Conan: I'm a zaibatsu in Tokyo

Chapter 327 The Sorrow of a Madwoman

After deciding to take action.

Conan spent a lot of time and effort to find a key figure.

That's Rena Mizunashi.

This announcer still works at the TV station, but she traded negative information for an exclusive interview with Tumen Kanghui.

This behavior is suspicious.

Conan believes that he can find a breakthrough by dealing with her.

While Conan was secretly following someone and acting as a pervert, he discovered a fellow pervert.

"Are you Hondo Eisuke-nii?"

Conan poked Hondo Eisuke, who was hiding behind the trash can, with his finger.

"what?"

"what!"

Startled, Hondo Eisuke knocked over the trash can in front of him, and a pile of garbage fell on him.

Conan covered his nose, a hint of helplessness in his eyes.

This guy is so clueless.

"Uh, this is a little bad," Hondo Eisuke said.

Conan covered his nose and asked, "Why are you here?"

"No, it's nothing," Hondo Eisuke said.

His eyes were darting around; there was something wrong with him at first glance.

Conan saw the photo that had fallen off Hondo Eisuke and quickly picked it up.

"What's this?" Conan asked, looking at Eisuke Hondo. "Why do you have a picture of Rena Mizunashi?"

“This isn’t a picture of her, it’s a picture of my sister,” Hondo Eisuke said.

He told Conan about his older sister.

His older sister left home when he was very young, and no one knows where she went.

There has been no contact since then.

He transferred to Tokyo because he saw on TV that Rena Mizunashi looked a lot like his sister.

“But when I went to ask her, she said she wasn’t my sister at all, and that I had mistaken her for someone else,” Hondo Eisuke said.

"Then why are you still following her?" Conan asked.

Hondo Eisuke said, "Because I feel she looks a lot like my older sister."

……

"Has your inherently evil face finally been exposed in front of Conan?"

Ai tilted her head slightly, a faint smile curving her lips.

Zheng Yi ruffled Ai's hair, making a mess of it.

"What do you mean by 'born evil'? Where did you learn such nonsense?"

Zheng Yi removed the hand that was messing with Xiao Ai's head, bent his index finger, and flicked it on her forehead.

“I’m not evil at all,” Shoichi said. “Conan will believe I’m a good person.”

Xiao Ai snorted.

No one understands Zhengyi better than me.

He can't pretend to be a good person in front of me.

Ai said, "Conan already suspects your relationship with Chihiro, and..."

"Wait a minute," Masakazu interrupted Ai.

He crouched down, met Ai's eyes, and then asked suspiciously:

"How do you know this?"

"what?"

Ai was stunned for a moment, then her eyes darted away, feeling guilty and unable to meet Masahiro's gaze.

Masakazu grabbed Ai's arm to prevent her from escaping.

"Tell me, how did you know?"

“The soundproofing in your bedroom isn’t good; I can hear you talking from outside,” Ai said.

She is 100% lying.

I know best how well the soundproofing is in Zheng Yi's bedroom.

Furthermore, Conan's voice is even softer than usual when he speaks.

He picked up Ai and carried her on his shoulder.

“Come on, I’ll take you to my bedroom to do some naughty things and see if Curaçao outside can hear you screaming.”

Zheng Yi decided to test the soundproofing of his bedroom.

"let me go!"

Ai was held by Zheng Yi like a kitten, with one hand around her waist. Her legs were kicking futilely in the air, like a fish struggling out of the water.

Her previously indifferent expression could no longer be maintained, replaced by a flushed face and embarrassment and anger.

Zheng Yi was so annoyed by her nagging that he suddenly stopped in his tracks.

He stopped, steadyed the squirming little girl in his arms with one hand, and swiftly removed her from his shoulder with the other.

He spread his arms wide, suspending her in mid-air like he was holding a doll, at eye level.

The air froze for two seconds.

Xiao Ai was panting, her chest heaving. At this moment, besides anger, she was mostly flustered from being caught red-handed.

She bit her lower lip, as if she had made up her mind, and glared at Zheng Yi with a "what the heck" attitude.

"...I planted a listening device in your bedroom."

The moment those words were spoken, the hands that were holding her froze instantly.

He squinted slightly, looking the little girl, who was only the height of a first-grade elementary school student, up and down as if he were seeing her for the first time.

"……what?"

Zheng Yi's lips twitched, his tone filled with an unbelievable sense of absurdity: "Are you a pervert?"

He even thought Ai had poked a hole in the wall of his bedroom, without suspecting a bugging device.

He pointed to his own nose, then to Ai, his voice rising several octaves:
“Me? I am Zheng Yi, a grown man.”

"I didn't install any listening devices in your bedroom, nor did I install any surveillance cameras in your bathroom!"

He grew angrier as he spoke, and unconsciously increased the pressure on her, making Ai dizzy from shaking her.

"And what did you do? You actually dared to install a bug in my bedroom? What's going on in that little head of yours all day?!"

When faced with Shoichi's questioning, Ai's eyes flickered noticeably.

She turned her head away, avoiding Zheng Yi's gaze, and her stubborn voice dropped eight octaves, sounding more like a muttering to herself:

"I...I didn't mean it!"

Her expression at that moment conveyed an awkwardness that even she couldn't convince herself of.

"That was an accident...purely a coincidence!"

Ai stammered as she explained:

"That day...that day when I passed by your room, I accidentally dropped a miniature listening device under the door."

"I searched for a while but couldn't find it; I just couldn't find it..."

She glanced at Zheng Yi furtively and quickly added:

"Later... later I realized that thing was still working, several days had already passed."

"I originally wanted to find an opportunity to secretly demolish it, but... but..."

"But what?" Zhengyi asked.

You'd better not have heard anything private.

"But you keep making me work in the lab, and I'm busy every day."

Ai's voice grew softer and softer until it was almost inaudible: "So... I just forgot to take it apart..."

Zheng Yi: "..."

That's a really lame excuse.

Forgot to dismantle it?
How could you even utter such a reason!
Very busy?

Does "very busy" mean you play video games with me every day?
You stayed home all day, not going to school or work, and didn't you even remember there was a listening device in my bedroom?
"Also, why do you have a listening device? What do you want to hear?" Zheng Yi asked.

Ai crossed her arms, looking rather disheveled as she was lifted into the air by Seiichi, but her eyes suddenly became clear.

She cleared her throat and began to explain in her usual indifferent tone:
Do you think I'm here to listen to your boring business pleasantries or your monologues?

"Or do you want to know if you're secretly doing something naughty in your bedroom all by yourself?"

She shifted slightly, trying to get a better vantage point, though it was difficult to do so:
"I was just testing your security system."

Zheng Yi raised an eyebrow: "Huh?"

"Because Conan likes to install listening devices on people randomly, I suddenly had this idea that day."

Ai's tone became assertive: "I originally just wanted to do a simple 'penetration test'."

“I want to see how long it would take your security system to recognize an intrusion signal if a tiny signal source were continuously emitting in your room.” She paused, then added, “The bugging device was a signal generator I made on the spot; it had very low power and the frequency was disguised as the standby radio waves of household appliances.”

"I want to see if your system can filter out this outlier from the massive amount of background data."

"And the result?" Zheng Yi squinted his eyes.

"The result is..." Ai pouted, a hint of disappointment flashing in her eyes:
"Your security system may look fancy, but it's actually incredibly slow to react."

"That bugging device has been ringing in your room for days, and none of your high-tech alarms have responded at all."

"This shows that your system is just a facade and cannot identify real potential threats at all."

Zheng nodded.

This is indeed a major failure of the security system.

Seeing that Shoichi seemed to really believe it, Ai breathed a sigh of relief.

Zheng Yi said, "Then I'm going to deduct the wages of those guys in the security department."

Xiao Ai's breath hitched.

Sorry.

She didn't mean to.

Xiao Ai understands the pain of having her salary deducted.

Zheng Yi continued, "If they can't even detect a bugging device, the security system needs an upgrade."

"And Curaçao, that bodyguard is also incompetent, his salary should also be deducted."

Ai's head bobbed up and down.

I'm sorry, Curaçao.

Finally, Masaru turned his gaze to Ai.

Ai sniffed and said, "I meant well, so can you put me down now?"

Zheng Yi put Ai down, then quickly and forcefully jumped back half a step to create a safe distance.

His nose twitched violently, as if he had just smelled rotten eggs, and his nostrils twitched as if he was trying his best to suppress the urge to sneeze or gag.

His eyes narrowed to slits as he looked at Ai with disdain.

The corners of his mouth turned down uncontrollably, and his upper lip lifted slightly, revealing the most instinctive expression of extreme disgust.

This is an undisguised disdain.

Ai's body froze instantly, her previously disheveled posture from being held in the air immediately tightening.

That look of disdain for trash!

Am I an innocent older brother who got defiled by a little girl?

Ai glanced disdainfully at Masakazu's hand, which was still covering his nose.

How funny.

Were you the one who just lifted me up in mid-air like an eagle snatching a chick?

Why pretend to be a chaste and virtuous woman now?
"Foolish woman," Zheng Yi said disdainfully.

"You're a lolicon!" Ai retorted.

“A lolicon wouldn’t install a security camera in a loli’s bedroom,” Zheng Yi said.

Ai Haibara couldn't refute it.

She really didn't mean it.

Her real intention was simply to test the security system inside the villa.

It just so happened to fall into the crack of Zheng Yi's bedroom door.

After realizing that the bugging device was working, Ai inexplicably didn't retrieve it.

"Also, that's just a listening device, not a surveillance camera," Ai retorted.

These are completely two different things.

Surveillance is far worse than wiretapping.

"The severity is the same," Zheng Yi said. "I didn't expect you to..."

"That's enough!" Ai said, her face flushed. "I didn't hear anything."

"hehe."

Fortunately, for Zheng Yi, the bedroom was just a place to sleep.

Zheng Yi looked aggrieved.

"I'm going to tell your sister."

Ai's pupils contracted.

After Zheng Yi finished speaking, he planned to go downstairs.

"No!" Ai clung tightly to Masakazu, her other hand gripping the stair railing.

I don't want Zheng downstairs at all.

"What?" Zheng Yi looked at Xiao Ai with disdain: "You dare to do it, but you're afraid I'll go tell your sister?"

Masakazu knelt down and whispered in Ai's ear:

Does your sister know you're a pervert?

"Tsk tsk, so young..."

Shoichi's words had no effect on Ai.

What Ai is most afraid of is Masakazu going to her sister and sharing her embarrassing past.

"No."

When Ai spoke, her eyes held a pleading look.

Zheng Yi remained unmoved.

"please."

Zheng Yi did not immediately give in.

Instead, he slowly stood up and brushed off the dust that had gotten on his hands when he squatted down.

"Beg me? Just talking won't do any good." Zheng Yi crossed his arms and glanced toward the kitchen.

"Wash the dishes? No problem!" Ai said decisively.

Zheng Yi shook his head.

That would be too easy on you, and I wouldn't get anything out of it by having you wash the dishes.

"Cook for me, for a month," Zheng Yi said.

Ai nodded.

It's just cooking, she can accept that.

Zheng Yi said, "Make the dishes I specify."

"no problem."

Ai had a vague feeling that something was wrong.

Zheng Yi is definitely going to make things difficult for her.

Ai bit her lower lip, her eyes flashing wildly between humiliation and relief.

She knew that Zheng Yi was taking advantage of her misfortune, but in order to protect her "innocence" in front of her sister, she had no other choice.

“…Deal.” Ai squeezed out the two words through gritted teeth: “But only for half a month! And you’re not allowed to mention a single word about it in front of my sister!”

"No problem." Zheng Yi snapped his fingers, readily agreeing to Ai's bargaining.

Zheng Yi suddenly rubbed his leg.

"I've been so tired lately, my legs are a little sore."

Ai naturally reached out and massaged Seiichi's legs with practiced ease.

"Massage, for a week," Ai asked.

"Okay." Zheng Yi nodded again.

Ai's eyes were filled with humiliation.

However, a massage would be acceptable.

She has massage experience; she used to massage mice frequently when she was in the lab.

After the massage was completed, the mice were given the medication.

"Cough cough."

Zheng Yi coughed and touched his Adam's apple, saying, "My throat feels a little uncomfortable."