The unscrupulous detective in Conan

Chapter 1274 If they really discovered something, they'll just stay silent again.
Fujino was naturally a heartless capitalist.

Capital, in essence, is the use of any means necessary to achieve profit, maximizing human efficiency and the benefits created.

Instead of messing around and ruining their reputation.

If you really cause widespread anger and resentment, who among your subordinates will be willing to work for you?
Not to mention efficiency...

Exploitation, in essence, is about squeezing the value of people, using all available means, including welfare, to obtain higher efficiency and profits.

As for those who think about exploitation all day long, but don't pay attention to the efficiency and value that the exploited employees themselves are squeezed out of.

They don't deserve to be called capitalists at all.

Those were landlords, rich landlords, and slave owners from the old feudal world.

The capitalists of the New World simply don't play that game.

…………

As night fell, Conan, Ai Haibara, and Professor Agasa emerged from the house of that grandson of the model shop owner.

Conan couldn't help but sigh. He thought he had encountered another case, but in the end it was just a misunderstanding caused by a Tiger tank model, which made him feel a little disappointed.

However, the problem isn't too serious!
At least this time, we've pretty much figured out what's going on with Hondo Eisuke!
"Finally, we're going to dive down..."

"The people in the company often wear black suits."

"My colleagues are all foreigners."

Conan, sitting in Professor Agasa's Volkswagen Beetle, stroked his chin: "It seems things are getting clearer..."

"Good, Luck, NO pain, no gain."

"Company".

Ai Haibara sat to the side, her eyes slightly lowered, "It seems we guessed who the other person was from the very beginning..."

"Company, people from the company, the CIA?"

"Yes."

Conan nodded in agreement: "To conceal their identities, CIA agents often say their profession is 'Company'!"

"Given the descriptions given by those people, it's probably the CIA."

"But don't you find it strange?" Ai Haibara retorted, speechless. "They're operating in a foreign country, yet they're talking about 'company' and even saying they're going to infiltrate in a small restaurant..."

"Emmm... I don't think it's surprising."

Conan pondered for a moment. He thought about it and realized that the FBI agents he had encountered seemed to be of similar level, so he figured that the CIA and FBI were probably around this level.

"..." Ai Haibara fell silent. She didn't know what to say. It was supposed to be such a high-class thing, but after all this, it seemed a bit of a letdown.

That's very unprofessional.

It's not like what's shown in the movies.

As I once told Fujino: This world is a giant makeshift operation; it seems so.

After thinking about it for a moment, she spoke again, her tone slightly doubtful and speculative:

"Since this person is a CIA agent, then could it be that Eisuke Hondo is one too?"

"That's not certain yet." Conan shook his head slightly. "The CIA probably wouldn't go so far as to recruit a little kid into their organization..."

"..." Ai Haibara fell silent again, recalling the old tradition of these Europeans employing child labor during the Great Depression.

Well, it’s hard to say.

"However, we can make a guess about Mizunashi Rena."

Conan then changed his mind and asked, "You said before that there should be quite a few spies from various countries in the organization, right?"

"Hmm, I don't know the exact number of countries." Ai Haibara thought for a moment, "At least the FBI in M6, we find quite a few in the organization every year, as well as CIA agents, and even some high-ranking officials are undercover agents."

Conan narrowed his eyes: "The relationship between Rena Mizunashi and Eisuke Hondou is still unclear, but if they really do have some kind of relationship, then I'm afraid..."

"Yes, that's an internal power struggle between the FBI and the CIA."

Ai Haibara shook her head slightly, a slight upturn at the corner of her mouth on her otherwise expressionless face. "The FBI fought against the organization, and ended up capturing the CIA. It's ridiculous."

Conan considered his guess and found it difficult to comment.

They hid it too well...

Or are they evenly matched opponents?
Conan was puzzled and decided to go back and share the matter with his best friend, who was also his strategist.

…………

The next day was school day.

Fujino drove to school as usual, spending a typical day as a high school student.

After school, I help Hondou Eisuke find his older sister, nothing much to say.

After school, Fujino brought up what had happened the day before to Sonoko and Ran: "Nanakawa Aya was hospitalized yesterday. Do you want to go and see her?"

"Xiaoxuan is in the hospital?"

"How is she doing now?"

Ran, Sonoko, and Nanakawa Aya are good friends. When they heard that their best friend was in trouble, they both looked a little worried.

Fujino didn't hide anything and said truthfully, "Appendicitis. I might need surgery in a few days, but there's nothing dangerous."

"That's good……"

"Shall we go tonight?"

"Going tonight would be too much of a disturbance to her rest. My mom is coming back tonight, so let's wait until we have a holiday to go."

"Your mom's been unusually coming home a lot lately. Did your plan work?"

"Hmm, I don't quite understand what's going on either."

The two breathed a sigh of relief and, after discussing it, decided to visit their good friend during the holidays.

"Detective Fujino!"

Hondo Eisuke suddenly ran over and greeted Fujino.

"I have to go now, I have something to do." After saying goodbye to the two of them, Fujino left the classroom with Hondou Eisuke.

"That's really strange, senpai and Hondo Eisuke have been getting really close lately..."

Sonoko sized up the two of them, her eyes full of suspicion. "Ran, what do you think?"

"what?"

"What are you and that guy Hondo Eisuke doing...?"

Xiaolan looked bewildered; she felt that her best friend seemed to be meddling in things a bit too much.

Why are you so nosy about what your senior and others are doing?

Xiaolan said helplessly, "I think it's better not to. If nothing happens, it's fine, but if we see something and the senior finds out, wouldn't that be awkward?"

"Xiao Lan, aren't you curious?"

"I'm not curious... Maybe my senior and Eisuke are investigating something..."

"That's very suspicious, isn't it!"

Sonoko touched her chin again. "Ran, do you want to go and take a look?"

"But we both have club activities today," Xiaolan said, bringing up the club matters.

Japanese high school students usually have clubs. Ran is in the karate club, Sonoko is in the tennis club, Fujino is in the kendo club (part-time), and Hondo Eisuke is in the calligraphy club.

School usually ends around 3 or 4 pm, similar to 2 or 3 pm in elementary school. If there are clubs in high school, students usually have to participate in club activities for one or two hours before going home.

So when there are no club activities, Conan will come over to ask Ran to go home together, or Fujino will drive them both home.

If so, it means the two of them went home together. As for the students in the "Going Home" section, they don't have this problem; they just go straight home after school.

Just like Fujino.

Upon hearing this, Sonoko became suspicious again: "It seems like Hondo Eisuke hasn't been participating in club activities much lately. He used to go to the calligraphy club after school. Don't you find that suspicious?"
"I also heard that someone ran into Fujino-senpai, and that there seemed to be a very pretty, unfamiliar girl next to him!"

"..." Ran's expression gradually turned helpless. She felt that Sonoko should be most concerned about this matter.

Xiaolan had no choice but to secretly follow two high school boys and act like a lovesick girl with her best friend.

The two of them hailed a taxi and secretly followed Fujino's car.

The taxi driver glanced at their school uniforms and immediately gave them a knowing look.

Then they immediately launched off and followed.

Ran and Sonoko couldn't understand what the driver actually knew either.

Halfway down the road, Fujino's car went very fast, leaving the taxi driver behind several times.

This immediately made the master a little angry.

He started drifting right there on the street and began his peak competition.

Despite being repeatedly left behind, the driver eventually caught up with Fujino.

Then, just after getting off the bus, Ran and Sonoko, who had been secretly following, witnessed a shocking scene: Fujino-senpai and a girl who looked very frail and pretty entered a hospital together!
"Then... who is that?"

Sonoko blinked, not recognizing the girl in front of her, and had no recollection of her.

"I don't know either..." Xiaolan responded in the same way, her mind completely blank: "I've never seen this person before. They don't seem to be a student at our school, and they don't seem to be someone the senior knows. Could they be the client?"

"Where did Hondo Eisuke go?"

"I don't know..."

For a moment, both of them were stunned into a blank, unable to understand how a living man could suddenly turn into a woman after a few turns.

And, surprisingly, he even ended up in the hospital!

By the way, isn't this a famous women's hospital in Tokyo?!
Could it be that there's some unspeakable secret?
Could it be that the senior was having an affair and that the mistress got pregnant?

Based on the senior's personality, well, that's a bit outrageous, absolutely impossible.

That is, Fujino-senpai accompanied a girl who couldn't afford medical treatment to her doctor's appointment...

It's somewhat possible, but unlikely.

By the way, Hondo Eisuke, it seems that you came with Hondo Eisuke.

But then Hondo Eisuke disappeared...

Could this person be Hondo Eisuke's sister?

But it doesn't seem like it...

Or perhaps, this person is actually Hondo Eisuke's girlfriend, the one with thick eyebrows and big eyes who seems timid but actually harbors a secret, and who ended up being dumped because of a misunderstanding about his girlfriend...

In an instant, countless possibilities flashed through their minds.

They're all incredibly outrageous.

Xiaolan snapped out of her daze and suggested, "Yuanzi, why don't we go in and take a look?"

"Well..." Sonoko hesitated for a moment, and after thinking for a while, she said in a low voice:
"Let's hurry up and leave, it won't be good if our seniors see us."

"Um……"

The two looked at each other, nodded, and realized that they shouldn't have been curious about such things, and shouldn't have followed along out of curiosity.

It's alright that I didn't see anything.

But once I saw it, a whole bunch of ideas popped into my head.

I want to ask, but I don't know how to explain why I came here...

So the two of them could only leave silently, filled with doubt, and no longer pursue the matter, their curiosity only lingering in their hearts.

What exactly happened with that taxi just now?

Hondo Eisuke, now known as Hondo Sakurako, naturally noticed the two classmates following them. However, he didn't realize that it was Ran and Sonoko following them, and instead thought it was some spy organization that Fujino had mentioned.

"I'm not sure either, maybe it was on the way..."

Fujino replied thoughtfully, saying that he couldn't very well say that his classmates had already found out about his cross-dressing, that would be too embarrassing.
As we all know, social death is a one-sided, idealistic, and Schrödinger-like phenomenon.

As long as you don't know it, things like "social death" don't exist.

…………

The Mori family is very harmonious today.

However, because Ran was at school and didn't get back until late, and Eri's cooking was less than ideal, the whole family went directly to Snow King Ice City for dinner.

Akemi welcomes this behavior of her neighbor freeloading meals.

Then, with Ran's help, Ai and the Shimokasa sisters prepared a big dinner.

Then, Eri Kisaki received a phone call and stood up: "I have an urgent case to prepare materials for, I have to go!"

"That hit-and-run case?"

"That's right..."

Fei Ying responded with a nod and then turned to leave.

Seeing this, the Mori guy immediately complained, "He left without even eating dinner. What has he been doing all day?"

Xiaolan looked at her father and immediately became displeased: "Dad, how dare you say that? Wasn't it you who introduced this case to Mom?"

"I only recommended him because the owner of the shop I frequented asked me if I knew any reliable lawyers..."

"And then you didn't mention that this case was handled by Prosecutor Kujo, did you?"

"How would I know such a thing!"

Kogoro Mori retorted stubbornly, "They've already confessed. The next step is just to try and get a lighter sentence. It's an easy case to judge. How was I supposed to know it would drag on like this until now?"

"Seriously, Mom's been incredibly busy with this case lately!"

Xiaolan complained, "Can't you go help Mom?"

How can I help?

Kogoro Mouri looked speechless: "I'm a detective, not a bailiff or a prosecutor or anything. Even if they wanted to investigate, they wouldn't let an ordinary detective like me do it, would they?"

"Brother Fujino is more like it."

"Ugh……"

Xiaolan sighed upon hearing this. As always, she felt that her father was very unreliable and always made a fool of himself.

Then, she glanced at Fujino out of the corner of her eye.

Everyone turned their attention to Fujino.

Fujino: "..."

Why are you looking at me like that? You're counting on me because your dad's no good, right?
You're trying to kidnap me! You're morally blackmailing me!

I'm a detective too, so if Mori-san can't find out, then I can, right...?

Well, you know what, I can actually do some research.

Fujino thought about his title and identity as a criminal consultant.

It seems that the Criminal Investigation Department can actually handle cases of hit-and-run accidents that result in injuries or deaths...

Now we can't just ignore it, can we?

(End of this chapter)