I'm in Conan, I'm not a gangster

Chapter 710 The Carnage in South Los Angeles (1st Update)
In Los Angeles, Emi Shiraishi weaves nimbly through traffic on her motorcycle, the roar of her engine drowned out by the city's hustle and bustle.

Conan gripped the fuel tank tightly, squinting to shield himself from the oncoming wind, watching the street scene rush past him.

"Hold on tight." Shiraishi E's voice came through the helmet, accompanied by a sudden, accelerating push.

The motorcycle made a sharp turn and drove onto the large bridge connecting the South Los Angeles area.

The river water beneath the bridge shimmered with light, reflecting the endless stream of car lights above.

Shiraishi E gripped the handle with one hand and took the tracker out of her pocket with the other.

On the screen, the dot representing the black Chevrolet is moving steadily.

"Five more minutes." He calmly assessed the distance and then parked his motorcycle in an inconspicuous corner at the bridgehead.

“There’s enough time.” He nimbly flipped off the bike and took off his helmet. “You wait here. The motorcycle is too conspicuous; we need to get another one.”

Conan nodded in understanding.

He knew better than anyone that if he rashly intercepted them while they were in motion, Xiaolan, who was tied up in the back seat, could very well become a hostage and even get injured in the first wave of conflict.

Just as he was thinking about how to find a suitable vehicle, Shiraishi E walked towards a brown family sedan parked on the side of the road.

The next movement was so fast that Conan barely saw it.

Shiraishi took a small tool out of her pocket and gently flicked it at the car door lock, and the car door opened with a click.

He got into the driver's seat, bent down and fiddled with it for a few seconds, and just two or three seconds later, the engine made a smooth start-up sound.

"This guy..." Conan thought to himself, clicking his tongue in amazement.

His fluid and skillful movements were more professional than any car thief he had ever seen in Beika Town.

From locking onto the target to successfully starting the engine, the entire process took no more than fifteen seconds. If Conan hadn't known beforehand that this car had nothing to do with Shiraishi E, he would have almost thought she was just driving her own car.

The brown sedan smoothly glided up in front of Conan.

The car window rolled down, and Shiraishi Ei rested one hand on the steering wheel, the other hand bringing a cigarette to his lips. The lighter clicked, and smoke slowly rose, swirling around his calm face.

Conan opened the car door and sat in the passenger seat, finally unable to hold back his words: "Shiraishi, don't you think this is strange? There are so many people at the party, why did they specifically target Ran?"

Shiraishi E exhaled a smoke ring, her gaze still fixed on the bridge: "Strange, isn't it? We're Asian, and strangers, and Ran is beautiful... it's not surprising we're being targeted. However,"

He paused, flicked his cigarette ash, and said, "The speed was indeed too fast. But now is not the time to delve into it."

“That’s right.” Conan took a deep breath, temporarily suppressing his doubts.

Rescuing Xiaolan is the most urgent task.

Just then, that familiar black Chevrolet drove past in the traffic not far away, heading towards South Los Angeles.

Shiraishi calmly stubbed out her cigarette, shifted gears, and started driving. The brown sedan silently merged into the traffic, maintaining a perfect distance from its target.

--------

Night falls, and the streets of South Los Angeles are shrouded in an atmosphere of danger and chaos. Broken streetlights cast a dim, yellowish glow on street corners, and the walls are covered in faded graffiti.

Emi Shiraishi's brown sedan silently glided into the area, like a shark diving into dark waters.

The tires made a soft, crunching sound as they rolled over broken glass and empty bullet casings.

The air was filled with a peculiar odor, a mixture of marijuana, alcohol, and a certain putrid smell—a distinctive aroma of late nights in South Los Angeles.

"They stopped." Conan lowered his voice, his fingers gripping the car door handle tightly, his knuckles turning slightly white from the force.

He pointed to a colonial-style American detached house not far away.

The lawn in the front yard of the house was withered and yellow, the iron gate was crookedly open, a few figures were standing in the yard, and further away, groups of three or five people were gathered under the street lamp at the street corner, the guns on their waists or in their hands reflecting a dangerous glint in the dim light.

Conan's breathing quickened involuntarily; he could feel his heart pounding in his ears.

“They’re everywhere… Damn, there are more than I expected!” His voice trembled slightly. “Aren’t the police doing anything? Shiraishi, what do we do now?”

Shiraishi E did not answer immediately.

His gaze swept across the surroundings like that of a hawk, assessing every potential threat.

The group of people on the street corner were clearly making a transaction, there were shadowy figures moving behind the second-floor window, and the people in the courtyard seemed nonchalant but were actually highly vigilant.

This is a complete criminal network, with each part working in concert, and a single move can have far-reaching consequences.

After a long while, Shiraishi E slowly "took out" a black tactical backpack from under the car seat, unzipped it, and tossed Conan a small women's pistol and several magazines full of bullets.

"What can we do?" His voice was calm to the point of being cold, as if he were discussing tonight's dinner menu: "Just kill them."

Before she finished speaking, Shiraishi E had already pushed open the car door and jumped out.

His movements were as fluid as a cheetah striking, and before anyone knew it, he was holding an MP5 submachine gun in each hand.

Without even pausing to adjust, he pulled the trigger the instant he landed.

"Bang bang bang-"

The gun muzzle spat out a dazzling tongue of fire, tracing a brief but deadly trail in the night. The bullet struck the two guards at the gate with pinpoint accuracy; one was shot in the chest, the other in the head. They collapsed to the ground before they could even warn each other, their blood spreading rapidly across the concrete.

In the dead of night in South Los Angeles, normal people would have already stayed indoors, and the windows of every household would be boarded up or barred with iron bars.

Those still wandering the streets at this time were all members of various gangs.

Shiraishi E needs no judgment, nor any mercy—in this jungle where the strong prey on the weak, kindness is suicide.

The gunshots were like pebbles thrown into calm water, instantly creating ripples. More gang members emerged from the shadows and returned fire.

Bullets whizzed past Shiraishi E, striking the car with a piercing sound, shattering the windows. But Shiraishi E seemed to anticipate the bullets' trajectories, moving nimbly through the hail of bullets.

He didn't have any fancy tactical maneuvers, nor the flashy rolls and dodges seen in movies. He only moved and shot with extreme simplicity—advancing, aiming, and pulling the trigger. Every movement was so fast it was dazzling, and so precise it was chilling.

The first to fall were those desperate criminals who raised their guns to fight back. Shiraishi's firing was almost continuous, with her left and right hands alternating to create sustained suppressive fire.

A burly man wearing a red headscarf had just pulled a pistol from his waist when a bloody hole appeared between his eyebrows; another young man hiding behind a motorcycle tried to raise his gun to aim, but was hit by a series of bullets and was forced to retreat, eventually collapsing to the ground.

Then, in the brief moment between turning her gun around, Shiraishi bought bullets through the Bandit Shop, thus skipping the reloading action, and began suppressing fire on the enemies hiding behind cars and trash cans.

The MP5 submachine gun has an extremely high rate of fire, and its dense bullets riddled the makeshift cover with holes.

An old Chevrolet sedan was riddled with holes, and its fuel tank exploded after being hit, instantly illuminating the entire street with towering flames.

Gang members hiding behind the car burst out, their bodies ablaze with flames, letting out piercing screams, but were quickly shot down.

Inside the car, Conan stared in disbelief at the scene. One man, with two submachine guns, had taken down more than thirty gang members in just a few dozen seconds—this was completely beyond his understanding of "fighting prowess."

Shiraishi E's movements were swift and precise, every step calculated, every shot aimed straight for the vitals. This was no longer a battle, but a one-sided massacre.

"This guy's probably cheating, right?" Conan muttered to himself, his voice trembling slightly with shock. "He's completely unreasonable..."

The strong smell of blood wafted into the car, making Conan feel nauseous.

He saw a gang member with a bullet wound in his arm trying to crawl away from the battlefield, but Shiraishi E didn't hesitate to finish him off with a shot, ending his life.

This is real gang warfare, without the romanticized depictions in comics, only the stark reality of survival and death.

Just then, Conan caught a glimpse of a black man in a black hoodie quietly raising a gun and aiming it at the unsuspecting Shiraishi E from the shadows of the second-floor balcony.

The man's movements were extremely stealthy, completely blending into the darkness. Only the faint light reflected from the gun barrel when he occasionally moved gave him away.

Time seemed to freeze at this moment.

Countless thoughts flashed through Conan's mind—the sanctity of life, the dignity of the law, the principle that detectives should not take away lives… But all of these seemed so pale in the face of the life-or-death reality before him.

If he doesn't shoot, Shiraishi E will die; if Shiraishi E dies, not only will Ran be unable to be rescued, but he himself will also have a hard time leaving this hellish place alive.

In this life-or-death battlefield, naivety is tantamount to suicide.

But he was never a fool.

Conan raised the lady's pistol almost without thinking.

The gun was heavier than he had imagined, and its cold touch instantly brought him to his senses.

He narrowed one eye, aiming the crosshair at the shadowy figure's chest. Without hesitation or delay, he pulled the trigger.

"boom!"

A crisp gunshot pierced the night sky, a stark contrast to the rapid-fire of the MP5.

The figure on the balcony swayed, the gun in his hand fell to the ground with a crisp sound, and then he leaned forward, tumbling off the railing and crashing heavily onto the lawn in the front yard.

Shiraishi glanced back, her gaze lingering on Conan's face for a moment before she nodded slightly, then turned back to continue clearing out the remaining enemies.

But in that one glance, Conan saw a fleeting look of approval in his eyes.

The gunfire gradually subsided, and corpses lay scattered across the street, their blood staining the pavement.

Shiraishi E stood amidst the chaos, her two guns still pointing warily around, making sure no one had escaped.

Conan slowly lowered the still slightly smoking pistol, his fingers going numb from the recoil.

He looked at the body lying on the lawn, and his stomach churned.

This was the first time he had ended someone's life with his own subjective thoughts, but strangely, he did not feel the panic or remorse he expected, only a cold calm.

"What are you still standing there for?" Shiraishi E's voice pulled him back to reality: "The person is still inside."

Conan took a deep breath, opened the car door, and got out.

His shoes made a sticky sound as they stepped on the blood-stained ground. He forced himself not to look at the corpses and quickly followed Shiraishi E's footsteps.

In this dark neighborhood teeming with crime, on the brink of life and death, a naive soul perished forever.

But Conan knew that this was a necessary price to pay—to save Ran and to survive.

(End of this chapter)