Conan: Science Cartoonist Kudo Yuji

"So, this is the shelter hospital after the West Side bombing?"

Walking along the smoky street, Higashino III looked at the overcrowded West District Hospital and sneezed. Fine dust particles in the air made his nose sting, but thankfully he had just received a mask from the checkpoint, so he immediately opened it and put it on.

"It's completely useless."

Two consecutive sneezes left his mask soaked with saliva, offering no relief whatsoever. He glanced at the people sitting listlessly at the hospital entrance and, feeling a pang of pity, walked a little further away.

"hateful!"

Some of the people with bandages, kneeling on the ground wailing and crying, were mostly family members who had not survived. Unlike the dazed people, the people at the door were mostly uninjured; they were probably working in the East District when they suddenly heard a loud bang, and in an instant, they were the only survivors in their homes.

Is this the area used by the police?

Just as Higashino III was about to walk over, he suddenly noticed some police officers he had seen at the Osaka Police Headquarters. Worried that Ran Mouri would tell the chief to take him back, the boy immediately jumped into the bushes and covered himself with a thin layer of black and gray leaves.

"Did Minister Aoyama really disappear here? That must have happened during the period when the surveillance system failed."

"That old elevator doesn't even have a floor database. If it were like the one at headquarters, we could know which floor Minister Aoyama went to back then."

A policewoman covered her nose and mouth with a handkerchief.

"Sasaki Kiyose's body, or rather their bodies... Has the chief said when they will be sent for examination?" A male police officer in a suit turned to the person walking at the back, who was clearly the leader.

"No, his body isn't the main focus right now. What we need to figure out is the type of bomb. Have the measurement results for the underground gas pipelines come out yet?" "Firefighters are still fighting the fire. In many places, the surface looks fine, but the underground is still burning. Entering without an oxygen tank could easily cause poisoning." A person holding a tablet reminded us, "Several hundred bodies that died from carbon monoxide poisoning have already been sent for cremation."

"Let's choose the nearest pipe explosion point that's already extinguished and go take a look."

The leader made the decision, and then the police officers all went outside. After a few minutes, when they could no longer hear any voices, Higashino III jumped out of the bushes again.

"Fortunately, I kept following the path where there were living people."

He walked into the hospital building, stood at the elevator door, and while waiting for the elevator to come up, he thought about where he should go to see something.

"Go to where those injured police officers are... They probably won't even pay attention to me, and they might even call a doctor to take me to the ward. I'll go see Sasaki Kiyose's body first."

After confirming that the flash function on his glasses was working properly, he took the elevator directly to the morgue floor, pausing briefly as he exited the elevator.

"Wait a minute, I remember the old man saying that Sasaki Kiyose died at the epicenter of the explosion. How could his body still exist after an explosion of that magnitude?"

It probably doesn't even qualify as a solid mass; at best, it's powder.

Higashino III turned to look back at the elevator, because someone upstairs was using it and it was already going up, but the person wasn't going to the morgue.

"But those police officers just mentioned Sasaki Kiyose's body. Does that mean it has nothing to do with Sasaki Kiyose at all?" (End of Chapter)