Conan: I've been linked to the tech tree system.

Seeing this confirmed Gin's suspicions. As expected, he snorted coldly and pulled the trigger.

"boom"

"boom"

Two gunshots rang out in quick succession, echoing in the dimly lit warehouse.

......

Gin hid behind a tall red shipping container, clutching his left arm, letting the warm blood soak into his well-defined right hand, his face grim.

Even without looking, you can tell that the arm grazed by a sniper bullet has charred black edges, jagged eversion of the dermis, carbonized and ruptured muscle fibers of the triceps brachii, and burst damage to the capillary network of the brachial artery branches.

Fortunately, he reacted quickly enough to turn around the moment he sensed the danger, and only injured his arm.

If it had been a second slower, it wouldn't have been as simple as having a large chunk of flesh scraped off.

Looking at Miyano Akemi lying motionless on the ground, she was definitely dead.

Gin fired a few more shots to prevent the enemy from reviving, then waved to Vodka, who was hiding behind him: "Binoculars."

"Oh." Vodka was sweating profusely, completely lacking the charisma he had displayed when he was intimidating Miyano Akemi.

He frantically reached into the pocket of his trench coat and pulled out a monocular telescope.

Gin took it and peered through the narrow gap between the containers in the direction from which the sniper bullet had come.

Under the bright moon, no longer obscured by the clouds, he noticed a strange reflection.

Magnifying the telescope, sure enough, there lay a sniper dressed entirely in black.

The corner of the container was devoid of moonlight, making it difficult to discern the sniper's features.

However, his signature black knit hat, his deliberately short black hair, and the AWM sniper rifle he was holding clearly identified him.

"Akai Shuichi."

Gin slowly grinned, a slightly excited sneer escaping his lips.

"Have you finally succumbed to loneliness?"

Chapter 73 Who is the mantis, and who is the oriole?

Then, Gin's cold smile turned cruel.

He looked at Akemi Miyano lying in a pool of blood at his feet and felt a sense of relief.

"I don't know why you dared to come back... but seeing your ex-girlfriend die in front of you must have been painful, right?"

Gin took out his phone, intending to call Chianti and ask her to come over and deliver a gift to "Shuichi Akai," who had returned to Japan.

But the sudden, piercing sound of a police siren made him immediately abandon the idea.

"Brother, what do we do now?" Vodka asked.

"...The FBI actually cooperated with those useless bastards from the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department." Gin's expression was a little unpleasant. The sounding siren made him feel as if he had returned to that night when he was tricked by "Starlight".

That night, he lost a very useful tool—Calvados.

this time......

Gin glanced at the vodka, whose expression was anxious but whose eyes still held great trust.

Then he looked at the wall behind the warehouse.

'That's not a stronghold; we should be able to blow it open with bombs and then break out of the encirclement in the opposite direction.'

'But this time, without any means of transportation, it will be difficult to evade the police pursuit even after escaping.'

Gin's thoughts raced. At that moment, the police officers outside had started parking their cars one after another, forming a perimeter, and began their routine announcements into the warehouse—there was no time for him to hesitate.

He took out his phone again and called the nearest headquarters of the organization, asking his men to send a helicopter to pick him up.

As Gin instructed the helicopter to fly to the designated location, he kept a watchful eye on his surroundings and noticed out of the corner of his eye that a humanoid silhouette with red shadows around its edges suddenly appeared on the white lime wall behind him, which was covered in various kinds of dirt.

The wall was peeled away like a watercolor painting smeared with ink, revealing the shimmering sea outside the warehouse. A high school girl, seemingly out of place from another world, walked through the humanoid silhouette and into the warehouse.

Gin instinctively pulled out his pistol and pointed it at them.

"Oh dear, you still prefer to greet people with a pistol, huh?" The girl raised her hand to indicate that she posed no threat and gave Gin a charming smile.

Gin hung up the phone, his face icy: "'Starlight'? You called the police again?"

Upon hearing this, "Starlight" sighed in a very affected manner, which, combined with the girl's clear voice, made her nine-tenths cute.

Then, in a helpless tone as if asking, "Why don't you use your brain?" he said, "Tell me, do you think I'd be stupid enough to run over here and walk right into their trap if I called the police?"

“It’s not impossible.” Gin continued to look at her with cold eyes, showing no sign of letting up.

God knows what this person, whose mind is just as abnormal as Vermouth's, is planning.

"...Can't there be even a little trust between people?" The girl looked up at the sky, but unfortunately, the warehouse roof blocked her view, and there was no skylight, so she couldn't see the full moon that night.

"I heard that the police had been mobilized on a large scale, so I rushed over to rescue you... You are allies after all, and your distrustful attitude is really disappointing."

"Save us?"

Gin remembered that Bourbon knew about the other party's family's movements. He glanced at the girl, who indeed showed no signs of aggression, and began to trust her a little more. The coldness on his face softened somewhat.

What kind of car did you drive here?

If we can escape by car, that would be best, so we don't have to bother the organization's helicopter.

Although traveling in a modified armed helicopter is convenient and safe, making too much of a fuss will only attract extra attention from the Japanese police, and one will have to be extremely careful about everything they do for the next few weeks.

That's far too expensive.

"car?"

"Starlight" stretched out her fair hand and gently covered her slightly open mouth: "I'm still a minor, I can't drive without a driver's license."

She looked at Gin with a accusatory gaze, as if asking, "Why are you instigating minors to break the law?"

Gin's face darkened.

Suppressing the urge to shove this pretentious bastard into cement and sink him into Tokyo Bay, he put down his gun, turned around, and leaned close to the container, glancing through the crack at the police who had already set up a cordon outside the door.

Since no one responded to the calls, the police have dispatched a fully armed tactical team, carrying riot shields, to slowly advance into the warehouse. The situation is not optimistic.

Gin tentatively considered "Starlight" as one of his own forces and began to plan his next move.

"Starlight," however, walked over to Gin with her hands behind her back, like an ordinary girl going on a picnic, and curiously looked outside, mimicking his manner.

"Why are you hesitating here for so long with just a few police officers?"

The girl spoke in a questioning tone.

Gin glanced at her but ignored her.

The model workers in the organization do not argue with the mentally ill.

"Didn't I invent something for you... Oh dear, this doesn't seem to be on the shelves yet."

The girl touched her lips with her slender fingers, looking as if she had just realized something.

Gin looked at her and noticed that, at some point, the girl had acquired a black, hollowed-out device that resembled a honeycomb briquette in her hand.

The device is a sphere with a smooth outer shell and a metallic sheen, with a core that is flashing red light in the middle.

"[Sonic Phase Decomposer: A decomposer manufactured using a special process. It can scan the natural frequencies of specific objects and emit a directional infrasound array to achieve structural resonance strikes against shields and armor. Effective range: 50m, sound pressure level: 148dB.]"

"Starlight" professionally explained the invention to Gin and Vodka, who was completely oblivious to what was happening next to him.

Unfortunately, both of them were completely confused.

Seeing Gin's unusually confused expression, the girl sighed again: "How come the people in the Black Organization are all so ignorant and incompetent?"

"Stop talking nonsense." Gin, the assassin from the action team, spoke with a hint of murderous intent. "Just tell us what the point is."

“I’ve already told you all… fine, fine.” The dark muzzle of the gun she raised made her swallow back her sarcastic words. “This thing can reduce the structural integrity of the police’s new riot shields and armor to 7% of their initial value within 10 seconds… Simply put, it irreversibly turns the shields they are holding and the armor they are wearing into cardboard that can be pierced by a pistol.”

"pistol?"

"pistol."

Gin frowned as he looked at the little thing, unable to see how it could have such a great function.

"Don't believe it?"

“…” Gin stared at her without saying a word.

Tohru Tono was a little unhappy.

Those ignorant fools dare to question their own inventions!

"Then pay attention and learn from it."

I slapped the ball on top of the container. After a moment of ringing in my ears, it seemed as if an invisible ripple spread outwards.

After waiting quietly for a few seconds, Tohru Tono stepped onto the smooth outer wall of the container and leaped up with the force of the upward movement.

The moment the tactical squad spotted him, less than 10 meters away from the container, he pulled out a silver plasma gun from his pocket, quickly raised the muzzle, aimed at the officer holding the shield at the front, and pulled the trigger.

No sparks came out of the muzzle, but with a hissing sound, the plasma bullet flew out of the barrel and shot straight at the shield.

Everything happened very quickly. In the blink of an eye, the JK girl, whose only arm was visible, had completely disappeared behind the container, leaving only two electric light bullets spinning and dancing in the air.

The police officer, holding a riot shield, charged forward, shielding himself against the bullets. He couldn't dodge them, nor did he need to.

I was even a little excited.

"Over there!" he shouted to his teammates the instant the strange gunshot rang out.

The aimless progress has come to an end.

Once the target is locked, the person responsible for providing cover with the shield only needs to focus on that one direction, which will allow for faster and safer progress.

—At least that's what he thought in the instant before his consciousness faded.

The shield melted away as quickly as snow in early spring the moment it met the plasma bullet.

The bulletproof vest and armor he wore, equipment meant to provide a sense of security, offered him no effective protection whatsoever.

The scorching yet icy bullets spun as they propelled the pumping blood from the heart, shattering the very nexus of human action.

The team's strongest shield suddenly turned into a still-warm corpse.