Conan: The Romantic Daily Life of a Ghost Detective

A person in sportswear is doing endurance training by gripping a horizontal bar.

It's so late and they're still not home. I wonder if they're a student who ran away from home after arguing with their parents, or an office worker who ran here to vent their frustrations after arguing with their wife.

Because the country's basic building law stipulates that real estate developers must build a neighborhood park within a 5-minute walk of a residential area, as part of urban management.

However, where there's a policy, there's a countermeasure.

Although the park in front of us covers a large area, the facilities inside have a dilapidated feel of being neglected for many years, and the paint on the children's slides and seesaws is peeling off.

During the day, you might see housewives chatting and laughing with their children and pets.

But at night, the park, lacking lighting, even exudes a faintly eerie and terrifying atmosphere.

Xiaolan stood at the park entrance, looking distressed: "I...we don't necessarily have to go in."

It seems that the park she imagined and the haunted house-like area in front of her are completely different things.

Wen Shui smiled and said, "Let's go in and rest for a bit. My legs are sore from walking. Besides, the Slit-Mouthed Woman might be hiding inside that green dinosaur's belly when she's resting."

"Don't try to fool me like a child. These animal sculptures have hollow bellies, with only steel bars inside for support," Xiaolan said, dissatisfied.

Warm Water: "How did you know?"

Xiaolan suddenly blushed and looked down at her toes: "When I was little, I was just a little curious, and then..."

"You used karate to smash the cement sculpture?" Wen Shui continued her sentence.

"How could that be? I'm not Ultraman!" Xiaolan angrily punched him, almost knocking the warm water into the second stage. "I later wrote to the design company of the neighborhood park and asked their staff to find out."

Wen Shui rubbed her shoulders and said, "So cute."

"Right? I loved these cute animal sculptures when I was little too." Xiaolan looked at the distance with longing.

Wen Shui: "I mean, you're so cute. I feel like only the protagonist in a comedy four-panel comic would do something like this."

"Are you praising me or insulting me?" Ran pouted and complained. "Honestly, you're just like Shinichi."

"Shinichi Kudo, what happened to him?"

“When I was little, he knew about the letters I sent and said something similar…” Xiaolan’s expression darkened considerably.

Wen Shui thought to himself, "Oh no, I've accidentally touched on her painful memories." So he quickly tried to salvage the situation: "Actually, it's not a bad thing for a girl to be a little silly. It makes people want to protect her."

Xiaolan suddenly looked up and stared at him in disbelief.

"Oh dear, why are we suddenly talking about this? Aren't we here to investigate a case?" She seemed a little flustered. "Let's go play on the seesaw, it's been so long since we played on it."

After saying that, Xiaolan ran into the park in a panic, forgetting that she had just been filled with fear of the park.

But then again, what's the connection between investigating a case and a seesaw?

Wen Shui followed.

The two sat on a seesaw painted yellow, looking at each other.

Xiaolan regretted it as soon as she sat down, because she realized that when they were playing on the seesaw, their eyes would inevitably meet, which made her feel even more awkward than before.

Moreover, as her body rose and fell on the seesaw, her soft breasts would tremble slightly.

Sitting opposite him, Wen Shuijun had glanced at it more than once.

Hmph! Even someone like me, without any hesitation, started to appreciate it. Warm water really isn't picky about food.

No, no, that's a bit too humble a way to put it...

Xiao Lan's mind was in a mess, and her originally fair face was noticeably flushed in the night.

Wen Shui looked at Xiao Lan across from her with curiosity, not understanding why sitting on a seesaw would make her so shy.

The two of them hadn't had any excessive contact before, and he hadn't put anything strange into Xiaolan's body, so why was it so exaggerated?

To make Xiaolan feel less awkward, Wen Shui tried to look away from her.

Then it happened to land right behind Xiaolan, in the direction of the fitness area at the end of the park.

Wen Shui suddenly noticed that the person in the sportswear was still there holding onto the horizontal bar, but hadn't done any pull-ups for a long time.

Although Wen Shui had seen many videos in her past life of elderly men performing jaw-dropping feats on the horizontal bar.

But this is the first time I've seen someone holding onto a horizontal bar like this.

Is it for training the endurance of the arm muscles?

Xiaolan noticed his gaze at this moment. She turned around and suddenly found a way to get out of the awkward atmosphere: "I'm also very good at playing on the horizontal bar. I'll show you."

As she spoke, Xiaolan jumped off the seesaw and ran towards the horizontal bar.

"Wait a minute!" Wen Shui had a bad feeling, but Xiao Lan ran away too fast, causing the seesaw to fall directly to the ground from mid-air.

The impact of the landing struck the lukewarm water, causing it to turn deathly pale.

Xiao Lan ran a few steps, and the fitness area that had been hidden in the night came into view.

The ground around here is made of plastic, and the paint on the gym equipment looks very new.

When Xiaolan's gaze fell on the person doing pull-ups, all the words she had prepared to say hello got stuck in her throat.

Upon closer inspection, Xiaolan realized that the person in the gym uniform wasn't practicing pull-ups.

Instead, his hands were tied, and his body was suspended in mid-air.

It was a girl about the same age as her, wearing ordinary sportswear, staring straight ahead with her big, watery eyes. The girl had fair skin and delicate features, and was probably the kind of girl who would be very popular in the class.

But at that moment, a huge, gruesome wound brutally pierced through the lower half of her face.

The wound, like it had been haphazardly cut open by a sharp blade like scissors, stretched from the corner of his mouth all the way to his ear.

The white teeth and the bloodied, mangled tongue were intertwined.

The blood stained the girl's tracksuit jacket dark red.

"what!!!"

After a few seconds of stunned silence, Xiaolan let out a piercing scream and then turned and ran away.

She hadn't run more than a few steps when she bumped into a lukewarm body of water.

However, the panicked girl temporarily lost the ability to distinguish friend from foe, and directly poured the warm water on the ground, splashing around wildly.

Fortunately, Xiaolan lost her temper and didn't choose karate techniques, otherwise Wen Shui probably wouldn't have lasted long.

However, this is not a long-term solution. The park may not be as safe as we imagine. We must get Xiaolan back to her super-powerful state as soon as possible.

"Xiao Lan, calm down!! Look who I am!" Wen Shui seized the opportunity and slapped Xiao Lan across the face.

The crisp sound was especially loud in the quiet night.

“Warm Water Jun…” Xiao Lan came back to her senses, and a red handprint slowly appeared on her fair face.

Wen Shui breathed a sigh of relief, seemingly having calmed down, and was just about to explain.

Xiaolan suddenly hugged him, then gently pressed her cheek, where she had been slapped, against his burning chest, and said in a trembling voice:

"That was fake, right? It must have been a prank, like one of those prank shows on TV, right?"

Wen Shui sighed, then hugged the girl's slender body and whispered in her ear, "Don't worry, leave the rest to me."

Xiaolan did not respond.

But it took the initiative to rub its injured cheek against the warm water on its coat, like a cat cuddling with its owner.

This state lasted for several minutes, just as Wen Shui felt it was about time and was preparing to release Xiao Lan, who was gradually calming down, to examine the crime scene.

"Is this what you meant by not wanting to be in a relationship for the time being?" A cold, terrifying voice came from behind.

Wen Shui turned around and looked.

At the park entrance, he discovered that Ai Haibara had transformed into the "Evil Scientist Sherry" and was glaring at him angrily.

Beside her, the "Shirley" wearing a headband also looked angry.

Chapter 24 The Witch Who Screams in the Mist

Wen Shui looked at the two graceful figures standing at the park entrance. Because there were streetlights there, he could clearly see the dissatisfaction on their faces.

Didn't they go to investigate another neighborhood?

How did they manage to catch up, and why did they choose to appear at such an inopportune time?

While Wen Shui was still in a daze, Xiao Lan jumped out of his arms at lightning speed and waved to the distance: "No, you've misunderstood. A murder has occurred here."

Wen Shui added, "Don't come in, it might damage the crime scene."

Unfortunately, standing at the doorway, one cannot see the specific situation here, only the general outline; otherwise, Wen Shui and the others would have discovered the body long ago.

Ai Haibara and Sonoko Suzuki charged in aggressively.

Then, where he could see the hanging corpse, he suddenly stopped and stared incredulously at the direction behind Wen Shui.

Ai Haibara frowned slightly.

Sonoko Suzuki gaped, her voice trembling as she exclaimed, "The Slit-Mouthed Woman... she really appeared!!"

Although Sonoko is a bit braver than Ran, she is still just a typical teenage girl, and the park at night has a naturally scary atmosphere.

Sonoko Suzuki's previous anger vanished completely, and her blood seemed to freeze.

She screamed and buried herself in Ai Haibara's arms, who was closest to her. In the dim moonlight, one could vaguely see the softness beneath Ai Haibara's black dress, which was forced to change shape constantly.

Wen Shui looked over there with envy.

Then he noticed that Ai Haibara's eyes seemed even colder than before.

When Ran saw Sonoko scream in fear, she immediately ran over to comfort her, and Sonoko then threw herself into Ran's arms.

Because Xiaolan was facing away from the warm water, he couldn't see what was happening in front of him, but he vaguely heard Xiaolan say, "Be gentle, you drank the papaya milk for nothing..."

So you can probably imagine the details.

Ai Haibara straightened the shoulder straps of her dress with her hands, then took out a half-finished barley tea drink from her handbag and handed it to Ran: "It's still a bit cold, use this to cool it down."

"Thank you."

Xiaolan quickly pressed the cold beverage bottle against her cheek to cover the red handprint.

Then, her gaze towards Ai Haibara held a hint of gratitude.