herself, couldn’t find it.
Why stick it on the gun? An’an had her own considerations.
In dramas, people usually stick trackers on other people’s clothes or shoes. But how would she know which clothes or shoes Amuro would wear to the pyramid scheme’s den?
He wasn’t Silver-Haired Model Bro, who wore the same set of clothes all year round.
“But he will definitely take this gun,” An’an said with certainty.
The gun had obvious signs of maintenance. It was clear that its owner took good care of it.
And another thing, the gun could help An’an determine her boyfriend’s purpose for going out.
If he didn’t take the gun, then he wasn’t going to the pyramid scheme’s den, so she wouldn’t have to sneakily follow him for half a day only to end up staring at him at a late-night barbecue stall.
Fan An finished her preparations, cleaned up the scene, and nonchalantly waited for Amuro to come home for dinner.
At the dinner table, all the dishes she had requested were there. The food was so delicious that the girl was deeply moved and secretly swore: Don’t worry, Tōru-kun! I will definitely rescue you from the pyramid scheme’s den!
Damn it! Such a handsome and kind-hearted person! How could you pyramid schemers bear to do this?!
An’an went back to her own home after dinner. Given that he had suddenly received Gin’s life-or-death summons last night, Amuro was reluctant but did not ask her to stay.
Time passed, second by second. At night, the dark-haired girl, who was playing on her phone in bed, leaped up.
“The tracker is moving!”
On the screen, a flashing dot of light began to move, gradually moving away from the Trojan Horse Apartments.
An’an, without a word, put on her pre-prepared night-crawling clothes, a black mask that covered most of her face, and grabbed her phone and keys and went out.
Her phone’s speed dial 1 was directly connected to Inspector Megure—the legendary police officer in Beika who was on call 24/7 and had the fastest response time. There was no crime scene that Megure Juzo couldn’t get to!
Also, An’an touched the boning knife hidden in her clothes. She was by no means unarmed.
A mere pyramid scheme’s den. She would tear it down tonight!
“Tōru-kun will definitely be very surprised later.”
As An’an followed her boyfriend, who was out in the middle of the night, she shook her head and sighed. “Although being involved in a pyramid scheme is a little embarrassing, how could he keep it from me? Is he afraid that his image in my heart will change from a reliable adult man to a clumsy beauty?”
No, no. He’s just trapped in a pyramid scheme’s den. It’s not even a fraction of the pits Suspect An has fallen into in her life. How could An’an laugh at him?
Tōru-kun will always be the handsome and kind-hearted Tōru-kun in her heart.
The tracker stopped in the depths of an alley. The dark-haired girl pressed herself against the wall at the corner and held her breath, peeking out.
In the dark night, a dimly lit streetlight barely illuminated the depths of the alley.
The blond young man was half-squatting, a man lying face down on the ground in front of him.
The muzzle of the gun impatiently tapped the man’s temple. Bourbon’s voice was icy. “Still trying to run?”
As his words fell, he suddenly looked up and stared at the corner of the alley. “Who’s there? Come out!”