Detective Conan: The System Takes Me to Zero's World

Chapter 329: Juke Hotel Case Key Turn: Video Mystery and Hidden Cameras Emerge

James walked quickly to Kudo Yuki's side, frowned slightly, leaned close to her ear, and asked in a low voice: "Kudo Yuki, is your repair program reliable? Look at this video, it's so damaged, can it really be repaired intact?"

Kudo Yuki frowned slightly, a trace of worry flashed in her eyes, and she responded softly: "I dare not guarantee that the video can be completely restored to its original state, but this program is our greatest hope at the moment. It is very likely that the hidden content of the damaged part can be restored to the light of day. We can only wait and see patiently.

This case has been unsolved for 17 years, and I am hoping that this time I can dig out key clues from these videos and bring a turning point to the case investigation.”

Her eyes were once again fixed on the screen, her hands tapping on the keyboard, her fingertips dancing quickly following the system's instructions, and every keystroke seemed to be confronting the mysteries of the past.

At this moment, Kudo Yuki's fingers paused on the keyboard, her beautiful eyes narrowed slightly, and she noticed something strange. She frowned slightly, and a hint of doubt flashed across her face.

James was sharp-eyed and noticed her change instantly. He hurriedly approached her and asked in a low voice, "Kudo Yuki, what happened?"

Kudo Yuki frowned slightly, looking solemn, and replied in a low voice: "This surveillance camera has been hacked. When I repaired it, I found that some encryption programs were implanted in it, and it can't be opened at all.

It must have been set up deliberately 17 years ago by someone to prevent us from restoring the video and hide those shameful traces."

James' face darkened instantly when he heard this, and he looked serious: "It seems that there was a lot of water in this matter back then. Someone was scheming behind the scenes and was determined not to let the truth be exposed."

Kudo Yuki's eyes were focused on the screen again. Her hands quickly typed on the keyboard. According to the system's instructions, she disassembled and deciphered the complex and obscure program codes bit by bit. She murmured, "Since I discovered it, I can't let it go. I want to see what secrets they are hiding. At most, I have to restore the video completely even if it takes a little more time."

In the following time, the control room fell into silence, with only the "click" sound of Kudo Yuki tapping on the keyboard and the subtle sound of electricity emitted by the equipment echoing.

Kudo Yuki leaned forward, staring at the screen, her eyes seemed to be drawn by the jumping code, and her fingertips collided with the keys on the keyboard.

James even slowed down his breathing and stared at the screen without blinking, hoping that a key clue would pop up on the screen and solve the mystery that had lingered for seventeen years.

Time passed by minute by minute, and as the last line of garbled code was successfully repaired thanks to the efforts of Kudo Yuki, the originally stuck and black screen suddenly brightened up and finally became coherent and smooth.

"It's fixed!" Kudo Yuki's tense nerves relaxed instantly, and she let out a long breath. She first looked at James, her eyes full of relief, and then turned to the hotel staff, "Please go out first and close the door."

James nodded quickly and turned to face the others in the room, "Please everyone go out for a moment and close the door. Thank you for your cooperation."

Everyone walked out of the room in a line, their footsteps light. The last person took hold of the door handle and slowly turned it. With a crisp "click", the door closed tightly, temporarily locking the secret that was about to be revealed in the room in this space.

When only Kudo Yuki and James were left in the room, Kudo Yuki copied the restored video to her phone. She looked at the data transfer progress bar on the phone screen.

Kudo Yuki copied the video to her mobile phone, saved it into the USB flash drive handed to her by James, and then formatted all the hotel-related videos.

James watched Kudo Yuki finish all this and couldn't help asking, "Can I see it now? I really want to know what's hidden in it."

Kudo Yuki tapped the play button. In the video, in the control room at night, two staff members were suddenly knocked unconscious by an unknown smell. Rum's men quickly tied them up and hid them in the closet.

Rum sat on a single sofa with a sinister look on his face. He covered his right eye and stared at the hotel surveillance screen with his left eye through his glasses. His men in black were on standby behind him.

Based on past experience, Rum pointed out to his men the floors and characteristics of Amanda's bodyguards in different occasions, including the blond man on the right side of the elevator on the 3rd floor, the short-haired woman in front of the stairs on the 6th floor, the man with dreadlocks on the 7th floor, the older man and the red-haired woman on the rooftop. Then his men worked in groups of two, pushing large suitcases and following orders.

They pretended to faint on each floor and then used electric shock guns to stun the targets. They knocked out the bodyguards one by one, put them in suitcases, and took them back to the control room to report.

The only ones left to be dealt with were the Oriental woman beside Amanda and Kuroda Bei, who was mistaken for a newly hired big man. Rum put on his signature hat, smiled sinisterly, and prepared to lead the team to deal with them personally.

James looked at Rum's sinister look in the video, frowned slightly, and couldn't help but whispered: "This bald leader looks like he has bad intentions, and his methods are so cruel. He has tricked so many bodyguards. He came prepared."

Kudo Yuki stared at the phone screen and responded: "Well, judging from these actions, I'm afraid there will be big moves behind this."

As the two were talking, the scene in the video changed again. Asaka hurriedly walked out of Amanda's room and ran towards Hiroshi Haneda's room. Then Rum led his men to the open door of Amanda's room.

But at this moment, the video screen suddenly went black, and then there was no movement.

James came forward and looked at the black screen of the phone. He tapped the phone anxiously and muttered, "What's going on? The screen is black at this critical moment. It's so distressing."

Kudo Yuki frowned and said, "It seems that the video is seriously damaged. I finally repaired part of it, but I didn't expect that something went wrong at the key point."

James kept rubbing his hands together, his face full of anxiety: "What should I do? We are just missing this little bit of key information. Maybe it will reveal the truth of the entire Haneda Hiroshi case."

Kudo Yuki thought for a moment and said, "James, don't worry. Although there is a problem with the key part of this video, there is still surveillance video to watch."

James nodded helplessly and could only hope for this.

Kudo Yuki played other surveillance footage on her phone, and the scene switched to the bathroom.

Rum's men pretended to wash their hands and suddenly threw the bottle, which Kuroda Bei picked up subconsciously.

In an instant, the stun gun came at him! Kuroda Bei reacted quickly, and with a backhand he restrained the man behind him, causing the stun gun to accidentally hit the man in front of him, and then he elbowed him to knock him unconscious.

James watched this scene and couldn't help but admire: "Kuroda Bei is really good!"

Kudo Yuki nodded: "He has always been very good."

The video was interrupted at this point, and Kudo Yuki immediately switched to the surveillance video.

The scene flashed, and Kuroda Bei anxiously ran to the hotel front desk, showed his police ID, and asked the staff for Amanda Hughes' room number. He said that Amanda had made an appointment to meet him tonight but had not contacted him, and he was worried that she was in danger.

But the staff refused to reveal the room number on the grounds of protecting the privacy and safety of the guests. Kuroda Bei had no choice but to leave, frowning as he walked, thinking that the two people tied up in the bathroom might know the room number, but they probably wouldn't tell it easily, so he decided to try another method.

When the surveillance video ended, Kudo Yuki whispered, "The senior must have been extremely anxious at that time."

James agreed: "Yes, the other party has already calculated it."

Kudo Yuki immediately switched to the next surveillance video: Kuroda Heibei cleverly used the waiter to enter Amanda's room.

James looked at the screen and frowned, "What did he see when he went in?"

Kudo Yuki stared at the screen: "The situation is controlled by the other party. The old senior is in a state of panic. Now we can only go to the scene to look for clues."

Upon hearing this, James walked to the door, gently opened it, and waved to the people waiting outside, indicating that they could come in.

The manager walked in first, looking back and forth between the two men, trying to read their expressions and asking, "What's going on?"

James shook his head slightly. "There was a problem with the video at a critical point, but we watched some other surveillance videos and found some new information."

The manager sighed with disappointment: "Alas, this case has been going on for so many years. I had hoped to dig out useful clues from these videos so that the hotel can resume its previous business status, but I didn't expect it to be so bumpy."

The rest of the people also walked into the control room one after another, and everyone's eyes turned to James and Kudo Yuki, as if waiting for their further explanation.

Kudo Yuki raised her eyes and asked the manager, "Is the room where Haneda Hiroshi and Amanda lived 17 years ago occupied now? We should go in and see if there are any other clues."

"Those two rooms have been idle ever since what happened. No guests have been arranged to stay there. They are just cleaned up regularly. But after so many years, I don't know if anything useful can be found there."

"Then please take us there to have a look. Maybe we can find some clues."

The manager nodded and walked towards the two rooms.

The two followed the manager to Amanda's room. The manager took out the key and opened the door that had been closed for many years with a "click".

The furnishings in the house still retain much of the same appearance as they did back then.

James stepped into the room and quickly scanned the surroundings with a look of helplessness. "It seems that the clues here are not easy to find. So many years have passed. Even if there were any key items at that time, they are probably gone long ago."

Kudo Yuki walked straight to the window facing the door, crossed her arms, and stared out the window. Her eyes were full of thought, and then she slowly turned her head, her eyes moving back and forth between the door and the window, and the bold idea in her mind became clearer and clearer.

She waved at James, “James, come over here and take a look.

James heard the sound and walked quickly to her side.

Kudo Yuki stretched out her hand, gestured in the air, and spoke a little faster: "Look at the position of the window and door. If someone wants to observe the situation inside the house from the outside, this angle is simply a perfect hiding spot."

James looked in the direction that Kudo Yuki pointed, and a gleam of realization flashed in his eyes. "There is indeed such a possibility."

Kudo Yuki pointed at the telescope hanging around James' neck and suggested, "James, look out in this direction. Maybe you'll find some new clues."

James did as he was told, took out the telescope, raised it to his eyes with both hands, and observed the situation outside the window in the direction pointed by Kudo Yuki.

At first, he saw only an ordinary scene with lush and green trees, but nothing special.

James frowned and couldn't help wondering in his heart: "Is it really just Kudo Yuki's guess, and there is no actual clue?"

He was unwilling to give up and decided to investigate again, trying to find some different clues from those seemingly ordinary pictures.

He raised the telescope again and adjusted the focus, narrowing the range of his vision little by little, focusing on the area outside the window that was blocked by branches and leaves.

The breeze blew gently, the leaves rustled, and the lush branches and leaves swayed in the wind, as if deliberately interfering with James's sight, or as if guarding the secret hidden in them.

He frowned and stared at the area blocked by branches and leaves. As the focus was further adjusted, his vision became clearer and the outline of the small camera gradually appeared in front of his eyes.

The camera was not large in size and was cleverly hidden in the angle between the branches and the trunk. There were vines wrapped around it, and if you didn't look closely, it would be difficult to detect its existence.

The camera looked a bit old, with a thin layer of dust on its surface, and it had obviously been placed here for a long time.

James suddenly put down the telescope, his eyes full of surprise, and quickly handed it to Kudo Yuki, pointing in that direction. "Kudo Yuki, look, there is a camera here! It's hidden well, if you don't look carefully, you can't find it at all."

Kudo Yuki took the telescope and took a closer look. As expected, she saw the camera hidden among the branches. She squinted her eyes and thought, "James, do you think there is something like this in Haneda Hiroshi's room?"

"That's very possible." James looked at the manager, "What's the difference between the layout of Haneda Hiroshi's room and this room?"

The manager scratched his head. "These two rooms are actually on the same side, but the window of Haneda Hiroshi's room is slightly tilted, facing another area, which is a little different from this side."

A gleam of light flashed in Kudo Yuki's eyes: "Then we have to go to Haneda Hiroshi's room and check it out. Maybe there are similar cameras hidden there, and maybe we can find more crucial clues."

James agreed, and the two followed the manager and walked quickly towards Hiroshi Haneda's room. They walked hurriedly, as if the truth was waiting for them to uncover not far ahead.

The manager took out the key and opened the door. The furnishings in the room remained roughly the same as they were back then, but compared to Amanda's room, it was a bit more deserted and quiet.

James checked around, then walked to the window, holding a telescope and looking out the window: "Kudo Yuki, there is a camera here too! It seems our guess is correct."

Upon hearing this, Kudo Yuki immediately moved closer to the window to find out what was going on.

To be continued...