Conan, I'm an actor

It felt like the person on the other end had X-ray vision and was warning them not to make any rash moves unless they wanted to be riddled with holes.

"There must be a problem with the surveillance system. It's possible that the system has been hacked." Gin's voice was somewhat cold. "Prepare to retreat. Their target shouldn't be us, but Sherry, whom we captured."

“You mean…” Vodka’s face turned ashen.

There are probably two people who care about Shirley right now: Cognac and Bourbon. The fact that they dared to barge in like this means that Shirley must know something that threatens their identities, which also indirectly confirms that these two people have questionable identities.

"It's very likely that your jinx came true." Gin was also somewhat speechless.

Just then, he saw a dark object being thrown into the room next to his—a defensive grenade. That guy, he really thinks highly of himself!

Chapter 213 The Detonated Facility

With a loud explosion, he felt some liquid flowing out of his ears.

The glass in front of him shattered, but he couldn't hear a sound. He knew it was because the shockwave had caused him to lose his hearing.

His extensive experience and rationality told him that staying here would mean certain death, but he refused to accept that.

Since this facility will be abandoned soon anyway, let's give these guys a big gift and erase all traces of it while we're at it.

"Target located, now evacuating along the designated route with the target," Curaçao's voice came through the headset.

"Hurry up, New Town." Almost at the same time, Karen's voice came through the headset, "Gin seems to have gone to the control room. There are engineering explosives planted in this facility to self-destruct if necessary."

"It should be a delayed detonation." Shinjo rushed towards the control room, while telling Sakata Yusuke to go outside and get the car.

“It’s a time-delay detonation, but the time delay is only 30 seconds. From activating the bomb to leaving this factory, there are only 30 seconds.” Karen’s words made New Town stop in his tracks.

"What did you say? In thirty seconds, how is Gin planning to escape?" Shinjo's face turned green.

"There is a shaft in the control room that leads to the underground pipes. If you escape from there, it won't take more than 30 seconds."

Do you know how powerful the explosion was?

"All four nearby buildings will be affected by the blast and reduced to ruins!"

Shinjo turned and left, urging Sakata Yusuke and Curaçao to hurry up, as he didn't want to be buried in the ruins.

When Yusuke Sakata learned that the bomb was about to detonate, he was terrified. He immediately started the car and waited, cold sweat dripping down his forehead as he feared the bomb might suddenly explode.

As they left the factory and got into their car, there were 21 seconds left before the explosion.

The car sped out of the factory's blast radius, then the vehicle shook violently, and shortly afterward, the sound of gravel hitting the roof could be heard.

Looking at the ruins behind him, Yusuke Sakata hesitated for a long time before finally managing to say, "Boss, you've gone too far. This will probably be on the news."

“He didn’t do this. If I’m not mistaken, it was Gin who did it,” Curaçao defended Shinjo.

“Is that guy crazy? This isn’t a busy area, but to blow something up like that…” Sakata Yusuke stopped mid-sentence, realizing that they seemed to be dealing with a group of insane criminals.

“Those guys are no different from madmen, and if we’re talking about madmen, we’re madmen too.”

"How is Shirley? Is she injured?" Shinjo asked, frowning.

"I'm fine..." Shiho Miyano's voice came from the back seat, but it was very weak.

"You don't look like you're alright." Xincheng glanced at the rearview mirror. "Have you checked if she has a tracking device on her?"

“We’ve checked; there’s no tracking device. However, she’s quite weak. Gin and Vodka probably guessed someone would come to rescue her, so they skipped several meals to delay the rescuers,” Curaçao said. “Plus, she was already weak to begin with…”

Shinjo's lips twitched. This was not good news. If Gin guessed that someone would come to rescue Sherry, it meant that he had roughly locked onto his target.

It seems they're not far from completely breaking off relations; the only question is whether the police are ready to close in.

Just then, he noticed four or five black cars in the rearview mirror and muttered, "They really are persistent. Sakata, speed up, find a way to shake them off."

"Understood!" Yusuke Sakata replied, flooring the accelerator.

The car began to accelerate suddenly, quickly exceeding the speed limit. However, the drivers of the vehicles behind were not to be underestimated and kept close behind.

Because he was unfamiliar with the route, Yusuke Sakata could only maintain a speed of around 170 km/h.

Shinjo frowned as he looked at the vehicle relentlessly pursuing them from behind, and asked Curaçao behind him, "Do you have any more grenades?"

"At this speed, are you going to throw a grenade?" Curaçao frowned and said, "Even if you throw it, it might not hit them."

"Try an airburst."

"I understand." Curaçao opened a wooden box, took out two homemade cluster grenades, opened the skylight, and threw them behind him.

With a series of explosions, the leading black sedans instantly lost control, with the last two plunging off the highway. Those that did escape were lucky, as the occupants of the leading vehicles were all killed by the blast wave of the grenades, while these two had a chance of survival.

Half an hour later, inside the medical facility on Jiuliangliang Island

“The basic examination shows no problems, but a more detailed examination is needed, which will take a lot of time,” Asai Narumi said, looking at the report in his hand. “The patient is currently very emotionally unstable and needs family members to be with him.”

"Is this your judgment based on your professional medical ethics, or is it what she requested?" Xincheng asked, frowning.

Akemi Miyano is completely dead. If we bring her here, and something unexpected happens, she might come back into the organization's sights...

“This is my judgment. She didn’t say it, but I can tell that she misses her family very much.” Dr. Chengshi’s words relieved Xincheng.

"I understand. How long will it take for her to recover?"

"It will take about two weeks, but I think..." Before Dr. Chengshi could finish speaking, there was a knock on the door.

Shinjo turned his head and was taken aback to see Okakura Masaaki. This man, since joining them, had been largely uncooperative, avoiding contact with anyone except Sakata Yusuke, who had brought him back.

"You go out first," Shinjo said to Asai Shigemi beside him.

Narumi nodded and turned away from Masaaki Okakura.

"Speak, what brings you here?" Shinjo stared at Okakura Masaaki in front of him. "Have you run into some trouble? Or is it that your friends outside have run into trouble? I remember your family members have already been moved."

“A friend of mine was in this accident and is currently in the hospital receiving emergency treatment,” Masaaki Okakura said, frowning. “Could you…”

“No, unless you can convince me that he’s useful to us.” Shinjo said, looking at Okakura Masaaki. “I’m taking you in only because the list you provided has that kind of value.”

Masaaki Okakura's face twitched slightly. He understood what Shinjo meant: only those of value could survive. For him to intervene and save someone, a significant price would have to be paid, or his friend would have to possess sufficient value.

“My friend used to work with Tequila, so he knows a thing or two…” Masaaki Okakura racked his brains, trying to find some value for his friend.

Just then, Shinjo's phone rang, and the caller ID showed it was Kazama.

Chapter 214 Information about Syndra Corporation

As soon as he answered the phone, he heard Amuro Tooru's voice asking if he was involved in the bombing at the factory in the suburbs.

“Yes, Gin has locked them up in that facility, so we have no choice but to storm it.” Shinjo crossed his legs and glanced at Masaaki Okakura beside him. “Let me ask you something. Were there any survivors from that car accident on the highway?”

Shinjo's expression was somewhat complicated after hearing what Amuro Tooru said on the other end.

"I also have a software engineer's copy..."

"Alright, that's enough." Shinjo looked at Okakura Masaaki with a complicated expression. "Your friend is dead."

"Impossible! The news says he's still alive!" Masaaki Okakura was quite agitated; clearly, his friend was very important to him.

“No one could survive an explosion like that.” Xincheng shook his head. “The news reports are fake; they’re just a ploy to lure the culprits out. The medical staff and patients at that hospital are all disguised police officers. It’s a trap.”

"A trap?" Masaaki Okakura's expression changed. "They have no intention of rescuing anyone; this trap is destined to be..."

“They won’t go to rescue them, but they will silence them.” Shinjo stretched his neck. “These people who are rumored to be alive are just bait for the organization.”

“This…” Masaaki Okakura hadn’t expected his friend to be dead, but he quickly realized something and asked, “How could these police officers be so audacious? They actually dared to plot against the organization?”

"That's a bit too bold. If it were me, I would have arranged for these people to be in different hospitals," Shinjo said, stroking his chin.

"Why?" Masaaki Okakura was taken aback.

“This kind of simple trap is obvious at a glance.” Shinjo snorted. “If I were Gin, I would definitely blow up the hospital as a return gift. If it’s scattered across different hospitals, we need to consider the consequences.”

Masaaki Okakura opened his mouth, but then he thought about it again and realized that it really was something Gin would do.

"By the way, what about the software you mentioned earlier?" Shinjo stretched his neck. "Itakura Taku died a few months ago, and Tequila is also dead. What happened to your friend?"

“The software developed by Itakura Taku was the first choice, but he didn’t finish it, and according to him, the development difficulty was too great,” Okakura Masaaki said with a frown. “Considering this, the organization made two more preparations.”

"Two preparations?"

“One is an artificial intelligence project. They’ve set their sights on a project by the American company Syndora, which seems to be called ‘Cocoon,’” Masaaki Okakura said. “My friend is posing as a programmer, and he’s in charge of liaising with a programmer who has infiltrated that project.”

"Sindora Corporation's [Cocoon]?" Shinjo was taken aback. "What's the other preparation?"

“There was another project that was originally assigned to Itakura Takuya and then split into more than a dozen departments, each to be completed by different IT companies and programmers.” Okakura Masaaki shook his head. “However, according to him, the project is progressing very slowly, and it seems that there are problems with coordination between the various projects.”

Xincheng's lips twitched. Sure enough, this was the thinking of the remnants of the old generation. Didn't they know that most program code could only be described as a pile? With so many piles of program code gathered together, it would be a miracle if it could run normally.

"I understand." Shinjo turned on his computer and started searching for information about [Cocoon]. If he remembered correctly, the company was coming to Japan to hold a press conference soon.

Soon, he found out about Syndra and its background. The company would be coming to Japan to hold a press conference in half a month.

"Is there anything special about this company?" Karen asked, somewhat puzzled.

"What if I told you that another artificial intelligence in this world might very well be here?" Shinjo browsed through the information on Syndra Corporation, but the company had very little publicly available information, and he didn't find anything useful.

On the other side, Karen seemed very interested in the news about "another artificial intelligence," and there was no news from her all afternoon.

After dinner, just as Xincheng was about to go out to meet Pisco, Karen finally made a move.

"Are you sure there's another AI at that Syndra company?" Karen's voice carried a hint of confusion. "Syndra's servers are completely undefended, including the database of that 'Cocoon'."

"Really?" Xincheng's eyes lit up.

"What's with that expression?" Karen suddenly had a bad feeling.

"That 'Cocoon' is actually a VR game. If you can hack into the 'Cocoon' server, can you get me in? Also, can you visualize monsters and other things on the server?"

"That's how it is in theory. What do you want to do?" Karen suddenly had a bad feeling.

"Afterwards, the Syndra Company will hold a press conference in Japan, where they will showcase this 'Cocoon'," Shinjo said with a smile. "However, there are limited spots available, and it's only open to children."

"You want me to hack into a big company's server just to play games?" Karen thought Shinjo was absurd. "Do you think that makes sense for a human being?"

“That depends on how you define the human brain circuit,” Shinjo said with a smile. “And don’t you think it’s interesting? Monsters suddenly appear in a pre-existing game world, drastically increasing the difficulty.”

“It’s interesting, but are you sure those guys won’t find out the difficulty is too high and someone will quit the game?” Karen said, frowning. “If everyone quits the game, then there’s no game left to play.”

"They probably won't be able to quit the game."

“Let’s do it!” Karen said without hesitation.

After receiving Karen's reply, Shinjo drove directly to the conference room at the Beika Hotel.