Conan: Science Cartoonist Kudo Yuji

"This is too slow, even slower than the trucks that transported war criminals in the movies."

It had been ten hours since we left Kyoto. The once bright sky was finally dimming. As we drove through a small town in Aichi, Yuuji slightly pulled back the passenger-side curtains to block out the interior.

"It's only 8 p.m., and there's no one on the street anymore."

“After all, it’s not a big city like Kyoto or Tokyo. If it weren’t a main road, I doubt even the streetlights would be on.” Kenzo Masuyama said soothingly when he heard the young lady’s complaint.

"Young Master and Miss Marina are still asleep. We need to find a place to rest."

"These two guys fell asleep as soon as they got in the car. Will they even be able to sleep tonight?"

Kuroba Jintaro fiddled with a deck of cards with sharp edges in his hand. Having left Kyoto, he had lost his carefree attitude and was now extremely wary.

"Don't worry, Mr. Kuroba, we have some good self-defense items in the car."

Noticing that there seemed to be a shop selling dango (rice dumplings) still open at the intersection ahead, with a small lamp hanging at the entrance, Masuyama Kenzo turned off the engine and got out of the car, leaving the four children in the car.

"If someone is acting suspiciously, there's a Sten gun in the trunk under the passenger seat."

Upon hearing this, Yuuji immediately pulled the gun out from under his buttocks and held it to his chest, checking the gun while using it as a windproof shield to observe his surroundings.

"You seem to be very familiar with guns?" Jintaro watched as the boy deftly loaded the magazine.

“When we have free time, my family will take us to the beaches in Hawaii to shoot guns. I’ve touched this gun before.”

Yuuji turned his head smugly and patted the barrel of his gun: "I have a P08, it's really cool."

"What's so cool about guns?" Jintaro frowned, looking at Yuuji like a child who had just received a toy. "They're just weapons used to take other people's lives."

"Well, that makes sense." It's impossible to talk to people of this era about how cool or stylish guns are, since no country has yet recovered from the trauma of war.

"He is back."

Kenzo Masuyama opened the car door and got in, placing the paper-wrapped rice cake in Yuuji's arms with a bitter expression.

"This is troublesome. The guesthouse here is closed because of a serious terrorist incident that happened recently in the area, so they are refusing to let outsiders stay here."

"The hotel must be gone too." Kuromaru Yata, who had woken up at some point, sat up straight and leaned forward: "A horror event? What was that?"

"The shop owner wouldn't explain clearly, he just told us to drive away that night." Kenzo Masuyama slumped over the steering wheel, realizing that he didn't know where to go next and that driving was very unsafe.

"Didn't you notice whether this family has a habit of reading newspapers?" Yuuji weighed the dumpling in his arms. The outer layer was newspaper, and the inner layer was oil paper.

"This is from last week, it's a local Aichi newspaper." Yuuji glanced at the front of the newspaper after opening it.

"They're all things related to Kyoto."

He turned the newspaper around and looked at it from top to bottom, finally finding information about missing local children in a corner.

"Look, here's a special section that publishes photos of newly missing children."

Below the photo are more than twenty names, all of them of lost children.

"It should be related to this." (End of Chapter)