Jiangxia Tongzhi: "…"
This mission's gotten weird. Gin's treating him like a walking crime manual.
Thankfully, he'd seen enough episodes of Detective Conan to hold his own. His bag of tricks should be enough. He just wasn't sure yet if this trip would involve ghosts… or murderous auras.
…
The mission site this time was a little far—Shizuoka.
Jiangxia arrived by car, and it was already dark when he pulled out of the station.
The location Gin had texted was a platform near the station.
When he got there, Gin and Vodka hadn't arrived yet.
He pulled out his phone to check if the task had been postponed. But before he could even unlock the screen, a figure emerged from the corner convenience store.
It was a tall young man in sunglasses, walking briskly, clearly distracted.
Jiangxia glanced over—and froze.
There was a flickering cloud of murderous aura surrounding the guy. His emotions must be unstable; the aura kept blinking in and out, like some kind of homicidal strobe light.
To Jiangxia, the guy basically looked like a human-shaped disco ball of danger.
The disco ball—whose actual name was Akira Shirakura—was deep in thought about recent troubles and wandered off in a daze.
Halfway to the parking lot, he noticed Jiangxia staring at him with unsettling enthusiasm.
Startled, Akira Shirakura tripped and fell on the spot. His car keys flew from his hand and landed near Jiangxia's feet.
Jiangxia calmly put on gloves, picked up the key, and walked over to help him up. He even gave him a friendly pat to brush the dust off. "You okay?"
"N-no, I'm fine…"Akira Shirakura replied, heart pounding at the intensity of Jiangxia's stare.
But then, on second glance, Akira Shirakura thought maybe he'd overreacted. The guy didn't look dangerous... though he was still holding his car key hostage, so escape wasn't really an option.
A little uneasy, Akira Shirakura kept his guard up—but didn't overthink it.
He was a model, and his career was just taking off. He was already somewhat well-known.
To him, this guy was probably just a fan—an overenthusiastic fan. This kind of aggressive look wasn't uncommon from fans.
Not uncommon, but not welcome, either.
Still, he tried to yank the key back twice, and Jiangxia didn't let go.
To avoid a scene, Akira Shirakura forced a smile. "Want me to sign something for you?"
Jiangxia nodded and tore a slip of paper from his notebook.
He wasn't interested in the autograph. He just wanted the guy's name—there was a murderous aura hanging around, and he needed to figure out what case it was related to.
Matching 2D anime to 3D humans was hard. Names were easier.
Soon, Akira Shirakura handed back the paper with his signature.
Jiangxia took one look at the name and knew.
—This was the weirdo who offed his professor over some embarrassing crossdressing photos.
Just as he was wondering whether to poke at that lingering murder aura a bit more, a flash of black caught his eye.
A Porsche 356A had pulled up quietly across the street.
Jiangxia sighed inwardly. Duty calls. Not the best time to go poking.
Akira Shirakura, seeing Jiangxia still wasn't letting go, prompted awkwardly: "Uh, my car key…"
Jiangxia came back to himself and let the key go, watching the murder-model scurry off with a bit of regret.
Then he crossed the road, opened the Porsche's back door, and climbed in.
Gin, watching Akira Shirakura disappear, asked: "Who was that?"
"Dunno. Chatted a few times in passing. Think he's famous or something," Jiangxia replied. He reached forward, pulled out the car's cigarette lighter, and used it to set fire to the autograph paper, then dropped it into the ashtray.
If Akira Shirakura was about to get wrapped up in a murder case, Jiangxia had zero interest in being found carrying his signature.
Gin watched the paper burn. It really was just a signature.
And this meeting point was one they'd agreed on in advance—if Jiangxia wanted to sneak around or betray the organization, this wasn't the place to do it.
Since it didn't involve the org, Gin dropped the issue.
He handed over a slip of paper with some phone numbers and a name: "Masami Hirota."
Jiangxia glanced at it. An old man.
This Professor Hirota was Miyano Akemi's professor—the guy who liked backing up all his photos to CDs like it was still 1999.
Before Akemi's death, she'd borrowed some vacation photos from him and passed them along to Sherry for fun. When Sherry returned the disks, she accidentally mixed in some classified organization info.
After Sherry defected, that mistake couldn't be buried. The org traced the missing disk back to Hirota—Akemi had accidentally returned the wrong one.
Now Gin was here to retrieve the lost material—and make sure no one who might've seen it lived to talk.
Problem was, Professor Hirota wasn't some no-name. He had social status, connections, and the added sympathy of just having lost a student. If he suddenly turned up dead, it could draw attention.
So Gin brought Jiangxia.
The plan: fake an accident or a suicide.
But to pull that off, they couldn't just bust the door down.
Hence, the phone number. Gin wanted Jiangxia to call first, pretend to be an insurance salesman or something, so Hirota would open the door without a fuss.
That way, even if Hirota declined the "sales pitch," it'd look like a normal interaction. No suspicion if they stopped by later.
Jiangxia entered the number… but paused before dialing.
"I've been on a few shows recently. If he watches detective dramas, he might recognize my voice. And if I try to fake it, it'll sound unnatural."
That was an excuse.
Jiangxia just didn't want to make the call.
Landlines had answering machines. If Hirota didn't pick up, it'd go to voicemail. Hanging up without a word would seem shady. But saying anything meant leaving a voice recording—and then they'd have to retrieve the tape later.
Gin probably hadn't thought about that. To him, the call was just prelude. After that, they'd break in, do the job, and clean up the mess.
But Jiangxia didn't trust it.
Gin was strong, sure. But the man's luck was so bad it practically looped around and cursed others. Anything could happen—random murder case, police blockade, whatever. And once that tape was out there, it was out.
*Goal #1: Top 200 fanfics published within the last 30 - 90 days by POWER STONES.
Progress: 8/60(approx) for 10 BONUS CHAPTERS
Goal #2: One BONUS CHAPTER per review for the first 10 REVIEWS.
Progress:1/10*